‘Sometimes you make changes and revert back’published at 22:57 GMT 9 January
22:57 GMT 9 January
FT: Wrexham 3-3 Nottingham Forest (4-3 on penalties)
More from Nottingham Forest boss Sean Dyche, speaking to TNT Sports: “As I said I must credit the lads in the second half, they acted as a catalyst and livened a few up, and in the second half onwards we looked how we should, a Premier League side.
“But you can’t give [away] a two goal head start in football. Credit to them [Wrexham] by the way. I’m not taking anything away from them, fair play. They win it in the end and they go through, but an absolutely unacceptable first half from our point of view.”
On what changed in the second half: “I could have taken all of them off [at half time], including myself probably. The tempo. The mentality to take the game on, which was lacking so badly in the first half. Slow, methodical, we’ve done a lot of work on changing the feel of a game. No intent basically, no desire to make a difference. And then all of a sudden the tempo rose, the way we were asking questions, scored some good goals. The mentality to keep going from the second half group was excellent.
“The club had such a big season last year and sometimes they think it’s just roll on. It’s not. You have to fight again, work again, and deliver again. It was clear that wasn’t happening in pre-season and during the early part of the season. We’ve come in an addressed it and made a change at times, but sometimes you make changes and revert back to that.
“The fact of the matter is we had to make changes because of the schedule but the footballers show their hand. They won’t be knocking on my door to ask ‘why aren’t I playing that first half group, that’s for sure.”