Ever seen the opponent's striker swing through your slow, sloppy defenders?. Not if you've had those guys! The best defenders in Football Manager 2008

Name: ergey Ignaschevic
Club: CSKA Moscow
Position: DRC
Age:27
Nationality: Russian
Value: 0

Pretty good attributes for a free player!

Name: Aurelien Teaudors
Club: Sochaux
Position: DC
Age:18
Nationality: French
Value: around 300k at the start, gets up pretty quickly

Screenshot here is from his 3rd year, showing a huge improvement over his original stats.

Name: Arthur Sorin
Club:Kalmar FF
Age:22
Position:DC
Nationality:French
Value: 20k EUR

At 20k, you can't hope for more.

Name: Oded Gavish
Club:Turun Palloseura
Age:17
Position:DC,SW
Nationality:Israel
Value: 2 k EUR
PA:-9, CA:70

Due to the huge difference between CA and PA, Gavish, with shit stats at the beginning, can improve, given the correct training conditions, beyond imagination. Screenshot is from fm scout, from fmgreece.gr. Second screenshot shows potential attributes.

Name: jose san roman
Position : DR/WBR
Age :18
Team: River
Nationality: Argentinian
Price: 12K EUR

Another one of those guys you can get for nearly nothing and has a PA of -9. His stats improve rapidly and can become a rock in the defense for any mid-table side, especially after the second year. Don't expect him to get a work permit though

Name: Matias Cahais
Position : DLC
Age :19
Team: Boca
Nationality: Argentinian
Price: 200k EUR

A definite must. Will progress rapidly and comes at an absurdly low price. In my screenshot, third year in the game, his value is 7m EUR, and his sale value around 10m. He plays best as a DC

Name: Rafael Forster
Position : DC
Age :17
Team: SC International
Nationality: Brazilian/German
PA:-9
Price: 525k EUR minimum fee

Not one of those cute defenders that will pass correctly to anything further than 10 yards. Has animal strength though, a tough guy to scare opponents away (and beat them up if they are not scared enough and get too close)

Name: Sokratis Papastathopoulos
Position : DC
Age :19
Team: AEK
Nationality: Greek
Price:1.8m EUR