Morgan Gibbs-White was the heartbeat of the Nottingham Forest team in Istanbul as the Reds ran riot against Fenerbahce in the first leg of their Europa League play-off.
Vitor Pereira replaced Sean Dyche since Forest last played a game, with a poor 0-0 draw with Wolves signalling the end of Dyche’s pretty abysmal tenure at the football club.
Who was your Nottingham Forest Man of the Match vs Fenerbahce
Pereira had his team practising set-pieces in the warm-up and quite clearly that was a nod towards what he believes the team need to do better from the Dyche-era.
After the game, the captain on the night Gibbs-White was put up for an interview, and he delivered some very intriguing comments about the performance.
Nottingham Forest skipper Morgan Gibbs-White
Photo by Serhat Cagdas/Anadolu via Getty Images
Morgan Gibbs-White aims dig at Sean Dyche
Forest needed just 45 minutes to look much more like their usual selves and Fenerbahce must have been wishing it was a Sean Dyche team that had rolled into town.
Murillo, Igor Jesus and Gibbs-White had Forest three to the good inside an hour, and frankly, the tie should be well out of sight with the number of other chances missed on the night.
Senior players vented to Evangelos Marinakis after the 0-0 draw with Wolves, and that to Dyche being sacked, with Gibbs-White suggesting he might have been one of those players.
MORE FOREST STORIES
Gibbs-White said in his press conference: “Yes, definitely, I feel like we had a real identity, and it could have been even more. It’s not done though, there’s another game, and we need to go again on Sunday.
“His message is that we’re actually going to have an identity, and he and his staff are going to give us a real identity for the remainder of this season. We needed that really just like we needed the performance tonight, we needed a clean sheet, and we needed a win.”
Vitor Pereira will hope for a positive performance against Liverpool
The challenge for Forest is to follow this result up against a top Premier League side, and Liverpool will be the next stern test at the City Ground on Sunday.
West Ham will play their match with Bournemouth on Saturday, and should they claim a big win, the points will be level between the Hammers and Forest before Pereira’s team plays.
😍What a win for Nottingham Forest vs Fenerbahce. Give us your three-word verdict to that performance!
Viva La Vitor!!!!
Forest’s performance last night was special, but naturally, more is still required in the quest to avoid relegation from the top-flight.
As Gibbs-White says, however, an identity has been badly needed at Forest for a little while and now, whisper it quietly, but the Reds might just have found their spark.
Join Our Newsletter
Receive a digest of our best Nottingham Forest content each week direct to your mailbox