lost that loving feeling - Doughty to the Rescue

As we all know, after Friday's EGM, it has been revealed that major shareholder Nigel Doughty will invest a further £5 million to steady the debts within the club. This is great news after a long period of concern and finally the situation looks to be getting better, however there is still a long way to go.

The money Mr Doughty intends to invest will take his percentage of shares up to 85% compared to his current ownership of 40%. Overall he has invested £12 million into the club and if his offer is accepted, like we all know it will, then this latest instalment will take his total investment to £17 million. Forest are struggling financially anyway but just think how bad it would be without Doughty's millions! Football isn't a money-making business so we have to give him credit for investing so much valuable capital into his and our beloved club.

At the meeting on Friday and within the local media it has been indicated that when the deal has been accepted Forest will not be a PLC for long. During the EGM, Nigel Doughty labelled PLC's as "Cancers" and when discussing the situation with the media he talked about his future plans to remove the 'Nottingham' and 'Forest' from such a tag. Many people share the same opinion and the sooner this plan is carried out the better because the club will benefit from not being a PLC. Not a lot of money has been made over the years and one major disadvantage is that you have to advertise your accounts and people try to take advantage of that. Many club's see our financial position and decide they are going to try and take the young stars for next to nothing, but they've got another thing coming if they think they can rob us and take all our valuable asset's away!

Although the accounts haven't been published the board have made it clear that we are currently just below £20 million in debt. This is worse than I expected and it was also indicated at the meeting that if no money had been invested by the end of April then we wouldn't be able to trade past that date, this just underlines how vital the investment made by Doughty is. Even when the deal goes ahead some players will still have to be sold to ease the debts. Forest made it clear that they are in negotiations with two Premiership teams for one player for a substantial profit, and it doesn't take a genius to work out which player there talking about.

Jermaine Jenas has been scouted by some of the top sides in England recently and unfortunately his departure doesn't seem far away now. However if somebody had said to me at the start of the season that Paul Hart would bring Williams, Jenas and Bopp into the team but one would have to be sacrificed for a large fee, then I would say that's not a bad return. Obviously we would like to see all the youngsters stay at the club but life in Division One isn't like that and you have to sell some players to balance the books.

Nigel Doughty plans to invest heavily in the youth academy to ensure that we continue to develop some of the best young stars in the country. The £5 million will be used to pay debts and enable building work to continue on the academy, which was stopped a few weeks ago due to our financial status. Unfortunately Stern John will not be handed a new contract when his current deal expires at the end of the season. Stern has had a good campaign so far scoring 14 goals in the process and he is heading the club's scoring charts. However, the board have to reduce the wage bill and with Craig Westcarr coming onto the scene it looks likely he will take Stern John's place in the squad next season. On a brighter note Nicky Summerbee should be offered a deal in the near future. Summerbee has looked good since signing on a pay-as-you-play deal and this news is a major boost for supporters.

Throughout all of the activities over recent day's, the important thing to remember is that Nigel Doughty has a good business brain and he will take the club forward. When he steps in and replaces current Chairman Eric Barnes, there will be major changes. He believes the merchandising at Forest has to change because it is poor at the moment. Other activities will happen and they will be clear for everyone to see. Doughty feels it is vital that we stabilise the club then rebuild because it has been poorly run over the past two years. He is expected to takeover as Chairman in the summer. In my opinion it should be sooner but if we have to wait until the end of the season then so be it.

So overall, I feel confident about the future of Nottingham Forest. There have been suggestions by a number of people that the changes proposed won't help us long term but I believe they will. £5 million doesn't seem like a lot of money but when you haven't got any at all it is a substantial amount. It's not only Nigel Doughty's money that will make this club successful - it's his business knowledge. No matter what anybody says, Forest have been run poorly and it's about time somebody took control of the situation and finally got us moving forward instead of standing still. It may take a few years to repair the damage created since the football club turned into a PLC, but at least we now know that the people in charge are Forest through and through. With Nigel Doughty and Paul Hart at the helm the side will continue to develop. Hopefully in a few years we will be able to look back on January 18th 2002 and say that's the day when Nottingham Forest started to rebuild some pride and move towards where we should be, the Premiership.