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Forest draw a blank with Doncaster

Nottingham Forest remain in the play-off spots despite being held to a goalless draw at home by battling Doncaster. But boss Billy Davies denied the suggestion this was two points dropped as Forest's winless run was extended to six games.

He said: "Psychologically it was a great point to take us to 60 and at the end of the season it could prove very important to us.

"We are mentally and physically tired and bringing people back from injury but the players have put in a great effort. We have one more match before the international break and the freshness that we should get from that will do us the world of good.

"We had lots of possession today and lots of chances but our final ball was poor at times and that let us down.

"What we need at the moment is a bit of break and a goal to ricochet in off somebody's backside.

"But we are three points off an automatic promotion place, we have nine games coming up and it is going to be an exciting end to the season.

"There will be no easy games for anyone between now and May. Every single match will be difficult but we are in the mix and that is all we can ask. The players deserve great credit for what they have done so far this season but there are a lot of twists and turns ahead of us.

"In my opinion the promotion issue will go down to the last two or three games."

Doncaster boss Sean O'Driscoll revealed he had watched how Hull ended Forest's 36-match unbeaten home record seven days earlier.

He said: "We watched the video of the game and got a few ideas from the way Hull went about their business in beating Forest 1-0 here a week ago.

"We asked the question of whether or not they were lucky and they weren't, so we looked at the way they were set up and asked ourselves whether we could do the same.

"We didn't quite get the result they did but we've got a point and we engineered the kind of openings that could have led to us getting a goal.

"We certainly got ourselves into situations to score but didn't hit the target and you've got to do that if you want to get a goal.

"There's no doubt we were stretched because we had to bring on substitutes because of injuries and there was tiredness among the players.

"Injuries have caused us massive problems this season but the spirit has always been there. We've had to concentrate on our organisation and discipline and it has served us well again today.

"To come here and be a threat without Billy Sharp was a big plus to us. We were always going to miss him but James Hayter kept going extremely well."

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