Football / FA Cup: Wednesday looking to Wednesday

Sheffield Wednesday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

Nottingham Forest. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

WEDNESDAY rather overdid things last season, taking their attempt to win both domestic cups to the fullest extremes, even deluding themselves temporarily that they might sneak in for the title, too. In the end they drove into an impossible fixture jam and emerged with nothing.

This time it may be different, but only, perhaps, in that they end up empty-handed sooner. Tomorrow, without Chris Waddle, they face Wimbledon at Selhurst Park in the quarter-finals of the Coca-Cola; on Wednesday week, a resurgent Forest in an FA Cup replay at the City Ground. No doddle either.

Two minutes remained when Colin Cooper earned Forest a second crack at Trevor Francis's team but it is the least they deserve after making light not only of their unequal League status. Deprived by the injury of 19-goal Stan Collymore, the men of Nottingham were without their most potent marksman, too. And yet they might, but for some excellent goalkeeping, have seen off last season's beaten finalists emphatically.

Hesitant in defence at first, they allowed Mark Bright to head Wednesday into a 10th-minute lead and would have been two down had Nigel Jemson, a Forest old boy, not made a horrible hash of an open goal. But thereafter Wednesday offered only a rare threat.

Resisting the temptation to dispense with his five-man midfield, the Forest manager, Frank Clark, left Lee Glover, Collymore's deputy, to forage alone until the last 14 mintues, when he took off Neil Webb and sent on Gary Bull.

But Glover shouldered his burden manfully and, even against a defence marshalled by his redoubtable former colleague, Des Walker, found three clear opportunities to score. On each occasion, however, the goalkeeping of Kevin Pressman was the equal of his shooting.

Pressman should have been beaten when Steve Stone missed a glorious chance with four minutes left but was ready to be acclaimed Wednesday's hero of the hour when Cooper's forehead forced home the equaliser to extend Forest's unbeaten run to 13 matches.

Goals: Bright (10) 1-0; Cooper (88) 1-1.

Sheffield Wednesday (4-4-2): Pressman; Nilsson, (A Pearce, 33), Walker, Palmer, Worthington (Watson, 68); Bart-Williams, Hyde, Jones, Sinton; Bright, Jemson. Substitute not used: Woods (gk).

Nottingham Forest (4-1-4-1): Crossley; Lyttle, Cooper, Chettle, S Pearce; Phillips; Stone, Bohinen, Webb, (Bull, 76), Woan; Glover. Substitute not used: Black, Wright (gk).

Referee: M Reed (Birmingham).