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Managers' Development Discussion Thread - The Youth Academy
This is one of a group of threads inviting discussion from all managers about the proposals for developing various parts of Itsagoal.

It is important to realize that although each of the proposals has been formulated after much thought and discussion, none of them is set in stone. The members of the Think Tank have done their best to consider topics from all angles, but do not claim to have thought of absolutely everything.

This is therefore the chance for everyone to get involved with discussion. Please therefore read through the proposals, and make your comments.

For this process to be both useful and manageable, please do not stray from the topic being discussed. Threads will be closely moderated to keep them relevant.

We expect there to be differences of opinion, and would encourage all managers to engage in positive discussion. In the end, Itsagoal is Ron's game, and he will make the final decisions, but we want to hear from you first!


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Youth Academy

Objectives.

Improve the quality of youth academy graduates.

Focus on managerial decisions and reduce random elements.

Allow flexibility for the manager.

Introduce youth training.

The current system is too random, doesn't force the manager to make enough decisions or to interact with it very much. It is key that all academies are capable of bringing through top quality players ( albeit less frequently) even though they may not have the funds of the larger academies.

One of the major factors we have is how many players we can allow into the system from the YA. The current system allows a manager to attempt to promote youth as frequently as the manager wishes, but the player will often fail to promote. The reason behind that relates to to maintaining the size and age of the players population.

One challenge is how to allow the odd star player through a small academy yet still have value add from youth coaches and youth training. How do we do that ?

Put simply, the impact of the academy on a player will vary. So some youth will do well and reach their full potential with the minimum of help, whilst others will only reach their full potential if they have the best coaches and training. This means that whilst better academies will have more success overall, all academies can find and produce stars.

The proposal below takes a different approach to the promotion of players from the youth squad to the senior squad. It will increase the quality of players entering the game via the YA and also give the control to the manager as opposed to allowing the system to dictate which players are accepted and which are declined promotion.

The key change here is that a club is limited to promoting 2 players per season. 3 with a large academy

Those players are much more likely to accept a place in the senior squad.
The quality of the players will be affected by the length of time spent in the academy, the quality of the coaches, the focus of the training and of course the player.
All players graduating the academy will be in the fair/good/great range. Its fair to say some poor players may come through, especially if they haven't spent long in the academy.

Think of the academy like a pyramid, at the top is the 18 year old he will promote and at the bottom are several 13 year olds. As the seasons tick by the manager will need to remove players that start to show signs of not making the grade so he maintains the pyramid structure, weeding out failures along the way.
and making room for the next intake.

Squad size limitation.
Squad size will be limited to 26 players. This is an effective way to police the size of the overall player population whilst giving manager license to use both the YA and the Agents system as they see fit.

There will be 3 YA tiers. The tiers relate to capacity for players. At least 1 Youth coach per tier will be required.

- - Tier 1 - Total Capacity 7 - Total Promotion spots 2
- - Tier 2 - Total Capacity 14 - Total Promotion spots 2
- - Tier 3 - Total Capacity 21 - Total Promotion spots 3

All clubs have Tier 1 by default.
One off cost to open tiers 2 and 3.
Tiers to be opened sequentially.

Training.

The manager may select specific training, (e.g. Mental, Physical or Technical) or he can select general training. He can also select the intensity, which may have cost / health implications. So from time to time a youth player may develop an injury, and have to stop training for a period of time. This will feed into how injury prone the player is when he graduates.

Training will occur daily, with daily updates to statistics / condition etc. Training settings will persist until changed by the manager. When promoting players their "Physical/Mental/Technical" ratings would feed into the overall make-up of the final player, so to some extent the manager is able to mould the final player.

Signing Youth players.

Players will be available to sign in the age range 12 to 17.
The scout will provide a potential rating. This is an initial rating and an indication of the player potential. Better scouts will return players faster, but the quality of the scout rating will remain the same. Generally will be less accurate than a coaches rating.

Promoting Youth Players.

- - Player must spend a minimum of 1 season (56 days) in the academy before promotion.
- - Players can be promoted any time from the age of 16.
- - Players promoted early ( before their 18th birthday ) risk not realising their full potential as senior players.
- - Players should be promoted by the manager prior to their 19th birthday, or lose the player.
- - Players selected for promotion will by and large accept. In the event they fail to sign, compensation will be payable based on the time spent in the academy and on the quality of the player.
- - Time spent in the academy will have a significant impact of players reaching their potential, so whilst managers can still sign older youth, the reality is they wont be as good.
- - The coaches potential rating is an indication of the final quality but there will be some variation on that.
- - Youth players will not have contracts as such, the manager will be able to terminate any youth contract when he chooses. Otherwise the player will stay in the academy until he is promoted or rejected.

Costs.

Costs to be applied daily based on the type of academy, what tier it is (tier 1,2 or 3), training intensity levels , the number of youth and youth player quality ?
Signon fees, based on player quality and age.
One off costs for opening the academy tiers.

Player information.

Current information will remain.

- - Age & birthday.
- - Physical rating
- - Mental Rating
- - Technical Rating.
- - Overall Rating.
- - Coaches potential rating.
- - Health ( injured / knock / fit )
- - Injury score. This will track how injury prone the player is based on his time in the academy.

The player will have a coaches potential rating. That rating will become more accurate the longer the player stays in the academy and will be a clearer indication where the player will land in his final potential / rating.


Philosophy.......

With youth its about how they develop, that is why the accuracy of the ratings improve over time, its not realistic to know to much at the beginning of the process.
The cost of bringing young players in will be low, the idea being that managers evaluate the players and how they train, hold on to the better ones and release the others, but that is up to how the manager plays the game. There is flexibility for the manager to make decisions.

Youth academies will be a bit of a gamble, they have to be. If they are too deterministic it unrealistic. I think we have an offering here that is a big improvement on the current YA.
Its more interactive, manager decisions will dictate which players get through and will to an extent effect their quality and make up of attributes.

Players that are released or removed from the academies wont turn up again or be sold by agents.
Its also unlikely that squads that are low on numbers will be able to take extra on from the youth academy.

Very good and well thought out.

'The player will have a coaches potential rating.'

Will this be available before or after joining the academy?

I believe it will be prior to joining Lemmy as the scout will provide it.

Looks interesting.

What does the last sentence mean?

"Its also unlikely that squads that are low on numbers will be able to take extra on from the youth academy."

It means that even if your squad is desperately low then you are still restricted to the maximum number of promotions from the YA per season.

Someone posed the question if a manager could deliberately run their squad numbers down to force more promotions from the YA.

This certainly does sound like a great improvement.

One question though...what happens if you've already promoted 2 youths in a season and a 3rd turns 18? Do you just lose him?

Also...

"Costs to be applied daily based on the type of academy, what tier it is (tier 1,2 or 3), training intensity levels , the number of youth and youth player quality ?"

I'm not sure I agree with costs being determined by player quality. Surely this is detrimental to the smaller clubs, when I thought the philosophy is that any club can produce a star. If it becomes cost prohibitive based on quality, then this won't work.

Yes you would lose him. Its up to the manager to manage when the promotions occur such that you get the best out of the YA given the rules. Thats part of the challenge..

As for your second point, its a good point. The quality of the youth wont have a prohibitive impact on the YA cost.

Ron

I think it all sounds quite good. I like the change with being able to terminate a youth player's contract, and remembering to maintain that 'pyramid' shape by culling the weak will allow you to have control over the amount of promotions per season.

May I ask a question regarding injury-prone players? Is that already in place? If so, it would explain why I have a Forward that has had at least 2 injuries or knocks every season. Poor bloke can't realise his potential because he's made of glass

Impressive - looks like a really positive move forward.

It adds another dimension to the game and more manager/club interaction.

When does he turn 18?
What age and position should i scout knowing that i already have "x" amount of 15 year olds in the squad?

I like ALL the changes - I think the advisors have pretty much nailed all the main issues

But - with the Youth Academy - what about existing youth academies? If I bring in a new 12 year old tomorrow into my academy, then there is every likelihood that in his life in the academy, the academy will change dramatically. This makes it hard to plan.
The simplest answer is probably just to refund clubs the money that they have wasted, at the time of the change. But it's still hard to plan ahead without a "rough" timescale.
Or will these youths get absorbed into the new academy. This also might be unfair as you've stated that the standard of youths will possibly increase in the new system, meaning the current crop won't have the same potential as the new crop
I'm just nit-picking - I'm very positive about the changes

I need to fine tune the detail, but my intention is that as far as possible the current youth will be absorbed into the new system.

There will be more information made available to managers in advance of the YA introduction, so they will have an opportunity to plan a bit.

Ron

Just a thaught.

The YA restricted to just 2youth player promotion a season is certainly to affect the future of the game even as a higher tier is sure to promote more players though. Think about the number of vacant teams in the game, or will they be automatically reset to gain youth players?

Another concern is the 'retirement' i see lots of old players in the game who are approching retirement, now the question is, can the 2-3 youth players able to promote by each team cover up the retireers?

What happens to a team who may not start accademy due to managers having little time to spend in the game? I'm quite sure that the game will loss equilibrium on players in the near future if these feature is applied.

I think the current YA system should continue, with a little possitive change in terms of youth quality and rate youth players accepting promotion offer. If a team is able to promote 4-6 player a season then that team becomes a makeover for the other teams with no accademy through the TM

promote a player at 18 and he will be with your team for at least 13 seasons as I don't think players retire before 31.

2 players per season from YA for 13 seasons = 26 players, enough to fill the squad. Providing the players accept contracts to promote to seniors there shouldn't be a problem.

cheers

A really great idea

JUST DO IT!

Maybe allow the manager to know when the players turns 18? Seems a bit unfair that you lose a player based of that if you didn't know when your players turn 18 to be honest.