Nottingham Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis has admitted he is "very optimistic" about working with former Arsenal sporting director Edu in the future.
Marinakis also owns Greek side Olympiacos and Portuguese top-flight club Rio Ave and in recent months [Edu](https://www.football.london/all-about/edu) has been linked with Marinakis' multi-club ownership model. [Edu resigned from his role at Arsenal](https://www.football.london/arsenal-fc/) last month, saying it was “time to pursue a different challenge”, while Marinakis has recently been linked with Brazilian side Vasco da Gama.
The 57-year-old shipping tycoon told Sky Sports: “Edu was a very good player and also a very good sporting and technical director. I have a lot of respect for him. What I can say is that I would like to cooperate with him on a much bigger project, a global project.
"I’m optimistic that in case all this goes ahead, it will be another successful venture for both of us. I’m very optimistic about it, but we need to see how this will be developed and will be finalised, if and when time allows.”
Marinakis is reported to be keen to expand his multi-club structure into Brazil and Italy. He said: “There are discussions and what I can say is that whatever I want to get involved in needs to be something major.
“The tradition is very important and it always makes more sense to me to manage or to own. But in big clubs where we’re talking about millions of supporters, you don’t consider it as ownership.
“I cannot use the word that I ‘bought’ Olympiacos or I ‘bought’ Nottingham Forest. This is something huge. It’s for all the supporters, for millions of people, so I cannot see it as a business.”
Marinakis reiterated his desire to establish Forest as a top-six Premier League club and head coach Nuno Espirito Santo responded to the Greek billionaire’s lofty ambitions at a press conference before Saturday evening’s game at Manchester United. Nuno said: “I think he expressed the man that we know, his ambitions and his desire to grow and improve. We try to follow, doing the best we can.
“(Qualifying for a place in Europe) is a high demand. Everything needs time. We are in a good way of building a team and a squad. If we look back, the way we kept our players (in the summer) was a good move in terms of stability and calmness for us to grow.
“Now we are trying to improve game by game. The engine of the club is the team, so my focus and my dedication is there so we can proceed.”