McGugan: We still have faith in ourselves

MATCH winner Lewis McGugan said Nottingham Forest always had the belief that they can compete with the best in the Championship.

But he said: "There are still plenty of areas we can improve."

The midfielder secured a vital win at promotion-chasing Reading with a great second-half strike.

McGugan was delighted with his goal and with the win, but said the celebrations would not go on for too long, with crucial home games against Preston and Swansea approaching quickly.

"This can give us massive confidence and we can enjoy it for a few hours – but not for too long because we have to be ready for the games coming up," he said. "Don't get me wrong, we can take plenty of positives from this and it will give us confidence. But there are also areas where we can improve.

"This win shows that we are back and back playing at our best. We know there is still work to be done and we will be ready for Preston."

Now McGugan wants Forest to keep a positive attitude in the coming weeks, as they seek to build on the three-point gap between them and the bottom three.

"It is a massive win against a club that is still effectively a Premiership set-up," he said. "You look at where they are in the league and the set-up they have – but there is a fine line between success and failure in this division. We have to be positive going into every game, even if it is against one of the sides at the top.

"We knew that we would have to get through a tough first 20 minutes on Saturday. But we got through that and we went into half time at 0-0.

"They had a lot of chances in the first half but didn't put them away and we felt that, if we had a couple of chances ourselves in the second half, we could put them away.

"Luckily enough, I got the goal. It was a tense when we had the five minutes added time. But the back four did superbly throughout the whole game and, in the final stages, the concentration was excellent."