Crystal Palace vs Forest: two sides still losing at home

Crystal Palace vs Nottingham Forest at Selhurst Park, 14:00 BST on Sunday 11 October, is a match between two sides whose home and away records point in opposite directions. Palace have lost both home matches and won once away. Forest have not won or scored at the City Ground, and are unbeaten on the road.

Palace arrive off a goalless draw at Leeds United, their first clean sheet of the season. Forest lost 1-0 at home to Coventry City, who had not scored a goal or won a point in their first four matches.

Palace: seven conceded at home

Palace lost 2-0 at Everton, lost 4-1 at home to Manchester City, won 3-2 at Fulham, lost 3-2 at home to Ipswich Town and drew 0-0 at Leeds. Six scored, eleven conceded, four points from five. Their two home matches have produced ten goals and no points.

The clean sheet at Elland Road was a change of shape: before it, every Palace match had produced at least three goals. They had more shots on target than Leeds that afternoon and were closer to winning it than the scoreline suggests.

Forest: no home goals, four away

Forest lost 1-0 at home to Leeds, drew 2-2 at Liverpool, drew 0-0 at home to Tottenham, won 2-1 at Aston Villa and lost 1-0 at home to Coventry. Four scored and five conceded, five points, and every one of those goals came away from home.

At the City Ground they have played three and scored none, despite having more of the ball in most of them; against Coventry they took twenty-four shots and put three on target. On the road they have a win and a draw and have scored in both matches.

• Crystal Palace: 4 points from their first five, 6 scored, 11 conceded
• Palace at home: lost 2, 3 scored, 7 conceded
• Nottingham Forest: 5 points from their first five, 4 scored, 5 conceded
• Forest away: won 1, drawn 1, 4 scored, 3 conceded; at home: 0 scored in three
• Kick-off: Sunday 11 October, 14:00 BST, Selhurst Park

Last time out

Palace drew 0-0 at Leeds United on 20 September, their first clean sheet of the season. They had twelve shots and four on target to Leeds’ two, and collected three of the afternoon’s five yellow cards, Adam Wharton, Yeremy Pino and Jefferson Lerma all booked for bad fouls.

Forest lost 1-0 at home to Coventry City the day before. Jay Dasilva scored on fifty-five minutes from a ball played forward by the goalkeeper Carl Rushworth, and Forest’s twenty-four shots produced three on target. It was their third home match of the season without a goal.

Where the table stands

After five matches Palace are fifteenth on four points and Forest thirteenth on five. Palace have conceded eleven, one of the three worst totals in the league; Forest have conceded five, which is respectable, and scored four, which is not.

The winner moves into the middle of the table. The loser drops towards a bottom group that currently starts at four points and includes Sunderland and Aston Villa alongside Palace.

What decides it

On current form this favours the away side more than the table does. Forest’s goals have all come on the road and Palace’s defence has been at its weakest at home. The counterweight is the afternoon at Leeds, which suggests Palace may have found something defensively just before the break.

For Forest it is a chance to continue a run of results away from home that their home form keeps cancelling out. For Palace it is the chance to win a first match at Selhurst Park, and to move clear of the bottom group while doing it.

Both sides come in carrying a single clean sheet and a question about goals. Palace scored six in their first four matches and none at Leeds; Forest have scored four in five, all of them on the road. Palace’s three goals at home have come in two defeats, 4-1 and 3-2, so they have shown they can score at Selhurst Park. What they have not shown is that they can do it without conceding more, and Forest, for all their trouble at home, have conceded three goals in their two away matches.

Simulate it before it happens

Palace have lost both home matches and Forest have scored all their goals away. On the Premier League simulator you can play this fixture now and see which record holds.

• Play the remaining 33 rounds from the real table and the real fixture list
• Run this fixture through the AI match simulator, in tactical view or in the physics arena
• Open the line-up builder for both clubs before you kick off a simulation
• Turn an arena simulation into a vertical video ready to share

"Forest have not scored a goal at the City Ground. On the road they are unbeaten."