ERIK LAMELA
RIVER PLATE, 19
Lamela was relegated at River
in 2011, but Roma coughed up
€14 million that summer. After two years,
Spurs broke their transfer record in a £30m
deal – worth it for the bamboozling rabonas.
AARON RAMSEY
ARSENAL, 20
Recovered from a horror injury
at Stoke to become essential
for Arsenal; helping them to a hat-trick of FA
Cup wins was topped only by his major role
in Wales’ dream run to the Euro 2016 semis.
ADEM LJAJIC
FIORENTINA, 19
“The one that got away for Sir
Alex”? Nope. Instead, Ljajic got
attacked by his own boss Delio Rossi in 2012,
before replacing Lamela in Rome. He hopped
around Italy – now he’s frozen out at Besiktas.
ALAN DZAGOEV
CSKA MOSCOW, 20
Dzagoev was a darling of Euro
2012, bagging three goals as
the tournament’s joint top scorer. But since
then? Well... not so much. He’s now into his
13th campaign at CSKA. More was expected.
IKER MUNIAIN
ATHLETIC BILBAO, 18
Once La Liga’s youngest ever
scorer, Muniain has won only
a pair of caps for Spain and lost in five major
finals. However, he now skippers boyhood
club Athletic, nearing his 400th league game.
DAVID DE GEA
ATLETICO MADRID, 20
The keeper joined Man United
that summer for £18.9m. He
considered legging it after a tough first year,
but stuck around to win the title in Fergie’s
final season – then held the team together.
LACINA TRAORE
KUBAN KRASNODAR, 20
Those Drogba comparisons
were always weird – Traore is
6ft 8in, for starters. He certainly hasn’t come
close, having spent the last 10 years skipping
around as many outfits in seven countries.
LUCAS MOURA
SAO PAULO, 18
The new Iniesta?! Valued at
£70m?! Calm down, FFT. The
sought-after Lucas did become PSG’s record
signing (for £38m) in 2012, though – and
Spurs fans will never forget his Ajax heroics.
CHRISTIAN
ERIKSEN
AJAX, 19
Instead of joining Chelsea as
a spotty teen, the Dane became one of the
Eredivisie’s finest playmakers in his own time.
He joined Spurs on the same day as Lamela,
excelled, then steered Inter to Serie A glory.
NEYMAR
SANTOS, 19
“He does a lot of firula [fancy
footwork] and falls over a lot”- so evaluated Pele a decade ago. Neymar
has yet to achieve his ultimate ambition of
bagging the Ballon d’Or, but he’s done OK for
a lad who falls over a lot since leaving Santos
in 2011: a winner of 15 major trophies, status
as the world’s most expensive footballer in
history and soon to become Brazil’s all-time
leading scorer... beyond one Pele. Thankfully,
O Rei has softened in his stance nowadays.
EDEN HAZARD
LILLE, 20
It wasn’t ever a case of when
Hazard would become one of
the world’s best players, but how quickly –
and who for. Zinedine Zidane had tooted his
credentials as a “major star” before Chelsea
shelled out £32m for him in 2012. The Blues
trebled that investment seven years later
after he’d become their undisputed talisman.XHERDAN
SHAQIRI
BASEL, 19
Skilful, pacey and partial to
a banger: for 2011, see 2021 too. He’s been
key for his country but represented Bayern,
Inter and Liverpool without such status, and
was oddly placed at Stoke. Still: very talented.JAMES
MCCARTHY
WIGAN, 20
Don’t snigger: Barcelona were
spying him at Hamilton. McCarthy was pivotal
for Wigan, helping them to shock Man City in
the 2013 FA Cup Final, then followed his boss
to Everton. Injuries have stunted his progress.CONNOR
WICKHAM
IPSWICH, 18
Ipswich’s youngest player was
signed by Sunderland for £8m, and kept them
up in 2013-14 with five goals in three games.
Sadly, the striker has averaged nine outings
per season since 2015, and is now at Preston.RYO MIYAICHI
ARSENAL, 18
Impressive enough for Arsene
Wenger, and for his ‘Ryodinho’
moniker at Feyenoord. But the loans declined:
Bolton, Wigan and Twente, before Ryo settled
at St Pauli. He headed home to Japan in July.MARIO GOTZE
DORTMUND, 18
Gotze was Germany’s World
Cup final-winning hero in 2014,
but his game time eventually dried up under
Pep Guardiola after he swapped Dortmund
for Bayern. A BVB return in 2016 didn’t spark
a revival, and now he’s trying his luck at PSV.JEFFREY BRUMA
CHELSEA, 19
He looked like a future partner
for David Luiz; instead, Bruma
made one league start for Chelsea and has
bounded around Europe with Hamburg, PSV,
Wolfsburg, Schalke, Mainz and Kasimpasa.AHMED KHALIL
AL-AHLI, 19
Er, who? “The most technically
gifted player to come out of the
UAE for a decade”, that’s who. Khalil hasn’t
had a bad career: he’s beyond 100 caps and
nearing 50 goals for his country, but simply
hasn’t felt the need to leave the Middle East.MARIO
BALOTELLI
MANCHESTER CITY, 20
Oh, Mario. We all enjoyed the
banter era – but what happened to the rest
of it? His Euro 2012 semi-final brace against
Germany was momentous; Milan, Nice and
even Marseille looked like they might be new
dawns. But then the (inevitable?) downfall:
his last three clubs have read Brescia, Monza
and Adana Demirspor. Not-so-super Mario...HOW DID WE DO?
In June 2011, Jack Wilshere was the face of
FFT’s ‘20 under 20’ cover – but where did the
other stars of tomorrow we tipped for glory
a decade ago end up? Well, it’s a mixed bag...FourFourTwo December 2021 59JACK
WILSHERE