Using Loans to Improve Youth Development on Football Manager | FM Youth Development Guide

Grow those stars by loaning out your youth players for a faster progress and development of youth on Football Manager. Our guide to using loans to improve youth development on Football Manager gives you everything you need to be aware of when it comes to find suitable targets & how to loan out young players.

There’s nothing more rewarding in Football Manager than to see your best youth talents nurture into world class players. On the road to a successful youth development in Football Manager there are several tips and tricks that could increase the progress of your youth players.

If you want to succeed with youth development it’s important to give young players match experience, and regular match minutes. Despite game time and match experience on a higher level is important in the development of youth, it’s not always possible to incorporate your under-21 players into your squad – it’s here loaning out your young players comes in!

Sending out young players on loans – An approach to Youth Development in Football Manager

Succeeding with youth development might mean you have to use every trick in the book to aid a player’s development. There are so many factors that influence the progression rate of youth. It’s a careful process of making them ready for the first team, where you need to take into account injury risk, current abilities, training performance, match and training load.

Your attention to detail will determine whether it turns out as a success story or not. It requires a constant focus and methodical approach to the player’s happiness and morale. There are constant dilemmas and decisions to be made over each individual.

We all want to see our youngsters reaching their potential ability level… AND we all want to line up with the most competitive squad no matter you’re managing Benfica or Nottingham Forest.

Finding space for each and every promising youngster in or around the first team might be difficult. Let’s be real. Most players in your squad will never be good enough to reach the first team. No matter, your task will be to let everyone within the club reach their highest potential.

Since every player’s personality and vision about themselves are unique, your approach to player development needs to vary. What might have worked for one individual may not work for another. Otherwise, the career path of one individual might be quite different to another despite eventually reaching the same level.

Your approach to squad management and how you balance every player’s happiness and needs according to the agreed playing time and future plans can both hamper and benefit player development. Just face it. You’re probably not able to give each member of your youth teams similar chances to reach first-team football. And you’re probably not able to give each individual enough senior match experience as required due to the fierce competition both between and within the squads.

Using loans to enhance the progression of a player’s abilities can be the solution you are searching for!

So let me share how I approach youth development by using loans to give young players match experience.

The Importance of Match Experience

To succeed with youth development the focus should be on training first and foremost for anyone under the age of 18. Here your attention would go first and foremost to improving players’ technical and mental attributes. Don’t worry too much about physical as they will improve naturally with age.

When turned 18, more focus and attention should be set on match experience and minutes on the pitch. Basically, the player requires more tactical knowledge to get ready for a higher playing level.

For a player to develop and come close to reaching his potential ability the player must have continuity in training as well as playing matches. It must be a balance of quality, both relating to training and playing level. Besides having quality coaches who work with the players on the training ground, the players need regular match experience at an appropriate level which makes them better at learning necessary skills relating to their position and role.

This is an essential part of player development.

By giving players match experience they will improve areas of the game relating to their position and role.

This means that a midfielder will develop attributes such as teamwork, decisions and off the ball whilst defenders will naturally learn concentration, anticipation and positioning. What they will develop ties in with their position on the pitch and duty.

The quality of the matches the player is part of is an important factor as well. It won’t help a player’s development to play for the first team too early. Yes, it can give him a push in the right direction, but it pays to be patient. What’s important to keep in mind is that he might not have the technical or tactical skills to work under the current instructions, or he may lack the physical abilities to play at the tempo of the game.

Similarly, the players’ will not learn anything if playing against opponents far below their level. Sure, every match experience will slightly aid his development but playing at an appropriate level according to his operating level will let you see far greater effects.

With below-par performances and low average ratings, the players confidence and morale will become a hinder on your way to improved development. In fact, the progress of player’s development will be affected by their happiness and morale. Keep them happy and they will turn in better training performances – meaning they will develop at a faster rate.

Player’s Operating Level vs Playing Level

A great source of progression is to play against better oppositions in or around the player’s current operating level. This information is visible within the Coach report and lets you see which playing level each player can perform at.

Knowing which playing level your B-Team, Reserves or Under-19s are at can be helpful in your quest to develop youth. This will also come in handy in the quest to find suitable loan clubs which I’ll discuss more later on. By visiting the league overview you’ll also see how the specific competition ranks according to other competitions at similar reputation level.

Using the knowledge of the reputation of the competition and give players minutes on the pitch at their current operating level or slightly above will be helpful. Some will progress more by playing for the Under-23 team throughout the season, while others may need higher standards to develop. It all ties in with their personality, current abilities, their strength and weaknesses.

A valid question in this instance is to ask yourself whether a player is good enough to play for the first team or may fall through? How far away is he to take the level? Visiting the Development Centre or examine the coach report can give you the answers your searching for.

In the Development Centre you’ll get brought to the attention of suitable first-team candidates, or players who requires your attention who could be loaned out or improved the progress of.

First Team Candidates - FM21 Development Centre

Match Minutes and its effects?

Before looking closer into how you can give match experience it’s necessary to dip into the topic of match minutes. As far as I know, there are no golden rules to the number of match minutes necessary to see a progression. In fact, every player will develop to a varying degree if given minutes on the pitch.

This does not mean you shall throw your youngsters onto the pitch at the very first opportunity. It’s not certain it will aid a player’s development playing against opponents far above their level.

What you have to take into account are each players fitness level, overall training and match load. Some players will progress more by feature in only 50% of the total amount of matches, whilst others can play 60-90% and still develop.

For the youngest players, less is often more. This means that you keep track of their fitness level to ensure they don’t get jaded or injured.

For the Under-23s and below it might be beneficial to rotate the squad and make sure every player, at least the ones you have faith in, plays a minimum of 75 minutes per match. It might mean a heavier rotation of the starting line-ups but match performance and results are subordinate match experience.

How many minutes you give each player depends on their personality, natural fitness and injury susceptibility.

It might not be beneficial to see the same players play week in and week out. Some would benefit from a week of rest where the focus is only at training.

Giving a player 15 minutes or below of match experience will in most instances not be very helpful. It can give them a boost in confidence to get onto the pitch when the team is playing well, but in regard to the development factor, the increase is limited and therefore difficult to observe.

Similarly, a player might not develop as expected if he plays week in and week out. The strain from matches will eventually affect the training performance and its effects. I’m sure there are cases where players develop no matter the number of matches but it’s essential to find a balance between training and match experience relevant to their individual needs. For instance if he has top class Natural Fitness, Stamina, Work Rat and Determination – meaning he has the physic to withstand high training load.

Let us look closer at how you can provide essential match experience in the next chapter.

How To Provide Necessary Match Experience?

There are several ways to give players the necessary match experience to develop themselves. My approach is often varied. As a result, there are no settled rules as I have a number of different options to choose from. It all depends on the fixture list and the respective players’ match sharpness.

But through years of expertise, I’ve come to these conclusions which may help you to give young players match experience which they need to develop.

Promote breakthrough prospects and youngsters with massive potential to the first team. Let them train with the more experienced players and make them available to play for the Under-23, B-Team or Reserves. All according to their current abilities.
- I tend to promote three to five of the best talents. This makes them eligible to be mentored by First Team members.
Let them get a taste to the senior playing level and select one to three of these prospects to travel with the first team. Slowly introduce them to senior match experience by letting them get 10 to 30 minutes from time to time. It’s better to substitute them on in matches against teams in the bottom half of the league.
- Throughout a season you wish to provide these players with a minimum amount of 900 match minutes, or at least 10-20 appearances for the first team by simply getting substituted on in the last minutes of the match – without taking into account starting appearances.
Let them share the enthusiasm of winning matches by substituting them on for the last 20 minutes in matches you lead comfortably. As a result, their confidence and morale will improve. With increased morale comes better training performances.
Select your best young players in the starting line-up for cup matches and unimportant matches (e.g when being drawn against teams from divisions below you). Another situation can be if you’re already out of the CL or Europa League. Perhaps you find yourself in the middle of the table without any risks or chances to be relegated or promoted. Give your youth a chance!
Use the second half of the season to let these players start matches before you replace them with more experienced players in the second half to settle the score.
Trust your youth by rotating your starting line-ups for heavy fixture lists. It may cause you some points in the short run, but will give lots in return for the long term.

By following this approach, you will allow your young players to have playing time on a varied scale. They will rank up 75 to 90 minutes at their appropriate playing level, such as feature for the Under-23s. They might get anywhere from 15 to 90 minutes for the senior team. It all depends on the opponent, the score and the fitness level of the regular squad players and the youngsters.

P.S. By promoting your best young players to the first team you’ll ensure you got options if you encounter injury crises. You got players to push the more experienced players. Additionally, you got alternatives if a specific player’s form drops, and these players will be available for mentoring.

Which players should be loaned out?

Finding suitable loan targets can be as easy as visiting the Development Centre and update yourself on the players who need attention. The backroom staff (herein the Head of Youth Development or whoever in charge of ‘Providing Youth Development Information’) will hand recommendations of players who need more playing time and more match experience.

But if you wish to take a more strategic approach to finding suitable loan targets then there are 6 factors that you should consider looking at when deciding whether you shall develop the player at the club or send him out on loan.

Game time – When analyzing the youth squad for identifying suitable targets to send out on loan, play time and match minutes will triumph everything.
You need to browse your youth squads to identify players who will struggle to get appearances for any of the youth teams. If they are way off the current ability level of the rest of the side, there’s nothing wrong to set them on the Unwanted List, or release them if they are simply not good enough and lacks the potential to become a useful member of your team.
Players Ability vs Potential – Any player who isn’t not yet good enough for the first team but has the potential to be a useful player for the first team should be considered to be loaned out. It may be a case where the player finds themselves in between squads. He may be too good for the Under-23s or Under-19 squad, and lacks the ability to make a remark for the first team immediately, perhaps due to fierce competition.
By loaning him out, he’ll get the chance to mature and gain match experience at a higher level than playing in a youth competition.
Tactics Used vs Player role suitability – Some players, especially newgens may be difficult to incorporate into your team due to their positional abilities and role suitability. Even though there may be players that lacks the role suitability to quickly adopt to your tactics, it may be advantageous to give them play time outside the club to gain familiarity with a position and role. You can lock the proposed preferred role to the role and position he shall play in for your team. This means that you need to consider what type of formation the club that wish to loan him uses.
If the club normally plays with a 3-4-3 DM Wide and the tactic you uses is a 4-2-3-1 sending your attacking midfielder to that club may result him rotting on the bench, or learning a new position instead of being played in your desired position and role.
Player is over the age of 18 – any players under the age of 18 it is better to prioritize training over match experience. Most likely, the training facilities and level of coaches you can provide will have an higher standard than what a club in lower divisions can provide. At the same time, you’ll be able to give the players the necessary years to be labelled as homegrown players. Especially important if you poach under-17 youngsters from all over the world.
Negative Personality – Any players with ‘bad’ personality traits – such as Fickle, Unambitious, Low Determination or Temperamental isn’t worthy to keep at the club. Unless you receive a player with world-class potential and negative personality, it’s not worthy to try to mentor him. Instead, it’s better to release the player to save money on wages, or loan him out and hope he performs to a level where his value increases so much you can gain a decent profit.
Affects Squad Dynamics in a negative way – The players nationality, the time spent at the club and the players age will affect the team spirit and intra-squad connections such as social groups. If you have signed a number of potential wonderkids in the future and finding it hard to integrate the players a the club, a loan move could be the best option to continue their development. You can ‘get rid’ of these players that might not be part an influential member of the First Team, B-Team or Under-23s, for instance if they are part of the ‘Other Players’ Social Group.

Finding suitable players to loan out can be a dilemma. Often you favor keeping them within the club to have full control of their development at the expense of playing football at a lower level than what you’ve wished for.

Paying attention to the development advice within the Development Centre or via personal player progression observations from your staff can help you find suitable loan targets. These player progression observations may be brought to you at monthly summary inbox messages. Pay attention to advice such as ‘Needs More match experience at a higher level’.

All players over the age of 17 are eligible to be put on the loan list in Football Manager. There are some leagues that let you place 16-year-olds on the loan list, but it doesn’t mean you should.

My preference is to identify suitable outgoing loan targets between the age of 19 and 23. It’s very rare I send players at the age of 18 or younger out on loan. It may happen if the reserve level is too poor or there are risks of unhappiness by keeping them at the club over their own will.

As you might know, match sharpness and injury risks affects each other. Since lack of match sharpness will increase the injury risk, and injuries hamper player development it’s important to reduce the injury risk.

Paying attention to players with lacking match sharpness is, therefore, one way to find suitable players to loan out.

Loans can also be a solution if the progress stagnates.

Placing Young Players on Loan: The solution with lacking match sharpness

In Football Manager there are three different ways of making a player available for loan. Following I’ll simply go through the different approaches using the example with the players listed below.

1. Place on Loan List

Placing on the loan list in Football Manager

The most basic option is to put the player on the loan list. At the age of 18, Henrique Pereira is one who falls between B Team level and Under-23s. I’ve promoted him to the B-Team and made him available to play for the Under-23 for 90 minutes, but my Under-23 Manager has favored Samuel Pedro – one with less potential and abilities. Don’t ask me why, but it’s not ideal at all!

To put the player on the loan list simply go to;

Player > Transfers > Transfer Status > select Make Available for Loan

This will notify clubs about his availability and hopefully, some will come forward with a bid.

2. Put on Development List

Placing on Development list in Football Manager

Another option is to let your Director of Football find a suitable loan club for your player by placing him on the Development List. Here I’ve placed Diogo Nascimento on the Development List in a bid to increase his experience level outside the club for the remainder of the season. Hopefully, a few months with new inputs will be good for his career.

By placing him on the Development List you can instruct your DoF to find loan clubs under specific restrictions. As a result, you can set your own preferences regarding playing level and expected match minutes as well as positions you want your loaning club to use him at.

You can set the preferred agreed playing time, the minimum training facilities and his availability while out on loan.

To put player’s on the development list go to;

Player > Transfers > Add to Development List

FYI! You can place any player under the age of 23 on the Development List.

Whenever I put a player on the Development List, there are three things I put attention to:

A) Agreed playing time – to ensure the player gets game time I prefer them to be at least a Regular Starter
B) Training Facilities – ensure only clubs with Good training facilities or above can loan the player
C) Position & role – ensure the player is playing in the same role and position as he would do for your club. Remember he should be familiar with your tactics

DID YOU KNOW?

Did you know you can set a default template for players you put on the Development list? Inside the Staff Responsibilities Transfers & Contracts section, you can instruct your Director of football to find any clubs that match your chosen criteria.

Simply go to the Offer to Clubs section and select minimum playing wage, playing time and minimum facilities. This way, you’ll never need to set up the instructions on a player to player basis.
you can even setup a different template for players within your first team as your Under-21 and Under-18s. Handy, if you want to ask for an higher playing wage percentage, or you wish to select an higher facilities for your Under-23 First team players than your Under-18s.

offer clubs on loan - Staff Responsibilities Football Manager 2023

Instead, you can update the template for specific players that requires a different setup than the defaults.

2.1 How to Manage The Development List

If you got a whole number of Under-21 players that you’ve placed on the Development List but find it difficult to attract suitable clubs, you can always edit the Director of Football’s instructions , or whoever in charge of finding suitable loan clubs for players on the development list.

Inside Transfers, you can locate the list of players placed on the Development list under the Director of Football header. From here, you can click each player and make necessary adjustments to the agreed playing time, minimum training facilities or loan options. Useful, if you have just read this guide on loans and want to apply a more strategic approach for loaning out players on Football Manager.

Director of Football Development list on Football Manager

3. Using Local/National Partnerships and Affiliated Clubs

Thirdly, and most importantly, you got the case with affiliated clubs. Taking advantage of partnerships and agreements where you can freely send out players can for instance be beneficial. To move a player to an affiliate club go to;

Player Name > Development > Move to Affiliate

This opens ups the screen visible above.

Benfica has several affiliated clubs – three in the same divisions as themselves and one in each tier below.

Therefore I’ll take advantage of these agreements by sending João Ferreira – a 19-year-old attacking fullback who has fallen behind Renato Matos and Filipe Cruz. He’s currently operating at the third division level and Leixões could be a suitable option – a club playing with a similar formation as us.

Another option was Alverca who plays in the third division but uses a 5-3-2 formation.

Both clubs have decent options on the right back so we’ll see how this loan turns out. I’ve made sure to have the option to recall the player if necessary and make the loaning club able to terminate the loan by un-ticking ‘Loan cannot be terminated’.

What to do if no loan offers come in?

Last but not least you got a fourth option. It’s often frustrating to see any clubs moving forward by making a loan offer. To speed up the process, you can offer a player out on loan. It will automatically place him on the loan list and make any clubs aware of his transfer status.

Player > Transfers > Transfer Status > Offer To Clubs > Select the Loan Offer Tab

In this event, you’ll able to set specific loan clauses, options and contract terms. In order to make sure the player develops within his position and role I normally set restrictions on the preferred position and role. The agreed playing time is also important as it sets expectations on how many matches the player will record out on loan. In this event, it’s important to be realistic and not set any higher player status than what’s useful.

How you’ll set the loan options, clauses and other restrictions depends on your personal preferences and needs.

Finding Suitable Loan Clubs

Should a player develop at a decent rate when out on loan, it’s important to find a suitable loan club that puts the player in focus. Finding the right club can be difficult at times as there are pros and cons of sending a player out on loan no matter their playing level and what they got to offer.

Personally, I can spend lots of time finding the right loaning club for my prospects. This means I’m rejecting a number of loan offers and are patient in my approach.

To find the most suitable loan clubs I focus my attention on a few strategic, but important areas of the loaning club.

1. Competition Level.
Firstly, comes their playing level and reputation. It will hamper a player’s development playing at a lower level than what my club can offer. For instance, it’s not recommended to send out a player operating at the third division level to a premier division club. For one, you can’t expect the player to make that many appearances and secondly he might not learn as much as he’s not yet good enough to play at that level.

In fact, sending a player out on loan at a playing level far above or below his operating level deviates from your original objectives – to give the player a senior match experience.

When that’s said, any player who is good enough is better to be loaned out to a division higher up the leagues, as close to your playing level. If you’re managing a club in Ligue 1, Ligue 2 could be a suitable playing level to enhance his development, rather than playing at National level.

2. The Clubs Training Facilities

Secondly, it’s important to consider the clubs’ training facilities. You can not expect to send the player out on loan at ‘State of the art’ training facilities for all your players but the better training facilities the better foundation to develop. Having an overview of the different training facility levels and their impact is important.

Personally, I would avoid clubs with lower training facilities than ‘Average’. Of course, this depends on the level of your club and the expected level your young players can manage.

3. Manager Profile & Traits

The third thing to consider is the profile and traits of the manager of the loaning club. Together with the coaching staff will the influence of the manager have a huge impact on the success of the loan and the progress of the player.

The manager of the loaning club should have high ‘Working with youngsters’ and motivation. Additionally, you want the Manager to have a positive personality who can push the player on the training ground and get the most out of him.

If he got specific traits it’s advisable that these traits fit the playing style of your club, such as favoring ‘Play Out of Defence’ if you use a similar team instruction.

Favourable other tendencies you should look for are;

Will use young players in low priority cup matches
Signs a lot of youth players

4. The Squad Depth of The Loaning Club

Last, but not least, you have to consider the squad depth of the loaning clubs. It’s no reason to send a player out on loan to a club with many players within a similar position. You need to ensure he’ll be able to record enough senior match minutes by making sure he will be prioritized.

A different case is if the loaning club got an experienced player or a professional squad group which can be positive for his development.

For instance, Leixões got only a veteran striker in their ranks. Therefore, I decided to move Henrique Araujo, one of the most promising strikers within my squad, out on loan.

In Conclusion

Giving young players match experience and minutes on the pitch for the senior team will be vital for their development.

Using loans for development will always have its pros and cons. When to loan out and what’s the right move is a cause to debate. It’s not always you’ll get it right.

Hopefully, this article will help you to find a solution for your young players who have stagnated or aren’t yet good enough for your team. Loans can be the solution for sorting player’s lacking match sharpness and increase their progress rate. It’s just a matter of finding the appropriate loaning club despite it may take time to find the right one.

In the next article, I’ll discuss how you can monitor players out on loan and what to do to continue their progression by handing you further tips on how to approach youth development on Football Manager.

Stay tuned for upcoming content!

Using Loans to Improve Youth Development on Football Manager | FM Youth Development Guide – Part 3