Nottingham Forest and Olympiacos both have Evangelos Marinakis steering the ship.
It’s been quite frequent for the two clubs to swap players since the Greeks purchased Forest.
That’s not to be unexpected but perhaps it’s getting towards the stage where that experiment should stop.
News emerged yesterday that Hwang Ui-jo could be on his way back to the City Ground.
The striker signed from Bordeaux in the summer and was immediately loaned to the Athens-based club.
Now with Michel in charge of Olympiacos, he’s been deemed surplus to requirements.
See also, Josh Bowler.
The winger was plucked from Blackpool in the summer and many felt he’d be a useful addition for Forest.
Instead, he was sent to Greece and he’s now also fallen out of favour under Michel.
Forest have to do better with their loan arrangements and the two lads currently on loan with Olympiacos are in limbo.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing.
In Olympiacos, Forest should have the perfect club to be able to send players to.
They will play in front of big crowds, in a decent league and alongside quality players.
But, the key with any loan is that whenever a player spends time away from the club, they play plenty of football.
Forest and Olympiacos swap shop needs to close
The idea is a romantic one.
Ultimately, lots of the deals involving players going between Forest and Olympiacos turn out to be nothing more than a fling.
Many of the players who have arrived in Nottingham from Greece have failed to live up to their pre-signing billing.
It’s easy to understand why it’s done.
Any deal that takes place can often make easy money for one club or the other and in that sense, it’s easy to see why it’s done.
From a football perspective though, it’s extremely flawed.
The deals involving Ui-jo and Bowler simply have to be the final straw for this kind of arrangement.
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