It's brilliant to see Forest making the headlines again by spending big money on players. £2.65 million is peanuts to the big Premiership clubs, but to us it's quite a lot of money, although I don't think it's a gamble as Earnshaw has a prolific record at every club he's played for in the Championship, as well as scoring a respectable 11 goals for West Bromich Albion in the Premiership three seasons ago. Three of those were in the same match when West Brom destroyed Charlton, a team we will be playing next season!
Earnshaw is also a regular Wales international and boasts 39 caps to his name, and has scored 13 goals for them so far. He was most prolific at his first club Cardiff City, where he netted 85 times in 178 games, before being sold on to West Bromich Albion in 2004 for £3 million. After two seasons there, he joined Norwich in the Championship, where he scored 27 goals in 45 games. This impressive strike rate persuaded newly promoted Derby to shell out £3.5 million for his services, but he struggled to make an impact at Pride Park as he was mostly used as a substitute, and only scored once in the Premiership for the Rams all season.
But don't let his record at Derby fool you. He had a bad relationship with manager Paul Jewell and the Sheep were so awful anyway that it's no wonder he didn't score many goals. With such an excellent record at all his other clubs and for Wales, I have no concerns over him at all. Now it's just a question of who partners him in attack next season. Will it be Nathan Tyson, Junior Agogo, or somebody else?
The papers are now saying that Tyson has turned down his contract offer and could be on his way to Bristol City after they tabled a £750,000 bid. I thought he wanted to stay. He told the Evening Post a couple of weeks ago that he wanted to sign a new deal, but if the rumours are true, then perhaps Forest aren't all that desperate to keep him. Considering his injury problems of the last couple of seasons, I don't really blame them, and there's a big question mark over whether he'd be any good in the Championship anyway.
Meanwhile, Agogo has done an apparent u-turn and decided to stay at the City Ground. That must be because no 'big' clubs have shown an interest in him. For what it's worth, I do think he would do quite well in the Championship, but he will have to work hard and show a good attitude, because since he came back from Africa, he has got too big for his boots, and consequently lost his place in the starting line-up.
I've read that Nigel Doughty has earmarked £10 million for new players this summer, which I hope will be spent wisely. Colin Calderwood, for all his other faults, has made some very shrewd signings during his two-year tenure. Three years ago, Joe Kinnear and Gary Megson made some appalling decisions in the transfer market and flooded the Club with rubbish like Gareth Taylor, Eugene Dadi and Nicky Eaden. I can hardly believe the side that we put out in the Championship last time round. No wonder we went down! Our current side on paper at least looks a million times better than that one already, and with the addition of quality players like Earnshaw, I'm confident we will be capable of achieving at least midtable respectability next season.
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