Bayern Munich lead Chelsea in Morgan Gibbs-White race

Chelsea have been linked with a move for Morgan Gibbs-White, but Bayern Munich are reported to hold the inside track on signing the Nottingham Forest vice-captain.

Bayern move ahead of Chelsea in the Gibbs-White race

The Blues have held a long-standing interest in Gibbs-White, first reported by the Daily Mail earlier in the summer. Arthur Ferridge, writing for the Evening Standard on 23 September 2026, reports that TalkSport now has Bayern as the leading contenders for his signature.

Forest aren’t going to make this easy. Gibbs-White is their vice-captain, and he only signed a new long-term deal last summer after the club rejected bids from Tottenham. Any sale from here is expected to eclipse the £116m Forest received from Manchester City for Eliott Anderson, and Bayern’s involvement only complicates things further for Chelsea.

Chelsea’s interest stretches back months, but it remains to be seen whether they’ll renew their pursuit once the window reopens. That uncertainty sits alongside Chelsea’s ongoing midfield gap – a problem largely of their own making after a summer of heavy spending elsewhere.

Whatever price Forest eventually name, it’s likely to sit in similar territory to that £116m Anderson fee given how central Gibbs-White has become at the City Ground. Chelsea have already spent heavily this year, with Morgan Rogers arriving in July alongside Maxence Lacroix and Marco Palestra, all at great expense according to the Standard’s report. No formal Chelsea bid, agreed fee or personal terms for Gibbs-White have been reported, so this remains speculation rather than an active deal – and going again for him in the summer would mean beating Bayern to the punch while also getting past a Forest hierarchy in no rush to sell.

In other news…

Chelsea are also said to be regretting their decision not to sign Manu Kone this summer, having considered the Roma midfielder as a late replacement for the Manchester City-bound Enzo Fernandez. Corriere dello Sport now reports his asking price has doubled from €50m (£42.9m) to €100m (£85.9m), after he was reportedly available for the lower figure at one stage of the summer – a saga covered in more depth on our breakdown of the collapsed Camara move and the wider search for midfield reinforcements.

Elsewhere, the Blues are also tracking 15-year-old Gambian prospect Adama Jeng and monitoring Feyenoord midfielder Gjivai Zechiel, according to the same report.