Hyam and Barnett Set to Start Against Forest Tuesday, 27th Nov 2012 10:58 Luke Hyam and new loanee Tyrone Barnett are set to come into the Town side which faces Nottingham Forest at Portman Road this evening. Midfielder Hyam will take over from Nigel Reo-Coker, who is out with a hamstring problem, while Michael Chopra will probably drop to the bench to allow Barnett to make his Blues debut. Aside from those two switches, manager Mick McCarthy will probably go with much the same side which drew 1-1 with Peterborough at home on Saturday. The Blues boss was pleased with Stephen Henderson’s display in goal and the Irishman is set to keep his place between the sticks. Tommy Smith and Danny Higginbotham will continue at the heart of the defence with Bradley Orr at right-back and Aaron Cresswell the left full-back. Skipper Carlos Edwards will be at right midfield, Lee Martin on the left with Guirane N’Daw — who is OK despite receiving a cut to the eye on Saturday — alongside Hyam, who McCarthy has confirmed will start, in the centre. Up front, Chopra will be a little unlucky to drop out but the Blues boss would seem certain to want to utilise Barnett’s height and physicality alongside top scorer DJ Campbell. McCarthy will have to decide which of his domestic loanees he’ll leave out of the 18 — Town have six with only five allowed in a matchday squad — with Bilel Mohsni perhaps the unlucky man. Aside from Reo-Coker, who is expected to be out for two or three weeks, only striker Paul Taylor is sidelined at present, with the ex-Peterborough man expected to miss the remainder of the season having undergone foot surgery. The Town boss says he is looking for his players to make their mark as he tries to lift the Blues out of the bottom three: “I’ve said to players ‘Who can be the one who gets us a point or who wins us the game?’. “Is it a goalscorer, is it a last minute tackle, is it a block on the line, is a goalkeeper saving one? Who wants to be that person that makes sure we get something out of the game? “On Saturday Lee Martin got us the penalty by doing something positive, getting at them, and then when we needed Hendo to make the saves, he did.” McCarthy says he has a lot of time for his Forest counterpart Sean O’Driscoll and dismisses claims that he was close to becoming the manager at the City Ground in the summer: “He’s done really well, Sean, and I’m delighted for him because he did a great job at Doncaster and then left like some of us do for whatever reason. “He was on the coaching staff there last year with Steve Cotterill and when he went back it looked like a good move for him because he knew the players and he’s done really well. I think the signings he’s made have been good. “I was linked with everyone in the summer, every job that became available. I wasn’t really ready or whatever. In the summer loads of jobs came up that I got a mention for, the one that I accepted was Ipswich.” While Forest, who have lost once in their last 10 matches and sit in seventh, 16 places and 14 points above the Blues, would appear on paper to be a much stiffer proposition than Posh, McCarthy points out that that doesn’t necessarily follow. “It doesn’t matter, it’s the team that turns up on the day, especially in the Championship,” he said. “If they turn up and they’re all at it and they play as well as they possibly can, we’re going to have a really tough game if we don’t perform as well. “If we turn up and we’re at our best and they’re not because they’ve travelled and they don’t like it or they’re tired or for any number of reasons, it could be a good night for us. You just don’t know on any given day really.” While taking all games as seriously as one another, the Town boss says his side’s form at Portman Road for the remainder of the season will be crucial: “Home territory is usually where you get most of your points. But we’ve got to concentrate on getting them all over the place.” McCarthy says Town’s relative isolation compared to most other clubs can work in the Blues’ favour when they are at home: “It’s a long way for us to go to every game. Well, it’s a long way for the others to come here. And Nottingham is one of the closer ones, I would have thought. “But it’s not the travelling, you get used to travelling as footballers. It’s about us being at home and being comfortable with it and picking up points here.” Forest boss Sean O’Driscoll, who famously held a 36-second long press conference after Town beat his Doncaster side 6-0 at the Keepmoat Stadium in February 2011, says his new team can sometimes be their own worst enemies: “Our biggest problem is ourselves. “We had 10 shots in the first half against Wolves [in Saturday's 2-1 away win], which is fantastic, but we conceded 11 crosses. It’s a dangerous game trading one off the other. “We’re still trying to get the balance right - we want to keep the forward play we’re capable of but not be so open when we lose the ball. That applies whoever we are playing. The biggest improvement we can make is in our own squad and our own organisation.” Like his Town opposite number he says where teams are in the division doesn’t always have a bearing on how they will perform on any particular day: “We’ve tried not to look at league positions and where clubs are and what points they’ve got. This is the Championship — we need to prepare for every team as though we’re playing Manchester United.” O’Driscoll has to make at least one change with striker Simon Cox out with an ankle injury. Dexter Blackstock is expected deputise. Defender Greg Halford and on-loan Spurs midfielder Jermaine Jenas haven’t travelled due to calf injuries and midfielder Radi Majewski is on the way back after an ankle injury but isn’t yet ready for inclusion. Ireland international midfielder Andy Reid is a doubt with a hamstring problem and may not be risked after missing Saturday’s game at Wolves. The current Forest squad includes ex-Blues defenders Dan Harding and Danny Collins. The centre-half, who was on loan at Portman Road during the first half of last season, is set to wear the Forest armband tonight. Luke Chambers joined Town on a Bosman free transfer after departing Forest in the summer, while Scott Loach was an academy schoolboy with his hometown club after leaving the Blues’ youth set-up when his family relocated back to the Midlands. Lee Martin was on loan with the Tricky Trees in 2008/09, while Michael Chopra made three Forest starts and two sub appearances without scoring in 2004 when on loan from Newcastle. Danny Higginbotham spent a short spell on loan at the City Ground last season. Historically, the visitors very much have the upper hand, winning 33 of the games between the two sides (30 in the league), 14 (13) ending in draws and Town winning 18 (17). The Midlanders have won the last five matches between the teams. Town’s 2012 got off to the worst possible start on January 2nd with previously goal-phobic Forest leaving Portman Road with a 3-1 victory. Marcus Tudgay and Garath McCleary put the visitors - who hadn’t scored in their seven previous games - two goals in front at the break then, after the Blues had missed a number of chances, skipper Grant Leadbitter pulled one back from the penalty spot before Tudgay sealed Forest’s victory with his second of the afternoon. In December last year, Town fell to their second 3-2 defeat in two games as Forest netted twice in the last six minutes to come from behind to deny the Blues their first win at the City Ground for 12 years. Danny Collins — now with Forest - scored two goals in a game for the first time in his professional career, putting the Blues in front twice, but Robbie Findley equalised for the home side before the break, then Joel Lynch and Marcus Tudgay netted another leveller and the winner in injury time. Tonight’s referee is fans’ favourite Andy D’Urso from Billericay, who has shown 36 yellow cards and four reds in 18 matches so far this season. D’Urso’s most recent Town match was the 2-1 home victory over Leeds last season in which he booked five, three of them Blues players, and sent off visitors’ full-back Aidan White for a foul on Jay Emmanuel-Thomas. Squad from: Henderson, Loach, Lee-Barrett, Orr, Hewitt, Cresswell, Chambers, Higginbotham, Smith, Mohsni, Hyam, N’Daw, Drury, Edwards, Carson, Emmanuel-Thomas, Martin, Murphy, Campbell, Barnett, Chopra, Scotland.
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