At Manchester City, a number of exceptionally skilled players have progressed through the ranks, but what happened to those who were predicted to do great things but fell short?
Over the past ten or so years, Manchester City has provided several fantastic players with a platform to succeed at the highest levels.
However, not all highly regarded young athletes have lived up to the expectations placed on them at the Etihad Stadium.
Guidetti, John
Despite being a City employee for no less than seven years, John Guidetti never started a senior game for the team and was instead loaned out to Burnley, Feyenoord, Stoke City, and Celtic.
He was a City youth player who scored goals frequently, but he was never able to advance.
Guidetti has established a respectable career for himself, playing 28 times for Sweden at the international level and enjoying moderate success in Spain with Celta Vigo and Alaves, as well as a brief loan stint in the Bundesliga with Hannover in the January 2020 transfer window, but it’s a far cry from what many at City expected him to accomplish.
Steven Johnson
Michael Johnson is commonly brought up when discussing failed English wonderkids. The most exciting homegrown prospect Man City had produced in a generation, the teenage midfielder broke out at the Etihad Stadium in the 2006–07 season. But Johnson’s career was ended by 2012.
The midfielder was plagued by injuries. Johnson sustained stomach and knee injuries that proved to be too severe for him to recover from, as opposed to Michael Ballack and Roy Keane. Johnson, who was let go by City in 2012 after making only four appearances in five years, has a particularly severe example of unrealized promise.
