Club record signing Morgan Gibbs-White is being “pushed hard” to get even better after finding form for Nottingham Forest.
There is a question mark over the 22-year-old’s fitness ahead of Wednesday night’s Carabao Cup quarter-final against Wolverhampton Wanderers, given he missed the weekend’s FA Cup defeat at Blackpool with a recurrence of a calf problem. But regardless of whether or not he faces his former club, Reds head coach Steve Cooper believes there is much more to come from the summer signing.
Forest splashed out an initial £25 million to secure Gibbs-White’s services in August, with the potential for that to rise to £42m if certain add-ons are met. There is no evidence he feels the weight of that fee, however, with Cooper joking, “he certainly doesn’t come to training with a price tag above his head”.
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Instead, the attacker’s focus is on how he can keep improving. He netted his first two goals in the Garibaldi prior to the World Cup break, and picked up where he left off when the season resumed by having an impact on games.
“We’re really happy with Morgan. Everyone can see the talent, but what everyone has been really impressed with is his work-rate and his commitment to winning and wanting to do well,” said Cooper. “He’s having such a positive contribution to so many of our on and off the ball actions, and that’s what we really want.
“The exciting bit for me is, I think he is performing at a really good level now, but if you see the work we are doing with him, it’s all about getting a lot more out of him.
“That’s always got to start with the player. It’s the same with Neco (Williams), it’s the same with Brennan (Johnson) and so many of the players. Yatesy (Ryan Yates), for example, will have a daily meeting, because that’s what he wants and demands to help him improve.
“This is how we work, we do a lot of individual work and a lot of developmental work. A lot of it is based on improvement and trying to get better. Morgan is right in the middle of that at the moment.
“We’re pushing him hard and stressing him in a positive way, in terms of our demands from him. But also, I like to think we are giving him great support as well, in terms of trying to make that improvement.
“The same goes with the other players as well - and not just the younger players, some of the mid-20s and some of the guys coming from different countries who are having to adapt to the Premier League and England, you need to give them the individual work to see how they’re doing and what they want.”
Gibbs-White was Cooper’s top target in the summer. The pair have worked together before, at Swansea City and with England Under-17s, and the Forest boss is keen for the youngster to work on his “all round” game.
“We have challenged him with assists, goals and goal involvement, because that’s what he really can bring to the equation,” Cooper said. “Everyone looks at goals and assists but we look at goal involvements as well; you can go further than that and say chance involvement as well, because he can do something amazing and the chance is missed. We definitely want to get positive data on him, in terms of his final actions up the pitch, but we want him to keep working on everything, really.”
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