Nuno Espirito Santo gives honest Tottenham verdict as Nottingham Forest plan revealed

Nottingham Forest boss Nuno Espirito Santo has revealed he is unsure how the Boxing Day clash with Tottenham is going to play out.

Spurs have built a reputation for being the Premier League’s biggest entertainers throughout this season, having scored the most goals out of any team with 39, but have only kept four clean sheets. Fourth-placed Forest go into the match in fine fettle off the back of three-successive wins and were the first club to stop Brentford from scoring on their own patch so far this season.

Asked what he thought could happen on Thursday, former Spurs boss Nuno said: “You never know what’s going to happen in the game. What we can see is good players, a lot of goals, also conceding goals. We analysed yesterday, it was different in terms of goals and situations.

“The result was a little bit unexpected but what we are preparing is a new game, new situations will happen and we are facing a very good game.”

Nuno adopted a back three of Morato, Murillo and Nikola Milenkovic on their way stopping Brentford on Saturday and he might be tempted to go back to it in an attempt to halt Tottenham’s goalscoring prowess. He added: “I think it worked OK. We were good in the game.

“Defensively we had to be aware that Brentford were very offensive, a lot of goals and situations and one of the reasons was that. But before, we did it against (Manchester) City and many games before so it’s a shape the players knew, the routines were there and we decided to go with this game, let’s see.”

Forest have two more matches before the January transfer window opens, which could see them strengthen further to boost their chances of Europe. Nuno insisted all his focus was on Spurs before even thinking about the comings and goings next month.

He added: “We have two games to go and this is what we are focused on. Of course there’s work to be done but in the right moment, we will do it. Right now the focus is on Spurs and how we can compete well. This is what we have to be ready for.

“Each part of the club has to be responsible for that situation (January window) and the window is a tricky one in terms of recruitment, in terms of creating an unbalance in our own squad. You just have to be ready but more than anything, the players are focused and committed on their tasks.”