Nottingham Forest are now busy establishing themselves in the Premier League and it’s down largely to one man.
Steve Cooper was an inspired appointment made by Evangelos Marinakis, with former sporting director Dane Murphy also taking a large slice of the credit for his appointment.
Cooper’s arrival at the club sparked a remarkable transformation. He took the club from the bottom of the Championship to the Premier League in a matter of months and then managed to keep them there.
The squad was largely in place when Cooper arrived and it proved to be that the Forest head coach simply needed to find a winning formula and add some quality in January to kick-start the revival.
Stuart Broad reminsices about Steve Cooper’s Forest team
Two of the promotion-winning Forest team are currently playing alongside each other for Tottenham in the Premier League.
Brennan Johnson and Djed Spence were mainstays in the promotion campaign, with the pair instrumental to getting the club back into the Premier League.
On Sunday, the pair rolled back the years a little bit with Spence setting up Johnson for one of his two goals in a 3-1 victory over Southampton.
Stuart Broad reminisced on social media and although he was happy for the pair, he doesn’t think either are a patch on the current crop.
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Brennan Johnson linked with Forest return
It was claimed last month that Forest were considering a move to re-sign Johnson in the summer to bolster a European campaign.
However, it feels like a non-starter from a Forest perspective, with Daniel Levy unlikely to do business on the cheap just two summers after signing Johnson for £47.5 million.
Johnson is enjoying a pretty steady season in the Tottenham team and in terms of his ability, it’s hard to deny he’d be a useful signing.
However, Forest have moved on and given the money that would be needed to bring him back, there is likely to be better quality at a more attractive price than Johnson offers right now.
it’s great to see both Johnson and Spence producing the goods for Spurs but as far as Forest are concerned, both are now part of the past rather than the present.