---
title: "Villa player ratings: Nottingham Forest (A)"
canonical: "https://readastonvilla.com/2017/02/04/villa-player-ratings-nottingham-forest/"
type: "post"
language: "en-GB"
author: "Sheldon Muchmore"
section: "Features & Analysis"
published: "2017-02-04T22:36:46Z"
modified: "2017-02-04T23:09:15Z"
---

# Villa player ratings: Nottingham Forest (A)

Aston Villa’s chances of a play-off position disappeared over the horizon as a result of an agonizing 2-1 defeat to Nottingham Forest.

Villa opened the scoring in the 19th minute thanks to Kodjia’s brilliant curling effort from the edge of the box. However, just before half time, Johnstone made yet another unforced error and spilled a Jamie Ward shot, allowing Assombalonga to tap in the equalizer. For most of the second half it looked like Villa would be the ones to score the winner, but this all changed when Jack Grealish was sent off in the 78th minute for a second booking. A man down, Villa found themselves on the backfoot and this pressure told when teenager Brereton fired home in the dying moments.

The result leaves Villa a whole 13 points off of the 6th and final play-off position and just 8 points above the dreaded relegation zone. Villa can now probably forget about earning a chance of promotion this season, and they should now start looking below them instead. A couple more poor performances over the next few weeks could actually see Villa dragged closer to a relegation fight instead of the expected play-off battle.

Here are our player ratings for tonight’s game.