Saturday 16th November

[Crewelad87]

Who are Forest's main rivals according to them? Would it be Leicester and Derby?

Definitely Derby. They were chanting " we only hate derby" at the game vs Leicester the other week.

 

[mozzavale]

A load of Stoke and Vale fans came to Wembley to cheer for us in the 1997 playoff final

Remember it well. A lad I played football with went. He's a big Vale fan but the Sentinel made him wear a Stoke top for a photo

 

[Conker]

It’s Derby and it’s both ways, you know a real rivalry.

 

[mozzavale]

Funny one the Potteries derby. Stoke in a similar position to Forest in that they share a city with a much smaller team, but Forest unlike Stoke could not give a toss about the smaller team. Yet for all the perceived hatred from the Vale fans towards Stoke the last few derbys at VP have barely scrapped 10k (according to 11v11), that would be with at least 4k Stoke in there, plus one match under 9k, which probably meant more Stoke than Vale in VP, and that’s not including the daft diddy cup match the other season. Very odd, I’m sure there must be a valid reason for the poor Vale turnouts?

Can't speak for anyone else, I went them all. But after a few years of sell outs, 20k plus attendances early to mid 90s at both grounds...the level of violence put a lot of people off going. We got 8k the first season back in the Championship. Was an early kick off on Sky. I missed the kick off as I was playing Sunday morning and had to rush back for it. Then part of our ground was closed down by the council.

Our attendances plummeted around early 2000s. Not sure why. We had a sky game v Grimsby in the Championship where only 3k turned up. Can't really put a finger on why that happened, especially as we were in a league we could only dream of being in now. Over the years though, a lot have finally started to return. We get similar averages now in L2, and last season when relegated from L1, than we did at the tail end of our Championship years.

 

[jacobncfc]

Who are Forest's main rivals according to them? Would it be Leicester and Derby?

Derby. I live in Leicester and that’s almost as one-sided a rivalry as ours with them is.

Us and Forest is obviously a complete nothing of a rivalry and has been for a few generations, but that would change pretty quickly if we were at the same sort of level for any length of time. I don’t really care about them at all either way though tbh, possibly because I’ve never lived in Notts. I wouldn’t say I hate anyone really, the odd team I enjoy beating a bit more than the others but ultimately I am quite happy not having a ‘proper derby’.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

That's the classic case Forest hate Derby and Derby hate Forest, it's a classic well known English derby. Leicester are the odd wheel who want it to be a rivalry more than Forest do for that reason.

Saying that there is definitely added spice to that fixture due to proximity. Leicester's has to be Coventry surely?

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

I watched a Forest fan vlog of our play off game with Notts and he was wanting County to win so in the comments I asked him why a Forest fan would want County to win and he replied I want all Nottingham clubs to do well I haven’t anything against Notts.
Which sums up just how much rivalry there is from Forest’s side.

Of course you did

Why would he want Grimsby to win that Non League playoff? I assume he was sat in the home end?

 

[Si Robin]

And of all those quoted fierce and sometimes toxic consensual two way rivalries only 1 play in the same league and even that one is newly formed and hotly disputed.

This comes back to my point about it having to have a history to it to make it more than a rivalry.

Until we got promoted to the Football League in 1999, we played Gloucester City every season - getting crowds of over 2,500 in the Southern League in the 1990s (the Boxing Day game at Meadow Park in 1994 had 3,018!!). Our other games that season averaged around 800. Anyone my age and older will only ever consider them our true rival and the real Gloucestershire Derby.

Forest Green is just kids on both sides wanting to act out Football Factory very poorly because we haven't had a true rival since leaving City behind. It's a rivalry out of necessity rather than anything else.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

Yup history is very important but often chosen to be overlooked.

 

[valefan16]

Who are Forest's main rivals according to them? Would it be Leicester and Derby?

My family and friends are mostly Leicester fans and it kind of depends where you live, if you live sort of Melton Mowbray/Oakham end of Leicestershire then they would look at Forest, if more Loughborough/Coalville side then Derby and Hinckley/South Leicestershire would be Coventry.

Suppose the City itself would be more split/neutral to who they dislike the most.

 

[Son of Cod]

I reckon we could stake a real claim for the biggest sad sack club nobody cares about.

What about Bradford? Probably a load in the Championship too tbf. Coventry, does anyone care about them?

 

[Jimmy Anderson]

Can't speak for anyone else, I went them all. But after a few years of sell outs, 20k plus attendances early to mid 90s at both grounds...the level of violence put a lot of people off going. We got 8k the first season back in the Championship. Was an early kick off on Sky. I missed the kick off as I was playing Sunday morning and had to rush back for it. Then part of our ground was closed down by the council.

Our attendances plummeted around early 2000s. Not sure why. We had a sky game v Grimsby in the Championship where only 3k turned up. Can't really put a finger on why that happened, especially as we were in a league we could only dream of being in now. Over the years though, a lot have finally started to return. We get similar averages now in L2, and last season when relegated from L1, than we did at the tail end of our Championship years.

3000 were the attendances vale were getting in the 1970s and 1980s then alot more started to come in the late 80s early 90s under John rudge. I think alot of fans stopped going when John rudge got sacked in 1999, also some stopped going due to bill bell selling the best players and not replacing them. Vale were one of the first few clubs go into administration and you can see why really as went from being div 1 for 7 straight seasons averaging 8500 to having 4000 on a Saturday and 3000 on a Tuesday night and getting relegated from div 1 to div 2. The 3 seasons between 2000 and 2003 vale averaged around 4500 then from 2004 onwards it rose to more 5000 to 5500 which it stayed too untill 3 years ago where it went up too 6500 averages and first season back in league one 7600 average.

 

[lordofthepies]

Crewe as mentioned is the most natural one for their own reasons of not having a proper rival. The two clubs don't like each other but it's just not a Derby.

I quite like Stockport. Probably like them a bit less now I've moved here as younger County fans can be a bit annoying when they work out I'm a Crewe fan.

 

[Stocky]

I quite like Stockport. Probably like them a bit less now I've moved here as younger County fans can be a bit annoying when they work out I'm a Crewe fan.

I agreed with the gist of one of your earlier posts when you said that we've come back to the FL and just decided you're massive rivals of ours. When in reality it was never that big of a deal, just a local game.

I get it a bit and I think some of your fans were happy to embrace it too. And it probably is a younger element for both.