youth academy doesn't suck

[scrim]

I've always thought the youth academy was a bit hard done by reading through this forum. Sure, you don't always get a useful player, but you can sell the free one for a decent amount, about as much as selling out your stadium 6-7 times over. Not bad considering the small cost of building a youth academy.

Anyway, I'm at level 5 now. A top 5 star 18 year old costs $7-10m and I got my two free players from my level 3 junior pitch this morning.

As usual I signed the free 2 star guy, an 18 year old striker, and he is on the market now at around $800k.

Now I seem to remember getting a 4 star guy with a special who costs 21 tokens for the other player. But this time it was a 18 year old 3 star DC/R (who will easily make 4 star before the end of the season, needs 16 more skill points), which was exactly the position I would need to get a player for at the start of next season after the retirement of one player, and a 2 star guy I have had since the start of my game who is still getting 7s and 8s every game but I'm worried wont be able to cut it as a 1 star player in level 6. This youth player only cost 12 tokens - is this normal now? I couldn't see his $ value so I wasn't really sure how good he was, but anyway I've got 40 or so tokens, so I said **** it and signed him.

Turns out he is worth $4.18m and is a fast trainer (improved 22% from a normal stretching training), so he is going to be a useful squad player for me for the next few seasons. If I had spent the tokens on a bank investment, 25 tokens would have got me $7.2m ($288k/token) or 28.8m for 85 ($339k/token), Even if I sold him straight away, this guy would net me $350/token. And if I bought a decent young squad player with that bank investment money it probably would have cost me 5-6 tokens in an auction anyway...

So, did I get lucky or is this the new norm?

[dv8r]

It does suck. We wait for a few weeks and cant even sign both. The amount you sell the free player is nothing but pocket money tbh.

[Joshiko]

i agree with you. once i thought that young academy sucks but after hearing some cases in this forum and making some calculations and comparisons on my own, now i revise my view

[Ryanch]

I think it should cost less tokens...
free player is useless

[scrim]

Err I did just sign both. And for 12 tokens I get $800k and a solid player worth $4m, which is better than you could get for 12 tokens in any other way at level 5. Or you can sit on your hands and not sign the second player and get money for nothing by selling the free player. How is that useless?

And people say it isn't realistic that you have to pay for players from your youth academy, what a load of rubbish. Do you think clubs in real life just build a facility, a kid walks in and a professional player walks out? That it didn't take millions in investment and thousands of man-hours in scouting and coaching on top of building the facility. Think of the 12 tokens as the investment, except you can choose to make it at the end rather than having to gamble up front like all clubs do.

[Saransh Vatsa]

Err I did just sign both. And for 12 tokens I get $800k and a solid player worth $4m, which is better than you could get for 12 tokens in any other way at level 5. Or you can sit on your hands and not sign the second player and get money for nothing by selling the free player. How is that useless?

And people say it isn't realistic that you have to pay for players from your youth academy, what a load of rubbish. Do you think clubs in real life just build a facility, a kid walks in and a professional player walks out? That it didn't take millions in investment and thousands of man-hours in scouting and coaching on top of building the facility. Think of the 12 tokens as the investment, except you can choose to make it at the end rather than having to gamble up front like all clubs do.

What do u mean by what more do u want? Yesterday I bought a 22 yo 4 star DL with defensive wall S.A for 6.5 million $ and a DR/DC 4 star 23 yo free kick specialist for 5 million $ and had to spend only 3 tokens in total!!! That too on the 3rd day of the season. Sheer luck but both the players much better than the useless academy player. Not to menton, I have been getting only DCs for past seven seasons from the academy and guess what, I am in my seventh season.... :P In 18 T, I can buy a totally new playing eleven with 4-5 star players of age 20-26. My token budget is just 35 a season so I can't afford to spend half of it on a single academy player with no S.A and just 4 star. Yup, u can get about a million or two from the free one. I am receiving my players tomorrow on the 5th day of season so I hope I can get something decent from the 3 starrer. And if they are again DCs, it will be an extension to my record. 8 times straight!!! What a streak.... I can bet even the greats of July Fourth can't beat that. All respect to him anyways.

[dv8r]

For value, signing the token player is a huge waste of tokens. Why? 4 star player for 12-24 tokens, I can buy my own 5 star fast trainers for 1-3 tokens on auctions.

Free player is useless at lower levels.

[Moel]

For value, signing the token player is a huge waste of tokens. Why? 4 star player for 12-24 tokens, I can buy my own 5 star fast trainers for 1-3 tokens on auctions.

Free player is useless at lower levels.

Not all servers are equal. On mine a 5 star player is not very common and go for usually 30 + tokens. I've seen them up to 70+ tokens. Even 3 star 25 yr old can go for 15 tokens.

[Razz]

For value, signing the token player is a huge waste of tokens. Why? 4 star player for 12-24 tokens, I can buy my own 5 star fast trainers for 1-3 tokens on auctions.

Free player is useless at lower levels.

Exactly.
I don't care how fast a trainer they are a 4* player isn't going to keep pace with the rest of my squad. I usually buy market players at just below 6*, and good ones will get about 3/4 to 7* by season end, after dropping a star they then get to 6 1/2 in the second season, 6 1/4 the third, barely hit 6 the fourth season and after that they only stick around if I can't find a decent young replacement.

A 4 star youth academy player would have to be almost a 5 star and an absolutely amazing trainer (gaining a full star per season).

Now I know there are the occasional super trainers out there, but I can't gamble 18-20 tokens on it when i can almost certainly get 3 or 4 (or even 5 or 6, with luck) almost-six-star 18-19 year olds off the market for that amount of tokens.

[July Fourth]

Youth academy is only useful to players who are at the top level at their servers where the transfer market has a player list of 3* players only, Other than that it's only ever any use to sign the 2* free player and sell him immediately to a manager 3 levels below you because they see the 2* youth player as a 5* player.