“If you go up one side of the mountain, you are going to have to eventually come down the other side.”
In the form of his career at 32, Nottingham Forest striker Chris Wood has just been asked if he enjoys all the positive headlines.
The New Zealand international has been in the spotlight – scoring eight of Forest’s 15 league goals so far – but his thoughtful answer reflects his journey across 12 English clubs, including Burnley, Leeds, Leicester and Newcastle.
“It’s about making coming down the other side as small as possible to bounce back up and make a new mountain,” says Wood, speaking to BBC Sport before Saturday’s home game against Ipswich. “Mentality is huge in sport and in football. If you can control that side of the game it helps.
“You go through these mountains and waves through the whole season. It’s not just a case of skyrocketing. That’s what I got told by [former technical director] Dan Ashworth when I was at West Brom: It’s not always going to be plain sailing.
“There are going to be those waves and you have to ride with them and hope the downside is as small as possible to get the upsides as big as possible.”
Wood, who scored 14 league goals last season, became the first Forest player to win the Premier League Player of the Month award in October and is closing on Bryan Roy’s club record of 24 goals in the competition.
Under boss Nuno Espirito Santo, he has scored 19 goals in 28 top-flight appearances and says he has found a manager who both understands and values him.
“You have to find where you are appreciated. Managers have their own style and how they want to play games,” says Wood, speaking at the club’s training ground.
“That’s not anything I can control. It just means you might not be in the right area or the manager’s cup of tea. There’s always a manager who likes a number nine, or a false nine.
“I’m not a man who is going to beat two or three players and stick in in the top corner, I’m a man who relies on service. If they can’t supply me, I can’t score.
“It’s about trying to find the role which fits everyone and fortunately under Nuno it has.
“The six or seven loans I had as a youngster taught me a lot about being appreciated and valued. It’s not always about you as a person or player, it’s how you connect and build with a team. A lot of it is out of your control.”
Nuno has been at the City Ground for 11 months, since replacing the popular Steve Cooper in December 2023, and kept Forest up despite a chaotic end to the season.
Survival came after a four-point deduction for breaching profit and sustainability rules amid a backdrop of refereeing rows and controversial club social media posts.
Wood established himself as the side’s talisman, scoring a hat-trick at Newcastle in Nuno’s second game and two at Burnley to officially seal survival on the final day of the 2023-24 campaign and relegate his former club.
Only Erling Haaland and Cole Palmer have more Premier League goals than him since Christmas and the forward agrees he is in the form of his career – and wishes he had met Nuno earlier.
“Definitely, it’s worked well so far and hopefully there’s a lot more to come for both of us. I’ve had a lot of great managers over my career and it’s nice to have another one to add to the group,” he tells BBC Sport.
“He came in and gave me the confidence to start, he put me in his first team and it’s spiralled from there.
“I feel I can have an open and honest conversation with him. There’s that mutual respect there and you don’t always get that.
“He’s a down to earth man, loves having that team ethic. He wants to trust everyone and does until you break that trust. That’s a great way of looking at life.”
Wood’s disappointing 12-month spell at Eddie Howe’s Newcastle between January 2022 and January 2023 may have coloured the average fan’s perception of him – yet his Premier League credentials are better reflected by a record of 53 goals in 165 Burnley games over four-and-a-half years with Sean Dyche fighting for survival.
And his goalscoring ratio at Leeds in the Championship was one in two (44 goals in 88 games) following a Leicester spell of 20 goals in 62 games.
He has 77 goals in 239 Premier League games and will hope to join the 100 club with Forest contract talks ongoing as his deal expires at the end of the season.
“Whenever it happens it happens. It’s not something I can control or worry about,” he said.
“I can’t let it affect me. These things take time and I just have to worry about scoring goals, winning games and doing well for this club.
“I still have ambitions and drive to play long into my 30s. It’s how you take care of your body and how you take care of nutrition off the pitch, it’s huge.
“I want to play for as long as I can.”
Add Comment