Steve Cooper blasts Nottingham Forest’s ‘unhelpful’ social media team over that tweet which went viral before the club deleted it.
The manager, who is already under some pressure to pick up points after s disappointing start to the 2022/23 season admits his club’s social media post ahead of Saturday’s defeat at Wolves, which appeared to belittle their opponents, wasn’t helpful.
Forest uploaded a picture of their striker Emmanuel Dennis on the Molineux pitch surrounded by wolf cubs with it captioned ‘playtime’.
This was a playful attempt referencing Wolves’ unveiling video of Diego Costa, when he was paraded in a video holding a pack of ferocious looking wolves with chains.
The tweet by Forest was reportedly sent to players WhatsApp group to inspire the Wolves team to victory.
The Forest tweet was quickly got rid but not before the photoshop piece was shared in a WhatsApp group for the Wolves players, with Ruben Neves claiming it was that which served as motivation ahead of their 1-0 win at Molineux.
Interim coach Steve Davis said: “Yes, we were aware of it.
“We were going to use it in the talk but Ruben said he put it on the players’ chat so I didn’t need to say any more.
“Those sort of things used to happen on the pitch. That doesn’t happen so much now, but it gave us an edge.”
After the game, Wolves responded with a post of their own, a chopped down tree with the caption ‘playtime’s over’ with Notts Forest adds on the board behind to taunt them even more.
Neves, who scored the only goal, put his own response on Instagram.
View this post on Instagram
Cooper said it did not have a bearing on the result, but did not help his team.
‘I was asked about it in the press conference afterwards but I wasn’t aware of it, then I was notified about what happened afterwards,’ he said ahead of Tuesday’s visit to Brighton.
‘It wasn’t a good thing from the club and it wasn’t helpful.
‘But it’s been dealt with. The important thing is about learning from it.
‘It didn’t have an impact on the performance or the result; I’m not going to use that as an excuse. Professional players of both teams won’t need a social media post to be motivated to get a result.
‘It wasn’t a good moment for us. But we need to draw a line under it, trust that the club will deal with it and move on.
‘It wasn’t helpful. But at the same time, it’s done now. It won’t happen again, and we need to move on.’
🗣️ “It wasn’t a good thing and it wasn’t helpful.”
Nottingham Forest manager Steve Cooper wasn’t pleased with the social media team as Wolves claimed they used it as motivation to beat them at the weekend. 🐺🌳 pic.twitter.com/GWbK3DF1NY
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) October 17, 2022
talkSPORT’s Gabriel Agbonlahor said Forest’s tweet was ’embarrassing’ and ‘shocking’, while Jamie O’Hara described it as classless.
“I’m going to have a go at them, it’s embarrassing.
“Don’t tweet anything mocking another team until after the game, if you’re going to do it.
“As a club, you’ve embarrassed Nottingham Forest.
“Why would you Tweet something like that when you’re bottom of the league and can’t buy a win?
“You put your team under pressure, it gives Wolves the team talk they needed before the game. Shocking.”
Jamie O’Hara added: “They’re not Man City! Nottingham Forest have come up into the Premier League and they’re putting out tweets like that when you’re bottom of the league!
“Show a bit of class!”
This is what fans said as Steve Cooper blasts Nottingham Forest’s ‘unhelpful’ social media team over that tweet…
@davo261088: Well dealt with. Stupid decision from someone on the social media team who got too big for their boots.
@JamesLawrie18_: One of the most embarrassing things I’ve ever heard from a manager 😂
@Cosimo_diMedici: This is funny. Here is why, if Forest won, it’s all fun and games, now they’ve lost, it’s not helpful. Forest did not lose because of that. They lost because they didn’t take their chances and were profligate.
@morgzwhu: i like cooper as a manager but don’t blame your social media team for your own shortcomings you pillock
@Rads__Gooner: Blaming the social media admin for your team being shit is really poor from Cooper.
@GassingBlade: 21 signings don’t seem to have been that helpful either!
@NoelHolohan: If we lost to wolves because of a small bit of banter on Twitter god help us for the rest of the season.
@KJMsport57: The club is a mess. There are amateurs in professional roles. Such a shame because Steve Cooper had built a top team.
@bwoodbridge33: To be fair, the Wolves admin response was sheer brilliance 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
@d_p_ball: And all Forest fans said it long before the game started. It was stupid and deleting it only made it worse. We need to stop feeding the sharks outside the club and focus on ourselves #nffc
@nffcbywater123: Didn’t help the cause, but wolves weren’t exactly world class we was just shit, hope this helps xo
@jamiecweir: I like and hugely respect Steve Cooper, but he can be awfully po-faced and humourless about things that are just a bit of fun. First Richarlison’s keepy-uppies, now a bit of pre-match ribbing which was harmless and funny. When did we start taking things so seriously?! Lighten up!

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