Stoke City and Watford join Celtic in Man City player pursuit | OneFootball

Stoke City and Watford are battling to sign Manchester City youngster Freddie Anderson, as detailed in a report from Football Insider.

The report states that the young centre-back is expected to leave the Premier League club's academy this summer, alerting the Championship duo who are also being joined by Scottish giants Celtic in the defender's pursuit.

Anderson has featured regularly for City's U16s this season and the central defender can also operate as a right-back, with Anderson spending 10 years in the academy of the current Premier League champions.

The 16-year-old is the son of former Arsenal and Manchester United defender Viv Anderson, who was Sir Alex Ferguson's first signing at Old Trafford back in 1987.

As per the report from Football Insider, Anderson senior opted to send his son after being impressed by the standard of the facilities standard and the youth setup.

Both Championship clubs have seen lots of youngsters break through at first-team level and it will be interesting to see if further interest surfaces as more and more clubs are alerted to his expected Man City departure.

However, Celtic has emerged as a fantastic destination for young players over the years and the European football element could make a north of the border move that little bit more desirable.

The verdict

A lot of talent can be picked up from those who are released from the Man City academy, with the Citizens producing an insane amount of talent, especially across the most recent seasons.

The fact that two big Championship clubs, with strong academies, and a club like Celtic are now involved in his pursuit speaks volumes about his potential and the future he could possibly have.

As mentioned above, the early interest in Anderson will more than likely be followed by even more interest and it will be interesting to see if either of the second-tier duo are able to position themselves better than Celtic.

A player who will go straight into an U17 or U18 set up wherever he ends up signing for, he will be considering where he may be afforded the most opportunities to progress, whilst looking at the clubs in his pursuit and where these teams might be in a few years.