Nottingham Forest have £7m Lassana Coulibaly transfer offer rejected by Salernitana as Steve Cooper targets ANOTHER deal

NOTTINGHAM FOREST have been told to dig deeper after Salernitana rejected a £7million offer for their midfielder Lassana Coulibaly.

Sources in Italy claim Forest tabled their bid to land the 26-year-old Mali international last week.

However the Serie A club, currently at their winter training camp in Turkey, refused to play ball.

SunSport understands the Italians are holding out for £8.5million for the powerhouse midfielder, who made the breakthrough at Bastia in his native Corsica, before spending time on loan at Rangers and Cercle Brugge.

However, Coulibaly has really come of age this season in Serie A after joining Salernitana on freedom of contract in the summer of 2021.

Steve Cooper has funds to add reinforcements to his Forest squad in January, despite signing 23 new players during the summer.

He sees Coulibaly as the ball winner he needs to bolster his midfield.

However the Italian media outlet Le Cronache has reported that Salernitana sporting director Morgan De Sanctis was "not tempted" by Forest's initial offer.

It remains to be seen if Cooper is ready to up the ante to land Coulibaly or if he will instruct Forest's transfer team to move on to alternative targets.

However, Forest appear to have missed out on another target with Bari's Moroccan striker Walid Cheddira increasingly unlikely to move to England.

BETTING SPECIAL - BEST BETTING APPS FOR THE WORLD CUP

Forest, Spurs and Watford have all been linked with a January swoop for the 24-year-old striker who has scored 14 goals and produced five assists in 15 appearances for the Serie B club this season.

However Serie A giants Napoli remain favourites to land Cheddira, ahead of league rivals Lazio and the trio of English admirers.

Bari and Napoli share the same owners and that gives the runaway Serie A leaders a clear path to landing the Moroccan World Cup star.

Cheddira missed last night's World Cup semi-final after being red-carded in stoppage time during Morocco's 1-0 win over Portugal in the quarter-finals.