FM26 wonderkids: The 10 best young stars to sign including Porto starlet and Man Utd target

In just two weeks’ time, a brand new edition of Football Manager will be released into the world – and while it’s fair to say that FM26 has had its fair share of teething troubles, anticipation remains more than a little bit high as the world’s best management simulation returns to claim another gigantic chunk of our spare time.

One of the very first questions on the lips of most players will, of course, be which of the game’s wonderkids they should scoop up at the first opportunity. Well, because we have access to the early access beta, we can tell you which youngsters you need to sign ahead of the full release on 4 November.

We span the game forward eight years to the year 2033 – a point at which players aged 16-21 in real life right now would be around their prime – and picked out 10 of the very best players in the world that may not be on your radar right now. Nobody needs to be told that Lamine Yamal will turn out to be pretty handy in the future, after all.

There’s one caveat before start. Football Manager games no longer give youngsters fixed potential ratings, but instead they get a score randomly chosen from within a pre-determined range. In short, all of these 10 can become world-class footballers, but none of them are absolutely guaranteed to get that good in your first save. Still, the chances are that they all have perfectly acceptable floors to go with their gigantic ceilings, so these are some of your best bets…

Real-life Manchester United target among best wonderkids in Football Manager 2026

Ilias Akhomach (Villarreal – AM RC): We’re going in alphabetical order here, so we start with probably the best-known player on our list – Villarreal’s Ilias Akhomach, already a regular starter with the Yellow Submarine and a Morocco international in real life. He had everything you want in a winger by the age of 28 in the game with tons of pace, brilliant technique and dribbling and excellent crossing and decision making. He doesn’t become an all-rounder, but there are big numbers everywhere you need them for a right winger, and the game estimated his transfer value at well over £200m.

Ayyoub Bouaddi (Lille – DM/M C): Lille midfielder Bouaddi is being linked with Manchester United in the gossip columns these days, but in our game he cost Liverpool £107m in 2029 and was worth every last penny. He’s a complete midfielder, with absolutely massive stats right across the board by the time he turned 25. A brilliant technician and defender with wonderful physicals and mental stats that are off the charts. Perhaps the very best player we saw in the game in our simulation, Yamal included.

Kennet Eichhorn (Hertha BSC – DM/M C): In real life, Eichhorn is a tender 16 years of age with just seven senior starts to his name in the second tier of German football. In the game, he blossoms into a world-class midfielder. He’s still only 23 in our simulation but is already a brilliant playmaker with great metal attributes who has the tackling skill to do some great work off the ball as well – and all of his physical attributes went to 15 or more. He was worth £59m to Inter Milan in 2029 in our virtual world. See if you can get him for less early doors.

Matias Fernandez-Pardo (Lille – AM RL/ST): Another Lille youngster, the Belgian is one of remarkably few young prospects who developed into truly first-rate strikers in our game. It could be a position at which high-end wonderkids are hard to come by (it was always wing-backs that disappeared over time in FM24) and that would mean that a fast, skilful and lethal forward like Fernandez-Pardo is worth even more that he might be otherwise. He was still at Lille in our game, and racking the goals up. In case veteran FM players are wondering, by the way, yes Evan Ferguson is still ridiculous.

Saba Kharebashvili (Dinamo Tblisi – D RLC/WB L): Kharebashvili is exactly the kind of wonderkid Football Manager players are always looking for – not only is he brilliant and capable of playing right across a back four, but he’s cheap and only cost Napoli £3.6m in 2027 in our save. By 2033 he was at Barcelona (via a brief loan spell at Norwich City, naturally) and was lightning fast, had brilliant mental qualities and 16 for both marking and passing. One hell of a bargain, by the look of it.

Porto & Wolfsburg starlets worth signing in FM26

Matvey Kislyak (CSKA Moscow – DM/M C): Russian wonderkids are, rather understandably, not getting many headlines right now but apparently Aston Villa’s scouts were happy to take a trip to Moscow at some point as they snapped up Kislyak for £16m in 2026 before selling him on for a profit of over £100m to Liverpool a few years later. Probably the best ‘genuine’ defensive midfielder in the game in our virtual 2033 – which is interesting as he’s often regarded as an attacking midfielder in reality. The new Alexis Mac Allister, it would appear.

Kostas Koulierakis (VfL Woldfsburg – D C): Already an 18-cap international in the real world, the 21-year-old Koulierakis develops into a superb all-round centre-back who is not only a big physical presence but also technically impressive – a player with no meaningful weaknesses for his position. In our game, he went to Atlético Madrid for £51m in 2030, honestly a bit of a bargain.

Gilberto Mora (Tijuana – AM LC): Another player we’re adding to our shortlist at the start of every save going forward, the diminutive Mora is only 5’6” and is hopeless in the air, but stupendous everywhere else – he’s fast, brilliant off the ball, a superb dribbler and technician and an excellent goalscorer with Juventus (who paid just £7.75m for him in 2027 in our game). The stat block of a winger or a number ten who’s practically impossible to mark.

Rodrigo Mora (Porto – DM/M/AM LC): Apparently, being called Mora is a predictor of future success in football – Manchester United signed him on a free transfer from Porto in our save and now he’s worth at least £144m. He has eye-popping stats across the board but his combination of pace, finishing, first touch and composure screams ‘striker’ to us, and retraining him from a midfielder to a forward could make him even better. Not that he was too shabby out on United’s wing, mind you.

Christos Mouzakitis (Olympiacos – DM/M C): Another first rate defensive midfielder, Mouzakitis is Real Madrid’s answer to Andrea Pirlo by 2033 in our game. 16 passing and vision, 17 technique and absolutely no meaningful weaknesses, he cost £35.5m in 2029 and perhaps his Greek team in real-life would part with him for less earlier on. A super high work rate would help him to be effective out of possession, too, but it’s as a playmaker that this guy plainly shines.