Time to seize the opportunity
21/10/02 | by Daniel Harding

As I glance upon the form table this evening, I can smile because Nottingham Forest are at the summit. It may be on goal difference alone, but it’s good enough for me. We have an opportunity over the next 3 games to announce ourselves as true automatic promotion contenders.

If we win on Saturday we will leapfrog Leicester into third place. Then on Tuesday night we face Norwich at Carrow Road. If we gain three points there I think we could go second as I can’t see Norwich getting more than a point away to a resurgent Coventry City. We then face Sheffield United at home, which is definitely winnable.

If we emerge with 9 points out of this run, we will have cemented ourselves as genuine, seriously genuine, contenders to get out of this frenetic frustrating purgatory of a league.

Apart from the daylight robbery committed at Pride Park yesterday, the weekend threw up some interesting results.

Ipswich continued their dismal form away to Reading, sinking to a Nicky Forster hattrick. Pablo Cõunago was sent off for the visitors to complete a bad afternoon for Ipswich with a Darren Ambrose free kick giving them something to smile about.

Wolves finally started playing like they did last season, gaining a 2-0 away win at Stoke with goals from Colin Cameron and a late strike from Nathan Blake.
    P + - Pts
1 Portsmouth 13 29 11 32
2 Norwich City 13 24 8 28
3 Leicester City 13 19 11 27
4 Nott'm Forest 13 24 13 24
5 Sheffield United 13 22 16 24
6 Watford 14 20 21 24
7 Coventry City 13 18 16 22
8 Burnley 13 16 18 21
9 Rotherham Utd 14 23 18 20
10 Reading 13 17 13 20
11 Gillingham 14 17 19 19
12 Derby County 14 15 17 18
13 Wolverhampton 12 23 16 17
14 Bradford City 14 14 19 16
15 Ipswich Town 12 16 15 15
16 Walsall 14 19 23 15
17 Crystal Palace 13 17 17 14
18 Preston 13 18 21 14
19 Stoke City 13 15 19 14
20 Millwall 14 13 25 13
21 Sheffield Wed. 14 13 20 12
22 Wimbledon 14 13 21 12
23 Grimsby Town 14 9 23 9
24 Brighton 13 11 25 4

Divison One table: 21/10/02

It was the battle of the No. 10’s at Fratton Park as Merson’s Pompey took on McAllister’s Coventry. It was honours even at the final whistle but both players had their say. Merson played a great ball through to Pericard, on loan from Juve, who scored with a wonderful lob. With McAllister pulling the strings though, Coventry fought back and equalised shortly after with Davenport poking the ball home after a well worked set piece.

Under pressure Sheffield Wednesday manager, Terry Yorath, led his team to a hard fought 2-1 success at home over Bradford City with a brace from Gerald Sibon. Stephen Warnock getting Bradford’s solitary strike.

Brighton suffered at the hands of the referee at home to Sheffield United. They were two nil up with half an hour left when Sheffield United pulled two back. The ref then gave two iffy penalties, which handed the points to the Blades and the match ball to Carl Asaba.

Leicester suffered their first defeat at the Walkers Stadium to Burnley after a bit of head tennis lead to Ian Moore’s 55th minute goal. This extended Burnley’s unbeaten run to 11and they are eighth in the table. The Foxes were today placed into administration even after heavy wage cuts throughout the club. A consortium containing Gary Lineker is rumoured to be interested in taking over.

Norwich City had a 3-1 win at home to Millwall with David Nielsen getting a brace and Darren Kenton adding the third with a Steve Claridge strike sandwiched between them.

Too many times in recent years, Forest have crumbled on the occasions when they have had the chance to really establish themselves - the Huddersfield match springs to mind when we lost 3-1 thanks to Peter Ndlovu. Let’s hope a player of his ilk does not prove to be our nemesis again.