Wooden not aiming to rival ´formidable´ Haaland for Golden Boot

Nottingham Forest’s Chris Wooden is just not aiming to rival the “formidable” Erling Haaland for the Premier League’s Golden Boot after netting a brace towards Leicester Metropolis.

Wooden took his tally to seven for the season with two second-half targets in Forest’s 3-1 win over rivals Leicester, after Ryan Yates noticed his opener cancelled out by Jamie Vardy.

The 32-year-old’s double noticed him transfer stage with Stan Collymore on 22 Premier League targets for Forest, with solely Bryan Roy (24) scoring extra for the membership within the competitors.

Solely Manchester Metropolis’s Haaland (10) has scored extra instances than Wooden this time period, although the New Zealander was not getting carried away together with his nice begin to the marketing campaign.

“I simply need to hold scoring as many as I can. He’s [Haaland] a really formidable man, and he’s in all probability going to attain 30 targets this season,” Wooden mentioned.

“He’s a really formidable man to chase. He’s {Nuno Espirito Santo] are available in and put an emphasis on placing the ball within the field. He’s labored on that within the coaching pitch.”

Seven targets in 9 @premierleague video games.

pic.twitter.com/GLAXAX8cEF

— Nottingham Forest (@NFFC) October 25, 2024

It’s been a outstanding turnaround for Wooden, who has flourished below Nuno Espirito Santo since his arrival on the Metropolis Floor.

Since Nuno’s first sport in control of Forest in December 2023, solely Haaland (18) has scored extra non-penalty targets within the Premier League than Wooden (17).

“It’s consistency with what Nuno’s been engaged on. We obtained higher and higher final season however we additionally conceded poor targets at instances,” Wooden continued.

“I feel consistency is the largest factor. I wouldn’t say it fuelled us, we conceded quite a lot of set-piece targets and we labored at that and we’ve obtained to maintain going.”

Nuno additionally sung the praises of his in-form ahead, saying Wooden deserves all of the reward he’s receiving in the meanwhile.

“He’s performed a tremendous job. He’s very sincere and he offers every little thing on the pitch for us. We’re delighted and we need to proceed. Chris deserves his plaudits,” Nuno mentioned.

For Leicester, in the meantime, it marked a troublesome encounter for Steve Cooper, who was going through his former facet for the primary time since leaving the membership nearly a 12 months in the past.

Coming into the sport on the again of consecutive wins, the Foxes’ defensive lapses have been ruthlessly punished by Forest.

James Justin’s poor clearance allowed Yates to open the scoring, earlier than Harry Winks’ poor move and Wout Faes’ mistimed header have been wolfed up by Wooden.

“It’s self-inflicted, little question about that, and it’s on us. All of us must take accountability for the way the sport panned out,” Cooper mentioned.

“We made poor errors for the targets, little question about it, and we have been punished for it however I simply assume conceding so early on within the second half was clearly not factor.

“We’ve to take accountability for it. It’s a setback after profitable a couple of video games coming into this.

“We’ve to just accept it, fully on us and me and we’ve obtained punished for the poor giveaways on the targets.”