Attitude of players angers Nottingham Forest boss after FA Cup exit

Nottingham Forest manager Chris Hughton was left angered by the attitude of his side in their FA Cup thrashing at Swansea.
Nottigham Forest are out of the FA Cup after a 5-1 thrashing at Swansea.Nottigham Forest are out of the FA Cup after a 5-1 thrashing at Swansea.
Nottigham Forest are out of the FA Cup after a 5-1 thrashing at Swansea.

Houghton was annoyed at his side’s slow start and lacklustre attitude during their 5-1 drubbing.

"It took until the second half for us to change the way we played and change the attitude and then we were in the game. At 2-1 we were right in the contest and I felt like we could really push on from there.

"We were up against a side who were in confident mood because of where they are in the league and I thought we should have worked much harder in the first half. We found it difficult to get out at times but we should have stopped them playing as much as they did and I just felt we needed much more energy from the team in that first half.

"If you're away from home against a confident side and you don't think you can be as good as them as a footballing side, then you have to work hard to nullify them and we didn't do that.

"It's about the fundamentals in a game like this and if you don't do them right, you concede goals like we did and then you get punished.”

The boss was also angered by the penalty decision which led to Swansea’s third goal.

"I thought it was an awful decision for the penalty from the referee and it changed the mood of the game,” he said.

"We weren't good enough from that point onwards to recover from that disappointment and turn the game around in our favour.

"I've seen replays from all different angles of the penalty decision and there's not one where I thought it was a penalty and in fact, a lot of us were expecting the lad to be booked for simulation.”

Houghton is now keen that his side do not let the fourth round exit affect their league campaign.

He added: "The most important thing for us at the moment is that it doesn't affect our league matches moving forwards.

"Today we wanted to progress to the next round of the FA Cup but we never gave ourselves the opportunity to do that and now we have to make sure that we bounce back at home next weekend."