Why the Nottingham Forest game against Brentford has been rescheduled by one week is explained.

Latest Nottingham Forest news as changes made to Premier League schedule for Steve Cooper’s Reds.

The Nottingham Forest Premier League calendar for December and January has undergone a number of alterations.

The Reds’ away match against Brentford has been rescheduled to take place one week later. The game, which was scheduled to start at 3 p.m. on Saturday, January 13, has been rescheduled for Saturday, January 20, at 5.30 p.m., and will air live on Sky Sports.

With the change, Forest will have a free weekend on January 13 and 14. This is because this season, the Premier League will have a mid-season break.

The 2023/24 campaign is the first time the winter break has been utilised in the top-flight since it was introduced for the 2019/20 season. Disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic and alterations to the schedule due to last year’s World Cup meant it was not incorporated into the past three campaigns.

To fit it into this year’s calendar, the Premier League announced in August that matches originally planned for January 13 would be split across that weekend and the weekend of January 20/21. With the TV picks announced today, it is now known which games will take place when.

The clash with the Bees could be one of just two league games for Steve Cooper’s side in the month of January. The first weekend of the month is reserved for the third round of the FA Cup, the weekend of 12/13 represents their winter break, Brentford are their hosts on January 20, then – should Forest progress – the fourth round of the FA Cup will be staged across the weekend of January 27/28. The Reds close out the month at home to Arsenal on Tuesday, January 30.

The Premier League, the Football Association and the English Football League agreed on the idea of a mid-season break in 2018. The two-week break is structured to ensure Premier League matches are still played every weekend over that period, with the matches split across the two weekends.
FA Cup fifth round ties will be moved to midweek to incorporate the break. Additionally, it was agreed FA Cup fifth round replays would be removed from the calendar, being replaced with extra-time and penalties. The Premier League said this was agreed with the FA “to help combat the congested fixture calendar and to improve player welfare”.