Max-Edgar Chabot Rejects Angers Contract for Manchester City Move

SCO Angers are bracing themselves for another blow in goal. Max-Edgar Chabot, the 18-year-old goalkeeper tipped as one of the club’s brightest prospects, has rejected his first professional contract and is closing in on a move to Manchester City, according to Le Parisien.

For a club already nursing wounds in that position, the timing could hardly be worse.

Last season’s standout loanee Hervé Koffi returned to RC Lens after an impressive spell, Angers unable to match the price required to keep the Burkina Faso international. The response was pragmatic rather than romantic: Anthony Lopes, out of contract after his stint at FC Nantes, arrived as a free agent to plug the gap.

Now comes the risk of losing the future as well as the present.

Le Parisien reports that, while no deal has yet been signed, talks between Chabot and Manchester City are at an advanced stage, with an agreement potentially days away. For Angers, who nurtured him through their academy and into the U19 side, it is a familiar modern story: develop, showcase, then watch a heavyweight swoop.

Chabot’s reputation has been building steadily. He has featured for Angers’ U19s and earned a place in France’s U17 squad for last autumn’s U17 World Cup, a nod from national selectors that did not go unnoticed beyond Ligue 2 borders. City, always scouring Europe for elite teenage talent, have moved quickly.

If the transfer is completed, Angers will have lost Koffi, reshaped their senior goalkeeping department around Lopes, and seen one of their most promising homegrown players depart before even signing pro terms.

For a club trying to build patiently, it is a stark reminder of the market they live in—and of the pull a club like Manchester City still exerts on a teenager with the world at his gloves.