Nottingham Forest suffer shock League Cup defeat to Swansea City

The heat is already on Ange Postecoglou after Socceroo Cameron Burgess scored for Swansea City in the 97th minute to send Nottingham Forest crashing out of the Carabao Cup in the third round with a 3-2 defeat.

Forest held a 2-0 lead at half-time after two goals from Igor Jesus - both the product of flowing front-to-back moves that were the first true signs of Postecoglou’s unique style of football, and in particular the second, coming just before the break.

But their failure to see off the game with a third goal opened the door for Swansea to mount a comeback, and the situation was not at all handled well by Forest’s players.

Burgess, who wore the captain’s armband for the Championship outfit, headed home from a corner kick in the 68th minute to give them a spark, then two goals in added time saw them cap off a remarkable victory - and a hollow defeat for Postecoglou, who looked shattered at the full-time whistle.

Substitute Zan Vipotnik capitalised on some lax marking at the near post to equalise at 2-2, and a penalty shootout beckoned - but the South Wales outfit, playing at home, kept pushing. A long-range drive from Ethan Galbraith rattled the woodwork, falling favourably for Burgess, who volleyed it home to knock Forest out of the tournament.

Forest has now conceded six goals in two games under Postecoglou, following a 3-0 defeat away to Arsenal at the weekend, and remain alive in only three competitions: the Premier League, the FA Cup and the Europa League, which begins next week.

Postecoglou had made 10 changes to the side that lined up at the Emirates Stadium and many of the new faces - including on-loan midfielder Douglas Luiz, winger Dilane Bakwa and Jesus, who was withdrawn at half-time - showed signs that they could play a big role for him going forward.

But Postecoglou could not hide his disappointment at the result, a critical slip-up as he attempts to win over the trust and respect of Forest’s fanbase after the shock dismissal of his predecessor, Nuno Espirito Santo, who guided them to their best league finish in 30 years last campaign.

“The overriding factor is we are out of a cup competition that really we should have progressed in. That opportunity, we shouldn’t have lost,” he said.

“We can look at the individuals within that, and there were some promising performances. But all that fades away when you realise we missed a great opportunity to progress.”

Postecoglou was left to rue what he said was a wrongly-disallowed goal from Arnaud Kalimuendo, who thought he had made it 3-0 to Forest after being introduced off the bench - but said they only had themselves to blame for being too “frenetic” with their play and not calm and composed enough in the latter stages of the contest.

“I just got a sense the players thought it was sort of just going to happen automatically - that we were totally in control of the game,” he said.

“It’s cup football. We should have been a lot more prepared for what was going to come and handled it a lot better than we did.

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“It’s not about me. It’s about the club. It’s about us progressing and creating an environment where we can have real success. Tonight was a great opportunity for us to progress in a cup and give ourselves an opportunity to get that success. To let it slip is hugely disappointing.

“We need to understand that we are going to have to earn everything we are going to get; it’s not just going to come to us. I just got the feeling tonight that towards the end we just thought it would naturally pan out that we would win the game. That’s not how football works.

“You learn a lot from everything. From my perspective, you understand some of the things we need to work on so we can get to where we want to.”

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