David Beckham is taking a "major" interest in the career of Nottingham Forest's Brennan Johnson as another Premier League club joined the race to sign the winger.
According to the Daily Mirror, the former England star has been taking a close look at the fortunes of the Wales international who has been in superb form at the City Ground this season.
Beckham has sent Johnson several supportive messages on Instagram - when he scored his first goal, while on loan at Lincoln and after his performance in Forest’s FA Cup win over Arsenal.
Johnson has won rave reviews for his performances for Forest this season that has led to inevitable transfer speculation with Crystal Palace now said to have joined Leeds, Newcastle and Brentford in the race to sign him.
Forest turned down Brentford's bid - thought to be worth more than £18m - in the January transfer window with the club insisting he was not for sale as they eye a crack at promotion back to the Premier League.
And the player's father David, a former Red himself, knows Beckham well. They played in the same youth team at Manchester United, with Johnson Snr working for Beckham today in a player liaison capacity.
He told the Garibaldi Red podcas today that the club has discussed a new contract with his current deal set to expire next summer.
"(Initially) I said let's get the wheels in motion and wait until September when the window has closed and the manager can bring his own players in," said Johnson Snr.
"If Brennan was part of his plans we'll consider signing. If he's not then there's no point. We got to September and spoke to Dane (chief executive Dane Murphy). The contract offer wasn't very good.
"Our next contract talks were in December when they had a bid of £10m plus (from Brentford) and I said it wasn't the right time to be talking, Brennan should just focus on the first team.
"We knew Brennan was always going to stay through the January window. That was the fact of the matter.
"I spoke to the owner last week and had a very good chat with him down in London. He was fantastic. He came across really well.
"He told me how he sees the club and its future. We said great, we'll carry on talks. There's 15 games to go so let's sit down and try to get something sorted by the end of the season, but it's so busy it will probably be by email or something.
"That's where we're at. Everyone thinks it's like deadline day and you have an hour to agree the contract.
"It's not. The club take their time. We're in no rush and everything is going really well. The club have been brilliant and we'll get there in the end."
