Keith Andrews takes charge of his first ever Premier League match as he takes Brentford to the City Ground to take on a Nottingham Forest side who only scored one goal across their seven pre-season friendlies.

🔴 Forest Keep Key Defenders, but Goal Threat Remains a Concern

Forest have been really active in the transfer window, from drafting in lawyers to ensure that Gibbs White doesn’t go to Spurs to signing players like McAtee, Ndoye and Igor Jesus. What is really significant for me is the players that Forest have been able to keep - there is a demand for high-quality centre-backs (just ask Bournemouth), so keeping both Murillo and Milenkovic is a big win for Forest from this window.

Elanga will be a big miss, especially with how well his speed suited the approach of Nuno Espírito Santo, but Forest’s main challenge will be having enough goals this season. 

They only scored one goal in pre-season, and Chris Wood overachieved his xG by 6.6 goals last term, so there is reason to suspect that Forest may find goals hard to come by. They also ended last season quite poorly, with just one win from their final five games of the season, as the pressure to qualify for Europe started to overwhelm them.

🟤 Brentford Face Goalscoring Questions in Post-Mbuemo and Wissa Era

As I’m writing this, Brentford have just agreed a deal with Bournemouth for Dango Ouattara, which is a step in the right direction as Brentford look to replace the 50 goal contributions that Wissa and Mbuemo combined for last season.

There are positives for Brentford and for Keith Andrews. Brentford aren’t a club that panics often. The Bees have only parted with a manager midway through the season on one occasion, so we can expect the former set-piece coach to be given a chance to settle into his new surroundings. The signing of Jordan Henderson doesn’t fill me with confidence, but the Bees do have talent - Schade, Carvalho and Damsgaard are all players who can play regularly at the Premier League level.

Brentford will have to rely on Igor Thiago realising his potential and avoiding injury. A real concern for Brentford is that if Thiago were to get injured, it’s hard to see where a consistent stream of goals for Brentford comes from this season. 

📊 Nottingham Forest v Brentford H2H

Both sides claimed away wins in the head-to-head matches last season. Brentford came away 2-0 winners at the City Ground in this fixture last season, and Forest registered a victory by the same margin at the Gtech Community Stadium earlier in the season.

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