Youth development, your successes vs failures

I'm just looking through my FM09 save now and the amount of young talent I've bought or tried to bring through myself, see how many players made the grade, how many I let move on and whether they flopped or made it afterwards.

This is a save across about 17 years so there will be quite a few but it will be all players who I signed or had come through the youth system that I remember I put time and effort into developing. The failures will be players with roughly top 10 potential who didn't end getting close to that. The average players will be those who got into mid-table type teams or are capable of it and I just kept them as back-up and the successes with me or away from me will be players at champions league sides.

Failures:

21

Average players:

29

Success with me:

21

Success elsewhere:

9

This is looking through at the history of my team and players who went where and when etc. I'm surprised I had so many players that were a success, counting players as 19 or under when I signed them to be elligible, most who moved on didn't get enough game time with me so it limited them but a few have gone on to be better players. I'm a bit disappointed with the amount of failures I had and average players overall though, out of 120 players bought about 70 were 19 or under (the rest from the academy) and I don't have an awful lot to show for it in terms of a massive ream of successful players.

On my current save I seem to be signing 10-15 youth players a season.

I'm in my 8th (I think) season now and the majority of my first team squad are those I signed at age 18 or younger, so something is going right. Maybe 25-30 players over 7 seasons who've gone from being a promising youngster to an established first-team squad member. Sadly no-one from my academy has yet to be a 'success', although I've at last deemed 3 of them worthy of being part of the first team squad this season.

There are a couple I can think of who've left at age 20/21 without much progress but have started to come good for others, while there's some I developed but chose to sell despite their obvious talent and have 'made it' elsewhere. Of the former there are only maybe 2 or 3, but the later perhaps reaches double-figures. Last season we made £44m on someone who cost £2.6m, £10m on someone who cost £575k and so on. I'd describe the players in question as being successes with me, but not neccessarily successful nor of the standard required - although we've increasingly become a club to sell simply because we have too many good players - which is a good sign for our youth development!

Depends what counts as a failure though. I've got players still on the books who signed at 16-18 with big promise but have never really developed, but would be easily good enough for a team not quite at our level. One, for instance, was called the next Juninho Pernambucano (sp?) at 16 and was brilliant for his age, but 4 unsuccessful loans (playing in the top flight in Spain, Italy and France) now looks not quite the player he should have been. Still described as a "cultured midfielder", but in no danger of troubling the first-team. Moved to the B team to try and finally develop.

The B team did no favours for a DC I had high hopes for though. In my 2nd season I signed two 16 year old English DC, both of whom I had high hopes for. One became a regular for us at 18, while the other spent 3 seasons in Segunda B before being released. He's now having success elsewhere though, playing regularly at the back for Premier League Sunderland. A DM I put effort into trying to develop but made just 6 league appearances has since starred at Tottenham before a big money move to Lazio. Similarly, a RB who made just 1 appearance is now a star at Wolfsburg.

Thankfully struggling to find anyone I had hopes for who's disappeared off the radar or ended up in the gutter. Maybe because I hold on to players a long time.

After getting bored winning everything in 2040 with Benfica on FM09, I decided to only play homegrown players, after 5 season my starting 11 were all trained youth players, 6 of which were decent, 2 were world class, 2 were below average and didn't contribute much and 1 was a complete 1 star numpty but I had nobody else in his position (left back) that was any better.

He only had 5 for tackling and no stamina

My youth development sucks. I need help!

I sign 10-15 young players a year, too, but if they're not already close to the First Team, they usually don't make it at my Ajax. Somehow they don't really develop in the Reserve, although I set them up playing in the Belgian First Division. In my 8 years at the club I had only 1 player from my own youth academy coming through. Some of my ex-players have a place in the starting XI at other clubs. I usually buy players for 10 Mil and sell for 30 Mil a year.

at ajax i have got the same problem. dont think i have had a player come into the youth system yet whos gone on to be even remotely good enough for the 1st team. if i buy an under 18 player then if hes not good enough when he joins, then he dont tend to make it.

i have bought some good young bargains on my game though. got a wonderkid striker for 8m whos now 20 and already won champions cup player of the year and club player of the year. got an AML who cost me 20k and now worth 5m, a DC for 3m who is wanted by everyone at 18 and already a 1st team regular.

My biggest success was a lot of youngsters i brought into an inter team. They were in a bad way when i joined, so first 2 seasons made do with older players, whilst buying a bunch of 16 year olds. By The time i left them after 14 years, id had a lot of players who been with me at least 10 years from when they were 16-18. Thats my biggest success story with youngsters, normally i only bring 1-4 that make it. This team had about 8 plyaers starting.

I can remember one guy in particular on FM09, an Italian regen named Rocco Pintus... had amazing stats, good reports from my coaches, was only 17... I brought him in, loaned him out for a couple of seasons then thought I'd play him as my main striker was getting too old. Well, I persevered with him for 7 seasons but despite having all the ingredients Rocco was shocking ended up selling him to Genoa where he averaged 6.5's for the rest of his days.

Looking at my Spurs team in 2035, of my regular match squad of 18, only 4 weren't with me before the age of 20, though that includes both players I've brought through at Spurs, and old hands I've previously brought through at Liverpool(My right winger was playing for me at age 17 for Liverpool, and is now 32 and still cutting the mustard).

With my England team in the same game, of my squad of 26, 20 were either brought through my old Liverpool team as a young player, or were brought through at my current Spurs team. I'd say I've done a pretty good job.