Nottingham Forest arrive depleted too but with underlying numbers that make you look twice. Nikola Milenkovic will not travel after picking up bone bruising in training. Igor Jesus is out for weeks with a calf injury. Neco Williams is a doubt through illness. And yet Forest carry a positive xGD of +3.47 per game in 2026-27, which is among the best in the division. They have generated 8.5 xG and scored only 4 goals this season, a conversion gap that stands out across the whole slate. The structure is there. The finishing has not arrived yet.

Then there is the head-to-head, which shapes everything. All five previous meetings at Selhurst Park have ended level. Eight of the last ten encounters across all competitions have finished in draws. That pattern is not noise. These two clubs seem constitutionally unwilling to separate at this ground, and both arriving with makeshift defences, their best strikers absent, and an overwhelming fear of losing makes a repeat feel inevitable. The OddsIndex Score Predictor has this at Palace 1.0, Forest 1.4. I land on 1-1. A scrappy, set-piece-driven stalemate is what this fixture has always delivered here, and I have no strong reason to believe October 2026 will be different.

The one angle that keeps nagging at me is Forest's away form. Their away xG sits at 2.84 per game this season, and the news data confirms they have scored at least two goals in each of their last seven away league matches across competitions. That is a serious threat even without Jesus. If Liam Delap, now the undisputed focal point of their attack, finds any kind of service from Morgan Gibbs-White in the half-spaces, Palace's makeshift back three is genuinely exposed. This match in this Premier League season sits on a knife edge, and the draw is where the value lives.

• Palace's home xGA stands at 2.30 per game in 2026-27, and without Disasi and Tomiyasu, that defensive fragility only deepens. Ahanor starting his second Premier League game at centre-back is a real structural weakness for the home side.
• Forest's away numbers are quietly dangerous despite the injuries. Two away games this season have produced an average of 2.84 xG and 2.0 goals scored per match. Remove the conversion problem and Forest are a genuinely threatening away side, even without their main striker.
• Liam Delap steps up as the lone striker with Jesus sidelined for weeks. He has already logged 12 shots in four appearances, a 0.37 xG/90 rate, and will now receive the full attacking responsibility rather than sharing it. Palace's patched-up defence makes him worth watching closely.
• Referee Peter Bankes averages 4.1 cards per match across 2025-26 and 2026-27 combined, above the league average of 3.8. Forest foul 15.0 times per game, the highest rate in this slate. That combination points toward a card-heavy afternoon regardless of how the goals market plays out.
• The corners battle tilts toward Forest on the data. They average 3.4 corners per game to Palace's 2.4 in 2026-27, and their 121 touches in the opposition box per match versus Palace's 85 reflects a wide, set-piece-hungry team. The market pricing Palace as slight corner favourites looks like a mispricing.
• Forest's xG conversion gap is the big talking point. Eight-and-a-half xG, four actual goals. That is a historically poor finishing rate, but it cannot hold forever. A draw at 1-1 gets the regression started. A Forest win outright is the bolder thesis for anyone who trusts mean reversion at even the modest +162 on offer.

The sharpest contrarian angle is Forest's moneyline at +162. I am not dismissing it. If the xG-to-goals regression finally arrives at Selhurst Park, Forest's away attacking numbers make them the logical winner. I have watched enough of these fixtures to know you do not bet against the draw when the head-to-head is this dominant and both dressing rooms are walking in desperate not to lose. Back the stalemate as the primary play. Add the cards market with genuine conviction. And if Aina is in a typical foul-heavy Forest performance under Peter Bankes, +370 on him to see yellow is the best value number on the board.

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