Birmingham City manager Pep Clotet has revealed that he will be unable to call upon winger Jefferson Montero for his side's trip to Nottingham Forest on Saturday.

Montero joined Birmingham on a season-long loan from fellow Championship side Swansea City on the final day of the summer transfer window last week, and although it has been confirmed that the paperwork was completed in time, the Ecuadorian has yet to receive international clearance for the transfer.

Speaking about Montero's situation ahead of Saturday's trip to The City Ground, Clotet was quoted by Birmingham Live as saying: “I am still awaiting to hear about clearance, I don’t think that’s cleared yet, so it’s one of them.

"Otherwise he would be available for selection as well.”

Despite the setback, Clotet has been impressed with what he has seen from Montero on the training pitch so far, with the Spaniard claiming: “He looked better than I thought.

“Obviously his training regime at Swansea was a little unknown for us. It’s a bit better for us than we thought.”

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Earlier in the summer, it was reported that Montero could be forced to look for a transfer to a side outside of England, due to issues with the winger's work permit.

As well as Montero, Clotet has confirmed that midfielders Jacques Maghoma and Kerim Mrabti will also miss the meeting with Forest due to injury.

The Verdict

This will be frustrating for Birmingham.

Having beaten the clock to seal the deal for Montero, you imagine they will have been keen to get the winger involved in first-team action as soon as possible.

It now looks as though they may have to wait sometime for that to happen yet, and all the time that delay is going on, Montero's match sharpness is likely to be reducing more and more.

Add to that the fact that both Maghoma and Mrabti are set to be absent due to injury on Saturday, and you feel that Birmingham could have really done with having a winger such as Montero available for the trip to the City Ground.