Sophia Poor has found an unusual way to introduce herself to a whole new audience. The 19-year-old London City Lionesses goalkeeper has been turning her EA Sports FC 27 player card into a TikTok series and it has quickly become one of the more entertaining football trends on the platform.
Poor’s card is rated just 62 overall, with a bronze rating and some particularly modest individual attributes. Rather than taking the ratings too seriously, she has decided to prove EA Sports wrong and the results have been hilarious.
Project FC27 begins:
Poor’s series, titled Project FC27, started with one of the lowest-rated parts of her card: her one-star skill moves. In the first video, Poor gets a balloon and sets about demonstrating what a one-star skill player can actually do. She balances the balloon, performs kick-ups with it and even attempts push-ups while keeping the balloon under control. The video struck a chord with FC fans, picking up more than 100,000 likes and almost one million views.
Suddenly, Poor’s FC 27 card was getting attention far beyond her usual football audience. Fans began discussing her ratings, with some joking about adding the goalkeeper to their teams and others simply enjoying the creativity of the series. And Poor wasn’t finished.
“Alright, you’re convincing us”
The second video focused on another low rating: 12 for heading accuracy. Poor responded by taking a football and repeatedly heading it into the air, performing what were effectively kick-ups with her head. It was considerably more impressive than a rating of 12 would suggest.
Even EA Sports got involved, commenting on the video:
“Alright, you’re convincing us.”
Ball control? No problem
Next came ball control rated 10. Poor’s response was simple. A long ball comes towards her and she calmly brings it under control with her foot, making the supposed weakness look remarkably easy. There is something particularly amusing about watching a professional goalkeeper casually demonstrate a skill that her virtual card suggests she struggles with. But the series continued to find new ways of doing exactly that.
The short passing challenge:
Poor then turned her attention to her short passing rating of 19. This time, the challenge involved a car boot and another creative display of skill. After a series of impressive touches and kick-ups, Poor eventually sent the ball towards the boot. One of the highlights saw her kick the ball through her friend’s legs as her friend held a handstand, before Poor finished the sequence by sending the ball into the boot while turned around. It’s another moment that makes you question whether a 19-rated short passing statistic really tells the full story.
Vision: 34
Poor’s next challenge was her 34-rated vision. The video starts with her without her glasses, looking at a sheet of paper showing five gold stars with “Skill Moves” written underneath. She can’t make out what is on the page, before putting her glasses on and suddenly, everything becomes clear. It’s another simple but funny way for Poor to poke fun at her FC 27 ratings, turning a 34-rated vision stat into another entertaining instalment of Project FC27.
More than just a viral series:
Project FC27 has already generated more than two million views, with fans increasingly invested in seeing which rating Poor will attempt to challenge next. The appeal is partly the humour, but there is also something clever about the concept.
Footballers regularly use social media to show the best moments of their careers. Poor has instead taken something that could be seen as a negative, a relatively low-rated FC card and turned it into content. Every rating becomes another challenge. Every video gives fans another reason to watch and the more impressive the demonstrations become, the funnier the original ratings look. For a young goalkeeper trying to build her profile, it is proving to be a very effective way of getting people talking.
From Villa prospect to London City Lioness:
Away from TikTok, Poor is already regarded as one of the promising young goalkeepers in the English game. She signed permanently for London City Lionesses in July 2025 from Aston Villa on a deal running until the summer of 2028, having spent the second half of the previous season on loan at the club.
Poor began her development in Leicester City’s WSL academy, where she started 12 matches, before moving to Aston Villa. She was subsequently handed first-team opportunities, including a start against West Ham after being called into action against Chelsea. Her performances earned her a nomination for the WSL Player of the Month award, an impressive achievement for a teenager. She has also represented England at U17 and U19 level and has a BWSL2 Championship winners’ medal on her CV.
London City head coach Jocelyn Prêcheur was particularly impressed by what he saw during Poor’s loan spell.
“As a goalkeeper, Sophia has probably the biggest potential I have ever seen,” Prêcheur said at the time.
He also said he believed she had “everything to become the best English goalkeeper in a few years.”
Poor herself has been equally clear about her ambitions.
“I want to break through into the WSL 100%,” she said after making her move permanent.
“I want to play for this club. I think it’s such a great club, I see the future of this club and I see myself as part of it.”
From bronze card to breaking through:
For now, Poor’s biggest audience might not be watching her between the posts. They are watching her on TikTok. But Project FC27 is doing something useful beyond providing a few laughs. It is introducing a young goalkeeper to an audience that might not yet know her name, while giving fans a glimpse of her personality away from the pitch.
And with every new video, Poor is slowly making the case that her 62-rated bronze card might be seriously underselling her. There is still a long way to go before she reaches the ambitions set out for her by Prêcheur and her own goal of becoming a WSL goalkeeper, but if Project FC27 is anything to go by, Sophia Poor certainly isn’t short of confidence. The next question is simple: Which rating is she going after next?
