The aim of this series, as last year, is to provide a shortlist of players that meet this requirement. All players have at least potential 80, and all will have an OVR of 73 or lower. The original intention of this (in the FIFA 12 series) was to keep costs down, but looking at this list I’m not sure that’s a problem any more! Still, I’ll stick to 73 or lower for the sake of avoiding overwhelming you with options.
A new addition this year is that player contracts have a huge impact. The fewer years left on the contract, the more likely you are to get a good deal. So if a player only has 1 year left on his contract you can get him for much less than his asking price. As such, I’ve added a column that says how many years are left on each player’s contract, and whether you can get him in the first transfer window. That’s the “Avai?” column (short for “available?”). To save space I’ve formatted it like this: Y/3 would mean yes, you can buy this player in the first window, and he has 3 years left on his contract. If it says something like “N/5″ that means he has a 5 year contract and you can’t get him at first (the “N” is because he’s just joined the club), but you may be able to get them in the next window. The ones to look out for are Y/1 or Y/0, as some players only have months left on their contracts. Players who are on loan will have a “-” in this column because information on their contracts is not available.
Finally, if you see that a team is low on this position when you go to buy a player, don’t be put off. On FIFA 12 this meant, essentially, that you’d never be able to buy this player, as his team would never buy backups and thus would always refuse to sell him. In FIFA 13, however, it just means that you have to pay a little extra to get him.
In the first of two pieces on strikers, in this article we’re going to look at goalscorers. These will be the guys getting the goals and winning games for you. Although they may not be as strong or good in the air as target men, they have fantastic finishing and ball skills and rely more on their technical ability than their physical presence. Let’s see who I recommend:
NOTE: I made a mistake and forgot to include centre forwards (CFs) in this article and the one on target men. It’s now been updated and 15 more players have been added to the list (see below), so it’s definitely worth looking over the article again to see if there’s anyone new you want to get. Johnny Russell has now been added to the target men article too, so make sure to check it out here.
- Willian José
- Yassine Benzia
- Emmanuel Mayuka
You’ll find Wilian José to be an invaluable purchase. His attack positioning is already rated 80 (his highest attribute), meaning that time and time again you’ll find him popping up in the right place at the right time, or making the perfect run to get himself into space. He’ll bag you tons of goals that other strikers wouldn’t have the brain to create. He’s also big and strong and has a 4 star weak foot, further adding to his value. Finally, he’s only got a year left on his contact, so you can probably get him for around £1.8m.
Yassine Benzia is a very different type of striker to Willian José. Benzia is quick and has great dribbling and balance, as well as very good finishing. He’s the type of forward who relies on his ball skills to skip past defenders and get himself into goalscoring opportunities. He could also be put just behind a target man, or out on the wing, and his flexibility makes him well worth considering.
Now for another Southampton player (they’ve really done well for themselves this year). Emmanuel Mayuka has so much going for him it was impossible not to include him. He’s a speedster and an acrobat, has good dribbling as well as great finishing, his positioning is very strong, and he has a five star weak foot and four star skills. The only problem is that he’s only just joined Southampton so you have to wait to get him, but it’ll be well worth it if you decide to be patient.
Honourable mentions also go to Jeroen Lumu and Nicolás Blandi. Lumu is very fast and although his technical stats aren’t amazing yet, he has a lot of attacking stats that are rated about the same – dribbling, finishing, heading, long shots, shot power – so when he reaches his potential it means he’ll be an amazing all-round striker. I’ve included Blandi as well because he is very cheap for his starting OVR, so you can get a real bargain if you decide to go for him.
As in FIFA 12, make sure you keep checking these players, as their prices and OVR may fluctuate radically after over time. If you’ve had any experience of this (especially if a player’s price drops), please post it in the comments.
Here’s the full list:
| Pos | Name | OVR | Pot | Age | Cost (£) | Wages (£) | Club | Avai? | Foot | Weak foot | Skills | Traits | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ST | Willian José | 71 | 85 | 20 | 2,600,000 | 6,000 | São Paulo | Y/1 | Right | 4 | 3 | ||
| ST | John Guidetti | 73 | 85 | 20 | 3,900,000 | 15,000 | Manchester City | Y/2 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| ST | Yassine Benzia | 63 | 84 | 17 | 675,000 | 2,000 | Olympique Lyon | Y/2 | Right | 4 | 4 | Finesse shot | |
| CF | Filippo Boniperti | 62 | 84 | 20 | 700,000 | 2,000 | Empoli | Y/3 | Right | 4 | 3 | ||
| CF | Nassim Ben Khalifa | 68 | 84 | 20 | 1,700,000 | 4,000 | Grasshopper | Y/3 | Right | 3 | 4 | ||
| ST | Sergio Araujo | 69 | 84 | 20 | 1,700,000 | 4,000 | FC Barcelona B | - | Right | 4 | 4 | On loan from Boca Juniors | |
| CF | Christian Pasquato | 71 | 84 | 22 | 2,600,000 | 6,000 | Bologna | Y/5 | Right | 4 | 3 | FK specialist, flair | |
| ST | Samuele Longo | 70 | 84 | 20 | 2,600,000 | 6,000 | RCD Espanyol | - | Right | 3 | 3 | On loan from Inter | |
| CF | Leandro | 73 | 84 | 20 | 3,700,000 | 10,000 | Grêmio | Y/4 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| ST | Samed Yesil | 64 | 83 | 18 | 1,100,000 | 2,250 | Liverpool | N/4 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| CF | Dani Pacheco | 71 | 83 | 21 | 2,400,000 | 9,000 | Liverpool | Y/2 | Right | 3 | 3 | Finesse shot | |
| ST | Giovanni Sio | 73 | 83 | 23 | 3,300,000 | 10,000 | FC Augsburg | - | Left | 3 | 3 | Long shot taker | On loan from VfL Wolfsburg |
| CF | Heung-Min Son | 73 | 83 | 19 | 3,400,000 | 10,000 | Hamburger SV | Y/2 | Left | 5 | 3 | Injury prone | |
| ST | Jeroen Lumu | 63 | 82 | 17 | 675,000 | 1,750 | Willem II | Y/3 | Left | 4 | 3 | ||
| CF | Marcos Junior | 67 | 82 | 19 | 1,200,000 | 4,000 | Fluminense | Y/2 | Right | 4 | 3 | Speedster, acrobat | |
| ST | Benik Afobe | 66 | 82 | 19 | 1,200,000 | 3,000 | Bolton | - | Right | 2 | 3 | On loan from Arsenal | |
| ST | Nico López | 70 | 82 | 18 | 2,300,000 | 6,000 | Roma | N/4 | Left | 3 | 3 | ||
| ST | Nicolás Blandi | 71 | 82 | 22 | 2,400,000 | 7,000 | Boca Juniors | Y/3 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| CF | Marco Sau | 73 | 82 | 24 | 3,200,000 | 10,000 | Cagliari | Y/2 | Right | 3 | 3 | Speedster, acrobat | |
| CF | Paulo Dybala | 73 | 82 | 18 | 3,400,000 | 6,000 | Palermo | Y/4 | Left | 2 | 3 | ||
| ST | M'Baye Niang | 72 | 82 | 17 | 3,400,000 | 7,000 | Milan | N/3 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| CF | Alexandr Kokorin | 73 | 82 | 21 | 3,600,000 | 10,000 | Dinamo Moskva | Y/2 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| ST | Emmanuel Mayuka | 72 | 82 | 21 | 3,600,000 | 7,000 | Southampton | N/5 | Right | 5 | 4 | Speedster, acrobat | |
| ST | Anass Achahbar | 65 | 81 | 18 | 850,000 | 1,750 | Feyenoord | Y/3 | Left | 4 | 4 | Flair | |
| CF | Haris Seferovic | 69 | 81 | 20 | 1,500,000 | 5,000 | Fiorentina | Y/3 | Right | 2 | 2 | ||
| ST | Paco Alcácer | 71 | 81 | 18 | 2,100,000 | 4,000 | Getafe CF | - | Right | 4 | 3 | On loan from Valencia CF | |
| CF | Mauro Formica | 70 | 81 | 24 | 2,200,000 | 7,000 | Blackburn Rovers | Y/2 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| CF | Jamie Murphy | 72 | 81 | 22 | 2,300,000 | 7,000 | Motherwell | Y/1 | Right | 4 | 3 | ||
| CF | Caio | 71 | 81 | 21 | 2,300,000 | 7,000 | Santa Catarina | - | Right | 3 | 4 | On loan from Botafogo | |
| ST | Jordan Rhodes | 73 | 81 | 22 | 3,300,000 | 10,000 | Blackburn Rovers | N/5 | Right | 4 | 2 | Finesse shot | |
| ST | Hugo Vieira | 72 | 81 | 23 | 3,300,000 | 7,000 | Sporting Gijón | - | Right | 3 | 3 | On loan from SL Benfica | |
| ST | Niklas Bärkroth | 58 | 80 | 20 | 300,000 | 1,250 | IFK Göteborg | Y/2 | Right | 4 | 3 | Flair | |
| ST | Max Clayton | 60 | 80 | 17 | 450,000 | 750 | Crewe Alexandra | Y/2 | Right | 3 | 3 | ||
| ST | Luka Djordjević | 65 | 80 | 17 | 850,000 | 2,000 | Zenit | N/4 | Right | 4 | 2 | ||
| ST | Dellatorre | 67 | 80 | 20 | 1,100,000 | 5,000 | FC Porto | - | Right | 4 | 3 | On loan from I. Porto Alegre | |
| ST | Giuseppe De Luca | 69 | 80 | 21 | 1,500,000 | 4,000 | Atalanta | - | Right | 3 | 3 | On loan from Varese | |
| ST | Marvin Sordell | 68 | 80 | 21 | 1,500,000 | 4,000 | Bolton | Y/3 | Right | 3 | 2 | Flair | |
| ST | Diego Rubio | 71 | 80 | 19 | 2,200,000 | 7,000 | Sporting CP | Y/4 | Right | 3 | 2 | ||
| CF | Gianluca Sansone | 73 | 80 | 25 | 2,900,000 | 10,000 | Torino | N/1 | Left | 3 | 3 | Finesse shot | |
| ST | Teemu Pukki | 73 | 80 | 22 | 3,300,000 | 10,000 | FC Schalke 04 | Y/2 | Right | 4 | 3 | Finesse shot, flair | |
| ST | Cyriac | 73 | 80 | 21 | 3,300,000 | 10,000 | RSC Anderlecht | N/4 | Right | 4 | 3 | Acrobat, injury prone |