Nottingham Forest moved out of the relegation zone on goal difference with a 0-0 draw at home to Fulham, but head coach Vitor Pereira remains winless from his four Premier League games in charge.
Forest had dropped into the bottom three on Saturday evening after West Ham earned an unlikely point against Manchester City. However, they swapped places again less than 24 hours later, following a low-quality stalemate at the City Ground.
Dan Ndoye appeared to have given the hosts a priceless lead midway through the second half when he raced through and slotted past Bernd Leno, but the goal was ruled out for offside following a VAR check.
Ndoye was introduced at half-time by Pereira, who has overseen just one win in his seven games in charge across all competitions. He made an immediate impact, winning a penalty from Calvin Bassey's clumsy foul which was then overturned due to another offside call.
Pereira's half-time changes - he also brought on Omari Hutchinson - made Forest more dangerous in attack, although it was right-back Ola Aina who went closest with a shot from the edge of the box that rattled the crossbar.
Fulham, in 11th, failed to have a shot on target despite Bassey forcing a superb save from Matz Sels in the first half - again though, that was adjudged to have been offside.
Rodrigo Muniz's goalbound volley was crucially deflected behind by Aina in the second half before Sasa Lukic shot narrowly wide as both sides settled for a point.
Nottingham Forest head coach Vitor Pereira told Your Site:
"Very happy with my players because we gave everything. Happy with our supporters because they tried to help us until the end.
"In my opinion, I said to them now, this is not a speed race, this is a marathon until the end and in our minds, because of course today was a chance to get three points, but the next game we have another chance to get three points.
"This is the spirit, it's not because we play home or away. The spirit must be to win points and to fight, to compete to win the game.
"In football, sometimes the result is difficult to control. But what we do on the pitch, we can control. Or we give everything to win, or we show the spirit to win the game, or not. I'm happy with them and proud of them, because they did everything to win the game.
"I think it will be tough until the end. The decision, I believe, the decision will be at the end. I hope that we can get points before then to escape the relegation zone.
"Because the teams that are competing with us, Tottenham, West Ham, Leeds, they have good teams. And we need to, mentally, we need to be prepared to compete and to fight until the end."
Fulham head coach Marco Silva told Your Site:
"First half was very balanced. No chances, we had one great one from a set-piece. Big chance from Calvin. It was a game that probably needed a goal from one team or the other to open up.
"We arrived with balls in dangerous areas, but our inspiration in that moment, the decision was not at the level that allowed us to create chances because the space was there during the first half.
"And the second half, a little bit more of a broken game. The conditions and the weather created a different scenario in the game. It was a tight game. After the penalty that was offside and all that stuff, it created different emotions in the game and from that moment, both teams were trying to win the game.
"When you are able to keep a clean sheet, it's always a good sign. It's something that we have been missing in many moments of the season."
Analysis from Your Site' Callum Bishop:
It feels like a broken record simply saying that Nottingham Forest continued to struggle in front of goal.
This wasn't as bad as their 35 and 22 efforts without reward against Wolves and FC Midtjylland respectively, but it was another 11 fruitless shots. It could've been so different.
It was about the fine margins. The tightness of the offside that denied Ndoye a precious goal was hard to spot with the naked eye.
"This is where we don't give advantage to the strikers. You see it, where has he got an advantage?" were Jamie Redknapp's words afterwards. But it wasn't just the goal.
On another day, Ola Aina would've been celebrating the goal of his life. Instead, he had to watch his incredible strike cannon off the crossbar. If Ndoye had started his very first run of the game half a second later, he'd have won his side a penalty.
Of course, there are still question marks on how clinical Vitor Pereira's side are. And rightly so. But when luck isn't on your side, it makes it even harder to find momentum. Especially when you're in a dogfight at the bottom of the table.
