FC 24 93 Winter Wildcards Icon Lev Yashin Player Review

Who cares about the Statistics, PlayStyles, AcceleRATE, Positioning, Work Rates… All we want to know is… DOES HE WEAR THE HAT IN GAME?  Of course the answer was quickly made available and the price of Winter Wildcard Yashin promptly skyrocketed to a comedic level.  It really is the small things in life.

Of course the idea of Tommy Shelby starting center back to conclude my Weekend League was also part of my decision to review the keeper turned outfield stopper, but the idea that the Friday evening price for Yashin was on par with Winter Wildcard Van Dijk was about as insane as it gets.

Thankfully for the sake of my  coin balance and all future reviews I was able to hold off testing Yashin until later on in the Weekend League run and picked him up for a more reasonable 1.6 million coins.  The SHADOW Chemistry Style was applied in hopes that Yashin could manage the Pace and Defending duties needed for the trial by fire of the final stretch of Weekend League matches.

Yashin was the rock at the back to conclude the Weekend League league grind in the following squad:

Overall 

This is one of those reviews that from the outset you hope dominates the game and becomes a legendary Ultimate Team story.  The trick is making sure to not view any deficiencies with rose colored glasses and allowing your excitement to cloud judgment.  In the end I think the overall rating and general experience was one that separates the unique design of the card from the general ability in game, which is definitely solid, but not one that will become a staple in many squads at this price.  

Main Statistics – Defending

Defending Rating: 10/10

Pace Rating: 9/10

Physical Rating: 9/10

PlayStyles: Block Plus, Jockey, Intercept, Anticipate, Relentless

If you look at the overall ratings for the various statistics and then look at this category you will notice that everything good that Yashin provided will be wrapped up in the next few lines.  But in the end it was these combinations of attributes that make Yashin such a strong defender in game.

The 88 SPRINT SPEED is just about enough to deal with the various speedsters you come across in the Weekend League mix.  The key (and I will touch on that further) is to make sure that you have Yashin in motion prior to sprinting and in general he has more than enough Pace to keep up.

Once you have Yashin in the correct areas the various PlayStyles and ridiculous defending statistics do the rest.  The 99 INTERCEPT with the INTERCEPT PlayStyle is about as good as it gets and playing a high line I found Yashin constantly stepping in to deal with problems before they materialized.

The 93 STANDING TACKLE was another highlight and combined perfectly with the ANTICIPATE PlayStyle and 99 STRENGTH.  In general you can rely on Yashin to protect the box and even against taller strikers the 99 JUMPING was just about enough to ensure that zero headed efforts found the back of the net during the review.

Value/Coins

Value/Coins: 4/5

There is really only 92 Maldini to draw price point comparisons to this card and thankfully I have had a small amount of experience (albeit a loan) to comment on that.  For me Maldini’s “feel” is simply superior to Yashin and while Yashin performs fantastically on the defensive side of the ball, the movement on the ball was quite poor.  For 1.6 million coins I am not sure I want the risk of having a defender who can be caught in possession so easily and so it just falls away from perfect value for me.

Good vs. Bad 

Good vs Bad Rating: 5/5

While the majority of the praise came regarding the defending there was one more area that surprised.

+ With 64 SHORT PASSING I was certain this was going to be a difficult battle and possession would be hard to maintain after tackles.  But across the review Yashin was a solid mover of the ball and oftentimes carved opponents' midfields apart with incredibly accurate passess.  It doesn’t make sense, but it worked.

For me this is where Maldini separates himself from Yashin and overall where the value of the Russian’s card starts to fall.

- The 98 AGILITY & 94 BALANCE feel present when defending and then completely abandon Yashin on the ball.  The 62 DRIBBLING is not helping anything, and the card felt so sluggish in game.  It was best to tackle and immediately pass in this case, but the moments that required a movement away from attackers to create passing lanes were complete chaos and felt unnecessarily dangerous, even resulting in a couple of goals against along the way.  

- The 98 ACCELERATION is another statistic that felt more present defensively and certainly contributed to the poor dribbling as well… But even Defending you again have to be diligent in getting Yashin in motion as he really doesn’t explode into sprint speed at all.

Closing Words

After all was said and done this weekend matched my best Weekend League finish ever and Winter Wildcard Yashin played a huge part in closing out the final 8 matches of that battle.  While not a perfect card, the defending is simply too good to overlook and provided a reliable partner to VVD.  I still feel like there is some “cap tax” on this one, but the performances were there to just about back it up.  Even just for the aesthetics Yashin is certainly worth a try in game, the collateral of a solid defender is just a bonus.
Hoping you are well.  Cheers for reading