It’s been a topsy-turvy week at the City Ground, but when I caught up with Joe Lolley, he explained the objective among the Nottingham Forest players is still automatic promotion to the Premier League.

In an exclusive interview with Nottingham Sport Joe provided a pragmatic and honest insight to life in the Championship and the fierce competition within.

What better place to start than the shock defeat to Charlton Athletic earlier this week, I asked Joe how the players reacted to the defeat and the mood going forward? “Just to get over it as quick as possible, luckily, in the Championship you pretty much have a game straight away. We’ve got a massive game at the weekend, it doesn’t come any bigger than playing top of the league, on TV, away from home. We’ve got a chance to go second with a win, so, in that respect it’s pretty easy to get over the midweek defeat and concentrate on Saturday. If we play like we’ve done against similar sides, then we can give West Brom a tough game and hopefully provide a good account of ourselves.”

I alluded to the fact that Forest have fared better in clashes against teams in and around the promotion places, the fancied sides if you will. I wanted to gauge the mindset of Lolley and Co regarding such opposition and especially West Brom. Immediately, and intelligently, he was quick to avoid any kind of prediction: “I wouldn’t like to make any bold statements that could bite us on the backside, but our form against the teams around us has been pretty good so there’s a quiet confidence that makes us relish these kind of games.”

Interestingly, Joe was equally as keen to address the improvements required against the sides in the lower echelons of the division: “These are the games in which we need to improve, it’s that confidence required to break the opposition down that we’ve got to work on.” This, I loved hearing, it gives you an insight to the mindset of a player who’s not prepared to let those bigger victories paper over the cracks at the bottom of the wall.

I moved onto the player himself and his recent resurgence of form. From his stunning performance against Leeds United to his man of the match award v Charlton it’s clear to see that last season’s quality is shining through once again: “Confidence has grown as the season’s progressed and I feel good on the pitch. If you can’t enjoy a chance of promotion to the Premier League and make history with a club like Forest, then there’s something wrong. I want to make things happen, to try and score the goals that take us higher up the league.” Once again, such willingness and that sense of single-mindedness to make a difference will be music to the ears of the Forest faithful.

The intent of reaching the Premier League for the first time in twenty-one years triggered me into getting Joe’s take upon the Championship and how competitive it really is. I asked him if he agreed that it’s possibly the most competitively matched division in recent history: “Yes, I’d say so, in times gone by you could win when not playing well, but nowadays in the Championship you get punished very quickly and every game is tough. Look at the sides in and around the relegation zone, Barnsley gave us a tough game up here; Wigan beat us away from home and Charlton took four points from us. The gaps aren’t massive now which is why you’ve got to be at it every game and the team that is most consistent will thrive in the end.”

As I brought proceedings to a close I focussed on the intent and sights upon which the Nottingham Forest player and his colleagues were genuinely aiming for: “The target was always to be up and around the promotion places, let’s face it, if you’re not targeting that then what’s the point? When we lost some games and dropped down to 9^th/10^th we had a few doubts, but we’ve shown our form by beating very good teams and putting a couple of good runs together. If we can put one of those runs together again, which we’re good enough to do, then we stand a good chance, not just of making the play-offs, but the automatic spots. I think that’s got to be the aim now for us and anything less than play-offs will be a big disappointment!”

With tongue firmly in cheek I asked the man himself if he’d fantasied about smashing in one of his long-range rockets in the play-off final at Wembley. Joe laughed before replying with the pragmatism that we’ve all been accustomed to: “I hope it doesn’t come to that, we’ve got to concentrate on winning games because top two is the aim, but if we end up in the play-offs it’s still a very good season, at that point I might start dreaming about those kind of moments, until then, we’ll concentrate on our current form.”

It was an honour and a pleasure to talk at length with Joe Lolley, on behalf of myself and Nottingham Sport we’d like to thank the player himself and Nottingham Forest for allowing us this courtesy.

*Article provided by Steve Corry (Nottingham Forest Correspondent).

*Main image @NFFC Joe Lolley feeling good on the pitch as focus is solely now on Forest’s promotion push.