It will be a shock to the system to see one of our home-grown players wearing the colours of another team, but I suppose it was inevitable that he was not going to sign a new contract as he had become disillusioned being a peripheral member of the squad last season, even if he was handed a new lease of life when Billy Davies returned as manager.
Following Wes Morgan's departure to Leicester last year, McGugan became Forest's longest-serving player, having made his debut in 2006 as an 18-year-old. During his seven-year spell at the City Ground, he scored an impressive 40 goals in just over 200 appearances, a great many of them from long-range. In fact he won 'Goal of the Season' two seasons in succession, and played an integral role in Forest's promotion back to the Championship in 2008.
Under Davies, McGugan was mostly used as a 'super sub', coming off the bench to score some significant goals. His ability from set-pieces was a cause of concern for many opposition defences, and even though he struggled to break into the starting line-up due to his lack of stamina and work ethic, his tendency to pull a rabbit out of the hat out of the blue made him a vital player to have around.
After being frozen out completely under Sean O'Driscoll and Alex McLeish, McGugan made a return to the first team spotlight last season and scored in six successive games, which helped Forest to keep their play-off chances alive on the last day. Without McGugan's input, and their lack of firepower upfront, the Reds would never have come close to finishing in the top six. In fact we may have ended up fighting relegation instead.
Forest will no longer be able to rely on some 'McGugan magic' to get them out of trouble, so they will have to work a lot harder now to score goals. That will probably be no bad thing, but I will really miss Lewis. Let's just hope he's having an off-day when we play Watford next season!
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