NOTTINGHAM FOREST 0 CITY 0

League Division 1

16th November 1985

Attendance 15,140

Scorers Wilson(29), Simpson(56)

Ref V Callow

City Nixon, Reid, Power, Clements, McCarthy, Phillips, Lillis, May, Davies, McNab, Wilson – sub Simpson(45)

Forest Sutton, Mills, Pearce, Butterworth, Birtles, Webb, Carr, Metgod, Clough, Davenport, Rice – sub Walker(45)

The Blues showed a gritty performance at the City Ground, which deservedly brought them their first League win since 31st August. manager, Billy McNeill wasn’t going to let this victory go to the players’ heads though, but said after the game: “We must now aim to use this victory as a launching pad for the future.”
The catalysts for this victory were the performances of David Phillips and Clive Wilson, Paul Fitzpatrick in The Guardian wrote: “Phillips played with splendid vigour in midfield and troubled Sutton more than once with the power of his long-range shooting. But the architect of City’s best result of the season was Wilson, who made a significant contribution to his side’s promotion campaign but who has been restricted by injury to rare appearances this season.”
It was Clive Wilson who put City ahead just before the half hour, when he took a low cross into his path from Mark Lillis and his shot took a slight deflection to hit the back of the Forest net.
City’s second goal was scored by another exciting young player, Paul Simpson. The goal was more to do with the failure of Forest’s defence though, Stuart Pearce, under pressure from Neil McNab, hit a back pass weakly to Sutton, under challenge from Lillis he came out second best and the City striker crossed it for Simpson to tap the ball into an open net.