Amazing IRL Footballers that Football Manager got wrong

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Jamie Vardy

Harry Kane

N’Golo Kanté

Mo Salah

Tariq Lamptey

Conclusion

Football Manager is brilliant at predicting underrated wonderkids that can become amazing real-world players. There are countless players Football Manager has tipped for greatness who’ve gone on to tear up the footballing world. But if there’s one historic weakness in the game, it’s predicting late bloomers and accurately reflecting those kinds of players in its mechanics.

Recent updates have tried to address this—building late developers into Football Manager 2024—but this doesn’t help those who blossomed late in their careers before now. So, I’ve dug into the archives to find players whose Football Manager profiles look comically bad compared to how good they became. Some of these players you wouldn’t have signed on a free transfer—but you’d now break your transfer record for them in real life.

Jamie Vardy

Early in his career, Jamie Vardy was unrecognisable from the player we know today. This is someone who wouldn’t have been able to spearhead a Vanarama National playoff charge, let alone lead a team with 5,000/1 odds to a Premier League title. All the characteristic Vardy attributes we recognise now are completely missing. Eleven acceleration? Tell that to Premier League defenders over the last decade. Seven aggression?! It would take me a thousand guesses to figure out which striker this was meant to be.

You can’t really blame Football Manager, though. No one—except maybe Vardy himself—could have predicted his meteoric rise from non-league obscurity to top-level silverware. But looking back, his old profiles are hilarious with the benefit of hindsight. It makes you wonder if there are any other hidden gems languishing in the lower leagues, waiting for their moment.

Harry Kane

Harry Kane’s early career was slow, to say the least. Uninspiring loans at Leyton Orient, Millwall, Norwich, and Leicester would not have convinced you he was a future world-class player. Football Manager seemed to agree. His profiles in games from 2010 to 2015 were underwhelming. The fact that, in someone’s save, he ended up playing for Tamworth tells you all you need to know.

However, Kane’s low ratings in Football Manager turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Miles Jacobson, the game’s director, once revealed that Kane’s Football Manager profile became a motivator for him. Speaking to the Daily Mirror, Jacobson said:

“Harry Kane. We did always have him as all right, but I have personally said sorry to him because there was a long period where he was on loan at other clubs, and we didn’t think he was going to reach the heights that he has done.

“I met him at the London Football Awards, and he is known for playing a lot of computer games. I said, ‘We get 0.5 percent wrong; you were one we got wrong.’ He said to me that one of the reasons he was trying so hard was to make sure his stats were better in the game!”

Football Manager: influencing real-world football since day one.

N’Golo Kanté

This article could just be a Leicester title-winning side reunion. I need to know what was in the water for Leicester’s scouting team during this period. They were on fire, unearthing hidden gems left, right, and centre. And it seems they saw something that Football Manager completely missed.

In Football Manager 2014 and earlier, N’Golo Kanté was just an average playmaker with very limited technical ability. In fairness, they got his work rate right, but that’s as much credit as I’m willing to give them. The rest of his attributes were way off. Even a Natural Fitness rating of 16 feels too low for Kanté. And don’t get me started on the 10 strength and 11 tackling—absolutely criminal.

Mo Salah

Relatively low potential. Very average technical ability. Mohamed Salah in Football Manager 2012 and 2013 was unrecognisable from the player he is today. He’s now arguably the best player in the Premier League, but back then, you’d have thought his ceiling was as the best player in the Egyptian Premier League. In one alternate reality, he ends up as a winger for Zamalek, scoring two goals in seven games.

In real life, however, Salah tore up the Premier League at that age, scoring 19 goals and providing 12 assists in 38 games. And that season barely stands out for him! It’s safe to say Football Manager underestimated his potential—as did Chelsea, in fairness.

Tariq Lamptey

I don’t care that he’s only 18 in this screenshot. You don’t make it as a Premier League footballer with attributes like these. At best, Tariq Lamptey’s stats suggest he’d develop into a League Two player. A wing-back with four strength, three balance, seven passing, and eight tackling, standing at 5’5″? Opposition wingers would be licking their lips at the thought of facing him. The only thing Football Manager got right was his speed. It’s almost as if they thought Lamptey was an Olympic sprinter rather than a professional footballer. It’s the only possible explanation.

Conclusion

All the players mentioned here are fairly obvious examples. They’ve all played in the Premier League, and most of us would have guessed their profiles were inaccurate at some point. But now I want to hear from you. Are there any more niche players that Football Manager got wrong? Is there someone from your local league who was massively underrated but went on to great things? Let me know in the comments!

About the Author

William is the admin of Out of Context Football Manager, an X account that focuses on FM news. He's worked for LADbible Group and is VG's resident FM expert.