The art of an FM Wonderkid is to find someone in some faraway land with very little PR, unearth them and then personally give them the platform to be the player you believe they can be.
You’d find some unknown teenager hidden away in Belgium, Brazil or Argentina, sign him for a fee that felt suspiciously low and then spend the next five seasons watching him become one of the best players in the world. And you laud over your abilities indefinitely, and apply for real-life scout roles.
Or in modern day football, you set up a Twitter account (No, I won’t call it ‘X‘), give it some acrimonious handle about your knowledge and focus, then speak into the ether into you’re eventually right.
The funny thing is most of the time we were completely wrong. For every wonderkid that turned into a superstar, there were ten Freddy Adus sitting on a bench somewhere wondering what happened.
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It wouldn’t make sense if we did a FM Wonderkid article and didn’t mention Freddy Adu at some point, and even less sensical would be to not do an article on him specifically. Which we did. It’s here.
Having said all of that, every now and then Football Manager, absolutely nailed it. And here are 5 players where the game somehow saw the future before everyone else did.
Vincent Kompany (Football Manager 2007)
Back on FM07, Vincent Kompany felt like cheating.
He already looked like a complete centre-back despite still being young. His physical attributes were ridiculous, his leadership stood out immediately and if you looked through his profile you could already see the foundations of a player who seemed built to captain teams.
It was the balance of everything. Strength, positioning, tackling, composure — there weren’t many obvious weaknesses. All for the princely sum of about £7m for anyone logical enough to gamble.
Real life somehow ended up following an eerily similar script.
After joining Manchester City, Kompany became one of the defining players of the club’s modern era. He captained title-winning sides, became one of the Premier League’s best defenders and produced moments people still talk about now — including that goal against Leicester during the run-in.
For once, Football Manager almost undersold him.
Lionel Messi (Football Manager 2006)
It feels weird to add Lionel Messi to an FM Wonderkids list, but I’m gonna do it anyway.
His dribbling, acceleration and technique numbers looked absurd at a time when most people outside Barcelona’s system still hadn’t fully seen him play.
Then real football happened.
Multiple Ballon d’Or awards, World Cup success and endless arguments about the greatest player of all time later, Messi ended up becoming something far bigger than a wonderkid.
Again, Football Manager got there early.
Strangely enough, this was also an era in the FM Wonderkids world where there wasn’t as much of a pull to their academy club as there is now. So, if you were a decent-size club, Lionel Messi on Football Manager 2006 would cost around £10-15m. I signed him for Man United every single save.
Sergio Agüero (Football Manager 2006)
There was always something satisfying about finding Agüero on older Football Manager saves.
He wasn’t built like a traditional striker either. His profile looked quick, technical and aggressive, and within a couple of seasons he usually turned into a goalscoring machine. You’d sign him once and then wonder why you ever bothered scouting strikers again.
Again, his real-life career followed a fairly similar path.
Agüero became one of the Premier League’s most reliable goalscorers and eventually Manchester City’s all-time leading scorer. Most football fans could probably tell you exactly where they were when he scored that title-winning goal against QPR.
Football Manager users had already watched him score hundreds. And as FM Wonderkids go, he’s the only one on this list that was signed from a South American club, and that feels right.
Kylian Mbappé – Football Manager 2016
Kylian Mbappe is perhaps the one where is ‘FM Wonderkids’ status was immediately dwarfed by his real-life ambitions once he broke through into that AS Monaco team.
His pace looked outrageous, his potential looked frightening and after a couple of seasons he usually became unstoppable. Defenders simply couldn’t live with him.
A World Cup winner before turning 20 and one of the biggest names in world football, Mbappé became another example of Football Manager spotting something before much of the football world fully caught on.
In Conclusion
It’s quite nice to do an FM Wonderkids breakdown where the players actually did well.
But maybe next time we’ll go for more niche players. Much like this one. And if you personally ever bought them as an FM Wonderkid yourself, then you’re lying because I’m the only one.
Who was your favourite FM Wonderkid who actually came good?