The Best FC 27 Wonderkids — and What the Game Gets Wrong About Them

Every autumn the new game arrives and the same list follows it: the highest-rated young players in EA FC, copied straight from the ratings database. This is that list, with one difference — we checked every card against the football. Thirteen players aged twenty-one or under are rated 81 or higher in EA FC 27. For six of them the game has it right. For the other seven it is rating last season, rating the wrong position, or rating too low. The database does not publish potential, so this is not a list of who will be best in five years; it is a list of what the game believes today, and where it is wrong. (Figures as of 12 October 2026.)

Doué's 86 is a rating for last season's player, and that player was very good. He scored and assisted in the Super Cup in August. By 12 October he had four league starts, no league goals and one assist, and in mid-September he was on the bench for matches against Slovan Bratislava and Brest. Since then he has opened the scoring in two 4-2 Champions League wins, at Manchester City on 14 October and at home to Barcelona on 20 October, and scored his first league goal of the season off the bench at Strasbourg in between. PSG still rate him highly enough to have offered him an extension, reportedly to 2031 or 2032.

The card's 90 dribbling is second on this page only to Lamine Yamal's. The season was slow to give it much to do.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 86 (DRI 90, PAC 83) — a card earned last season. Real-level: a slow start, then three goals in seven days in October. Tier: Elite Now. Verdict: generous in September, earned in October.

No card on this page moved further. Diomande was rated 66 a year ago; he then scored twelve and made nine for RB Leipzig, starred for Ivory Coast at the World Cup, and joined Real Madrid in August for a reported €125m, the club's record fee. EA FC 27 rates him 84, eighteen points higher.

That is a rating for the Leipzig season. In Madrid he started slowly: an assist for Kylian Mbappé against Elche on 15 September, then, on 10 October, his first goal, the only one in a 1-0 win over Villarreal on a day he started ahead of Vinícius Júnior. Then the form arrived: a goal and an assist in a 4-1 win over Sevilla on 18 October, and a goal off the bench against his old club RB Leipzig in the Champions League three days later. Nineteen-year-olds who cost that much are judged on the first months whether that is fair or not.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 84 (PAC 93, DRI 87) — the game paid for the Leipzig season. Real-level: a goal and an assist in his first eight league games, then a goal and an assist against Sevilla on 18 October. Tier: Elite-in-Waiting. Verdict: generous, for now.

The rating is fair; the label is not. EA FC 27 files Yıldız as an attacking midfielder. Juventus use him mostly on the left wing, cutting in onto his right foot, and sometimes as a second striker — last season he played twenty-one matches on the left and fourteen as a second striker. He is also out: a fractured fifth metatarsal in Juventus's first league match, at Frosinone in August, needed surgery, and he is not expected back before November.

It matters because the card is built around the wrong job. 85 pace and 85 dribbling are a winger's numbers, and that is the player Juventus have.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 84 (PAC 85, DRI 85) — the right rating on the wrong position. Real-level: Juventus's left-sided attacker, injured until November. Tier: Elite Now. Verdict: fair rating, wrong position.

Zaïre-Emery came through as a central midfielder and the game still rates him as one. Paris Saint-Germain increasingly do not use him there: he helped out at right-back last season, and this season he has started at left-back when their regular options were unavailable. He is on the shortlist of twenty-five for the 2026 Golden Boy.

The card, oddly, supports the move — 79 defending and 85 physical alongside 81 dribbling. It describes a player who can do several jobs, and that is exactly the problem for a midfielder who wants one.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 83 (PHY 85, DRI 81, DEF 79) — a midfielder's label on a utility player's season. Real-level: a Golden Boy finalist used out of position. Tier: Elite Now. Verdict: wrong position.

Güler is the best young number ten in the world this season, and the game files him as a right midfielder. Real Madrid have moved him into the hole behind the striker, where he has a goal and two assists in eight league appearances as of 12 October, after a season in which he was used deeper in the build-up.

His card agrees with the football more than its position does: 85 passing and 87 vision are a playmaker's numbers.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 83 (PAS 85, DRI 84) — a ten's numbers under a winger's label. Real-level: Real Madrid's ten. Tier: Elite Now. Verdict: wrong position.

In September the CIES Football Observatory valued Froholdt at €83.7m, the highest figure for any player outside Europe's five biggest leagues. He missed Porto's Champions League match against Manchester City under concussion protocols, then came back and scored in a 3-1 win over Benfica on 20 September.

The game moved him from 71 to 82, and it is still behind. A twenty-year-old who is the most valuable player in his league and scores in the derby is rated below three players on this page who are not playing in their position.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 82 (DRI 81, PHY 80, DEF 78) — a complete midfielder's card, a level too low. Real-level: the most valuable player outside the big five leagues. Tier: Elite-in-Waiting. Verdict: too low.

Mainoo went to the World Cup with England and did not play a minute. He came back to Manchester United and became their player of the month for September, starting against Everton, Manchester City and Fulham and playing in all five of their September matches.

The card has him at 81, up from 77, with 83 dribbling — a press-resistant midfielder's number. On September's evidence the rating has not caught up with the role he now holds.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 81 (DRI 83, DEF 78) — a holding midfielder who can carry the ball, rated a notch low. Real-level: United's player of the month. Tier: Elite Now. Verdict: too low.

The best evidence that a rating is not a ranking sits far below this list. Cissè is rated 66 in EA FC 27. He has started three of his five Serie A matches for Milan, as of 12 October, and scored twice, including against Juventus on 6 September.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 66 (PAC 79, DRI 71) — a card from his Serie B loan. Real-level: two Serie A goals for Milan. Tier: Raw Gem.

And the opposite case. Palestra's card rose seventeen points, from 61 to 78, for a season at Cagliari in which he was named Serie A's defender of the season. Chelsea signed him in July. A quadriceps injury before his expected debut kept him out for seven weeks; he finally made it on 10 October, eighteen minutes off the bench in a 5-1 win over Bournemouth.

Scout Gamer Read — EA FC 27: 78 (PAC 90, PHY 81) — a rating still waiting for minutes. Real-level: Serie A's best defender last season, eighteen Chelsea minutes by 12 October. Tier: Ready Now.

Quick Reference