A remarkable evening at the City Ground began as Jonjo Shelvey was dismissed after clashing with Forest skipper Henri Lansbury, and former Arsenal forward Nicklas Bendtner saw the resultant penalty saved by Karl Darlow.
Clark then looked to have opened the scoring after nodding home Matt Ritchie’s set-piece, only to be penalised for an alleged foul.
Ritchie himself then gave the Magpies the advantage with a powerful finish, before Darlow kept out another spot-kick – this time from Lansbury – after Paul Dummett saw red for bringing down the midfielder.
Rafa Benitez’s side were just minutes from a hard-earned point against their free-scoring hosts, only for young midfielder Matty Cash to pop up with a scrappy winning goal late on.
Clark admitted the Magpies were left aggrieved by the showing of referee Stephen Martin, and spoke of his surprise at seeing his 37th-minute opener chalked off.
“I haven’t seen it back, but I think the ref just blew up and said that I’d fouled the player marking me, but as far as I can remember I don’t think there was a foul there at all. It could have been a big turning point in the game,” he told nufc.co.uk.
“It was a big game, and in this league, all of the decisions have to be spot-on – they have to be right. I think we felt that a number of the decisions tonight were wrong. At the end of the day, it’s down to the ref, and his linesmen, as they make the calls. But on our side, far too many of them went against us and were wrong.”
Defeat at the City Ground rounded off a disappointing week for Clark and his teammates, last Saturday’s surprise loss to Blackburn Rovers at St. James’ Park preceding a heartbreaking EFL Cup exit at the hands of top-flight Hull City.
However, the Republic of Ireland international insists the Magpies can take plenty of heart from their efforts over the last seven days, and already has his sights set on a return to winning ways against Birmingham City next Saturday.
“Coming out for the second half, we knew what we were in for – going 1-0 up with nine men, it was always going to be a tough task holding on,” he said. “We knew at 1-1 we had to hold on for the draw, and that would have been a massive result for us.
“We showed a lot of pride out there, and we all stuck together to the end. We’ll try and take those positives from the game, but in the end it’s disappointing.
“We’ve worked hard this week. I know we didn’t play as well as we would have liked against Blackburn, but against Hull and today we showed a lot of pride. We’ll regroup now, go again next week and prepare for another big game.”
