Manchester City have exited the transfer race for Bayer Leverkusen’s Florian Wirtz.
And instead they will focus on landing Nottingham Forest’s Morgan Gibbs-White.
The German sensation could have been a natural successor to Kevin De Bruyne, however, City withdrew their interest as costs for the potential deal reached eye watering highs.
Estimates suggest that the deal would have been the biggest in City’s history, costing them a total of £252million inclusive of transfer fees and wages.
While Pep Guardiola’s side have pulled out of the race for 22-year-old, Liverpool and Bayern Munich remain interested.
Wirtz is a leading young talent in European football and was a key figure in Leverkusen’s unbeaten domestic double last season.
However, City views that the overall cost of the potential deal for the Germany international is too expensive.
Wirtz became the youngest goalscorer in Bundesliga history in a 4-2 home game loss to Bayern Munich aged just 17 years and 34 days old.
The 22-year-old already has 29 caps for Germany and six goals.
Man City are no strangers to walking away from deals they deem too expensive.
They famously cooled their interest in England captain and then Tottenham striker Harry Kane because of the size of the transfer fee in the summer of 2021.
They waiting a year before signing Erling Haaland for £51.2m in 2022.
While City have pulled out of talk for Wirtz, talkSPORT understands they are frontrunners for a deal for Nottingham Forest midfielder Morgan Gibbs-White.
In April, talkSPORT reported that Nottingham Forest slapped a £100m price tag on Gibbs-White.
This summer, City are looking to fill the gaping hole in their midfield created by the departure of veteran midfielder De Bruyne.
The Belgian has won six Premier League titles and the Champions League across ten trophy-laden years at the club.
Gibbs-White joined Forest in 2022 following their promotion back to the Premier League, in a £25m plus add-ons switch from Wolves.
The 25-year-old has 153 appearances, 18 goals and 27 assists across the Premier League.
The midfielder has two England caps after making his debut against the Republic of Ireland when Lee Carsley called him up for the UEFA Nations Leagues matches last September.
