Chris Hughton hopes that Nottingham Forest's blossoming relationship with Manchester United can enhance the club's reputation regarding potential future loan additions.

Red Devils midfielder James Garner is one of five loan players currently on Forest's books, with Cyrus Christie, Anthony Knockaert, Luke Freeman and Filip Krovinovic also at the club on a temporary basis from Fulham, Sheffield United and Benfica respectively.

Garner is the youngest and most raw of those five, with the 20-year-old joining on loan from Manchester United in January having spent the first half of the season on loan at Watford.

The midfielder had his loan deal cut short by United in January, though, with a view to him getting more regular minutes elsewhere having made only 12 league starts for the Hornets.

Since moving to the City Ground, Garner has been an integral player under Hughton. 15 of his 16 appearances have been starts, chipping in with three goals from midfield and producing a string of impressive performances.

It remains to be seen whether Forest can tempt United into letting them have Garner back on loan in 2021/22, but Hughton is hopeful that regardless of whoever they potentially look to bring in on a temporary basis, their parent clubs will trust the Reds to "take good care of them".

Speaking to FLW in today's press conference about whether managers may see Forest as a good loan club for their younger players, Hughton said: "I hope so. It's also about the loan players we have.

"At this moment, we have five loan players. There's definitely more responsibility as a club in regards to the relationship you have with the parent club of a player when they're a young player.

"If I'm looking at our current five loan players, we probably have more responsibility with James because he is a developing, young player, as opposed to an established player who has been around for a while.

"We have very good links with United, and right the way through this process, we've kept them updated with stats from his games, his improvements and our own thoughts.

"I'd like to think any club that we could potentially take a player on loan from, whether that be a young player or a seasoned player, feel like we would take good care of them."