Brett Ormerod column: Play-off win at Nottingham Forest one of my career highlights

I can’t believe 10 years have passed since that amazing night at the City Ground. It’s frightening, it’s gone really quick – too quick, to be honest!
Brett Ormerod's says he was more nervous off the field than on it as Blackpool's sensational season built towards its grand finaleBrett Ormerod's says he was more nervous off the field than on it as Blackpool's sensational season built towards its grand finale
Brett Ormerod's says he was more nervous off the field than on it as Blackpool's sensational season built towards its grand finale
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It’s definitely up there with some of the best memories from my career.

If memory serves me right, Forest were unbeaten at home for eight or nine months and the last team to beat them at the City Ground was us during the normal Championship season.

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In that game we took our one and only chance when Charlie Adam scored from the penalty spot.

They missed about 50 chances, so they really ought to have beaten us on that day.

But they were quietly confident heading into the second leg that they’d beat us and overturn our lead from the first leg.

Going a goal down, I think any other team would have crumbled given the way Forest were at home – but that was just the way we were that season.

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We just got the ball and went at them again, and it turned out to be one of the best nights in Blackpool’s history.

Despite holding a 2-1 lead we went into the game as underdogs – but we were always the underdogs that season, so that didn’t faze us.

We never thought too much about it. For us it was just about playing football the way the gaffer wanted us to play and do what he wanted.

We were very confident by then. We had gone 1-0 down in plenty of other games during the back end of the season, yet we still managed to win most of them.

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Even in the final when we went behind twice. We just knew we were going to score, I don’t know why.

When you concede a goal your head normally drops and it can take you a while to get back into the game.

But we were just used to it and we just knew we were good enough to create chances.

We also knew we had players throughout the team who could take those chances.

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When we went 1-0 down early doors, in front of a massive crowd at Forest, we could easily have folded but it didn’t affect us one bit.

We just got the ball, carried on doing what we were doing, created chances and scored goals.

The atmosphere after the game was absolutely unbelievable.

I was substituted in the second half, just like I was in the final.

When you were playing in the game nerves weren’t a problem, but when you come off it’s a completely different thing because it’s not in your hands anymore and there are a lot more nerves.

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But the scenes with the fans after the game and the bus journey back were brilliant.

We stopped at a petrol station and got a load of ale. It was a fantastic night.

Forest boss Billy Davies did our team-talk for us before the game. I know Bill because he signed me for Preston.

I don’t know what he was thinking. Perhaps he was just trying to play a bit of mind-games to try and get in our heads.

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But the talking he did before the game – telling us that was it because a 2-1 lead wouldn’t be enough – meant Ian Holloway didn’t have to tell us a thing.

He had heard what Billy had said in the press in the lead-up to the game, so he just said, ‘There’s your team-talk, boys.’ It helped as motivation.

It’s never over until it’s over, is it? In football nothing is ever guaranteed. We played exceptionally that night.

DJ Campbell got the headlines with his hat-trick and rightfully so because he was brilliant.

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The good thing about that team was the talent we had across the park. We had so many talented players.

Just look at Stephen Dobbie – he came on as sub, scored and made the difference for us.

We had quality in the starting 11 and we always had quality to come off the bench too.

These players stepped up to the plate and on that night it was DJ’s turn.

He was absolutely on fire. He was unplayable. Forest couldn’t live with him.

We got the chances to him and he stuck them away brilliantly.