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| Captain Waqas Azam |
We go through last week courtesy of a 3-1 home win against Cardiff with our goals coming from Brandon Wilson, Jamie Frost and Brad Jackson. In the previous week, Forest won 3-0 at West Brom, but for 70 minutes it had been a close game.
Then Tyler Walker, son of former Forest favourite Des, netted a hat trick in those last 20 minutes, including a penalty, to take Forest through.
Coached by former Villa and Swindon boss Kevin MacDonald and ex-Forest forward Jack Lester, they are a team very much in form that hasn't lost a game since October. They are treating this as a big game tonight and, as such, just as a number of other clubs do, they have made it free entry for all season ticket holders to try and attract as big an attendance as possible.
Lester said of a potential big crowd: "It would be fantastic. The players would get a real buzz off that.
"They're very excited. With these kind of games, it's a case of reining them in a little bit, but the more fans they in front of the better, They'd love that.
"These games are treated like first team games. Because they're in a stadium it always feels a little bit different. It's a chance to show how good they are and how far they've come."
Lester added: "The programme that Kevin leads here is about developing professional footballers for this club. That's our main aim, but this is an exciting game for us. It's nice sometimes to treat it like you would in the first team, looking a bit more tactically at what the opposition are about, whereas the rest of the week is about giving information to the players to make them better individually."
Forest have a big squad which enabled them to rotate when they played Birmingham last Friday. They made ten changes to the team for that game and Forest are asking the question as to who will play in this game with all of Matty Cash, Joe Worrall, Oliver Burke, Walker and Gerry McDonagh all pushing for recalls.
That game against Birmingham ended in a draw which stretched their unbeaten run to nine games, of which seven have been wins.
Burnley have played against Man United in each of the last two seasons in this competition, both of them in the third round. We beat them 4-3 two seasons ago at Old Trafford, with Jason Gilchrist netting a hat trick but last season were beaten 2-0 at home in a very close game.
Should we get through tonight, then it could be three years in succession with the draw having given us or Forest a home time against Spurs or United in round six.
That potential tie will be pushed to one side though ahead of tonight's game. As Terry Pashley said: "We have a tough game ahead of us and that is all we are concentrating on. The only time the next game will be on anyone's mind is if we overcome a very tough Forest side on Tuesday.
"I could use it in my team talk as an incentive, but I never do. All I want is for the lads to be focused on Nottingham Forest and I know they will be.
"We had to work hard for all that we got in the last round and we know we will have to work hard again against Forest, but equally we know that the lads will give their all."
It's been a difficult preparation for our boys with a lack of league games and once again being forced to train away from Gawthorpe because of the work that has gone on there with the pitches.
"We must be three or four games behind everyone else in the league now, due to either not being able to find a venue or bad weather forcing games to be called off," Pash said. "We will be playing catch up over the next few weeks, on Saturdays and midweek, so in that respect preparation for Tuesday has been tough, but no more difficult than before the Cardiff game.
"The tie has come round pretty quickly and it's vital to get your recovery in from the previous game, so arguably it's a bonus that our league game was called off on Saturday, but the boys are fine anyway and we'll go down to the City Ground and look to do ourselves justice and give a good account of ourselves."
Burnley will field a team similar to that which beat Cardiff a week ago. For that game we lined up: Tony Aghayere, Hamam El-Fitouri, Waqas Azam, Shaun Hobson, Andy Nugent, Brad Jackson, Andreas Bianga, Brandon Wilson, Christian Hill, Ntumba Massanka, Khius Metz. Subs: Connor King, Vashiko Dixon, Jamal Crawford, Jamie Frost, Josh Dolling.
Kick off tonight is 7 p.m. and admission is £4 adults, £2 concessions but free to our season ticket holders on presentation of your season card.