Championship play-off hopefuls Nottingham Forest reportedly tried and failed to sign Gallagher from Premier League outfit Southampton in January.
If Nottingham Forest got their way, Sam Gallagher would be wearing the famous red kit right now and scoring the goals to fire them into the play-offs.
Instead, he is stuck on the bench at Southampton, making the odd appearance for the club’s U23 side. This was not what either side had planned.
According to the Sun (31 January, page 58), Forest made an enquiry about taking Gallagher on loan for the rest of the 2018/19 season.
The 23-year-old has scored 17 goals in Championship spells with Birmingham and Blackburn and would have been a welcome addition to Martin O’Neill’s attack.
Instead, however, Gallagher was forced to stay at St Mary’s. It was claimed that Southampton rejected all bids as they felt the youngster had a role to play in their survival bid.
But he has hardly been at the forefront of Ralph Hasenhuttl’s plans since. Gallagher has played just eight minutes of Premier League football since the January transfer window slammed shut.
He was even left out of the 18-man squad for Saturday’s 2-1 win against Tottenham, instead playing for the U23s in a 3-1 Premier League 2 Division 2 defeat to Wolverhampton Wanderers two days later.
So maybe Gallagher would have been better off at Forest after all. Standing at 6ft 4ins, he is exactly the kind of old-school target man O’Neill loves, a la Chris Sutton, John Carew and Daryl Murphy.
At the age of 23, he really needs to be playing first-team football.
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