Technical/Youth Directors next year?

[OohAhhCantona]

I was wondering what you forum members think of Technical Directors buying players in next years game for the managers. Youth Directors also running the academy and an expanded academy system.

A "continental" system as I see it referred to in the media like what Newcastle had.

A.C. Milan, Sevilla, and I assume now Galatasaray since they hired Frank Rijkaard use them.

In theory it means that the manager is left to concern himself with the day to day running of the club, the picking of the team, and the decisions about tactics and training. The director meanwhile looks after the budget, and allocates money for transfers and the youth academy.

The director is often involved in the selection of the manager, so that the manager knows he has full support from his subordinates. The plus side is that there is an experienced football head watching the scouts, the budget and the academy, allowing the manager to get on with the team. The down side is that the experienced football head often cannot help giving their opinion of the manager's actions. Most directors of football are ex-managers, given a more "senior" role at the club because the board do not want to lose his experience.

The director of football's job is sometimes compared to that of a general manager in a North American professional sports organization.

I just feel that this is something we could all love/hate in next years game and I think some managers would have fun fitting players into a system or using a system to fit the players. Having a top class youth set up with more control over the youngsters you bring in would be great, think of Arsenal with 0 french youngsters and all English lads.

Please feel free to share opinions of this and features you would like to see if there were going to be a Technical/Youth Director in charge of/having some power regarding transfers/youngsters at your and other clubs in the game.

And so nobody gives me what for, I really enjoy fm 2009 and have started a project with Nottingham Forest to get them back into European football ?

I was just thinking about this and talking with some friends who play fm and thought I'd post here to see what the forums think.

Here are some suggestions as to how it might work in the game:

--Technical Directors
-Give the TD a shortlist at the start of transfer windows with ratings of importance for each player (low,medium,high, or a rating system of 1-5 or something like that)
-Have the board willing to spend so much and the technical director deeming what is too much for a player and what is acceptable
-Have no say in player transfers/youth set up at all and a heads up on the TD's short list of who he wants to bring in for that window
-Have the TD hire scouts just to help you become aware of players
-Have the TD sell players cause the board wants money and he can get a good price

--Youth Directors
-The option to tell the youth director where you'd like to concentrate getting players from, if you're Celtic you might want to get Irish youngsters, and if you're Rangers N.Irish ones (not to bring the religious part of it into this just to clear that up, but we all know this to be most of the time true)
-Having France's Clairefontaine, this would be very cool I think, and telling your chairman not just to upgrade the youth set up, but to try to be better or just like Clairefontaine.
-Setting up youth projects in countries around the world to look for talent there, somewhat a permanent scout and/or coach that will train up the locals from a young age and give the region a better PA
-Having the board push for the youth players to come through and make the team, Real Madrid have a problem with this and they are one of the most famous clubs in the world, a lot of youngsters dream to play for them.

That's all I can come up with for now but I hope to hear from you forum members and hope you can come up with some great suggestions and/or better mine.

[Fox2k]

This sounds interesting.

[given1legend]

I like the sounds of this.

[david22]

Its a good idea but probably to complex for SI, knowing them they'll mess it up - maybe if it was optional so they could be turned on and off

[TheSBH]

Good job mate

[BenArsenal]

I like the Youth Director one, but not so keen on the Technical Director.

One of the biggest joys I get from the game is from buying and selling players. I would be disappointed if that was taken away.

[charlo116]

I love the idea and it would make it more of a challenge playing as a big club because you wouldn't have complete control over the transfers.

[nubei]

i love the day when i get my new youth players. think the youth director and implementing a proper academy system would be great idea.

[Ryknow]

I agree with BenArsenal about the technical director

Nice idea about the Youth Director though, so this could in turn improve the youth system at your club to a new level?
I would love to use heaps of youth players from my club but they are just too poor. I think there needs to be some more improvement for the academy at a club

[9sublime]

Only give some clubs a technical director, the ones who have them in real life. Therefore, if you take the job at one of those clubs you have to accept that you are going to loose transfer control.

[SCIAG]

The thing is, the role of technical directors/directors of football varies a lot from club to club. Nicky Hammond's role at Reading is that of a puppet- he's basically a Chief Scout who does some contract negotiating if the manager asks him to- whereas at other clubs they actually do the buying.

9sublime- terrible idea, and I rarely say that. I do NOT want it coded so that Nicky Hammond does the transfers for me if I want to play as the club I support. Why should I lose my main source of enjoyment in the game because my club gave one of their former players a basically cosmetic role?

[simon07]

Love the idea's in the orginal post.

It could also swing a managers decsison on if you take a certian job, for example, If a club approaches you that uses a footballing director, you may reject saying you want sole control on transfer policy etc!

[ism-scfc]

Would be brilliant for realism but won't happen as SI won't take the transfers out of the game due to the fear of losing a lot of the fanbase

[Deadbloke]

It could form part of the negotiations for a new contract maybe?

For example, If a club is trying to sign you as a manager, you could say you'd only join if they gave you complete control over the transfers?
Or if you start the game with a club, when it comes to renew your contract you could say the same thing, and depending on how well you'd done they'd accept that or let you go and hire a different manager?

I admit tho I'd get really annoyed if I supported one of the teams that had a Technical Director and I lost the chance to sign players in the first transfer window...

[bfcplayoffwinner]

its a cracking idea if its implemented correctly and only at the clubs that do have them, if some clubs sasck their manager they then might implement that ruling as a fresh approach for their next manager gr8 thread i think but doubt they will do it

[Gauvner]

This would be a good idea & i like it.

But it must be as it is in RL like Tottenham recently just came away from the TD & YD, when they Hired Redknapp.

I also agree with Deadblokes idea which in Contract Negotiations you could possibly ask for a TD &/or YD etc. Or vica versa where you say you will only join if they scrap the TD. But i imaging this would be hard to implement.

[Jamesf1985]

A well thought out idea but personally I hate it. For me the most enjoyable part of the game is deciding who to buy, who to sell and how to divide up your own transfer budget for the best results..

Do you go for the one 'marquee' signing to provide an immediate boost to your first team or do you buy 4 or 5 young players with huge potential knowing that in a few years you should have assembled an amazing squad.

Also look at the current flawed AI approach to transfers, I don't want a old player forced upon me or a techniqual director deciding to buy a central defender as I have 4 strikers with big reputations who aren't doing the business so I want to replace them. Also I remember in 08 when the chairman would step in and spend half your transfer budget on a player who didn't fit at all into your system just because he had a high reputation.

Not being able to handle transfers and shape my own squad how I liked would totally ruin the game for me.

[DJJOEYT]

sounds good well done

[OohAhhCantona]

I like the Youth Director one, but not so keen on the Technical Director.

One of the biggest joys I get from the game is from buying and selling players. I would be disappointed if that was taken away.

That would be part of the fun in selecting a club!

Freedom like what Redknapp and Shearer were given when they went to Tottenham and Newcastle (Damien Comolli and Dennis Wise were both fired) should be a request you can make when you are offered the job, like the transfer budgets or training facilities upgrade.

Some Technical Directors are better than others so the game would reflect that.

I don't really think it would be that hard for SI to put it into the game, they already have chairman stats like "business" and "buying players" for managers. Technical Directors would probably be rated with the same stats and the better their business and buying player stats the better the price they get a player for?

You could build a team up at a club like Everton because Moyes has control there or have the players bought for you and fit them into a system like Tottenham when Jol and Comolli were there. For the lower league managers the Technical Director wouldn't really bother them as most lower league clubs wouldn't have the money to spare when the manager can do all the work.

Not every club will have a Technical Director and not every Technical Director will leave you with no say in what players are brought to the club.

It gives the game another dimension, do you start low and build up to a European spot? Or do you jump right in and have a squad ready to go for a run at the cup?

It would mean giving a lot of thought to the club(s) you choose to manage.

"Bill Kenwright has offered you 20,000 a week until 2012 with full control over transfer dealings 10,000,000 transfer and 600,000 wage budget"

"Roman Abramovich has offered you 120,000 a week until 2012 with full control over transfer dealings as long as you are looking to bring world class talent to the club unless the board see an opportunity to sign a top player in which case the board will pursue. You will be given 100,000,000 transfer and 2,000,000 wage budget"

"Tom Hicks has blah blah blah please hand in a 10-20 player short list/3 man short list for each position you want to improve (maybe 5 positions selected?) and the board will do it's best to bring those players to the club in order of the priority you have set blah blah transfer and wage budget"

In these 3 examples you can see how 3 different kind of Technical Directors or lack of them would work as a manager.

Suggestions have been great so far, but I do understand the concern some of you have with not having any control, I wasn't meaning for it to be that way at all clubs, just some, or even limited control to some extent.

The Youth Directors would be great, being a French team and setting up a school in Africa where they already speak french should be a great benefit from the club, and maybe 5-10 years down the road that area is somewhat of a hot spot for footballing talent because you have coaches there and the players are better at a younger age because of that.

The youngsters there will already be prone to having you as a favorite team as you could play friendlies each year there and like in real life the team would train there and build relationships yada yada. Meaning maybe the best prospect in that region would already have a favorite player on your team because he mentored him during the teams trip there to play the friendly, he'd want to sign for your team and that would help because it would be harder for other teams to poach him and ruin the work and money you put into that youth program.

I don't think the guys at SI will have a huge problem with any of this as a lot of it is somewhat already in the game, like the business and buying players stats.

More Ideas from you and more concerns with the TD/YD too I am having a good time reading them. If I mentioned something in this post someone already mentioned my bad I give you full credit and I just forgot while writing this reply