When to retire decent players

Started my career at West Ham and was there three seasons the got offered the Barcelona job which I promptly took. I am now in 2016 and players such as Xavi, David Villa, Daniel Alaves, Puyol and Mascherano are all well the wrong side of thirty. My question is how do you retire them? Theyve all been such good servants I don't want to upset them by leaving them in the reserves but similarly I don't want to sell them either. So how do others deal with situation?

Sell them. You can use the money to bring in new, younger players and they will get first team football again. Everyone wins.

Even 1 team legends such as Puyol and Xavi do not recognize their age. Leave them out for most games in a season and they will be very unhappy. These players should be happy to stick around getting the odd game and teaching the new players.

I find that if a player is close to a realistic retirement age then leaving there contracts to expire can prompt their decision. Once you get to Jan/Feb(England) if no contracts are offered they may announce their decision to retire at the end of the season.

There should be an option to ask a player to consider retirement to concentrate on coaching/scouting should they show an interest on their profile screen. Obviously some players should outright refuse but others could agree they are ready for the next step in their career.

If they have considerable time remaining then I would look to move them on or keep them for tutoring as mentioned in the above posts.

Usually after 31-32 I will only give 1 year contract extensions, then during the season in which their performances start to drop off I simply don't renew their contract and allow them to leave or retire as they see fit.

Of course if they are still performing to an acceptable level I will keep them on, regardless of age. I'm managing Bolton at the moment and have just renewed a 35-year-old Fabrice Muamba's contract for the 4th time.

Another advantage of doing it this way is I have found older players wage demands decrease as they get older. So for example Muamba is currently on a £15k a week rotation backup contract, down from £45k a week key player in his younger days.

Another advantage of doing it this way is I have found older players wage demands decrease as they get older. So for example Muamba is currently on a £15k a week rotation backup contract, down from £45k a week key player in his younger days.

This is not always true. When i took charge of Ac Milan in 2015 Ibra's 11 milion euros/year expired at the end of the season. I tried to offer him a one year contract worth 1,5 mil, but he asked for a whopping 13 mil + numerous bonuses. Needless to say i said no and he then signed for Twente Enschede for 500 k per year. The fans were outraged but what could i do.

Im not sure about FM12 but in FM11 I found that once you convince an elderly player to become a coach, i.e. to get non-playing attributes, it was then impossible to sell him as he rejected every contract. This has put me off trying it in 12 so far, though of course for the right player I would

Check what they wanna do in future, e.g. management, coaching etc. Go to their development in private talks, and tell them they would make a good coach or scout etc. They may say they're willing to giv eit a go now. Offer them a contract as coach or player/coach and they'll be happy not to play.

Im not sure about FM12 but in FM11 I found that once you convince an elderly player to become a coach, i.e. to get non-playing attributes, it was then impossible to sell him as he rejected every contract. This has put me off trying it in 12 so far, though of course for the right player I would

Ah I had that, it was frustrating, I wanted to sell a 31 year old regen who had done fantastically for me, was still at the top of his game, but I knew he was going to taper off sometime soon so wanted to pre-empt it and get rid of him, unfortunately he rejected every single offer for him. I had six world class strikers and a youngster i wanted to give games so he would become world class, I had no choice but to send my 31 year old out on loan with the option to buy, as it was the only thing he would accept.

Check what they wanna do in future, e.g. management, coaching etc. Go to their development in private talks, and tell them they would make a good coach or scout etc. They may say they're willing to giv eit a go now. Offer them a contract as coach or player/coach and they'll be happy not to play.

That results in Xavi wanting 45k a week to be a coach...

Put them out to stud

Make them play gradually less games. I did that with Luke Young in FM11