Nottingham Forest enter the 2026-27 Premier League campaign under their fifth manager in two seasons, as Oliver Glasner takes charge of a club still searching for its footing after one of the most turbulent years in recent English football history.
A season of chaos and unlikely heroics
The 2025-26 season began with optimism — Forest had finished seventh the previous year and earned a return to European competition for the first time in 29 years. It fell apart almost immediately. Nuno Espirito Santo was dismissed after just three matches, triggering a managerial carousel that saw Ange Postecoglou last eight games and Sean Dyche 25, before Vitor Pereira steadied the ship and guided the club to safety in the spring.
For all the domestic misery, Forest's European campaign told a different story. They defeated Porto — twice — and Fenerbahce on the way to the UEFA Europa League semi-finals, where Aston Villa ended their dream. The form of Igor Jesus was central to that run, and Morgan Gibbs-White's resurgence under Pereira — nine goals in 10 league matches — gave the club's supporters something to cheer at home, too.
Forest became the first club in Premier League history to use four permanent managers in a single season, yet finished 16th and reached a European semi-final in the same campaign. Turbulent scarcely covers it.
Glasner's task and the Gibbs-White question
Pereira's reward for saving the club was a summer dismissal, with Glasner arriving after stepping away from Crystal Palace — a side that finished one place above Forest last season. Reports suggest Glasner held talks with AC Milan before opting for the City Ground. How his relationship with owner Evangelos Marinakis develops will likely shape the season.
The biggest asset at Glasner's disposal is Gibbs-White, 26, who contributed 18 goals across all competitions in 2025-26 — the most of any Forest player. Creative, relentless in the press, and increasingly clinical in front of goal, his 15 league goals made his omission from England's World Cup squad all the more surprising. Keeping him fit and firing is the single most important task for the new head coach.
A defensive bedrock worth building on
One underappreciated element of last season was Forest's defensive record. The same back five — Matz Sels, Ola Aina, Murillo, Nikola Milenkovic, and Neco Williams — remained largely consistent throughout the Premier League campaign, shielded by Elliot Anderson and Ibrahim Sangare. That quintet conceded fewer goals than Liverpool and Bournemouth, and only one more than third-placed Manchester United.
Forest also used 31 players across the league season — only relegated West Ham used more. Finding greater squad cohesion will be essential if Glasner is to avoid a repeat of the chaos that defined 2025-26.
What to expect in 2026-27
In their four Premier League seasons since returning to the top flight, Forest have finished 16th, 17th, seventh, and 16th. Predicting a smooth mid-table campaign feels almost too straightforward for a club with Marinakis at the helm. The early departure of Anderson complicates the picture further.
Glasner's pedigree offers genuine hope, and the Europa League semi-final showed the squad has character when united. Whether that unity can be sustained across a full season — with just one manager — remains the defining question of Forest's summer.
