The best they never had: England’s 10 greatest underachievers

They promised so much...

Theo Walcott has waved farewell to Arsenal after 11 years of mostly unfulfilled promise. Sponsored by Nike at 14, a Southampton first-teamer at 16 snapped up by the Gunners, a World Cup-bound England player at 17... but over the subsequent 11 years he's won just 47 caps.However, Walcott is far from the only player who didn't fulfil the great expectations thrust upon him. Here, we take a look at various Englishmen once tipped for greatness who ultimately failed to live up to the hope – or hype.

Jack Wilshere

At his best, Wilshere is one of the country’s most thrilling talents – a galvanising force in midfield, smart in possession and capable of unlocking defences with his excellent vision.

Having spent the 2016/17 season on loan with Bournemouth and with his contract expiring in the summer, Wilshere’s Arsenal future looked bleak. Since his latest return from injury, however, he has been in outstanding for the Gunners and has reportedly been offered a new contract – albeit with a reduced salary.

The bottom line, though: Wilshere is now 26 and has barely played any football compared to his peers – just 78 league starts in seven seasons. He may still come good but, let’s be honest: scrambling a loan to a smaller club was never the plan for the man who was supposed to be the future of Arsenal and England’s midfield in his mid-20s.

Joe Cole

In his early days, Cole was full of neat tricks, sharp turns and jinking runs. He was at his best in the No.10 position, but unfortunately English football’s rigid structures were still some way short of truly accommodating his abilities.At West Ham, he was part of the ludicrously talented team that went down with 42 points, and when Claudio Ranieri signed him for Chelsea, the Italian said he could be the club’s next Gianfranco Zola. It wasn’t quite to be. After Jose Mourinho replaced Ranieri, Cole won 10 trophies in 6 seasons at the Bridge but as a competent left-winger rather than the creative force his talents promised. A catastrophic start after joining Liverpool permanently stalled Cole's England career on 56 caps and set the tone for the rest of his club days, and the 36-year-old now plays for Tampa Bay Rowdies in the NASL.

Ben Foster

After struggling for years to find a suitable replacement for United legend Peter Schmeichel, Sir Alex Ferguson thought he’d found a solution in Foster. Fergie claimed the £1m signing from Stoke City in 2005 would be “England’s next goalkeeper”; as it turned out, he won just eight caps.

Initially, he was loaned out to Watford, whose manager Aidy Boothroyd went even further and said he had the potential to be the best goalkeeper in the world. Having made just 23 appearances in three years he was moved on, initially to Birmingham City and then West Brom, where he’s carved out a solid if unspectacular career.

Revealingly, Foster said he was relieved to escape the pressure of playing for United.

David Bentley

Bentley's penchant for scoring spectacular goals drew the inevitable comparisons with David Beckham, but he ultimately lacked the drive and passion for the game that saw Beckham become one of sport's most recognisable names.

Having broken through at Arsenal, he struggled to hold down a first-team place while in the grips of a 100-bets-per-day gambling addiction. He spent time at Blackburn and Tottenham, where he made his most memorable contribution – a dipping volley from distance in a 4-4 draw against his former club in the north London derby.

He retired at just 29 having fallen out of love with the game, and now runs a restaurant in Marbella.

Kieron Dyer

Dyer is arguably more famous for his injuries than anything he achieved on the football pitch – his most memorable moment is probably getting sent off for fighting his own teammate Lee Bowyer.

The midfielder started at home-town club Ipswich and enjoyed a good spell under Sir Bobby Robson at Newcastle in the early 2000s, but the remainder of his career was stymied by a series of long-term injuries. He made fewer than 50 league appearances in the last six years of his career, which were spent at West Ham, Ipswich, QPR and Middlesbrough.

Dyer won 33 England caps and was selected in both the 2002 World Cup and Euro 2004 squads, but a more reliable indicator of his impact is that he only managed a total of seven minutes across both tournaments.

Ravel Morrison

Sir Alex Ferguson said Morrison was the best player he’d ever seen at that age, and the midfielder starred alongside Paul Pogba in Manchester United’s FA Youth Cup-winning side of 2011. He possessed such potential that Paddy Crerand, not an easy man to please, called him "the best youngster I'd seen since George Best" - but off-field demons have plagued his career. United reluctantly let him go to West Ham, where boss Sam Allardyce called him the "biggest waste of talent" he’d ever worked with. Loan spells at QPR, Birmingham and Cardiff preceded a move to Lazio, where again his attitude won him few friends and a series of temporary moves again followed. The 24-year-old Morrison is currently on loan at Atlas in Mexico, but we’ve only ever seen brief flashes of his real ability.

Francis Jeffers

Some people in football are forever associated with certain phrases. If we say "dentist's chair," "good feet for a big man" or "naked shower headbutt", you’ll know we’re referring to Paul Gascoigne, Peter Crouch and Tony Pulis.

For Jeffers, the label "fox in the box" became a millstone around his neck during a difficult spell at Arsenal. He’d broken through at Everton as a goal-poaching striker, with 18 goals in 49 league games for the Toffees.

Despite scoring on his only appearance for England in a defeat to Australia at Upton Park in 2003, Jeffers never recaptured the Everton form that persuaded Arsene Wenger to splash out £8m on him. He dropped down the divisions and, following a brief spell with Newcastle Jets in Australia, finished his career at Accrington Stanley.

Lee Sharpe

Signed from Torquay United as a 17-year-old, Sharpe was one of the stars of Sir Alex Ferguson’s early days at United, but a combination of injuries and the playboy lifestyle soon saw him helpless to fight off the rise of the young Ryan Giggs on the left wing. Capable of playing on either side of the midfield, Sharpe shifted to the right – until David Beckham soared onto the scene. The last of his eight England caps came in 1995. A little too showbiz for Fergie's liking, the 25-year-old Sharpe was moved on in 1996, initially across the Pennines to Leeds United before spells at Bradford, Portsmouth and Icelandic side Grindavik, before hanging up his boots at the age of 32 in 2003.

Jonathan Woodgate

Woodgate was described as the ‘jewel in the crown’ of Leeds United when the cash-strapped club were forced to sell him to Newcastle for £9m in 2003. He played well for the Magpies, but injuries hampered hm and there was general astonishment when 18 months later Real Madrid signed him for £13.4m. He spent his first season at the Bernabeu out injured and when he got his first start in a game against Athletic Bilbao, he scored an own goal and got sent off for two bookable offences.

He went on to play for Middlesbrough, Tottenham and Stoke but managed just eight appearances for England over nine years. In July 2007, Woodgate was voted the worst signing of the 21st century by readers of Spanish sports paper Marca.

Robbie Fowler

At first glance this might strike you as a controversial choice: in his first spell at Liverpool, Fowler scored 120 goals in 236 league games. When it came to England, however, Fowler only made 26 appearances for his country, scoring just seven goals. That’s fewer than Daniel Sturridge, Danny Welbeck and even Joe Cole.

Fowler was such a natural, untroubled finisher that it’s hard to shake the feeling he could have done so much more. At the end of the 1996/97 season, at the age of just 22, he’d had a third successive 30+ goal season. Talk of him going on to break every Liverpool goals record you can imagine didn’t seem far-fetched. Following those prolific early years he never scored more than 20 in a season again.