Jump to content

The FM20 Youth Academy Challenge


Recommended Posts

  • Replies 5.6k
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Top Posters In This Topic

7 hours ago, Muttley84 said:

@Fastbasher - Dunno if its just me, but all your links seem to be broken (404 error).

Thanks for the heads up Muttley84.

 

Probably not much point in fixing them now. I got sacked after 2 wins, 1 draw, 23 losses in the league and 2 losses in the Serie C cup. I think the board we more than patient with me.

 

I'll try to get the links working for the next try.

Link to post
Share on other sites

7 hours ago, schnauzer said:

I've been reliably informed on another thread that this should improve come the full release, is just an optimization issue! Fingers crossed eh

Good to hear. I'd started a youth save in Wales but found the game unplayable. I'm back to FM19 until it gets fixed. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Image result for fc energie cottbus

FC Energie Cottbus 2020/21 Season Review

 

League Table    Youth Intake    Finances    Facilities

 

Had an unbelievable first season managing to clinch promotion the Bundesliga 2 despite being predicted to be relegated. Mainly thanks to this man Dimitar Rangelov scoring 28 goals. Had a decent youth intake bolstering my youth squad, a lot of players with good potential getting close to breaking out into the first team to replace ageing players in the squad. The finances are terrible and thus i've been unable to upgrade any facilities, despite that the board have decided they are going to build a new stadium as they are paying too much for ground maintenance.

Spreadsheet_2021.thumb.PNG.cee1fb3a046b87ea50be141f45373a9b.PNG

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Second try.

Meet the manager of Sportfreunde Lotte. Freshly promoted to the third tier of German football after relegation in 2018.

 

Facilities are fairly average. We do have a 10k capacity stadium, but this is a requirement for this division.

 

The playing staff should give this team a healthy start. There are two Kosovan internationals, one Beninese international and players with youth team experience in Holland, Austria and Croatia.

Jeron Al-Hazaimeh is the star of the team. The versatile left sided player is also the captain and highest paid player.

There are also some talented looking backroom staff.

 

Wages are quite high compared to the other teams that came up, but the team has a 75k GBP wage budget and 4.1m GBP in the bank, so we should be fine for a while.

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

There are 4 transfers scheduled to take place on 1st July that were already agreed before I took over.

 

How do we treat these?

Is the team still eligible for the challenge?
I can't find a way to cancel them.

Link to post
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Fastbasher said:

There are 4 transfers scheduled to take place on 1st July that were already agreed before I took over.

 

How do we treat these?

Is the team still eligible for the challenge?
I can't find a way to cancel them.

if they have already been agreed and you cant cancel them thats fine as far as im aware 

Link to post
Share on other sites

17 minutes ago, Fastbasher said:

There are 4 transfers scheduled to take place on 1st July that were already agreed before I took over.

 

How do we treat these?

Is the team still eligible for the challenge?
I can't find a way to cancel them.

15 minutes ago, OneManSnipez said:

if they have already been agreed and you cant cancel them thats fine as far as im aware 

Yes, the rule is, if you have the option to cancel, then do so, if not, they are just normal players in your team you can use. Do take a screenshot of the agreed transfers from the date you take over and add to your first season post where you submit it as an explanation of why you have any transfers.

Link to post
Share on other sites

2nd time is the charm right? Trying with my local (kind of) side Kingstonian (I now live 3 minutes from their old ground that AFC Wimbledon currently play at but sadly as a result the K's no longer play in Kingston but in nearby Tooting) 

Profile

Though with no left back and my GK retiring this could be a shorter challenge than my first try :D 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Will join this fun challenge as well.

FYI: Scottish reload date seems to be the 3rd of May 2020. Here the relegation playoff tie is determined in League 2. So saving on 2nd of May should do the trick (perhaps you need to save on the 1st of May).

Edited by andershs
Link to post
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, OneManSnipez said:

One frustrating thing about germany is that you can register under 17s...

million.thumb.PNG.7be4872b1558d95b497721b19b8ff301.PNG

got this guy from my youth intake and hes getting bids of over a million from bundesliga clubs but i cant play him til next season...

Yeah, that's one of the drawbacks of playing in Germany. Sometimes, in these cases, I'd take the money and invest...

Link to post
Share on other sites

 

Decided to try this out with Dalbeattie Star in Scotland.

bMTFIjn.png

There were a few transfers that had happened before the reset date in June, which is probably for the best as there are only 17 players on the team. My two best players appear to be regenerated players in their mid 20s, not quite sure how that happened. And it very quickly led to this message, which I haven't actually personally seen before: 

qMPuBam.png

Starting Squad

The team has more than enough wide players, and there is someone natural at all positions in the formation I want to use, which is a positive. Definitely thin in the middle and at goalkeeper. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, XaW said:

So, England once again. I've taken over Stratford Town!

XMXdFbo.png

Epic! Lived near Stratford for a while so I've been hoping they would become playable for this (but more likely dafuge challenge) for a long time. Time to buy the game I guess!

Link to post
Share on other sites

I've always wanted to try this challenge.

However, I've never been able to fathom how it is possible. From my experience the only way I have progressed up the ladder and gotten better is just getting better players. Yet, I don't think I have ever gotten a decent youth pull player (no, i got one in FM19) that actually ever played significant time for me.

So it seems you have to be a tactical genius to actually do this challenge. I assume you get inferior players and get weak youth pulls. So, how is it possible to really progress? What am I missing? Or is it just as hard as I assume it looks?

Link to post
Share on other sites

Sacked for a 2nd time.

 

Can't say it was undeserved. I left Lotte in 19th place with 1 win, 5 draws, 17 losses from 23 games.

The players hated me and the club was 2m pounds lighter in the bank during my 7 month reign.  I'm not expecting a statue any time soon.

Link to post
Share on other sites

@jstu9 

The idea is that you need to survive long enough to upgrade your youth facilities and get better intakes. Some can be sold to fund more upgrades. Eventually you will get some decent ones coming through. The challenge is keeping them.

Money in not usually an issue because you are not spending a lot on wages or anything on transfer fees.

 

Surviving is tough though. Especially if your youth isn't developed enough to replace the original players when they leave or retire.

Link to post
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, OneManSnipez said:

Anyone know how to change who is responsible for youth intakes, atm ion my save it seems my u19s manager is despite having a really good hoyd

I'm not at my gaming comp at the moment, I'll have a look when I get home and fire up the game (in about 3-5 hours from now).

Link to post
Share on other sites

Just curious, why is there the rule about loading only your country?

I would say adding more countries/leagues the level of competition to sign players is higher and more realistic as well, so it will be even more challenging having the top leagues teams more active in the transfer market and trying to steal your young players.

Link to post
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, OneManSnipez said:

Anyone know how to change who is responsible for youth intakes, atm ion my save it seems my u19s manager is despite having a really good hoyd

Go to Staff - Responsibilities - Staff and then choose Advice and Reports.

There you can choose who provides reports and how often.

Link to post
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Icy said:

Just curious, why is there the rule about loading only your country?

I would say adding more countries/leagues the level of competition to sign players is higher and more realistic as well, so it will be even more challenging having the top leagues teams more active in the transfer market and trying to steal your young players.

In the rules it also say : "We used to limit this to just loading the leagues from the country you are playing in but we now allow you to load as many leagues as you to add a bit more immersion into their saves. You don't have to add any more than the country you are playing in but the option is there for people that want to."

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

                                                955969101_PalermoLogo.thumb.jpg.8ca668244088fea87a1affe26ce93900.jpg

                                                                                                       Season 2020 / 21

                                                          League Table                          Squad                       Transfer History     

 

Season 2020 / 21 -   5th in Serie C Group C -  Knocked out in Playoff Quarterfinal

Overall very happy with my first season. Promotion would have been way to early.

I'm very happy with the way I play so my tactic is a keeper I think. 

Got 3  good experienced player but they all want to a bigger club, but hopefully I can keep them one more season.

The next couple of seasons I will be in squad building mode, so I'm very curious how my youngsters will develop.

Youth Intake looks very promising but not anything special so it all depends how they develop next couple of seasons.

Most promising :     Antonino Indelicato  -    Jordan Ferrario -    Alessandro Loro

 

GL to you all !!! :) :) 

 

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, jstu9 said:

I've always wanted to try this challenge.

However, I've never been able to fathom how it is possible. From my experience the only way I have progressed up the ladder and gotten better is just getting better players. Yet, I don't think I have ever gotten a decent youth pull player (no, i got one in FM19) that actually ever played significant time for me.

So it seems you have to be a tactical genius to actually do this challenge. I assume you get inferior players and get weak youth pulls. So, how is it possible to really progress? What am I missing? Or is it just as hard as I assume it looks?

This and the Ultimate Football Manager challenge are the 2 I try every year and never get close to completing either! To echo what @XaW said it's an endurance test, especially in England. I've tried this challenge for about 6 or 7 versions now and the best I've got is 10 straight seasons in the championship with Dulwich Hamlet on FM17 (I think) I'm far from a tactical expert (might explain why I never complete this) but what I do is find a tactic and style I like and just go from there, retraining players to suit my tactic and so on. The early seasons are the toughest and if you can get through them then it's a lot of fun seeing players develop. I've already got 1 failed attempt to my name this year but that's also part of the fun I feel. In here we can talk about our saves and there's no competition over who can do it in the quickest time, in fact I think most of us relate to the struggles more than anything.

The best advice I can give is that I pick a side that I can form a connection with as I find that an way of helping me push through the times it's tough (and there's a lot of those for me) and makes me want load up the game each time so pick a side or a league you're familiar with and give it a go. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Talking of struggles @darren1983 I'm going through a tough patch! 

Ethan Hazelden-Muldoon below is the only newgen from the holiday season regularly getting into the team, and to be fair he's bagged 5 goals despite not being great...

I managed to get up to a national B license which I'm chuffed with!

We also nearly made the FA Cup first round proper, which would have really helped with the finances because we are predicted to lose 150k this season :(

Just need to keep going and stay above the relegation zone - not doing too badly considering the pre-season odds of 400-1! Loosing my only left back to a 3rd tier Croatian side is a really weird one and I think I'm going to struggle a fair bit more after this. I'm already forced to play a 442 diamond due to no wingers (bar Wearmouth who isn't very good), so a massive youth intake is needed!

 

One thing to note is that I requested improved junior coaching to the board, they initially rejected it. However after I said I would give young players plenty of game time, they told me that if this happens they will improve the facilities! I cant track this board promise anywhere but I'm giving the scraps of youth I have a go and hoping something happens :) 

Keep it up guys!

2019-11-04.png

2019-11-04 (1).png

2019-11-04 (2).png

2019-11-04 (3).png

2019-11-04 (4).png

2019-11-04 (5).png

Link to post
Share on other sites

Baford_United_F.C.png

Season 1 - Position 11th

Youth Candidates - Transfers - Squad - League Table - Manager Profile

Decent first season, had a fairly big squad but i did accidentally mess up some contract renewals and lost two semi decent players.

Youth intake wasn't great, wasn't terrible. Irvings (midget centre back, will need re-training) , Carragher (meh CM) , Garton (flair striker with no finishing but decent determination so may re-train) , and Chalk (okay AMC) got tags and I will try to give them some first team footy next year. My team has quite a few high determination players and youngsters so thats good for mentor groups.

Not sure I can maintain this level next year, especially with the match engine as it is currently, I've been changing tactic more than I would like because I can't get strikers performing but I understand that is fairly universal. Is fun to see some of the absolute howitzer long range goals being scored though, even at this level.

We started off with a decent amount of cash so I managed to get two coaching badges completed before we became absolutely skint.

This is a worry though:

stadium issue.PNG

Edited by Rizz0therat
Link to post
Share on other sites

d2GM6E3M_400x400.jpg

Dalbeattie Star 2020/21 Season - Scottish League 2 (9th)

League Table | Transfer HistoryFinances |

Not much to write home about, we missed out on the relegation play-out due to Annan being a dumpster fire for the entire season. Was somewhat annoyed about how the board was totally fine with our performance in the league for the entire season. Only to end up in 9th with them angry at me for not meeting expectations based on goal differential. A 92nd minute goal in the last match of the season dropped us from 7th to 9th, costing us around $7,000 dollars. 

The team was fairly decent, although I did have to complete an 8 points from 5 games task after my team failed to score in about 4 straight games (We went WWDLD for me to retain the job). Our big problem was that we tended to let in lots of goals and not score many goals (what a concept).

Youth Intake

Our new batch of youngsters

Tags

1a - Instantly our 3rd choice Center Midfielder, he will make the squad because there are not really any other options and I am intrigued by some of his mentals and his decent passing stat.

1b - Now our 3rd Choice Striker (another youth striker has better current ability than this one), definitely in need of development, I'm not sold on this one but given the optimistic view of his potential and some fairly okay mental and physical attributes, hopefully he can grow into himself

1c - Tagged him high because he is the top/only Goalkeeper in this intake, he is now our backup keeper and also reserve keeper, hopefully something better comes along and usurps him, but for now he is one injury away from being our top keeper, scary.

1d - Now this is the player I am most excited about, 1a and him are the only 2 who got any first team game time at the end of the season. I love the 14 finishing and the 14 nat fitness, and he instantly became my backup striker. Obviously still needs some hard work on other attributes.

1e - If he played he would be taking all of our set pieces, my assistant actually currently rates him as having better current ability than 1a, which I tend to disagree with, but hopefully he can progress well. He has pretty good versatility and all in positions that I currently am using in my formation.

1f - Love his mentals and he is one of the only wide players in my intake, but my goodness his technicals are god awful and he won't be getting a sniff any time soon until that changes (barring an injury crisis)

1g - Tagged for high potential, nothing to write home about, another wide defender, luckily our team has enough wide defenders at the moment. Hopefully develops down the line.

1h - Another center mid with decent mental attributes (although his personality is one of the worst). Just tagged in case of emergency. Also is somewhat versatile which is a plus

1i - Now our 4th choice center back, so once again let's pray for the health of the 3 CBs in front of him or he might end up seeing the field, or at least the bench. 13 jumping reach and 4 heading is one of those combinations that seems like a disaster waiting to happen.

1j - The only noteworthy wide midfielder in my youth intake, low self belief seems like a horrible personality though.

1k - The other center back, probably not worthy of being tagged but I'm not actually sure which of the 2 is better so I tagged him just in case.

 

Probably won't tag anywhere near the number of players next year, but I was so excited that I tagged 11 of them this year. The game called this youth intake a golden generation, and I don't really agree with that at the moment.

 

The team is in a pretty awful financial situation at the moment, we get an average of 165 people to come to every game (for a 3000 seat stadium) and I haven't been able to make any sort of progress on making upgrades to our team's setup. But hey we tied for top of the league in sellouts! With 0.

pvQsj0d.png

Link to post
Share on other sites

Great that you are doing this challenge again @darren1983! I am back for another go at this challenge. Last year I completed it with Real Jean FC, but doing it in the Spanish league is "easy" compared to what some other people were doing! So I will try the challenge in a smaller league and I am giving it a go in Croatia with NK Zadar! 

 

Bilderesultat for nk zadar

 

NK Zadar

Season Update 2020-2021

My first season in charge and NK Zadar was the obvious choice. Luka Modric hometown club was tipped to finish 4th in the league, and with decent facilities! 

We had a great season and we secured first place and promotion three rounds before the season ended. We started a bit slow with one win and two draws in the first three games, but after this we picked up speed and never looked back. To be fair we had a good team and since we were tipped in 4th place the promotion wasn't a big shock! But the 2nd division is a tough league, and with only one team going straight up, it was good to get promoted as soon as possible. 

We also had a really good cup run, mainly down to us only facing inferior teams at home until the semi-final. when we drew HNK Rijeka from the Premier Division. Rijeka were in 3rd place, and they smashed us 0-4 at home. We cannot complain about a semi final, but if this is what we are facing in the Premier Division we have a very tough season ahead of us.... 

A good youth intake saw a couple of good prospects coming through. We also got improved Youth Recruitment and Junior Coaching budget at the end of the year, as well as stadium expansion plans for another 140 seat. I know, not much, but beggars can't be choosers!! 

 

League, transfers and facilities

3.thumb.jpg.51f940d94f76d6bee3857b46eece90aa.jpg4.thumb.jpg.16e49c4c71b811566f0e28ae5189363f.jpg5.thumb.jpg.51fdc5e793a2e03986003e54d125c143.jpg

Best performers

6.thumb.jpg.5f3ef3c322ab7bdba930a9fd52f40744.jpg7.thumb.jpg.068fd869ba55b79281aef36f89683e60.jpg8.thumb.jpg.1ef790300928a73c75a047b7832f053d.jpg

Best Prospects

9.thumb.jpg.cce34606b4ac2f140064f5705eb3f36b.jpg10.thumb.jpg.33dccca43c5a74b715da9077ced874c7.jpg11.thumb.jpg.a4392aadf9a116bb226341b13528642d.jpg

 

Season	|   League                            |  Position |  League Cup   |        Europe         |   Notes
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2020/21	|   Druga Hrvatska Nogotemna Liga     |  1st      |  Semi-final   |         N/A	          |   Promotion to top division first year

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, schnauzer said:

@thomas_e Haha what are the chances! Look at my screenshot for my only LB for Whitby Town, who has randomly agreed to sign for NK Zadar! Please leave my other players alone I'm down to bare bones as it is :lol:

:lol::applause::brock:

Magic! Yes, I have tweaked the challenge a bit! No signing players, except from Whitby town!! 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...