Nottingham Forest player must be seen as Lincoln City transfer blueprint | OneFootball

Nottingham Forest defender Harry Toffolo must be seen as the transfer blueprint for Lincoln City.

Nottingham Forest defender Harry Toffolo must be seen as the transfer blueprint for Lincoln City.

The 29-year-old left the Imps for Huddersfield Town in January 2020, while his more recent sale to Forest has added to the shine he had already given his former club.

The Lincoln City transfer blueprint

Toffolo played 85 games for Lincoln, netting four times and providing 13 assists, after originally penning a two-year deal with the club.

He joined from Millwall in the summer of 2018 on a free transfer, and made the move to Huddersfield before the end of his contract at the Imps.

The Norwich City youngster spent loans at Rotherham United, Peterborough United, Scunthorpe United, and Doncaster Rovers, but made a real splash at Lincoln.

His signing has become a blueprint for the Imps in their transfer business. It can be distilled down to securing the services of young players with high ceilings, building them up, and then selling them on for a profit down the line.

It is the model Peterborough United have become known for too, with the likes of Ivan Toney, and more recently, Harrison Burrows, passing through the ranks at London Road.

An Imps club record

Left-back Toffolo is still making Lincoln money. In the annual report released in January 2024, it was confirmed that the total fee gained from his sale was a club record.

The approximate figure of £640,000, which was most recently added to by a sell-on clause in their deal to sell Toffolo to Huddersfield.

Lincoln are a sturdy Sky Bet League One club because of business like this, where they eek out every element of the profit they can from a sale. The model is clearly working.

Toffolo one of the success stories

Toffolo is one of the success stories of Lincoln’s policy, while the 2023 summer transfer window saw similar deals struck for Danish duo of wing-back Lasse Sorensen and goalkeeper Lukas Jensen.

Joining Huddersfield and Millwall respectively, the pair earned the Imps more badges to add to their growing collection of transfer triumphs.

The successes of purchases and sales like that of Toffolo are not to be sniffed at. They help a team with the status of Lincoln remain a competitive force in League One, battling at the present with quality players among their ranks, while also fixing one eye on the future financial stability of the club.

Scottish midfielder Ethan Erhahon is the latest in the list of players Lincoln could be put into the Toffolo category. City head coach Michael Skubala himself admitted it was going to be a hard task to keep him in Lincolnshire last summer.

The Imps managed to do that, but with the January transfer window just around the corner, interest may well be renewed.