Well, I can’t say I’m disappointed.
With a lot of international and lower league transfer windows set to close later today, this could be just one of many ‘deadline day’ deals that we see take place at Nottingham Forest. We’ve known for some time that Forest have been doing their best to try and trim what is an incredibly large squad, and it appears as though we’ve made a bit of a breakthrough, although not one of the names that you’ve been reading about all summer.
The club confirmed yesterday that Gboly Ariyibi has left the club to sign for Greek side Panaitolikos for an undisclosed fee.
Two things strike me straight away about this deal. A) At least the club have finally managed to get one of the people at the City Ground that are deemed surplus to requirements. Given how big the squads are, it simply isn’t sustainable to keep this many players on the books. Now let’s hope for some more in the next few hours. B) Isn’t it a bit of a treat to see a player move between Forest and Greece that doesn’t involve Olympiacos for once?
Personally you won’t find me complaining about this move one bit. It was clear to see that he didn’t have a future at the club judging by his lack of opportunities and appearances in the past, zero appearances in fact for the first team since he signed in January 2017 from Chesterfield.
Then when you consider the way the club addressed the wide positions this summer with the signings of Sammy Ameobi and Albert Adomah, it was quite obvious that he was just being bumped further and further down the pecking order.
And whilst the club didn’t disclose the fee, at least we managed to get something out of the deal rather than just letting him go for nothing next summer when his contract ran out. Although part of me is rather annoyed that the details of the fee weren’t released. With a value of £450k on Transfermarkt, I want to know whether or not we got ripped off or if we’ve sold him for relatively nothing.
