Nottingham Forest boss Steve Cooper says victory at Chelsea was one for the fans.
Forest won 1-0 via Anthony Elanga’s goal on Saturday.
Cooper said: “It’s a huge result,” said Cooper. “After staying in the league last season, I spoke openly about it giving us an opportunity to grow every part of the club. From my point of view that is the level of the team, the strength in depth of the squad and how we play.
“Results like this really help that momentum and that process. We’ve really got to hone in on that now and use it to our advantage.
“Great credit to the players for sticking to the plan. We knew it was going to be the type of game it was. You don’t come here and plan to dominate possession and create chance after chance. But you do come here knowing if you do certain things well, you can create chances and you can keep a clean-sheet. That’s how it unfolded.
“On the back of what happened last week at United – when we all saw how we were treated there (in two controversial refereeing decisions) – and doing some decent things in the Arsenal game, for the guys to continue to believe in what it takes to win a game like this, they deserve a lot of credit.
“We missed the chance of the first half, with T (Awoniyi) off the set-piece. He’s the guy we probably wanted it to fall to!
“We knew we were going to be a threat there and on dangerous fast attacks as well. If you look at how tactically well we were set up when we won the ball, and then to put that technical and athletic ability together to create and score the goal – with T’s assist and Anthony’s brilliant finish – is something we talked about how we could hurt Chelsea. After that, it was just about keeping a clean-sheet.
“We got the long-overdue away result, which the players deserve and the supporters definitely deserve. The fans have made noise like that when things have gone the opposite way in games. I’m just so pleased that, going into the international break, they can get back on the motorway and have something to shout about, because they deserve it.”
