Nottingham Forest vs Ipswich Predictions

Nottingham Forest’s astonishing 5-5 draw at Villa Park in midweek proved enough to take The Reds into the play-off places at the expense of local rivals Derby County who dropped down to seventh place. On Saturday Forest play host to an Ipswich Town side that were involved in a five-goal thriller at home to Bristol City, but were on the wrong end of a 3-2 scoreline. Bottom of the table Ipswich have twenty fewer points on the board than their hosts with nineteen games played, so its no wonder Forest are the bookmaker’s favourites to win this weekend.

Nottingham Forest got off to a fantastic start against Aston Villa with goals from Grabban and Carvalho putting the visitors 2-0 up in the opening six minutes. However, Villa striker Abraham scored two goals in the space of three minutes to bring the hosts back onto level terms with just fourteen minutes on the clock. Cash put Forest back in front in the twenty-second minute, but Abraham completed his first half hat trick to level the teams via a thirty-sixth minute penalty.

The goals didn’t dry up in the second half, with Forest taking just six minutes to retake the lead via midfielder Lolley, but following the sending-off of the visitors defender Tobias Figueiredo, Aston Villa responded once again through that man Abraham whose fourth goal of the game made the scoreline 4-4 in the seventy-first minute. Villa then took the lead for the very first time in the match when El Ghazi netted the hosts fifth goal in the seventy-fifth minute, but this time Notts Forest responded with an equaliser of their own when Grabban rescued a point for the ten-men of Forest with his second of the game with eight minutes left on the clock.

Aston Villa only have themselves to blame for not winning this match, but Forest deserve credit for their clinical finishing in the final third. The hosts had 68% of the overall possession, twelve corners to the visitors two, and fifteen shots to Forests seven, but it The Reds that will be the happier of the two clubs to have earned a point from the match. Striker Lewis Grabban moved onto twelve Championship goals for the season during that scintillating 5-5 draw in Birmingham, and provides the hosts most likely source of goals this weekend.

Ipswich Town are yet to produce a goalscorer anywhere near to reaching double figures in league goals this season, with Edwards and Sears leading the way on four goals apiece. Former West Ham prodigy Freddie Sears was on target twice for the Tractor Boys against Bristol City on Wednesday night, but the hosts still ended up losing the game. Sears opened the scoring in the thirty-second minute and that goal proved enough for Ipswich to lead their guests during the half time interval.

An own goal from Bialkowski just ten minutes into the second half brought Bristol City back onto level terms, but Sears restored the hosts lead three minutes later. Bristol City responded again, but this time it took less than sixty-seconds for Paterson to equalise for the visitors and five minutes after that City took the lead through Diedhiou with what turned out to be the winning goal.

Ipswich Town will have been disappointed to lose the game after having 54% of the possession and three times as many corners as Bristol City, but the visitors had more shots and were just that little bit more clinical with their finishing.

We’re confident that Saturday’s game will produce more goals and have backed both teams to score and for the game to produce over 2.5 goals. Three of the last six meetings between the pair have produced over 2.5 goals, while the same total of games have also seen both teams score. Ipswich’s last three results have all seen both teams score and over 2.5 goals scored, while three of Aston Villa’s last six have also produced at least three goals and seen both teams score. In terms of a final score, we’re backing a narrow 2-1 win for Forest.