Idea on Academy Development

[grantgates999]

I would love to see a more in depth and expansive addition of U-17, U-16, U-15, and U-14. This does not necessarily mean that there needs the ability to treat them as the first team (that level of depth) and or immediately promote them to first team (even though it might be beneficial to have the next Jude Bellingham start at 14 if you play in the Non-League Football). A good starting point might be the annual or even bi-annually report on players with notes from coaches about potential and recommendations on what positions to train them in over the coming years with decisions to be made about their development. Take Reece James and Trent Alexander-Arnold for example. They came up as forwards and midfielders and found their way to RB later on in their academies. These decisions you could also automate to the Director of Youth Development and the 1st team manager could take over manually.

From a back end perspective idk if that would increase the total amount of automated teams needing to simulate results or not, but I if it was an algorithm based on possible growth trajectories, possibilities of training far better in a certain position, academy facilities, and junior development budget that was ran let's say twice a year before the Development Center is updated with the corresponding email based, then that may be a good short term solution until the players reach U-16 and can be promoted into the first team. If it is just an algorithm and you do not need to make all of the youth teams playable, then you could go all the way down to U-10 maybe? Earlier then that and it gets too messy. One other thing to look at is you could prompt the director of youth development to give him a budget for youth trials for academy players by region vs. just the ability to ask your board to increase the overall fund. Obviously, the nation that a club is in will have the highest of that nationality, but you could have academy scouts or designate scouting assignments for academy players in the scouting department for overseas candidates. Those players will have an increased likelihood of dual nationalities to maintain domestic league requirements. I know that there is not a lot of involvement from first team managers with the academy at the highest level, but I personally would love the option to have that added depth. Who knows? Maybe one day you could start out as a youth manager too. 

 

Just a thought and am curious to hear anyone's feedback on how this might look in the game!!

[oskarhughkudelka]

Very true

[WedgeUA]

Yes, some way to control positions of young players will be very useful. When team always plays with inverted wingers as LAM and RAM and academy produces constantly non-inverted LM and RM instead... At least give some option so academy tries to consider your tactics and preferable roles or give instructions for academy so i.e. you want them to prepare players for i.e. 4-2-3-1 and wingers should be inverted.

[Sandy Tait]

Academies are, IMO, the most underdeveloped part of the game and it's been due an overhaul for a long time. You get an inbox item in the first half of the season with a vague prediction of what you'll get, then in the second half of the season they all turn up for a trial and that's it, leaving the whole thing feeling like a glorified die roll. It's particularly out of place when you're managing the likes of Ajax or Barca who famously have absolutely enormous youth academies that have many, many levels as well as youth camps and satellite academies in other nations.

 

I'd love to see:
* The Youth Academy getting its own page in the Development Centre section
* Multiple youth levels visible, as you suggest, with the number and the size being tied to the club's youth facilities and recruitment ratings; it wouldn't even need to be a full team page like with the U18s, but perhaps just a section on the new Academy page briefly outlining the player names, positions, etc. like we currently get on the Youth Candidates page in the Development Centre
* Youth players below U18 not having precise or fixed positions, and your Head of Youth being able to suggest that a player might benefit from playing a different role (either permanently because it better suits their ability or, as Ajax do, short-term to help them round out their skills; e.g. playing centre backs in midfield for a season to develop their technique, passing, etc.); player positions and roles are generally way too permanent in FM and you just don't get the natural drift that many players have over their careers (attacking mids becoming centre mids, then defensive mids as they get older and slower, etc.) or younger players being tried out in a different role and sticking with it because it actually suits them better (TAA as you mention, Mousa Dembele going from a forward to a midfielder, Gareth Bale from wingback to winger, Danny Rose going from winger to wingback, Jan Vertonghen moving from midfield to defence, etc., etc.)
* The option for youth camps and satellite academies overseas, a bit like affiliated clubs except it doesn't require a pre-existing club and would be solely for getting youth players into your academy - at the very basic level this could simply be an item in the Development Centre noting that you have a youth camp in, say, South Africa, and the game reflecting this by boosting the club's scouting knowledge for South Africa and increasing the chance of South African players coming through in your Youth Intake (or into the Academy)

[Zachary Whyte]

Thank you for the detailed feedback. The developers will put this under consideration for a future FM.