[FM20] Tequila and Mariachi?

[metallimuse]

Incredible progress and a real inspiration to read with your player development.

[_Ben_]

2 minutes ago, metallimuse said:

Incredible progress and a real inspiration to read with your player development.

Thank you! It's almost as if now the progress of the club takes a back seat whilst I focus on the progress of the players, which, will then in the long run, re-ignite the progress of the club. I wouldn't expect many more on-pitch fireworks for a few years!

[metallimuse]

32 minutes ago, _Ben_ said:

Thank you! It's almost as if now the progress of the club takes a back seat whilst I focus on the progress of the players, which, will then in the long run, re-ignite the progress of the club. I wouldn't expect many more on-pitch fireworks for a few years!

I've been putting the infrastructure of the club first while still making great progress domestically but now that's all sorted by the end of this season with the new stadium I'm going to be looking next at really developing the players and building up my finances so I can make an assault on Europe next.

[_Ben_]

10 minutes ago, metallimuse said:

I've been putting the infrastructure of the club first while still making great progress domestically but now that's all sorted by the end of this season with the new stadium I'm going to be looking next at really developing the players and building up my finances so I can make an assault on Europe next.

I think that I'm a step ahead of you, coming from the Spanish leagues, simply because of the infrastructure of the teams around us but you'll soon get to a point whereby money doesn't matter. I have €140m in the bank now and I'm not planning to spend much - ensuring the facilities are great and then finding those few talents who will upgrade the squad in the long run.

[_Ben_]

Wonderkid

Not quite technically where I want him to be, but having my in-game son reach wonderkid level is fantastic. What could top this? His brother appearing maybe?

[_Ben_]

Sentiment

Watching Alená come back to watch us watching the central defender that he formed a good relationship with during his five years here? Sentiment, right there.

[metallimuse]

1 minute ago, _Ben_ said:

Wonderkid

Not quite technically where I want him to be, but having my in-game son reach wonderkid level is fantastic. What could top this? His brother appearing maybe?

Does the game tell you he's your son? Never had one in all my years.

[_Ben_]

Just now, metallimuse said:

Does the game tell you he's your son? Never had one in all my years.

Yep:

and on my profile:

---

I've been incredibly lucky with this over the years. On FM17 I had a Japanese son when I was managing First Vienna but I didn't progress the game enough to see how good he became, on FM18 I had a Rwandan son managing BX Brussels who went on to become my assistant manager after a fairly poor playing career and now I've had this lad!

Last year, I did get Sammarinese brothers through my intakes and they both went on to win the league together in the same team! I also was pretty sure that I had twins come through the academy (same birthdate, date of birth and surname) back on an older FM - but I think that was before they were recognised as such.

[metallimuse]

Very cool.

I'm hoping to get a son now I'm starting double figures at my club and praying he's decent 

[_Ben_]

6 minutes ago, metallimuse said:

Very cool.

I'm hoping to get a son now I'm starting double figures at my club and praying he's decent 

There was a thread in the GD section that was asking for a search filter for 'Father' or 'son' and indeed 'brother/relative' as it'd be a nice challenge to put together a family side. Take this lad for example - he just popped up in a Player Search so I did a little more research (i.e. scouting) to reveal who his father is:

He came through the system at Southampton when his father was managing there.

[_Ben_]

October/November 2034

When things aren't going right, it's important to analyse and try and rectify it. It's been a long afternoon in front of FM and I've completed a lot more of the game than I normally would in one day!

October started well - by well, it didn't really start in a positive way as I looked to stay tight and really not worry about our lack of goalscoring as we entertained Napoli and Real. Taking four points from these two games was a huge positive, and we were not hugely outclassed by the Madrid giants. A heavily rotated squad took on Hercules, with the Lyon game in the back of my mind. One thing that I took from that game is that when Ronaldo has fully developed, he's going to be every bit as lethal as he namesake. He scored twice, both goals rather innocuous positions whereby his attacking running and precise finishing stunned their defence. The next two games relied on two penalties to win them - neither game had Ronaldo on and neither time I was quick enough to hit the 'Change Taker' button to give Neyveson a chance to kick start his goalscoring season, but centre back Carlos Alberto converted twice.

November saw another game where my forwards didn't find the net, with two goals coming from each full back. Neyveson and Lyndon finally combined, twice, to see of Osasuna and a loss against Lyon was not unexpected, given their standing as the second best team in France, behind Monaco and ahead of a Mourinho-as-DoF-led PSG. We thrashed Leganes and another penalty from Alberto secured a shock qualification in the Champions League, with a tie left to play.

We're not out of the woods yet as the majority of the team is in poor form and we aren't anywhere near our fluid best but we move into December at least somewhere near where we need to be. Below are the average ratings of all players below 7.0. Looking towards the bottom of the list, key players like Escobar, Carlos and Bono have really under-performed. It is no surprise that we have failed to find the net (hence Neyveson's low rating and return of 3 in 14(3) at 0.21 goals/90) when our creative players aren't influencing the game enough.

 

[_Ben_]

Consortium?

We'll see where this goes...

[_Ben_]

Intake Preview

Another golden generation?!

[_Ben_]

Retirement

It's very rare I get attached to non-newgen players but the combination of Puig and Pena has been the cornerstone of this game. I, as a mark of respect/squad planning, won't be getting him to reconsider his retirement and he'll play out his last six months as a professional with us.

[_Ben_]

December 2034/January 2035

A hellish two months and whoever decided to put a four team Supercopa (how did we even qualify?!) in January is stupid! We've just about made it through the league games and we're just about where we are expected to be - even though Valencia, Atletico, Sevilla and Granada are all behind us. We crashed out of the Copa del Rey with a terrible, and tired, performance against Elche - who are fighting their own relegation battle, in the league below us.

We are also through, safely, to the Knockout phase of the CL - and we have been drawn against Monaco, a tie I expect to lose. 

Something is just not right this season with our style of play and, quite frankly, I'm not enjoying it. This season needs to hurry up and conclude and we can move on from there.

---

We have lost Neyveson to a broken foot and also missed Carlos Alberto for a good chunk of January so I have recruited three loanees for the rest of the season with Ibrahima Gueye being the pick of them. None of them have any interest in joining permanently and they are largely for numbers as we are still in two competitions with a threadbare first team

[_Ben_]

Perceived potential change

This was Dani Uriate when he generated last summer, as shown in my intake report:

This has nothing to do with his personality, I don't think, but it's a good show of changes in perceived potential ability. I have not changed any staff during this time so I can't say that other people are viewing him, rather they know him better or he's now looking like he can perform at a much higher level.

Four stars means nothing to me, other than he could be amongst the best players in a squad. I think that is paying off signing all of the players as, to be fair, Uriate may not have been signed if it wasn't for his personality.

[wesl]

22 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

A hellish two months and whoever decided to put a four team Supercopa (how did we even qualify?!) in January is stupid

First edition with this format took place this year. The final was the match where Valverde made that horror tackle on Morata. I think you probably qualified through league position, with the cup finalists also being in the top 4? Something like that.

[_Ben_]

21 minutes ago, wesl said:

First edition with this format took place this year. The final was the match where Valverde made that horror tackle on Morata. I think you probably qualified through league position, with the cup finalists also being in the top 4? Something like that.

Yes - the top four were in it and it was Barca who won the Copa del Rey last year. They seem to have followed on from Italy with having this type of competition mid-season. It gave us a bye in the Copa del Rey ourselves but it was two games against tough opposition we really didn't need!

[_Ben_]

February/March 2035

We've sneakily managed to put together a pretty good run of form here that has lifted us to a good position in the league, above a lot of the big teams all seemingly having bad seasons together - yet we still aren't playing too well. Our performance against Hercules was the highlight of the two month period whereby both midfielders finally got themselves in on the act - running the midfield and scoring a great goal each.

We succumbed in France to two late goals and we just couldn't turn that around at home - ending our fantastic first season in the Champions League.

 

[_Ben_]

2034/35 Youth Intake

A golden generation but a much longer tail that what I had last year with many more negative personalities. Here are my three to watch:

Juan Francisco Herrero. Mohamoud Almansour. Gustavo Catalan

From my three - I have picked Herrero due to his personality. Dani Uriate had made great progress in both training and perceived potential ability and shares a common personality with Herrero, so I'm interested to see what he can do. I do also like the Mijhalovic-esque Centre Back freekick taker. Almansour seems to have the quality to make the first team although his crossing ability is very poor. He'll play B-team football shortly and I hope his development will be promising. Catalan is my 'project' - he's got a good personality and I want to see how much I can extract from a player seen as a 1.5* standard. He may be useless - but he's good comparative data.

[_Ben_]

Youth Intake: One Year On

As said previously, last year was the first year that I actually retained all of the youth candidates and gave them varying roles within my two squads (B and U19) based on their ability and their potential. I have been tracking M.Citizen Dani Uriate across the year but here is the full breakdown of their perceived potential ability - 365 days after they generated:

Talking personalities first of all: Molinero has gained professionalism, Aguilar has turned to Resolute but there has been no other changes. It is worth noting that these two, although not just these two, have been part of the B-team this year which, on the whole, has the more promising and, as such, better personalities in it.

Looking at the changes in potential - Molinero and Uriate have changed a whole star. Again - I don't know or care how much that star is worth really but I am interested in how much more they have to develop - and, in that sense, the stars are important to know how to shape their development. Looking at the more negative personalities - that of Minambres and Garcia - neither of those have changed at all.

It is also interesting to look at the media description - normally the games way of saying 'this player has potential.' The top four are all now 'Promising' but so is Felix Lopez - a player who has, himself, increased in perceived potential ability and has a good personality. He is playing B-team football this year, largely as a plug to fill my complete lack of defensive midfielders.

---

It is definitely producing some interesting results and every bit that I can learn to get the best from the players is essential to how I play the game.

[_Ben_]

My intended recruitment policy: The Cultural y Deportiva Leonesa 'way'

The above shows every player in the game who has a dual nationality of Spanish and Qatari. 

For some background on why this is important - Leonesa are a small club, in the second tier, that come from Leon. They are, in real life, owned by the ASPIRE Sports Group, from Qatar but this is not reflected in the game as their current chairman is Spanish and their local takeover (in 2025) replaced a board who had distinctly Spanish names. The club has two partnerships, one with ASPIRE Senegal (this is harder to count as there are many more dual Spanish/Senegalese players in the database) and one with ASPIRE Academy, based in Qatar. Each of these players has entered the Leonesa youth system through this agreement. Faisal Ali, Abdulla Ballan and the promising Abdulrahman Al-Ali are all players who have come from this group.

I don't believe that the owners have a massive impact, although I do recall Valencia having some Singaporeans and I've seen a few Saudi's come from the Man City academy in the past, so this is down, in my eyes, to the academy. 

I was really hoping to set up an academy link with a club similar to this but all of the African nations and the Romanian link came up negative at youth intake day and I just don't know why!

[_Ben_]

April/May 2035

The season has come to a close and, despite our really poor play, we have ground out some important victories, finishing above our media prediction of ninth. However - the season has been massively overshadowed by the fact that we finished ahead of Valencia, Atletico and Sevilla and, if we hadn't have capitulated, at home, against Sociedad on the last day of the season, would have finished third.

April saw a continuation of poor goalscoring and surprisingly bad defending, conceding three for the first (of two) times this season against an average Athletic team. We then stumbled against Leganes before scraping past another mid-table team in Villareal. We found some scoring form against the smaller teams in May but couldn't end on a high against a Sociedad team that, on the course of the season, probably deserved third.

---

May also saw the first of our transfer deals for the summer, with Benjamin moving to the Middle East. He's been a great servant but, with our stagnation, it's time to opt for youth.

[_Ben_]

End of Season: 2034/35

As I predicted in one of my mid-season ramblings, there is likely to be more progress for the club in the next few years than there is to be on the first team squad, as typified by the improvement the B-team has made, narrowly missing out on the playoffs. We can be proud that we have competed in four competitions with, at times, a threadbare squad. I think  that the summer will see a move to bolster the squad with some academy players - in the hope that I can now create a settled squad for the next five or six years and see progress there, rather than rely on the older heads who have got me to this point but will slowly be fading away over the next years themselves.

Here are the statistics for the year just gone, which sees Sergi Puig play his last season in competitive football and, worryingly, a huge dip in average ratings for the whole squad. As I've said - I haven't really enjoyed how we play and I'll be looking at this over the summer but to watch the average ratings plummet for my top players year to year is a worry. Below is the comparison between last year, our fourth placed finish, with this:

Jorge Navarro and Alex Villasanti are the only two first team players to maintain their form with Andrei Oprea the only one to 'improve' it - although he was very much in a transitional half season in the first team and certainly hadn't found his feet. Plus, his average rating this year isn't exactly something to shout about. Neyveson broke his foot but really struggled for form all season, Brian Pena has scored once since 2032 now, Jose Bono and Escobar look lightweight in the middle of the park and even the normally rock solid full back and centre back trio of Celsinho, Bravo/Samaniego and Carlos Alberto have all been wobbly. 

The largest problem has been goals:

Teams are now sitting back way more and the old 'control the space' way has become a lot more difficult to do. All of my forward thinking players have struggled, except for Samuel but he has hardly been clinical with a total of nine goals across the two seasons. 

---

We're expanding the stadium and improving the youth facilities over the summer but my hard work on the pitch is already beginning. We are bringing in Ruimar Evaristo from Gremio (I thought it was last year but I didn't realise he wasn't turning 18 until this May) and then we are going to get as much quality youth into the first team as we can. From there, it'll be a steady slog with these players to see how far that they can go. 

Next season must be a much more pleasurable play for me or this could be an early end!

---

[_Ben_]

2034/35 Youth Cohort Progress:

These 13 players have just completed their first team in the professional ranks of my team, and, as such, have had their progress monitored. Above is the development, which is incredibly promising. As a cohort - they have averaged 1.2 points progress for the average of their attributes and their has been a 1 point increase for mental attributes - which I feel are key for top players.

Here are some individual highlights:

Amazingly, six of this cohort make the top 10 player improvement for a year. Granted, our facilities are improving year on year but this is unprecedented progress from some, on paper, quite average players. It is worth noting that the top three have great personalities whilst I'd say the second three have positive (on a scale of poor, average, positive, great) so to see their development being so good is a) great news but b) somewhat confusing in terms of finding those ideal personalities.

In terms of looking at end average - here is the top 10:

As always, Benjamin and Baena are anomalies as they are both older and Villalba is also discounted as this was his second season at the club. Therefore, Uriate makes it into the top three and Aguilar and Molinero have also secured good improvements.  It is worth noting though that the majority of these top players are getting plenty of B team minutes (highlited yellow) so it would be interested to see how the trajectory of their career pans out - knowing that SI have introduced 'early declines' and 'differing rates of progress/regress' but I doubt I'll get another fifteen years into this game.

---

This has been a great year for my intake as my B-team is now becoming a great breeding ground for top talent and, even though there is no competitive football, my U19 players are showing that they can progress well, too. My next cohort is up next and I'll be using the same kind of amount of players once again.

[_Ben_]

2035/26 Youth Cohort

In comes the new cohort of twelve youngsters. As mentioned - we have a range of personalities but, overall, I'd say that they are worse. We have a wide range of 'starting mean' but it is worth noting that Alberto Ropero, my now first team centre back, started with a mean of just 6.8. Even our weakest players here are significantly better than that - including my 'project' - Gustavo Catalan, who comes in at 8.2, good enough for 37th best out 56 players who have been part of this tracking.

---

Three players make the top ten for starting averages with the standout Almansour coming in third (adjusted for removal of Baena and Benajmin) with centre back Herrero an adjusted sixth. It is also a space in the top ten for Felipe - who I missed off at first due to his poor personality and probably only makes this list due to the attribute skew for being very one-footed.

---

I've changed up my overview so that I can see the phases that I have gone through and can compare like-for-like more. This feels like a much weaker cohort than last, yet was described as a golden generation, whereas the last one wasn't. We are weaker technically and physically yet the progress made by the cohort last year was previously unheard of. It'll be interesting to see how far this group can go.

I've very much got my eyes of Almansour and Herrero who will be playing B-team football next year but I'm hoping to give more of them first team football, too.

 

[_Ben_]

Loan Development

I don't track goalkeepers (because it's a fiddle to set up for one player when there are ten other players on the pitch) but Fulvio has made excellent progress and is naturally a replacement for Sergi Puig. He, therefore, is excluded from this update.

---

This has, unfortunately, been the final nail in the coffin for Palacios and Burgos and I'll be looking to move both on as they are a) not good enough to make the first team as shown by their lack of development, maybe indicating that PA or natural PA is reached and b) now not good enough for the B-team and, by playing them, stop other youngsters from developing. Galindo, whilst making no progress, has scored nine and assisted seven times for an AR of 7.14 and, on form alone, may get another chance. 

---

I need to keep monitoring loan deals as, whilst I'm not expecting gains similar to that of the youth players, I need to see what is more important - attribute gain, first team experience or good form at a level that is right for the player.

[_Ben_]

Retirement

What a player. Thank you Sergi Puig.

[Fudal]

Is Puig a club legend?

[_Ben_]

1 minute ago, Fudal said:

Is Puig a club legend?

No, annoyingly, it's been very hard to make any moves on these lists:

[_Ben_]

2035/36 Squad Changes

As I said, this season will see the most significant number of changes for a few years. However, the vast majority of these squad changes are internal promotions. Significant changes include Fulvio in for the retiring Puig, Ruimar Evaristo in for Qatar bound Jose Carlos and the most sentimental of them all - the deal that has seen Brian Pena leave the club after fifteen years. He, like Puig, has been a key part of this save but the time is right- just 23 goals in five seasons in La Liga, with just one since the end of 2033.

Below is the squad with our 'club DNA' shown:

Fulvio is already a really good fit in goal and will be the first choice for the remainder of this save, I'd imagine. Full backs are still strong - even though I still only have three. It is worth noting that Diego Samaniego is my first 'full circle' full back - although he is the only one that isn't both footed. Centre backs are strong and I've added Quique Fernandez to the first team after his impressive spell in the B team last year. The defensive midfielders remain strong and consistent although Villalba is finding first team minutes more and more hard to come by. I've added Juan Francisco Mejia to the first team as an extra body that I didn't have last year, after deciding that he wasn't quite ready. 6G and 4A last year with an AR of 7.42 show his quality in the B squad and he's a lot more rounded than he was. He won't be first choice but I'm confident that he'll soon make his way into the team given his exceptionally well rounded but impressive attributes for his age. I've added two wingers - Ruimar Evaristo, who is clearly quality at such a tender age and Gualberto Esquivel who, despite being the most raw player, comes off the back of a great season in the B-team. He needs some quite specific development as I outlined when I signed him, so giving him first team minutes and allowing me to control his traits will be necessary. The two forwards stay the same.

--

I've also made some slight changes to the development squads - with the B squad now becoming the home of anyone talented (whereas before it was just 11 players picked so I could guarantee they'd get football) with the remainder getting their footballing education in the U19 squad. Here is my B-team:

Rafa Molinero is the closest to the first team here and that could be good with only three recognised full backs. He's got a bit to learn still but he was the player who through listed as a CWB (what I'd consider a specialist role, maybe indicating high potential) and has made great progress (this equates to an average of 1.5 mean points better off). Ortega, a signing last summer from Sevilla is promising but isn't the tallest, yet is only sixteen. Dani Uriate has been the poster boy for this new development approach and is doing well - although does lack a lot of the actual attributes I want for him in the midfield. Never the less, if he continues to develop and defy like he has done for the past year, then the sky is the limit. Almansour is my big prospect right now but comes into a role that I hope will be filled with Esquivel for the foreseeable, so I need to work out how to get them both into the team. Alejandro, somewhat overshadowed by Mejia in his development year is coming along really nicely and is not far from displacing Samuel from the first team. Rafa Aguilar is also showing some promise up top.

Top 5 Prospects:

5. Toni Ortega

4. Dani Uriate

3. Rafa Molinero

2. Alejandro

1. Mohamoud Almansour

Edited April 4, 2020 by _Ben_

[_Ben_]

New Signing

My signings are rarely flashy these days but below is a player I have spent €950k on and who will join the B-team for the next few years:

I like that he's two footed and has great long shots and decisions. We can work on rounding out the rest but to see someone who is already good on the ball with good intelligence can only bode well. He also joins an area whereby I don't have a huge amount of depth.

[quee]

Hi Ben. I'm wondering if you can give me some input on mentoring. I remember reading some of your posts about this and thought you would know more about it.

Once a player gained the targeted personality, is it safe to remove them from the mentoring group or it is better to keep them together?

I have a Born Leader and Resolute goalkeepers, is it safe for the resolute goalkeeper to be in the same mentoring group as the Born Leader? I don't want him to go lower and get a lesser personality.

[_Ben_]

5 hours ago, quee said:

Hi Ben. I'm wondering if you can give me some input on mentoring. I remember reading some of your posts about this and thought you would know more about it.

Once a player gained the targeted personality, is it safe to remove them from the mentoring group or it is better to keep them together?

I have a Born Leader and Resolute goalkeepers, is it safe for the resolute goalkeeper to be in the same mentoring group as the Born Leader? I don't want him to go lower and get a lesser personality.

Of course. Here is the first team and the current set up that I have:

This is a process of a lot of hard work but also getting especially lucky early in the save - being able to bring through quality players, who would be team leaders, who have good Determination and Personalities.

Now - anyone who I want to bring into the first team who doesn't have a great personality goes into a mentoring group. To be honest - the first mentoring group isn't entirely necessary but there is no professionalism 'knowledge' from Driven so I want to increase that. What I tend to do is remove the player whenever they reach the 'ideal' personality. This works better for me, I'd imagine, because of the squad personality, which is Highly Professional as well as the general personalities within the squad. For a team with a wider range of personalities - that may be a bit more hit and miss.

----

For your example - look at the personalities:

Born Leader
Leadership 20, Determination 20

 

Resolute
Determination 15-17, Professionalism 15-17
Leader <19

 

If you were to keep them together and the Resolute player had an impact on the Born Leader - you'd find that he wouldn't have that tag for much longer as his determination would drop. This would also worry me as there is no indication of the player's professionalism. As far as I am aware - Leadership isn't passed on through Mentoring.

If it was the other way round, and you utilise the Leadership Course to get the second player to have 20 for Leadership, then you may end up with a player who has the traits of a Born Leader but also really good professionalism.

 

If you include their Media Handling styles, we can get a better insight as to what their hidden attributes actually are and see but the short answer is - If Resolute is more higher in hierarchy, keep them together. If Born Leader is higher in hierarchy, I'd be cautious about it.

[quee]

5 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

If Resolute is more higher in hierarchy, keep them together. If Born Leader is higher in hierarchy, I'd be cautious about it.

Forgive me, but shouldn't it be the other way around?

Since you would want the Resolute player to gain something from the Born Leader?

Resolute is an influential player, whilst Born Leader is a team leader.

I'm confused now.

But thank you for the detailed reply! Much appreciated, just trying to get my head around it 

[_Ben_]

12 hours ago, quee said:

Forgive me, but shouldn't it be the other way around?

Since you would want the Resolute player to gain something from the Born Leader?

Resolute is an influential player, whilst Born Leader is a team leader.

I'm confused now.

But thank you for the detailed reply! Much appreciated, just trying to get my head around it 

Yes, you're right!

However - my concern with the Born Leader is as follows:

These are the attributes we know - Leadership 20, Determination 20 but none of those are hidden. If you could tell me his media handling style I can begin to close down what is under the hood, but, he could have (as an extreme, and I'm sure he'd then fit into another category - but hopefully you get the jist):

Ambition 1

Controversy 20

Loyalty 1

Pressure 1

Professionalism 1

Sportmanship 1

Temperament 1

This player, despite being highly determined and a leader of others might have no ambition to better himself on the pitch or training ground, might want to jump ship whenever he can, crumble under pressure, not look after himself, pick up bookings for simulation (although probably not as a GK!) and react badly to anything you say. Worst of all - he's a 'leader' in the sense of his leadership attribute and being a Team Leader, too.

This is extreme, as I said, but we don't know what is under the hood for this personality type!

----

With Resolute - you'll at least know something about his hidden personality traits. Take Diego Samaniego - he's Resolute/Level Headed in my team. Here is what I know about his hidden attributes:

Determination 15-17

Leader <19

Ambition 1-20

Controversy 1-20

Loyalty 12-20

Pressure 1-20

Professionalism 15-17

Sportmanship 1-20

Temperament 1-20

It's not much, but I've got a player who is professional (more likely to train better, decline at a later age, work harder in training, take a better approach to his own fitness, display better body language on the pitch, react well to man management and support my opinion) as well as quite loyal (will look to stay at the club but will accept decisions to sell and accept lower contracts if sold). This is taken from a great guide here.

 

---

Remember, personality impacts so much under the hood. I, personally, would rather forego with Born Leader personality for one where I actually know  a little about how he will develop and act.

Post up a couple of screenshots of the players please (including their media handling) and we can talk through them with a bit more clarity!

[_Ben_]

Youth Production

Keeps on building up!

[_Ben_]

Cosmetic Changes

Every so often I get immersed in the cosmetic side of the game and spend a day or so solidly working on how to change my skin. I've just had one of those spells - and these are the results. Note - I ported all of my 'attribute-less' stuff into the newest TCS skin)

What I've done:

• Removed the shirt/shirt number and reduced the size of the (horrid) faces.
• Changed the key text in the first two columns. I want 'media handling' but can't find the right coding!
• Added the stats/90 module from the TCS skin. I think it's great - especially because I can't edit the season stats panel at the bottom (or can't seem to right now!)
• Added a big polygon on the left with the standard attribute sorting rather than my customised one.
• Added CA and PA stars to the additional information. They're not the be-all-and-end-all but it's nice to look sometimes without it taking up too much room.
• Position panel the same as before.
• Changed up the Career Stats panel to give me some more room but can't, right now, add Assits, Av Rating etc.

I also did this:

A) it fit's nicely into a screenshot now

B) I play the game in 2D that has us moving from one side to the other anyway.

C) Why not!

I've also removed the silly role suitability circles too as I just don't care for them.

[_Ben_]

August/September/October 2035

(Because I forgot to update after two months...)

We've made a really steady start to this season, which is great considering that relatively large (for our scale) upheaval that we've gone through. We're still not fantastic in front of goal and the player ratings which are quite poor, with only three players (Quique Fernandez: 7.11, Carlos Albert: 7.13 and Alex Villasanti: 7.03) averaging above the magic 7.  

Barcelona look to be back to their best as they hammered us and we also lost to a resurgent Sevilla side, before shutting out against Granada - in an attempt to not lose two in a row but unable to capitalise on their defensive instability. Mejia scored his first senior goal in a comfortable win over Mallorca and Quique Fernandez netted his first league goal for the club against his old side Celta before Ruimar netted his first in the league against Zaragoza in a comfortable end to the month. You may notice a lack of Neyveson in October - he's currently sidelined by injury and Ronaldo is deputising.

The Europa League is relatively easy and our B team at doing enough to get us through that group - even if the wins are far from comfortable on paper. I'll continue to shuffle the pack to get us off to the best start in the league before our post-Christmas focus shifts to trying to win a second European trophy and, as with the Europa Conference League, not qualify for it again.

---

We've also expanded our stadium, too:

 

[_Ben_]

Wonderkid watch

He's pretty good!

[_Ben_]

International Recognition

These eleven, plus Alex Villasanti - a 28 cap regular for Paraguay, show our strongest return for international players at different age groups. We are still yet to have a full Spanish international with Neyveson unable to get into the squad and Carlos Alberto unused when he was called up a few years back.

[_Ben_]

Changes in Development Tracking

So, if you've been following this - you'll know that I track improvement in my players by the ways of a 'mean attribute improvement.' I'd probably just use total points added (like @Mikaelinho has been with his 'Ginga' players in the Santástico save) but, as I can't see the actual attributes, this works well for me.

However - it takes into account an overall improvement - which is great, as I'm seeing x player is 1.5 mean 'points' better off, for example. However, I don't feel that it properly takes into account the starting point. My ideology is to develop players for a) my first team b) other first teams in top leagues or c) to remain in the professional game - therefore, I need to be not excluding those players who are weaker to start with. I've always shown a 'top mean end' table for those who leave the year of tracking as 'the best' but I feel that is a little harsh on those who came into the academy with a much lower starting point - for example Gustavo Catalan, who started as 0.5* Gold and 1.5* (with) black PA and is my 'project' player.

Therefore, I've added another column for % growth, based off their starting point:

You can see that my player, aptly named 'TEST' made 2.0 points of improvement - the best of anyone (!!) in my academy. Yet, he was already really good and that 2.0 points is only 12% of his ability, that puts him down in 13th on the % growth. It is Alberto Ropero, who, given his 'Mean Start' would surely be un-fancied in a cherry picking academy structure now, who improved by 20% of his total ability - and is now 255 games into his senior career with the club.

----

I'm now adding my tracking system to all players (including GK - but that only counts mental and physical attributes as their technical ones are different) and I will collate all of the information for every player shortly before the new youth candidates arrive. This is only because I can then sort them easier so that I don't have to keep moving data around as the new players integrate into the squad - plus, the youth candidates are measured, alone, for a year anyway.

I will be able to see who has made good improvements across their time at the club, look at who's progress is stalling and who is declining - being able to inform transfer activity even better.

[Mikaelinho]

How have I missed this? Your work is excellent and it's straight up my alley! I know what I'll spend my breaks at work doing today!

[_Ben_]

2 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

How have I missed this? Your work is excellent and it's straight up my alley! I know what I'll spend my breaks at work doing today!

Ha! It wasn't a 'come and read my posts now!' mention - I am just genuinely enjoying your work. The thing I like most is actually the gif that shows the progress. Wouldn't be as noticeable on my game because of the thresholds for coloured attributes - meaning they'd need to improve a lot to see many changes on that screen.

 

[Mikaelinho]

1 minute ago, _Ben_ said:

Ha! It wasn't a 'come and read my posts now!' mention - I am just genuinely enjoying your work. The thing I like most is actually the gif that shows the progress. Wouldn't be as noticeable on my game because of the thresholds for coloured attributes - meaning they'd need to improve a lot to see many changes on that screen.

 

I know it wasn't! I was simply pleasantly surprised when I started reading. Now I've properly started from the beginning and not page 9 and I'm really enjoying your work a lot as well. A well thought out youth development strategy always gets me going!

[_Ben_]

Tactical Thoughts

 

I'm, once again, having some tactical thoughts - largely due to our pretty awful return of 16 league goals in 14 games and the top scorer (on 5) being our centre back, with 100% of those goals from penalties. I'm working through, out loud, my tactic, which is more-than-just-influenced by @Ö-zil to the Arsenal! and his FM20 save.

---

Mentality:

• GK: Balanced
• LB: Attacking
• RB: Attacking
• CB: Balanced
• CB: Balanced
• DM: Balanced
• MCL: Positive
• MCR: Very Attacking
• AML: Balanced
• AMC: Very Attacking
• AMR: Balanced

I've added Underlap to both the full backs as it pushes their mentality up and reduces that of the wingers, hopefully stopping them from being so isolated. I've also changed the HB(d) to a DM(d) so that, instead of the 3-2-5, we form a 2-3-5 which will give us a bit more going forward. Both of my most attacking players are through the middle so it makes sense to focus the play through that but narrow the attacking focus a little to get the wingers into the box.

We've also pushed to a more offensive defensive line and line of engagement as I'm confident in the pace of my defence and the sweeping abilities of GK, Fulvio.

---

I know that this is very one-dimension, but it can be very easily switched from IWB/W to WB/IF when the game necessitates it.

 

[_Ben_]

7 minutes ago, Mikaelinho said:

I know it wasn't! I was simply pleasantly surprised when I started reading. Now I've properly started from the beginning and not page 9 and I'm really enjoying your work a lot as well. A well thought out youth development strategy always gets me going!

Every year my main saves becomes a 'accumulation of everything I've learnt in the previous FM's' and I guess that this is no different. It's a long slog and now the development has taken precedent over league form, given the strengths of Real and Barca, but I guess that'll make any success I do have even sweeter.

Your save has had a big influence over the destination of my next save, whether it on FM20 or FM21 - in Brazil, probably with Manaus, the small team from the biggest city in the rainforest. We'll be playing the best samba football that we can!

[_Ben_]

Staff personalities (and development)

Maybe another missing link towards the goal to the 'perfect' intakes, and, for me, yet another thing to monitor in my ever growing spreadsheet. Just look at all the tabs!

Ok - so coach development and personalities seems like a really important thing that could be used to influence players. Remembering that I want the best personalities to come through my youth intakes so that I can allow them to develop to the best that they can (and remembering that personality is completely separate to wanting high PA - that comes from facilities, youth rating and luck).

I also know that staff attributes change, just look at mine over the course of the save:

At the start of the game, my manager, Dario Samaniego, had a Continental A Licence, which was in line with those at the level that I started at. Since then, it's progressed to the Pro Licence and a lot of the mental attributes have also developed.

---

So how does that impact this game?

I am convinced that there is a link between staff and players, particularly staff who influence youth intakes - namely the manager, HoYD and youth staff. I am also aware that I am kind of playing this game by different rules - the game, itself, says that training is more important up to the age of 18, but I'm using my B-team to develop my best young players from the season they come through the academy - so am, technically, giving up my own youth training in favour of the B-team training and staff. Therefore I have less control from the get go and may not 'see' a player (for mentoring etc) until he is 18/19 years old - meaning that the generation personality is really important for his initial development.

My first job is to look to see if there is any link between the personalities of the staff. I have read, a lot, about the impact of just the HoYD and I would agree that he has a difference - we had 0 M.Citizens before he came but have now had 3 in the last two intakes. But I think it goes deeper:

(N.B: Up until now, I've not had any charge of signing youth staff [HoYD aside] so this group has been put together my Sergio Busquets, my DoF)

For clarity - some personalities that I haven't encountered too much and how they are made up, under the hood:

• Resilient: Pressure 17-19, Determination 15-17, Professionalism <18, Leader <19
• Spirited: Pressure 15-20, Professionalism 11-17, Determination <18, Leader <19
• Sporting: Sportsmanship 18-19, Determination 1-9, Professionalism <18, Leader <19
• Driven: Determination 18-20, Ambition 12-20
• Light Hearted: Pressure 15-20, Sportsmanship 15-20, Determination <18, Professionalism <18, Leader <19
• Realist: Sportsmanship 2-5, Determination 11-17, Professionalism <18, Leader <19

Of the above - I don't really like any of these as they don't have concrete understanding of the level of professionalism, just 'less' than an amount. I would say that all on the list, with Realist (low Sportsmanship is severely going to hamper development due them making the wrong decisions with their training and fitness) and Sporting (due to the poor determination) aside, are 'ok.'

----

I have used a very simple traffic light system: Red = poor personality, Amber = ok personality and Green = good personality. Firstly, poor old Esau Roldan had nobody that liked him and secondly, how annoying is it that I'm Unambitious because I haven't moved jobs!

What I'm getting from this, and it may be completely random from such a small pool (can you see where this is going?) is that the staff who have the poorer personalities are linked to players who also have them. I recall and can't quote it word for word, about a sentence in the Intake that says 'so and so has developed with my style' or similar - could this be personality linked too?

So, here is the plan.

Out goes Isma, Emilio, Vitienes and Garmendia, all of my youth staff with 'negative personalities' and they are replaced with the below backroom team:

(New staff screenshotted to hopefully show development in attributes over years)

Antonio Augusto. Juan Bergueno. Julio Velasquez. Matias Blanco. Rauciele Reis Carneiro.

This is where Part B of the title comes in. All of these staff are inexperienced and have several coaching badges left to pass through. They aren't great right now - but remember, my best players won't actually be training with these coaches, which, to me, limits those losses. These staff will develop themselves by going through the coaching badges and will hopefully make steps to be good coaches themselves but will be, hopefully, impacting the 'generation personalities' of the youth candidates.

---

@Jimbokav1971 - you are normally my go-to for player development thoughts, and I read all of your posts in the Youth Only challenges @XaW - do either of you two have any experiences with personalities? 

Really interested to hear thoughts from other people, too!

Edited April 8, 2020 by _Ben_

[Jimbokav1971]

Hi @_Ben_For what it's worth I think player personality is far less important than it once was and by that I mean that the ability to change personality is significantly harder with Mentoring now than it used to be with Tutoring. 

I also think, (and SI will tell you differently), that the hidden attributes that have the greatest impact on player development, (especially youth development), are not those that used to be of greatest importance. Ambition is now deemed to have the same importance and Determination and Professionalism for example and while that might be the case now, (SI certainly say it is), it certainly never used to be the case, (in my opinion). 

There is indeed a link between staff personalities and Youth Intake personalities, but it's not huge and in my opinion not significant enough to spend too much time worrying about. I assume that you know how Mentoring works, well assume that when your Ass Man or HoyD tells you that he "has had an influence on" player x or y coming through the intake, then consider this that he has had a similar impact on the player as a mentoring session might have had. (So that's a very slight influence in my opinion). I quite like your idea that a player with who has a staff member as a favoured personnel list will be influenced by them, (I have never tracked it), but certainly the link between Roberto and Herrero suggests that, (although I would suggest that you need much more data to concrete your findings). 

I'm not sure I agree with what you are saying here. 

My advice is that you should stop looking for "perfection" and instead look for the "easy fixes" where you know what is wrong and can look to fix it. 

Resilient is decent because (and lets ignore pressure for the moment because we are just talking about player development and not player performance),  Det is still a big driver and you know what it is here (15-17) and Professionalism could be as high as 17, but could also be really low. That's fine. so "fix" Pro, (if it needs fixing), and if need be fix Amb too. I really don't mind Resilient at all, (or certainly didn't when I used to care about personalities. 

Spirited is similar. I like pressure, (but we are ignoring that), Pro is decent and could be good, Det could be anything. So fix Pro and see what happens. 

Sporting I'm less keen on. I don't have any interest in sportsmanship at all, Det is low and Pro could be low. There are immediately 2 things to fix. My advice is that makes it a bad personality because there are plenty of personalities with no "fixes" required or more often just 1. 

Driven is good. Good Det and possibly good Amb, but decent Amb guaranteed. If you don't like Driven then you are not going to like much. Remember that Pro used to be the big driver in Youth Development, but we are told that Amb has joined Det in being of equal importance. 

L.Hearted could be good. You just need to work out individual values. You are looking at it negatively. I like to look at things positively until such time as I have more information and the position is more clear. 

Realist could be good, but again there isn't enough info. With m,y glass half full, Det could be 17 and Pro could also be 17. You wouldn't turn your nose up at that would you? 

That's not my understanding of what Sportsmanship affects but I haven't taken much of an interest in a while so could be wrong. 

Is that the sort of thing you were looking for? 

[_Ben_]

Thanks @Jimbokav1971 - my turn to dissect your post now!

10 hours ago, Jimbokav1971 said:

For what it's worth I think player personality is far less important than it once was and by that I mean that the ability to change personality is significantly harder with Mentoring now than it used to be with Tutoring. 

I also think, (and SI will tell you differently), that the hidden attributes that have the greatest impact on player development, (especially youth development), are not those that used to be of greatest importance. Ambition is now deemed to have the same importance and Determination and Professionalism for example and while that might be the case now, (SI certainly say it is), it certainly never used to be the case, (in my opinion). 

I've found changing personalities to be relatively straightforward this year - granted, not as easy as with tutoring but once you've got things in the right starting place, they tend to move quite quickly.

I think that I want professionalism for both development and then player control when they are in the first team.

11 hours ago, Jimbokav1971 said:

There is indeed a link between staff personalities and Youth Intake personalities, but it's not huge and in my opinion not significant enough to spend too much time worrying about. I assume that you know how Mentoring works, well assume that when your Ass Man or HoyD tells you that he "has had an influence on" player x or y coming through the intake, then consider this that he has had a similar impact on the player as a mentoring session might have had. (So that's a very slight influence in my opinion). I quite like your idea that a player with who has a staff member as a favoured personnel list will be influenced by them, (I have never tracked it), but certainly the link between Roberto and Herrero suggests that, (although I would suggest that you need much more data to concrete your findings). 

As I said - I'm not after a fix that means each player in my intake will come through as a M.Citizen, for example - I'm just looking for little things I can do to turn the tide in my favour. I, like you do, use the hierarchy when a player has signed to kind of 'judge' CA a bit better etc. This is just another one of those things.

Ahh, yes - the 'has been influenced by' is the string of text I was after. I'm just interested in seeing how many that can be influenced by staff members. I do wonder though if it depends on a) the personality but b) the quality of the staff member. Looking back at my graphic, my HoYD has the best personality but is also very clearly the most skilled member of staff, so it'll be interesting to see how that works.

11 hours ago, Jimbokav1971 said:

My advice is that you should stop looking for "perfection" and instead look for the "easy fixes" where you know what is wrong and can look to fix it. 

Resilient is decent because (and lets ignore pressure for the moment because we are just talking about player development and not player performance),  Det is still a big driver and you know what it is here (15-17) and Professionalism could be as high as 17, but could also be really low. That's fine. so "fix" Pro, (if it needs fixing), and if need be fix Amb too. I really don't mind Resilient at all, (or certainly didn't when I used to care about personalities. 

Spirited is similar. I like pressure, (but we are ignoring that), Pro is decent and could be good, Det could be anything. So fix Pro and see what happens. 

Sporting I'm less keen on. I don't have any interest in sportsmanship at all, Det is low and Pro could be low. There are immediately 2 things to fix. My advice is that makes it a bad personality because there are plenty of personalities with no "fixes" required or more often just 1. 

Driven is good. Good Det and possibly good Amb, but decent Amb guaranteed. If you don't like Driven then you are not going to like much. Remember that Pro used to be the big driver in Youth Development, but we are told that Amb has joined Det in being of equal importance. 

L.Hearted could be good. You just need to work out individual values. You are looking at it negatively. I like to look at things positively until such time as I have more information and the position is more clear. 

Realist could be good, but again there isn't enough info. With m,y glass half full, Det could be 17 and Pro could also be 17. You wouldn't turn your nose up at that would you? 

I think I may have oversold the 'good' and 'ok' personalities!

I hate Balanced, it tells me nothing. Resilient is good and, with the Highly Professional squad personality that I have, the player can be fixed pretty easily. I've had a few good players who have come through with that personality and they've done well. I also don't dislike Spirited, Driven and Light Hearted (and I've found that most M.Citizens 'fall to L.Hearted if one of their attributes drp [don't know which one] so it must be pretty solid across the board) but they are, I guess, two tiers below the M.Cit, M.Pro and a tier below Pro, Res because I have concrete values for professionalism. I'd probably add Driven to this list too, although I have had players who started as driven, had no change in DET but obviously gained Professionalism and turned to a Model Pro. I guess I'd make a hierarchy looking something like this:

Tier 1: Model Citizen, Model Pro

Tier 2: Professional, Resolute, Driven.

Tier 3: Resilient, Driven, Spirited, Light-Hearted

Tier 4: Realist. F.Pro, 

---

I think a lot of my obsession has come down from monitoring I do of the first year since generation (I don't know how much of my thread you've read so I'll explain!)

I take a mean of all of their attributes at the start and end of the season and then calculate a % growth. These are the top 10 from the 50+ players I've tracked:

These are all largely good personalities, but I'd argue that F.Pro, F.Spo etc are only average, yet they have performed well. If I take a look at this sorted by personalities - my 'better' ones have tended, on average, to perform better:

(N.B: Ignore the numbers)

----

11 hours ago, Jimbokav1971 said:

That's not my understanding of what Sportsmanship affects but I haven't taken much of an interest in a while so could be wrong. 

Just trying to think outside of the box!

I've read a few sources and I believe it has more than just the on-field sportsmanship that we'd initially suggest. How good as they players at being sportsmen? Do they take care of themselves etc. I may have overshot this but I don't really like the though of having anyone with really low hidden attributes (except the controversy one) which is kind of why I stopped liking the Realist, even though their Pro could be great. I've got a couple in my intake this year so I'll see how they develop.

11 hours ago, Jimbokav1971 said:

Is that the sort of thing you were looking for? 

This was great - you've made me think about my answers to your statements, which in turn I will take back to the game! Thanks. Enjoy Wales - you seem to be making some really good progress now and hopefully you can start developing your players when the facilities/rep etc increase to a good enough standard.