‘Not getting rubbish players’ - Dilemma posed by Edu and Co in modern football as Nottingham Forest bring sporting director role back under the microscope

Back when Brian Clough was guiding Forest to top-flight title glory and back-to-back European Cup wins, managers held almost complete power. Owners made money available for new signings, but it was the man in the dugout that identified targets and drew up plans on how best to fit those additions into a tactical blueprint.

Head coaches are now all the rage, with those on the touchline reporting to several levels of leadership above them. The logic behind multiple layers of control has always been sound enough, with pressure and responsibility being shared across multiple shoulders - rather than being lumped onto one set.

Having multiple voices added to any given discussions is, however, always going to lead to differences of opinion and the occasional argument. That could be considered a positive in some ways, with a fresh set of eyes often spotting something that others have missed, but accountability on the results front will forever rest with those that pick the team.

If they have a certain way of playing in mind, then recruitment drives should match that mindset. When that is not the case, then divides quickly form. That has been the case at Forest during a season which has seen unwanted records broken when it comes to appointing four permanent managers - with Nuno Espirito Santo, Ange Postecoglou, Sean Dyche and Vitor Pereira all passing through Trentside.

Nuno is said to have butted heads with Edu, who was drafted in by enigmatic owner Evangelos Marinakis to oversee business across his stable of professional football clubs. Fingers of blame for the Reds’ struggles - which have delivered another relegation battle - have been pointed mainly in Edu’s direction. He is said to have been exiled after just eight months in a directorial post.

Ex-Forest forward Harewood, speaking exclusively with GOAL via European casino affiliate site Casino Zonder Cruks, said when asked if the sporting director model is a recipe for trouble: “It is. Yes and no. The players that he's getting in are good players. But it's just not the players of a manager's thought process, how he sees he wants to play.

“Every manager's got their own ways and how they see things. And they've got players that will fit their mould. But at the same time, the managers, the owners are not getting rubbish players. They're good players. You just need a good manager to get that out of them. So that's another spanner in the works.

“The players that are at Forest are good players. All of them are very good players. But for some reason, the managers have not bought what those players are capable of doing for what he wants them to do. Which is always hard.

“But that's what he brought you in to do. So if you're taking a manager's job, beforehand you're going in and having a meeting and you would be doing your due diligence and you'd be told what players you've got. So if you know that, you know you're going in to do a job with those players. So you know beforehand what you need to do.

“Sometimes you have to look at the other side of it as well. If a manager's going in to take over a club and he's seeing what there is and what you've got to do, that's the player he needs to deal with and that's the player he needs to work with and try and get the best out of them.”

Inconsistency has been an issue for Forest, on the back of their seventh-place finish and qualification for Europe in 2024-25. Transfer business is considered to have contributed significantly to a sudden reversal in fortune, with additions being made that did not match the style of football that delivered a surge up the Premier League standings.

The Reds are now scrapping for top-flight survival, with collective heads being kept just above water for now, and speculation is already raging regarding what the next window will bring. Pereira, who has seen his side reach the Europa League quarter-finals, has seven games left in which to ensure that there is no mass exodus of top talent from the City Ground this summer.

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