Where are they now? The Guardian’s 10 ‘next big things’ from 2014

The Guardian have quite the knack of identifying the most promising players emerging in European football, but they don’t always get it right. 

Ever since 2014, their comprehensive ‘Next Generation’ series has earmarked some players – such as Jadon Sancho, Gianluigi Donnarumma and Manuel Locatelli – long before they broke through.

Prior to that annual feature, they’d run regular lists, and earlier in 2014 they picked out 10 players aged 20 or under as ‘The next 10 big things: Europe’s top youngsters and stars of the future’. Eight years on, all of those players should theoretically be at the peak of their powers and tearing it up.

Here’s how they’ve got on.

This wasn’t exactly the wildest shout, given Pogba had already made his Manchester United debut against Leeds some years prior and had left to become a Scudetto winner at Juventus, while captaining France as they won the Under-20 World Cup in 2013.

During the 2013-14 winter window The Guardian noted: “United want him back and have been linked with a £40m bid this month. PSG are also keen.” Sure enough, he did eventually move back to Old Trafford – for a club record £93million fee – after four title-winning seasons in Turin.

The midfielder dazzled as France won the World Cup in 2018, but silver pots have been few and far between back at Old Trafford – he won the League Cup and Europa League in his first season back, but nothing else in five long years since.

READ: The 10 players Man Utd let leave alongside Paul Pogba in 2012

Draxler had long since emerged as a special talent at boyhood club Schalke back in January 2014, and at this stage we were nearing the stage where he was a near-daily fixture in the transfer gossip columns, regularly tipped to join the likes of