I started out my career as the manager of Tottenham Hotspur (COYS!) and I managed to win the league in my first two season as well as the CL in my 2nd. Failed on both attempts on my 3rd season. In all seasons I've been buying up young regens with the hope of making them mainstays.
Considering I picked Spurs, I had a bevy of attacking talent at the beginning of the game. However, my team's strikers started depleting (in terms of quality) rapidly, even though I signed Lukaku and Suarez. Defoe wanted out due to a colleague disagreement, Crouch and Keane were barely getting any playing time, Lukaku was inconsistent, and Suarez had two seasons under my team and totally forgot how to find the net in both of them. Pavlyuchenko was my only real and consistent attacking threat from the front which made my seasons bearable. I also signed Son Heung Min (from HSV) who helped Pav during his off-games and did his share.
Fast forward to my 4th season. Due to their profligacy, I've sold Defoe, Keane, Crouch, Lukaku and Suarez, leaving Pav as my only remaining "senior" striker with Son Heung Min backing him up. Obviously my team would be very light up front if I continued like this. I decided to start bringing up some of the youngsters I've purchased to help share the load. None of them were particularly incredible in the CA department though had around 3-3.5 star PA.
Because of the amount of STs I purchased, I decided to try out a new formation with 3 strikers leading the line in a 4-3-3 style. In the start of the season, my striker core consisted of two 18 year old Italian regens, and the aforementioned two strikers. And to my surprise, my team started clicking. The two regens worked well with Son Heung Min and are able to out-pace any defense in the league which allowed for a very potent offense.
Then Son Heung Min went down for a month and a half during international duty leaving me with a huge gap in my 3 pronged attack. Again, having to go through my youth purchases, I brought up a 17 year old Turkish striker to complete my attack once again and he too starts tearing up the world. Of course, one could think I'm exaggerating his contributions, but at this point in my season, he's got 22 goals in 21 games (15 in league, 1 cup and 6 in CL... with 7 Finishing rating) while the two Italian regens are also doing amazing - one of them leads the league in average rating, the other assists.
With this new trio, I couldn't in any conscience put Son Heung Min (who isn't slouching in the performance - 17 g in 25 apps) back into the starting lineup, so I made a second striker combination with a 16 year old French regen, and a recently signed 17 year old Mexican regen. This combination works wonders as well. My 16 year old has 9 goals in 7 games including a 5 goal game in his 2nd PL match against Birmingham. The Mexican has done incredibly as well with his average rating above 7.6 in as a little over 10 games.
In addition, I also brought up a few CMs to shore up my injured midfield and they too have hit the ground running. With one of them scoring on his debut and another being PL player of the month his first month and PL young player in his second.
That begs the question, what did I do right? Not that I'm ungrateful for their quick starts or anything like that, but I've read the forums and I know football and 17 and 18 year old players shouldn't be this dominant, especially when my experienced ones are terrible. 17 and 18 year old strikers shouldn't have a goal a game pace (with 7 finishing rating no less). Lastly, 16 year old strikers shouldn't be scoring 5 goals in a PL match.
Did I just get terribly lucky with my youth purchases?
I can provide pictures if you guys want...
And sorry for this incredibly long post.
Considering I picked Spurs, I had a bevy of attacking talent at the beginning of the game. However, my team's strikers started depleting (in terms of quality) rapidly, even though I signed Lukaku and Suarez. Defoe wanted out due to a colleague disagreement, Crouch and Keane were barely getting any playing time, Lukaku was inconsistent, and Suarez had two seasons under my team and totally forgot how to find the net in both of them. Pavlyuchenko was my only real and consistent attacking threat from the front which made my seasons bearable. I also signed Son Heung Min (from HSV) who helped Pav during his off-games and did his share.
Fast forward to my 4th season. Due to their profligacy, I've sold Defoe, Keane, Crouch, Lukaku and Suarez, leaving Pav as my only remaining "senior" striker with Son Heung Min backing him up. Obviously my team would be very light up front if I continued like this. I decided to start bringing up some of the youngsters I've purchased to help share the load. None of them were particularly incredible in the CA department though had around 3-3.5 star PA.
Because of the amount of STs I purchased, I decided to try out a new formation with 3 strikers leading the line in a 4-3-3 style. In the start of the season, my striker core consisted of two 18 year old Italian regens, and the aforementioned two strikers. And to my surprise, my team started clicking. The two regens worked well with Son Heung Min and are able to out-pace any defense in the league which allowed for a very potent offense.
Then Son Heung Min went down for a month and a half during international duty leaving me with a huge gap in my 3 pronged attack. Again, having to go through my youth purchases, I brought up a 17 year old Turkish striker to complete my attack once again and he too starts tearing up the world. Of course, one could think I'm exaggerating his contributions, but at this point in my season, he's got 22 goals in 21 games (15 in league, 1 cup and 6 in CL... with 7 Finishing rating) while the two Italian regens are also doing amazing - one of them leads the league in average rating, the other assists.
With this new trio, I couldn't in any conscience put Son Heung Min (who isn't slouching in the performance - 17 g in 25 apps) back into the starting lineup, so I made a second striker combination with a 16 year old French regen, and a recently signed 17 year old Mexican regen. This combination works wonders as well. My 16 year old has 9 goals in 7 games including a 5 goal game in his 2nd PL match against Birmingham. The Mexican has done incredibly as well with his average rating above 7.6 in as a little over 10 games.
In addition, I also brought up a few CMs to shore up my injured midfield and they too have hit the ground running. With one of them scoring on his debut and another being PL player of the month his first month and PL young player in his second.
That begs the question, what did I do right? Not that I'm ungrateful for their quick starts or anything like that, but I've read the forums and I know football and 17 and 18 year old players shouldn't be this dominant, especially when my experienced ones are terrible. 17 and 18 year old strikers shouldn't have a goal a game pace (with 7 finishing rating no less). Lastly, 16 year old strikers shouldn't be scoring 5 goals in a PL match.
Did I just get terribly lucky with my youth purchases?
I can provide pictures if you guys want...
And sorry for this incredibly long post.