20 Phenom Footballers Who Never Delivered on Their Promise

Many a footballer has come along over the years accompanied with the proclamation that they are the next—insert superb footballer's name here—and many a footballer has fallen well short of that accolade.

These things happen for a variety of reasons. Injuries, personal issues, poor management can even halt a players progress to becoming the footballer that coaches see within.

Here are 20 players who never quite delivered the career they promised.

Roysten Drenthe

Real Madrid signed Roysten Drenthe in 2007 and he was tipped to be the next big thing. The rise of Marcelo saw Drenthe play fewer and fewer games for the club before he stormed out in a rage one day.

Since then, Drenthe has been shipped out on loan to Hercules and Everton but failed to hold down a regular starting berth at either club.

At 25 years of age, it's not too late for the Dutchman to prove us all wrong.

Ryan Babel

Another Dutchman, another 25-year-old, another nearly man.

Ryan Babel had it all—pace, trickery, a thunderous shot—but he could just never string it all together on a matchday.

Flashes of brilliance were often overshadowed by being carried by his teammates.

Liverpool finally gave up after four years and sold him to Hoffenheim in 2011.

Matt Le Tissier

Matt Le Tissier didn't deliver for a reason totally different to some of the other players on this list.

He didn't deliver because he wasn't allowed. Superb in the Premier League, Le Tissier was constantly overlooked for England, meaning his international career never took off.

For a player so creative and full of flair, England missed out on what might have been.

Lee Sharpe

When Manchester United signed Lee Sharpe in 1988 for £200,000 from Torquay United, it was a record for a YTS player at the time.

Sharpe burst onto the Manchester United scene until he became beset by injuries which saw a decline in performance.

Sharpe was notorious for his playboy lifestyle—a sure factor in the demise of his abilities—and went on to have relatively poor showings at a host of different clubs, including Leeds United, Sampdoria, Bradford City, Portsmouth, Exeter City, Grindavik and Garforth Town.

His measly eight England caps speaks volumes about his disappointing career.

Paul Lake

Paul Lake marks a sad entry to this list of footballers.

Lake was widely tipped by many—including the late Bobby Robson—to have a huge future in the game.

After appearances in the England U21 team and England B side, Lake ruptured his cruciate knee ligament and faced years on the sidelines.

His return ended in disaster after just eight minutes into his second comeback appearance, the ligament snapped again.

14 operations later, Lake retired from football. He is now a physiotherapist.

Andrei Arshavin

Andrei Arshavin set the Premier League alight in his first season for Arsenal, but the diminutive Russian suffered a loss of form that never recovered.

You might say being the captain of Russia and playing at a top Premier League club is delivering, but everyone knows that Arshavin was capable of more.

After being booed by the fans who once cheered his name, Arshavin was loaned back to former club Zenit St. Petersburg.

Stan Collymore

One of English football's great hopes was Stanley Victor Collymore.

Clinical depression, rumours of attempted suicide and a well-publicised report of a sexual misdemeanour in Staffordshire's Cannock Chase are now the stories that people would rather hear about.

Collymore had fantastic ability in footballing terms, but not the strength of mind to deal with it.

He retired at age 30 without a single professional trophy to his name.

Serhiy Rebrov

Serhiy Rebrov is the all-time leading goalscorer in the Ukrainian Premier League, but his time in England was extremely forgetful.

Signed by Tottenham Hotspur in 2000 for £11 million, Rebrov managed just 10 goals in 60 league appearances for the club over a four-year period. Nine of those 10 goals came in year one.

Upon re-signing for Dinamo Kiev, Rebrov miraculously rediscovered his scoring touch almost immediately, but the damage to his reputation was already done.

Tomas Brolin

When you retire at the age of 29 with no injuries to speak of, there's something not quite right.

Tomas Brolin was known throughout Europe after a wonder goal against England in the 1992 European Championships, but a move to Leeds United three years later started the dwindling downward spiral of his career.

Brolin played 20 league games for Leeds in the Premier League and was widely criticized for his lack of defensive work. Leeds fans often refer to him as their worst signing of all time.

From Leeds, Brolin moved on to FC Zurich and AC Parma on loan before a permanent spell at Crystal Palace and finally Hudiksvalls ABK.

A total disappointment whenever he pulled his boots on.

Sergio Conceicao

Don't get me wrong, I think that Sergio Conceicao was a magnificent player. After all, the Portuguese international displaced Luis Figo on the right wing for his nation at one point.

The problem with Conceicao is that he was a fly-by-night. Conceicao never stuck around at a club long enough to turn from being a great player into a legend.

Penafiel, Leca, Felgueiras, Porto, Lazio, Parma, Inter Milan, Lazio, Porto, Standard Liege, Al Qadsia and PAOK was the footballing route he traveled. That's 12 clubs in 17 years.

Surely he would have achieved more than his 56 caps for Portugal if he had just settled somewhere.

Robbie Fowler

When people talk about Robbie Fowler, the phrase "natural finisher" often gets a mention—and rightly so.

Fowler was lethal in his early days, but injuries littered his career and stopped him from becoming one of the best strikers England has ever produced.

I'm not knocking Fowler in any way—in fact, he's one of my personal heroes—but who knows what he could have achieved were it not for the niggling injuries and incidents that plagued his career.

Fowler remains to this day the only player who has scored more than 30 goals—in all competitions—in his first three full seasons in England.

He never again achieved those dizzying numbers and didn't break the 20-goal barrier for the rest of his career.

Mario Balotelli

Everyone knows Mario Balotelli has immense ability. Everyone also knows that Mario Balotelli is a loose cannon, liable to go off at any time.

Balotelli's most amusing yet highly unacceptable feats in his Manchester City career has been throwing darts at the youth team due to boredom.

If "Super Mario" isn't careful, he could be bounced from club to club before ever realising the true ability he possesses.

Nicklas Bendtner

Most people who know anything about football are in agreement that Nicklas Bendtner—whilst capable of occasionally good goals—is generally an average footballer.

It stands to good reason that in his own eyes he must be something of a failure—only it's quite the opposite.

Bendtner believes he is one of the best strikers in the world and—by pure deduction of the aforementioned—must be considered a great phenom (in his own eyes) that has never delivered (in our eyes).

I'm glad that was cleared up so easily.

Jamie Redknapp

Jamie Redknapp was a midfielder of great passing ability, but once again he is another footballer labelled as a victim to injury.

In 16 years of professional football, Redknapp only managed 314 league appearances to go alongside his 17 England caps.

He now enjoys the role of pundit.

Marcelo Salas

Marcelo Salas was top of his game back in the late 1990s, prompting a big-money move from Lazio to Juventus for a staggering $18 million in 2001.

The move proved to be the turning point in Salas' career for all the wrong reasons, as injuries struck and his career unraveled.

The once-great power, drive and sharpness that Salas enjoyed had deserted him—and so did interested European clubs.

Salas retired aged 33, playing his last professional game for Universidad de Chile—a far cry from Serie A.

Gianluigi Lentini

When Gianluigi Lentini signed from Torino to AC Milan in 1992 for £13 million, he became the world's most expensive player. Needless to say, Milan had high hopes for the winger.

Tragically, Lentini was involved in a car crash that resulted in him suffering a fractured skull and falling into a light coma.

Whilst Lentini eventually made a full medical recovery, his football ability didn't.

The former world's most expensive player only ever managed 13 international appearances.

Javier Saviola

People may wonder why Javier Saviola appears on this list, and of course I will explain.

Saviola cannot be faulted for injury reasons or off-field misdemeanors. He actually has a pretty decent strike rate in return for the amount of games he has played, but the problem is thus.

Saviola started his career like a train—much like Robbie Fowler at Liverpool—and everyone wants and expects more as each year goes by.

Sadly for Saviola, his sparkling form at first club River Plate was his best ever.

Saviola should have been better than just good.

Michael Owen

If it was 2001 and you had declared that Michael Owen would be washed up at 26 years of age, you probably would have been laughed at.

2001 was the year Michael Owen has given the Ballon d'Or, the ultimate personal recognition a footballer can achieve in his career. Perhaps Liverpool knew something no one else did, because they then sold Owen to Real Madrid a few years later.

Owen never hit his Liverpool heights at Real Madrid, Newcastle or Manchester United, largely due to his constant injury problems. In fact, his first season for Real Madrid is the last time Owen managed over 40 appearances during the course of a season—a poor return for a player who once was the only player England fans looked for on a team sheet.

Owen never hit the magical 20-league-goal target for any of his clubs, and now finds himself without a club at all.

Jonathan Woodgate

Jonathan Woodgate is the ultimate injury-prone footballer if there ever was one.

In the last nine years of his career since leaving Leeds United, the lesser-spotted Woodgate has managed a meagre 149 league appearances.

His time at Real Madrid from 2004 to 2007 resulted in just nine league appearances in three injury-plagued seasons.

If there was ever a footballer who you couldn't rely on, it's Woodgate.

Paul Gascoigne

Paul Gascoigne is perhaps the biggest phenom of them all. A sparklingly brilliant footballer whose career was curtailed dramatically by the many demons he fought on a daily basis.

Gascoigne is still considered by some to be one of the best midfielders that has ever lived, and who knows what he could have gone on to achieve in the game had it not been for the binge drinking, smoking, drugs, depression, addiction, bipolar, mental health, bulimia and obsessive-compulsive disorder issues he carried.

Gascoigne stood no chance by himself, and help wasn't forthcoming in the correct capacity at the time.

"Gazza" is the epitome of the footballer who had it all but couldn't handle it.

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