Rafa Benitez is potentially in line for a shock return to Premier League football with newly-promoted Nottingham Forest.
The Reds have endured a poor start to life back in the Premier League since their promotion last season. They have only won one out of their opening eight league games this season, a run that got even worse against local rivals Leicester City on Monday evening.
The Foxes blew their counterparts away at the King Power Stadium as James Maddison inspired the hosts to a 4-0 victory - their first win of the campaign - condemning Forest to their fifth defeat in succession.
Ahead of the match, there were suggestions that Forest boss Cooper was under immense pressure with owner Evangelos Marinakis considering a managerial change - talk that has only got louder following the final whistle in the East-Midlands.
As per The Telegraph, Cooper currently finds himself ‘on the brink’ of losing his job and it appears that his replacement has already been identified in the shape of former Liverpool and Newcastle United boss Benitez. The Spaniard already boasts a relationship with Forest advisor Lee Charnley, from their time together at St James' Park.
He has been out of work since a miserable spell with Everton having coached with the likes of Valencia, Real Madrid, Chelsea and Napoli throughout a lengthy - and often successful - career.
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Any decision over Cooper’s future would be a brutal one from Marinakis considering the former’s work at the City Ground over the last 12 months. He was appointed with the club bottom of the Championship and inspired a stunning run of form to secure a place in the playoffs and with it a place in the Premier League.
Despite talk over his future, the former Swansea City man refused to comment about his job following the miserable reverse against Leicester.
He said: “I’m not thinking about that. I understand where the question comes from, but I’m not thinking about my personal situation, apart from how I can be at my best every single day.
“The tougher and harder it gets, the harder I work and the more it means to me. Hopefully that’s what leadership is, standing up and being counted, trying to be a role model within the training ground. It’s a poor run of results. The stats, with chances and goals we are conceding, are not good. We are trying to address it.
“What I would say is, you didn’t see the team give up. I know it’s a group of players that care, even though we are new. Sometimes you can feel that it isn’t that, and I’m not sensing that at the moment. We’re just trying to put loads of layers of our work to become the team we want to be. We’re not that at the moment.”
