Former Chelsea defender Dan Petrescu is emerging as an early contender for the vacant manager's job at Nottingham Forest, according to the Telegraph.

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Petrescu is an early candidate for the Forest job

The Romanian has never managed a professional football club in England, and is currently the manager of Qatar team Al-Arabi.

The 47-year-old does have experience of playing in England though, having had spells with Sheffield Wednesday, Chelsea, Bradford City and Southampton.

Petrescu is arguably most well known for his time at Chelsea where he enjoyed five years at Stamford Bridge as a player.

The Romanian amassed over 150 appearances for the Blues and he scored 17 goals during his time there.

As reported on FLW, Stuart Pearce left his role as manager of the Sky Bet Championship club on Sunday, and the club are now actively recruiting a replacement to fill the void.

Pearce held talks with club chairman Fawaz Al-Hasawi on Sunday afternoon, and the talks culminated in the former England-under 21 manager leaving the club.

Forest have been in an abysmal run of form, and have only managed to pick up one win in their previous ten league games.

The departure of Pearce comes after his side lost two successive Sky Bet Championship games, against Fulham and most recently Millwall.

The 1-0 loss against Ian Holloway’s Millwall on Saturday at the City Ground, was seemingly the final straw for Pearce, and club chairman Al-Hasawi decided enough was enough.

Pearce, 52, took over at the City Ground last summer for his second job in league football after managing Manchester City last decade.

Whoever takes over at the City Ground faces a tough challenge of changing the form of the team, with the club only winning one game in their last 10 league games.