Nottingham Forest head to Chelsea eager to improve their away form, but also hoping for better luck when it comes to refereeing decisions.
The Reds believe some key calls went against them in defeats at Arsenal and Manchester United. And that means there is plenty of focus on today’s man in the middle.
Head coach Steve Cooper was left “biting his tongue” after last weekend’s 3-2 loss at Old Trafford which saw Joe Worrall sent off and a penalty given against Danilo – both contentious decisions. The club wrote to the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL) afterwards to express their views.
Prior to that, Forest felt they should have had a spot-kick in their opening game of the season at the Emirates Stadium. Cooper argued a header from Willy Boly struck the arm of Declan Rice.
Head coach Steve Cooper was left “biting his tongue” after last weekend’s 3-2 loss at Old Trafford which saw Joe Worrall sent off and a penalty given against Danilo – both contentious decisions. The club wrote to the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL) afterwards to express their views.
Prior to that, Forest felt they should have had a spot-kick in their opening game of the season at the Emirates Stadium. Cooper argued a header from Willy Boly struck the arm of Declan Rice.
This afternoon, Tim Robinson – who has overseen just a handful of Premier League fixtures – will take charge at Stamford Bridge. Cooper has stressed “everyone on the pitch” needs to be mentally strong during the game.
“Like a lot of clubs, we do referees’ analysis now and we show certain statistics around how they’ve been. That’s not good or bad, it’s just referees – like players and teams – will have different trends,” the Welshman said.
“We show the players every week who the referee is, with some bits around their statistics on certain things, like penalties and cards. But everyone will do that now. There’s so much intel and data you can get on all aspects of the game, so it’s nothing out of the norm.
“This is another tough away game in a big stadium, in terms of standing up and being strong. That’s everyone on the pitch. Everybody.
“So it will be interesting to see how that goes, especially after what happened last weekend. I’m really interested to see on that.”
Forest had hoped for a quick reply from the PGMOL after last weekend. But the governing body was taking time to respond.
“We should stand up in terms of how we feel about things – good and bad,” Cooper added. “It shouldn’t always be negative and critical, because it is a really tough job for referees and they need the best support they can get and the best infrastructure around them.
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