Bon Voyage Big Willy Boly

Forest confirmed the signing of Willy-Arnaud Zobo Boly on the 1st of September 2022. We were five games into our Premier League comeback season and on the back of a heavy defeat to Manchester City. We needed some brawn to beef up our defence for the battle ahead, and Boly was that man.

There was no fanfare when Boly arrived, no photoshoot in Rock City, no montage video on socials. Just a plain old-fashioned club statement. Be honest, you probably didn’t give his signing much thought at the time either. You were too busy wondering what the next Jesse Lingard dance craze would be instead.

This has been the tale of the Boly era at Forest, often overlooked while other players get fawned over. Moussa Niakhate was immediately labelled as the ‘Rolls Royce’ defender even before he’d kicked a ball for Forest. Is a Rolls Royce defender a good thing I wonder. Big, cumbersome, usually needing someone else to drive it for you. Either way, no such car-based moniker was attached to big Willy Boly. Perhaps he is a Mercedes G-Wagon of a defender? Legendry, boxy & dominating. Better suggestions welcome.

Aside from an iffy debut game against Fulham, Boly’s presence in the team brought our best runs of form in the 22/23 season. Afterall he was our only central defender with any Premier League experience that season, and it showed. Boly played eight games for Forest where he had at least 30mins on the pitch. We won twelve points from those games. That’s 1.5 Points Per Game (PPM), well above survival form.

By comparison, Moussa Niakhate made thirteen appearances and picked up twelve points, 0.92 PPM. Relegation form, not Rolls Royce form. Willy’s impact on the team can also be seen in the number of goals Forest conceded before and after his run of games. We conceded thirty goals in our first fourteen games that season. Boly then played five of our next six games and we conceded just five goals. We went from averaging 2.1 goals against per game to just 0.8 goals against. Better than twice as good!

When Boly got injured away at Fulham we reverted to type. Over the next thirteen games we conceded 2.0 goals per game again. There was no defence without big Willy Boly.

Felipe arrived with his fancy ponytail swaying in the breeze blowing in off the Trent, but he didn’t have the same impact. Yet again fans were gushing praise at a centre-back that wasn’t stopping the goals and putting points on the board. 

It took Felipe TWELVE games to register a win for Forest. By comparison it took Boly just two games, and he managed it with a simple old-fashioned precise haircut to boot. You can see in the following charts how much more consistently Boly has brought points to Forest when he plays.

Just think back to those crucial wins over Crystal Palace and Leeds in the 22/23 season. A change in Forest’s form that was pivotal to survival and no coincidence it was Boly’s introduction to the team that saw us move out of the relegation zone before the world cup break.

The beautiful thing about climbing the football leagues is that every new success is built on previous moments. The joy of this season is built on a block that Willy Boly made in 2022 that earned us a precious three points towards survival. There is still time to appreciate him properly for that.

If I sound bitter, then I think it’s because I feel like good old fashioned smart defending is undervalued. Instead, fans rave about a swashbuckling challenge on the halfway line that’s great for the highlight reel, but not so great for all the space left behind. I’m sure a fan survey would place Boly behind Felipe as the defender that was key to our survival in 22/23, but you can see from the table below, it wasn’t even close.

Boly’s first goal for Forest came in the quarter finals of the League Cup against his old club Wolves. A crucial goal to put Forest in their first cup semi-final for decades. We can’t forget his goal against Manchester United last season either. Just having his giant face in the right place right time for the ball to deflect into the goal. Perfect old fashioned centre half play. His third and maybe final goal for Forest came on that joyous sunny day last season as Forest battled against Chelsea at The City Ground to celebrate survival.

At least Nikola Milenkovich has been learning the art of scoring a goal from Boly in training and is contributing this season. He is proving to be the true heir to the Boly throne.

Boly’s time at Forest has admittedly been plagued by injury interruptions. I do believe our Premier League story would have been more comfortable if that weren’t the case. His prime years came at Wolves during their own recent European exploits. The Wolves fans fully appreciated his talents at that time, with not one but two songs named after him that appear on music streaming sites. At that point of his career, he was a top centre back in the Premier League.

This season at Forest Milenkovich is rightly being hailed in the same kind of regard that Wolves used to give Boly. Is the big Serb B*stard better than prime Big Willy Boly though? There’s only one way to find out…….

Stats of course!

We can compare the stats for Boly from 2018/19 to Milenkovich’s stats this season and see that prime Boly just has the edge on the defensive numbers and certainly the possession numbers, which you might not expect. Boly’s lack of game time undermines his time at Forest, but when you consider we only paid around £2m for this potential level of a defender then it still goes down as a very smart signing that delivered crucial points to our journey.

It seems like Boly’s time at Forest is coming to an end. It’s unlikely he will extend his contract at Forest, although obviously I’d love him to stay around. Perhaps as he moves towards a coaching role, he can bring some brick s/housing to players like Zach Abbott and Tyler Bindon.

We’ve never got to see much behind-the-scenes Willy. A couple of post-match interviews is about all I can remember. Luckily Ola Aina’s Snapchat has provided a glimpse into the real Boly. Dancing with Nuno, fashion mishaps, a cheeky grin in the changing rooms.

Chris Wood picked out Boly as the toughest player in the changing rooms. Ola Aina said that it would be Willy Boly he would call if he needed a lift. That speaks volumes to me about his character. A quiet but reliable presence in the dressing room. Not taking things too seriously except when he's out on the pitch.

I’ve tried to give you every argument I have as to why we need to mark the end of Boly’s time at Forest with the respect he deserves. The important role he played laying the foundations for Forest to progress towards Europe. If my numbers-based arguments and passionate pleas aren’t enough then how about this final perspective.........

Here is Willy Boly re-imagined with a manbun! If that isn’t enough for him to get a song before he leaves, then I give up. Bon voyage Big Willy Boly!

Thank you for reading!

(First published in Issue 21 of The Oh Mist Rolling In Fanzine in April 2025) / Statistical data from FBRef.com as of 4th April 2025

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