The dark horses in the Premier League are fighting! Two new players are out of the list of European matches. Nuno openly plays a bad game?

Just 6 months ago, Nottingham Forest was still a dark horse team in the Premier League. On March 8, 2025, they defeated defending champion Manchester City in the Premier League and rose to third place in the league, moving towards Champions League qualification. Although its form declined at the end of the season: Forest eventually fell to seventh place, it eventually qualified for the European war. It's still a brilliant season for the team Nuno coached. After all, this club has missed the top league for 20 consecutive years and even fell to the League One for one.

But since the end of last season, the situation in Nottingham Forest seems to have taken a sharp turn. Head coach Nuno has a tense relationship with his boss Marinakis, who said the relationship between the two has "changed". At the same time, Nuno clashed with the new sports director Edu, causing a rapid split within the club. And this contradiction seems to have spread to the court - last weekend, Forest was defeated 3-0 by West Ham United, which has not won so far.

Although Marinakis tried to repair his relationship with the head coach and the Greek boss also paid out of his own pocket before the transfer deadline, these did not seem to satisfy Nuno. He excluded Omari Hutchinson, who set a club transfer record and signed for 43.4 million euros, from the UEFA Cup roster, and Zinchenko, who joined the buzzer as of the day, was also not selected.

Some people believe that Hutchinson faces competition as the reason why he was excluded from the preliminary list. But considering the transfer fee he spent and his talent, this reason is obviously untenable. Zinchenko was even more puzzling - his experience and versatile attributes should have made him an ideal complement to this team that is about to face a long season. What is even more surprising is that the midfielder Nicholas Dominguez, who is still recovering from injuries, appears on the roster. He has been absent since he suffered a knee injury against Chelsea in May this year.

Forests must comply with UEFA regulations and cannot register for all players, which means that someone must be excluded. But Nuno's move seems to be a clear message: the decisions on football matters are in his hands, not the person responsible for signings. For Nuno's approach, Forest's midfield star and England international Elliot Anderson publicly expressed his support. The 22-year-old has been a key figure in the rise of the Forest since Newcastle joined. When asked if he hopes that Nuno will remain the Forest coach after international matches, he replied: "Of course I hope. He is very nice to me. I feel that he has given me the freedom to do what I do best. He believes in me, that's the most important thing."

It's hard to imagine that there will be Forest players - except those who are cruelly excluded - taking a different position on Nuno's future. And now, this club is at a crossroads. Are they firing the head coach who led the team to this day and risking all their efforts being wasted? Or continue to support him and hope that the situation can repair itself? This was a difficult decision for Marinakis. But when the debate was fierce on the team's board of directors, the two players may not be able to win the European war for non-own reasons. Today's forest is a broken club, and you have to ask: Why did all this take a sharp turn in just five months?