EVERTON want to off-load England defender Michael Keane — and hope Nottingham Forest make a big offer.
Keane is out of favour under Frank Lampard and the Toffees plan to cash in on the 29-year-old ex-Burnley centre-back.
Forest have money to spend and want to boost their survival battle.
But Steve Cooper will explore other options first and Everton may have to settle for a fee around £15million at best.
Forest signed a remarkable 22 players in the summer window after returning to the Premier League for the first time since 1999.
But they still suffered a dreadful start to the season, picking up just six points in their opening 11 matches.
However, just before the World Cup break, Cooper’s men began to find some form.
They took seven points from the four league games before the mid-season pause, including wins over Liverpool and Crystal Palace.
It leaves them in 18th place, one point adrift of safety.
Forest also booked their place in the last 16 of the Carabao Cup with an impressive 2-0 win over Tottenham.
HOW TO GET FREE BETS ON THE WORLD CUP
But Cooper knows his side still have a lot of work to do.
Speaking after the win over Palace, he told BBC Sport: “We know we’ve got a lot of work to do – whatever happened today the league position wasn’t going to look great.
“But at least we’re making positive steps, at least we’re picking up points.
“It’s been a really, really tough couple of months, we’ve had to do something that no team or manager or coaching staff has had to do before with the amount of players that have come in.
“Every time we’ve had a tough moment, we’ve responded with a performance or result so that’s reassuring. Days like today help belief grow and we’ve got to build on that.”
