How Do People Find Bargain Players

[Ronaldo Beckham]

I am curious how everyone in here finds their bargain players from different countries.

Do you trust your scouts or leave it to your DOF to make your signings ?

Do you scout specific countries or regions ?

Do you search for players with certain attributes ?

I am asking cos I see people on here sign players I have never heard of and I enjoy hearing these new players. I want to find some bargains myself.

I would like to hear posters I admire in here for their process in finding such players so if @Welshace @Jogo Bonito could if possible when they have the time post in this thread about their scouting players process I would appreciate it even if it is just a short paragraph. 

[bangkonggedek]

Rarely ever use DoF myself to make signings.

For non-newgen players, you can't go wrong with occasionally scouting Brazil every couple of months for players released for free from their clubs. I find these Brazilian players on the last few iterations of FM databases, even for those with the potential ratings on the lower end of the scale, tend to possess pretty evenly spread attributes so that they'll easily slot in to whichever tactics you're building for your team, or at least to be signed as good multipurpose squad/backup players. Honestly though I think that the Brazilian researcher(s) year by year keep on overrating their domestic players especially on their mental/tactical aspect of the game, as from the fair numbers of football matches that I've seen of their domestic league, the tactical cognizance and spatial awareness on display were quite frustrating to watch, to put it mildly. Thankfully enough the abundance of talents on every other aspects of the game did make up for it.

I digress. For specific attributes, I usually put it on my priority to sign those reported with the better Determination, as from experience its effect might be not that noticeable per player per match but when you build a whole squad with that attribute on the higher end of the scale on average, the effect is rather significant in helping your team consistently getting better results or bouncing back from behind during a match.

I took special care for players' Work Rate in combination with Stamina and Natural Fitness; as those with good rating for the former but reported poor on the latter two might struggle to consistently keeping fit especially for leagues with stacked schedules.

Some player with Either as their preferred foot might consequently lacking in the attributes spread at glance, but depending on the way your tactic being set up and the role they're being used, they will consistently perform much better than their Right Only or Left Only colleagues.

As for newgen players, along with the usual countries, look for the occasional talents coming from Colombia (sometimes they came with ridiculously cheap release clauses as other forum members might have noted), Turkey, Russia, Mexico and (somehow!) Egypt. For newgens from other African countries usually I look up their youth national team setup and look for the ones currently attracting interests from plenty of (mainly French) clubs, even those with the seemingly low base abilities. Somehow these AI scouts are rarely wrong and when raised properly, these kids will eventually turn into legitimate world beaters.

[Welshace]

These days I have my go to leagues and countries in general I will search regularly manually club by club because by now you just know they tend to produce decent prospects regularly..

 

But if I was going to suggest a method, it will be this..

Consider the country you are managing in, any rules for transfers that should determine where you scout? (eu players only etc)

Then send scouts to each of those countries to search..

I would also at this point search through top clubs manually.. maybe pick a couple of players out for scouting from each club.

 

Generally speaking if using scouts, I would use certain parameters... for youngsters I will always look for great personality traits (driven, model proffesional etc) I will also tend to favour certain attibutes depending on the style of team I'm building.. i.e lower leagues i will favour physical stats massively over anything else, middling clubs I'll look at some decent technicals but favour mental stats such as workrate, teamwork, determination, and those that pertain to the position i'm looking at...  and at top skillful teams, i'll favour technicals over anything else.

 

But yeah, by now it's a simple choice of scouting the usual suspect countries and leagues.. my favourites are the scandanavian countries (everyone does this by now though), Bulgaria, Romania, Belgium lower leagues, Austria etc.. generally speaking, the lower reputation league with some decent clubs in.

 

Though the leagues you scout change with the club and league you are managing too, the classic example is in the lower lower leagues you would always scout Reunion as there is a wealth of players with a reputation low enough to sign for you, but vastly superior to your level etc.

 

[Ronaldo Beckham]

Cheers for the advice so far guys, much appreciated that you took the time to post in here.

[Snorks]

I would agree with what Welsh said.

I think we all have different 'methods' to scouting. If I am at a big English club, I like to have a scout in each EU country, one in S.America etc. I also have a 'Youth' scouting team, high in JPA, who are also regionalised (Ideally I would have them working in pairs - one looking at senior players, the other looking at youth teams/comps) but staff numbers restrict that.

For the 'bargains' I tend to go young - scouting the top teams intakes in the top leagues from intake day. 

I monitor the youth tournaments, and scout players that show up there manually.

Towards the end of season, I look at teams likely to be relegated from the level I play in. Getting a team report and looking at their best players - many won't want to play in a lower league and a reasonably sensible approach can secure some quality quite cheap.

I tend not to add any parameters, I prefer to get notified of anyone that is good and I will sort the shortlisting manually. Any player I am interested in, whether because of CA, PA or personality, will get shortlisted - I have four shortlists,, U18, U23, Backup, First Team and players are added for a year. So, I get to reassess every year, some kids are spotted at intake, can end up sitting on the shortlist for years but always in the 'correct' shortlist. First Team shortlist gets players with high enough CA to get First Team or Key status with me, Same with Backup shortlist, U23 and U18 shortlist is purely on age unless CA high enough.

All players on the shortlist are 100% scouted, and reports are kept up to date. So I Can often spot a player, top quality but on a long contract - he sits on the shortlist until his contract runs down and price has dropped.

[Welshace]

5 hours ago, Snorks said:

I would agree with what Welsh said.

I think we all have different 'methods' to scouting. If I am at a big English club, I like to have a scout in each EU country, one in S.America etc. I also have a 'Youth' scouting team, high in JPA, who are also regionalised (Ideally I would have them working in pairs - one looking at senior players, the other looking at youth teams/comps) but staff numbers restrict that.

For the 'bargains' I tend to go young - scouting the top teams intakes in the top leagues from intake day. 

I monitor the youth tournaments, and scout players that show up there manually.

Towards the end of season, I look at teams likely to be relegated from the level I play in. Getting a team report and looking at their best players - many won't want to play in a lower league and a reasonably sensible approach can secure some quality quite cheap.

I tend not to add any parameters, I prefer to get notified of anyone that is good and I will sort the shortlisting manually. Any player I am interested in, whether because of CA, PA or personality, will get shortlisted - I have four shortlists,, U18, U23, Backup, First Team and players are added for a year. So, I get to reassess every year, some kids are spotted at intake, can end up sitting on the shortlist for years but always in the 'correct' shortlist. First Team shortlist gets players with high enough CA to get First Team or Key status with me, Same with Backup shortlist, U23 and U18 shortlist is purely on age unless CA high enough.

All players on the shortlist are 100% scouted, and reports are kept up to date. So I Can often spot a player, top quality but on a long contract - he sits on the shortlist until his contract runs down and price has dropped.

This.. in a nutshell...

 

I would also add that I see my scouts as the first step only.. they are one tool in many that I use and I certainly don't decide anything based on what they say alone.. the amount of perfectly suited players I would have missed out on because my perfect scout claimed the players lack of pace or downside in any area is ridiculous.. I don't trust them 100%.

Basically, I like to cover all the bases and have every finger in every pie to hopefully spot any potentials and then just zero in on the ones that are great...

 

The thing about finding unknowns is that they are generally unknown because they lack something that everyone else can't or don't look past.. the players I tend to find and post on the forums are all missing something that everyone elses typical filters miss...

 

It's why one of my favourite players in recent editions is someone like Pavelka... everyone looks past certain key attributes that are missing, but fail to see that what he does have is pretty unique to his level and reputation. (in this case, it's his technicals which are a weakness,but his mental attributes are hard to find in someone so obtainable and cheap)

[mortiphago]

Looking for young players with good determination (>15) and a decent spread of other mentals and physicals has never failed me. Technicals can improve through training, but you cant really teach mentals, nor improve physicals much (specially pace. Players generally dont get faster past 18 to 19 years old).

 

As for bargains, I've had great luck with south korean regens

[dothestrand]

1 hour ago, mortiphago said:

Looking for young players with good determination (>15) and a decent spread of other mentals and physicals has never failed me. Technicals can improve through training, but you cant really teach mentals, nor improve physicals much (specially pace. Players generally dont get faster past 18 to 19 years old).

 

As for bargains, I've had great luck with south korean regens

Determination is usually high on my list; ditto work rate and teamwork. Usually when there's a new intake, I use the three and strength/stamina/natural fitness starting with 10+.

[Woolly]

For younger players I do what the earlier posts state, however, I always look at the beginning of a season for players who are coming to the end of their contract within 12 months, and make a note of any I like the look of. Come January time I look again at the contract list I scout those players at larger clubs and below the age of 25, then if the scout report is favourable I will offer a contract. Not every player will want to accept a contract especially if you are with a team in a lower reputation country/league but even if they don't want to take up your offer straight away waiting a few months when the contracts get closer to finishing or have finished can usually lead to a player changing their minds and not only want to join a lower rep team but will be more take lower wages as well. I've picked up many bargains this way (not all of them have been successful but I've nearly always managed to sell them on without losing too much to agents and signing on fees).  As has been said before Brazil is great for picking up regens however, don't forget the other South American countries one of the best goal scorers I have found was a regen from Peru who I got on a free the lad just scored for fun. I've also had a fair bit of luck with African teams the gems are there to be found even if some are better hidden than others.   

[FlairRA]

For regens I typically go onto the scouting feature and seperate by 'Interested', two separate categories for Non-EU/EU and then search for the ones with the highest value. After that I highlight 50 players each (from EU and non-EU) and select "Scout till Full Knowledge" and then after that it's a simple matter of choosing the highest potential players with the least cost. I haven't got much to say for non-regens as my saves typically don't go that way! For bargains South America is where you certainly want to go. 

[User0912]

Apologies if its obvious but how can I get a scout to scout a region, for the life of me I can't remember where it is.

Thanks

[steakfaced]

15 hours ago, User0912 said:

Apologies if its obvious but how can I get a scout to scout a region, for the life of me I can't remember where it is.

Thanks

In scouting assignments, simply choose region rather than competition, etc. 

[User0912]

2 hours ago, steakfaced said:

In scouting assignments, simply choose region rather than competition, etc. 

Thanks got it.

Cheers

[theeyeofthetiger]

I scout Portuguese, Scandinavian countries permanantly

[Nonlondoner]

I search the lists of all known players on the scouting screen by selecting whichever attribute best suits the sort of player I'm after. Say look for Finishing of 15-20. Then check the highest ones for other good attributes (high technique for example) and then get reports. You have to trawl through a lot of dross but you will find a bargain or two. I've picked up two players for my Arsenal team that way, so there's quality out there.  There's an unsigned 15 year old German AMC at the start with a very high PA. I'm not able to confirm name as I'm nowhere near my PC. 

[wardog]

For me it's all about scouting. Actually finding my current save frustrating because I have a small scouting allowance. 

Historically I love to send scouts to Romania and Serbia find a gem an monitor. Usually theyll throw a minute release clause into a contract. Wait till he's no longer "just signed a new contract so won't leave" and boom that guys mine. Tell the press to shh because they think I've over paid then sell on for huge profit. 

That's just an example but in general for me its constant scouting. I'll have one of the largest shortlists you'll ever see just monitoring players all the time. 

[fidelitywars]

Think that ultimately, it's about knowing the database and finding patterns as to where talented players tend to emerge (in FM, at least). As a rule, there are certain clubs that usually have a few high potential/low(ish) value players so my first ports of call are always Dinamo Zagreb, RB Salzburg, Dynamo Kyiv, Boca Juniors, Partizan Belgrade, Braga and Steaua Bucharest where i'd usually sort by age (youngest to eldest) and juts browse each profile.

From there, there are certain leagues that tend to offer rich pickings for bargains - for me, these are Romania, Serbia, Switzerland, Ukraine, Denmark, Norway, Argentina, Mexico and increasingly, Portugal (outside the big 3 but including Benfica and Porto's B teams). I tend to just scour through each team with the view set to show technical attributes, sorted by technique. I find this gives as good a snapshot of abilities as possible - anyone who seems to have a well-rounded technical game, I click on to view their full profile and assess whether they're worth scouting. This approach is also useful to scour through the under 21 national teams of Europe and South America, as well as the u19 national teams of any nations whose leagues are being run in full detail. Scrolling through full national teams sorted by age (youngest to eldest again) can also be useful - typically, anybody playing international football for any half-decent nation whilst still a teenager is worth a closer look.