Fouad ‘Fred’ Bachirou is back in the Nottingham Forest squad for tomorrows trip to Wales as the Reds take on Swansea City in the fourth round of the FA Cup.
The French born Comoros international midfielder has played just once for Forest since signing in the summer from Swedish side Malmo, against Barnsley on the seasons opening day in the Carabao Cup defeat.
Injury has meant that Bachirou has been sidelined for most of the campaign up until now but tomorrow he’s likely to feature, as Forest look to win in a bid to reach the fifth round of the competition where they’ll play either Manchester City or Cheltenham Town.
Manager Chris Hughton is expected to experiment with Jordan Smith, who kept goal against Cardiff, likely to return to replace Brice Samba as Gaeten Bong and Carl Jenkinson should again feature in the full back positions.
Jenkinson said, knowing that a win in Wales potentially pits Forest up against a superb Manchester City outfit for the first time since 2009 (when Forest famously won 3-0) “I think the day after the draw was done, we came into training and was chatting about it the changing room. I sort of said that’s a good opportunity to play Manchester City if we can.”
“Obviously, we’ve got to beat Swansea first but it’s a bigger incentive as they are the games you want to play in. Competing with some of the best players in the world. We can’t look ahead of Swansea because they are a very good team in their own right.”
“We know we’ve got to beat a solid team to get there but it’s a further incentive for everyone if you’re looking at it. We would get to play City at home as well. It’s a motivation even more to get through.”
Ryan Yates will miss out with injury after Manager Chris Hughton said “he’ll certainly miss Saturday’s game but the next few days will determine how long he’s going to be out for.”
The Forest boss continuing “I think it’s fair to say we will make a number of changes but as we showed in the last round, we have a group of players who haven’t started the last few league games who will want to come into the side and put on a good performance. All of those players have terrific fitness levels, they have trained really well and you always hope the occasion will help to lift them.”
Kick off at the Liberty Stadium on Saturday is 3pm with those having the luxury of Sky/Virgin Media also able to watch on BBC Wales.
*Main image @NFFC Fred is back having played just once this season in the Carabao Cup.
