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This article is part of Football FanCast’s In Numbers series, which takes a statistical look at performances, season-long form and reported transfer targets…
One man’s misfortune is another man’s opportunity and that appears to be the case over at the City Ground at the minute.
Carl Jenkinson has surprisingly been ruled out of action for the next few weeks despite not featuring over the international break so Matty Cash duly stepped in to fill the void at right-back again.
The 22-year-old was utilised there before the arrival of the former Arsenal man on the eve of deadline day last month.
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Nottingham Forest managed to record one of the upsets of the weekend, beating then league leaders Swansea by a single goal on their own patch.
Alfa Semedo’s late strike meant that they put an end to the Swans’ unbeaten run whilst also putting the rest of the Championship on notice.
Reds boss Sabri Lamouchi made as many as five changes with the shock exclusions of Jack Robinson and Joe Lolley, but it ultimately paid off and Cash played a huge role.
Despite swapping the defence around, Forest managed to keep a clean sheet – against what was the league’s highest goalscorers too.
In reality, their industrious and astute defending left Reds shot-stopper Brice Samba without much to do, restricting the home side to only nine shots, just one of which being on target.
Cash at right-back recorded a passing accuracy rating of 78.3% whilst registering four clearances, the second-most in the side, and one tackle, per WhoScored.
Both of Forest’s clean sheets in the Championship this season have come when the 6 foot 1 ace is playing at right-back so maybe it is time to make a claim on that position being his own going forward.
It would certainly allow the likes of Albert Adomah, Joe Lolley and Joao Carvalho all to feature higher up the pitch.
Jenkinson could soon find himself in a similar situation to the one he faced at Arsenal whereby he wasn’t able to break into the first-team lineup because of the talent ahead of him – he made just 70 appearances in around eight years, often finding himself a neglected figure.
He may be an out-and-out defender, but Cash’s performances of late should warrant a decent run in the side – why change something that worked against one of the most in-form sides in the division this season?
