logo
logo
A word of warning for Marcus Rashford.

7 Man Utd academy graduates who flopped after leaving Old Trafford

Marcus Rashford looks as though he’s inching towards the exit door at Manchester United.

Wythenshawe’s finest may be inspired by Scott McTominay’s exploits at Napoli, Angel Gomes’ England call-ups after excelling at Lille or even Paul Pogba’s rise to superstardom at Juventus back in the day. That lot have all shown there can be life after Old Trafford for Carrington alumni.

But not every Manchester United academy graduate has gone on to enjoy success elsewhere. We’ve identified seven homegrown players who have flopped after leaving the club.

Jesse Lingard

Lingard made over 200 appearances for his boyhood club, with his career undoubtedly peaking with the match-winner in United’s 2016 FA Cup final victory over Crystal Palace.

But he arguably never looked better than his magical half-season loan stint at West Ham back in 2021, when he notched nine goals in just 16 Premier League appearances for the club.

That spell at the London Stadium suggested he had all the tools to become a great success elsewhere, but his career hit a standstill when he returned to his parent club to see out his contract rotting away on the bench.

He reportedly turned down a permanent move back to West Ham in favour of a better wage offer from Nottingham Forest, but he was one of several that struggled to make any kind of impression during that wild, scattergun transfer approach from the newly-promoted club.

After just one season at the City Ground, Lingard spent a good six months looking for a club before eventually landing on the leftfield option of FC Seoul.

Willy Kambwala

*So far.

We’re not writing Kambwala off just yet. He still has time on his side to be a success at the Ceramica.

It’s still only halfway through the 20-year-old’s first season away from Old Trafford, and even amid the sh*tshow of United’s disastrous 2023-24 campaign he looked as though he had something about him in his early breakthrough appearances.

But the club’s decision to cash in for a reported €11.5million fee is not looking a bad one at this stage. Kambwala’s start to life at Villarreal could’ve been better, to put it mildly; he’s made just two La Liga appearances to date and was shown a straight red card in one of them. Ouch.

Brandon Williams

Can you call a player a flop if he doesn’t have a club?

The fact that Williams has spent six months as a free agent at this early juncture of his career tells you things haven’t quite gone to plan for the local lad, who looked as though he had all the makings of a future United cult hero in his early, spiky appearances at left-back.

A 2021-22 loan to Norwich City didn’t kickstart his career, nor did a short-lived stint at their rivals Ipswich Town last season amid off-field controversies that included court claims he ‘inhaled laughing gas from balloons’ before a high-speed car crash.

He’s still only 24 and could yet come good elsewhere if he knuckles down. But we have our doubts.


READ NEXT: Where are they now? The Man Utd XI from Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s final game in 2021

TRY A QUIZ: Can you name Man Utd’s 30 youngest Premier League debutants?


Adnan Januzaj

Flop might be a little strong for the Belgian winger, who made over a hundred appearances over the course of five seasons at Real Sociedad.

He had his moments during his time in the Basque country and was part of the side that won the historic 2020 Copa del Rey final against local rivals Athletic Club, albeit without making it off the bench in the final.

Ultimately, though, Januzaj’s post-United career gives us the overwhelming sense of ‘meh’. Did we dream him looking outrageously exciting in his breakthrough appearances at Old Trafford? Or was the media just desperate to find a crumb of positivity in the short-lived David Moyes era?

Timothy Fosu-Mensah

We feel a bit bad including the Dutchman here, because he’s suffered absolutely horrendous luck with injuries.

Bayer Leverkusen looked a decent fit for Fosu-Mensah, who signed for a small fee in January 2021 after he’d failed to make it beyond the fringes at Old Trafford. But a knee ligament injury just a few weeks after arriving doomed his time in Germany.

In three and a half seasons, he made just 30 appearances for Leverkusen, including a grand total of zero in their historic double-winning campaign under Xabi Alonso last term. That meant he wasn’t eligible for any medals before his quiet exit in the summer. Poor fella.

According to recent reports, he’s back training with Ajax. It would be a nice story if he can make an unlikely comeback with his boyhood club.

Real Madrid new soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo from Portugal kisses his new jersey during his presentation at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium in Madrid on Monday, July 6, 2009.

QUIZ: Can you name Man Utd’s 25 most expensive sales in history?

Cameron Borthwick-Jackson

Louis van Gaal was a big fan of the Manchester-born left-back. While it was probably clear to everybody else that Borthwick-Jackson didn’t quite have what it took to nail down a place at his hometown club, it would have also been fair to assume that he’d have gone on to enjoy a respectably decent enough career.

Not really. The 27-year-old is currently without a club, having been released by Slask Wroclaw following a failed loan away to Ross County last season. That’s a bleak sentence, isn’t it?

Scott Wootton

Going back to the late Fergie era for this one, Wootton can be filed alongside Borthwick-Jackson in the “might do a job elsewhere” category.

The defender joined old foes Leeds United following his release in 2013 but was something of a disaster at Elland Road during their pre-Bielsa era of midtable mediocrity in the Championship.

After leaving Leeds, Wootton plugged away to earn a decent living in the lower reaches of the Football League, representing MK Dons, Plymouth, Wigan Athletic and Morecambe before his move to sunnier pastures – Australian A-League outfit Wellington Phoenix – in 2013.