Steve Cooper’s exit was no surprise but is Nuno a sideways step for Forest?
In many ways the appointment of Steve Cooper’s replacement at Nottingham Forest has been more than a year in the making. A 4-0 defeat by Leicester in October 2022 started the process but the head coach’s popularity earned him a new contract and an upturn kept him in situ until the inevitability of his sacking on Tuesday.
Various alternatives were sought last season, from Rafa Benítez to Sean Dyche to Bruno Lage, but the mixture of a lack of interest in the role or an acceptance that they would not be a considerable improvement on Cooper meant plans to change were shelved. Eventually, after coming down to a choice between the former Eintracht Frankfurt head coach Oliver Glasner and Nuno Espírito Santo, the latter was favoured.
Nuno has a number of key elements in his favour that explain why the Forest owner, Evangelos Marinakis, made his eventual selection. The Portuguese has experience of managing in the Premier League, will be able to communicate with Forest’s contingent of Lusophones, took Wolves into Europe and has big‑name clubs on his CV. At Wolves he earned promotion and two seventh-placed finishes, which is the level Forest want to reach.
A four-month spell as Tottenham manager and his dismissal by Al‑Ittihad following a poor start to the season after a title win do not reflect well on Nuno. His failure in north London is an important reason for his desire to return to the Premier League – he feels it unfairly tarnished his reputation.
Nuno arrives at a club that seem to be in a constant state of flux. The amount of change caused by 23 signings after promotion resulted in a disjointed team and a struggle for Cooper to settle on a first‑choice XI. By the time Forest lost against Leicester, Cooper was questioning
Read on irishexaminer.com
