Manchester City are reportedly interested in signing Elliot Anderson from Nottingham Forest. The midfielder has impressed with his performances last season, earning a place in England's World Cup squad. Anderson's ability to cover a lot of ground and bring energy to the game has made him a valuable asset for Forest. He was indispensable for the team in a campaign where they hired four different managers, playing 97 per cent of their league minutes. No player across Europe's five leagues had a higher share of their team's touches or passes, and Anderson was also responsible for a large proportion of their chances created, line-breaking passes and recoveries. For good measure, Anderson also delivered 21 per cent of their crosses. His set pieces were excellent, and only Pascal Gross averaged more open-play crosses than his 2.0 per 90. The best examples of his ability from out wide came in Forest's 3-2 defeat at Manchester United, another team who are interested in Anderson, in May. Having sent a flat cross to Morato's head for the first goal, he whips in a low ball to Morgan Gibbs-White for their second. Much of the damage Anderson did in 2025-26 came from these areas. He often dropped to the sides of Murillo or Nikola Milenkovic while the full-backs pushed forward. This dragged out the opposition shape and allowed Gibbs-White, Ibrahim Sangare, and Nicolas Dominguez to operate with more freedom. The graph below, depicting his most common line-breaking passes, using data from Skillcorner, outlines that too. Anderson's intelligence meant these passes took different forms too. Against Crystal Palace in February, he positions himself between the lines and calls for a pass from Sangare, who opts for the safer options. As the ball goes wide to right back Ola Aina, he has the awareness to look over his shoulder to see Gibbs-White set off on a run and goes closer to ask for the ball. Upon receiving it, he releases a first-time pass over the Palace defender that falls perfectly to Gibbs-White, giving Forest a two-on-two in seconds. Anderson is also good at dropping between the centre-backs to progress