EA Sports' FIFA 22 is here, and many of us have hopped right on into Career Mode to lead our favourite team to glory. Whether you're flying high in the Premier League or languishing in League 2, you should be keeping an eye on your players' potential. The training methods you use can make a significant difference, and if a player is getting close to their potential, you might wonder if it's still worth playing and training them to try to boost it further.
So, here's everything you need to know about players in FIFA 22 reaching and exceeding their potential through match experience, good management, and training.
Can players exceed their potential on FIFA 22?
The short answer is yes: players can exceed their potential. The potential of a player in FIFA 22's career mode is an average stat based on where they'll typically end up, but as a manager, it's up to you to take their career by the horns and lead them to exceed their potential ability. It's not a guarantee, but it's well worth trying to mould your young stars into the best players they can be.
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Take Liam Delap, for example. His current ability is 64, with a potential of 85. At just 18 years of age though, he can develop exceedingly quickly - you might have him in the mid or high 70s by the end of a season or two if you play your cards right. From here, it's easy to expect a 20-year-old rated over 75 to exceed 85 by the end of his career - just make sure you're doing everything you can to help that player along.
How can players exceed their potential on FIFA 22?
Player development in FIFA 22 is based on a bunch of factors, so if there's a specific wonderkid you want to base your team around for years to come, you'll want to focus hard on them in all facets of your play.
Training drills
The first way to get players to exceed their potential is through training. In order to get the maximum development for your players, you need to keep their match sharpness high.
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In order to maximise your players' growth towards their potential, you need to do the training drills at least once. Once you've got a high grade (aim for an A), you can then simulate all drills from there. It can get tedious, but it'll make your players better (and hopefully polish up your skills a little bit too). After the first time around, you can just sim them to get the same result again and again. A player with high match sharpness will get attribute boosts, making their overall a lot higher than it otherwise would be.
Player Development Plans
Player Development Plans are an enormously important aspect of making your stars exceed their potential. Head into this section and you can set a specific plan for which areas you want your players to develop. You need to base this on each individual player too - maybe an attacking fullback needs some more focus on the defensive aspect of his game, but equally you might want to maximise the player's aptitude in his existing strengths. It depends on your game plan and how you want to use each player.
You can see the stats that get a boost (or a decline slowdown for older players) with the arrows that appear when hovering over the player's role. Get this right, and you'll be able to get your players to reach and exceed their potential a lot more easily.
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You can see the estimated time your player's overall rating will take to increase too - in the top middle area of the screen. Don't worry though, read on if you want to learn how to speed that up a tad.
Play your youngsters
The real trick that ties all this together is game time. You won't develop a player by having him sit on the bench. As mentioned before, high match sharpness gives a player attribute boosts, as does high morale and form. How do you get morale and form? By playing some football. If your starlet starts to get a few good games in, their development plan will rocket forward, allowing them to boost their stats, learn a new position, or even change their work rates.
The point about form is interesting, too, as you might want to alter the way you play to emphasise the skills exhibited by your young player. Maybe you could square the ball to a young striker when through on goal, or go in for more crunching tackles as a CDM with high potential. Winning matches and getting your highest potential players in the headlines is the best way to ensure they develop how you expect them to.
Which players have the highest potential on FIFA 22?
Aside from older players who are still dominating at the top of the game (think Messi, Ronaldo and the like), there are a number of players with extremely high potential. You can have a look at our handy page featuring the best FIFA 22 wonderkids, but here's a selection of the highest potential players who have a chance of exceeding that massive potential.
- Kylian Mbappe (Ovr: 91, Pot: 95)
- Erling Haaland (Ovr: 88, Pot: 93)
- Jadon Sancho (Ovr: 87, Pot: 91)
- Pedri (Ovr: 81, Pot: 91)
- Phil Foden (Ovr: 84, Pot: 92)
- Ryan Gravenberch (Ovr: 78, Pot: 90)
- Joao Felix (Ovr: 83, Pot: 91)
- Ansu Fati (Ovr: 76, Pot: 90)
- Jude Bellingham (Ovr: 79, Pot: 89)
- Florian Wirtz (Ovr: 78, Pot: 89)
Of course, there are plenty of other brilliant players in FIFA 22 you can train up and help exceed their potential. For less affluent clubs, our helping hand on the best young strikers should be of use, whilst bigger club managers will be delighted to find the best defenders, midfielders, wingers, and strikers all right here.
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Remember, you aren't guaranteed to have your players exceed their potential, but by following these steps you're giving your players by far the best chance to do so.
Featured Image Credit: EA Sports