Nottingham Forest boss backs Awoniyi despite penalty miss

Nottingham Forest, Nuno Espirito Santo says he, the coaching crew and the players are behind Taiwo Awoniyi who missed the crucial penalty that sent the club out of the Carabao Cup in their penalty shootout loss to Newcastle United at the City Ground.

The Nigerian made his first start of the season and was in action for the entire game and was involved in the penalty shootout, missing Forest’s fifth and final penalty.

Nuno is however backing the Super Eagle to come back stronger as he continues to build his fitness ahead of the Premier League game against Wolves on Saturday.

On whether the penalty miss will affect Awoniyi’s confidence, Nuno insists they will support the Nigerian.

‘Always. You cannot ignore the (penalty) moment for all of us, especially for the player involved in that situation. But we are here to support him and we don’t have too much time for sorrow because we go again on Saturday.’

Nuno is delighted Awoniyi is gradually getting back to full fitness.

‘It was good. In the end it was clear he was lacking some energy, but he worked very hard until the end.

‘He had two or three good chances to finish. We want to give Taiwo this opportunity to raise his levels of fitness because the talent is there,’ the Forest boss said in his post-match comments.

Awoniyi was Forest’s top scorer in his first season in the Premier League with 10 goals and third last season with six despite missing almost half of the games through injury.