In recent years, Nottingham Forest has established a reputation for nurturing young players, providing them first-team experience at the club before moving on to achieve great things in professional football while profiting handsomely.
Ryan Yates, the Reds’ current captain following Joe Worrall’s loan move to Besiktas, came through the Nigel Doughty Academy before breaking into the first-team picture in 2019 after several successful loan spells in the Football League with Notts County and Scunthorpe United.
Current Aston Villa right-back Matty Cash is another outstanding example of the caliber of players that have come through the club’s academy, with Cash changing his game under former manager Sabri Lamouchi before winning a Premier League move to Villa for £16 million in 2020.
In 2012, the club transferred Patrick Bamford to Chelsea for £1.5 million, a good price for a teenager who had only appeared once for the Reds’ senior side.
Players Forest have sold from their academy since 2016:
Arvin Appiah – £8m
Ben Brereton – £7m
Ollie Burke – £13m
Ben Osborn – £5m
(Soon to be) Matty Cash – £16m
Total: £49m in four years
👏👏👏👏👏#NFFC pic.twitter.com/AvOHppeMC4
— Second Tier podcast (@secondtierpod) September 2, 2020
However, 12 years later, the club may regret selling him, as the striker went on to succeed in the Championship and Premier League, with the 30-year-old hitting 58 goals in 178 appearances for Leeds United.
All of the previously stated players have progressed successfully, and the trio has seen success at all levels of England’s football pyramid. However, the club made a wise decision to sell a youngster from its academy in 2019 after only a few first-team appearances.
Arvin Appiah’s statistics at Nottingham Forest
Winger Arvin Appiah, like Cash, Bamford, and Yates, came through the Forest academy, and the kid has a lot of potential to succeed at The City Ground.
Appiah was a fixture in Forest’s academy teams, having competed in competitions such as the FA Youth Cup for the Reds’ under-18s.
He rapidly struck the attention with his pace and direct dribbling, and his performances earned him a first-team call-up for the EFL Cup fixture against Burton Albion in October 2018.
The forward made his first-team debut as an 85th-minute substitution, and Appiah scored to reduce the deficit as Forest were eliminated in the fourth round.
His performance at the Pirelli Stadium earned him several substitute appearances for the Reds. However, he had to wait six months for his first appearance for the club, as Appiah started in a 3-0 loss to Sheffield Wednesday and played 69 minutes before being substituted.
Appiah only made one other start for the club, totaling eight first-team appearances till the completion of the 2018/19 season.
In an unexpected move, the then-18-year-old left the City Ground for Spanish second-tier club Almeria for £8 million, just six months after signing a fresh four-and-a-half-year contract with the Reds. Fast forward five years, and the club made a very sensible business decision.
Arvin Appiah’s stats after leaving Nottingham Forest
Since his arrival in Spain, Appiah has struggled to make a significant impression and deliver value for the club’s £8 million investment.
Appiah appeared 21 matches for Almeria in his first season, scoring only once, and was frequently used as an impact substitute. His lack of playing time resulted in a loan move to CD Lugo, where he struggled to find his footing again, failing to score in any of his 13 league games and recording only one assist.
Despite his poor loan stay at Lugo, Appiah returned to Almeria’s main squad for the 2021/22 season, making 31 appearances but contributing only three goals.
His performances later resulted in two more loan moves to other Spanish sides CD Tenerife and Malaga during the 2022/23 season, with Appiah clearly not performing at the needed level, making 21 appearances over the two spells and scoring only once.
After many fruitless periods in Spain, the now 23-year-old returned to England last summer on loan, joining Championship side Rotherham United for the 2023/24 season.
Almeria’s owner, Turk Al-Sheikh, has already admitted defeat over Appiah’s signing in 2019, claiming that the move for the Forest man is a “blot on a list of successes” at the club, with the winger’s transfer value now just £170,000, according to Football Transfers, a staggering decrease from what the club paid for him five years ago.
His loan move to Rotherham has also been a catastrophe, with the winger appearing in 20 Championship games this season without scoring a single goal, with Appiah starting only four occasions.
Given his terrible last five seasons, as well as the fact that his contract is set to expire in the summer, it is extremely likely that he will become a free agent in the summer, with Appiah looking for his sixth club in just over five seasons.
Appiah, who was originally regarded as a better prospect than Brennan Johnson, who was a year above him in the academy, has regressed, with the Wales international thriving at Forest until his massive £47.5 million move to Tottenham Hotspur last summer.
Overall, the Reds did an excellent job in unloading Appiah in 2019, with the winger’s cost more than covering the club’s FFP spending, allowing the club to develop in all areas, and reaping the benefits five years later.
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