Nottingham Forest goalkeeper Brice Samba has revealed that notes on Sheffield United penalty takers were "hidden in a towel" that helped inform the three saves made in the Championship play-off semi-final shootout.
Oliver Norwood, Conor Hourihane and Morgan Gibbs-White were all denied from the spot by the 28-year-old at the City Ground to send the Reds to Wembley. First, Samba dived at full stretch to the left and stuck out an outstretched arm to deny the first penalty of the night from Norwood.
Next, in perhaps the most impressive of the trio, the goalkeeper took the bold decision to stay centrally and stay strong to somehow tip Hourihane's firmly struck effort up onto the crossbar and back out towards the on-loan midfielder. Sander Berge and Iliman Ndiaye did both find a way to score by sending the 'keeper the wrong way, but another loanee, Gibbs-White, was also foiled after failing to fool Samba, who dived right again to keep out the low effort.
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In the aftermath of the ensuing pitch invasion, a water bottle with a white piece of paper listing the names of nine opposition players written in black marker pen has been recovered. Norwood, Hourihane, Berge and Gibbs-White are all listed, as are Ben Osborn, Rhys Norrington-Davies, John Fleck, Daniel Jebbison and William Osula.
Interestingly, Ndiaye is not listed, which may be why Samba struggled to keep out the Blades' fourth effort. While the photograph is short of details due to the round nature of water bottles, next to Hourihane is the start of what looks like the word 'straight', which is, of course, where the Republic of Ireland international aimed the penalty. Straight down the middle and straight at Samba.
The goalkeeper has also took to Twitter and replied to the post that described Samba as a 'genius' by joking with the author to "give it back". In reply to another fan who mentioned that it was 'good luck they didn’t see your bottle before the pens', Samba revealed: "It was hidden in a towel until I got to the post!"
