Steffenwolff

Nice! I have a list aswell. I've been playing Football Manager since 2001. I know where the quality players pop up by now Once in a while I get surprised though. A wonderkid coming out of Slovan Bratislava etc

Thanks for the feedback and I get what you're saying but I'm talking about running a club where the priority is youth and not spending millions on incoming players. Again, I get where you're going with this and Mourinho is a great example of the kind of coach who doesn't look at youth academies. Just ask Kevin De Bruyne and Romelu Lukaku how they feel about the guy. He doesn't even care about 19 and 18 year old players as they were at that point, so why would he bother with players that are even younger. I like your idea about academy focus! But I would like to run the youth team too. Have you ever played Hattrick? That online football game that was a huge hype like 15 to 20 years ago? Well, I used to invest heavily in the youth team there aswell! I loved the whole concept of getting to run your own youth academy, rather than to wait and see what they would come up with. I'm no Mourinho. I like giving youngsters a chance and as someone who rather plays leagues in Belgium, Holland, Switserland or Argentina I'm not the kind of person who plays with big teams that can spend tens of millions on star players. If I were to manage Tottenham I would have a different approach to things, just like you stated.

One of the things I love most about the game (and many friends along with me) is the possibility to bring home grown players into the first team and to give them a chance on the pitch. However, the current youth academy system has its limits. Once a year there's an inflow of new players and if your academy is any good there are maybe one or two you can use. Ok, cool. It's not like I'm managing Ajax, Barcelona or Boca Juniors, so I'll take that. But I always try to grow my teams into the kind of Youth Academy that is worldclass. Nothing but the best. This takes years and even then I end up kidnapping the best youngers I can find in other teams. This, because my own youth academy can't deliver (there are exceptions ofcourse). I really want my teams to live up to the standard Ajax, Benfica and other teams have set. The thing is, these teams really invest in their youth. Not just by throwing money at the infrastructure, training grounds, youth coaches and head of the academy. They go around and effectively scout other youth players, which they then try to sign at an early age. Getting a 13 or 14 year old and dropping him in a high professional environment can do wonders and you get to mold the players into the players you need for your system. In the current system they are "scouted" by your staff and you don't know how long they have been at your club. You first see them when they are 16, 17 years old. In the current system, no matter what I try: coach, head coach, etc all playing the same system as my first team, even by default because it's the coaches favorite system and I still end up with wingers where I need wingbacks or Harry Maguire when I always play with playmaking defenders. You get the idea, right? Or worse, I just bought a young Danish player who cost me a zillion of euros to buy, only to be given a excellent youth player by my academy who turns out to play at the exact same position... if only I had known this in advance !!! I could have spend my money on another position. In real life, managers know what kind of youth players are coming up, years in advance. What if - hear me out - we get to scout younger players, sign them and develop them into players for the first team years in advance? Not all of them will make it. Some will stagnate, some will improve beyond expectations and one might be the next Freddy Adu, that star player at 13 you just had to sign, only for him to become that player you'd wish you never signed when he turns 19 and is rotting on your bench because yeah... he was awesome until he wasn't. That kind of sad story. Imagine the extra dimension this could mean for the game!!! You'd be able to let your coaches handle the actual games ofcourse, but you'd have more time to train them and to plan the future of the team. Now, I do understand this is a burden on the database and hence the overall performance of your computer, so this could be like maybe an option when you start the game or something? You could toggle it off or on in the starting page. In the end it's every player's choice if they want the expanded youth academies in their game or not. Thoughts? edit: English isn't my first language, made some typo's