Training & Youth Intake - A Brief Guide **Updated for FM20**

[XaW]

2 minutes ago, OlivierL said:

@XaW thanks ! do u give the poached tag after u receive the first message about your player being poached ? or is that not possible ?  Do u tag him after the real intake happens ? So u write all those names in a notepad ?

Can u search on 'poached' in the search bar ?

No, I can't nickname him before he is generated, so I usually write down the name and do a search every once in a while. And then also, if there's clauses I can find the players in the screen for the transfer clauses.

So as soon as I see them generated I nickname them and add them to my shortlist.

[santy001]

It's anecdotal, but how much benefit do people seem to find when setting up their own routines and schedules?

Right now I lead Individual Training, and I get strong performance. Through a combination of signing players with the right qualities, staff with the right qualities and imposing a very heavy discipline based approach to the team in terms of warnings it goes quite well.

Team training averages are pretty much always above 8, more often closer to 8.5. Players develop really well but my assistant manager is left to General Training. Just thinking about taking the plunge and if it does yield any benefits or if generally the assistant manager gets it best.

[Gee_Simpson]

1 hour ago, santy001 said:

It's anecdotal, but how much benefit do people seem to find when setting up their own routines and schedules?

Right now I lead Individual Training, and I get strong performance. Through a combination of signing players with the right qualities, staff with the right qualities and imposing a very heavy discipline based approach to the team in terms of warnings it goes quite well.

Team training averages are pretty much always above 8, more often closer to 8.5. Players develop really well but my assistant manager is left to General Training. Just thinking about taking the plunge and if it does yield any benefits or if generally the assistant manager gets it best.

I think the general consensus is that doing it yourself squeezes that little bit more out of your players but you have to know what you are doing obviously, you have to make sure the training is well balanced each week. Because this is my first FM since FM13 I find the training too overwhelming for me tbh so I'm using the same approach as you, I let the assistant take general training and I'm in charge of individual training. How good is your assistant in terms of coaching attributes? I'm still in pre season so haven't been able to judge how well my assistant is doing yet, but that's encouraging that your assistant is doing well, I reckon I'll stick with this approach.

What about scouting for you guys? Do you set it all up yourself or leave it to your Chief Scout?

Edited May 6, 2020 by Gee_Simpson

[santy001]

I find you have to be very pro-active early days @Gee_Simpson give cautious praise to those performing well, and assertive/calm remarks about poor training. By the time you've got a few months in and got a set rhythm with the team and begun to establish discipline it seems like it all falls into line. I've been over a year without any players flagging as training poorly.

Scouting is similar, I leave the Chief Scout on assignments and I handle the meetings. 

[Gee_Simpson]

13 minutes ago, santy001 said:

I find you have to be very pro-active early days @Gee_Simpson give cautious praise to those performing well, and assertive/calm remarks about poor training. By the time you've got a few months in and got a set rhythm with the team and begun to establish discipline it seems like it all falls into line. I've been over a year without any players flagging as training poorly.

Scouting is similar, I leave the Chief Scout on assignments and I handle the meetings. 

Ah okay, cheers, I'll keep that advice in mind. This game in general is pretty overwhelming at first considering I haven't played it for so long, I've also been leaving the general scouting to my Chief Scout. I did have myself in charge of the meetings but I switched it to the Chief Scout too, but then he only picks a few from the list so I reckon I'll take control of meetings again but otherwise leave him be. I'll review the training and scouting at the end of the season, hopefully my staff do a good job. 

Edited May 6, 2020 by Gee_Simpson

[Zemahh]

19 hours ago, santy001 said:

It's anecdotal, but how much benefit do people seem to find when setting up their own routines and schedules?

You can do just fine with leaving it to your staff. However, if you're willing to put in the effort of going through each and every player and fixing their weaknesses, rather than simply training them in general roles, you can get some crazy results. Rashidi (BustTheNet) has some training videos, where he explains his training methods in great detail and shows progress with his Ajax youth.

Edited May 7, 2020 by Zemahh

[santy001]

Had to remove the link to a third party site there, but it does seem like there is the scope for further improvement by doing it manually. Gives me something to work on but first of all I'll be trying to make sure I avoid any horrendous blunders before making tweaks I think.

[Gee_Simpson]

2 hours ago, Zemahh said:

You can do just fine with leaving it to your staff. However, if you're willing to put in the effort of going through each and every player and fixing their weaknesses, rather than simply training them in general roles, you can get some crazy results. Rashidi (BustTheNet) also has some training videos, where he explains his training methods in great detail and shows progress with his Ajax youth.

Are you referring more to individual training here rather than the general team training? 

Edited May 7, 2020 by Gee_Simpson

[XaW]

11 hours ago, santy001 said:

It's anecdotal, but how much benefit do people seem to find when setting up their own routines and schedules?

Right now I lead Individual Training, and I get strong performance. Through a combination of signing players with the right qualities, staff with the right qualities and imposing a very heavy discipline based approach to the team in terms of warnings it goes quite well.

Team training averages are pretty much always above 8, more often closer to 8.5. Players develop really well but my assistant manager is left to General Training. Just thinking about taking the plunge and if it does yield any benefits or if generally the assistant manager gets it best.

Sounds you are doing exactly the same as me. I very rarely have to discipline players after the first seasons due to this.

And with the sole exception of the one "casual" player, that I am desperately trying to improve personality of, pretty much everyone are training good or better.

Let me know how you get on, if you do start the team training. If it's really better then I might have a stab at it myself...

[santy001]

My first thoughts are to make changes to the actual routines the AM uses, see if the changes made there yield further improvements and then look at possibly taking over the assignments of the routines myself. 

Given FM has the proclivity to under-represent injuries compared to real life it feels like one area of immediate gains is to somewhat push harder than they are currently set to do.

[Zemahh]

1 hour ago, XaW said:

And with the sole exception of the one "casual" player, that I am desperately trying to improve personality of, pretty much everyone are training good or better.

Training Rating = happiness + development

Your players can develop (increase their attributes) just as well if you leave training to your staff, however, the question is where they develop.

For example, let's say you have an Advanced Forward that lacks in mental areas. You (or your staff) could simply chuck him on Advanced Forward regime and while he would still develop (and thus get good Training Rating), a lot of that development would be scattered around the attributes that could already be good. Besides that, worse attributes tend to increase faster than good ones, which means you could make him a much more complete player if you made sure he's training in areas he lacks in instead (e.g. False Nine/Deep Lying Forward). That includes general training, different sessions put increased focus on different attributes, so if you have a player who's development you want to maximize, you could tailor it towards him.

Edited May 7, 2020 by Zemahh

[Gee_Simpson]

7 hours ago, Gee_Simpson said:

Are you referring more to individual training here rather than the general team training? 

@Zemahh

[Weston]

4 hours ago, Zemahh said:

Training Rating = happiness + development

Your players can develop (increase their attributes) just as well if you leave training to your staff, however, the question is where they develop.

For example, let's say you have an Advanced Forward that lacks in mental areas. You (or your staff) could simply chuck him on Advanced Forward regime and while he would still develop (and thus get good Training Rating), a lot of that development would be scattered around the attributes that could already be good. Besides that, worse attributes tend to increase faster than good ones, which means you could make him a much more complete player if you made sure he's training in areas he lacks in instead (e.g. False Nine/Deep Lying Forward). That includes general training, different sessions put increased focus on different attributes, so if you have a player who's development you want to maximize, you could tailor it towards him.

Interesting, I'd never thought to train a player in a different role to increase attributes differently without the intention of actually changing his role.

I have always set players to train in the role I want them to play in or get better in and I set individual and trait training myself. I usually just have them working on the area they're weakest in within the current role - is that counterintuitively less effective somehow? I used to ignore when they said "it's not going to get any better" because why not keep trying, but lately I've listened every time and tried to find some other area to focus in, even if it's already strong.

[Zemahh]

1 hour ago, Weston said:

I usually just have them working on the area they're weakest in within the current role - is that counterintuitively less effective somehow?

You don't have to train a player in the role he's playing in your tactic, training roles are nothing more than sets of attributes that will be focused on. In fact, you don't even have to select a specific role, you could just keep it on Playing Position and only select additional focus, if you wanted to be extra specific about which attributes you want to try improving (basically spend your Potential Ability points on, which I'm sure you know are limited). For more on this, look up RDF Development Guide & Training Schedules, he got some amazing results by being extra surgical when it comes to training.

[Djuicer]

18 hours ago, Weston said:

Interesting, I'd never thought to train a player in a different role to increase attributes differently without the intention of actually changing his role.

I have always set players to train in the role I want them to play in or get better in and I set individual and trait training myself. I usually just have them working on the area they're weakest in within the current role - is that counterintuitively less effective somehow? I used to ignore when they said "it's not going to get any better" because why not keep trying, but lately I've listened every time and tried to find some other area to focus in, even if it's already strong.

I often do this. Many Forwards I train as complete. Almost never uses that role though. Same with midfielders and defenders too. (RPM for midfield and Libero for defenders)

[KrKAlex]

18 hours ago, Zemahh said:

You don't have to train a player in the role he's playing in your tactic, training roles are nothing more than sets of attributes that will be focused on. In fact, you don't even have to select a specific role, you could just keep it on Playing Position and only select additional focus, if you wanted to be extra specific about which attributes you want to try improving (basically spend your Potential Ability points on, which I'm sure you know are limited). For more on this, look up RDF Development Guide & Training Schedules, he got some amazing results by being extra surgical when it comes to training.

I always thought they would use their familiarity with the role. But this also makes sense. Thanks!

[Hovis Dexter]

On 21/03/2020 at 00:56, Seb Wassell said:

If you are hiring an Assistant, or coach, for training purposes, these are the attributes you'll want to pay attention to:

Determination, Level of Discipline and Motivating apply to all categories

Working With Youngsters applies when working with youth teams 

For ages I've been trying to decide upon my list of attributes that I should look for in defenders, midfielders and attackers and keep changing my mind. I'm pretty sure that I know what I should be looking for. Many thanks.

[Hovis Dexter]

Does anybody know if having more than one recovery session per week has a cumulative effect?

[Seb Wassell]

On 06/05/2020 at 20:04, santy001 said:

It's anecdotal, but how much benefit do people seem to find when setting up their own routines and schedules?

Right now I lead Individual Training, and I get strong performance. Through a combination of signing players with the right qualities, staff with the right qualities and imposing a very heavy discipline based approach to the team in terms of warnings it goes quite well.

Team training averages are pretty much always above 8, more often closer to 8.5. Players develop really well but my assistant manager is left to General Training. Just thinking about taking the plunge and if it does yield any benefits or if generally the assistant manager gets it best.

It is designed to be perfectly competent if left to your staff (assuming you hire appropriately). However, it is also designed to allow you to achieve more, both in terms of specific and overall output, if you take control yourself.

22 hours ago, Hovis Dexter said:

Does anybody know if having more than one recovery session per week has a cumulative effect?

Yes

[Hovis Dexter]

18 minutes ago, Seb Wassell said:

Yes

Thank you

[XaW]

@Seb Wassell: A question, if I may? Regarding poaching, I've had a lot of youngsters poached from me, but my club have never poached someone. I have almost all staff responsibility assigned to me. Does that impact anything? Do I need to have the HoYD assigned to the buy players for the future set in order to poach players or will the poaching (into my club) happen no matter staff responsibility?

[Seb Wassell]

3 hours ago, XaW said:

@Seb Wassell: A question, if I may? Regarding poaching, I've had a lot of youngsters poached from me, but my club have never poached someone. I have almost all staff responsibility assigned to me. Does that impact anything? Do I need to have the HoYD assigned to the buy players for the future set in order to poach players or will the poaching (into my club) happen no matter staff responsibility?

It should happen regardless. @Andrew James may be able to help here.

[XaW]

19 minutes ago, Seb Wassell said:

It should happen regardless. @Andrew James may be able to help here.

Thanks for the answer.

I'd like to know if there's anything I can influence regarding poaching players from smaller clubs, or it's only random. It feels like there is only an exit from my academy at the moment, so I'd like to know if I'm unlucky or not doing something I could. Any elaboration from Andrew would be most welcome!

[Zemahh]

4 hours ago, XaW said:

I'd like to know if there's anything I can influence regarding poaching players from smaller clubs, or it's only random.

Pretty sure that improving your Youth Recruitment levels is the only way to influence that. The message is there just for immersion sake really.

[zemaniano85]

On 29/10/2019 at 14:20, herne79 said:

Intensity can be measured for each individual unit or the team as a whole.

What does it mean? Please...  @Seb Wassell how can I measure the overall intensity? 

[OlivierL]

One quick question. the higher the facilities, the better staff you can attract? 
 

[Seb Wassell]

3 hours ago, OlivierL said:

One quick question. the higher the facilities, the better staff you can attract? 
 

No. (Training) Facilities contribute to how effective training is and thus how well/quickly players develop.

Attracting staff is down to reputation, location/competition and finances, as with players really.

[OlivierL]

8 minutes ago, Seb Wassell said:

No. (Training) Facilities contribute to how effective training is and thus how well/quickly players develop.

Attracting staff is down to reputation, location/competition and finances, as with players really.

Thanks

[Andrew James]

On 10/05/2020 at 13:24, XaW said:

I'd like to know if there's anything I can influence regarding poaching players from smaller clubs, or it's only random. It feels like there is only an exit from my academy at the moment, so I'd like to know if I'm unlucky or not doing something I could.

As mentioned in a comment above, Youth Recruitment is the way to impact this. A higher YR rating means you'll be able to bring players in from further afield, making it more likely to find players worth poaching.

[XaW]

12 minutes ago, Andrew James said:

As mentioned in a comment above, Youth Recruitment is the way to impact this. A higher YR rating means you'll be able to bring players in from further afield, making it more likely to find players worth poaching.

Thanks for the answer, Andrew. Guess I'm simply unlucky then, but at least I know I'm doing all I can. 

[Weston]

I imagine everyone is tired of answering HoYD questions by now, so I apologize for this in advance.

My youth intake has been a bit disappointing yet again, and as my club stature and bank balance have both increased since I hired my current one, I thought I should look into an upgrade. This is who is in the role now:

He has an 18 average rating in the highlighted attributes, good personality, and really good attributes for training. As a bonus, he prefers a narrow formation as do I.

Here are the two options to replace him with, should I opt for that route:

Positives:
- Better personality
- Equally great coaching attributes
- Better negotiating and tactical knowledge if that helps?

Negatives:
- Slightly lower highlighted attributes
- Wide formation
- No world knowledge..?

Positives:
- Best possible highlighted attributes
- Adds knowledge of Brazil, so maybe we get some good kids from there?
- Equally good personality
- Better negotiating and tactical knowledge if that helps at all?
- Perfect JPA/JPP will help me better assess my current squad in general

Negatives:
- Considerably less good coaching attributes
- Wide formation

What do you experts think? Should I pay to upgrade? Are either of these two a substantial upgrade? If so, which should I pick?

 

Edited August 1, 2020 by Weston

[Hovis Dexter]

Since I always try to hire Kristjaan Speakman I’d extend his contract rather than changing him 

[Weston]

7 hours ago, Hovis Dexter said:

Since I always try to hire Kristjaan Speakman I’d extend his contract rather than changing him 

Well he's yet to get me anyone who is good enough for the first team, but perhaps that's just how it goes.

[OlivierL]

On 01/08/2020 at 17:19, Weston said:

Well he's yet to get me anyone who is good enough for the first team, but perhaps that's just how it goes.

i would go for the one with the best personality. In lower league i'll only look to personality and maybe the formation. a good PA , CA judging and coaching attributes and working with youth are great but means nothing if they have a negative personality.

Speakman is off course a great HOYD . so the difference isn't that big.

[Weston]

4 hours ago, OlivierL said:

i would go for the one with the best personality. In lower league i'll only look to personality and maybe the formation. a good PA , CA judging and coaching attributes and working with youth are great but means nothing if they have a negative personality.

Speakman is off course a great HOYD . so the difference isn't that big.

Ended up having a more in-depth conversation about this over in the page below. Lot's of things were discusses, including the fact that the preferred formation concept is probably a myth.

 

[OlivierL]

1 hour ago, Weston said:

Ended up having a more in-depth conversation about this over in the page below. Lot's of things were discusses, including the fact that the preferred formation concept is probably a myth.

 

Thanks, good topic. Hope u got better intakes now with a new HOYD ?

[Weston]

1 hour ago, OlivierL said:

Thanks, good topic. Hope u got better intakes now with a new HOYD ?

Nope, Speakman has said this year is even worse, so I plan to replace him after. Frustratingly you can't sign pre-contracts with staff in the game so since this youth intake seems set already I'm going to wait until closer to the end of the season to save the money being spent to release him / buy out the other guy.

[goku4]

I have state of the art youth facilities but still I can not recruit talented players  All I get is 3.5 star rated players as FC Köln in 8th season. But my competitors have 4-5 wonderkids produced in their youth system. What else do I need to look for to improve recruiting?

[OlivierL]

On 06/05/2020 at 13:08, XaW said:

No, I can't nickname him before he is generated, so I usually write down the name and do a search every once in a while. And then also, if there's clauses I can find the players in the screen for the transfer clauses.

So as soon as I see them generated I nickname them and add them to my shortlist.

In my Caley Braves save , five or six players have been poached. Three of them are visible and are Scottish . Caley Braves produce only french regens with French names and Scottish or African second nationality. 

Players that have been poached had a Scottish (of Scandinavian) name, never a French name.  @Seb Wassell , is it possible that those players never would have popped up in my youth intakes , or could they have became visible with a french name ? 

It's very strange that i'm losing young players with names (and nationalities) that would never get through my ranks.. 

Thanks for the help

.

[Seb Wassell]

22 hours ago, OlivierL said:

In my Caley Braves save , five or six players have been poached. Three of them are visible and are Scottish . Caley Braves produce only french regens with French names and Scottish or African second nationality. 

Players that have been poached had a Scottish (of Scandinavian) name, never a French name.  @Seb Wassell , is it possible that those players never would have popped up in my youth intakes , or could they have became visible with a french name ? 

It's very strange that i'm losing young players with names (and nationalities) that would never get through my ranks.. 

Thanks for the help

It's possible that not all young prospects actually make it through, however I'm not sure on your particular circumstances. If you have the save, something @Andrew James may be able to shed a little more light on.

[OlivierL]

10 hours ago, Seb Wassell said:

It's possible that not all young prospects actually make it through, however I'm not sure on your particular circumstances. If you have the save, something @Andrew James may be able to shed a little more light on.

Thanks @Seb Wassell can i send it by PM (upload it on wetransfer?) 

[Seb Wassell]

3 minutes ago, OlivierL said:

Thanks @Seb Wassell can i send it by PM (upload it on wetransfer?) 

Please head over to our Bugs forum, where there are instructions on how to upload  https://community.sigames.com/forum/726-football-manager-2020-bugs-forum/

[Sarmatian]

How important is JPA and JPP for HoYD?

 

Managing a club in minor league (Serbia), and managed to persuade Zabaleta to come on free as a player, cause he was 37 years old at the time. He already has staff attributes and HoYD as strongest role so I'm hoping to persuade him to stay on when he hangs up his boots.

He is a model professional, with great mental attributes, but his JPP and JPA is 9-10. My current HoYD is around 13-14 in those areas, but massively worse in personality and mental attributes.

 

Should I try to get Zabaleta to do it or is his JPA-JPP too low? Is there a chance those stats improve later on? How does staff CA/PA work?

[Atarin]

Very interesting thread. I have always recruited HOYD based on JPA & JPP. If I'm understanding the advice correctly its only his personality, media-handling style, preferred formations and playing styles that matter. Do I have that right?

[zlatanera]

16 hours ago, Sarmatian said:

How important is JPA and JPP for HoYD?

16 hours ago, Atarin said:

Very interesting thread. I have always recruited HOYD based on JPA & JPP. If I'm understanding the advice correctly its only his personality, media-handling style, preferred formations and playing styles that matter. Do I have that right?

I'm not sure how it works in FM20 as I know there were some youth recruitment changes, but yeah in terms of actually bringing in the quality newness JPA / JPP doesn't make a difference, neither do coaching attributes (Attacking, Defending, Fitness, Mental, Tactical, Technical, GK). I find JPA/JPP is most important on an Assistant Manager as on all squad views it is their opinion on star rating, not that of whoever does your coach reports, that you can see. But I always make sure at least one staff member who can be assigned the Coach Report responsibility has high JPA/JPP (currently Aldo Dolcetti with 20/20 at Roma!)

16 hours ago, Sarmatian said:

Should I try to get Zabaleta to do it or is his JPA-JPP too low? Is there a chance those stats improve later on? How does staff CA/PA work?

Model Professional is an ideal personality, if his preferred formation isn't too far out of your preferences then I'd say yes, sign him up.

JPA/JPP can improve over time - I signed Karim Benzema as a mostly ceremonial DoF on FM16 when he had a drastic 3/3 JPA/JPP, I think by the time I finished the save (5 seasons with him in the role, I think) it was about 15/12 or something. 

If Zabaleta hasn't taken his coaching courses, or at least not many of them, you can expect to see growth (primarily in the coaching attributes) as he takes them. 

[fivetwelvepony]

On 23/10/2020 at 01:37, zlatanera said:

I'm not sure how it works in FM20 as I know there were some youth recruitment changes, but yeah in terms of actually bringing in the quality newness JPA / JPP doesn't make a difference, neither do coaching attributes (Attacking, Defending, Fitness, Mental, Tactical, Technical, GK). I find JPA/JPP is most important on an Assistant Manager as on all squad views it is their opinion on star rating, not that of whoever does your coach reports, that you can see. But I always make sure at least one staff member who can be assigned the Coach Report responsibility has high JPA/JPP (currently Aldo Dolcetti with 20/20 at Roma!)

Model Professional is an ideal personality, if his preferred formation isn't too far out of your preferences then I'd say yes, sign him up.

JPA/JPP can improve over time - I signed Karim Benzema as a mostly ceremonial DoF on FM16 when he had a drastic 3/3 JPA/JPP, I think by the time I finished the save (5 seasons with him in the role, I think) it was about 15/12 or something. 

If Zabaleta hasn't taken his coaching courses, or at least not many of them, you can expect to see growth (primarily in the coaching attributes) as he takes them. 

Why does the game highlight JPA/JPP as the key attributes then?

Edited October 30, 2020 by Experienced Defender
f word

[Zemahh]

3 hours ago, fivetwelvepony said:

Why does the game highlight JPA/JPP as the key attributes then? Just to F with us?

JPA/JPP might not affect the quality of youngsters HoYD brings through, but it affects his Scout Reports. When you get the intake, he will provide you a list and his judgement of their CA and PA. A 20/20 HoYD should have them more accurate than a 10/10 one.

The quality of youngsters coming through is dictated by your nation's Youth Rating and your club's Youth Recruitment and Youth Coaching.

[zlatanera]

10 hours ago, fivetwelvepony said:

Why does the game highlight JPA/JPP as the key attributes then?

6 hours ago, Zemahh said:

JPA/JPP might not affect the quality of youngsters HoYD brings through, but it affects his Scout Reports. When you get the intake, he will provide you a list and his judgement of their CA and PA. A 20/20 HoYD should have them more accurate than a 10/10 one.

Also he can be set to conduct all transfers for youth players, similar to the Director of Football. In which case those attributes are vital if you want him to bring in good prospects. 

[04texag]

54 minutes ago, zlatanera said:

Also he can be set to conduct all transfers for youth players, similar to the Director of Football. In which case those attributes are vital if you want him to bring in good prospects. 

And also, your HOYD can be really good for scouting youngsters for Transfers if your HOYD has high JPP/JPA

[04texag]

Sorry one other thing, I also use my HOYD for training reports. He's considered a coach, so he will have MUCH better scouting ability, so his training reports should be very accurate compared to normal coaches.