One of my greatest passions playing Football Manager and one I'm sure many of you reading this share is developing young talent into star players. That means the youth intake day is one of the more exciting days in the season. We all hope that day brings us that potential superstar that will lead our club to new heights for seasons to come. But why do we or don't we get them?? To answer that question I did a number of simulations ,trying to figure out if any of the conventional wisdom we have of youth intake holds up against hard facts. For most of this I used GNK Dinamo who have 20 in youth intake.
First I checked if the quality of the staff member doing the intake influences the quality of regens. The team’s best player had a CA of 137, top 5 average were 133,8 and squad average was 117,7.
I ran 20 simulations with the HoYD, DoF, AM each, plus 4 other simulations on another save with a HoYD with all 20, 16, 12 or 8 attributes.
Every one of them had basically the same PA production. The average top regen had the PA around the CA of the best player and the average PA of the 5 best regens per generation was usually half a star better than PA than the average squad member had CA.
Afterwards I did 20 simulations with my Diname save in 2022. The top player had 175 CA, top 5 165,8, squad average was 152,6. The results were top prospect average PA of 155, top 5 regens 131. Eventho my squad was significantly better, I wasn’t producing players that were that better on average, leading me to think reputation has something to do with it as well.
Following that idea I did 20 sims with Barcelona . The average CA for a barca player was pretty similar to my future team, just 3 CA higher. But barca produced far better players with the top prospect on average being 175 PA, top 5 being 154,4 . Meaning they produce a world class player every year, with 5 players who could become first team / rotation players for the team.
IN Short, the quality of the staff member doing the intake doesn’t influence the regen PA. Squad CA and club reputation do. Apart from this the country youth rating is the most important factor in getting a high PA player. Reputation doesn’t per say increase the PA but it helps recruit players from countries with better Youth rating than the one you currently manage in.
Another thing I wondered is does staff influence the type of personality your regens are. The anweser to that is both yes and no. The personality of an average regen mimics that of your average squad member. But 2 or 3 of them (those singled out by the staff member) have personality traits more like the staff member doing the intake.
One thing I stumbled in accidentally while doing this is the influence of your selected first 11 on the day of the intake. I was getting pretty weak players ( by weak I mean compared to my top players) eventho I had 3 or 4 world class players. On average the best regen was 151, eventho the average CA of my first 11 players was 162. So I calculated the average for those not selected, surprisingly their average was 152 almost indentical to the top regen PA. After that I did 15 sims with my subs selected as my first 11 and the average PA for the top prospect was 160,2.
The average PA of the top 3 regens created can be split into thirds cuz of the way they related to the squad CA.
1st tier top prospect PA half star more than squad average
2nd tier top prospect PA squad average
3rd tier top prospect PA half star less than squad average
1st tier 2nd best prospect PA squad average
2nd their 2nd best prospect PA half star less than squad average
3rd tier 2nd best prospect PA star less than squad average
1st tier 3rd best prospect PA half star less than squad average
2nd tier 3rd best prospect PA star less than squad average
3rd tier 3rd best prospec PA star and a half less than squad average
Hopefully i will have some free time in the future to see if staff preferences have an influence on the positions your regens play. I did some small sample which is more favorable to club legends dictate positions and not staff preferences.
Summary
To turn your club into a factory for world class players you need:
A strong squad or at least starting 11
A squad full of players with high ratings in determination, ambition and professionalism
A club with high reputation
High youth intake both club and country
On the day of youth intake select your subs as the starting 11.
First I checked if the quality of the staff member doing the intake influences the quality of regens. The team’s best player had a CA of 137, top 5 average were 133,8 and squad average was 117,7.
I ran 20 simulations with the HoYD, DoF, AM each, plus 4 other simulations on another save with a HoYD with all 20, 16, 12 or 8 attributes.
Every one of them had basically the same PA production. The average top regen had the PA around the CA of the best player and the average PA of the 5 best regens per generation was usually half a star better than PA than the average squad member had CA.
Afterwards I did 20 simulations with my Diname save in 2022. The top player had 175 CA, top 5 165,8, squad average was 152,6. The results were top prospect average PA of 155, top 5 regens 131. Eventho my squad was significantly better, I wasn’t producing players that were that better on average, leading me to think reputation has something to do with it as well.
Following that idea I did 20 sims with Barcelona . The average CA for a barca player was pretty similar to my future team, just 3 CA higher. But barca produced far better players with the top prospect on average being 175 PA, top 5 being 154,4 . Meaning they produce a world class player every year, with 5 players who could become first team / rotation players for the team.
IN Short, the quality of the staff member doing the intake doesn’t influence the regen PA. Squad CA and club reputation do. Apart from this the country youth rating is the most important factor in getting a high PA player. Reputation doesn’t per say increase the PA but it helps recruit players from countries with better Youth rating than the one you currently manage in.
Another thing I wondered is does staff influence the type of personality your regens are. The anweser to that is both yes and no. The personality of an average regen mimics that of your average squad member. But 2 or 3 of them (those singled out by the staff member) have personality traits more like the staff member doing the intake.
One thing I stumbled in accidentally while doing this is the influence of your selected first 11 on the day of the intake. I was getting pretty weak players ( by weak I mean compared to my top players) eventho I had 3 or 4 world class players. On average the best regen was 151, eventho the average CA of my first 11 players was 162. So I calculated the average for those not selected, surprisingly their average was 152 almost indentical to the top regen PA. After that I did 15 sims with my subs selected as my first 11 and the average PA for the top prospect was 160,2.
The average PA of the top 3 regens created can be split into thirds cuz of the way they related to the squad CA.
1st tier top prospect PA half star more than squad average
2nd tier top prospect PA squad average
3rd tier top prospect PA half star less than squad average
1st tier 2nd best prospect PA squad average
2nd their 2nd best prospect PA half star less than squad average
3rd tier 2nd best prospect PA star less than squad average
1st tier 3rd best prospect PA half star less than squad average
2nd tier 3rd best prospect PA star less than squad average
3rd tier 3rd best prospec PA star and a half less than squad average
Hopefully i will have some free time in the future to see if staff preferences have an influence on the positions your regens play. I did some small sample which is more favorable to club legends dictate positions and not staff preferences.
Summary
To turn your club into a factory for world class players you need:
A strong squad or at least starting 11
A squad full of players with high ratings in determination, ambition and professionalism
A club with high reputation
High youth intake both club and country
On the day of youth intake select your subs as the starting 11.
