Preston 1-2 Forest (FA Cup 3rd Round)


With the initial draw holding so much suspense and excitement, we were drawn at Preston – an all Championship affair that certainly wasn’t going to be a pick of the day for ITV or ESPN.

The game saw Mr Tantastic himself, Phil Brown, taking control of his first game as Preston boss - who would have no doubt been hoping for an immediate response from his new squad to show a sign of intent.

Yet in the opening 20 minutes of the game, it was Forest who was the better side with McGoldrick twice testing Lonergan in the Preston goal.

As the first half progressed though, Forest slowly began to get overruled by Preston and after a few chances; Darren Carter picked up the ball on the edge of the area and hit a sweet driven shot into the bottom right hand corner of Lee Camp’s goal.

Preston continued to control the rest of the first half and come the half time team talk; it’s believed Billy was left dishing out some stern words to the team.

Fortunately within 5 minutes of the restart, Earnshaw executed an excellent through ball for Paul Anderson who darted past two Preston defenders before keeping his head and slotting it past Lonergan just inside the box.

The game had suddenly changed the balance back into Forest’s favour with McGugan and Gunter coming close during the second half.

With the game shaping up for a replay – which neither side would of really wanted – Forest won a late corner after St Ledger blocked a Tyson cross. McGugan whipped in the ball and after an initial goalmouth scramble, Luke Chambers popped up to poke the ball home with less than a minute to go - that’s Luke’s third goal in his last five games now – which proved to be enough to get us into the 4th round.

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