Latest Nottingham Forest news from NottinghamshireLive as the Reds are beaten 1-0 against PSV in their fifth pre-season friendly of the summer
Nottingham Forest boss Steve Cooper has admitted his side need to improve but saw positives from their pre-season defeat to PSV Eindhoven on Sunday.
The Reds were beaten 1-0 at the Philips Stadion in their fifth pre-season friendly of the summer. Winger Johan Bakayoko had a fantastic game and scored the winner after sweeping the ball in from the edge of the box.
But there were some positives for Forest to take away from the Netherlands as Cooper handed a Reds debut to new signing Ola Aina before he was substituted at half-time. Morgan Gibbs-White also made his first appearance for the Reds since winning the Under-21 European Championships with England earlier this month.
And when asked if the match was just about getting some minutes into the player’s legs, Cooper told Forest TV: “I think it’s a bit more than that now especially as we near the start of the season.
“Some players were making theIr first start, Morgan, Woody, Ola played his first game for the club as well. it’s still a good group, but certainly a sort of mix-and-match group in terms of player status and with all of that in mind, I thought we were definitely better than what we showed certainly against Leeds.
“I thought some of our build-up play was good. I thought we got in positions we didn’t capitalise on and we didn’t make the most of the good positions.
“It was a really poor goal that we conceded with, two clear headers from the set piece, and then the defenders there on the end of the box, but we’ve given a team that’s going to play in Europe in the next couple of weeks not much, really.
“Defensively, I thought we were fairly sound on the whole and sticking to our pressing strategy so definitely positives to take from the game but I’ll always want more and we need more for sure.”
