How do you recruit for the U21s squad?

[Eccentric_Ed]

Hey guys,

I have a question for you guys regarding who do you designate to recruit for your U21s squad. In my recent saves I have tried to delegate this responsibility to various members of my backroom staff including the director of football, my assistant manager, the U21s manager, and the head of youth development, but they just keep signing the absolute worst young players in the game. Eventually I gave up on delegating this task and now I'm in charge of signing all players for the U21s squad. I'd like to ask if you guys have encountered the same problem, and have you found a way around it, or is it just the fact that this features (delegating signing players for the U21s team) in the game simply doesn't work and needs to be developed?

[FrazT]

I have never trusted any other staff member to do recruiting.  In reality though, I rarely buy specifically for the under 21/B squad unless there is a bright prospect who is not quite ready for the first-team squad and needs some game time.  The second squad is usually populated by players from the under-18s who are too old for that squad and 19-21-year-olds who may or may not make the first team squad

[Sinbad7104]

Something i've always struggled with so would also like to hear others experience  with this

[Uncle Adi]

I delegate to the U21 or HOY and sign the odd player that catches my eye. Sometimes I'll keep control of who finalises sales to stop them from selling someone I have high hopes for.

If it's important to you then maybe you just need better staff?

[Lord Rowell]

Similar to the OP, when i've delegated in the past their signings are well below the standard my club is capable of. Better off just do it yourself.

Hopefully something SI can improve for FM25 and onwards...

[FourFiveOne]

Probably the best thing is to do it yourself. Just set up scouting for 16-19 year old talents with a predicted potential of at least 4 stars. You'll find players out of contract (free) but also relatively cheap ones. If you are a big, rich club its obviously much easier as you can spend more money.

Real life examples are Noah Darvich signed by Barcelona to play at the B team for a year and Lukas Bergvall by Tottenham, molding/shaping them according to the club's desired  philosophy and play style.

[Eccentric_Ed]

This is actually quite an important aspect of the game if you intend to stay at a club for a long time. In one of my recent saves I didn't recruit many good players for my U21s team, and 4 or 5 years down the line I actually started struggling to meet the Premiere League's registration rules (because you have to register at least 8 home-grown players). And it gets even more difficult if you start qualifying for European competitions because you also have to register 4 players who were trained at your club in order to fulfil the registration rules. After about 5 seasons in, most of my trained at club players were just not up to the standard that was required for us to compete in Europe. So my advice for anyone who's planning to manage a club for many years is to pay close attention to your U21s squad and make sure that you populate that squad with enough good 18 year olds so that a few years down the line they will hopefully be good enough for your first team. 

[kingjericho]

My DOF signed a handful of out of contract EPL youngsters that turned out good. But those 3-4 good signings were amongst probably 60 signings in total.

[turnip]

I'm in control of all signings at my clubs.

If you're managing a club within the EU and have the money for it, then just sign anyone who looks remotely decent and let development decide which ones you keep. Being in the EU, you can sign 16/17 year olds who should make good progress just through training.

And if you don't have good training facilities, then you don't have enough money to do this yet.