Ex-Nottingham Forest man wins promotion, 27-year-old never made CG appearance

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Former Nottingham Forest winger Gboly Ariyibi has won promotion to the top flight in Turkey during his maiden campaign with Ankaragucu.

The 27-year-old made the switch from Greek club Panetolikos in July 2021 and he’s now added a league title to his CV.

Ariyibi has been a regular in the team during 2021/22 and he’ll now hope to keep his place as Ankaragucu compete in the Super Liga.

During the recent campaign, he made 32 appearances, scoring three goals and claiming two assists after typically operating on the left-wing.

Ariyibi struggled to make an impact at Forest. In fairness, he was signed by Gary Brazil on deadline day in January 2017; only for Mark Warburton to take charge weeks later.

With Forest in a perilous state, Warburton went with tried and tested. That saw the man signed from Chesterfield slip down the pecking order at an alarming rate.

Ariyibi spent time on loan with MK Dons, Northampton and Motherwell; before making a permanent switch to Panetolikos in 2019 on a free transfer.

In Greece, he scored five goals in 51 appearances for the club. As a result, he was allowed to move to Turkey last summer and he’s not looked back.

Ariyibi is quick, skilful and capable of gliding past players with relative ease.

Ariyibi wins promotion but he was never the right fit for Forest

Arriving from Chesterfield, it appeared that Forest had utilised the lower league market pretty well. The Reds clearly struggled to get the best out of him and not making a single appearance is telling.

Forest have a proud history with younger players. Ultimately, if Ariyibi had been good enough he would have been given a chance to shine at the City Ground at some point.

That never transpired and he was never remotely close to first-team action.

During his time at Chesterfield, he scored four goals and claimed 14 assists from 96 appearances at the senior level.

Those numbers were hardly inspiring, although at the time he was a young lad and he was signed with one eye on the future.

Ariyibi clearly had something though and he will hope to kick on following the first promotion of his career.