Most of the players I have sold flop in their new clubs

[Draakon]

I usually play my long term save with Ajax and I've noticed it in previous FM-s as well, so it's not a FM22 issue, but I thought that because of current events in real world football* it's worth noting here and perhaps somebody could give their opinion about the possible causes behind that.

 

So. I play with Ajax and in my long save I have 'youth only' policy. Because of the youth system and amount of talent Ajax has, it's not extremely difficult, but it happens from time to time that I need to give first team chances to youngsters who are not really ready or some of my first eleven players are rated just 2-2,5*. What's curious is that it doesn't seem to affect their performances too much (I know that star rating is less important than attributes or how the player fits into your tactics).

Because Ajax is such a big force in Eredivisie and we consistently win domestic titles, our players have high match ratings. Because I play youth only, it means that players have played several seasons together and teamwork is really good. Winning breeds confidence and high morale certainly helps.

As a result, big clubs take notice and try to sign my players. I usually let go any player for £40m-£50m fee, especially if the interested club is one of the European giants, because they'd get unsettled anyway if English top six, PSG, Bayer, Real, Barca etc. want them. Even average team players (like the same 2,5* players I mentioned before) are sometimes tracked by lesser EPL or Bundesliga or Serie A clubs, and I allow them to leave if the money is right, because it's still a bigger league and a step forward in their career...

 

... and they flop. Miserably. It's not even the case that some 19-20 years old youngsters make that step too early (although it happens), because even big teams loan them out and they get enough first team football in lower levels before they return to compete to their parent club for first team game time. It's the cases where my first team player is around 22-24 years of age and is sold for big money, but then produces embarrassing 6.5-6.6 average rating in the big league and finds himself on the bench for the next season. All of their careers have made a nosedive after leaving Ajax.

In FM22 only players who have been doing well in EPL level are Jurrien Timber, Nicolas Tagliafico, Noussair Mazraoui and Andre Onana. Most others have flopped.  Mohammed Kudus joined Arsenal for £47m and is benched, Perr Schuurs went to Real Madrid for a similar amount of money and couldn't make a cut. Newcastle paid £60m for Edson Alvarez and he's been below 6.7 player for them on average, Lisandro Martinez in Spurs - the same.

Even mediocre players fall to the same trap. Kik Pierie didn't want to extend his contract with us because Werder Bremen was interested - he signed with them and three months later they're 15th in Bundesliga with Pierie average rating no higher than 6.58.

 

I don't reckon it as a bug, because it certainly happens often enough in real life as well - player does extremely well in one club, is bought by a bigger club and then his performances drop. It's even more evident when he has to switch the country and adjust to new culture as well, but at the same time it makes me ask - how can't AI clubs figure out that those players are not really that good? Why does PSG want my 20 years old centre-back who has just 3,5* potential according to my coaches? They should find better players on the market easily.

And it looks soooo easy to make money from these moves. Just nod, take another £50m check and watch your player fail elsewhere. Is AI scouting really that bad?

 

*any similarities to Antony and Martinez joining ManU are purely coincidental

[2feet]

Some bigger clubs buy players to weaken the club theyre buying from, and make them less of a threat to replacing their club

Then they just sell them on later to get their money back

[DMVian]

Could player reputation be the reason? And then they get to the new club and real ability isn't up to snuff?

First year of my Scotland save, I had two loanees from EPL have top seasons as I finished #3. One had an expiring and the other a cheap transfer. But they both demanded absurd salaries to stay. I had to let both walk. One didn't have his contract extended and signed with Middlesborough for big $$$, the other rode the bench and featured mostly in U23. Going into season 3, the one whose contract expired is still making too much money for Middlesborough, who has him transfer listed pretty low after a good season. The other was offloaded permanently back to Scotland, now making less than what I offered.

If player reputation is the reason, then that is actually really realistic. Players and clubs overrate the players. Then reality hit. One club bought a guy who beat up Scotland then realized a huge overpay. The other player overrated his value on a permanent deal and then had a lost season and took a smaller number.

I'm under 100 hours in, and I may be giving too much credit to the game. But your post and other examples in my game makes me think player reputation is a really underrated aspect in value.

[Xavier Lukhas]

5 hours ago, DMVian said:

Could player reputation be the reason? [...] But your post and other examples in my game makes me think player reputation is a really underrated aspect in value.

I'd bet a couple of drinks that it's the case. Back in FM17, I had the most reputable club in the world in Slovenia by some margin (it was ridiculous, it was difficult to actually even draw a game even in the UCL). When I bought some kids that I stored in the Reserves because I had to make room in the main squad, I was at times welcomed by messages of their NT manager calling them. And I'm not talking about U19s or U21 nonsense, I mean playing for the big boys despite having less than 10 first team apps, and most likely 0 (as in the number "zero") first team starts. And I'm not talking about some small time NT from Central Asia, I'm talking about really good European countries like France. The kids weren't even that good yet; they would eventually be, but they were not top European NT material at all, and considering how NT worked in reasonably older FMs, there was no such things as news articles about "battle for citizenship" or whatnot. The bigger country had dibs and that was the end of it, so there should be no pressure to "forcefully" cap the player in case he decides to defect.

Yet, just the fact that they've signed for the reserves of the biggest club in the world meant that they could do a job for the NT. Nah, that's not how it works. But m8, there's this nobody who always get into NT despite being invisible with his club, so that's realistic!

On 05/09/2022 at 14:24, Draakon said:

Is AI scouting really that bad?

The AI is also completely unable to create a tactic that exploits the strengths of players properly, nevermind properly scout a player profile for a given tactical style (although they should be able to as all managers have preferences in players and or/tactics, I just don't see it). It's also not able to use players that have a distinctive advantage over the competition despite having low CA. I recall that in the Netherlands, I had a striker with just 100-110 CA. Even though the average quality of Eredivisie players isn't great, that's still a pretty weak CA amount for a top division player, and even my coaching staff agreed that he wasn't good enough. Except that he also was one of the top scorers in Eredivisie. Why? 15 Pace and Acceleration. Even with otherwise garbage attributes, being that fast is enough to make a mockery of the average Eredivisie defender, and even give some Ajax players a good workout. But if you leave it to the AI to decide what the worth of that player is, he probably would struggle to even find a professional contract, nevermind play any sort of professional football at all.

The AI cannot really perceive attribute distribution separately from overall ability; or at least they cannot infer meaningful tactical and recruiting conclusions from it, nevermind build a tactic or a team around the quality of their players. The AI generally has pretty poor tactical awareness; it works well enough to make the game playable, but it's not so good that you don't notice some obvious cracks. At least it somewhat prevents the AI from going all in on players who can only work in a given system, so there's a balance to be found... even if it results in obvious poor recruitment choices at times that are more reputation driven than attribute driven.

Oh wait, actually I found the guy on my other computer. Only 95 CA, third best goalscorer in Eredivisie (11 vs 13 and 15), second highest average rating at 7.45. I even have his hidden attributes on display. He's simply faster than the average defensive Eredivisie player, so he'll keep scoring over and over again even if he's unable to do anything else correctly. I do think you wouldn't go out of your way to recruit such a player, but there most likely are some D2 clubs who could use a player that can score plenty at D1 level.

And Finishing is overrated, of course.

Edited September 6, 2022 by Xavier Lukhas

[Draakon]

Might be right what you said.

 

Because I play youth only save, I don't really need money, but I force myself to accept good transfer bids and happily include £50m+ minimum transfer fee clauses to player's contracts. Philosophy behind it is that I feel Ajax acts as a springboard for really talente players into the bigger leagues/clubs, so if my player receives a good bid, I accept it even if it hampers my first team in short term and make us weaker for a few months. So I let them leave and in the last meeting I congratulate them and wish them success in the next step in their careers. So that's why it makes me sad if they don't make it and rot on the bench two-three seasons later. 

 

[crpcarrot]

i'm only playing 21 year 2034. and i've noticed that too. every player i let go did not do well. some hardly got a game. don't have an explanation other than AI cant train their players to improve. judging by how my asst Man allocates work among coaches i am not surprised. 

previous version i played were 2011, 12,13 i remember regretting selling players in those cos they did so well after leaving.

[Xavier Lukhas]

The AI also works under the assumption that having good depth is having at least three first-team level players per position (roughly 3 stars relative to their team's strength). That's how you see clubs with more money than sense stacking 3 or 4 strikers on their bench coupled with at leat another couple other players who can play the position, even though they play a one striker formation. A  few editions ago, Mourinho's Man Utd was notorious for buying basically every striker under the sun and end up with a main squad with 5 or 6 players who can play the position. A human player with good rotating skills (which is anything better than the AI, the bar is that low) would only really require two strikers and perhaps one or two players whose main roles are AML/R but can do the job at the ST position in case of injuries.

in other words, IRL big clubs also have tight squads that they rotate a lot, while smaller clubs have big squads with little rotation. In FM, big clubs have gigantic squads with no rotation.

[kentonizking]

On 06/09/2022 at 17:44, Xavier Lukhas said:

I'd bet a couple of drinks that it's the case. Back in FM17, I had the most reputable club in the world in Slovenia by some margin (it was ridiculous, it was difficult to actually even draw a game even in the UCL). When I bought some kids that I stored in the Reserves because I had to make room in the main squad, I was at times welcomed by messages of their NT manager calling them. And I'm not talking about U19s or U21 nonsense, I mean playing for the big boys despite having less than 10 first team apps, and most likely 0 (as in the number "zero") first team starts. And I'm not talking about some small time NT from Central Asia, I'm talking about really good European countries like France. The kids weren't even that good yet; they would eventually be, but they were not top European NT material at all, and considering how NT worked in reasonably older FMs, there was no such things as news articles about "battle for citizenship" or whatnot. The bigger country had dibs and that was the end of it, so there should be no pressure to "forcefully" cap the player in case he decides to defect.

Yet, just the fact that they've signed for the reserves of the biggest club in the world meant that they could do a job for the NT. Nah, that's not how it works. But m8, there's this nobody who always get into NT despite being invisible with his club, so that's realistic!

The AI is also completely unable to create a tactic that exploits the strengths of players properly, nevermind properly scout a player profile for a given tactical style (although they should be able to as all managers have preferences in players and or/tactics, I just don't see it). It's also not able to use players that have a distinctive advantage over the competition despite having low CA. I recall that in the Netherlands, I had a striker with just 100-110 CA. Even though the average quality of Eredivisie players isn't great, that's still a pretty weak CA amount for a top division player, and even my coaching staff agreed that he wasn't good enough. Except that he also was one of the top scorers in Eredivisie. Why? 15 Pace and Acceleration. Even with otherwise garbage attributes, being that fast is enough to make a mockery of the average Eredivisie defender, and even give some Ajax players a good workout. But if you leave it to the AI to decide what the worth of that player is, he probably would struggle to even find a professional contract, nevermind play any sort of professional football at all.

The AI cannot really perceive attribute distribution separately from overall ability; or at least they cannot infer meaningful tactical and recruiting conclusions from it, nevermind build a tactic or a team around the quality of their players. The AI generally has pretty poor tactical awareness; it works well enough to make the game playable, but it's not so good that you don't notice some obvious cracks. At least it somewhat prevents the AI from going all in on players who can only work in a given system, so there's a balance to be found... even if it results in obvious poor recruitment choices at times that are more reputation driven than attribute driven.

Oh wait, actually I found the guy 

I love how his marking has gone up for......reasons?!

[Xavier Lukhas]

13 hours ago, kentonizking said:

I love how his marking has gone up for......reasons?!

If anything, the thread below shows how opaque at best training is... and how unintuitive it is at worst to be polite. It's kinda jarring when you don't know what you'll get out of training. I wager that IRL you would know what you expect out of a training program for a player and how to min-max your gains, but maybe I really don't know anything about it. There can be surprises, but I'd have thought that trainers, coaches or sports scientists would have a pretty good understanding of how to get results that are somewhat in line with what they expect.

 

[TokyoWanderer]

hace 1 hora, Xavier Lukhas dijo:

I wager that IRL you would know what you expect out of a training program for a player and how to min-max your gains.

No, you wouldn't. There even isn't such as thing as "training program for a player". Teams work in groups. Look for a video of a team training in real life and you will realize that the concept of min-maxing makes zero sense.

Also, how is a forward gaining 1-2 points out of 200 in marking something notable? Do you guys know that forwards play defense too, right? Players can get marginally better at something even if they are not doing specific training on it outside of matches.

 

On your other point about CA and the AI picking players, different ratings have different weights when it comes to CA, so for example high pace already gives a striker a high base for his CA. You can get pacey strikers to score a lot of goals because the ME is not perfectly balanced, but you can't design an AI to buy players who exploit the match engine. If they are buying the players with the highest CA possible for positions of need, the AI is doing a good job. The human player will always have an advantage because it can exploit the ME in ways the AI can't.

[Xavier Lukhas]

6 minutes ago, TokyoWanderer said:

No, you wouldn't. There even isn't such as thing as "training program for a player". Teams work in groups. Look for a video of a team training in real life and you will realize that the concept of min-maxing makes zero sense.

Also, how is a forward gaining 1-2 points out of 200 in marking something notable? Do you guys know that forwards play defense too, right? Players can get marginally better at something even if they are not doing specific training on it outside of matches.

I don't know, I've read reports of players given specific tasks, like Beckenbauer's OM staff specifically training Basile Boli to do 100m sprints followed by a cross over and over again. And to some extent, players do have personal programs in FM, even if they do practise together overall. That's this kind of min-maxing I was thinking about, the kind you see in the gym when you want to target a specific muscle group and design/choose exercises around that.

6 minutes ago, TokyoWanderer said:

On your other point about CA and the AI picking players, different ratings have different weights when it comes to CA, so for example high pace already gives a striker a high base for his CA. You can get pacey strikers to score a lot of goals because the ME is not perfectly balanced, but you can't design an AI to buy players who exploit the match engine. If they are buying the players with the highest CA possible for positions of need, the AI is doing a good job. The human player will always have an advantage because it can exploit the ME in ways the AI can't.

I was thinking about it not in the sense of exploiting the ME, but that the AI knows and tells you in their reports that they value pace. They also have report on how the attributes of your team stack up vs. the league or another team. So I wouldn't have thought that it was far-fetched to have an AI say that this player is faster than the average defender from this team, therefore let's play him instead of another option. It's not exactly unknown of IRL, or so I summarize. By extension, it could be part of the scouting setup to search for a given player profile to fit a given role. Or at least, that's how I was thinking about it.

[TokyoWanderer]

hace 29 minutos, Xavier Lukhas dijo:

 So I wouldn't have thought that it was far-fetched to have an AI say that this player is faster than the average defender from this team, therefore let's play him instead of another option.

The AI already takes player types into consideration when choosing who to pick for a formation. Watch any AI team playing, for example, a flat 4-4-2 with a TM-S and a AF and you will usually see a fast player in the AF role and a strong player in the TM role. Which player is chosen considers a broad evaluation of their CA level and how the spread of attributes works for a given role. The AI already takes speed into account when picking players/

The AI picking a player based on a single attribute of the opposing team wouldn't be a good idea and it isn't realistic either. A team may adapt its style depending on the opposition, and if the tactics/style change, it may affect who starts.

.

[Xavier Lukhas]

3 hours ago, TokyoWanderer said:

The AI picking a player based on a single attribute of the opposing team wouldn't be a good idea and it isn't realistic either. A team may adapt its style depending on the opposition, and if the tactics/style change, it may affect who starts.

Unrealistic I don't know; I would've though it could've given the edge to some players over another by being exceptional in a given department compared to the mass of other players, or make a team being able to single out someone in a mass of data (after all IRL players don't have attributes either, that's not realistic). Baseball enthusiasts tend to crunch number to that kind of degree, and certain attributes do work on their own without supporting attributes, so I don't see it as unthinkable. I can see where you come from though, I'm simply thinking that if the human player can select players with such minutia, you could consider that the AI also could. Now whether the AI should is a different topic...

Anyway, we're drifting further from the topic, so I'm happy to leave it there.

Edited September 9, 2022 by Xavier Lukhas

[Draakon]

Why is it unrealistic to focus on weakness of a single opponent player? It happens every weekend in real life football. Space behind too attacking-minded fullback is exploited, target man is set against a shorter defender, the most pacey and technical winger tries more dribbles when his marker is already booked etc. 

If everything, we should see more of it in FM.