POTTER AND COOPER HAVE TO BATTLE ON

GRAHAM POTTER and Steve Cooper are two of the brightest British managers in the game but both are learning how little margin of error there is at the very top. Cooper achieved a miracle by leading Nottingham Forest to promotion last season after taking charge when they were bottom of the Championship, while Potter was given the Chelsea job thanks to three seasons of impressive work at Brighton. The Chelsea hierarchy gave Potter a fiveyear deal and have emphasised their long term backing for him.

After some early-season wobbles about his future among the Forest board, Cooper signed a new three-year contract at the City Ground late last year — to the delight of the supporters.

Yet the challenge for both is as simple as it is difficult. Chelsea must qualify for the Champions League and ideally win a trophy. Forest must stay in the top flight. Whatever the noises from above, both men know they will be scrutinised heavily if they fail. That is why it is hard not to feel sorry for a manager when his team concedes a goal like Chelsea’s opener here. When Christian Pulisic’s cross clipped Willy Boly’s heel, it would normally have drifted behind for a corner. Instead, it hit the bar and fell to Raheem Sterling, who lashed it in from close range.

Potter would have been grateful to catch a break, and he would have felt the same early in the second half when Morgan Gibbs-White’s perfectly-struck volley crashed off the underside of the bar. Potter knows that despite the noise in the background, most of his predecessors this century have still managed to win trophies. Twenty-one arrived during the Roman Abramovich era and though this is the Todd Boehly show now, supporters have come to expect success. They will not stand for a couple of barren seasons.

Given this is their first top-flight campaign of the 21st century, Forest fans are far more forgiving but owner Evangelos Marinakis is the one who makes the vital calls and he backed Cooper when other influential figures were pushing for a change.

The quality of Cooper and Potter is beyond doubt but in the Premier League, a crisis is only one or two dodgy results away. In English football’s ultimate high-wire act, simply keeping your balance is one of the toughest tasks imaginable.