Who were your clubs? I remember at the turn of the Millenium Bristol City had a striker called Marvin Brown. Was City's youngest ever player and seemed a real talent for the future (and if you played as City CM00-01 he'd inevitably get snapped up by Premiership or upper-end Championship clubs)
At the age of 24 he's now playing for Salisbury City.
I remember at a similar time Bristol Rovers had a player called Simon Bryant who made his debut really young and Rovers fans at my school were ridiculously excited about. Injuries got to him and I think he's retired now...
So who weren't your club's stars of the future?
PS I decided that this would be out of place on the main football thread and did need to be a thread in its own right.
Darren!
Caskey!
Alton Thelwell
now at Orient
rampant youth policy =
endless shit
Is that a hardcore band name?
If not, I'm stealing it.
Haha No way!
He got released from Kettering last season, he was awful!
Jon Harley
Broke into Chelsea's first team around the same time as Terry, who at that point couldn't kick a ball to save his life (and despite the hating, is now a very good player indeed).
Sam Dalla Bona never really made it either and he was supposed to be amazing. I think he is at Napoli now though, so he can't be all that much of a failure
Harley
'made it' though
What are defining as 'made it'?
He's alright now, but hasn't gone on to be the player a lot of people thought he would be. He didn't manage to keep playing at a high standard for very long either. Like I've said for Dalla Bona, he isn't the success he was tipped to be, if not a complete failure.
played in the top league
for quite a while and a few fairly big clubs.
Fair enough
But I can think of a fair few shocking players you could say that about
loads
but I thought this was more about promising youth players who never break into the 1st teams.
I didn't get that from the first post
but each to their own
Certianly what I had in mind was both that
and, to an extent, lower league players tipped for the Premier League but who never got there.
It's open to definiton of course though...
+
Jody Morris.
Almost forgot Micheal Duberry
Why Man Utd were ever 'courting' him I don't know
What about Zeke Rowe?
He didn't even slightly make it after being tipped for greatness.
Jon Harley Woo ooh
Jon Harley Woo ooh
He used to play for scum,
But now he's Wimbledon
Amazing on his debut, pretty poor after that...
What about Norman
Whiteside, or whatever his name was? 80s Man Utd player, debuted at 15, career cut short by injury.
To be fair though
In his short career he did play in the World Cup Finals and score the winner in the FA Cup Final. So he did sort of make it. To an extent.
He's ballooned now though. I love it when ex-players balloon.
What do you reckon's worse?
To have everyone say you can "make it" but never do so or to actually make it for a a really brief period of time only to have it all taken away from you?
I hate the way the media
take joy in ex players who balloon eg : Maradona (though he was never svelte). After years of having to be cautious with their diets it's no surprise they let it go a bit.
Oh, course, it's always going to happen.
I guess I just love middle-aged fat guys generally.
I never realised just how short Maradonna was
until I saw him in some charity match the other day. He still had some pace for a portly middle-aged man
and The Killers
wrote a song about him
I love you.
That's like saying
what about Van Basten?
Luke Nightingale
for Pompey. Scored 3 in his first 3 for the first team aged about 17, now playing for Havant & Waterlooville I think.
I remember Pompey signed a young defender Zamperini I think his name was from Roma. Was highly rated but disappeared completely from view.
not really a reply to the thread but was matt le tissier always fat?
I wouldn't have said he was fat.
I mean he wasn't renowned for sheer athleticism but he wasn't a huge guy.
suppose so.ok how about andy reid?he is fat.for a modern day footballer he is obese
arturo lupoli
quincy owusu-abeyie or however the hell his name was spelled.
they were both meant to be future arsenal legends, now they are shit.
West Ham have had a few
mostly from their FA Youth Cup winning team in '99 when they trashed Coventry 9-0.
Bertie Brayley was on fire in those games.
Now known as
Bertie "Show me the money" and "I've played at more clubs than Bernard Manning" Brayley.
really?
Quite a few from that team have faded down the leagues, Izzy Irekipien (sp?).
With clubs pushing younger players through the ranks at an earlier stage do competitions like the FA Youth Cup mean as much nowadays? Also a lot of teams field foreign players (eg Chelsea v Man City recently) which I suppose reflects the way the game has gone.
Yeah
there was a lot of foreign players in the FA Youth Cup Final wasn't there? That's something that I think is pretty unacceptable.
As for Brayley, he's been at more Non League clubs than I can't think of on the Essex/Kent border. Good player though, more of an attacking midfielder these days.
scored a hatrick in the
youth final if memory serves correct.
What's worse is that the foreign youth players are adopting the hairstyles of players who play their trade in the lower leagues in this country.
It's a bit outdated but it's great seeing a youth player who is from the area of the club come through the ranks and then into the first team*
*and then be sold off to the highest bidder
Michael Chopra
Aced the youth team, reserves, went out on loan, did the same... hit the first team and scored 1 goal, against Sunderland, where he now resides in never ending mediocrity
And Sunderland themselves had Michael Bridges
who, in fact, was not the new Michael Owen. Which brings us round to Owen's former colleague (I believe) at England youth level Mr Francis Jeffers...
Didn't Michael Bridges score a shed load for Leeds up until injury?
Over 20 in the top flight.
I love Micky Bridges.
Bridges was a great talent
Supremely unlucky with injuries though
But Bridges was good
until he became crippled.
I think wew need to draw a disttinction between young players playing in the prem who get crippled, and thouse in league 1 who get crippled.
Franny
Jeffers played AND SCORED for England! How did that ever happen?
Harpal Singh
of Super Leeds. Was hyped to be the first big Brit-Asian to make it. Now plays in the Irish leagues.
He was shit in champ man
as well.
i love how 'now plays in the irish leagues'
is a proper failure.
and it really is.
Jermaine Pennant
Showed so much potential at Arsenal but couldn't cope with the footballing lifestyle. He hasn't exactly set the world alight at Liverpool, I guess he could still make it.
Mind you he is still playing at a big four club.
I'm not quite sure how though...
You're using the term 'playing' pretty loosely there :)
he has made it
Depends how you define "made it"
Sure, he's at a big club, but he's only really a squad player there and I don't think he has fulfilled his potential he initially displayed.
Matt Piper
Extraordinarily quick teenage striker. Scored the last goal at Filbert Street. Immediately got sold to Sunderland for £3.5m. Played about twelve times for them in three years due to injury, which eventually caused his retirement.
Also Stuart Campbell, a holding midfielder set for the Scotland squad until falling out of favour and going on to rattle around the lower divisions. Stuart Wilson. Jon Stevenson. Jon Ashton. Sam McMahon. Jordan Stewart, who was sold to Watford just as he got rubbish.
And of course the mother and father of all unfulfilled 90s talent, Julian Joachim.
Where's Stefan Oakes now?
Wycombe, I think
Joachim - this goal still makes me cream
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwNN5s3aJPM
Which one is that?
The MOTD goal of the month at Barnsley or the ridiculous acceleration play-off goal against Portsmouth (played at the City Ground)?
MOTD goal of the month
Came runner up to Dalian Atkinson I believe
and talking about unfulfilled talent - Dalian Atkinson was a prime example
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oArLA8e4Dww
Great goal though
NEVER
get sucked in to believing who is good on champ man/FM is going to be good in real life.
it's rarely true.
Henri Saivet is the future of world football!
that's what i'm led to believe.
damn you footy manager.
let's go through the other greats.
Sergio Aguero is a quality purchase.
Ismael Aissati and Lorik Cana are always on my shopping list...
Aaron is pretty good as well.
remember when mido was always a good'n to buy in FM 2005, and Djbril Cisse
Tonton Zola Mokouko
Tonton Zola Moukoko
Was genuinely the best player ever according to Champ Man. It's one of my life's biggest dissappointments that he never made it.
^^^ THIS
I bought him for every team I managed on CM 01/02. He was a genius.
See also: Peter Watovaara
Haha!
They scored 40 & 50 respectively in the Premier league for me in different seasons.
50 goals in the league?!
how did he not become a superstar?!
The mind boggles
He definitely made it though
Stephen McPhail
Now captaining FA Cup LOSERS Cardiff. We were always told he was the next 'Liam Brady'. He wasn't. He could pass, providing there was no opposition player within 50 yards of him, but that was it.
Lionel Morgan
Made his debut for Wimbledon at 16. Looked absolutely immense. Sold to spurs at the age of 17 and then had a career ruining knee injury. Think he is a physio or something now
And Jason Euell
Scored a shedload for the youth team and reserves, scored an overhead kick on his debut from outside the box, Sam Hamman called him the new pele and said he wouldn't sell him for less than 10 million, and now he plays for Southampton
the new Abidi Pele
Knowing Sham, that is probably what he meant
Paolo Vernazza
Stephen Hughes, Ryan Garry. Anyone that plays for Arsenal youth is immediatly tipped as the best payer ever, only for people to realise a couple of years later they're probably not.
Not quite the same thing I know
but it'd be inappropriate for this thread to pass without Richard Wright's name coming up.
Likewise for Francis Jeffers
FOX IN THE BOX!
FLOPS IN THE BOX!
Still has a championship medal
so does Louis Saha
so does Ian Pearce
My point? I don't have one.
David May...
has a European Cup Winners medal.
You cannot judge a player by the medals in his pocket.
Alan Shearer has......a Prem Winners medal, 2 FA Cup runners-up medals.
Overrated
Yeah that was a mistake
it was a bit odd at the time as we were about to sign Dudek, his profile was even added to the website only for Richard Wright to turn up the next day. People thought that th board had overruled Wenger and told him to bring English people in. I can imagine they went pretty quiet after this though.
Wenger has had little luck with signing English players
Hopefully this will change with Walcott! He's going to make it for sure!
But at the time it seemed a good move
and even if it hadn't worked out at Arsenal you'd still have put money on him becoming a regular at a Premier League club and a long-term England international squad player (if not most likely a first-choice). Obviously that never happened...
^^^ this
I don't see how it was a mistake on Wengers part to sign who was regarded as the best young keeper in the country. It was Wrights inability to kick a ball that let him down.
With hindsight it was a mistake
and unfortuately that's the only advantage I have over Wenger.
I think both Wright and Jeffers were bad luck rather than genuine error.
I'm sure Wenger put just as much thought and reasoning into them as all the signings that worked...
Sean Bean!
He was great in When Saturday Comes but after that he just vanished!