Nuno Espirito Santo insists that he does not focus on the Premier League table, but rather on the mistakes of his team after the 2-0 defeat of Nottingham Forest against Brentford.
Forest missed the opportunity to go to third place in the rankings after goals in both half of Kevin Schade and Yoane Wissa sealed the victory for the Thomas Frank team.
Their defeat leaves them sixth in the table, with the top five that Champions League football secures for next season.
Nuno acknowledged that his players were the second best against the bees, but was still optimistic that they could bounce back from their latest setbacks.
“It's a bad night and a bad game,” Nuno told Sky Sports. “I am not really worried about the table, I am more worried about the mistakes we make and how to correct them.
“Credit to Brentford [their goals were] Situations that we normally have to solve with a better defense. We are disappointed, but it is about responding and going for the next one.
“I am not saying it was because of the semi -final [FA Cup defeat to Manchester City]. It was very demanding in a fitness aspect, but we should have defended better.
“We have not made too much, Brentford defended well. We have to compete much better to achieve what we want. The way we have done it in this game is not normal for where we are.
“There are still four games to go, play a lot of football. We have to concentrate on ourselves and play better football.”
The result of Thursday ended a miserable few days for Forest, who were defeated 2-0 in their FA Cup Semi-final collision with Manchester City in Wembley Stadium.
The side of Nuno has now lost three of their last four Premier League matches (W1), just as much as their previous 16 beforehand (W11 D2 L3) on a crucial part of their campaign.
They have also lost back-to-back home games without scoring in the competition for the first time since December 2023 under Steve Cooper.
And Anthony Elanga urged his teammates to place their Wembley defeat in their review level and to fully concentrate in turning their losses quickly.
“We are really solid in the defense this year. We recently lost in the semi-final and we lost today. We have to regroup for Monday,” Elanga told BBC match of the day.
“We forgot the game at Wembley [Stadium] And wanted to start strong today. The goals we admitted today were not like us.
“We have to go game-per game, and we have to start winning and bringing ourselves into the best possible position. That starts with Palace.”
Opta's supercomputer still ranks the opportunities of Forest to finish in the top five, with 58.7%, but the pressure is on.