In Football Manager, signing the perfect players can be the difference between success and mediocrity. With thousands of players in the game, identifying the right fit for your team requires careful planning, scouting, and negotiation. Whether you’re building for the future or addressing immediate needs, here’s a guide to help you search, scout, and buying players in Football Manager.
From knowing what to look for in a player’s profile to assess strengths and weaknesses to how to methodically search to identify the best possible players on Football Manager, we take a deep dive into how to recruit perfect players in Football Manager.
In this comprehensive guide to signing players on Football Manager we hand you our best tips to identify great players that can immediately improve your team. Here are several things you wish you knew sooner focusing on mastering the art of buying players.
To follow the natural process of player recruitment we first look at how to search for the best players on Football Manager by setting up scouting assignments or search filters to obtain more knowledge about the player. Then, we’ll emphasize what to look for in a players’ scout report to track down those highly recommended signings that can quickly improve your squad before providing a few tips in the negotiation process to increase the chance of signing the best players on Football Manager.
Table of Contents
Scouting & Searching for The Best Players on Football Manager: 7 Quick Tips
1. Use Scouting Networks Effectively
Scouting is crucial to ensuring you get the best value for money. Assign scouts to regions or leagues where there are untapped markets, such as South America, Eastern Europe, or Africa, which tend to produce hidden gems.
Your scouting team should have diverse expertise to cover multiple regions and include scouts with knowledge of the biggest footballing nations across the world. Understanding which nations that has a higher likeliness to produce quality newgens can give you an advantage over your opponents.
By constantly increasing and improving your scouting network, you can use your network of scouts more effectively at tracking down the best players on Football Manager, hidden gems across the world, or unveil the best bargains which let you improve your squad by saving money.
READ MORE | Football Manager Scouting Regions & Nations’ Level of Youth Rating
Scouts with high judging player ability and judging player potential are essential for providing accurate reports. Then, you should consider their level of Adaptability to ensure the scouts can quickly settle in in new environments and start to scout players as quickly as possible.
Scout reports will give you valuable insights, including player consistency, injury proneness, and whether the player is a “model citizen,” indicating their professionalism or ambitions displayed through their type of personality.
Take full advantage of the scouting reports and ensure you got extensive knowledge about the player before making the final decisions on whether to target the player further.
2. Judging Potential vs. Current Ability
Balancing short-term and long-term squad building is key. Some players may not have high current ability but possess exceptional potential. This is especially useful for smaller clubs aiming for future success. Use tools like the Development Centre to track young talents within your academy or set up scouting assignments that enable you track down the next generation of wonderkids early on.
In contrast, clubs in need of immediate results should focus on players with high current ability but who might be undervalued by their current club. Players nearing the end of their contracts, or those listed for transfer, often represent value-for-money signings.
However, for long-term planning, spending an extra effort at setting up appropriate recruitment focus to identify promising talents and future wonderkids can be advantageous.
Scouting for under-23 players in South America with special focus on Brazil, Argentina, Colombia and Ecuador could be a great way to identify wonderkids and quality newgens at a low cost. Then, you could look to those hidden wonderkids factories to track down future world class players. These are clubs famed for their youth academy and have a reputation for producing generational talents within their nation, or region.
RELATED | Football Manager’s Best Youth Academies
3. Search for Players Based on Key Attributes
The foundation of signing the perfect player begins with an efficient search process. Use the player search filters to narrow down the type of player you need. Start by identifying the key attributes required for specific roles.
For example, if you’re searching for a box-to-box midfielder, prioritize physical attributes like stamina and work rate alongside technical ones like tackling and passing or mental ones like off the ball movement will be beneficial when scouting for the best possible box-to-box midfielders.
In Football Manager you can quickly search for specific types of players by highlighting their key attributes for each of the player roles.
Simply go to: Players in Range > New Search > Pick Attributes > Highlight key attributes for role > Choose type of role
When highlighting key attributes for roles, you will filter the number of players within range by all the key and secondary attributes for the role. For a Ball-playing Defender, a player has to meet a criteria of 17 different attributes to be found.
Rather than trying to find an exact match of players with at least 15 in all highlighted attributes for the role, I recommend reducing the number of attributes you look at and the minimum threshold to a level that fits your division. You can find out how your teams units compare to the rest of the league by going to the Squad Planner in FM24 and click Reports > Comparison.
Here you’ll get a visual representation of how the average level of all the player attributes in Football Manager compare to the average level within your division.
In addition to attributes, leverage scouting assignments to search by position, potential ability, and age. FM’s “Player Search” tool also allows you to filter by contract status, making it easier to find players with expiring contracts or those available for loan.
Using additional conditions and filtering by transfer or contract status can be an efficient way to identify potential transfer targets both when you are planning to improve your squad for the short term, or for the long term.
4. Find Similar Players
Have you ever been in the situation where your star player won’t sign a new contract, or bigger clubs are attracting his interest? When looking for a replacement, the ‘Find Similar Players’ tool on Football Manager can be a quick way to sign the perfect player.
You can search for any player within the database and quickly identify players with some of the same skill-set and best abilities as the chosen player.
Let’s imagine you want a similar type of player as Vinicius Junior within your squad. Simply head to the player’s profile, locate the ‘Find Similar Players’ button under the Comparison section and discover players within your scouting range with similar abilities.
The Find Similar Players search will pick notable attributes and the natural position of the player you want to find similar players to. You can then edit the search by filtering for players within a specific age range, lower the attributes to a more fitting level for your squad, or add or remove certain attributes that you wish to prioritize, or not.
For instance, by reducing the minimum attributes to 11 and filter by players between 16 and 21, you might discover future wonderkids with a similar style of play and somehow similar skills as a world class player.
5. Player Comparison – Highlight Attributes per Role
Once you have found an interesting player, the Player Comparison tool can help you to compare two players’ abilities and skills with each other.
This tool is very useful when searching for potential first team signings as you can compare a transfer target with a member of your squad, for instance your best player.
One of the ‘hidden features’ of Player Comparison is the opportunity to compare their strengths and weaknesses by browsing first and foremost their Attributes but also their Statistics.
In this instance, I want you to pay attention to the ability to highlight key attributes for a specific role!
This is a wonderful tip if you’re in need of a better player to perform in the chosen roles within your tactics.
Highlighting the key attributes enables you to quickly see their weaknesses, or strengths, and how they will fit into the preferred role. Perhaps you’ll discover the player doesn’t have the attributes needed to play as an Inside Forward but is more suited to play as a Winger or Advanced Playmaker – meaning you either need to alter your tactics to get the best out of the signing, or take into account he will take some time to adopt to the role as you need to improve certain weaknesses of play by setting up ‘Additional Focus’ within his Individual Training.
6. Analyzing Player Data
Beyond scouting, FM allows you to dive deep into player analytics. Use the data analysis hub to track player performance across multiple metrics, such as key passes, tackles won, or expected goals (xG). Data-driven insights can help identify players who outperform their average ratings, revealing hidden talent that traditional scouting might miss.
Additionally, analyze your own squad’s weaknesses and gaps. For instance, if your team lacks creativity, use the data hub to find players who excel in chance creation or assist statistics.
Scouting for players based on statistics and data can also be a great way to search for quality players when setting up your recruitment focuses, or you look through the club’s pool of players found.
You can add any stats you prefer by including additional conditions in search filters, and thereby identify great performers for the position you wish to add depth to. This will be a viable option once you are a few months into the save, and players have played several matches.
Then, you can customize the view of the players in range screen with specific statistics
Improving the Recruitment Team with a Recruitment Analyst will be essential when analyzing players performance. A good recruitment analyst requires Judging Player Ability, Analyzing Data and Tactical Knowledge.
Whenever you scout a player, the analyst will generate a similar Analyst Report card as soon as possible. These Analyst Reports will only be beneficial once the player has played a minimum of 5 matches. However, the more matches the player has played, the more data there is to digest – ensuring you can make a better judgment of the player’s strengths and weaknesses relating to performance.
An additional tip relating to assessing players performance is to add potential transfer targets you are interested in into a shortlist. You can create different shortlists that enable you to track players for a specific position, by age, or by role.
When adding players to a shortlist, you can keep track of the player’s form and unveil statistics and more information about how he has performed in league matches or non-competitive matches (if we’re talking about young talents who play for the Under-21s or U18 team).
7. Unveil Players’ Playing Styles with Highlight Packages
When a player has caught your attention, it will be useful to track the player over a longer period before making a bid. It’s not always enough to have access to basic player data, his current ability or potential, player attributes and positional abilities to rate the player.
To get a better understanding of the player’s style of play and his tendencies in movement and positioning you can ask your scouts to watch the player from 1 to four matches per individual scouting assignment.
This will generate highlight packages where you can watch the player in action.
To generate a highlight package, simply ask your scout to attend a match the player is featured in. Rather than click get scout report, choose ‘Watch for Three / Four Matches’.
The more matches you watch, the better foundation you get to make a purposeful decision.
Asking for highlight packages on players you are highly interested in could be one of the last steps before making a bid. You’ll be able to see how your future winger operates in and out of possession.
Does he frequently cut inside and could be classed as an Inside Forward as he tries to place the ball in the back of the net by taking long shots from outside the penalty box, or does he frequently make lay-off passes when receiving the ball out wide?
At the end of the day, learning how the player operates helps you to make smarter signings by disclosing their playing style far better than basing your judgment on his star rating for his best suited player role.
What to look for when signing the perfect player on Football Manager?
So far, we have kicked-off our comprehensive guide to signing perfect players on Football Manager with a quick look at how to search and scout for players. Now, it’s time to shift our focus on analyzing players to identify the perfect signings. Let us take a closer look at how to assess player profiles or analyze scout reports to find the perfect player.
1. Determined Players = Youth to Gold!
When looking to improve your squad a players’ star rating, transfer value and the overall level of player attributes required for the position and role might be the first things that catches your attention. However, rather than being misled by his potential ability star rating or whether he got above 13 in attributes for all technical and mental attributes for his best position and role, I always consider a player’s level of Determination and Work Rate before analyzing the player’s abilities furthermore.
This is essential if you are considering buying lots of promising talents and look to develop them into future wonderkids on Football Manager 25.
Determination and Work Rate are two absolute attributes on Football Manager – meaning they are locked to an individual and aren’t as easily developed as the other player attributes.
A player’s level of Determination will also be one of the factors to his Personality. This means that a player with higher levels of Determination will not only have a more positive Personality but also be more committed on the pitch as well as on the training ground resulting in both better training performance and often quicker progress resulting in a higher likeliness to reach their maximum potential ability as long as they stay injury free and get the necessary match experience and game time.
Both the Determination and Work Rate attributes can develop as the player matures and gain experiences off the field meaning you can use mentoring and tutoring to develop these absolute attributes. However, with all matters of mentoring, it may backfire resulting in Determination or Work Rate decreasing as another in the mentoring group benefitting from it more than the player you had desired to improve his Determination or Work Rate.
Signing players with low Determination should be avoided at all costs. At least I shy away from them. I might even release Newgen arriving at the yearly youth intake if they have under 10 in Determination. The reason is that these players might not develop as much, or it might be harder to see them reaching their maximum potential.
When signing the perfect player, you can’t solely look at a players Determination or other single player attributes to determine whether the player is a good or bad signing. As you’ll learn below, these are just part of the bigger picture.
On the topic of signing the best players for your squad, considering their level of Determination can be the first step before assessing the pros and cons of the player. Or it could even be the last thing to look at before deciding who to buy if you find yourself in the position where you have multiple transfer targets of your interest.
No matter how you look at it, signing determined players will be essential if you’re destined to build a squad of wonderkids and wish to turn your youth talents into potential future first team starters.
2. Hidden Attributes: Consistency
On the matter of signing the perfect player, hidden attributes can really affect the player’s performances and progress. These attributes will only be discovered by getting an extensive knowledge of the player’s abilities and will be revealed in the Scout Report Card.
In this instance, you need to consider both his positive and negative ‘hidden attributes’ and take them into account when judging how good the player is or will become in the future. In total there are six different hidden attributes on Football Manager.
When signing the best possible players, there are only a few that’s more important than the rest. For instance, you’ll be able to sign a significant better player if he has high levels of Consistency or ‘Enjoys big matches’.
Apart from that, you got Adaptability and Versatility that will be important if signing players from outside your country, or you are managing a minor squad where you need a versatile player who can be backup for multiple positions.
In fact, when signing the perfect player on Football Manager I would recommend you prioritize any consistent players.
A consistent performer will be more likely to turn in a higher average performance over a longer period due to their higher likelihood to perform to their maximum ability level in any specific matches than a player who is inconsistent.
The level of consistency will first and foremost influence a player’s technical and mental abilities resulting in that a player with a low consistency will be more likely to see greater differences in his performance over a longer period of matches than a player who has higher consistency.
Throughout a season, these consistent players will become far more valuable for you as you can always rely on them due to their tendency to perform more regularly to their maximum level of player attribute, or his current ability.
This means that a player who has low consistency will be less likely to be as good as what you would imagine from the player profile screen as the player’s performance will vary since he will sometimes perform below par as he finds it hard time to play to their maximum attribute level on a regular basis.
However, if you sign players with sublime physical attributes, their performance won’t be as affected by low consistency than if the player for instance got easily exhausted because of poor stamina or wouldn’t be able to return to fitness that quickly due to low natural fitness.
3. Assess Injury Proneness!
When assessing the scout report and you shall value the pros and cons to determine whether a player will be a great signing or not, it’s useful to take a closer look at a player’s level of injury proneness.
When searching for players to sign you should avoid signing players of high injury proneness. These players will be more likely to suffer from injuries on a more frequent basis than one with lower injury susceptibility.
Paying €50 Mil to experience the player getting hampered with injuries time and time again is not money well spent!
Instead, taking the time to assess the player’s injury history and injury susceptibility will be valuable at the earliest point as possible. If you see a player is ‘fairly susceptible to injuries’ or you can see from their injury history that they have a track record of picking up the same type of injury again and again, it’s better to shy away from the player than to take the unnecessary risk of signing him.
However, if you do sign the player despite having above average injury susceptibility you should understand the increased risk for the player to be hampered with injuries and potentially be out for more games than he starts.
This means that you should consider having a reasonable backup player in case the player gets injured – which he will… at some point!
The result is that the cost of the player will be higher than you would originally imagine, as you perhaps need to sign two players at the cost of €80 Mil for one position, rather than spending €50 mill on one reliable player.
At the same time as assessing a player’s injury proneness I need to include an additional tip!
When searching for players, prioritizing players with a higher degree of Natural Fitness could be advantageous!
These players will be able to maintain their fitness between matches and their physical attributes won’t decline as much if they suddenly get out with a long-term injury or is nearing their peak of their career.
Players with a higher level of Natural Fitness will also tolerate a more intensive training and match load – resulting in becoming more important to the team than the rest of the squad.
Apart from tolerating a higher training intensity and match load, these players will stay fit, or return to their match fitness, quicker after minor injuries as well as reducing the risk of getting match fatigue as quickly.
If signing players with a high injury proneness and low Natural Fitness – these players won’t be able to return to match fitness as fast resulting in you having to balance their game time and training intensity to a greater degree.
These players might require more rest and won’t be able to tolerate playing 90 minutes per match twice a week, or being put on a demanding individual training where you ask him to learn new traits as well as focusing on an additional training focus at double training intensity.
RELATED | How to reduce the number of injuries in Football Manager
Signing players with high Natural Fitness will let you discover that these players will maintain their physical attributes at an appropriate level despite reaching their latter stages of their career.
Just look at Cristiano Ronaldo, a prime example of a player with top natural fitness. Even though he’s reaching his forties, he is still able to play football at a rather high level despite his quickness isn’t what it used to be.
The same applies to these players on Football Manager – meaning you can sign a player who you can enjoy and potentially have success with throughout his entire career!
What is a perfect player on Football Manager?
In Football Manager, a perfect player varies depending on the your squad, preferred tactics and overall club philosophy. However, there are some recognizable features with those excellent signings.
The scout’s recommendation of the potential transfer target can give you some clues. The scout rating that varies from F to A+ can be of great aid to distinguish a bad player from a good signing. However, you should weight up the pros and cons within his scout report to determine whether he will be a great buy, or not.
The scout rating takes into account several factors such as his transfer value wage demands and his current and potential ability. On top of that, the scout rating might be reduced to a lower grade if the scout do not think the player won’t fit with the social groups, or he has specific cons that might make the transfer nearly impossible.
His form and performance at the time of watching the player in action can further impact the scout’s recommendation. Scouting a player several times will often be essential to make up a judgement of whether the player will be deemed as a good or bad signing.
Although the scout believes the signing will be excellent, considering his hidden attributes, how the signing impacts Squad Dynamics both relating to cultural differences, language and age groups must be considered.
Regardlessly, the level of player attributes will have a lot to say about his current abilities so a great buy often has higher levels of player attributes, where 20 is the maximum.
Final Tips at Transfer Negotiations
Once you’ve identified the player, the negotiation process begins. Understanding a player’s market value, age, and club situation will give you leverage. For instance, players nearing the end of their contracts can often be signed for less, or even pre-signed six months before their deal expires.
Waiting to the end of the transfer window before making a bid can help you to save money and pick up quality players for less money than anticipated, especially if they are nearing their contract expiration date.
1. Get in Touch With the Agent
After much scouting and searching for new players, you have eventually found your new star signing. He’s recommended as an excellent signing by your scouts and the expected transfer price and wages is reasonable. However, before making a bid, or a transfer offer if he’s available on an approach to sign, you must remember to ask the agent about his availability.
Remember to do that for any players you’re interested in!
Rather than experiencing the transfer offer being accepted and the player thereby immediately rejects to negotiate a contract because he’s not interested in joining your club, you should always talk to the agent and signal you’re interested in his players’ services.
By talking to the agent, you’ll get more information about how interested the player is in joining you and if not, what does it take for him to be interested in joining your club. Perhaps he never has any plans to play for your club.
Besides his future plan and interest, you will get a better understanding of what it takes to seal the deal – both in terms of the transfer price and approximate expected wages.
Some players will even expect to be played in a specific position or role.
What’s brilliant and that might help you to save a lot of money, is to contest the demands from the agent or the player. If he demands a wage structure that you feel is over the top, you can try to reduce the demands or get rid of promises by offering higher wages.
2. Smart Negotiations
Once entering contract negotiations there are steps you can take to sign top players at a lower cost.
Be aware of clauses that can save you money, such as installment payments, sell-on fees, or buyout clauses. Additionally, paying attention to wage demands and balancing your budget ensures the longevity of your club’s finances while securing top talent.
Most often, you shouldn’t need to break the bank to sign players.
When making transfer bids:
When making a transfer propasal you can be financial smart by emulating the transfer policy of Chelsea – extending the transfer fee over several installments e.g. using the maximum available on Football Manager, three installments over 12 months.
Then you could consider adding clauses such as fee after X amount of league appearances, x fee after international appearances or percentage from profit.
This ensures that the immediate expenditures aren’t as high and helps to maintain money in the bank for additional signings – depending on the remaining transfer budget.
In Contract Negotiations:
Rather than accept the terms without hesitation, you can save a lot of money by paying attention to:
- wage demands compared to his current wages – does he demand too much?
- clauses like: signing on fee, agent fee, appearances fee and unused subsitute fee should be lowered as they can account for a large amount of expenditures per year.
- increasing the contract length and adding bonuses such as goal bonus for attacking players, assist bonus for midfielders and fullbacks, clean sheet bonus for defenders and other incentivies for winning trophies can be used to reduce the wage demands. Even, reaching a specific amount of international caps could be a suitable bonus to include in the contract offer to reduce wage demands.
3. Don’t get Attached to Players
Finally, if all things fail and your perfect signing should reject your contract offer or the club won’t accept your transfer bid, remember there are other players out there with similar current abilities and potential, or perhaps you suddenly come around an even better player at a lower cost!
Regardless of how much you desire the player, it’s a great chance you can find the equivalent by keep scouting and searching… perhaps even for a lower fee!
By mastering these strategies, you’ll position yourself to consistently sign the perfect player, whether you’re managing a European giant or building a lower-league club from the ground up. Patience, research, and strategic thinking are your best assets on the road to success in Football Manager.
Which strategies do you use to identify perfect players on Football Manager? Let us know in comments your greatest tip for mastering player recruitment on Football Manager.
