I was earmarked to be the next Ryan Giggs at Manchester United – now I’m a free agent at 31placeholder image
I was earmarked to be the next Ryan Giggs at Manchester United – now I’m a free agent at 31 | Getty Images
Once touted as a major prospect at Manchester United, Tom Lawrence is now without a club after a string of injuries - so is his career reaching its close?
Towards the end of the 2013/14 season, Manchester United player-manager Ryan Giggs substituted himself off in the 70th minute of a 3-1 win over Hull City. The player who replaced him, Tom Lawrence, was his compatriot and was earmarked as his spiritual heir at Old Trafford. When Giggs gave Lawrence his debut at his own expense, it felt like a conscious decision to pass the baton.
It didn’t quite work out that way. After the match, The Daily Mail rather floridly described Lawrence as “the new Welsh wing wizard” but he had in fact made his first and last appearance for the club – and now, aged 31 and freshly released by Rangers, Lawrence is without a team and at risk of watching his career come to a premature conclusion. So what happened to Lawrence, and does he have one last act left in his career?
From Manchester United to Rangers - why Tom Lawrence wound up without a club
The first four years of Lawrence’s professional career were marked by a seemingly endless string of loan spells – six in total, ranging from Blackburn Rovers to Yeovil Town – and the Welshman never really settled at a club until he signed for Derby County permanently in 2017.
Never quite able to make the grade at Manchester United and lacking the level of creativity, threat in the final third and raw pace that had made Giggs so special as a player, Lawrence found his level in the second tier.
Still, he was close enough to Giggs’ level to earn 23 caps for his country (the last of which came in 2021) and proved himself to be versatile enough to play across the attack and midfield, as well as being deemed an important enough presence in the Derby dressing room to be made club captain.
That latter honour was bestowed just two years after Lawrence was one of the parties involved in an infamous drink-driving incident which saw former Derby skipper Richard Keogh sacked by the club and Lawrence eventually sentenced to 80 hours of community service alongside team-mates Mason Bennett. That, most likely, was the low point of his career, but on the pitch things were going steadily, if not as spectacularly as some pundits had expected when he was a teenager.
Lawrence left Derby in the wake of their relegation to League One in 2022, swiftly signing for Scottish Premiership side Rangers. Unfortunately, his career at Ibrox never really achieved lift-off.
Injuries are largely to blame. A serious Achilles injury in his first season restricted him to just nine appearances and over three seasons he managed a total of 65 games for his club, scoring 11 times – including against Benfica, PSV and Lyon in Europe – and Rangers eventually released him when his contract ran down over the summer.
There were flashes of his potential, a few fine finishes and nice touches, but between fitness concerns and a lack of consistency, never a sense of a player who was likely to make a late step towards those Giggs comparisons. Now, unless he can find a new club, he might have a career that was nearly a decade shorter than his more famous Welsh predecessor as well.
Will Wrexham give Lawrence a career lifeline?
Two and a half months after his contract with Rangers expired, Lawrence remains clubless. Teams and England can still signs unattached players after the end of the transfer window, so hope of final act close to the top level is not by any means lost – but time is likely running out, especially for a player with fitness concerns.
Reports from earlier in the summer suggested that Wrexham, newly promoted to the Championship, were keen, but a move to the Disney-backed North Wales hasn’t materialised. Given that Lawrence was born in Wrexham and grew up in Flintshire, one imagines that it’s a move he would be more than keen on if the chance came back around.
West Bromwich Albion were mentioned, too, as were Frank Lampard’s Coventry City, but if either club made enquiries than a deal proved difficult to reach. Lawrence’s options appear to be running rather thin.
Lawrence, like many players before him who move into their thirties with fitness red flags, may have little choice but to drop down the leagues if he is to continue his career – Stockport County of League One are another side who found themselves linked with Lawrence in the gossip columns this summer, although again there has been no discernible movement since.
It’s all a far cry from coming on for Giggs to make your debut in the Premier League at Old Trafford, but Lawrence has carved out a very respectable career in the 11 years since that match – which turned out to be something of a false dawn for United’s youngsters given that double goalscorer James Wilson, the teenage hero against Hull, has joined his old academy team-mate Lawrence in the search for a new club this summer.
Lawrence will likely get another shot in the EFL, given his experience and unquestioned quality at that level – it will just take a team willing to gamble on his fitness. The odds are he’ll find one. If this is the end, however, he can still finish his career content that he came a lot closer to Giggs than most young players do, even if it wasn’t as close as he might once have hoped.
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