Players don't improve after 23

[_mxrky]

If a player hasn't almost reached their ca by 23 forget about it on this game. They simply don't improve much, if at all. Forget having your own sadio mane, lewandowski, immobile, jamie vardy, mohammed salah. 

Even if you play them almost every game, with good form, good facilites and good personalty, after 23/24 they barely improve. 

[Marko1989]

Players will improve after 23 but veeeery little. But I agree with you. 23 is still very young, even 26 is still young, players should develop further. 

The game lacks dynamic PA and possibility of great late bloomers. But this is something that was discussed many times here and people are generally happy with this current development system. 

But I am not, I remember when development was not so strict and I played some saves as long as could just to see how good will my player will develop. Now, as you said, at 23 they are almost done. Of course I don't want players to improve indefinitely, but it should be possible for players to improve much better in their late 20s than it is currently the case. 

[DarJ]

24 minutes ago, Marko1989 said:

Of course I don't want players to improve indefinitely, but it should be possible for players to improve much better in their late 20s than it is currently the case. 

While I agree with you, we also have to acknowledge the fact that the average player plays about 3 seasons (I remember reading that somewhere but don't quote me on that) so if player development was slower there would be no point signing 18 year olds if you're going to play only 3 seasons anyway

[santy001]

Different players will have different development curves, and this is something completely impossible to scout or predict. There are no tools like the IGE that can extract this either.

Most players who have the possibility to continue developing later in their career then need the right circumstances to bring this about. This is also compounded by the fact that most human players will gravitate towards youngsters who are on early, positive development curves. Are you going to risk a £15m+ fee on say a Championship/Lower top flight player at 26/27 in the hopes he is going to enter another phase of development? Your scouts are unlikely to be confident in the potential at this time, so they're going to score the player lower than a 19/20 year old. 

It means most of the players with the possibility are priced out of moves by their clubs or human players particularly will ignore them in pursuit of younger (and in a lot of instances, cheaper) signings. Is it ever going to be worthwhile signing a 25/26 year old for £30-£40m from a midtable PL side or £10m on a 18/19 year old and hope that by the same age they have already gotten better than the 25 year old.

My experience of the game is a little different, but then I honestly think little of buying players well into their mid 30's on FM. 

[Marko1989]

5 hours ago, DarJ said:

if player development was slower there would be no point signing 18 year olds if you're going to play only 3 seasons anyway

I didn't think about that, it makes sense. Then development is unrealistic anyways, it would not hurt if they allowed players to develop more in mid 20s and by a little in late 20s.

I think that many good players learn something each year, they become better at something with each year of experience and so on. 

We now have the problem where wonderkid/world-class center back can have 16 marking at the age of 21 and 16 marking again at the age of 32 for example, no matter what happens in his career, because PA is fixed, he can stay with 16 marking forever even if he was the best defender in the world for last 10 seasons for example. It is simply not logical that good defenders are same at marking at the age of 20 and 30 when they are much,  much more experienced after they have faced much more good players against them.

Edited October 3, 2021 by Marko1989

[Vali184]

The game needs a complete overhaul of how ability and potential works.

[_mxrky]

3 hours ago, santy001 said:

Different players will have different development curves, and this is something completely impossible to scout or predict. There are no tools like the IGE that can extract this either.

Most players who have the possibility to continue developing later in their career then need the right circumstances to bring this about. This is also compounded by the fact that most human players will gravitate towards youngsters who are on early, positive development curves. Are you going to risk a £15m+ fee on say a Championship/Lower top flight player at 26/27 in the hopes he is going to enter another phase of development? Your scouts are unlikely to be confident in the potential at this time, so they're going to score the player lower than a 19/20 year old. 

It means most of the players with the possibility are priced out of moves by their clubs or human players particularly will ignore them in pursuit of younger (and in a lot of instances, cheaper) signings. Is it ever going to be worthwhile signing a 25/26 year old for £30-£40m from a midtable PL side or £10m on a 18/19 year old and hope that by the same age they have already gotten better than the 25 year old.

My experience of the game is a little different, but then I honestly think little of buying players well into their mid 30's on FM. 

I’ve certainly spent money on 23/24 year olds on the basis that my scouts deem them to have potential, only for them to never improve despite good performances and good personalities.

 

for example I’ve bought 23 year old Marcus edwards, had him for 3 1/2 seasons and the only thing that’s noticeably changed is his determination (which only happened because I warned him  about poor performances). He just simply did not improve despite playing him almost week in week out. He’s also still almost  20points off his pa according to the editor at the age of 26. He will never reach his potential in my save no matter what

Edited October 3, 2021 by _mxrky

[rsihn]

14 minutes ago, _mxrky said:

I’ve certainly spent money on 23/24 year olds on the basis that my scouts deem them to have potential, only for them to never improve despite good performances and good personalities.

 

for example I’ve bought 23 year old Marcus edwards, had him for 3 1/2 seasons and the only thing that’s noticeably changed is his determination (which only happened because I warned him  about poor performances). He just simply did not improve despite playing him almost week in week out. He’s also still almost  20points off his pa according to the editor at the age of 26. He will never reach his potential in my save no matter what

How often are you tearing into them about not improving?  I'm starting to wonder if people are actually using all the tools available.  Players can also get lazy once they've won a big contract in the first team (including actual personality changes with drops in ambition and professionalism) so it becomes even more important to stay on them about their lack of improvement.  You should be criticizing their lack of development at least once a month if they aren't showing any stat jumps.  I've had plenty of 25+ year old players have growth spurts and the occasional 30+ year old doing the same so it isn't limited to younger players. 

[Spurs08]

Marcus Edwards in particular very likely also has horrible personality stats - he was seen at Spurs as having all the talent in the world but not the attitude to make the most of it. 

[Crispypaul]

11 hours ago, _mxrky said:

for example I’ve bought 23 year old Marcus edwards, had him for 3 1/2 seasons and the only thing that’s noticeably changed is his determination (which only happened because I warned him  about poor performances). He just simply did not improve despite playing him almost week in week out. He’s also still almost  20points off his pa according to the editor at the age of 26. He will never reach his potential in my save no matter what

This seems pretty realistic for this particular player.

[Platinum]

On 03/10/2021 at 14:35, _mxrky said:

If a player hasn't almost reached their ca by 23 forget about it on this game. They simply don't improve much, if at all. Forget having your own sadio mane, lewandowski, immobile, jamie vardy, mohammed salah. 

Even if you play them almost every game, with good form, good facilites and good personalty, after 23/24 they barely improve. 

They definitely do improve, but only some will have big improvements. . @santy001listed some of the reasons why users can miss out on these players.

Also getting a jamie vardy ytype player isnt always about improving the players attributes, its also about making the most of a player with their current attributes. E.g. playing the write tactical system and having the right players around them.

[Spurs08]

A lot of it comes down to it being too easy to buy and attract players. If you can very easily stack your squad with wonderkids, you've got no reason to take a punt on someone who might be the next Vardy or on a decent mid-table player as as a squad option. If the AI more actively competed to sign the top prospects then this might change.

[Platinum]

33 minutes ago, Spurs08 said:

A lot of it comes down to it being too easy to buy and attract players. If you can very easily stack your squad with wonderkids, you've got no reason to take a punt on someone who might be the next Vardy or on a decent mid-table player as as a squad option. If the AI more actively competed to sign the top prospects then this might change.

Yeah I agree. We have no reason to take a punt when its easy to identify and buy a young player with potential, and there are hardly any drawbacks to having a squad filled with young players. And even if the young player you bought doesnt end up bcoming great you can just buy another young player for cheap again.

[Mars_Blackmon]

^ Yes, I hope that they addressed this.

[Harper]

Not sure if this is the case as is, but seems like the technical, mental, and physical attributes should be progressing at different rates and times.

Technical skills growing most rapidly from 15-20

Physical traits, particularly strength, growing most rapidly from 18-23. Pace and acceleration maybe incrementing based on sports science improving a player’s form and gait (I think Ajax did a tremendous presentation on this a few years back at StatsBomb conference). 

Mental attributes growing from 23+, particularly with match experience and maturing as an adult. Particularly leadership. I don’t think this grows nearly enough for a lot of players that rack up experience and have been in the rodeo for a while, whether it’s late rounds of knock out competitions, promotion playoffs, “learning and bouncing back” from heartbreaks like a Final or Promotion playoff losses. IIRC, agility and reaction time doesn’t peak until late twenties, early thirties (GK Reflexes, all player decision making)

U23 players with 13+ attributes in key attributes areas should be extremely rare. The punt on the 23-26 year old that has the technical ability and physical traits to perform, it’s a question as to whether they pull it all together. A change of scenery and more profession or challenging environment is a sink or swim moment.

[diLLa88]

I agree that young players develop too fast and old players develop too slowly.

It's insane that many of the good youngsters will have reached 100% of their potential by the age of 23. This does not make sense to me at all.

[Marko1989]

1 hour ago, diLLa88 said:

I agree that young players develop too fast and old players develop too slowly.

It's insane that many of the good youngsters will have reached 100% of their potential by the age of 23. This does not make sense to me at all.

Even if I agree with you there is a perfectly good reason why young players develop too fast, as one guy stated above. 

Most of the FM players don't play very long save games, for example 10 seasons. I was thinking, at most, I play 5 seasons in each save. That is how much time I need to win Champions league with teams I love the play, Chievo Verona level, Rennes, Werder Bremen and such. 

As that guy said, if the development was slower, there would not be any point for me to buy some young players because I would not even play long enough to see their best years. That is probably why development is a bit faster.

Even I would like to see late bloomers and possibility for players to improve in late 20's we simply can't have everything, so it seems that the faster development even makes sense for people who don't play very long saves. 

[Brasilia88]

From a probability perspective they could put it in the game. However, it would hurt your CPU even more, since every single player would have its' own calculation regarding it's development in relation to potential, likelihood and what's already there to give such development.  

[diLLa88]

2 hours ago, Marko1989 said:

Even if I agree with you there is a perfectly good reason why young players develop too fast, as one guy stated above. 

Most of the FM players don't play very long save games, for example 10 seasons. I was thinking, at most, I play 5 seasons in each save. That is how much time I need to win Champions league with teams I love the play, Chievo Verona level, Rennes, Werder Bremen and such. 

As that guy said, if the development was slower, there would not be any point for me to buy some young players because I would not even play long enough to see their best years. That is probably why development is a bit faster.

Even I would like to see late bloomers and possibility for players to improve in late 20's we simply can't have everything, so it seems that the faster development even makes sense for people who don't play very long saves. 

Could always tackle that by introducing two development curves. One faster with more emphasis on the young years for rapid development and one a bit more balanced for long term games.

[Freakiie]

39 minutes ago, diLLa88 said:

Could always tackle that by introducing two development curves. One faster with more emphasis on the young years for rapid development and one a bit more balanced for long term games.

Supposedly each player does have his own development curve. Due to the reasons pointed out in this thread already though, us players will rarely notice an actual late bloomer as we'd ignore them for a young alternative basically 99 out of a 100 times.

[GIMN]

Something that hasn't been mentioned is coaching.

Human players will look to find the "objectively best" coaches possible.  This isn't how it works in real life.  Coaches tend to be people the manager trusts (worked with before, or recommended by someone they know), coaches that were previously part of that club's youth set-up, or hired on reputation.  This is probably why a lot of clubs start the game with what a human player might consider to be a poor coaching team.

Being able to easily identify and hire the best possible coaches for your setup/budget, means you have a considerable advantage when it comes to developing players in their younger years and getting them to reach their potential early.  This, alongside the difficulty for even the best scouts to identify when a 23+ year old player has lots of scope for development, can make it very difficult to find someone who is 23+ that can be significantly improved.

I don't use editor or any tools that allow me to see CA/PA - but I had a Stuttgart save this season where I signed Ryan Gauld, and he improved in quite a few areas in the first season - I think his dribbling increased from 14 to 16, whilst passing, vision, off the ball and first touch all increased, too.  I don't know if how much scope for further progression he had, and can't remember if maybe he had a significant injury that may have seen his attributes drop before he signed, but I remember his development was a pleasant surprise.

[Marko1989]

29 minutes ago, Freakiie said:

Supposedly each player does have his own development curve. Due to the reasons pointed out in this thread already though, us players will rarely notice an actual late bloomer as we'd ignore them for a young alternative basically 99 out of a 100 times.

It is good if this is true, but I simple can't believe it until I see a couple of screenshots with late bloomers.

For example how they are mediocore players at 26 and then great players at 30. 

Example - finishing 12 at 26 and then finishing 15 at the age of 30. Because it is entirely possible for a player to improve his finishing in 4 years. 

( I know it is not everything in those attributes, he can simply play better at the age of 30, but at the same time - it is. It is nice to see some visual improvement, like higher attributes, and because all the real life late-bloomers got massive attributes upgrade) 

[DarJ]

1 hour ago, Marko1989 said:

It is good if this is true, but I simple can't believe it until I see a couple of screenshots with late bloomers.

For example how they are mediocore players at 26 and then great players at 30. 

Example - finishing 12 at 26 and then finishing 15 at the age of 30. Because it is entirely possible for a player to improve his finishing in 4 years. 

( I know it is not everything in those attributes, he can simply play better at the age of 30, but at the same time - it is. It is nice to see some visual improvement, like higher attributes, and because all the real life late-bloomers got massive attributes upgrade) 

I don't think it that black and white. does a striker finishing really improves that much from the age of 25 to 30 or is it that he's just more consistent when he's presented with shooting opportunity or even the managers with his tactics that puts the player in the best position to score goals? Timo Werner scored a lot of goals in the Bundesliga but is struggling in the Premier League. Did his finishing magically drop down drastically or is it something else?

It's like when people compare training IRL to training in FM. In FM training is there only to improve your players attributes and IRL together with improving the players abilities they rehearse certain movements, they are taught how to react in certain situations and the list goes on. 

My point is as much as we would like to simulate everything that happens in the real world, we also have to acknowledge that it's still a video game so there will always be limitations 

[Marko1989]

1 hour ago, DarJ said:

I don't think it that black and white. does a striker finishing really improves that much from the age of 25 to 30 or is it that he's just more consistent when he's presented with shooting opportunity or even the managers with his tactics that puts the player in the best position to score goals? Timo Werner scored a lot of goals in the Bundesliga but is struggling in the Premier League. Did his finishing magically drop down drastically or is it something else? 

Depends on a player. Some player really can improve his finishing/passing/first touch or whatever, from age 26 to 30 because with current training regimes and everything that is still young, and some players are just more composed, calm, etc, so they use those attributes better. 

The more are think about this the more I see how complicated would be to improve player development and replicate real-life. But again, I would really love to see dynamic potential. 

[tronium]

I would love to see players with dynamic potential, not only because of the increase in stats at different ages, but also because the decrease in stats is not well reflected.

In real life it is common to see players with 18-23 years old known all over the world for how well they do but a few years later they only play in lower divisions. This is not reflected today in Football Manager where the player who is good at 20-23 years old is good until he retires.

Football Manager itself changes in each new edition the potential of the same player as he evolves. I think there should be a way to reflect this in the game.

[santy001]

Dynamic potential will never make sense for the way its supposed to function in the game, the path its going down is for greater and greater variance in player development. It's always going to be incredibly difficult to represent players who drop off in football. How many do you not hear the story about why until they've retired or long since moved on? 

It's worth remembering as well that player development hasn't been on rails in the same way as it used to be for quite a long time. I've rated quite a few Stoke youngsters at -8/-85 over a handful of years now and they never appear on any of the top rated youngsters or must buy youngster lists, yet a search on the forums show for the odd person here and there they've been very impressive. Given the way those players careers have panned out in the years since, its been good to see that I can rate them with their high potential and yet they don't just become certainties in the eyes of the community. 

[FM1000]

Development should not stop at 23. In fact it should not even stop when a player reaches their PA, his attributes need to be readjusted, for example Ronaldo went from a tricky winger, a guy who could dribble past several players to a guy who could not go past his man anymore. But in return he became a goal scoring machine.

This kind of big attribute shifts does not happen in the game. Especially because every player thinks his individual training is not providing effect, so say goodbye to the attribute you wanted to raise.

[crpcarrot]

makes my style of playing worthless.  really feel frustrated if this is true.

dont understand the argument abut most players only playing 3 seasons. that's fine but why do something negative for the rest. if its that big a deal make a different game mode for the players who want long saves. i hear a lot of mention about making this game as close as possible to real life in SI promotional videos. this lack of development if true is not close to real life.

 

 

[KlaaZ]

On 09/10/2021 at 22:45, FM1000 said:

Development should not stop at 23. In fact it should not even stop when a player reaches their PA, his attributes need to be readjusted, for example Ronaldo went from a tricky winger, a guy who could dribble past several players to a guy who could not go past his man anymore. But in return he became a goal scoring machine.

This kind of big attribute shifts does not happen in the game. Especially because every player thinks his individual training is not providing effect, so say goodbye to the attribute you wanted to raise.

Development does not stop at 23. 

I signed this guy at 24.

And he looks like this at 31.

I did however give him plenty of game time, as he was my main defending midfielder for about six seasons. 

[Platinum]

9 hours ago, crpcarrot said:

makes my style of playing worthless.  really feel frustrated if this is true.

dont understand the argument abut most players only playing 3 seasons. that's fine but why do something negative for the rest. if its that big a deal make a different game mode for the players who want long saves. i hear a lot of mention about making this game as close as possible to real life in SI promotional videos. this lack of development if true is not close to real life.

 

 

It's not true at all, look at the screenshot the in the post below yours. People who say they don't improve I can only guess don't look at how players are progressing or their saves are so short that they never see them improve.

I've improved loads of players over the age of 23 and lots of them was just by playing them in matches, I didn't do anything special with their training.

Edited October 11, 2021 by Platinum

[MrPompey]

On 03/10/2021 at 14:35, _mxrky said:

If a player hasn't almost reached their ca by 23 forget about it on this game. They simply don't improve much, if at all. Forget having your own sadio mane, lewandowski, immobile, jamie vardy, mohammed salah. 

Even if you play them almost every game, with good form, good facilites and good personalty, after 23/24 they barely improve. 

Evidence and facts please else the rest of us will call this incorrect

[crpcarrot]

happy to know its not true however its also interesting that he has had a massive increase in mental attributes +14 but only net +2 in technical. its not a good sample size but i would expect his skills to improve more just though repetition of doing them for 6 years every week.

anyway its better than no improvement at all.

[KlaaZ]

21 minutes ago, crpcarrot said:

happy to know its not true however its also interesting that he has had a massive increase in mental attributes +14 but only net +2 in technical. its not a good sample size but i would expect his skills to improve more just though repetition of doing them for 6 years every week.

anyway its better than no improvement at all.

It just makes sense. How many players actually get better technically after a certain age? The biggest improvement from there onwards would be mostly physically or mentally. 

[crpcarrot]

I actually think it should be the other way around technical skills can be improved through practice, mental skills after a certain threshold would depend on the player personality etc. but this is just one example so doesn't prove that's how it is in the game.

[KlaaZ]

3 hours ago, crpcarrot said:

I actually think it should be the other way around technical skills can be improved through practice, mental skills after a certain threshold would depend on the player personality etc. but this is just one example so doesn't prove that's how it is in the game.

No, mental ability in real life mostly comes from experience, and thus playing time, mostly at a later age. It's one of the reasons why for example defenders tend to peak at a later age. 

[Zemahh]

On 11/10/2021 at 17:35, KlaaZ said:

Development does not stop at 23.

That's fair, but I think this thread is more about the meteoric rise of youngsters and the development slowing down quite significantly after the age of 23-24. To me, it just makes little sense to have majority of players peak in their early twenties. There's virtually no surprise element to development in FM, late bloomers are incredibly rare and experience isn't really a thing.

This player from my save is 23 y/o and after 4 seasons at my club I can pretty much say with confidence he won't develop much further despite State of the art facilities and 4*+ coaches.

This is another 23 y/o, who's close to being maxed out as well.

I guess I could just keep playing them both for another few years and perhaps they would improve a tiny bit more, but why would I, when I can just go out there and snatch another youngster with bags of potential and have him develop instead. There's no downside to playing 18-19 y/o's over experienced 27 y/o's who have been through it all, as long as they're close in ability. You can't really justify an oldie eating up wages of 2-3 youngsters, unless it's quite literally Ronaldo we're talking about.

[ajt]

2 hours ago, Zemahh said:

There's no downside to playing 18-19 y/o's over experienced 27 y/o's who have been through it all, as long as they're close in ability. You can't really justify an oldie eating up wages of 2-3 youngsters, unless it's quite literally Ronaldo we're talking about.

I think this is the important thing tbh.

I believe my kaiserslautern fm21 save in the career forum ended with my champions league winning squad having an average age of 23~ with as you say, no downside. Also there is the advantage of being able to shape the regens personalities.

It doesn't seem to be a strategy that is countered at all by the ai having more experienced players, and it's been like this for many years now. In fm22 I'm going to limit myself utilising a squad of young regens as I think it's what has led to me not enjoying the game as much, even if youth development is by far my favourite part overall its just boring to exploit the system in the long run.

At this stage I may as well just go all in and get one of those skins/layouts that disguises attributes to balance the game for myself.

Also fwiw some people earlier in the thread were saying about how most people just play a few seasons, whereas my saves are usually one club 10+ season complete rebuilds.

[saintrainhard]

It is always easier to buy 18-20 years old and teach them to reach their full PA lets say from 100 to 150 (their full PA) in 3 years than buy a 23 years old with 120CA in 3 years he will still in range 135 CA. Sell them for bigger money than what you bought them and let that problems be others players/ai problem

[Gangor]

On 09/10/2021 at 12:57, santy001 said:

Dynamic potential will never make sense for the way its supposed to function in the game, the path its going down is for greater and greater variance in player development. It's always going to be incredibly difficult to represent players who drop off in football. How many do you not hear the story about why until they've retired or long since moved on? 

It's worth remembering as well that player development hasn't been on rails in the same way as it used to be for quite a long time. I've rated quite a few Stoke youngsters at -8/-85 over a handful of years now and they never appear on any of the top rated youngsters or must buy youngster lists, yet a search on the forums show for the odd person here and there they've been very impressive. Given the way those players careers have panned out in the years since, its been good to see that I can rate them with their high potential and yet they don't just become certainties in the eyes of the community. 

The fact is that dynamic potential already exists in the game. While absolute potential for each player is fixed, perceived potential will change throughout a player's career depending on age, performances, reputation etc. People should just try playing without looking in the editor every five minutes and they would find that the game already works just how they want.

[enigmatic]

44 minutes ago, Gangor said:

The fact is that dynamic potential already exists in the game. While absolute potential for each player is fixed, perceived potential will change throughout a player's career depending on age, performances, reputation etc. People should just try playing without looking in the editor every five minutes and they would find that the game already works just how they want.

And also, progression towards that potential is influenced considerably less by age/personality and considerably more by playing well in a suitable level team than previous FM versions. Players with great personalities' development can just stop at 20 if they're not playing, or improve significantly in their late 20s.

The reason most FMers don't discover these players is they sign someone else instead.

[kalokalitokalo]

My dream would be get rid of PA. Obviously re-adapting the impact of other variables (age, personality of the player and the team, staff level and personality, facilities, game time and level, etc).

[mestre89]

En 3/10/2021 a las 23:23, rsihn dijo:

How often are you tearing into them about not improving?  I'm starting to wonder if people are actually using all the tools available.  Players can also get lazy once they've won a big contract in the first team (including actual personality changes with drops in ambition and professionalism) so it becomes even more important to stay on them about their lack of improvement.  You should be criticizing their lack of development at least once a month if they aren't showing any stat jumps.  I've had plenty of 25+ year old players have growth spurts and the occasional 30+ year old doing the same so it isn't limited to younger players. 

Hey bro, can I have a direct channel to speak with you?

[Lord Rowell]

On 03/10/2021 at 18:04, santy001 said:

1. Different players will have different development curves, and this is something completely impossible to scout or predict. There are no tools like the IGE that can extract this either.

Most players who have the possibility to continue developing later in their career then need the right circumstances to bring this about. This is also compounded by the fact that most human players will gravitate towards youngsters who are on early, positive development curves. Are you going to risk a £15m+ fee on say a Championship/Lower top flight player at 26/27 in the hopes he is going to enter another phase of development? Your scouts are unlikely to be confident in the potential at this time, so they're going to score the player lower than a 19/20 year old. 

It means most of the players with the possibility are priced out of moves by their clubs or human players particularly will ignore them in pursuit of younger (and in a lot of instances, cheaper) signings. Is it ever going to be worthwhile signing a 25/26 year old for £30-£40m from a midtable PL side or £10m on a 18/19 year old and hope that by the same age they have already gotten better than the 25 year old.

2. My experience of the game is a little different, but then I honestly think little of buying players well into their mid 30's on FM. 

Bold and numbers my edit for reference / visual.

1. I'm observing this myself in a 10 yr Dortmund save. I have a 23 yo with a PA of 193(!). Yes I am looking via the in-game editor because I'm genuinely curious. He's currently 171 and progressing 8-10 per year. Interested to see how close he can get to 193. He's been mentored to death including by Harry Kane - next point coming up...

2. I've often thought the way you do re. older players. However, I signed aforementioned Harry Kane age 34 for my Dortmund save. I only ever played him in midfield. He was like Pirlo for me for 2 seasons. Training performance of my players shot up across the board. I'm certain his signing made a massive help to me finally winning the UCL. I wanted to keep him another season but he sadly retired.
I also have now an old Kalvin Phillips, he's been superb for me - buys me time when I'm a club that still don't have amazing financial backing.

3. I have arranged to re-sign Erling Haaland - age 31 - that's a self-indulgence tbh but he does have natural fitness 20 so we'll see how it goes.

Edited September 24, 2022 by Lord Rowell
Haaland ref.