How Tobias Figueiredo has quietly proved his many doubters wrong

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Over the last few months, there perhaps hasn’t been anyone as polarising to Nottingham Forest fans as centre back Tobias Figueiredo.

The former Portugal U21 was such a crucial part of Forest’s side last year and really, has been ever since he was signed in 2018.

However, ever since lockdown, Figueiredo went through – to put it mildly – a very bad run of form, most notably so in the earlier parts of this season.

In that time frame, it is indisputable that mistakes made by the 27-year-old cost the Reds points – quite possibly even double figures.

As such, his involvement in the first team is a major sticking point for some fans, although recently he has slowly and quietly got himself back on track.

It is easy to see why and as is the way with football, people do have a tendency to remember bad mistakes.

The 2-0 defeat away at Reading was for many the final straw, as Figueiredo came on at half-time displaying woeful body language, before being at fault for a goal minutes later.

Then in a 3-1 home defeat to Brentford, Figueiredo was comically beaten by Ivan Toney for the third goal in what will be one of the easiest goals he scores this season, having already been beaten in the air for the first goal.

These are only two mistakes but really, there have been several others to choose from in the earlier parts of the campaign.

His marking at set-pieces became a huge concern as well, as he was regularly getting beaten and costing goals – so much so that he, as a centre back, was repositioned to zonally mark from the six-yard box as opposed to marking someone man to man.

Ever since then though, Figueiredo’s form has started to improve and while there are still many dissenting voices when he starts, the outcry isn’t anywhere near as justified as it was before.

In the absence of Scott McKenna, Figueiredo has been regularly paired with the ever improving Joe Worrall, which was a key partnership in Forest’s play-off charge last season.

Behind the scenes, they seem to have gone back to basics and it is clear that whatever they’re working on is being effective, as the stats are backing up Figueiredo’s resurgence too.

Figueiredo has capitalised on injuries to both Worrall and McKenna to play 30 Championship matches this season – by contrast, Worrall has 23 and McKenna 15 – so some of his figures will naturally be higher than the other two.

However, that doesn’t take away from how impressive they are in their own right.

When it comes to clearances, Figueiredo is way ahead of anyone else in the Forest team with 150 according to WhoScored – for context, Worrall has 98 and McKenna 50, so Figueiredo has more than both combined.

He has also made 42 interceptions this season, only bettered by Cyrus Christie with 55. Again for context, Worrall has 25 and McKenna 11.

Figueiredo isn’t afraid to put his body on the line for the club either, blocking 17 shots – Worrall does one-up him here as he has 21, while McKenna has blocked four attempts on goal.

It’s a similar story when it comes to tackling, as well – Figueiredo has completed 25 of his 32 attempted tackles, which gives him a success rate of 78%.

This is very similar to Worrall, who has completed 20 of his 26 tackle attempts – a success rate of 77%.

He also seems to mirror Worrall when it comes to being dribbled past – Figueiredo being beaten on seven occasions, while Worrall has been done six times. Amazingly, no player in the Championship has dribbled past McKenna yet.

As such, it’s clear that while Worrall indisputably carries more influence within the side, the two have actually been operating at a largely similar level.

This isn’t to say Figueiredo is perfect, because of course he isn’t – he has also given away 36 fouls, which is staggering when you consider Worrall has given away nine and McKenna three.

As a result, Figueiredo has eight yellow cards – which is the highest in the Forest side.

However, it is clear that Figueiredo is far from the liability that he is made out to be, which is some turnaround in fairness to him.

In fact, it is testament to Figueiredo that even when he made the cardinal sin of committing an error that led to a goal against Derby County, he wasn’t really slammed for it.

A clearance was shanked and fell straight to Colin Kazim-Richards, who pounced emphatically to level the scores at 1-1, though he probably hadn’t hit a ball as cleanly as he did then throughout his entire career.

On that occasion, Figueiredo was a contender for Forest’s man of the match, so it was a very cruel way for his match to end when he hadn’t otherwise put a foot wrong.

It is very clear that Forest’s chosen centre back pairing is Worrall and McKenna, but injuries have largely prevented that and will do so again for the foreseeable future as Worrall has a cracked rib.

However, while the first part of his season was very much a write-off, Figueiredo has proved that he can be relied upon in the second half and by doing so, has proven a lot of people wrong.

Should Nottingham Forest fans be a bit more receptive to Tobias Figueiredo?