Huddersfield Town produced the “perfect away performance” to snap their losing sequence.
So says Nottingham Forest skipper Matt Mills, who was on the receiving end as David Wagner’s side won 2-0.
Town travelled to the City Ground in danger of suffering four successive league defeats for the first time since 2000-01.
And Forest, who have hopes of forcing their way into the Championship play-off picture, had kept four clean sheets running in the league.
But after a Mills own goal set them on their way, they sealed three points courtesy of a spectacular strike by teenage midfielder Philip Billing.
It was a first defeat in 14 Championship games for Mills and his teammates.
And the centre-back said: “I thought it was the perfect away performance from them. They’ll certainly see it that way.
“They started the game very well, but didn’t get out their own half in the second half. They were 1-0 up, so they didn’t need to.
“They could camp behind the ball, frustrate us and hit us on the counter-attack.
“It was our job to break that down, but we couldn’t.”
Those views were echoed by Forest boss Dougie Freedman , who said: “That was as good a display as I’ve seen from an opposition side at the City Ground this season.
“We must give Huddersfield credit for that.”
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Mills admitted Forest played right into Town’s hands with tactics which allowed David Wagner’s side to take control early on.
“This was a classic case of when you go and try to press the ball in the wrong areas,” added the 29-year-old.
“Then you can be picked off by anyone.
“Huddersfield obviously play a lot from the back, so we thought we’d try and catch them high.
“But they made it difficult for us to do that.
“That’s not been us, we’ve been strong defensively, organised, and we’ve been very effective hitting sides on the counter-attack.
“I think we maybe got caught between the two, so I believe we’ll go back to the way I feel we play best and get results.”
Nottingham Forest 0 Huddersfield Town 2
Forest remained 10th and Town 17th ahead of games at Burnley and at home to Wolves respectively.
Mills, Forest’s close-season signing from boss Freedman’s former club Bolton Wanderers, refused to rule out the play-offs.
“We’ll work hard and go again,” he said.
“What else do we aim for? There’s no point aiming for mid-table mediocrity, you need to pick yourself up.
“We’re a dressing room of characters who want to achieve something.
“And we’ve got a manager who believes this team is capable of doing something, as we do.
“That will be our focus. As long as it’s mathematically possible, we’ll try our utmost to achieve that.”
