The FM22 Youth Academy Challenge

[Pelz]

Is Spain a notoriously difficult place to give the challenge a go?

Can't really recall ever seeing a Spanish team managed here; I imagine with release clauses as they are your players are continually poached with little you can do about it.

[Elsjorro]

Cottbus 2038-2039:

 

We are strolling trough the seasons. Its because i use instant result ofcourse. At least for the easier games. And that were quite a few this year i can allready tell you.

 

Transfers:

 

Per usual, no incoming players. We did start loaning out some players that needed experience to come trough. Dauble and Buchler are the ones i expect to really benefit from some minutes in a first squad. Only problem is we only got one sattelite club and its in the 2nd portual liga. So lets hope playing games there also contribute:

 

 

The preview was rather decent again:

 

 

 

Im very stoked for the good striker and central defender. Osei is 32 and Gunaydin still wont sign a new contract. They are literally the only 2 defenders ( Gunaydin isnt even a defender at best) so losing them both will be a huge blow to our team if we dont get anything new.

 

The intake itself was dissapointing, to say the least. With Birkenbach we did get a central defender who might take a spot in 2/3 years, but the striker (Curic) isnt a striker in my opinion. At best, he will be a future option for the midfield. But we allready got a ******** of decent/good/very good players on the midfield. So thats a bit of a bummer:

 

 

 

 

So im showing the best players and the most talented ones imo every year, because otherwise the updates are allways the same. 

 

So Pena. I allready showed him a few times. I was very happy to get him trough intake. As soon as he hit 16 i put him in the squad and he never left. First keeper of germany u21. He keeps wanting to leave, but then we got a winning spell of 4/5 games and he turns around and i get him to sign a new contract. Very happy:

 

Gunaydin. When it comes to numbers and performance, by far our best player. He is a playmaker, but because of the lack of defenders i play him as a central defender. He lacks certain abilities for that, but as a libero/footballing defender he plays very will. Is very comprehensive (Lol, i should google these words before i put them down) to Osei, who is the ffing tank in our defense.It is looking like we gonna lose him though, he realllllly doesnt want to sign a new contract.

 

Dogan. He came in like a wreeeeeeeecking baaaaaaaaaalll. I was really looking to make him a winger. But he didnt develop. So he came into the squad in the centre of the midfield and he never left. Has been the starter of every attack and he is developing very, very hard. Its weird to see how some 5 star prospects dont develop in any way, and others shoot to the skies. He occasionally wants to leave to, but did get him to sign a new one. 

 

 

So. Max Brecht. Another unusual suspect. Look at those mental attributes. His attributes are rising trough the skies. Im very keen to see where these 2 boys are going to end. I think Dogan and Brecht are future Germany players tbh. One of them might even make our first wonderkid.

 

 

League table: 

So, it definitly showed that our players where developing. I tried putting the youngsters in again and they did very good. The only realy problem i seem to have, is the fact i can't seem to get Hortnagl to score. I mean, 8 goals as a striker is very, very bad. But atm we have nothing that might contest his place, so we just need to keep playing him out. If im honest, we really need a good/decent striker, a good leftback and a CB. But we finished at a very, very welcome 10th place. So i'm very happy about that.

 

Season stats:

 

 

[thomas_e]

1 hour ago, Pelz said:

Is Spain a notoriously difficult place to give the challenge a go?

Can't really recall ever seeing a Spanish team managed here; I imagine with release clauses as they are your players are continually poached with little you can do about it.

I managed, and completed the challenge with Real Jean on FM19, which was my first go at this challenge. 

I do think I am the only one to complete the challenge in Spain and I also think it is more difficult now as I do believe I completed it when it was only three tiers available. This meant I took over a professional club and had an easier way to La Liga. I started in the 2020/21 season and completed it in May 2038. The 

The positive in Spain is that the re-gens are really good. The negative is Real Madrid/Barcelona/Athletico Madrid! The buy-out clauses werent a big issue for me, as players agreed to very high clauses. The way I lost players were the same as it is today, contracts expiring. 

[JLAB]

Hey mods, just wanted to make sure that it was okay for me to link YouTube videos that I'll be making based on my saves with this challenge or not. I know that there is a link button, but I wanted to double-check before I did so.

[DazRTaylor]

Forgive me as this is not a youth only save but I tend to talk to you guys more than anyone else.

Have any of you ever seen this before?  I got 115 points...and didn't win the league.

[OlivierL]

1 hour ago, thomas_e said:

I managed, and completed the challenge with Real Jean on FM19, which was my first go at this challenge. 

I do think I am the only one to complete the challenge in Spain and I also think it is more difficult now as I do believe I completed it when it was only three tiers available. This meant I took over a professional club and had an easier way to La Liga. I started in the 2020/21 season and completed it in May 2038. The 

The positive in Spain is that the re-gens are really good. The negative is Real Madrid/Barcelona/Athletico Madrid! The buy-out clauses werent a big issue for me, as players agreed to very high clauses. The way I lost players were the same as it is today, contracts expiring. 

Isn't it extra harder because of the reset date? I wanted to play with andreu from Barcelona but the season starts in july , with almost every player out of contract and most of them left the club.

[XaW]

1 hour ago, JLAB said:

Hey mods, just wanted to make sure that it was okay for me to link YouTube videos that I'll be making based on my saves with this challenge or not. I know that there is a link button, but I wanted to double-check before I did so.

If you do it as a text link (and not a preview video) then that should be fine. If it preloads the video then it slows the page down quite a bit. Unless @darren1983 minds, of course.

[darren1983]

1 hour ago, JLAB said:

Hey mods, just wanted to make sure that it was okay for me to link YouTube videos that I'll be making based on my saves with this challenge or not. I know that there is a link button, but I wanted to double-check before I did so.

What XaW really, people can link to blogs or youtube if they like as long as it doesn't slow the page down. 

5 minutes ago, XaW said:

If you do it as a text link (and not a preview video) then that should be fine. If it preloads the video then it slows the page down quite a bit. Unless @darren1983 minds, of course.

 

[JLAB]

6 minutes ago, XaW said:

If you do it as a text link (and not a preview video) then that should be fine. If it preloads the video then it slows the page down quite a bit. Unless @darren1983 minds, of course.

That would be the plan. I would make sure that it doesn't do anything more than that if I can help it.

1 minute ago, darren1983 said:

What XaW really, people can link to blogs or youtube if they like as long as it doesn't slow the page down. 

 

Appreciate it. I wanted to make sure I asked before I did anything else.

[Elsjorro]

Cottbus 2039-2040

 

Im just gonna keep dropping those updates today. I played to much again and falled behind on updating. Really need to stop doing that, cause sometimes i dont get the necessary screens i wont to drop.

 

So again, a decent load of players going out on a loan. I got high hopes for Dauble to be honest. He is the first player that went to a not sattelite club, other players were never interested ( as in clubs werent interested). He reallye developed well and scored ofer 15 goals in the competition, so he will get a spot next season in the first 18 players.

 

 

Preview time:

 

Oh my, 2 wingbacks, an attacking midfielder (sigh), two wingers and a striker. Please let it be a good striker this time.

 

 

 

 

Not to shabby at all. It isnt what i was hoping for in terms of positions. We yet again get a very promising midfielder and fellow dutchmen Nijhof looks like he could be a very very interesting player. Will go straight into the squad.

 

 

 

 

 

So how did the competition go? Well it went very well. It even went so well, we qualified for the Conference league. We even managed to keep Dortmund behind us, who arent a very top of the world time anymore. But again, we see the same problems we have for a few years now. No striker and the best players who dont want to sign new contracts.

 

 

 

And ofcourse this was bound to happen: Osei snatching the record of games played for us. Man, he is 33 now, but still in the starting 11. Lets see if we can get him to rack up 500 games.

 

[FlairRA]

1 hour ago, OlivierL said:

Isn't it extra harder because of the reset date? I wanted to play with andreu from Barcelona but the season starts in july , with almost every player out of contract and most of them left the club.

Not sure about this one, started a Spanish save yesterday and the two clubs I looked at had excellent squads. Similar for Germany. More consistently an issue in the English saves for me!

[thomas_e]

2 hours ago, OlivierL said:

Isn't it extra harder because of the reset date? I wanted to play with andreu from Barcelona but the season starts in july , with almost every player out of contract and most of them left the club.

I remember losing quite a lot of players when I started in Spain, yes. The first couple of weeks, re-signing players, is key! 

[ATW]

2 hours ago, OlivierL said:

Isn't it extra harder because of the reset date? I wanted to play with andreu from Barcelona but the season starts in july , with almost every player out of contract and most of them left the club.

Doing Spain now with UD Lanzerote.  Most players were re-signed for me by AI before reset date.  The problem, all but 2 were given Non-Contract so if there is a gem then teams will come sniffing quickly and you get the horrible "not willing to discuss terms as just signed contract".  

 

Another issue is you are meant to register a minimum of 14 FT players but the game does not update teams to full time so you need to bypass Registration Day.  

Edited November 10, 2021 by ATW

[Reifi]

RNK Split - Preseason

Going to try to do the Youth Only challenge again, this time with RNK Split! A team who made the Europa League knockout rounds as recently as 2011 but have fallen all the way down to the 3rd tier ever since. I'll mostly just be going over the qualifications for proof though I hope I can made a compelling Mid-Season report at some time to recap what exactly has been happening at the other split club in Croatia. Now, I will be posing the proof below and then I'll see you at mid-season!



 

Edited November 10, 2021 by Reifi

[JLAB]

Beira-Mar – Season 1 – 2022/23 Season Preview

So I realised very quickly after the last post that I didn't post the club vision that has been given to me at the club, which sees me being asked to not get relegated with a side that is currently predicted to finish in the top 10 out of 56 clubs, which again is telling me that I might need to actually get a good formation set up for the club.

Maurício Júnior is our best player at the club and was someone that my assistant manager considered to be good enough to play in the 2nd tier of Portugal, but then when I took over the side, I quickly realised that all of my players and backroom staff were all on amateur contract. So I had to make sure that all of my players were given big enough contracts that they would all sign. Júnior wouldn't accept anything less than £1.2K a week, and given that I am paying my whole team £9,929 a week, he is being paid 12.4% of our wages alone. I didn't, think this through, but he is an amazing player.

I've made a video showing what I went ahead and did with my tactic idea and the realisation of having to tinker a load of contracts because all of our backroom staff and players had been given new contracts by the previous manager and I wanted to replace my entire backroom staff which I could do without spending a single penny due to their amateur deals. I look forward to seeing how this challenge goes. I go into more detail in the link below.

JLAB's YAC with Beira-Mar Part 1

 

[karax268]

Gresik United Youth Intake preview 2025

 

 

 

Back to excelent intakes. hopefully some can help my first team. depth is dwindling

[Reifi]

Ok, NEVER go to Croatia, There is a rule that you have to start U21's and my team didn't have enough and I couldn't sign anyone. Literally had to stop the save

[OlivierL]

1 hour ago, ATW said:

Doing Spain now with UD Lanzerote.  Most players were re-signed for me by AI before reset date.  The problem, all but 2 were given Non-Contract so if there is a gem then teams will come sniffing quickly and you get the horrible "not willing to discuss terms as just signed contract".  

 

Another issue is you are meant to register a minimum of 14 FT players but the game does not update teams to full time so you need to bypass Registration Day.  

Then I had back luck Iuck with Andreu. I really wanted those Barcelona newgens coming through and I visited their Stadium. 

[Libertine13]

2027/28

Went into this season knowing that I may be better off selling our best player who is causing the majority of the team to be demoralised. We'll be worse off for it but we can't have another season like last. So when Hamburg came in for Ali Akbulut we negotiated as much as we could out of them and sent him on his way...

He was head and shoulders above everyone else at the club so it was disappointing that he wanted to leave and upset the rest of the squad in making the move happen. The season before last he was amazing and helped us to a Play Off spot, but last season didn't reach anywhere near his best...

The season started off really well, we went unbeaten in our first 7 games and were sitting pretty at the top up until November time. One win in our last 7 games before the mid season break brought us back down to earth. After the interval we won ten of our next 12 matches, but everyone else around us were flying as well, it was incredibly tight at the top with a handful of matches left...

Our run in was ridiculous, and this was after a loss against promotion hopefuls Magdeburg as well! We beat Jena to give us a massive boost in confidence going into the last three matches. However a loss to top of the league Dortmund II and then a complete collapse against Unterhaching meant our season was over. We drew our last game. All in all it was a much better season, though you could say we bottled it.

Maximillian Pronichev got his best returns yet with 18 goals in 38 games and youth product, Kilian Markmuller chipped in with 13 in 28. He's actually come on leaps and bounds over this season. 

As for the youth intake... I was delighted to see we may be getting a quality centre back but we really don't need more attacking midfielders right now.

The actual intake was decent enough. The centre back will definitely feature at some point next season, whilst not quite got the current ability, I want to give him some match experience and fast track his development if possible. 

[Padders]

4 hours ago, DazRTaylor said:

Forgive me as this is not a youth only save but I tend to talk to you guys more than anyone else.

Have any of you ever seen this before?  I got 115 points...and didn't win the league.

WOW!

[Pauldinho7]

The youth intake quality decline is making me lose interest in this challenge a little bit, but when you have a season like this, it is definitely proof that you can't give up!

What a season for Beira-Mar, sneaking into the Champions League on the final day of the season as well as reaching the knockout stages of the Europa League, we're now starting to look at home amongst the big boys although our squad depth is what is stopping us from challenging on all fronts. We also lost our first choice goalkeeper (board accepted) and our main right winger (Min release fee) in the January window so to achieve this is even more outrageous.

The youth intake as mentioned looked pretty average even though I have Superb Youth Facilities and Exceptional coaching & recruitment...

Oh, and I got completely FM'd at one point after we'd played so well... 90th minute of course!!!!

Edited November 10, 2021 by Pauldinho7

[ANGL]

I know I'm a slow player - but man, some of you here have played 7 or 8 season while I'm still at the half of my first 

[Daddy]

 

Final Table:

Fell off a little toward the end of the season. The issues I expected with scoring came to pass. Mostly scored 0-2 goals, but held most teams to that as well, though I was on the losing side of some 0-3 type losses. 

 

FA Cup: Made it to the First Round held Cheltenham to a 0-0 draw at home, but got stomped in the rematch on the road.

FA Trophy: Disappointing loss in Second Round.

Intake Preview:

Much better than I was expecting. A few immediately jumped in for some first team back up spots.

 

Vision and Media Preview:

Much like last season no one favors us to do well. The fear I had going in to end the season was losing my goalkeeper. He's not the best, but none of the youth prospects have developed yet. Fortunately I was able to resign him. Finances continue to be a problem as the team is well in the red and it constricts wage budget, coaching budget, and my inability to upgrade facilities. 

[Makoto Nakamura]

2022 End of Season Review

A poor end to the season but we easily exceeded expectations! 

  

 

 

  

2022 Best XI

Lars Søgård

Vebjørn Atle Strømme - Amadeus Yttervik-Triumf - Marius Brøttum - Thomas Bertheussen

Kim Steven Sara (YP1a)

Ole Martin Steen - Frode Mæland

Marius Solås                                                 Dag Andreas Hanhivaara

Steffen Klitgaard (YP1o)

[Makoto Nakamura]

This doesn't look good.  

[Makoto Nakamura]

2023 Youth Candidates

This isn't great and with the bug stopping player development we're going to just have to make do and deal with life in the 5th tier for the forseeable.

[the_hdk]

are there any clubs avaailable that produce foreign newgens? (ala Andorra in Spain)

[fries]

7 minutes ago, Makoto Nakamura said:

the bug stopping player development

Is this something that is confirmed?

[Makoto Nakamura]

2 minutes ago, fries said:

Is this something that is confirmed?

Pretty much, screenshots from my Abertillery Excelsior thread over on FMCU.

 

[fries]

4 minutes ago, Makoto Nakamura said:

Pretty much, screenshots from my Abertillery Excelsior thread over on FMCU.

 

This is exactly what I have experienced too. However, the youth players that get game time will still increase a bit

[libbyshuss]

44 minutes ago, fries said:

This is exactly what I have experienced too. However, the youth players that get game time will still increase a bit

exactly my experience too. I put it down to the training facilities being crap - I guess realistically they're unlikely to improve too much then. If it is a bug at least I've got an excuse why I've barely moved in 12 seasons!

[libbyshuss]

2034/35

Vanarama National League

Season Summary

League - after flirting with relegation for the last two season this has to be considered a success. For most of the season we were in the play off spots, just, but a final run in of just 4 victories in our last 17 games meant we finished 13th. But I'd have taken that at the start of the season so I'm happy!

FA Cup - 1st round exit to Reading, who were top of League 1. Ah well.

 

Players

So I had to sell my best (and pretty much only) striker at the start of the season. IT meant retraining an AMC and a ST which was only partially successful

 

Youth

But this was where the real action was this season! I was a little underwhelmed by the preview. A 5 star intake promised, but Es everywhere. So imagine my surprise!!

I fell of my chair when the intake came in!

 

Three players straight into the first team! And even with this newgen improvement possible bug they'll be useful first teamers for a while

Finances and Upgrades

No money, and the council keep stopping us expanding our stadium!

Had to sell another player to keep the wolf from the door, so to speak

Career

 

[OlivierL]

1 hour ago, the_hdk said:

are there any clubs avaailable that produce foreign newgens? (ala Andorra in Spain)

 

[WhiteCat33]

2 hours ago, Makoto Nakamura said:

Pretty much, screenshots from my Abertillery Excelsior thread over on FMCU.

 

So is the bug only for low level facility clubs or is development for players playing in youth teams just nerfed/bugged for everyone? I just thought my youth players not getting better without first team experience was a purposeful change since FM19 which was the last I played. 

[Makoto Nakamura]

2023 End of Season Review

A loss to Bossekop on the final day of the season sees us finish in 3rd, where we could've finished 2nd if we'd have beaten them but this is still a much better season than the last!

  

 

 

Overall Best XI

2023 Best XI

Lars Søgård

Vebjørn Atle Strømme - Amadeus Yttervik-Triumf - Marius Brøttum - Thomas Bertheussen

Kim Steven Sara (YP1a)

Ole Martin Steen - Johnny Solberg (YP2a)

Marius Solås                                                 Frode Mæland

Steffen Klitgaard (YP1o)

[Makoto Nakamura]

2 minutes ago, WhiteCat33 said:

So is the bug only for low level facility clubs or is development for players playing in youth teams just nerfed/bugged for everyone? I just thought my youth players not getting better without first team experience was a purposeful change since FM19 which was the last I played. 

I believe so, but it isn't that players aren't getting better without first team experience, it's about players getting worse even with first team experience.

[Makoto Nakamura]

A new goalkeeper? I'm listening.  

[Shambolic]

Attempt one is going to be done with team closest to me that got promoted which is Margate! First rather glaring issue is that we do not have a recognised striker and another is that we only have 11 non greyed out players  

 

[Makoto Nakamura]

2024 Youth Candidates

Told to look for a goalkeeper and winger and the best players are all defenders.

[OlivierL]

First international call-up for academy graduate - 26-8-22

[WhiteCat33]

RAAL La Louviere: Pro League A 2032/33 (Season 11)

Performance:

Season 11 will be one to forget and move on from. We were just awful in the back stretch of the season and fell down to 11th. Not really much more to say on that.

Youth Intake

This is the first intake for my new HOYD. This preview left much to be desired

However when the players came in, it may actually be a golden generation if they can reach their potential

I play a handful of 2* players as subs right now so a good number here can make the first team right away. Then I’ll be looking to loan some of the current subs and bring these guys into rotation. To note: I have a Slovenian and Romanian affiliate club so I’m assuming those two came in that way. Hate how now we don’t get a message about that in the youth intake anymore. 

 

Found this surprising:

Look at #5 that Jamaican player came through a Belgian club youth intake and it’s a club that’s more or less on the same footing as us not one of the big guys in the league. That is shocking and hopefully means maybe I’ll win one of these lotteries coming up. Genk has one at #11 and then a Belgian came through Willem II but that’s all we have on our list. One day we'll be up there...

Finances

Sponsorship money up to 2M from 1.6M. We are still broke so this may be a big transfer window where I reset the squad and look to build with this golden generation.

Excel:

[Watson156]

Season 6: Mid Season Break

Chertanovo Moscow | Russia Premier Liga | 2027/28

League Table | Squad | Results | Transfer History

Since the full game has been released I feared that I was going to have to put this game on hold, as there seems to be quite a few bugs especially in the Russian Leagues. Thankfully however they only seem to be affecting new games and so for the time being my beta save is still working as it should, I think!

Anyway onto this season. We started the season off with some good albeit frustrating news. Ex player Carlo Soldani had been sold to St Gallen for £7.25m. Of course the added extra being the 50% of the sale, which is going to be a massive help to keep the finances secure this season. As I'm pretty sure I've already said we lose about £500k per month and this extra money should comfortably see us through to the end of the season when we get our prize money. The frustrating part of this is after Spartak sold him of course he was called up to the National team and made his debut exactly a week later, so we missed out on the extra £1m that we would have been due. 

I said after last year that we needed to find a way to make a clearer route for our youngsters to play more often and actually have a chance of making the 1st team. To do this we have sold 10 players, loaned out 4 and we released 4 at the end of their contracts. This has been a welcome addition and while it hasn't produced an immediate impact for the club I'm very hopeful that it will in the future. The downside however of this has been that youngsters now feel that they are 1st team ready players and want new contracts going from around £90-250 p/w all the way to £1.2k+ p/w. It's proving a very tricky decision for me. I don't want players in my U21's on £1k+ p/w but I also don't want to risk losing 5* potential players on a free transfer. Any Ideas?

That's the off the pitch stuff dealt with now onto the pitch. We have done ok this season although it feels like we are doing worse than last season somehow. The reason I think is because we have lost games to some poor teams. 0-0 to CSKA doesn't seem bad, except they only had 10 men for 60 mins and I don't think we had a single highlight after the sending off.  0-2 to Khimki & Nizhniy Novgorod were both appalling results, especially if we want to even sniff the chance at making the European places. Losing 0-1 to Krylja was another shocker as we battered them all game but couldn't score and it cost us. The same should also be said about the previous game drawing 1-1 to Rubin thanks to an 89th minute goal. I HATE TRYING TO DEFEND CORNERS!!!!

Looking at the results as I write this there were actually some good results. Beating Akhmat 4-0 at home stands out as a great result, but probably the best performance was the 3-1 win against Rostov. The 2-1 win over Lokomotiv was all about throwing more strikers on! We had 4 strikers playing upfront from the 70th minute onwards. Finally our persistence and sheer attacking numbers made the difference thanks to an 85th minute penalty and then we managed to score an injury time winner for a change to secure the win.

Now we have the winter break and I'm sure what will be an onslaught of crap low bids for my youngsters which will result in them being angry about now being able to move to a 3rd division team. You've got to love the challenge!!

[Elsjorro]

I am having problems with the youth not developing to. I have a Nice example of a player who didn't upped one single attribute in 5 years. I loaned him out to a sattelite club and he came back with +3/+4 attributes. Ill try to post it tonight. It is ridiculous.

[Winski]

Please post it at the bugs section, because SI really need to check this ASAP  

[karax268]

The development bug explains a lot... 

I might just put my save on hold untill this is fixed

[ScotsmanFM]

If I do this challenge for my blog can I link blog posts as seasonal updates instead of writing it out twice? 🙈

[Elsjorro]

53 minutes ago, karax268 said:

The development bug explains a lot... 

I might just put my save on hold untill this is fixed

I might do this as well yes. Because the bug seems to be in the youth department. They dont develop from 15-18. After they become 18 you can send them out on a loan and then they develop. Also, it seems if you put the players into your first squad, they develop as well. But we all now you can't play with 11 16-year olds every year. 

[Makoto Nakamura]

An excellent intake and we do need some more defenders.

[Elsjorro]

So, to put the screens behind the words: I have a very nice example of what happens with the players development.

 

Bartosz Urbanski came in as a fairly talented player. This is him now:

 

Think we can all establish its a pretty decent player. So, i have a overview of how he developed. Bare in mind he was in my youth/2nd squad from 3-2036 to 7-2039. After that, i send him on a loan to Vizela, a small club in the 2nd division of Portugal. Look at what happend. He came back with most of the wanted attributes going up 3/4 points:

 

[karax268]

43 minutes ago, Elsjorro said:

I might do this as well yes. Because the bug seems to be in the youth department. They dont develop from 15-18. After they become 18 you can send them out on a loan and then they develop. Also, it seems if you put the players into your first squad, they develop as well. But we all now you can't play with 11 16-year olds every year. 

I haven't had much progress with 1st teamers either. Granted, I have poor facilities but still.. I'd expect at least some development.