Lucas Leiva Is Not a Flop, At Least Not Yet

At age 22, Zinedine Zidane was playing in the Intertoto Cup with Bordeaux. At that same age, Éric Cantona had just got a move from Auxerre to Marseille. Rivaldo had just moved from Corinthians to cross-town rivals Palmeiras in São Paulo.

With the money involved in today's game and globalized scouting networks, such players would already have been with one of the European giants before they had the chance to establish themselves in their local teams.