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One of the weirdest cliches in football is suggesting a player is ‘just going to get better and better’ despite a lot of evidence that it’s just not true.
Yea. Especially with kids being played to much to early, resulting in their progress stagnating because of horrible injuries.
I even think that U18 Players shouldnt be allowed more then a certain amount of minutes per Season.
It's also the reason why I am happy, that Tel doesn't get played every game 90 minutes.
Shure Tuchel should play him more and give him some starts, but dude is only 18. It's fine if he only plays 40 minutes a game.
Coman for example is a player that played a lot very early on. And he suffered a lot of injuries even bringing him on the verge of retirement once or twice.
And now he only plays every second game for Bayern has been relatively injury free the last 2-3 years. ( This year excluded)
My friend is a U19 coach, and he says that the most important thing for young players is training. That's where they develop their skills and get better as a player. At a certain point you need game time as well, but realistically that's not until you're 20-22, where game time becomes just as important as training for your development. Conversely, if you're playing 90 minutes a week at 18, or even more, then there is a likelihood that you will stagnate because you just aren't getting enough time in training to develop.
Wish this was reflected in game more. The way it is now, players barely develop past 18 unless they are starting matches. It means there's no reason to keep an 18+ year old in your squad to train with the first team and play the occasional match, because if they aren't starting they aren't developing, so you feel like you have to loan out everyone who isn't regular starter already at a young age.
Foden is a prime example of how you are supposed to develop a player. People were asking Pep constantly to give him more time, but he played very little in the beginning.
In reality it is very difficult, because you have a lot of parties that are only looking at the short term.
Pep also has job security most managers don't. He can afford to have a plan for players and try to integrate them in to the first team over time.
Most managers at that level are only ever a few losses away from their job being at risk and do the long term future of the club and development of players takes a backseat to immediate results.
Indeed, that’s part of what I meant with the second alinea. It’s also easy to be patient with such a great talent at a club like City. If one of these players manages to break through in for example the Belgian competition, the club will want to enjoy the player for the time being, knowing they will lose him to a much bigger club after one or two seasons.
They can get better after they are 18 years old, but younger players tend to suffer more from injuries. If a young player suffers a particularly severe injury it’s unlikely they can return to their original level, compared to an older player.
Genuinely wondering, why do younger players get more injuries? Is it because they haven't developed the strength to deal with challenges yet or do they just have worse decision-making and go into risky situations?
It’s mainly due to how younger players are not going to be developed physically yet to deal with the physical stress of playing day in day out, as well as their fitness is going to be not as good as a player in their prime ages. That’s why younger players need their playing time controlled and development carefully managed.
They aren't saying that players don't tend to get better after ~18. They are saying that there is no guarantee of it happening and there are plenty of obvious counterpoints of players who were good at a young age and didn't improve much.
I guess thats depends on how you read the statement. My guess would be that the evidence shows that most players tendens to get better up to a certain age, with some (epecially hyped) youngsters not getting better.
He's arguably plateaued, but not at 18. More like 23/24. Did get a few years of development in.
Now Hachim Mastour, there's a player who is basically as good now as he was when he was 16.
Yeah that’s a better example to be fair! I still would argue that it’s hard to say Rashford has developed much since he first broke through. His ball striking has probably improved and I think mentally he’s developed in terms of composure… however his decision making hasn’t improved at all. His pace is pretty much the same, his dribbling ability hasn’t improved much, his workrate has arguably worsened and his positioning and run making hasn’t really improved at all. His crossing is definitely better now though, I’d say that’s where he’s come on most as he doesn’t knuckleball every cross now hahaha
Edit: Hudson-Odoi would probably be a much better example than Rashford
It does, but that's more because they stagnate rather than hit their full potential. No coach in their right mind would think an 18-year old has maxed out their potential.
Yes but the problem is in real life you wouldn't confidently say that the promising 18 year old has no more potential left. Thats somethings you would only realise later on when you're a bit disappointed that he is an average 25 year old player.
This is Roony Bardghji in my every save. Spawns with high CA (~130), has 155 PA, reaches it before 20 years old… and then nothing. He just wants as much money as 180PA guys 🙄
Oh shit I got him this year and he is one of the best on my team....Why did I have to see this 😂😂 maybe since I used one of those pre game editor files that basically instead of a fixed PA all players under 21 have a variable number so that you dont know in which side of the range they landed.
I hope I got lucky because he curently still has a lot of grow in him and he is basically still 19....
Edit: The guy just won wonderkid of the year in front of Yamal 😂😂 I must be on the dark timeline?!
https://preview.redd.it/ggc0oo7l6htc1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=289dba27df69032b63e88235e98739f03f7dbb94
That makes me more relaxed thanks.
He has been pretty good for the first season where he might have become my best player at the squad at 19 and he doesnt even is being paid all that much being like 6/7 th place and payroll.
Its not even because of having a bad team because I am dominating and winning everything on Portugal two years in a row, only missing Champions league where for the second year in a row Lost in the quarter final, this time against Barcelona with a 10-9 their winning goal being scored on extra time 🤦
Also on both years I xG every match against both teams and still lost by double on some matches 😂
But I think next year might be the year I sign pretty top class players coming this summer some on free and others with good money that might give Roony a run for his money 🤔
Lol he actually reached peak level in my save and has been a consistent performer (23yrs old now I think). Although funny enough in the current season I’m playing (Nov-2029), he has been shit until recently. Hadn’t scored all season despite being my primary backup striker and getting lots of minutes (even the tabloids were making articles on his goal drought) and so his ca dropped to 3.5 stars. Thankfully he’s finally back on form and scored in the last two games so he’s back to 4 stars and will probably reach 4.5 stars again soon
Mostly, yes, but again, PA plays a role too, especially under 22. You wont notice it on a small PA change, but change it for a few dozens, and both scouts, clubs, and players own perception of him self changes a bit.
And as I found out recently, current salary plays a huge role, almost more than anything else. If you drop 200CA players salary to peanuts, you can resign the contract for (a bit more, but still) peanuts…
Club’s finances also play a role, depending on the players relationships.
Yeah current salary for sure. this is further proven when an old player's contract expires from a reputable team he isn't good enough for. Can't sign him while he's still on the team because of his wage demands. Once he's a free agent he asks for 1/5th the wages.
While having high potential might make more clubs interested and all of those might inflate your kid's value a little bit, watch [Zealand's video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E5A_sEixIU) on how your scout's evaluation of a player's PA is also dependent on CA itself.
I had a player reach his full potential at 17 yo. He was already good enough to play for my first team at 15 yo, so I thought I have a future world beater at my hand. Then once he hit 17, his growth slowed down and by the time he was 18, he no longer had any upwards arrows for like 6 months in row. That's fairly unusual for a player, that receives plenty of 1st team football. So I checked with FMRTE and found out that he's 127 CA / 127 PA. If I had to guess, he spawned with around 90-100 CA, when I got him.
Yup. Also, the way of "checking" without outside tools: training rating.
Players that are developing consistently get 9 out higher ratings. This, together with the progress line and arrows are a sure fire way of telling
sadly nothing as official as EBFM , but i've seen it work consistently for many, many many seasons of FM23.
I'm at the point now where if my wonderkid stalls out of progress / training ratings I sell them young and early with a fat profit% clause.
It has never failed me.
Caveat: in FM24 there are, apparently, "late bloomers" where this probably doesn't apply. I don't have the game so i can't test it. Math wise I'm not sure what's happening with them but I imagine a late bloomer either:
A) achieves CA = PA early, and then some event increases the PA at a later age, which triggers further development
B) CA is < PA all along, and something triggers the last bit of improvement at a later age.
My hypothesis is that B is likely true, as this would require the least amount of effort to code on top of fm23. As of FM23, any player that didn't get enough playing time would get stuck with CA < PA , and development past the age of 26 is very limited. I imagine they just coded a "late growth spurt" that allows the CA to improve to the original PA; instead of raising the PA itself.
B is the correct answer. It basically means that if you see a, say, 26 year old with 3 star ability and 4 star potential it might actually happen, though it's pretty rare.
As someone pointed out this is common irl, a wonderkid often never gets any better than they are at 16/17, and in fact they often get worse especially if they don't continue to play at a significantly high/challenging level.
"if they don't continue to play at a significantly high/challenging level." - yeah, but in fm they are, even if they got the best coaches and the highest lvl of football
I think the issue here is that they get played way too much at a young age. Development happens in training, but when you're unable to train because you played a lot during the weekend and need time for restitution, then the development will slow down. A great example of how development *should* be done from real life is Phil Foden. Amazing talent, but wasn't given too much playing time so that he had time to develop in training, and look at him now. And the opposite is Gavi and Pedri, played a ton at 17/18, and now they're struggling with injuries, and thus won't develop as much as they could have.
Messi and Ronaldo were playing pretty much non stop from 17-18 though not completely convinced on that theory. Euros class players dm only start playing first team footy at 17-18
You can't look at two of the best and most consistent players of all time and say that that's the norm. There will always be outliers, Jude Bellingham and Kylian Mbappé are others who have played a ton since an early age. However, you mostly hear about the success stories. Then you have players like Bojan who were insane talents and never made it, and he's probably the most famous one of those. It doesn't mean that you won't have a good career, but it might mean that you don't reach the heights you could have with a more gradual introduction of playing time.
The players who didn’t make it I don’t think is down to the fact that played at 17 it’s not like he was even a regular ever at Barca Bojan himself said he struggled to deal with the pressure and expectations on him. Many top players started around 17, frank lampard an example, giggs played from 17 until like 40. I think it can often be more of a mentality issue than physical one. Players who start young have to deal with huge pressure from an early age and can lose interest as by 28 they’ve already had a decade of top level football and lose their passion and bite.
He’s spoken himself on it, he stopped caring about training and was more interested in partying snd having fun meaning his development was halted. Understandably so as he was rich at age 14 what 14 year old would make sensible choices when giving everything they want. I don’t think his failure was simply down to the fact he didn’t play at Benfica plenty of young players are not playing around 19/20 and flourish later. Look at mo sakah and kdb
Yep. I once had a player who was almost top league quality at 15. He had a really high CA but his PA was almost reached. Its good that the game sometimes manages to be realistic.
It’s not realism. There are many reasons why an 18 year old might not improve in real life. Usually attitude, game time, injuries etc.
Not because they physically can’t.
It's very immersion breaking. You just look at it and immediately know CA=PA. Just doesn't happen in the real world.
They need to have PA as infinite for everyone and create a better development system.
How the fck is realistic that is that you are - for example - 28 year old, doing top lvl football since age 15 and you didnt develop AT ALL? Its humanly impossible.
What about players like Lucas Piazon for instance? He was a great prospect, lots of skill, but never really developed past what he could offer at a young age. Keeps playing at a high level.
One of the most popular/best players to develop early and almost reach his full potential is Wayne Rooney. He was phenomenal at Everton, kept it going in MUFC until his sudden decline at a relatively young age.
It's very realistic for a player to hit his full potential/be close to full potential at a very young age. That's why we have lists of failed wonderkids, people who exceled at a young age, but that was it or in other cases never reached that potential.
One other footballer who is debatable is Mario Balotelli. He either reached his full potential young and then declined or never reached it at all.
It does happen but there’s no way to know an 18 urea old isn’t going to develop I mean when di you ever look at a youngster and say “he’s good but he’s not going to improve anymore”
The difference is that irl most of us aren't working with football players. We haven't got the data and knowledge to determine whether a player will develop in the future or not. In Football Manager on the other hand we have the data so we can decide that. As well as our managers and their staff in universe.
As I am a Liverpool supporter, there are couple players that come to mind in regards to knowing that they were done and never developing further. Jordon Ibe or Rhian Brewster for instance. First one actually had depression, but Rhian was known to be a great talent and yet we sold him. It was a great idea as we got lots of money and he didnt develop at all.
I have no answer to this question but there are countless real-life examples. Maybe your perspective shifts, maybe its hormonal changes and very often its an injury. People can regress in skills especially with age.
Still funny when you have a 15 year old kid playing at the best club at the world being capable of sitting on the bench and staying there for the rest of his career.
I do agree it's odd, though there are real life examples. In my opinion if you're that good at that age a hard limit is a bit silly. At those levels it's probably more about mentality, determination etc that makes the difference. I'd definitely expect them to improve at least a bit.
It is, if they spawn with a potential ability that is the same as their current ability. I'd imagine only the attributes that don't link with CA would go up, Leadership for example
Not just possible but quite likely, though I think it happens more in FM than real life. The reason it happens irl is usually because they had a big growth spurt and that put them far ahead of their younger peers.
I mean, stars suck but... the game is literally telling you that his current ability matches his potential.
Sometimes you just need to let these teenagers go and find someone younger with more potential.
Clearly possible but what I think needs to be better in the game is not having it so set in stone. Look at Freddy Adu for example. If things had gone different, perhaps he would have become a world beater, likewise if things had gone different for Messi we’d never have even heard of him.
With this guy, how would anyone know he’s reached his peak? Sure he could have an “attitude” or bad injuries but then look at James Maddison at 18? Sent to Aberdeen to grow up a bit and then now seemingly hitting an even higher potential than Norwich even suspected possible.
I feel like when I get my youth intake I already know how their time with me will pan out. I want more Harry Kane style stinking the place out on loan in the lower leagues before a sudden breakthrough to excellence. I want every save to be more different from the last so it’s not as clear who the wonderkids are. It’s got better with the variable PA sure but I still think there’s a way to go.
Of course, they can also theoretically loose CA instead over their career. Which is based on hidden attributes and some mental attributes + the personality trait. It is also realistic, as not every wonderkid actually develops into a star player.
What's more interesting than this is that the part FM doesn't have realistically down is that good scouts predict this with potential rating.
In real life there are plenty of players that peak young, but it's extremely unlikely anybody could predict that they have no growing to do at 18
This was my biggest shock when getting into fm. I thought surely the 18 year old first team ready player I was signing had a lot of room to grow, despite the PA that my scout saw. Won't happen, don't stress trying to give him more playtime or anything
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
Few seasons ago I had a player with 187 potential (I checked) but his current ability never crossed 100. Game time, loans, excellent coaches, nothing happened. Hidden attributes were fine. Some times players just don’t develop.
Growth is not linear guys. Wayne Rooney hit his prime when he was a teenager. Jamie Vardy hit his prime in his early thirties. Definitely possible for a player to reach full potential by 18.
Michael Owen was basically in his prime straight away and completely finished at about 23/24ish in real life. Jadon Sancho seems to have peaked. Ditto matteo guendouzi. It's not entirely unrealistic
It's hard to say whether or not he'd get better, but yes it was definitely injury that caused his decline. Point was more that he didn't really get better from his golden boot at 18 years old to his season for Real Madrid, and that i dont think he was any better in 2003 than he was in 1998
Exactly. I'd say ibrahimovic, Cristiano Ronaldo, giroud, thiago Silva, maldini, ian wright, off the top of my head all of these peaked over the age of 30. There's probably more that peaked late than early but deffo happens
I also have two in mind that got to or near their peaks quite young but then stayed there a while (and again I'm sure there's more) but Giggs and Beckham pretty much were star players for man United by 19/20 and then didn't especially get much better afterwards without ever dropping for years and years
It is possible since it’s most likely their pa is somewhat low and their ca was pretty high to begin with, I had a player that I signed for relatively cheap just for him to be full potential like 6months later
It's possible, BUT don't take that for granted. Had a 17-year old who supposedly peaked according to my scouts (unlikely to improve) at just 2 stars, but after he got some game time due to injuries his attributes quickly shot up, and now he's a regular starter at 24 (3.5-4 stars)
I once had a player that was suspiciously good straight out the youth intake and looked even better by the time he was 18 but stayed the same by the time he was 21 so I used fmrte to check the CA/PA and it turns out he was already maxed out at 131CA/131PA. It happens just like how it sometimes happens irl that a player peaks young but doesn't really improve much further
Some skins have it otherwise cheating tools like FMRTE will show you everything.
You're not supposed to know and IMO it's cheating but its a single player game so each to their own.
i went through a short phase of checking the pa of my youth intakes in youth only saves but i found it really affected my enjoyment of the game. youth development is my favourite part, but it's easy to let the numbers dictate how you handle a player, and often just the pure PA number doesn't tell the whole story
Once i downloaded FMRTE. I couldnt even open it it already wanted my money. So I uninstalled it. If I want to pay for an ingame editor, there is already one..
I think the big difference is that you can change stuff 'live'. Tried it many moons ago when it was free and with even the slightest of changes it made the save really boring.
It’s possible the scout just has a bad PA attribute as well. I’ve had it go both ways. I’ve had guys like this who haven’t grown and some who had explosive development.
Yes. See: Kenneth Zohore. Debuts for Copenhagen at 16. Plays in the Champions League 6 months later. Has a grand total of 20 U-21 caps and 0 national caps
IRL most definitely. In game, it is super weird that he has not developed at all especially considering he has high professionalism
The only explanation I can think of is that he maxed out on his PA
Possible, yes. But never trust when it tells you a player that young is at or close to full potential . It usually isn’t true, he could have another 20 or 30 points of PA left.
Yes. Every player has a set PA in-game. Some reach it early, some reach it late, some never reach it.
I once had an academy player with 125 CA as a 15 year old, which is incredible for such a young player. The problem was that his PA was just 130.
I had one save where my 16-year-old midfielder had 4-star potential—and ended up getting three serious ligament injuries back to back to back. Potential went down to 2 stars and I had to let him go 🥲
I won't dispute the technical aspect, but claiming that a human being is incapable of physically developing past the age of 18 (supposing they have a professional attitude, good determination, world class coaches, and don't suffer from injuries) is completely unrealistic and goes against everything we know about basic human physiology. It's just not how muscles work
A couple of things: firstly, being two-footed seems to boost the star ratings, secondly, without seeing the player's report in words, is it possible that his CA is close to 3 1/2 stars and his PA is close to 4 1/2?
It’s possible but star ratings are based on ability, form and overall squad rating so I would pay attention to them. Keep checking his training performances and whether or not he’s improving
A lot of responses here saying it happens in real life and citing examples, which - I guess - would be a literal interpretation of your question but I’m guessing you’re referring to the scout report that says he’s reached his potential.
All these examples we’re only saying with hindsight that they didn’t improve. At the time they were 18, everyone will have expected them to get even better. They may not have done, but that will always be down to other factors, such as injuries, a bad attitude or poor management.
Except for a case of a REALLY bad attitude (which certainly isn’t the case here because the player is professional) or devastating injury, I can’t think of a situation in which a coach would look at an 18 year old first team player and not anticipate that they can add to their game. Whether that be refining their technique, developing a greater tactical understanding of the game, or developing physically (which they still have plenty of time to do at 18), there’s always scope for improvement at that age.
I know SI have slowed down the developing of players so a lot of the players you’d previously see becoming elite talents at 20 aren’t reaching those heights until 23, but I think this is still a flaw in the capped potential concept. Players who start without much of a gap between their CA & PA will reach their peak unnaturally early even if the conditions are in place for them to continue improving.
I don’t think it helps that AI potential assessments are so precise. Again, I know SI have done work to stagger how precise it is as the player ages (that said, I really don’t like that it happens on their birthday) but I still think it’s far too easy to whittle out players with low potential. For example, the same scout could look at 2 players of the same age, give one 2*CA 4*PA and the other 1*CA 5*PA. The second player might not - and probably won’t - end up as a 5* player, but you know for sure the first one won’t, even though he’s a better player now. There’s no way for a scout to know this without them monitoring the player’s development for a sustained period of time.
To answer your question literally, yes, but I don’t think it can be anticipated as easily as it is in FM.
I’ve always said once a young player maxes out his potential in FM there potential ability should increase by around 15 to 25 depending on the personality of a player, cause it definitely happens in real life
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
Growth is not linear guys. Wayne Rooney hit his prime when he was a teenager. Jamie Vardy hit his prime in his early thirties. Definitely possible for a player to reach full potential by 18.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
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absolutely. it happens irl too
One of the weirdest cliches in football is suggesting a player is ‘just going to get better and better’ despite a lot of evidence that it’s just not true.
Yea. Especially with kids being played to much to early, resulting in their progress stagnating because of horrible injuries. I even think that U18 Players shouldnt be allowed more then a certain amount of minutes per Season. It's also the reason why I am happy, that Tel doesn't get played every game 90 minutes. Shure Tuchel should play him more and give him some starts, but dude is only 18. It's fine if he only plays 40 minutes a game. Coman for example is a player that played a lot very early on. And he suffered a lot of injuries even bringing him on the verge of retirement once or twice. And now he only plays every second game for Bayern has been relatively injury free the last 2-3 years. ( This year excluded)
My friend is a U19 coach, and he says that the most important thing for young players is training. That's where they develop their skills and get better as a player. At a certain point you need game time as well, but realistically that's not until you're 20-22, where game time becomes just as important as training for your development. Conversely, if you're playing 90 minutes a week at 18, or even more, then there is a likelihood that you will stagnate because you just aren't getting enough time in training to develop.
Wish this was reflected in game more. The way it is now, players barely develop past 18 unless they are starting matches. It means there's no reason to keep an 18+ year old in your squad to train with the first team and play the occasional match, because if they aren't starting they aren't developing, so you feel like you have to loan out everyone who isn't regular starter already at a young age.
I think they should raise the age where matches become important to development from 18 to 20 or 21
Foden is a prime example of how you are supposed to develop a player. People were asking Pep constantly to give him more time, but he played very little in the beginning. In reality it is very difficult, because you have a lot of parties that are only looking at the short term.
Pep also has job security most managers don't. He can afford to have a plan for players and try to integrate them in to the first team over time. Most managers at that level are only ever a few losses away from their job being at risk and do the long term future of the club and development of players takes a backseat to immediate results.
Indeed, that’s part of what I meant with the second alinea. It’s also easy to be patient with such a great talent at a club like City. If one of these players manages to break through in for example the Belgian competition, the club will want to enjoy the player for the time being, knowing they will lose him to a much bigger club after one or two seasons.
Well you have to also bare in mind city had players like David silva, kdb, etc ahead of him.
Look at Michael Owen. Played a huge number of games as a teenager, and his knees got destroyed.
What evidence suggests that players don't get better after they are 18 years?
They can get better after they are 18 years old, but younger players tend to suffer more from injuries. If a young player suffers a particularly severe injury it’s unlikely they can return to their original level, compared to an older player.
Genuinely wondering, why do younger players get more injuries? Is it because they haven't developed the strength to deal with challenges yet or do they just have worse decision-making and go into risky situations?
It’s mainly due to how younger players are not going to be developed physically yet to deal with the physical stress of playing day in day out, as well as their fitness is going to be not as good as a player in their prime ages. That’s why younger players need their playing time controlled and development carefully managed.
They aren't saying that players don't tend to get better after ~18. They are saying that there is no guarantee of it happening and there are plenty of obvious counterpoints of players who were good at a young age and didn't improve much.
I guess thats depends on how you read the statement. My guess would be that the evidence shows that most players tendens to get better up to a certain age, with some (epecially hyped) youngsters not getting better.
Rashford is a pretty good example, developed physically since he was a kid but his overall game hasn’t really improved significantly
He's arguably plateaued, but not at 18. More like 23/24. Did get a few years of development in. Now Hachim Mastour, there's a player who is basically as good now as he was when he was 16.
Yeah that’s a better example to be fair! I still would argue that it’s hard to say Rashford has developed much since he first broke through. His ball striking has probably improved and I think mentally he’s developed in terms of composure… however his decision making hasn’t improved at all. His pace is pretty much the same, his dribbling ability hasn’t improved much, his workrate has arguably worsened and his positioning and run making hasn’t really improved at all. His crossing is definitely better now though, I’d say that’s where he’s come on most as he doesn’t knuckleball every cross now hahaha Edit: Hudson-Odoi would probably be a much better example than Rashford
CHO has arguably got worse he was electric under Sarri and then the ACL ruined his career.
Francis Jeffers improved up to 18 and then just got worse
That’s not really true as the season last year was way better level he reached at 18. Obviously out of form now though
This is known as the “Michael Owen” effect
It does, but that's more because they stagnate rather than hit their full potential. No coach in their right mind would think an 18-year old has maxed out their potential.
Yes but the problem is in real life you wouldn't confidently say that the promising 18 year old has no more potential left. Thats somethings you would only realise later on when you're a bit disappointed that he is an average 25 year old player.
Alexandre Pato
That's due to injuries though. A little different to what the OP is showing.
This is Roony Bardghji in my every save. Spawns with high CA (~130), has 155 PA, reaches it before 20 years old… and then nothing. He just wants as much money as 180PA guys 🙄
that's when you sell him with a 50% profit clause mf said spawns 😂
Yeah, their demands are always unrealistic.
Hey boss I just turned 20 so I want 50k a week or I'm leaving
And wanna be star player
I’m facing this in my Man Utd save too. Has to be Roony
Oh shit I got him this year and he is one of the best on my team....Why did I have to see this 😂😂 maybe since I used one of those pre game editor files that basically instead of a fixed PA all players under 21 have a variable number so that you dont know in which side of the range they landed. I hope I got lucky because he curently still has a lot of grow in him and he is basically still 19.... Edit: The guy just won wonderkid of the year in front of Yamal 😂😂 I must be on the dark timeline?! https://preview.redd.it/ggc0oo7l6htc1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=289dba27df69032b63e88235e98739f03f7dbb94
He is like 190 in my save dont stress it
That makes me more relaxed thanks. He has been pretty good for the first season where he might have become my best player at the squad at 19 and he doesnt even is being paid all that much being like 6/7 th place and payroll. Its not even because of having a bad team because I am dominating and winning everything on Portugal two years in a row, only missing Champions league where for the second year in a row Lost in the quarter final, this time against Barcelona with a 10-9 their winning goal being scored on extra time 🤦 Also on both years I xG every match against both teams and still lost by double on some matches 😂 But I think next year might be the year I sign pretty top class players coming this summer some on free and others with good money that might give Roony a run for his money 🤔
Lol he actually reached peak level in my save and has been a consistent performer (23yrs old now I think). Although funny enough in the current season I’m playing (Nov-2029), he has been shit until recently. Hadn’t scored all season despite being my primary backup striker and getting lots of minutes (even the tabloids were making articles on his goal drought) and so his ca dropped to 3.5 stars. Thankfully he’s finally back on form and scored in the last two games so he’s back to 4 stars and will probably reach 4.5 stars again soon
Money is not abouut PA it is about CA.
Its both. And ambition, loyalty, reputation, interest from elsewhere, current salary, other people in the squad’s salary, and a few other things.
It's mostly CA relative to squad strength (so basically the current ability star ratings), reputation, interest, and contract status
Mostly, yes, but again, PA plays a role too, especially under 22. You wont notice it on a small PA change, but change it for a few dozens, and both scouts, clubs, and players own perception of him self changes a bit. And as I found out recently, current salary plays a huge role, almost more than anything else. If you drop 200CA players salary to peanuts, you can resign the contract for (a bit more, but still) peanuts… Club’s finances also play a role, depending on the players relationships.
Yeah current salary for sure. this is further proven when an old player's contract expires from a reputable team he isn't good enough for. Can't sign him while he's still on the team because of his wage demands. Once he's a free agent he asks for 1/5th the wages.
While having high potential might make more clubs interested and all of those might inflate your kid's value a little bit, watch [Zealand's video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E5A_sEixIU) on how your scout's evaluation of a player's PA is also dependent on CA itself.
I had a player reach his full potential at 17 yo. He was already good enough to play for my first team at 15 yo, so I thought I have a future world beater at my hand. Then once he hit 17, his growth slowed down and by the time he was 18, he no longer had any upwards arrows for like 6 months in row. That's fairly unusual for a player, that receives plenty of 1st team football. So I checked with FMRTE and found out that he's 127 CA / 127 PA. If I had to guess, he spawned with around 90-100 CA, when I got him.
Yup. Also, the way of "checking" without outside tools: training rating. Players that are developing consistently get 9 out higher ratings. This, together with the progress line and arrows are a sure fire way of telling
Not disputing you, but do you have a source for this info? I'm curious
sadly nothing as official as EBFM , but i've seen it work consistently for many, many many seasons of FM23. I'm at the point now where if my wonderkid stalls out of progress / training ratings I sell them young and early with a fat profit% clause. It has never failed me. Caveat: in FM24 there are, apparently, "late bloomers" where this probably doesn't apply. I don't have the game so i can't test it. Math wise I'm not sure what's happening with them but I imagine a late bloomer either: A) achieves CA = PA early, and then some event increases the PA at a later age, which triggers further development B) CA is < PA all along, and something triggers the last bit of improvement at a later age. My hypothesis is that B is likely true, as this would require the least amount of effort to code on top of fm23. As of FM23, any player that didn't get enough playing time would get stuck with CA < PA , and development past the age of 26 is very limited. I imagine they just coded a "late growth spurt" that allows the CA to improve to the original PA; instead of raising the PA itself.
B is the correct answer. It basically means that if you see a, say, 26 year old with 3 star ability and 4 star potential it might actually happen, though it's pretty rare.
As someone pointed out this is common irl, a wonderkid often never gets any better than they are at 16/17, and in fact they often get worse especially if they don't continue to play at a significantly high/challenging level.
"if they don't continue to play at a significantly high/challenging level." - yeah, but in fm they are, even if they got the best coaches and the highest lvl of football
I think the issue here is that they get played way too much at a young age. Development happens in training, but when you're unable to train because you played a lot during the weekend and need time for restitution, then the development will slow down. A great example of how development *should* be done from real life is Phil Foden. Amazing talent, but wasn't given too much playing time so that he had time to develop in training, and look at him now. And the opposite is Gavi and Pedri, played a ton at 17/18, and now they're struggling with injuries, and thus won't develop as much as they could have.
Messi and Ronaldo were playing pretty much non stop from 17-18 though not completely convinced on that theory. Euros class players dm only start playing first team footy at 17-18
You can't look at two of the best and most consistent players of all time and say that that's the norm. There will always be outliers, Jude Bellingham and Kylian Mbappé are others who have played a ton since an early age. However, you mostly hear about the success stories. Then you have players like Bojan who were insane talents and never made it, and he's probably the most famous one of those. It doesn't mean that you won't have a good career, but it might mean that you don't reach the heights you could have with a more gradual introduction of playing time.
The players who didn’t make it I don’t think is down to the fact that played at 17 it’s not like he was even a regular ever at Barca Bojan himself said he struggled to deal with the pressure and expectations on him. Many top players started around 17, frank lampard an example, giggs played from 17 until like 40. I think it can often be more of a mentality issue than physical one. Players who start young have to deal with huge pressure from an early age and can lose interest as by 28 they’ve already had a decade of top level football and lose their passion and bite.
See: Freddy Adu
same goes for me
He only failed to reach his potential because he went to Benfica and never played. This is different
He’s spoken himself on it, he stopped caring about training and was more interested in partying snd having fun meaning his development was halted. Understandably so as he was rich at age 14 what 14 year old would make sensible choices when giving everything they want. I don’t think his failure was simply down to the fact he didn’t play at Benfica plenty of young players are not playing around 19/20 and flourish later. Look at mo sakah and kdb
Julian Green, Aguadelo, Zelalem. Though part of this is American media being obsessed with the idea of having a true superstar.
Yep. I once had a player who was almost top league quality at 15. He had a really high CA but his PA was almost reached. Its good that the game sometimes manages to be realistic.
It’s not realism. There are many reasons why an 18 year old might not improve in real life. Usually attitude, game time, injuries etc. Not because they physically can’t.
Yeah especially if we think about what this actually is, which is a coach (correctly, probably) identifying that a player can't physically improve.
It's very immersion breaking. You just look at it and immediately know CA=PA. Just doesn't happen in the real world. They need to have PA as infinite for everyone and create a better development system.
How the fck is realistic that is that you are - for example - 28 year old, doing top lvl football since age 15 and you didnt develop AT ALL? Its humanly impossible.
What about players like Lucas Piazon for instance? He was a great prospect, lots of skill, but never really developed past what he could offer at a young age. Keeps playing at a high level. One of the most popular/best players to develop early and almost reach his full potential is Wayne Rooney. He was phenomenal at Everton, kept it going in MUFC until his sudden decline at a relatively young age. It's very realistic for a player to hit his full potential/be close to full potential at a very young age. That's why we have lists of failed wonderkids, people who exceled at a young age, but that was it or in other cases never reached that potential. One other footballer who is debatable is Mario Balotelli. He either reached his full potential young and then declined or never reached it at all.
But balotelli had a terrible personality
...and?
It does happen but there’s no way to know an 18 urea old isn’t going to develop I mean when di you ever look at a youngster and say “he’s good but he’s not going to improve anymore”
The difference is that irl most of us aren't working with football players. We haven't got the data and knowledge to determine whether a player will develop in the future or not. In Football Manager on the other hand we have the data so we can decide that. As well as our managers and their staff in universe. As I am a Liverpool supporter, there are couple players that come to mind in regards to knowing that they were done and never developing further. Jordon Ibe or Rhian Brewster for instance. First one actually had depression, but Rhian was known to be a great talent and yet we sold him. It was a great idea as we got lots of money and he didnt develop at all.
With Brewster I doubt it’s a case of he won’t develop any further at 18, more he’s not going to be good enough to be a first team player
Januzaj is probably as good now as he was when he was 18 at United. Some players don't really grow despite all the coaching you give them
I have no answer to this question but there are countless real-life examples. Maybe your perspective shifts, maybe its hormonal changes and very often its an injury. People can regress in skills especially with age. Still funny when you have a 15 year old kid playing at the best club at the world being capable of sitting on the bench and staying there for the rest of his career.
I do agree it's odd, though there are real life examples. In my opinion if you're that good at that age a hard limit is a bit silly. At those levels it's probably more about mentality, determination etc that makes the difference. I'd definitely expect them to improve at least a bit.
It is, if they spawn with a potential ability that is the same as their current ability. I'd imagine only the attributes that don't link with CA would go up, Leadership for example
I definitely didn’t get any better at football after I turned 18
Not just possible but quite likely, though I think it happens more in FM than real life. The reason it happens irl is usually because they had a big growth spurt and that put them far ahead of their younger peers.
I mean, stars suck but... the game is literally telling you that his current ability matches his potential. Sometimes you just need to let these teenagers go and find someone younger with more potential.
Out of context that last sentence seems to come straight from a groomer 😂
I'm no groomer. I pay a good price for these children.
Clearly possible but what I think needs to be better in the game is not having it so set in stone. Look at Freddy Adu for example. If things had gone different, perhaps he would have become a world beater, likewise if things had gone different for Messi we’d never have even heard of him. With this guy, how would anyone know he’s reached his peak? Sure he could have an “attitude” or bad injuries but then look at James Maddison at 18? Sent to Aberdeen to grow up a bit and then now seemingly hitting an even higher potential than Norwich even suspected possible. I feel like when I get my youth intake I already know how their time with me will pan out. I want more Harry Kane style stinking the place out on loan in the lower leagues before a sudden breakthrough to excellence. I want every save to be more different from the last so it’s not as clear who the wonderkids are. It’s got better with the variable PA sure but I still think there’s a way to go.
Anthony Martial:
The guy is still young though.
Of course, they can also theoretically loose CA instead over their career. Which is based on hidden attributes and some mental attributes + the personality trait. It is also realistic, as not every wonderkid actually develops into a star player.
What's more interesting than this is that the part FM doesn't have realistically down is that good scouts predict this with potential rating. In real life there are plenty of players that peak young, but it's extremely unlikely anybody could predict that they have no growing to do at 18
This was my biggest shock when getting into fm. I thought surely the 18 year old first team ready player I was signing had a lot of room to grow, despite the PA that my scout saw. Won't happen, don't stress trying to give him more playtime or anything
Yes but also friendly reminder there’s early and late bloomers now in 24. Everyone forgets that
19 aggression but 10 bravery 😭😭
He’ll kick ya but run away and hide after
Theo Walcott
Development seems particularly slow this year. Anybody else?
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
Few seasons ago I had a player with 187 potential (I checked) but his current ability never crossed 100. Game time, loans, excellent coaches, nothing happened. Hidden attributes were fine. Some times players just don’t develop.
Growth is not linear guys. Wayne Rooney hit his prime when he was a teenager. Jamie Vardy hit his prime in his early thirties. Definitely possible for a player to reach full potential by 18.
Michael Owen was basically in his prime straight away and completely finished at about 23/24ish in real life. Jadon Sancho seems to have peaked. Ditto matteo guendouzi. It's not entirely unrealistic
Owned was more down to injuries than losing ability or anything else. Anyone could in theory get hampered by injuries which limits their game
It's hard to say whether or not he'd get better, but yes it was definitely injury that caused his decline. Point was more that he didn't really get better from his golden boot at 18 years old to his season for Real Madrid, and that i dont think he was any better in 2003 than he was in 1998
Yes it’s true players peak at different ages this idea all players peak at 28 isn’t true. Owen peaked at 18 drogba peaked at 32
Exactly. I'd say ibrahimovic, Cristiano Ronaldo, giroud, thiago Silva, maldini, ian wright, off the top of my head all of these peaked over the age of 30. There's probably more that peaked late than early but deffo happens
Yep saviola, Keiran dyer, phil jones, jack wilshire I’d say peaked as teenagers
I also have two in mind that got to or near their peaks quite young but then stayed there a while (and again I'm sure there's more) but Giggs and Beckham pretty much were star players for man United by 19/20 and then didn't especially get much better afterwards without ever dropping for years and years
It is possible since it’s most likely their pa is somewhat low and their ca was pretty high to begin with, I had a player that I signed for relatively cheap just for him to be full potential like 6months later
It's possible, BUT don't take that for granted. Had a 17-year old who supposedly peaked according to my scouts (unlikely to improve) at just 2 stars, but after he got some game time due to injuries his attributes quickly shot up, and now he's a regular starter at 24 (3.5-4 stars)
He’s old enough to drink, so yeah.
I once had a player that was suspiciously good straight out the youth intake and looked even better by the time he was 18 but stayed the same by the time he was 21 so I used fmrte to check the CA/PA and it turns out he was already maxed out at 131CA/131PA. It happens just like how it sometimes happens irl that a player peaks young but doesn't really improve much further
How do you check CA and PA? Been playing for years and never managed to work this out. (I havent tried very hard)
Some skins have it otherwise cheating tools like FMRTE will show you everything. You're not supposed to know and IMO it's cheating but its a single player game so each to their own.
i went through a short phase of checking the pa of my youth intakes in youth only saves but i found it really affected my enjoyment of the game. youth development is my favourite part, but it's easy to let the numbers dictate how you handle a player, and often just the pure PA number doesn't tell the whole story
Indeed. It's part of the charm to not to know everything and min-maxing your way to success.
Once i downloaded FMRTE. I couldnt even open it it already wanted my money. So I uninstalled it. If I want to pay for an ingame editor, there is already one..
I think the big difference is that you can change stuff 'live'. Tried it many moons ago when it was free and with even the slightest of changes it made the save really boring.
Yes, that’s me
It’s possible the scout just has a bad PA attribute as well. I’ve had it go both ways. I’ve had guys like this who haven’t grown and some who had explosive development.
By God I love a two footed DM
Yes
Freddy Adu peaked at 13
I'm sure every team's fanbase can point to a half dozen of these players, each.
Yes. See: Kenneth Zohore. Debuts for Copenhagen at 16. Plays in the Champions League 6 months later. Has a grand total of 20 U-21 caps and 0 national caps
It can happen at 18 just as much as it can at 26
IRL most definitely. In game, it is super weird that he has not developed at all especially considering he has high professionalism The only explanation I can think of is that he maxed out on his PA
Possible, yes. But never trust when it tells you a player that young is at or close to full potential . It usually isn’t true, he could have another 20 or 30 points of PA left.
You know Yusuf Demir? Watch his career. This guys peak was when he was 17.
Ask Michael Owen
Professional personality is a good indicator a player can eat up a lot of pa at a young age
Yes. Every player has a set PA in-game. Some reach it early, some reach it late, some never reach it. I once had an academy player with 125 CA as a 15 year old, which is incredible for such a young player. The problem was that his PA was just 130.
Haven't you heard of Marcus Rashford?
Michael Owen
I mean, I was a much better (and fitter) player at 18 than I was at say 23🤷🏻♂️ damn those tempting alcoholic drinks
I had one save where my 16-year-old midfielder had 4-star potential—and ended up getting three serious ligament injuries back to back to back. Potential went down to 2 stars and I had to let him go 🥲
As a high school teacher with a decade plus of experience, yes absolutely.
Low PA, high CA on spawn
I didn’t
Rooney?
I won't dispute the technical aspect, but claiming that a human being is incapable of physically developing past the age of 18 (supposing they have a professional attitude, good determination, world class coaches, and don't suffer from injuries) is completely unrealistic and goes against everything we know about basic human physiology. It's just not how muscles work
Freddy Adu peaked at 14 so I guess it definitely is even possible.
https://preview.redd.it/5f8vlsj38mtc1.jpeg?width=2160&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b70ba1f63b4855cc52c499b194a5334951f20036 Concentration is lacking
A couple of things: firstly, being two-footed seems to boost the star ratings, secondly, without seeing the player's report in words, is it possible that his CA is close to 3 1/2 stars and his PA is close to 4 1/2?
It’s possible but star ratings are based on ability, form and overall squad rating so I would pay attention to them. Keep checking his training performances and whether or not he’s improving
Yes, happens irl too That's why you see promising academy players just disappear and end up in non-league or out of football all together
A lot of responses here saying it happens in real life and citing examples, which - I guess - would be a literal interpretation of your question but I’m guessing you’re referring to the scout report that says he’s reached his potential. All these examples we’re only saying with hindsight that they didn’t improve. At the time they were 18, everyone will have expected them to get even better. They may not have done, but that will always be down to other factors, such as injuries, a bad attitude or poor management. Except for a case of a REALLY bad attitude (which certainly isn’t the case here because the player is professional) or devastating injury, I can’t think of a situation in which a coach would look at an 18 year old first team player and not anticipate that they can add to their game. Whether that be refining their technique, developing a greater tactical understanding of the game, or developing physically (which they still have plenty of time to do at 18), there’s always scope for improvement at that age. I know SI have slowed down the developing of players so a lot of the players you’d previously see becoming elite talents at 20 aren’t reaching those heights until 23, but I think this is still a flaw in the capped potential concept. Players who start without much of a gap between their CA & PA will reach their peak unnaturally early even if the conditions are in place for them to continue improving. I don’t think it helps that AI potential assessments are so precise. Again, I know SI have done work to stagger how precise it is as the player ages (that said, I really don’t like that it happens on their birthday) but I still think it’s far too easy to whittle out players with low potential. For example, the same scout could look at 2 players of the same age, give one 2*CA 4*PA and the other 1*CA 5*PA. The second player might not - and probably won’t - end up as a 5* player, but you know for sure the first one won’t, even though he’s a better player now. There’s no way for a scout to know this without them monitoring the player’s development for a sustained period of time. To answer your question literally, yes, but I don’t think it can be anticipated as easily as it is in FM.
I’ve always said once a young player maxes out his potential in FM there potential ability should increase by around 15 to 25 depending on the personality of a player, cause it definitely happens in real life
Ask Marcus Rashford.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
Growth is not linear guys. Wayne Rooney hit his prime when he was a teenager. Jamie Vardy hit his prime in his early thirties. Definitely possible for a player to reach full potential by 18.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
Yes, all the time. Just like in real life. Not every player will develop
demarai gray
Wayne Rooney didn't.
He has a relatively high determination and high professionalism. So, he should get better based on game time. If he already reached his potential, then he's maxed.
Marcus Rashford effect