{"id":649117,"date":"2026-05-04T13:51:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T13:51:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/649117\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T13:51:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T13:51:10","slug":"premier-league-relegation-battle-can-nottingham-forest-take-a-step-towards-safety-at-chelsea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/649117\/","title":{"rendered":"Premier League relegation battle: Can Nottingham Forest take a step towards safety at Chelsea?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When 42 points was not enough for survivalpublished at 12:14 BST<\/p>\n<p>12:14 BST<\/p>\n<p>      <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Jay Jay Okocha\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/cef2351e-8522-442f-ad43-b52e79fd8571.jpg.webp.webp\"  width=\"1024\" height=\"819\" class=\"ssrcss-egie1y-Image edrdn950\"\/>Image source, Getty Images<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The 2002-03 season stands out in that list of Premier League points needed for survival. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">And West Ham fans will not need to be reminded of which unlucky club went down to the Championship after amassing a tally of 42 points. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Yes, the Hammers were undone by a Bolton Wanderers side that was inspired by moments of magic from one Jay Jay Okocha in the run-in, including a wonderful solo goal to beat the Hammers 1-0 in April, as the Whites ended on 44 points to secure their safety.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A Hammers side, packed with internationals such as David James, Glenn Johnson, Trevor Sinclar, Joe Cole, Frederick Kanoute, Jermain Defoe, Paulo di Canio and Les Ferdinand, and inspired by interim manager Sir Trevor Brooking, battled manfully until the final day but just fell short. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The question is, if they were able to pick up six points from their final three games to once again finish on 42 points, would that be enough?<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Or could lightning be about to strike twice? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When 42 points was not enough for survivalpublished at 12:14 BST 12:14 BST Image source, Getty Images The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":649118,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-649117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/649117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=649117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/649117\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/649118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=649117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=649117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=649117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}