Freddie Guarin was a beast of a midfielder performance wise even when his stats didn't nessecarily show it. Proper hidden gem back in the day.
Adam Ljajic and Tosic were amazing too.
Adam Ljajic and Tosic were amazing too.
Touted wonderkids who made no impact in football
- Thread starter SambaBoy
- Start date
No impact is almost impossible, but there was this City player that was a massive talent and got a five tear contract only to get injured and not even going to the training ground. Still earned 30000 pr week for five years. Hardly ever played for them.
Remember a Portuguese wide player called Bruma that got alot of early hype.
I remember one version of Football Manager where every man and his dog had Van Den Borre at fullback. It got to the point where it became Van Den Boring.
It’s amazing how many people struggle with the premise of this thread.Yeap
Yeap
Was so hyped it was crazy. Think FM07 he was like the best player in the game but the hype was huge for real as well.
He won three titles, he was the main guy in Independiente for a while, he was top scorer in Libertadores in 2006...maybe this thread needs a new title
Mason Mount. At the young age of 22 he was 19th on the Ballon D'or list in 2021 and touted to be the next Zidane.
Theo Zidane that is.
That's good to know. I suspect he would agree he didn't quite meet the expectations of the media hype ascribed to him.
Did anyone mention Kerlon yet? Though if I remember correctly he struggled with injuries in his career so maybe harsh to name him.
I actually don't recall anyone here callling him the New Maradona, he was quite good, very technical, with a great shot. Yet nothing even remotely close to Diego.
Also another thing I've noticed through the years with the new Maradona thing, it's that sometimes it's confuse the "one that would take his role in the NT" to actually be a "new Maradona".
Don't think anyone on his right mind would ever think of Aimar, as a new Diego, as great as Aimar actually was.
In fact happens today with the Yamal, that so far has been outsatnding and looks the part. He is already named the "New Messi", but I think it's more related to his youth, his great talent, his Barca origin than actually any sane person seeing a Messi replica with him.
There were a steady stream of "new Maradona" type players in the UK media between the late 90s and Messi's debut in 2004.
Montenegro, Aimar, Riquelme etc.
Here's an old article on Montenegro. Its paywalled, but this was the lead.
Also, another from a Guardian piece which is still online
https://www.theguardian.com/football/1999/jun/16/thefiver.sport
There were a steady stream of "new Maradona" type players in the UK media between the late 90s to Messi's debut in 2004.
Montenegro, Aimar, Riquelme etc.
Here's an old article on Montenegro. Its paywalled, but this was the lead.
Also, another from a Guardian piece which is still online
https://www.theguardian.com/football/1999/jun/16/thefiver.sport
I guess his agents were working it to the max.
Aimar it's the only one that has some atributes similar to Diego, yet not close, even in the physical department. Yet el payaso was kind of the link between Diego and Lio.
Ortega was trully strong, short, amazing dribbling, but not close in pace, nor intelligence and sadly a bit of a wino. Yet Orteguita for someone that barely trained, that has his vices, was always fit and strong as fvck (this doesn't mean with the proper stamina), I've never seen him chubby.
Riquelme was the best example of what I've said before, he at some point became the new 10, but couldn't be more different than Diego in his physique and style. No one saw a Diego in him, like some sort of replica.
PD: technically also, no matter how great a Roman, Aimar, Ortega could be , Diego and Messi are on another level.
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Yeah agreed. The new Maradona phrase was more click bait marketing by UK rags than anything resembling an accurate representation of what each of these players were actually like.
Another worth considering would be D'Allesandro back in 2002
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/dallesandro.25746/
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/dallesandro.25746/
seems I'm going to be a pain in the arse...Andrés had a great carreer, mostly in South America with multiple League titles in Argentina and Brazil, a Libertadores, couple of Sudamericanas, an Olympic medal and a Youth NT WC title and he had become quite a name with Internacional, one of his biggest idols.
Most suitable for this thread are fellas like Iturbe, or De Federico, yet both of them had a pro carreer and went at some point to some high profile team and won or close to win sthg.
Maybe more in the freddy Adu type (yet not even near the hype) was Forestieri, he had a new Messi tag on his shoulder at some point when very young.
If we are changing the premise of the thread, to fellas that actually had talent but for whatever reason they didn't make it at the level of skills they had (even if at some point they had succeess in their carreers) then we can talk about for instance of:
Scocco:
to a lesser extent Conca:
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I was playing on the same "the new Maradona" theme as earlier. But you are correct, D'Alessandro did have a decent career.
D'Allesandro was my favorite player to watch in the Argentine league when Fox Sports World (as it was then) would show all the international leagues.
I enjoyed watching Leandro Romagnoli back then too. From a look at Wiki, it seems he became a bit of a legend at San Lorenzo.
Another name that was mentioned on here at the time was Santino Quaranta. There were a few MLS players coming through in the late 90s/early 2000s that had some mild hype behind them, Josh Wolff I think was another. In Quaranta's case, it would appear he got caught up in drug use and eventually cleaned himself up to open a soccer academy in the US. Wholesome.
I enjoyed watching Leandro Romagnoli back then too. From a look at Wiki, it seems he became a bit of a legend at San Lorenzo.
Another name that was mentioned on here at the time was Santino Quaranta. There were a few MLS players coming through in the late 90s/early 2000s that had some mild hype behind them, Josh Wolff I think was another. In Quaranta's case, it would appear he got caught up in drug use and eventually cleaned himself up to open a soccer academy in the US. Wholesome.
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Ah ok, still I don't have a great memory regarding that tag, but I sometimes feel that the New Maradona was more a thing of the International media or agents than a real Tag down here.
The two Tags I trully feel that people mostly felt were warranted in comparison with old Phenom/ Genius players; with real similarities in terms of style, "burst into the scene" situations, level of skills, pace, power and intelligence, were Kun with Romario and Messi with Diego, in fact both certainly became true at a certain level, in terms of ability and style.
In the past I recall reading articles of the Italian media comparing Platini with Sivori and later Diego with Sivori, both obviously great and accurate comparsions in terms of extraordinary ability and in some aspects, more or less, similar atributtes (specially Diego and Sivori)
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Honestly don't know how Quintero didn't make it. He was so gifted and really enjoyable to watch. Haven't been as disappointed by a player's career since Anders D'Allessandro.
Josh McEachran
Freddy Adu
Raval Morrison
John Bostock
Michael Johnson
Antony Le Tallec
Ganso
Jay Emmanuel Thomas
Freddy Adu
Raval Morrison
John Bostock
Michael Johnson
Antony Le Tallec
Ganso
Jay Emmanuel Thomas
Well he had a good carreer, he recently won an International Title with Racing in South America and was part of one of the most famous Libertadores Finals ever with a cracker of a goal (sadly).
In the "he could have been much more type of thing", a player like Recoba fits a lot better that tag than Quintero or D'Alessandro.
Diego Buonanotte, another rising Argentinian star, involved in a car accident that saw three of his friends die, him being the only survivor.
I clearly said after the WC ... What happened at Bayern
Also said after the WC... Did he really nail a position in any squadJames also had no impact at all, becoming the best goalscorer at a World Cup.
This was harsh ..But consistency?
Freddy Adu is always an interesting case. He clearly had some talent but no idea how he went from all that hype to not being played by a Finnish 4th division team. He kept trying the Europe route but even failed to join Blackpool when they have zero players and were desperate for anyone to join.
I followed his career over the years and it was a really obscure career near the end. Ended up playing 5 minutes for a Serbian team, two games in Brazil and dropped to the Finnish 3rd division before being told by a second division Swedish team that he hasn't got the mental or physical capability of being a professional footballer
I followed his career over the years and it was a really obscure career near the end. Ended up playing 5 minutes for a Serbian team, two games in Brazil and dropped to the Finnish 3rd division before being told by a second division Swedish team that he hasn't got the mental or physical capability of being a professional footballer
That’s not the point of the thread, though.
Jonny Rödlund. One of the biggest talents of Swedish football. Had one year in the United youth team.