In Football Manager they were stars. On the pitch, they never came close to stardom. The game has nailed the future of many stars over the years, but not every prodigy reached the potential he was given. In this series we look back at FM wonderkids (since FM05) who fell short of expectations.
Silviu Lung Jr.
FM 08 | Club: U. Craiova | Age: 20 | CA: 115 | PA: -9
In FM 08, Silviu Lung Jr. had huge potential and was ridiculously cheap. A must-buy. In real life, he spent almost his whole career in Romania, always as a starter, at U. Craiova and Astra, and in 2019, aged 30, he was at Kayserispor in Turkey. He won five caps and went to Euro 2016, but as third-choice goalkeeper.
Gabriel Obertan
FM 09 | Club: Bordeaux | Age: 19 | CA: 133 | PA: 185
Needed pace? Obertan was your man. With 185 PA in FM 09, he could become one of the best in the game. In reality, he joined Manchester United in 2009 and stayed two seasons. He moved on to Newcastle, where he had two good seasons, but from then on his career nosedived: three more seasons with fewer and fewer minutes, half a season at Anzhi in 2016, a return to England with Wigan, then Levski in Bulgaria and Erzurumspor in Turkey.
Guillermo Ochoa
FM 05 | Club: América | Age: 18 | CA: 130 | PA: -9
In FM 05 and FM 06, Ochoa had PA -9 and -10. He could not be missing from any save. And mind you: he did not have a bad career, far from it, but much more was expected. He left América in 2011 for Ajaccio, where he spent three seasons, and then played for Málaga (2014), Granada (2016) and Standard Liège (2017), before returning to “his” América in summer 2019. For Mexico, he passed a hundred caps.
Kerlon
FM 06 | Club: Cruzeiro | Age: 17 | CA: 121 | PA: -10
One of the players who left the biggest mark on FM fans: Kerlon, “the Little Seal”, famous for the trick where he dribbled with the ball on his head. With -10 PA, he regularly became the best player in the world in any save. In real life, he quickly went from big prospect to big disappointment. He left Cruzeiro for Inter in 2008, was loaned to Chievo (only 4 games) and Ajax (no full games), went back to Brazil on loan to Paraná and Nacional de Patos. In 2012 he left Inter and went to Japan. Then came Barbados, the USA, Malta, Brazil and Slovakia, where he ended his career at Spartak Trnava in 2017, aged just 29.
Which of these won you the most trophies in FM?
If you missed the other parts: Parte I | Parte II | Parte III
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