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By JAMES SHARPE Published: 01: 26 AEST, 19 May 2025 | Updated: 02: 51 AEST, 19 May 2025 15 View comments The Champions League dream is still alive for Nottingham Forest. Their victory at West Ham, courtesy of goals from Morgan Gibbs-White and Nikola Milenkovic, keeps the pressure on their top-five rivals and sets up a thrilling final-day showdown with Chelsea. Forest have secured European football for the first time in 30 years but the question still remains over how illustrious next season’s competition will be. After this, the Champions League, the Europa League and the Conference League all remain on the table. Boy, it was tense. Jarrod Bowen’s late volley for West Ham set up a frantic, frayed finish and it needed a stoppage-time save from Matz Sels from Niclas Fullkrug to secure the victory for Nuno Espirito Santo’s side. This win means that, while they still need their rivals to slip up, victory over Chelsea on the final day could secure Champions League football. It was never going to be anything but nervy. They have been nervous for a while now, Forest, this group of players who have performed at the peak of their capabilities and beyond for so much of the season but have since faltered to see their Champions League ambitions slip through their fingers. That twitchiness was on display early at the London Stadium. Forest needed the fingertips of Matz Sels to tip Tomas Soucek’s header over the bar less than two minutes into the game before Jean-Clair Todibo glanced wide from James Ward-Prowse’s resulting corner. Morgan Gibbs-White dedicated his opening goal to Taiwo Awoniyi following his recent ordeal Gibbs-White capitalised on an error from Alphonse Areola to open the scoring early on The Hammers goalkeeper gifted the ball to the home side, who made him pay for his mistake WEST HAM (3-4-1-2): Areola 5. 5; Todibo 6. 5, Kilman 6, Cresswell 6 (Alvarez 58, X); Coufal 6. 5, Ward-Prowse 6 (Soler 58, X), Rodriguez 5. 5 (Paqueta 58, 6. 5), Wan-Bissaka 6. 5; Soucek 6 (Fullkrug 58, X); Bowen 7. 5, Kudus 6 (Guilherme 79) Scorers: Bowen Booked: Coufal, Rodriguez, Paqueta, Todibo, Alvarez, Soler Manager: Graham Potter 5. 5 NOTTINGHAM FOREST (4-3-2-1): Sels 7. 5; Aina 6, Milenkovic 8, Murillo 7; Williams 7. 5; Dominguez 7 (Yates 90), Sangare 7 (Morato 83), Anderson 7 (Hudson-Odoi 83); GIBBS-WHITE 8. 5 (Danilo 83); Wood 6. 5, Elanga 7. 5 (Silva 90) Scorers: Gibbs-White 11, Milenkovic 61 Booked: Murillo, Morato Manager: Nuno Espirito Santo 6. 5 Referee: Sam Barrott 5 Attendance: 62, 466 Even Vladimir Coufal, who has never scored for the Hammers and will leave this summer, forced a save with an early effort. Nerves are easily settled, though, when your opponent gifts you the lead and it was West Ham who duly obliged when Alphonse Areola passed the ball straight to Morgan Gibbs-White, who had earlier had a fierce volley saved, to tap into an empty net. Gibbs-White charged to the corner flag and held up a shirt with Taiwo Awoniyi’s name on the back of the shirt, in solidarity with their team-mate who is recovering after urgent surgery on a ruptured intestine sustained after colliding with the post against Leicester. Before kick-off, Forest’s players had warmed up in t-shirts with ‘Awoniyi 9’ on the back and ‘We’re all with you Taiwo’ on the front. There were similar concerning scenes midway through the first half when Jarrod Bowen also looked to have clattered into the post head first after challenging for the ball on the line and was left needing medical attention before walking away with a cut above his eye. It was assistant referee Sian Massey-Ellis delaying her offside flag against Leicester that ended in Awoniyi sustaining his serious injury, leading to calls for that controversial edict to be changed, and there were similar murmurings of frustration around the London Stadium when Wood charged through and attempted two shots on goal before eventually being brought back for offside. That frustration was nothing, however, on the tortuous delay Forest fans had to endure to find out whether Milenkovic had doubled the visitors’ lead when the defender flicked in Anthony Elanga’s free-kick just after the hour. Officials spent six minutes to decide that his team-mate Nicolas Dominguez was in an offside position but not interfering with play. Referee Sam Barrott called over both managers to inform them that the new semi-automated wasn’t available and that there were issues with the communications between the VAR and the on-field officials. Nikola Milenkovic doubled Forest's lead in the second half to keep their top five hopes alive Milenkovic was one of the standout performers as Forest picked up a vital three points  Jarrod Bowen pulled one back for the hosts with a brilliant strike to make it a nervy finish Bowen celebrates after halving the deficit with a lovely finish midway through the second half Once given, it meant that Elanga had provided his 11th assist of the league campaign to join Bryan Roy as the Forest player with the most in a single Premier League season. And yet it was still to be a twitchy finish for Forest. Out of nowhere, substitute Lucas Paqueta chipped a ball to the back post towards and Bowen finished it in style with a beautiful touch to bring the ball down from behind his body and volley it into the net. Game on. Eleven minutes of stoppage time did little more to ease the tension as Fullkrug forced Sels into action and a late fracas saw the referee brandish a swarm of yellow cards. At last, though, Forest could breathe although next Sunday will likely be even more breathless.

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