Football: Forest artists fear changing times: The maverick managing genius at the City Ground faces a stiff test as his team flounder in the top flight. Joe Lovejoy reports

It never rains but it pours. To the further dismay of Graham Taylor, the last club in the country playing the way England should are contemplating a change of style to drag themselves off the bottom of the Premier League.

Nottingham Forest's dire start to the season is said to be tempting Brian Clough to compromise the principles which have made his team the last bastions of precision and artistry in a league which has sold its soul to the devil in return for an easy route to security. The long ball.

The axiom that the frenzy of English club football is lousy preparation for the international game will be truer than ever if Forest turn their back on sophistication and start kicking and rushing with the plebs.

Bottom or not, they are still a joy to watch, last week's defeat at Blackburn coming as welcome reassurance that they continue to prize pass and move above up and under.

Liverpool were from the same thoroughbred stable, Norwich City, too, but both have adjusted the rangefinder over the last couple of seasons, and now favour a longer ball to mask the mediocrity of their midfield technique.

Forest stand alone in pushing and running, and tracing a pleasing triangular route from A to B. But for how much longer?

After Blackburn had overpowered them last Saturday, winning 4-1, Kenny Dalglish paid tribute to the quality of Forest's football in defeat.

He said: 'They always play some nice stuff, and Cloughie will always play the same way. He'll never change his philosophy.'

Son of Brian is not so sure. Invited to comment on the reasons for his team's decline, and the best way to reverse it, Nigel Clough cited the departure of good players - Des Walker, Darren Wassall and Teddy Sheringham - and the need to adjust the pattern of play to compensate for their absence.

Without the defensive immunity afforded by Walker's pace and a reliable goalscorer at the sharp end, Forest's traditional strategy of soaking up pressure and hitting hard on the break - de rigueur at international level - was no longer working.

'We've been letting in too many goals, but we're not actually playing that badly,' Clough junior said. 'Obviously, if you take Des Walker out of any team, England included, they are going to miss him. We certainly have.

'We got off to a good start, beating Liverpool, but since then we've had problems adjusting to the loss of Des. You get used to having a player who has been there for seven years. You get used to playing a certain way, and you're not going to get out of those habits in half a dozen games.

'We've been able to take a few liberties in the past, with Des there at the back. We relied on his pace to get us out of trouble. That's not there now, so we have got to have a close look at how we are playing.'

The loss of Walker, sold to Sampdoria for a paltry pounds 1.5m, has left Forest with a soft-centre defence plundered for 16 goals in five successive defeats. A team who used to pride themselves on their parsimony now have the worst defensive record in the country.

That it has happened is down to an elementary procedural error by the most experienced manager in the game. In selling Walker, Clough was confident that he had a ready-made replacement in Wassall. He had, but he lost him, too.

Heavily reliant on Wassall though he now was, Clough had neglected to tie him to the City Ground long term, and Forest staggered under another body- blow when their 'new Walker' decamped to join Derby County, of all people, under freedom of contract.

From bad to worse. Sheringham, last season's leading scorer, and the only striker at the club with a decent scoring record, was sold to Tottenham Hotspur for pounds 2.1m, and replaced by Gary Bannister - a 32-year-old free transfer from West Bromwich Albion.

Even from the manager's chair, it looked bad. Clough told the tabloid newspaper which pays him for his thoughts: 'I suppose the whispering has started. I suppose they're saying that I'm past it at last - that the old so-and-so has either lost his touch or finally gone off his rocker.'

He is right about one thing, at least. The whispering has started. It began some time ago, when he hit some spectators who had run on the pitch and took to kissing other managers.

'Old Big 'Ead', as he calls himself, also treated the Wimbledon players recently to a hilarious rendition of 'My Way' - but although he remains very much 'The Boss', much now depends on Ron Fenton, his trusty lieutenant.

Fenton it is who takes the training, implements the strategy and echoes his master's voice in the dressing-room.

Stuart Pearce, captain of Forest and England, confirmed that Clough was a stranger to the training ground, but insisted his absence was nothing new, and thought he 'hadn't really changed'.

Pearce said: 'No matter how the team are doing, he sticks to a routine - the same one that has brought him success over the last 25 years. He still comes in only once a week.'

A Forest player for seven years, Pearce said he considered he knew Clough well, but he would not presume to offer him advice or seek his company on a social level.

'Over seven years, you get to know what you can do and what you can't,' he explained. 'Interfering is one of the things you can't do. We have a good working relationship - he's my boss and I work for him. That's it.

'We don't go out for meals, or anything like that. He hasn't asked me to go out with him for seven years, and I don't think he will start next week.'

Discussions on a professional level were also kept to a minimum. 'I wouldn't dream of going in to see him and saying: 'What's going on? What are we going to do?' He's been in the game a lot longer than me, he knows it inside out and he'll know what to do to put things right.'

Meanwhile, Pearce said, Clough's 'overpowering' personality would continue to shield his team. 'The manager's name will always get on the back pages before any of the players. He shelters us from a lot, really, taking the heat out of everything.'

If the heat got too hot, would the 57-year-old grandfather carry out his perennial threat, and resign? No way. Pearce recognised a kindred spirit when he saw one.

'I don't think he's the sort of person to stand down when the going gets tough. He's not a quitter. I can't see him packing it in for a younger man. There's more chance of that after he's won something.'

We must pray that he does, or at least that results pick up soon. At the moment, Forest cannot see the wood for the trees, but their measured, passing game is precious throwback amid the contemporary hurly-burly.

The prospect of Cloughie losing the faith, and joining the long-ball automatons, is too awful to contemplate.

(Photograph omitted)