Forest boss Davies: Threadbare squad gave its all

BILLY Davies today praised his young Nottingham Forest players, insisting they had achieved the "unbelievable" by extending their unbeaten run to six matches with victory over Sheffield Wednesday.

But he warned his injury-ravaged City Ground squad was being stretched to the very limit as they looked to continue their climb away from trouble in the Championship.

Davies revealed he had selected his only 17 fit players for the visit of Wednesday to the City Ground, a dozen of them 22 or under.

And, with Robert Earnshaw (hamstring), Nathan Tyson (calf) and Ian Breckin (groin) all having picked up problems during the 2-1 success, the manager said he feared his squad was at breaking point.

Davies will look to address the issue in the transfer market before the weekend trip to Cardiff, fearing a lack of strength in depth and experience could quickly become an issue.

"This club can't afford to lose the players we are losing; we can't afford to lose players like Chris Cohen, Paul Anderson and Julian Bennett," said Davies.

"We can't afford to lose Tyson, Breckin and Earnshaw because we do not have a big enough squad to sustain these injuries.

"We don't know how bad the injuries are. All three of them are carrying knocks but we can only work with what we have got.

"We had 17 fit players last night and 12 of those were under 22. The fact we have picked up three points is unbelievable.

"When you are in this position they are going to show their age. They showed their age in the first half, in my opinion, because they did not work hard enough and play at a high enough tempo. Wednesday deserved their goal as far as I am concerned.

"We showed our age in the second half again, because we gave the ball away too often.

"But the one thing you cannot fault, from this young side, is their courage to come back from a goal down; their work ethic, their team spirit and their desire to go on and win matches.

"They deserve huge credit for that. We had no Cohen, no Anderson, no Bennett and one or two other guys were missing as well.

"We had Breckin playing with a groin strain, Tyson with a calf injury and Earnshaw with a hamstring problem.

"It is incredible this squad keeps picking up results in the condition they are in.

"I have seen Joe Heath and Garath McCleary play for the first time last night. I had never seen the two boys play.

"I am still assessing our current squad and it is difficult. You are trying to bring in players to your squad when you don't even know about your full squad.

"It is a very difficult ask for them to come in and play in these conditions because of the age of the other players around them.

"But how can you fault them? We were playing against a side that has been put together over a period of three years.

"They have been working together for that long. Credit to the players for picking up three points from what I feel is a very, very good and very difficult side to play against."