Michael Dawson thinks Nottingham Forest took a huge risk during the summer transfer window and it’s now royally backfired.
The Reds had another hectic transfer window and it ended with Brennan Johnson being sold to Tottenham for £47.5 million.
Dawson has been discussing the situation involving Forest after the club were deducted four points for breaching financial fair play regulations earlier this week.
Forest have now slipped to 18th in the Premier League and sit one point and one place away from safety.
Dawson has cited the decision by Forest to delay a sale for Johnson as one of the factors that has now seen the club hit hard.
What Michael Dawson has said about Forest decision to sell Brennan Johnson
It’s always a shame in football when clubs have to sell their best players – and Forest selling Johnson was absolutely no exception.
The talented youngster scored eight goals last season. As a result, Forest were able to recoup £47.5 million for the services of Johnson and as an academy player, the entire fee is profit.
It’s claimed that Forest waited to sell Johnson. The club received bids from Atletico Madrid and Brentford in June and had they sold then they would have complied with the PSR remit.
Dawson believes that decision has now backfired on Forest – although he does feel the whole situation is a little unfair.
Dawson told Sky Sports News: “On Johnson, it was a risk and it’s backfired. If they had sold him they’d would have been in that financial window where they had to be.
“They haven’t got a crystal ball, they knew what the outcome might have been but I just think it’s a little bit unfair.”
Forest have to learn from this debacle
Dawson is right that this all feels a little bit unfair on Forest. Surely, Forest were respecting the profitability and sustainability of the club by holding out for a bigger fee for their star player.
However, it would appear as though the Premier League are hellbent on keeping the big six rich and aren’t particularly bothered about teams coming up and being competitive.
Still, Forest knew the rules and broke then anyway and as Dawson says, that is something that has backfired now that four points have been deducted from the Reds.
This whole debacle was so avoidable if Forest had the right people in place to ensure that more often than not the club’s recruitment was right.
At the moment there are too many players signed who make little to zero impact and this episode has to give Forest a wake-up call in that sense.
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