FM14 Wonderkids To Watch — Eder Alvarez Balanta

Eder Alvarez Balanta

Club: River Plate

Position: DC

Age: 20

Nationality: Colombian

Clubs to show interest: Inter Milan

Compared to: Mario Yepes

Eder Alvarez Balanta is a pretty exciting talent from South America, thanks again to our reader hfoster02 for pointing out this lad to us. He is a left-footed central defender, and that’s a big quality in itself as there aren’t too many good lefties as central defenders. He was brought in Argentina by River Plate and he did a great job in the club’s youth team, winning the Under 20 Copa Libertadores in 2012. Then he was promoted to the first team and he didn’t disappoint, scored twice in eleven appearances and played very well throughout.

It is believed that Inter Milan made a bid for him after he had played just five matches in the River Plate first team but the Argentinian club rejected the offer, setting a 12 million euro price tag. In July he signed his first professional contract which includes a release clause around 25 million euro.

Check out the video below to see some of the skills that he has demonstrated in a match against Godoy Cruz:

Eder Alvarez Balanta stats

River Plate > Appearances: 11 / Goals: 2

What should we expect from this Football Manager 2014 wonderkid? He surely has bags of potential, seems very good in the air, shows good positioning and anticipation and he can pass the ball pretty well too. I think this kid will be one of the first signings I’ll be making in FM14, provided the price won’t be too high.

By the way, FM14 was just announced and you can pre-order the game from us to get access to the beta version two weeks before the full game release. You can also take your chance in our FM14 giveaway, one of the three free activation codes could be yours!