Nottingham Forest hold £100m trump card in race for Leeds United transfer ‘target’ - opinion

Leeds United look set for their most important summer in decades but an ambitious transfer window will not be without its challenges - the most obvious being vast levels of competition for their targets.

Reports suggest Daniel Farke could have more than £100million to spend this summer with reinforcements needed across the board - albeit there will be priority areas. First-team additions in goal and upfront feel like a necessity, while long-standing interest in several No.10s would suggest competition for Brenden Aaronson will arrive.

And on that note, it should be of little surprise to see James McAtee’s name resurface. The 22-year-old was a known target for Leeds a year ago, with former CEO Angus Kinnear naming him alongside the likes of Emi Buendia and Fabio Carvalho as players they looked at to try and significantly improve Farke’s options at the time.

Manchester City did not appear keen on losing McAtee last summer but there seems to have been a change in the tide, with The Sunday Mirror reporting last weekend on his possible £25million exit. They claimed more than a dozen clubs were keen on the attacking midfielder, with Leeds one of five named teams to have reportedly made enquiries.

Another of those who appear to have made interest known is Nottingham Forest, and that could present a number of problems for Leeds. Most notably, Nuno Espirito Santo’s side are more established in the top-flight and will play continental football next season, whether it be in the Champions League, Europa League or Conference League. But Forest might also have something McAtee’s current club City want.

The £100m transfer edge Leeds United have to fight against

Etihad chiefs are planning for a busy summer themselves following City’s worst season in several years under Pep Guardiola, with a raft of fresh attacking faces their transfer priority. And among the many targets is Forest talisman Morgan Gibbs-White, with Fabrizio Romano labelling the 25-year-old a ‘priority target’ in Manchester.

TalkSPORT recently reported that Forest have slapped a £100m price-tag on Gibbs-White amid that interest, money that in the world of strict PSR regulations might even prove too much for City. They could, however, offer up McAtee as a makeweight, therefore bringing their expenditure down by around £25m, based on their valuation of the attacking midfielder.

Another admirer of McAtee, Bayer Leverkusen, could find themselves with a similar edge amid reports of growing City interest in their young star, Florian Wirtz. Similarly, the German club’s reported price-tag of over £120m could feasibly be softened by the offer of a player-plus-cash deal involving the Etihad academy graduate.

Leeds will have no such card to play, if indeed they do pursue a move for McAtee, but after another campaign on the fringes it’s not impossible to see McAtee push for a move that will secure him regular starts. Those starts could definitely come at Forest or Leverkusen but would be far more likely at Elland Road, given he would be seen as a significant upgrade on Aaronson, at least on paper.

Player-plus-cash deals are also incredibly rare in modern football for a reason, with so many moving parts already in negotiations for just one player, never mind two. And so while a move for McAtee would always be difficult for Leeds to pull off, given the level of competition, hope will not be lost.

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