Nottingham Forest were held to a 2-2 draw against Real Betis as the club played their first game in Europe for 30 years.
Igor Jesus was lauded by the Forest fans as he scored twice to give the Reds the lead after Cedric Bakambu had fired the hosts into an early lead.
It wasn’t to be for Forest, however, and in the 85th minute of the contest, Antony pounced at the back post to score a deserved equaliser.
Ange Postecoglou will have to take the point and move on to Saturday, where Sunderland are the visitors in the new head coach’s first City Ground contest.
Michail Antonio hails Nottingham Forest star Igor Jesus
The Forest striker was in fine form, and he will surely be in contention for the starting spot in Postecoglou’s team on Saturday.
Jesus has now bagged four goals since checking in from Botafogo during the summer for a fee that looks quite ridiculous at £10 million.
Antonio was a former fan favourite at the City Ground and he thinks Chris Wood should now be worried for his place in Postecoglou’s team.
He said live on TNT Sports: “What I really like about this is where he is. He gets himself across the centre-half, it’s really good movement. Brilliant. The second is the same thing again, he makes a little step forward and sold the defender, it’s a great finish.”
“He definitely looks like a real threat, he had a couple of other opportunities that he took quite well too. His movement, he’s big, he’s strong, I honestly feel that he’s been taken off on 63 minutes to play at the weekend. If I were Chris Wood, I’d be worried.”
Jesus has to keep his place against Sunderland
Football is all about grasping opportunities and Jesus does give Forest something a little bit different that is more befitting of how Postecoglou wants his team to play football.
Jesus has now scored four goals in the two games he has started and that level of performance simply has to be rewarded with a Premier League start.
Antonio knows all about being a team’s main centre-forward having occupied that position when he was becoming West Ham’s top goalscorer in the Premier League era.
It’s vital that Postecoglou settles on a solid team very soon and hopefully, Jesus is in the team when it gets announced on Saturday.
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