Sabri Lamouchi has warned his Nottingham Forest players they must get back to doing “the simple things” well, if they are to get a result at Fulham on Saturday.
Albert Adomah’s second half goal rescued a point for the Reds at Charlton Athletic in midweek, after they had fallen behind in the 18th minute to Lyle Taylor’s header and been on the back foot for long spells, in the first half especially.
Head coach Lamouchi admitted his team’s performance was in complete contrast to the one they put in to sweep aside Birmingham City 3-0 at the weekend.
And he knows they cannot afford to make the same kind of mistakes at Craven Cottage, against a side who thumped Millwall 4-0 on Wednesday night.
“It is really difficult to understand our performance on Wednesday and why we played completely different to Saturday,” Lamouchi said. “It is not because one was away and one was at home.
“We lost something.
“It was a different attitude. You can’t start games in the way we did. We gave them a lot of chances.
“We made mistakes with the marking, the passing, our positioning - simple things.
“When the simple things go wrong, in a two against one, at a corner, first post - goal.
“And there were two other situations which were clear chances for them.
“To be just one down in the first half, it was very lucky for us.”
He added: “I said after Birmingham, it was just the one victory. We need more time to work on many situations.
“To finish the game with one point on Wednesday was a little bit by luck.”
Forest were without Joe Lolley at The Valley as the winger was ruled out with a slight foot injury.
Lamouchi is hopeful of having him back available for the second game of the week in the capital, and says he will consider freshening up his starting XI against the Cottagers.
“Maybe we will make changes for Saturday,” said the Frenchman. “I need to check on how we train.
“We might need some fresh players.
“We need to try to play much better, first, and try to get a good result at Fulham. But Fulham are in a good dynamic now.
“That will be a tough game for us, we know that.”
