Leeds United boss takes positives from Forest defeat

Although not at their best Ross McCormack’s equaliser appeared to have given United hope of salvaging something from their journey to the City Ground only for Matt Derbyshire to score a winner for Forest seconds after the restart.

“I’d say that we would have nicked a point, but that is irrelevant,” said McDermott.

“I have been in games where we have nicked a point before. I said to them at half time, ‘don’t think that just because it isn’t going your way that you can’t get a result.’

“We could have got a result on Sunday. It was a great strike from one of their guys right at the end, just after we’d scored.”

McDermott saw some positives from the game, particularly from some of his younger players, including 18-year-old Gboly Ariyibi, who made his debut as a second half substitute.

He added: “If you look at our front three right at the end, they were all young and will get better all the time and they are going to be part of our squad going forward.”

“I thought that Gboly did smashing. For an 18-year-old boy that has come from nowhere, the occasion didn’t faze him and he showed a bit of pace.

“Ross (McCormack) came off because his hamstrings were tight. So we have to be mindful of that and we have to look after Ross.

“Paddy (Kenny) had a bad ankle, he did really well to come through the game. I have to say credit to Paddy because it was a really nasty tackle in the first couple of minutes.”