A few hours after Ange Postecoglou quietly exited the City Ground for the final time, in the aftermath of the lunchtime kick-off defeat to Chelsea, Nottingham Forest slipped into the bottom three in the Premier League.
Burnley’s 2-0 win over Leeds United lifted Scott Parker’s side out of the relegation zone and dropped Forest into it. It was the first time since March 2024 that Forest had been in the relegation zone in the Premier League.
Back then, a four-point deduction for breaching profit and sustainability regulations meant Nuno Espirito Santo’s side dropped briefly to 18th place, before a 1-1 draw with Crystal Palace, played out amid a defiant mood on the banks of the Trent, lifted them above Luton and out of the relegation spots.
There were 567 days between Forest climbing out of the bottom three that day and them returning to it as a footnote to Postecoglou’s disastrous tenure. It felt like a lifetime.
Hours after Ange Postecoglou was fired Nottingham Forest dropped into the relegation zone (Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images)
Tangling with relegation seemed such an unlikely prospect, following the seventh-placed finish under Nuno last season, which propelled Forest back into Europe for the first time in three decades. Maybe it was the two rapid-fire changes in manager that unexpectedly followed such a high. Perhaps it was the close to £200m invested in signing 13 players, as Forest looked to build a squad capable of competing on two fronts, domestically and beyond.
Unlike the previous three campaigns, nobody had expected Forest’s fourth season in the top flight to be a relegation battle.
But while one of Sean Dyche’s challenges is to take Forest as far as possible in the Europa League, another is to steer them clear of danger again.
Things remain congested at the wrong end of the table, with only three points separating Forest from Newcastle, who are currently 14th. There are eight teams who will have at least one cautious eye on the relegation battle.
Had Forest lost to Leeds, things would have looked much bleaker. At least four points would have stood between them and safety, heading into a two-week gap before their next game. Instead, after seeing them secure their first Premier League win under Dyche, the consensus among pundits, fans and bookmakers alike seems to be that Forest will not be relegated, that they have too much quality to go down, and that, in Dyche, they have a man armed with the requisite experience to steer them clear of trouble.
Forest have strengthened the squad that finished seventh — albeit, as Nuno admitted, while overachieving — with a group of young players possessed with exciting potential. And, following a manager who made a lot of things complicated, they now have a man at the helm who has a knack for making football sound blessedly simple.
But the sooner they turn optimism into concrete facts the better. And having spent the last three years proving their doubters wrong, now their challenge is to prove people who have faith in them right. Between now and the end of 2025, Forest have eight league games and they must view them as an opportunity to change the narrative, before they head into 2026.
“People forget, after one good season, you’re not just suddenly guaranteed to be a top-10 Premier League club. It takes a long time to make sure you are thought of as that. It’s a process,” said Dyche, in his press conference ahead of the visit of Leeds. “Three seasons ago, staying up was close. Two seasons ago, it was close again. Then suddenly, you jump (to challenging for a top-five finish). That doesn’t mean that you jump forever.
“I’m not naive, I know how tough the Premier League is. It’s not bona fide guaranteed that you are now absolutely a top-10 Premier League club. It doesn’t happen like that. There’s a process for the club, as well as for the players and the fans.”
Last season, when Forest were flirting with Champions League football, the teams around them rarely slipped up. The fight at the opposite end of the table has a different dynamic. Any team that is capable of stringing together even a handful of wins can see their situation quickly change significantly.
While play-off winners Sunderland have surprised everyone by rampaging into fourth-place, Leeds and Burnley, who finished first and second in the Championship last season, sit in 16th and 17th place in the table and are currently facing a fight to stay up.
Leeds’ upcoming run of fixtures is challenging: They face Aston Villa (H), Manchester City (A), Chelsea (H) and Liverpool (H), at a time when they have taken four points from their last six games. According to Opta, they face the most difficult fixtures of any Premier League club in their next eight games.
As Rob Edwards takes over as the new manager of Wolverhampton Wanderers, after leaving promotion-chasing Middlesbrough, his new side face the second most challenging run, as they look to add to their meagre tally of two points. As the table below shows, Dyche’s former club, Burnley also face a testing period.
Dyche has lived in Nottingham for several years. When he bumped into fans on the street, in the months prior to his appointment, they would talk to him in ambitious tones about what the club was capable of.
“I said, trust me, it’s not going to be that easy,” said Dyche. “The fans have been terrific and are finding a bit of balance. They have maybe looked at it and thought: ‘OK, this guy is just telling us the truth, he wants to be here, he loves the badge and he wants us to do well.’ But they’ve got to understand, there isn’t magic dust. You can’t just make it happen overnight, there’s a lot of work.”
When they return to action this weekend, Forest face a trip to Anfield. When Callum Hudson-Odoi finished off a rapid counter-attack there in September last year, it helped Forest to secure their first win at Liverpool in 55 years. Another will not come easily. But Arne Slot’s side have also struggled badly for form as they make a limp-looking bid to retain their title. They have lost five of their last six league outings, while also being dumped out of the Carabao Cup by Crystal Palace.
Callum Hudson-Odoi’s goal delivered Nottingham Forest a rare win at Liverpool last season (Ian Hodgson/AFP via Getty Images)
Getting even a point at Anfield would continue the positivity built from Dyche’s five games in charge, in which defeat at Bournemouth is the only game in which they were outclassed. As well as the wins over Porto and Leeds, Forest could easily have turned the draws with Sturm Graz and Manchester United into victories.
Later this month, Forest then host a Brighton side that has won only once away from home in six league games — albeit that win was an impressive 3-1 defeat of Chelsea — at the City Ground, before an early December trip to face Wolves, who Forest will hope are not revived by their change in manager.
Forest will then head to Everton’s new Hill Dickinson Stadium for the first time. David Moyes’ side claimed a 2-0 win there over Fulham before the break, to put a bit of distance between them and the bottom three — and to leave Fulham looking over their shoulders.
Marco Silva, the Fulham manager, had been among Forest’s targets as a replacement for Postecoglou, with a significant release clause in his contract an influential factor. Fulham’s struggles — they have lost five of their last six league games — could mean that the London club choose to part company with the Portuguese, potentially before Forest visit Craven Cottage on December 22, eight days after Tottenham have visited the City Ground.
Forest will finish the year with two home games, first against Manchester City and then against Everton (a team Forest have only beaten once in six meetings since they were promoted under Steve Cooper in 2022).
Sean Dyche is keeping things simple as he tries to drag Nottingham Forest up the table (Eddie Keogh/Getty Images)
Dyche began his tenure with a demanding run of five games in 17 days. The international break has been the first opportunity for him to take a breath. While seven players are away on international duty — including six of the starting line-up against Leeds, in Matz Sels, Nikola Milenkovic, Neco Williams, Ibrahim Sangare, Elliot Anderson and Dan Ndoye — he will have enjoyed some valuable time to work with the others at the Nigel Doughty Academy.
“We’ve come in after other managers to try to put it right. So far, I think there are positive signs about the performance levels. But the performance levels have got to win (games),” said Dyche.
