How To Un-Alienate a Player?

I've got a future-star young regen, a center-back, who is only 18 but came to me near the end of last season demanding more playing time. Since it seems reasonable to send a youngster out on loan, I told him I could loan him out to get him more first-team football. Then all of a sudden, he flies off the handle and wants to leave the club! Now every time I even attempt to talk to him, I get "I believe our relationship has broken down and talking won't change that".

I've tried to make him happier by giving him plenty of first-team starts this season, but he hasn't changed his attitude. I don't want to lose this guy because he'll probably become a world-class center back. Is there anything I can do?

I've had players before who requested transfers (though this player hasn't actually done that yet) and then decided they wanted to stay, but it was never clear to me why they changed their minds.

Well, obviously he isn't going to be a great player, from the personality aspect! It seems his professionalism is quite low. Every player needs to be treated differently, which is why the first thing I look for (after seeing a scouts rating of their PA) is their personality. Ambitious? Good, then they will want to join a winning club, and grow as a player, but may potentially ask for a new challenge, or to be transfered, if there is little success. Determined? Great, they want to win games as bad as the rest of the team, and will fit in nicely. Professional? Very good, again, because while they are coming up the ranks to become a first team player they won't complain, as it goes against their personality and the club personality. Driven, Born Leader, Model Pro, well, if you have decent talent, and this personality, welcome to my team!

So basically, I would try to treat the player well, as if nothing is wrong (assuming his contract still goes for some time) and see if he gets over it. But I am used to coaching ONLY professional, determined players. They are used to being criticized, dropped, even fined, and as I have been manager for 1200 games at the club they tend to respect my authority if I tell them I don't appreciate being talked to "like that"!

That's the strange thing -- his personality is professional, and his determination is 19! I have the exact same approach as you do -- I only look for players with the right personality types and heavily favor highly determined players. It just seems odd that he's acting this way given his personality.

The thing that makes this tricky is that while I'm only a few weeks into the season, his contract expires at the end of the season. So if I can't get him happy soon, I'll probably lose him.

Why was he so against the loan deal? Does he honestly think he is ready for week-in, week-out first team football? In that case you might want to give it to him. But with him being able to negotiate contracts in January you are definitely on a tight timeline. I am guessing he isn't interested in contract negotiations?

Maybe you can bring in a favored personnel or coach of his? Although with a young player they sometimes don't have any one in particular they favor...

All I can suggest is keep checking back every 3-4 weeks to see if he will chat. In the past, I have had players who refused to talk but over time would at least speak to me again in the conversation mode. Others however were stubborn and wouldn't and kept asking for mutual termination of their contracts!!

I had the same problem with a wonderkid Defensive midfielder who wouldnt sign a new contract, after 4 games he had played 1 and became alienated , i then played him for 7 games in a row (took about a month, he was good enough to make the team so i didnt penalise my team) and he was happy and signed a 5 year contract

Thanks for the help -- I basically did the same thing. I just gave him a lot of first-team time and eventually he just went from being alienated to being normal and happy again (with no notification).

I do think it's kind of unrealistic that if a player's alienated it's impossible to have a conversation with him.

I had a player recently become alienated and when I went to chat he said "What have I done now?" . I sent him out on loan for 3 months, and he's fine again.

What, 18-year-olds being unreasonable, hot-headed and ridiculous?? Never heard that before ...

Works if you maybe get him to learn from a more senior player, specially someone you can rely on. I had the same problem and after a bit of cuddling from a senior pro he is now better then the senior guy and has taken his place in the team.