Nottingham Forest FC has secured a promotion to the Premier League after a 1-0 win over Huddersfield Town in Championship Promotion Final match on Sunday. This marks the return of Forest to the top flight of English soccer after 23 years of absence.
The game itself didn’t offer much excitement. With so much at stake and the “winner takes it all” format, both teams were extremely cautious and waited for the opponent to make a mistake. Huddersfield ended up filching first when center-back Levi Colwill deflected a cross from Nottingham’s James Garner into his own net in the 43rd minute.
Having secured the lead, Forest went into an all-defense mode in the second period. Huddersfield made a push for an equalizer, but lack of efficiency made their attacks rather harmless. Colwill’s own goal proved to be a difference-maker as Nottingham managed to hold on and join Fulham and Bournemouth as one of the Championship teams that will play in the Premier League next time.
“We’ve been fantastic all season — we were really unlucky to not go up automatically,” said Nottingham’s Joe Worrall after the game. “We’ve played with honesty, and we play football the right way.”
Nottingham Forest has a rich history and was considered among the English powerhouses at one point. It managed to claim one domestic league title in 1978 and follow that up with two European Cup trophies in the following two years. The team would go on to win two Football League Cups by the end of the 80s before their decline started. They were relegated from Premier League in 1998–99 and they even spent some time in the third-tier of English football before a recent resurgence.
