After partaking in the FA Cup semi-finals over the weekend, Nottingham Forest had to watch on as most of their top-five rivals won.
Their chance to stake their own claim for the UEFA Champions League places came just a matter of days later, with their game in hand coming against a Brentford side with little but pride left to play for.
The Bees certainly didn’t start like a side who were on the beach though, and ought to have taken the lead when Mikkel Damsgaard’s free-kick found the unmarked Sepp van den Berg 10 yards from goal, but his header was impressively beaten away by Matz Sels.
After a nervy start, Forest did work a foothold in the game, and they felt their quest for three points should’ve been aided by the dismissal of Keane Lewis-Potter.
A card-happy Darren England deemed his trip on Anthony Elanga not to be worthy of a second yellow card much to the dismay of the Forest bench.
The mood on the hosts’ bench would’ve been even worse just before HT.
A long ball forward by Nathan Collins looked easy for Ola Aina to deal with, but a costly slip allowed Kevin Schade to sneak in and score his first goal in nine to put the Bees ahead going into the break.
Forest never once tested Mark Flekken in the Brentford goal in the first half, but within 10 minutes of the restart he was called into action.
Anthony Elanga stepped in off the left and unleashed a fierce drive towards the bottom right corner, but the Bees stopper got down well to turn the ball around the post.
It was all Forest after the break, but they were hit with the ultimate sucker punch 20 minutes from time.
Flekken’s goal-kick was misjudged by the entire Tricky Trees backline and it worked its way through to Wissa, who drew Sels off his line before dinking over the on-rushing keeper.
Nuno Espírito Santo’s side were growing desperate in the closing stages, but they were uncharacteristically poor in the final third this evening, failing to really work Flekken on too many occasions.
Losing back-to-back home league games for the first time this season has certainly come at a bad time for Forest, whose top-five spot is now under immense scrutiny.
Brentford meanwhile still have an outside shot at qualifying for Europe, but to do so they’ll need to finish eighth, hope Newcastle finish in the top six and Manchester City win the FA Cup.
Flashscore Man of the Match: Nathan Collins (Brentford)