Nottingham Forest Offer Sangaré New Contract After World Cup

Nottingham Forest are planning to offer Ibrahim Sangaré a new contract once he returns from the 2026 World Cup with Ivory Coast, Football Insider reported this week, with the club preparing to fend off interest from Manchester United and Beşiktaş before those inquiries advance into formal bids. Sangaré, 28, appeared in 26 Premier League games as Forest burned through four head coaches and barely survived, finishing 16th on 43 points.

His deal at the City Ground runs to June 2028, meaning the coming season begins with two years left on his contract. That is the window where external interest turns serious, and Forest are moving to close it.

Four Managers, One Constant

Every manager who took charge of Forest this season kept Sangaré in the starting lineup. Nuno Espírito Santo, Ange Postecoglou, Sean Dyche and Vítor Pereira all played him in central midfield without reconsidering the decision once, which is a cleaner endorsement than any public assessment could offer.

1. Nuno Espírito Santo, dismissed September 8, 2025, following a poor start that erased the optimism from Forest’s seventh-place finish the previous season
2. Ange Postecoglou, appointed September 9 and sacked October 18 after eight Premier League games without a win, including a 3-0 home defeat to Chelsea
3. Sean Dyche, hired October 21 on a two-year contract and sacked February 12 after fewer than four months in charge
4. Vítor Pereira, appointed February 15 on an 18-month deal, who inherited the squad sitting 17th with 27 points from 26 league matches and built three consecutive wins inside a broader eight-match unbeaten run that secured survival

Sangaré started under all four. His physical build, 191 centimetres tall with the engine to press and cover ground across both halves of the pitch, made him the piece each incoming coach left unchanged. Dyche used him alongside Elliot Anderson as a defensive screen. Pereira maintained the same axis as the foundation for his revival, building Morgan Gibbs-White’s 15-goal attacking contribution on the protection those two provided behind him.

Forest also ran their first European campaign in 29 years, appearing in the UEFA Europa League for the first time since the mid-1990s and reaching the semi-finals before Aston Villa ended the run with a 4-0 second-leg win at Villa Park in May. Fourteen additional appearances in that competition added to the tally Sangaré logged at a point when the domestic situation was already draining the squad.

The Bidders at the Door

Manchester United’s interest connects to a specific vacancy. Casemiro, who anchored their midfield since arriving from Real Madrid in 2022, is leaving Old Trafford this summer. United’s recruitment team has identified Sangaré as one candidate for the role, drawn by his physical dominance and capacity to control tempo from deep. Those qualities had been on display for three Eredivisie seasons at PSV Eindhoven, where Sangaré joined from Toulouse in 2020, made 140 appearances, contributed 15 goals and 10 assists, and won two KNVB Cups before Forest paid £30 million to bring him to the East Midlands on the final day of the 2023 transfer window.

His adjustment to Premier League football moved slowly across his first two seasons at the City Ground. The fee looked difficult to justify at times, and Forest’s own turbulence made consistent form hard to sustain. By the end of 2025-26, two clubs with specific midfield gaps had both identified him as the solution they wanted.

Beşiktaş moved separately. Takvim, the Turkish newspaper, named Sangaré the top target on the Istanbul club’s summer transfer list in May, with the club seeking to fill a midfield vacancy from the previous season.

Forest’s position is consistent. The club’s official player profile for Sangaré at Nottingham Forest already lists him among the squad’s senior established figures, and sources close to the club have indicated that selling a player who delivered 40 appearances through a chaotic season would undermine the work Pereira put in from February onward.

Sangaré’s Season at the City Ground

The full picture of what Sangaré contributed in 2025-26 is available through the FBref statistics covering his Premier League and Europa League appearances this season.

His minutes per Europa League game average out to roughly half his Premier League rate, which reflects deliberate rotation as the domestic survival battle sharpened in the second half of the season. Forty appearances and nearly 2,730 minutes of football in a campaign defined by instability is a significant workload. FotMob’s current market valuation for Sangaré sits at €25.3 million, against the £30 million Forest spent in 2023.

The defensive contribution ran consistently throughout. He committed 39 fouls over 26 Premier League games and drew 18 in return, a pattern typical of midfielders doing coverage work in tight central corridors rather than waiting for possession to arrive. He collected five yellow cards across the league run, a record that reflects the physical intensity he brought to midfield contests across all four managerial regimes.

Midfield at Risk

Forest’s calculation doesn’t exist around Sangaré alone. Elliot Anderson, the 23-year-old who partnered him through the second half of the season, is the subject of serious interest from Manchester City. Football Insider reported that the fee, if City close the deal, could reach £100 million. Pereira, asked about Anderson’s future after the season-ending draw at Newcastle United in May, said he did not have the answer.

Anderson’s sale at that kind of valuation is one type of problem for Forest: a record incoming fee that requires fast reinvestment in a position the system depends on. Losing Sangaré alongside it is a different scale of disruption entirely. The two players formed the midfield partnership Pereira used across the survival run, and the partnership had a specific logic. Anderson’s pressing gave Sangaré the room to screen and recycle possession under less pressure from opposing runners; once Sangaré had the ball, Anderson’s forward positioning gave him an immediate release option rather than turning back into congested space.

Sources cited in the reporting that first broke the Sangaré contract story indicated Forest cannot lose both central midfielders in the same window. Anderson’s departure at that valuation may prove hard to prevent, and the financial argument for it is clear. Sangaré’s departure carries no equivalent financial logic from the club’s side, and there is no replacement plan publicly in place for what he contributes to Pereira’s system.

Why Forest Won’t Wait

The urgency comes from contract mathematics. Sangaré earns £75,000 per week at the City Ground, per salary data in Nottingham Forest’s current wage breakdown published by Capology, with his deal expiring in June 2028. Two years from the start of the coming season.

A player with two years left on a contract still commands a meaningful transfer fee because the buying club has to act before the deal runs thin. Once a contract enters its final year, the player’s representative can threaten to let it expire, and any interested club can negotiate from a position of patience rather than paying market rate. Forest’s leverage sits at its highest point right now, and they know it cuts both ways: clubs pursuing Sangaré will calculate the same thing.

Sangaré turns 29 in December 2026. A contract extension agreed in the coming weeks would cover his late twenties and carry him into his early thirties, the range where his type of physically dominant central midfielder typically holds peak effectiveness. The decision is direct from the club’s side: pay wages for a player they already depend on, or risk losing him for nothing when the contract runs out in 2028.

FotMob’s €25.3 million valuation shows the asset has held much of its value since the 2023 signing. Forest want him settled and committed before 2026-27 begins, and the contract offer is the most direct way to achieve that before external interest turns into something harder to deflect.

The World Cup Window

Before any contract discussions can begin, Sangaré has a World Cup to play. Ivory Coast, returning to the global stage after a 12-year absence from the tournament, drew Group E of the 2026 FIFA World Cup alongside Germany, Ecuador and Curaçao. Their group-stage schedule:

• June 14 – Ivory Coast vs. Ecuador, Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia
• June 20 – Germany vs. Ivory Coast, BMO Field, Toronto
• June 25 – Curaçao vs. Ivory Coast, Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia

The group stage keeps Sangaré in North America until at least June 25. Premier League pre-seasons typically begin in early July, leaving a narrow window between his return flight and the first training session of the new campaign. Anderson is also at the tournament, representing England, meaning Forest could feasibly spend the bulk of pre-season preparation without both first-choice central midfielders before any contract paperwork has been signed.

Ivory Coast play their final group game in Philadelphia on June 25. Forest plan to open contract talks with Sangaré the moment he returns.