What's the best way to sell players?

I'm Manchester United in the first season, and I'm trying to sell Wes Brown, Darren Gibson, Ji-Sung Park, Anderson, Tomas Kuzszcak and Dimitar Berbatov. I'd also like to sell Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs, Michael Owen, Gary Neville, Rio Ferdinand and Edwin Van Der Sar at some point, maybe at the end of the first season.

However, whenever I transfer list them and offer them to clubs, hardly anyone is interested.

I had about 20 clubs come in with offers of loan for Brown, Park and Anderson, even though I'd set all of their statuses to "unavailable for loan". The biggest offer I got was £3.5m for Park, despite his value being £4.5m. Everton offered me £2.5m for Brown, despite his value being £4.4m. No-one at all made any bids for Anderson or Berbatov.

In the end, I had to loan out Anderson and Gibson to get £500,000 for each in loan fee, and hope someone will be interested when they return but it seems a bit ridiculous.

In real life, if Anderson was made available for £10-15m, clubs would be queuing up. Even £5-6m for Brown would be reasonable, I could see teams like Stoke and Sunderland paying £5m for Brown, and £5-7m for Park.

Even Berbatov, I could see teams like AC Milan/Inter Milan/Juventus etc buying him for £15-20m in real life.

In my head, and assuming it's real life, I can imagine the following happening (if United actually offered the players out):

• Anderson to an Italian team for around £12-15m
  
• Park to a team like West Ham, Stoke, Everton etc for £5-6m
  
• Brown to a team like Celtic for £5m
  
• Owen to a team like Everton, Fulham, Bolton etc for £5m
  
• Gibson to a team like Celtic, Rangers, Birmingham for £5m
  
• Kuzszcak to a team like Celtic, Rangers, Birmingham for £2m
  

I could even imagine Ferdinand going for around £4-5m.

However, trying to raise £35-40m through the sale of those players in the first season in the game is impossible. I'd be lucky to sell some of them for nothing!

How do you sell players - do you offer them to clubs with some clauses built in, like monthly instalments?

What strategies have people found to receive realistic transfer fees? I think the game has a naive philosophy that if you're offering them out, that means the AI teams can offer a fraction of the value. That shouldn't be the case - it just means I don't need them, but I still want market value. If I was selling Rooney, I might offer him out, but I'd still want £30-40m for him, not 10% of this!

Oh, and before some of you scoff at my imagined transfer fees in real life, my point is still valid - try taking over Everton or Aston Villa and selling a player like Lescott or Barry to Man City for £20m. It just wouldnt happen in the game.

I'd be interested to know if anyone has managed to start a bidding war for their players, and get an AI team pay well over the odds - for example, getting them to pay £20m for a £10m rated player.

I see where you're coming from and am having the same problems. I don't think iv'e sold a transfer listed player for over their value, really is frustrating. Although i have found that since the new patch its easier to sell player, but yes very frustrating.

Arsenal bought a 21 yr old left winger from my r. madrid team for 37.5M while he's only worth like 11M... and he's only my bench warmer, and I bought the kid around 16 and he never become anything when 21.

I didn't transfer listed him though and they are just very interested in buying

I'm Manchester United in the first season, and

Just a thought, are you fully patched?

I only ask because selling players is a tad easier in the latest patch.

Also, Ive found I got over the face value twice so far in this version of FM.

Both times the player had requested a transfer and I agreed. The AI set an asking price a bit over the face value and I sold them both.

If you don't play a player and maybe drop him to the ressy's, he'll become unhappy.

When you click on private chat/concerns, try *iss him off some more and see if he'll demand a transfer.

Ive never had a bidding war and tbh Ive never seen one from AI cntrolled teams.

This is because there is a hidden player value which all AI controlled teams seem to know. How often do you see an AI controlled team have a transfer offer refused?

Every player has a hidden price in FM, all you have to do is find it. Even the right bids for players like Messi will be accepted but offcourse he will refuse to negotiate with you (probably).

If an AI team bids 4mil for a player, just bid the same, it will be accepted (Usually). If there are numerous bids on a player you want, just up his contract demands to have a better chance of signing him.

(You prolly know all this but some peeps reading this thread may not, im not trying to preach mate )

Arsenal bought a 21 yr old left winger from my r. madrid team for 37.5M while he's only worth like 11M... and he's only my bench warmer, and I bought the kid around 16 and he never become anything when 21.

I didn't transfer listed him though and they are just very interested in buying

Yeah this happens too. I got 5 mil for a back up center half when a club enquired about him. He was not listed and was worth 3 mil. I chanced my arm and replied to the enquirey with 5mil demand and they accepted.

This only happened once to me so far though.

When the game was released, Miles said it would be a lot harder to sell players in the first season as they tried to reflect the current economic climate. Teams will more likely be looking for loans or loan/buy rather than paying millions for a player. Also as mentioned, this was a major issue in the game release, try patching to the newest patch if you havent already.

Also, I know its your game and all but what the hell are you thinking? Brown is the best right back at the club in the game at the moment. Rafael is good but not yet at Browns level. Anderson is quality if you play him as an advanced playmaker. You can easily have him as your main creative player in the first season and get 20 assists from him. Definately by the second if you wish to play Scholes more in your first season. As for Berbatov, dont let your real life feelings cloud your judgement of him in the game. If you play him right, he can easily get you 40 goals a season. Sell Rio Ferdinand at the end of the season? Now you really must be having a laugh. He will be your best defender for probably the next 3 years, and a great tutor for any youngsters. The same goes for Giggs, Scholes, VDS and Neville. If your like me and you like to get good prospects in early and train them up, you will need these guys around as tutors. Even if thats all they do it will be worth it. Just try and get them on new contracts and cut their wages. Giggs, Scholes and VDS are good for another 2 seasons. Park is a good squad player to have. Never lets me down. Can play on both wings and also in the middle as a attacking mid as a last resort and still does a job.

I would still get rid of Owen, Gibson and Kuzszcak though. Although ive tried every save and never managed to sell Owen, and I definately wont pay him the wages he always asks for. Always goes on a free.

Good advice StevoRobbo, I have managed to sell O'Shea for 9.5 million (Fulham) in the summer and Gibson (Sunderland) for 10 million in the winter. Kuzszcak is out on loan (Panathinaikos) with a view to buy at 7.5 million. Not huge amounts but sizable sensible boosts to your transfer kitty. Try not to sell out the core of the team and bring in so many new players at one go, your team needs more time to blend and might disrupt squad harmony. The Giggs, Scholes, VDS, Neville are all model professionals and should be allowed to stay in your club as wonderful tutors and still play some important roles in the club. Park and Brown are perfect squad players who never complain even they are dropped (low controversy), sound mental attributes and does play well when called upon. Take time to do your trimmings, no manager is likely to come in straight away and do a complete squad upheaval unless they are in LLM or backed by a sugar daddy.

I imagine what season you'll have after you manage to sell all those players and bring in new ones. Probably you'll get used to 15-20 position after 2 months.

No... i didn't want to be mean... but after all if you played Man Utd before, and if you played FM for some time now, what you asked it's simply insane.

I had VDS until 41 in my net, and he was still the best GK in the Premier League until i offered him a coach job, which he did just fine. I had him tutor at least 4-5 young GK over the years, and they learned quite well from him.

I had Gigs until 39 (when he retired unfortunately) ... besides stamina and strength which went down to 3-4, his passing and mental stats were just amazing. He got me out of jams more then 20 times, when i subbed him in the last 30 minutes. I had him at least 20 games/season, about 10 starting from the first minute, and hanging on until 60'.

Anderson and Fletcher.... wow ... i'm almost in my 6th season.... best midfielders, i can wish for.

Ferdinand.... he is 35 and still kicks ass, his mistake per game ratio is best from all defenders I have (and i brought in Shawcross, Pique and Cellini).

Brown... very very reliable player, in the last 2 season he was my best sub, for both DC and DR position.

The only one player who did not perform well for me - never (at least since we got him at Man Utd) was Berbatov ... and i tryed playing him regularly after 3 season i had to let him out. Chicharito was just unstoppable, i just couldn't let him on the bench.

In the end, although i saw you didn't want to sell him .... Evans... my god! ... for me, this edition of FM ... FINALLY! ... he is the best DC in the game for me... when played on the right DC® ... not DR .... he scores corners like crazy... about 10/season ... but only when in that position ... and his recovery rate.... he saved my bacon so many time when Ai broke free and went on rampage twords GK.... and here he was .... like a gazelle, outpacing the AI, and tackling from behind.... and i was screaming... not you fool you'll get red card... and then... there it was... i was just fine, his tackle was perfect, no reason for booking.

I think that you are the type of gamer who thinks that any player reaching 30 must be discarded.... if so ... oh boy! ... you have no idea... you are playing the wrong game.

I bought a Striker at the age of 30 for 4 years contract.... now he is 32 ... i intend to keep him at least until one of my youngsters will make a very strong impression of me. You don't value to much mental and technical stats of older players... and you think they will not perform well because they are not fast... well i'm sorry for you... you can always keep a <U21 sub for them if you consider they cannot keep up ... and have the exact old player tutor the exact U21 sub ..... and you will do miracles with those U21.

Do an exercise ... try to search ingame Strikers with Finishing and Composure above 17 ... thell me how many players do you get ... how "young" are they!? ... let Higuain alone, because he will not sign for you for any money ... what do you have ... repeat this exercise in you 5th season... tell me now, how many St below 29 do you have ? ... so what no ... no one .... who will you pick then?

My routine: Offer a player (at 150% cost), get some offers (usually loan or 100% price), go to transfer centre, select all offers and press negotiate, set back to 150%, offer again. In most cases I manage to sell player.

I assume most of you will have heard of the transfer crisis in modern football these days? Large amount of clubs are in money trouble, and even if they are not, they are far less likely to dish out large amounts for players. It's all a remain of the financial crisis that has been, or still is, happening. I agree it is frustrating sometimes not to be able to sell a player, or not to be able to sell him for more than his value, but when I thought about it just now, I don't mind it that much.. it's just the way the (football)world is at the moment.

I can imagine SI took this into account

Finding it really easily to get players sold on the new patch or even just sending youngsters on loan. even if it is just for their current value a lot more teams make bids. On the original unpatched version I had the same problems, and because Pedro was causing such a bad atmosphere at Barcelona I had to sell him for half of his value, as there was only one team prepared to pay that, the rest were just making loan deals where IRL if Pedro had a falling out at Barca there would be teams paying 20m at least.

The AI sells players too easily. Look at this fantastic deal made by Chelsea, and how stupid Barcelona is. This guy sits at the Chelsea reserves bench and rarely plays a game but he gets sold for 11.25m... LOL

Is there a difference in which transfer period you sell and buy, and what if i want to sell and buy outside of a transfer period?

I'm Manchester United in the first season, and I'm trying to sell Wes Brown, Darren Gibson, Ji-Sung Park, Anderson, Tomas Kuzszcak and Dimitar Berbatov. I'd also like to sell Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs, Michael Owen, Gary Neville, Rio Ferdinand and Edwin Van Der Sar at some point, maybe at the end of the first season.

its very hard to shift them agreed, but i gotta ask why you wanan sell those ones lol?!

anderson is a quality midfielder in the game in dm/cm/amc/ml specially after a few seasons when he reaches his pot.

scholes, giggs, brown, never getting any money for them and wages arent that bad and theyre good back up. (never replace them with the money youd get)

rio, why?

vds still a good keeper until you get the money for one of the regular replacements

ill give you berbs cauase he's ona fortune tho id still hang onto him.

id also like to scrap some of your suggested real life targets as nonsense ;p

• Anderson to an Italian team for around £12-15m
  
• Park to a team like West Ham, Stoke, Everton etc for £5-6m
  
• Brown to a team like Celtic for £5m
  
• Owen to a team like Everton, Fulham, Bolton etc for £5m
  
• Gibson to a team like Celtic, Rangers, Birmingham for £5m
  
• Kuzszcak to a team like Celtic, Rangers, Birmingham for £2m
  

brown, would find a better club

owen 5 mil pfft

gibbo, never

kuzszcak, he's polish so id assum he'd prob not be to keen on that one either

When the game was released, Miles said it would be a lot harder to sell players in the first season as they tried to reflect the current economic climate. Teams will more likely be looking for loans or loan/buy rather than paying millions for a player. Also as mentioned, this was a major issue in the game release, try patching to the newest patch if you havent already.

Also, I know its your game and all but what the hell are you thinking? Brown is the best right back at the club in the game at the moment. Rafael is good but not yet at Browns level. Anderson is quality if you play him as an advanced playmaker. You can easily have him as your main creative player in the first season and get 20 assists from him. Definately by the second if you wish to play Scholes more in your first season. As for Berbatov, dont let your real life feelings cloud your judgement of him in the game. If you play him right, he can easily get you 40 goals a season. Sell Rio Ferdinand at the end of the season? Now you really must be having a laugh. He will be your best defender for probably the next 3 years, and a great tutor for any youngsters. The same goes for Giggs, Scholes, VDS and Neville. If your like me and you like to get good prospects in early and train them up, you will need these guys around as tutors. Even if thats all they do it will be worth it. Just try and get them on new contracts and cut their wages. Giggs, Scholes and VDS are good for another 2 seasons. Park is a good squad player to have. Never lets me down. Can play on both wings and also in the middle as a attacking mid as a last resort and still does a job.

I would still get rid of Owen, Gibson and Kuzszcak though. Although ive tried every save and never managed to sell Owen, and I definately wont pay him the wages he always asks for. Always goes on a free.

Well, in response to the above, and a few others who commented on my transfer-out plans:

At right back, Rafael is currently playing brilliantly, had 17 games so far this season and has an average of 8.3. I can play John O'Shea there when I need to, and Neville plays a handful of games, mainly in Europe away to tricky sides, like Spartak Moscow when experience is valuable. I just didnt need Brown and thought if I could get £4-6m for him, that'd help towards fixing other areas of the team.

The formation I play requires 2 fairly defensive minded players in central midfield, and Anderson doesn't fit into that. I have Carrick, Fletcher, Hargreaves (he's back from injury now and his condition seems to be hovering around 94-100% so he doesn't look like going downhill too quick after games), and I bought a new midfielder called Daniel Kofi Agyei who's been great so far (labelled the new Michael Essien). There's 4 fighting for 2 positions already, and Corry Evans has put in a few good performances too. I didn't need the attacking qualities of Anderson in central midfield and something like £12-15m would have been very handy, especially as I'm losing £11m per month at the moment in loan interest.

Berbatov isn't performing at all for me, he's played 16 games, scored none and assisted just 2. Perhaps I'm playing him wrong but I don't think he fits into my system. I play Rooney with Hernandez, with Macheda on the bench and I'm in the process of signing a new striker for around £4m who looks really good, so I don't need 5 strikers. In an injury emergency, I can alter my formation slightly to play 4-5-1 with Rooney up top on his own so Berbatov is surplus to requirements, especially for a non-performer on high wages that I was hoping could get me over £10m.

Ferdinand is good, and does play reasonably well, average around 7.6 after 17 games. However, Vidic is my stand-out defender and Johnny Evans always plays brilliantly. He's played 11 games and has an average of 8.3 with 8 goals (of which 4 were headers from corners, and the other 4 were shots from outside the area, Paul-Scholes-esque!). O'Shea has filled in at centre back a few times, and everytime he plays, he gets highlighted in the post-match analysis as the man who made the difference. Selling Rio would leave me slightly short, but if I could get a high fee for him, despite his advancing years, I could probably buy a promising defender who would provide the backup to Vidic/Evans.

Van Der Sar is still good, but at his age, replacing him is something that needs consideration. I probably won't get a fee for him, but as I start moving him out and playing someone else, I may as well look at getting his wages off the books.

I take everyone's point about keeping Giggs, Scholes, Neville and Van Der Sar on for training reasons, and I am getting them to tutor other people, but in the long run, I don't think they'll be world class coaches, and their wages will still be around £60-90,000. I could hire in specialist coaches, with better stats at a fraction of this, and nostalgia isn't going to keep my bank balance in the black.

I think most people agreed with my plan to remove Kuzszcak, Owen and Gibson as none are playing at the moment.

Also, for that person who thinks I'd be in positions 15-20, I'm currently top of the division with 10 games to go, leading Chelsea by 5 points, and although I haven't sold them yet, I hardly play the players above, so it shows me my team can cope. I've brought in a few replacements already - Hazard is replacing Giggs, Agyei provides more DM cover, and Smithies is providing Van Der Sar backup for now.

However, my point still remains that shifting the players, especially the younger ones like Anderson, seems very difficult, and almost impossible to get market value for. I was hoping the AI teams would have an opinion of him that matches the posters on here - that Anderson is a quality attacking midfielder who will develop in a few years so it'll be worth spending £10-15m on him. No-one seems to be thinking that!

If anyone does have any sensible "tricks" to sell players - I know someone mentioned above offering them out for 150% of their value, but that doesnt sound like it'd work - then I'd love to hear them.

Thanks in advance.

It is meant this way, I mean the transfer matter within FM. It is done to avoid exploits, even if I agree that's quite funny seeing the if a human player sell players he is forced average to sell them at 80-100 % less than the player's value while if a human player buys instead , well, he forced usually to buy them till to 400-500 % more than the original value.

I have just been " forced " to pay 25M a player valued 2.8M.....

God, I hope Man Utd won't be sold to someone like OP, who sells our favorite players. I'd rather stick with the Glazers if that's the case.

Athos - most of the players I'm selling are 30+ so Alex Ferguson will have to sell them or move them on pretty soon in real life, just like he did with Roy Keane, and back in the day, Paul Ince.

The younger ones are players that I was hoping to get a high transfer fee for and then bring in better cheaper replacements, which I thought I'd be able to do. Anyway, I'm doing pretty well so far so I'll carry on!

I think this problem has been around since FM07 (my first FM game). I accept that sometimes we have to bid £20m for a £10m-valued player - thats similar to real life, and I get that. However, the AI never bid £20m for our £10m-valued player so thats annoying. Secondly, the AI never bid a fair amount or even a realistic amount. If I offer Berbatov for £2m, no-one will bid. In real life, they'd all be jumping at the chance (and they'd budget accordingly to afford his wages). I've heard reports in the press today about West Ham trying to loan Wayne Bridge and offering to cover £95,000 a week wages - they can afford to do this because they're not spending money buying him. The AI teams in FM would never do this!

My routine: Offer a player (at 150% cost), get some offers (usually loan or 100% price), go to transfer centre, select all offers and press negotiate, set back to 150%, offer again. In most cases I manage to sell player.

Let me get this straight - If a player is worth £4m then offer them to clubs for 1.5m and then when you get offers, re-negotiate and set it to there real value or maybe a bit more and then in most cases the clubs will accept?

I think this problem has been around since FM07 (my first FM game). I accept that sometimes we have to bid £20m for a £10m-valued player - thats similar to real life, and I get that. However, the AI never bid £20m for our £10m-valued player so thats annoying. Secondly, the AI never bid a fair amount or even a realistic amount. If I offer Berbatov for £2m, no-one will bid. In real life, they'd all be jumping at the chance (and they'd budget accordingly to afford his wages). I've heard reports in the press today about West Ham trying to loan Wayne Bridge and offering to cover £95,000 a week wages - they can afford to do this because they're not spending money buying him. The AI teams in FM would never do this!

I just sold Berbatov in Jan 11 for 16.75 million to O.Marseille. A loss no doubt as he was the record signing for Man Utd but it was a reasonable amount since he is going to his 30s and has 18 months remaining on his contract. Got Babacar as his future replacement. Value at that point was 8/8.25 million. I offered him out for 18 million and there was 3 clubs interested. Villa and Marseille came in with bids, Villa's a 48 month offer at around 14 million and Marseille at 16.75 straight cash. The AI transfer for 11.2 has improved.

I feel as a general guide, for older players in their late 20s, normally I will offer them out at around twice their value and the bids that come in will normally be slightly lower than what you ask. For younger players, I will be more willing to offer them closer to their value and adding percentage on profit/ international game/ league appearances clauses.

Of course, sometimes the listed player does not get enough interest due to differing circumstances. I wanted to offioad Carrick in the same transfer window but he was injured in the first two weeks of Jan. Once his injury status was cleared, I put him up but interest is not great as most clubs have already prepared their plans for the window and perhaps used up their budgets. Man City was the only club interested and they came in with a loan to buy bid which was pathetic in my view, even after I negotiated for a higher future price, it didn't meet my expectation so I rejected it, so Carrick continued to rot in the reserves. In my opinion, just to flag the player for transfer around 1 week before the transfer window starts for January to get the most interests and best price. For the summer window, the market will generally be active in July when most clubs refresh their season budgets.

It all depends on who you are selling and how much play time he gets over time. On the first season, i'm not exactly sure because like someone above said, every club has already bought the players, so none would be interested in your players.

But after 1st season, you can sell players like anderson, berbatov, etc... only under certain condition. If he's playing regularly in your squad, and get like 25+ games, and do somewhat decent, then you can get their face value if you transfer listed him (unless he's worth like 40M+, then fewer clubs can afford him and you might have to reduce your selling price). If you just bench him the entire season, and get only like 10 games, then you will need to reduce your price a lot to sell that player. I always manage to sell my players at their face value if I transfer list them. That's because I rotate my squad and these players easily get their player time necessary for the clubs to get interested. If I don't transfer list the player and other clubs are interested, i can easily get around 150-200% face value (most at 350%) even though their squad status is set as backup for first team. The only player I didn't manage to sell at their face value is Benzema because for the seasons I play him regularly, I got 100% face value when offer to other clubs but no one can afford his wage and he kept coming back and ask me to pay like 100k-150k p/w for 3 years for him to move on, so I always deny the request. Eventually, I have to make him so unhappy, bench him almost all season long and I only get like 60% of his face value for other club to take him. Maybe other clubs can afford his high wages (like 275k p/w ) because I reduce the transfer price a lot. Or maybe he's just so unhappy he's willing to take any offer to get outta my sight :-D

Also, AI teams aren't screwing you by hiking the price. There are a lot of threads that says about players getting offered at a very low price. For the rest of the players that you are interested, they are probably an important member of the club, so you are definitely not going to get them for their face value. Probably 200-300% of it and they'll sell. I saw a young regen which my scout rated highly from Bayern and I can't only buy him on 12.5M (like 600% of his face value) when he was 16, so I gave up. It's probably because he has the future. After 3 years, he only moved to Bayern reserve and getting loaned out, I easily get him at 4M (200% but the asking price drops a lot) because the club thinks he's still not good enough for their first team. So, it depends on which player you are signing...