Nottingham Forest head coach Nuno Espirito Santo has been discussing the type of impact Ibrahim Sangare can have on his team. The boss has also explained why he’s been missing in recent weeks.
The Reds travel to Newcastle today and Sangare is likely to be sidelined once again for Forest. An Ivory Coast international, the 26-year-old signed for Forest in the summer for £30 million from PSV.
Espirito Santo will need all of his better players available to him in the quest to secure Premier League survival. Sangare is one of those and now the Forest boss has been discussing the midfielder.
Espirito Santo explains Sangare situation at Forest
It’s not unfair to say that Sangare hasn’t scaled the heights with Forest that he did at PSV just yet. He’s taking some time to settle in the Premier League and he will be desperate to get back on the pitch.
Sangare was a stellar signing made by the club during the summer transfer window. He arrived shortly after Forest had agreed a deal with Tottenham to sell Brennan Johnson.
Espirito Santo didn’t have Sangare available for his first game in charge of Forest. After the game, he was quizzed on the absence of his midfielder from the matchday squad.
He told Nottinghamshire Live: “It is a big squad. We left some players out that are options for us but we have to make decisions.
“Ibrahim Sangare is different. He’s not in his best moment yet. He was seriously ill, he lost weight and it is his groin. But he is definitely an option for us.”
Sangare could star under Espirito Santo
The man who is still in the early days of his career at Forest will be hoping to get a chance to show the club’s supporters what he can do. Steve Cooper admitted before he left that he’d been utilising Sangare out of position to help him settle at Forest.
That situation didn’t help anyone. Sangare was at fault for Fulham’s first goal during the 5-0 thrashing at Craven Cottage and in that game, he was withdrawn at half-time.
It will be nice to see what Sangare can do at Forest under Espirito Santo, however. He’s organised, disciplined and will want his Forest team to play with the ball once he stamps his ideas across to the team.
It would be very foolish of anyone at Forest to write Sangare off just yet. Ultimately, he’s come to a new country and in a better league, he was always going to have a settling-in period.
Hopefully, he can get over his injury issues and following the winter break, Forest fans can finally discover what Sangare is all about on the pitch.
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