One Nottingham Forest player really struggled vs Malmo but he needs more game time

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Nottingham Forest were easy winners against Malmo with the 3-0 scoreline flattering the Swedish outfit.

In a repeat of the 1979 European Cup final, Forest never looked threatened, with the visitors struggling to adapt to the pace of the Reds players.

Brian Laws raved about Arnaud Kalimuendo after he bagged his first goal, with Ryan Yates and Nikola Milenkovic also getting their names on the scoresheet.

Sean Dyche will be satisfied with another three points and the fact that his team scored three goals for the third consecutive game in all competitions.

• READ MORE: Forest star proves his worth against Malmö

James McAtee struggles vs Malmo

Nobody wants to pick negatives out of an emphatic win, but it was clear that McAtee struggled for a second successive Europa League game as he replaced the injured Morgan Gibbs-White.

From the moment his first corner of the match went straight out of play, the confidence seemed to drain from McAtee as he tried desperately to make an impact.

In truth, there were some positives, with his teasing ball allowing Yates to force a good save from the Malmo goalkeeper in the build up to Kalimuendo’s goal.

But, for the money spent on McAtee, perhaps more is expected from him and in fairness, the challenge for him now is to simply try and carve out more minutes in Dyche’s team.

McAtee has come from a Manchester City squad brimming with World Class talent and now, he needs to understand that the emphasis is placed on him to be the one to make things happen when he does play.

James McAtee stats vs Malmo

Everyone is aware that McAtee can play better than he did here. However, the Reds star isn’t getting the minutes that he might have hoped to get and that is holding him back.

McAtee might be called into action once again this weekend if Gibbs-White doesn’t recover in time and he will have to make an improvement on this showing if that is the case.

Nobody takes any satisfaction in seeing a big-money signing struggle but although he did grow into this game a little bit, it’s alarming that he once again got cramp in the second half

Dyche has a bit of a conundrum on his hands with McAtee and now it will be intriguing to see what he deems best for the player signed from Manchester City in the summer.