Football Manager 2020: Best Young left midfielders (ML) & wingers (AML) – Sancho, Lemar & more

Football Manager 2020 was released
last month to rave reviews from the critics and the approval of Sport
Interactive’s die-hard fanbase.

Wingers and midfielders are vital for both your attack and defence in the modern game. Going forward, they offer skill, pace, crossing and finishing ability, but they must also be apt in defence.

The right winger can unlock the full potential of your front three - keep reading to see the best young left mids and wingers on FM20.

How to choose the best Young Left Midfielders on Football
Manager 2020

To qualify for this list, these players are aged 23 and under, and have a Potential Ability (PA) of at least 160. This means they can progress into the best players on the planet. Any players with a PA range of 140-170 or higher have also been included.

These players must also have left midfield (ML) or attacking left midfield (AML) as their most natural (or default) position.

Current
Ability (CA) and Potential Ability are hidden when in-game, and can only be viewed
by using the Football Manager Editor tool or In-Game Editor.

READ MORE: All
the best Wonderkid Strikers (ST) to sign on FM20

Star
ratings only reflect how good a player is in relation to your first team squad,
so if you want accuracy you must follow both CA & PA.

For
reference, all CA & PA values are out of 200 and highest-rated left winger/
midfielder in the game currently is PSG's Neymar with 185.

Thomas Lemar (CA 154 - PA 171)

Age: 23

Position(s): M (L), AM (CRL)

Club: Atletico Madrid

Country: France

Best Attributes: 17 Agility, 17 free-kick taking, 17 Corners

Value: £40 million

Wage: £105,000 a week

Thomas Lemar was part of the thrilling Monaco side that enjoyed a run to the Champions League quarter-finals back in the 2016-17 season. Lemar also won Ligue 1 that term with the Monegasques but was sold to Atletico for £55m.

Lemar is the perfect winger, fast, skillfull, a good finisher and deft at set pieces. £40m in valuation may not seem like that much, but he’s likely to go for a pricetag in the 9-figure margin, over £100m!

Julian Brandt (CA 152 - PA 172)

Age: 23

Position(s): M (CRL), AM (CRL)

Club: Borussia Dortmund

Country: Germany

Best Attributes: 18 first touch, 16 dribbling, 16 technique

Value: £35.5 million

Wage: £115,000 a week

Julian Brandt is a Swiss army knife, as the German international can play all across the midfield and attacking midfield making him a fantastic asset to have at your club.

READ MORE: All the best Young Right Backs (DR) to sign on Football Manager 2020

Mentally and technically superb, the one thing lacking from Brandt’s game is perhaps physicality. After becoming a star at Bayer Leverkusen, Brandt was transferred to Dortmund this season for a surprisingly low £20m. Brandt has since established himself as a regular for BvB, sharing winger duty with the next superstar on this list.

Jadon Sancho (CA 150 – PA 178)

Age: 19

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL)

Club: Borussia Dortmund

Country: England

Best Attributes: 18 agility, 17 dribbling, 17 technique

Value: £30 million

Wage: £99,000 a week

The second Borussia Dortmund winger on this list is Jadon Sancho, the teenager who topped our Wonderkid article for this position. Sancho is nothing short of incredible, he made his England debut at 18-years-of-age and has been tearing up the Bundesliga for the past few years at Dortmund.

His attributes are brilliant for wide play and they will only get better as he has over 15 years left at the top. That PA value of 178 is the highest on this list and will see him be almost as good as Neymar when he’s fully matured.

Goncalo Guedes (CA 148 - PA 171)

Age: 21

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL), ST

Club: Valencia

Country: Portugal

Best Attributes: 17 flair, 16 dribbling, 16 crossing

Value: £6.75 million

Wage: £8,250 a week

In recent seasons, Portugal’s national football side has gone from Ronaldo plus 10 to a well-rounded international force that has won the last 2 European trophies.

READ MORE: All the best Young Right Backs (DR) to sign on Football Manager 2020

Goncalo Guedes might not be able to play centrally in midfield like some of the other entries on this list, but he is accomplished as playing as a striker. Paris Saint-Germain may regret selling Guedes to Valencia for £35m...

Javairo Dilrosun (CA 134 - PA 161)

Age: 21

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL)

Club: Herta Berlin

Country: Netherlands

Best Attributes: 17 flair, 16 dribbling, 16 crossing

Value: £6.75 million

Wage: £8,250 a week

It's easy to highlight Sancho and Brandt but the Bundesliga has some amazing young wingers playing for its mid-table clubs. The first of which is Javairo Dilrosun, a player that is sometime overlooked in favour of other young Dutch talents but isn't one to be underestimated.

Dilrosun has all of the essential attributes to make him an excellent winger, including great pace (15), acceleration (16), agility (16), crossing (16), dribbling (16) and more! The Dutch delight can probably be purchased for around £10m, a bargain for someone with a PA as high as his.

Josip Brekalo (CA 131 - PA 163)

Age: 21

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL)

Club: Wolfsburg

Country: Croatia

Best Attributes: 17 flair, 17 agility, 16 acceleration

Value: £4.9 million

Wage: £30,000 a week

You would be forgiven for believing that Croatia had their time in the sun after making it to the final of the 2018 World Cup but there are some brilliant youngsters coming through for the Balkan nation. Josip Brekalo is another exciting young Bundesliga winger with solid attributes in all the right areas.

READ MORE: All the best Young Left Backs (DL) to sign on Football Manager 2020

Brekalo's mental attributes let him down a little, so he might not be the best performer in big games. After considering leaving Wolfsburg last Summer, the Croatian has really kicked on this season becoming a regular for Die Wolfe.

Moussa Diaby (CA 130 - PA 140-170)

Age: 20

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL)

Club: Bayer Leverkusen

Country: France

Best Attributes: 17 acceleration, 16 agility, 15 dribbling

Value: £4.3 million

Wage: £33,000 a week

The first of two Bayer Leverkusen wingers on this list, Moussa Diaby has a lot to prove after joining from PSG in the summer. At just 19, he has bag of potential and can become one of the best wingers in the world in around 5 years time.

Adept at playing on both wings and being physically sound, Diaby is a great asset for any side to possess. If you wish to purchase the Frenchman, you'll have to wait at least a season into your save to do so and by that time, he could cost upwards of £15m.

Alphonso Davies (CA 134 - PA 140-170)

Age: 18

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL)

Club: Bayern Munich

Country: Canada

Best Attributes: 17 acceleration, 17 pace, 15 natural
fitness

Value: £3.7 million

Wage: £33,000 a week

Canada is a country that has never shone when it comes to football but that could change thanks to Aphonso Davies' emergence. Despite being only 18, he's already accumulated 17 caps for the Canucks.

READ MORE: How to sign an uninterested player on Football Manager 2020

The MLS has a reputation for being a "retirement league" but Davies has shown that young talent is coming through its youth academies, being sold to Bayern Munich in 2017 from the Whitecaps for a deal of around £15m.

Paulinho (CA 127 - PA 140-170)

Age: 18

Position(s): M (RL), AM (RL)

Club: Bayer Leverkusen

Country: Brazil

Best Attributes: 17 pace, 16 balance, 16 natural fitness

Value: £3.7 million

Wage: £25,000 a week

Not to be confused with Barcelona’s Paulinho, Bayer Leverkusen’s Paulinho has yet to prove he is an excellent replacement for Brandt at the German Champions League club. One goal in 19 Bundesliga appearances isn’t much to show in half a season but he is still only 19-years-old.

Perhaps it’s the mental side of the game that’s letting Paulinho down, as after hopping continents to Europe for £18m in the summer, the pressure is definitely on the Brazilian. However, with a valuation of just £3.7m at the start of FM20, he is very affordable.

Nico Serrano (CA 127 - PA 140-170)

Age: 16

Position(s): M (L), AM (RL), ST

Club: Athletic Bilbao

Country: Spain

Best Attributes: 14 Natural fitness, 13 crossing, 13
technique

Value: £36,000

Wage: £325 a week

The youngest player on this list arguably has the biggest and brightest future ahead of him. Nico Serrano is only 16-years-old but his CA is almost as high as a lot of the entries on this list. If the Spaniard gets enough game time on loan or in the youth teams in his teens, he'll be a fully-fledged international by the time he's 21.

READ MORE: All the best Young Goalkeepers to sign on Football Manager 2020

The downside of Serrano is that his mental stats are poor and these tend not to improve as players mature. If you manage to purchase Serrano, though, he is worth a punt, costing around the one million pounds mark.

All the best young left midfielders/ wingers

READ MORE: All the best young Centre Backs (DC) to sign on Football Manager 2020