Nottingham Forest earned Wycombe Wanderers' millions when Aston Villa came calling | OneFootball

Let go by Wycombe in 2012, Matty Cash went on to become a Champions League footballer with Aston Villa, while Nottingham Forest profited.

Moving to Aston Villa in the summer of 2020, Matty Cash's move from the East to the West Midlands saw Nottingham Forest benefit hugely from a bizarre situation at Wycombe Wanderers.

Cash spent two years in the Wanderers' youth setup, but was released at the age of 14 before joining Nottingham Forest.

Becoming a Forest regular after graduating from their academy, Cash went on to become a Premier League footballer in 2020 with Aston Villa, seeing Forest pocket a hefty £16 million fee that could have belonged to Wycombe had things gone differently.

Nottingham Forest benefited from Wycombe's chaos

With significant financial issues after the end of the 2011/12 season, not only were the club unable to sack manager Gareth Ainsworth off the back of relegation to League Two, but the club also decided to disband their youth system due to financial problems.

The only club in the Football League without an academy, Cash was one of the individuals left without a footballing future as a result.

After leaving Adams Park, Cash became part of the FAB Academy (Football Academy Bisham), which provides a pathway for players released by professional clubs.

Given the platform to perform and impress, Cash was picked up by Nottingham Forest in October 2014 after 16 months with FAB.

After a loan spell with Dagenham & Redbridge in 2016, Cash began to continue bedding into the first-team picture at the City Ground before becoming a fully-fledged regular.

Premier League comes calling for Cash

After breaking into the first team with the Garibaldi, Cash went on to make 141 appearances for the club, scoring 13 goals.

Starting off as a right midfielder, Forest manager Sabri Lamouchi began to utilise Cash as a right back due to Tendayi Darikwa and Carl Jenkinson suffering from injuries.

He went on to make this position his own as Forest were in the promotion picture throughout the 2019/20 season until they slipped out of the play-offs on the very last day.

His impressive performances led to several clubs being interested in the full back, including AC Milan, Everton and Aston Villa, with it being the latter that would go on to secure his signature for a hefty £16 million fee.

As Villa continued to re-stabilise in the Premier League, Cash became a key figure under Dean Smith, Steven Gerrard and eventually Unai Emery, who would go on to take Villa to the UEFA Conference League, Champions League, and now the Europa League.

Eligible for Poland on the international stage through maternal links, Cash has gone on to make 19 appearances for the Polish national team since first being selected in 2021.

With the deal working out for both Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest, the East-Midlanders went on to get promoted to the Premier League themselves in 2022 under Steve Cooper. And from Cash, they made a fantastic profit on a player brought in for next to nothing that they fine-tuned to reach the top level.

As for Wycombe, a disastrous scenario that saw the club in financial turmoil in 2012 saw one of their brightest prospects leave searching for a new avenue, and the club will forever wonder what could have been had Cash risen through their own ranks as envisioned.