Bringing Through Good Youth Players

This is one area of the game that I've just never really got the hang of. I've spent the last few years playing as Sunderland. I upgrade my Youth facilities to top tier and I hire top coaches who are good at working with youth. I pay attention to who my staff say are the promising youngsters coming with each new intake, and I try to spot good youngsters on the market (sometimes if I see some good clubs sniffing around a kid I'll try and poach). I do what I can to give them first team experience in early rounds of cups and the odd run out in the Prem.

But nothing seems to work. I never get anyone to develop to the point where I would pick them week in week out over an established player. NO ONE! What am I doing wrong here?

Besides playing time they need to have a good personality to reach their potential(professional,resolute,spirited,etc) if they don't have a good personality and you don't have a suitable tutor then it's harder for them to develop.

Also they need to have good games to develop faster, if you are playing youngsters on the first team that aren't really ready for it won't help their development, this is where loans are very important.

This thread from SFraser is very helpful:

http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/262465-A-Guide-to-Developing-Youngsters

Playing them more regularly is really the key. The odd cup game obviously does them a bit of good, but really they need 10-15 league games a season once they hit 20-21, and not just the last 2 minutes of a game. Effective tutoring is another important point, and loaning players out is something else to consider.

I look at the star ratings for each youth player. And I loan out the top young players when I can.

Doing this before, I loaned a player out for 4 seasons to various clubs. He came back to me age 22 worth €32m

Had another fella went on loan for a season. I forgot about him. My RB got injured and I put him in, I checked him out before slotting him in he was 17 and worth €12m. Nice. He never lost his spot either.

I think you just have to loan them out. Give them games in the League Cup and FA Cup especially against weaker sides.

If I'm winning by more than 3 goals and it's at the 60 minute mark I'll put on the youth players to give them a go.

I think you just have to give them first team experience. Or they never progress.

I also keep a close eye on how the U18s are doing, top tackler, top passer, top goal scorer etc.

Same with reserves. Every few months just check to see who's performing well. Coming up to cup games against lower teams, have a look at who's doing well in the U18s and Reserves and give them a run out in the first team.

Thank you. This is all very helpful.

You need to tutor them so that they have 14+ Determination and good personalities like Professional, Driven, Resolute, Resilient, Ambitious etc.

And they need to have good attributes for their position/role (let them play your tactic) already when they are young. This is necessary for them to play well in the u18 league, and that is necessary for their development. A good indication that they will become good players is that they have 1+ star CA as well as 3,5+ star PA. If they have blue stars in the CA "meter" they will probably not reach their potential before late in their careers (if ever), which is too late for most human managers.

When rating your youngsters, try to imagine their current stats with +4 to every physical attribute, and +3 to the mental and technical attributes. While it is possible that they improve more than that, those are rare occurences as far as I know. If that projected improvement does not make him good enough for you or the league you are playing in, he will most likely never reach his potential.

In my experience it is very difficult to improve more than 4 stars in an entire 15-year career. So if a 16-years-old has 3 blue stars CA and 4 stars PA, it is not likely that he will reach his full potential. 2-3 stars of improvement is more common.

You need to tutor them so that they have 14+ Determination and good personalities like Professional, Driven, Resolute, Resilient, Ambitious etc.

And they need to have good attributes for their position/role (let them play your tactic) already when they are young. This is necessary for them to play well in the u18 league, and that is necessary for their development. A good indication that they will become good players is that they have 1+ star CA as well as 3,5+ star PA. If they have blue stars in the CA "meter" they will probably not reach their potential before late in their careers (if ever), which is too late for most human managers.

When rating your youngsters, try to imagine their current stats with +4 to every physical attribute, and +3 to the mental and technical attributes. While it is possible that they improve more than that, those are rare occurences as far as I know. If that projected improvement does not make him good enough for you or the league you are playing in, he will most likely never reach his potential.

In my experience it is very difficult to improve more than 4 stars in an entire 15-year career. So if a 16-years-old has 3 blue stars CA and 4 stars PA, it is not likely that he will reach his full potential. 2-3 stars of improvement is more common.

Actually stars aren't a very good barometer of potential as they change in relation to how good the rest of your team is.

Loaning them out is good yes, but only if they play and play well. The loaning club is usually having a worse training setup than you do, players on loan cannot be tutored and AI managers are often careless around injuries.

Therefore, I prefer being finished tutoring them before loaning them out.

Remember that training only do two things: providing fitness and distributing gained CA points. It does not improve the players.

Actually stars aren't a very good barometer of potential as they change in relation to how good the rest of your team is.

Yes that is true. But 3.5 stars = better than the other players in his position, regardless of how good that is.

Together with the assistant report saying stuff like "could be a good PL player in the future", stars give a good indication of a player's potential. This is useful but not the be all and end all of player quality judgement.

Yeh had a player who was a winger and his pace and acceleration were very low. But the other attributes for a winger were quite high.

His extra training was running faster.

Sometimes I'll look at a player and go hmmm you've got good AM stats, but you're a striker. I just retrain them to that position. Because I think those stats are better suited to that position and that suits my tactics better, especially if I'm short an AM and need a role filled. Cheap way to get positions filled.

Yes that is true. But 3.5 stars = better than the other players in his position, regardless of how good that is.

Together with the assistant report saying stuff like "could be a good PL player in the future", stars give a good indication of a player's potential. This is useful but not the be all and end all of player quality judgement.

Exactly why I try to loan them out.

Loans are also important to boost their reputation in case they don't end up being good enough for the first team and you end up selling them.

Exactly why I try to loan them out.

I really don't understand what you mean here :confused:

Yes that is true. But 3.5 stars = better than the other players in his position, regardless of how good that is.

Together with the assistant report saying stuff like "could be a good PL player in the future", stars give a good indication of a player's potential. This is useful but not the be all and end all of player quality judgement.

3.5 stars = 'very good rating for the senior team', (FM10) hovering is your friend.

I really don't understand what you mean here :confused:

I loan out youth players with high star ratings.

You need to tutor them so that they have 14+ Determination and good personalities like Professional, Driven, Resolute, Resilient, Ambitious etc.

And they need to have good attributes for their position/role (let them play your tactic) already when they are young. This is necessary for them to play well in the u18 league, and that is necessary for their development. A good indication that they will become good players is that they have 1+ star CA as well as 3,5+ star PA. If they have blue stars in the CA "meter" they will probably not reach their potential before late in their careers (if ever), which is too late for most human managers.

When rating your youngsters, try to imagine their current stats with +4 to every physical attribute, and +3 to the mental and technical attributes. While it is possible that they improve more than that, those are rare occurences as far as I know. If that projected improvement does not make him good enough for you or the league you are playing in, he will most likely never reach his potential.

In my experience it is very difficult to improve more than 4 stars in an entire 15-year career. So if a 16-years-old has 3 blue stars CA and 4 stars PA, it is not likely that he will reach his full potential. 2-3 stars of improvement is more common.

Players will only have "blue stars" if his main position is the same area as the coaches type in my experience.

eg a "defending" coach will give blue stars to defenders but all wingers/strikers etc will default to 0.5 gold stars.

I place a high emphasis on my youth team.

I begin by getting rid of coaches who are less then 3.5 stars and hire ones that are 3.5 or higher - even if it costs me lots of money.

I then click on each training category (defending, attacking etc) and see which one the coach has the highest rating and then put him on that.

I make sure I have each coach on only one training category

I upgrade my youth facilities and youth recruitment to the best they can be

Lastly, I create my own youth training schedules and assign a coach and sometimes two to each schedule. i then make sure the player is in the right schedule - i.e for my AML's i create a training routine for what I want an AML to develop - stamina, pace, technique and attacking.

I then scout the under 18 leagues and the under 18 tournaments and manually go through the international youth teams for players to buy. i tend to spend more money on youth players than any others - some I can sepnd 10m on and they turn out 3 years later to be stars and sometimes they turn our useless - you win some you lose some.

Remeber, there is no quick win - you have to be patient and I find that after 4 or 5 years is when my hard work starts to pay off.