Bournemouth welcome Nottingham Forest to the Vitality Stadium in a huge Sky Bet Championship showdown in the race for promotion.
Victory will see second-placed Bournemouth secure the final automatic promotion spot, whereas Forest can leapfrog Scott Parker’s Cherries with a win and go second to put promotion in their own hands on the final day of this season.
Team News
Bournemouth have no fresh injury concerns to report from Saturday’s win at Blackburn as Junior Stanislas (back) and David Brooks (illness) remain absent.
Forest have no fresh injury concerns after Saturday’s 5-1 victory over Swansea as Max Lowe (groin), Lewis Grabban and Keinan Davis (both hamstring) remains absent.
Stat Attack
- Bournemouth have lost two of their last five meetings against Nottingham Forest (W2, D1, L2).
- Forest have won just one of their last five visits to Bournemouth (W1, L4).
- Three of Bournemouth’s last five home wins over Forest have been through 2-0 results.
- Bournemouth’s Dominic Solanke has been caught offside on 16 occasions in the Championship this season.
- Each of Forest’s last three away matches have been settled by 1-0 results, with Steve Cooper’s team winning two of those three games (W2, L1).
Prediction
With just one more match left of the season after this crunch battle, Bournemouth know that promotion is in their hands especially after a ruthlessly clinical win away at Blackburn on Saturday where they were just superb in their passes and composure when on attack.
Mark Travers meanwhile did an excellent job in goal of denying Blackburn several opportunities to score but with just one win needed to secure promotion, they certainly will need a replicate performance because Forest won’t make this easy by any mile.
Forest meanwhile have simply done a remarkable turnaround and now head to the South Coast knowing that victory would see them put promotion in their own hands heading into the final day, which is simply unbelievable given their early-season woes in the relegation zone.
Steve Cooper’s men however can take heart from how they weathered a competitive first-half against Swansea on Saturday, before hitting their stride in the second half but they will now need to hit those strides pretty quickly and get the opening goal to put Bournemouth under real pressure.
Both teams also do like to score plenty of goals so with that in mind, I would be shocked if there are less than three goals at minimum here but Forest will need to score first given their away hoodoo at this ground in recent visits.
Prediction: Bournemouth 2-2 Nottingham Forest
Result: Bournemouth 1-0 Nottingham Forest
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