FIFA 23 FUT BALLERS DANJUMA PLAYER REVIEW

The FUT Ballers promo is a little difficult to place.  On one hand you can embrace the grindable material, and especially for new FUT Managers, improve your squad.  On the other hand, the cards have generally been all Premier League options and none that would really challenge the starting 11 of managers with established squads.

In the end it really comes down to your perspective and whether you want to see the positives or focus on the negatives.  For me, I am slowly viewing this promo as my road to 91 Cruyff grind.  All of the SBCs, objective cards, packs that come with the grind (Objective, Season & SBC), and even the eventual Squad Battles rewards will all work together in order to really bolster my attacking threat when Johan is complete.                

Part of this journey involved the objective grind: Play to Ball.  The rewards of which include multiple packs, 87 Hattan Bahebri, 87 Aiden McGeady, and the main focus of this review… 87 Arnaut Danjuma.  I should also note that because I had not completed the objectives beforehand, I was able to organize my squad so that this grind also brought in the recently Cop or Flop reviewed 88 Luis Diaz, 88 Patrick Bamford, 88 Dejan Kulusevski & 86 Oxlade-Chamberlain.  Additionally, 85 Saud Abdulhamid, 85 Álvaro Medrán, & 85 Igor Coronado were completed from the Squad Foundations: MBS Pro League Milestone… and in all honesty this was simply by mistake not realizing I was meeting requirements.   Not bad for 10 squad battles matches.

Now some of you may have completed the SBC/Objective cards or do not have interest, so for the sake of this review we will just focus on the three guaranteed objective cards when grinding for Danjuma.  The Spurs man acting as the main focal point. 

The 4-2-2-2 remained locked in for this FUT Champs Qualifying run and Danjuma spent the majority of his time playing as both the RAM and ST.  McGeady played mostly as the LAM and RAM with Bahebri doing the same as a super sub.  The application of both the FINISHER and ENGINE to Danjuma did not go quite so well, while the HAWK proved more effective.

Danjuma was the free transfer frontman all qualifying long in the following (much thrown together) squad:

Overall 

Difficult one to unpack here.  Danjuma had a fantastic showing during this review, producing the rather impressive 2.0 goal contributions per game, splitting it down the middle with 6 goals and 6 assists in 6 matches.

On the other hand there were numerous moments during this review where Danjuma could have delivered so much more.  The card is a bit of an enigma, performing wonderfully one minute and shockingly awful the next.

Main Statistics – Passing

Passing Rating: 9/10

Traits: Flair Pass, Swerve Pass

The biggest surprise of this review came in the passing department where Danjuma put on a display any midfielder would envy.  Playing as the drop back striker and as a RAM it was the passing that initially worried me the most about this review.  Turns out it was the exact opposite throughout.

84 VISION, 85 SHORT PASSING & 71 LONG PASSING hardly scream Pirlo-esque passing… but there is something special about this card and the way Danjuma delivers a ball.  Call it the Hair Trait, call it good luck, call it what you want… This man delivers.

In truth I have not come across many cards with both the FLAIR PASS and SWERVE PASS Traits.  In fact the list is quite short but includes Centurion TAA and Centurion Tavernier… two of my favorite passers in the game, both of whom I have played in midfield this year for that reason.  Maybe that is the key, but either way Danjuma was incredibly solid in his delivery of the ball into dangerous areas and the results don’t lie.

Value/Time-Coins

Value/Coins-Fodder Rating: 5/5

Big Objective grind, but overall it certainly felt worth it in the end.  The 10 Squad Battles matches were fine.  In fact almost the entirety of the introduction to this review was typed while my control rubber banded to complete the objectives.

The Draft portion of the objective could be tricky and is where the coins come into play.  For starters I struggled to find matches and had to turn on crossplay, thankfully avoiding the cheater brigade in my 8 matches.  

Secondly, I was very very fortunate that I was able to draft good squads and had okay opponents… going 4 - 0 both times and only using the two free draft tokens from the squad battles portion of the objectives for my two drafts.  Normally I would have expected to need 3 tries for 4 wins and the 8 matches… Saving 15k overall was nice. 

Of course you can go Offline Draft and guarantee these wins and matches for the two draft tokens, but that is essentially 8 more Squad Battles matches that I simply couldn’t mentally stand.

In return I received three 87s and some decent objective and Draft winning packs.  The fact that those 87s proved solid options throughout this review only cements the value for the time and potential coins I could have put in… a fantastic return overall. 

Good vs. Bad 

Good vs Bad Rating: 3.5/5

Danjuma has his moments and they largely came in areas you would expect.

+ The HAWK chem style was fantastic when combined with the CONTROLLED AcceleRATE and 98 SPRINT SPEED… The EXPLOSIVE AcceleRATE chem styles did nothing for the acceleration and generally slowed down the sprint speed.

+ 4 STAR SKILLS, 90 DRIBBLING statistics across the board and the FLAIR Trait had their moments.  In fact the dribbling felt okay throughout this review… In the end the acceleration simply sucked the life out of the good movements Danjuma pulled off.

+ 94 FINISHING, 95 SHOT POWER & the FINESSE SHOT Trait are all reliable… On the right foot.

It is interesting that the passing was my  main concern going into this review when it was almost every other category that provided let downs.  Danjuma doesn’t quite harness the Hair Trait as others have in the past.

- The acceleration on this card is broken, seriously, there is something wrong with it.  Regardless of AcceleRATE and chemistry style it simply was not it.  93 ACCELERATION never felt so in the mud.  

- The 4 STAR WEAK FOOT with this card is largely absent and some wild misses could have led to an improved goal total and a general different feel about Danjuma’s performance overall.

- 178cm | 5’10 with an AVERAGE Body Type and 80 STRENGTH should have delivered more than what it did.  Again, the acceleration seems more at fault as it invited way more challenges than it should have… More often than not Danjuma loses out in those situations.

Closing Words

TLDR: Danjuma is good but could be better, McGeady is ironically the only 5 STAR SKILL Baller so far and performed well as a LAM, Bahebri is a good super sub but would not replace the ones I currently have. 

If you are just starting, Danjuma is an option to bolster your squad for free.  If you are an established player that is not a Spurs fan… You are looking at this from a perspective of receiving some seriously awesome fodder returns for your time.
Danjuma simply does not have the consistency to be a long term option moving forward.
 Hoping you are well.  Cheers for reading.