Manchester City table £106m verbal bid for Elliot Anderson with add-ons | OneFootball

Manchester City have made a verbal offer worth £106m up front, with add-ons taking it beyond £120m, for Nottingham Forest midfielder Elliot Anderson, according to NY Times.

Forest will only consider a sale if the fixed fee surpasses the £125m British record Liverpool paid Newcastle for Alexander Isak last summer.

Manchester United admire Anderson but are not competing at these figures. They will avoid a bidding war and are focusing on West Ham’s Mateus Fernandes and Bournemouth’s Alex Scott. Recent midfield deals for Declan Rice, Moises Caicedo and Enzo Fernandez have all been around £100m or higher.

Anderson has three years left on the contract signed after joining from Newcastle in summer 2023, in a £35m agreement that sent Odysseas Vlachodimos the other way and valued him at £15m.

He played all 38 Premier League matches in 2025-26, scoring four and assisting four. He debuted for England last September, was named in Thomas Tuchel’s World Cup squad and received the No. 8 shirt.

City routinely target elite English players for homegrown reasons and Premier League pedigree. Anderson is viewed as a potential replacement for Bernardo Silva. He recorded more touches than any player in the league last season and scored in Forest’s 2-2 draw at City in March.

City have previously struggled when signing cover beneath established stars, such as Kalvin Phillips and Nico Gonzalez. With Bernardo gone, they can pursue a starter-level addition, and Anderson is regarded as fitting that profile.

Source: NY Times