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[Alfiegillardtfl]

So a few years back I saw an amazing story by @Meow where he had 1 year holiday then took over a newly promoted team to Vanarama national North/South (he had Salisbury if I remember correctly) then it was all the way to the top!

 

I was inspired and have done it a few times since, I miss the story though Meow if you are around!! 

 

So i was wondering if anyone else also does this challenge and how it is going, I'm finding it a lot harder this year as i feel there are just a lot less players available to do buy and way less on the free search etc but pushing through, anyone else had this problem with lower leagues and less available players?

[HudsonOfSmeg]

One of the best solutions for doing well in the Vanarama leagues is to loan several decent players from Championship/League One teams. For a striker, Pace and Aerial are king in those leagues (since most defenders are slow or have lower aerial) so if you can find a player with 14+ for movement and pace or aerial (finding one with all 3 who is interested might be harder).

Start by checking out the reserve teams for Championship/League One sides. Scout any players who could be decent, then see what the scout report comes back with - if they're interested and you can afford the wages (sometimes you can get away with 0% contribution) you can try to loan them. I've often found that a player i've loaned would be interesting in staying if they play enough, and if you enquire about their price the selling club sometimes lets you have them for free (usually if they've got less than a year left on their contract).

You can narrow it down by searching for players who are loan listed and contracts are expiring (add 'interested only' if necessary) - scout as much as you can and then try and pick up any who have 4+ star potential (and not to many negatives!) 

A decent goalie should also be a priority - Jack Flint (Bolton) or Nick Hayes (Ipswich) have good stats and are willing to drop down to Vanarama, so you should be able to get one of them on loan or for free.

[Alfiegillardtfl]

1 hour ago, HudsonOfSmeg said:

One of the best solutions for doing well in the Vanarama leagues is to loan several decent players from Championship/League One teams. For a striker, Pace and Aerial are king in those leagues (since most defenders are slow or have lower aerial) so if you can find a player with 14+ for movement and pace or aerial (finding one with all 3 who is interested might be harder).

Start by checking out the reserve teams for Championship/League One sides. Scout any players who could be decent, then see what the scout report comes back with - if they're interested and you can afford the wages (sometimes you can get away with 0% contribution) you can try to loan them. I've often found that a player i've loaned would be interesting in staying if they play enough, and if you enquire about their price the selling club sometimes lets you have them for free (usually if they've got less than a year left on their contract).

You can narrow it down by searching for players who are loan listed and contracts are expiring (add 'interested only' if necessary) - scout as much as you can and then try and pick up any who have 4+ star potential (and not to many negatives!) 

A decent goalie should also be a priority - Jack Flint (Bolton) or Nick Hayes (Ipswich) have good stats and are willing to drop down to Vanarama, so you should be able to get one of them on loan or for free.

I used to also be able to get in some players they did well and get a couple of mil for them so steered away from loanees and could never find the ones which were at 0 wages so thanks for the tip! 

 

how would you go about setting up scouts when you expect to go up the next year, atm i always go hot prospects and just try and go from there, should i change to end of contract or something?

[HudsonOfSmeg]

Towards the end of the season I set the filter to expiring contracts and scout as many as i can. You'll often (but for some reason, not always) get a notification if they get released at the end of their contract. One thing to note is that some players might not be interested in the move until you start the next season (it's like the AI still sees you in the lower league, even if you've been promoted). I usually go for younger players, but you sometimes find decent older players who could also be used for mentoring or backup.

[Alfiegillardtfl]

4 minutes ago, HudsonOfSmeg said:

Towards the end of the season I set the filter to expiring contracts and scout as many as i can. You'll often (but for some reason, not always) get a notification if they get released at the end of their contract. One thing to note is that some players might not be interested in the move until you start the next season (it's like the AI still sees you in the lower league, even if you've been promoted). I usually go for younger players, but you sometimes find decent older players who could also be used for mentoring or backup.

do you go purely frees and move all money into facilities and wages or do you find cheap imports as well?

 

Half the issue is being able to afford the wages the players good enough for that league demand lol i guess thats why you need to constantly develop youngsters, when i did it with merthyr took me like 3 years to leave championship as average age started at like 18 but the team was so good by the time i came up that i got 2nd place in prem first season up haha

[HudsonOfSmeg]

In the lower leagues, I mainly go for free players since I find clubs often want double or triple a players value. What I tend to do is try to sell off any average-performing players and use the funds to improve facilities first and then reinvest it in either transfers or wages, depending who is on my shortlist. Once i get to around League One or Championship, that's when you start having a decent budget and can switch to being able to buy players for a fee, but now you can also probably get players who have been released by Premiership clubs too

[Alfiegillardtfl]

23 minutes ago, HudsonOfSmeg said:

In the lower leagues, I mainly go for free players since I find clubs often want double or triple a players value. What I tend to do is try to sell off any average-performing players and use the funds to improve facilities first and then reinvest it in either transfers or wages, depending who is on my shortlist. Once i get to around League One or Championship, that's when you start having a decent budget and can switch to being able to buy players for a fee, but now you can also probably get players who have been released by Premiership clubs too

great thanks, i think maybe one of my issues is every version prior to this ive managed to do back to back to back all the way to the prem but this year ive had to tapper my expectations to staying in a div for 2 seasons on the way up, with merthyr it was 2 in league 1 then 3 in championship for example

 

have you managed to just do the back to back to back or found it a little harder to do i ttoo?

 

[Meow]

On 21/05/2024 at 16:49, Alfiegillardtfl said:

I miss the story though Meow if you are around!!

Still kicking around, but mostly in the FMM Discord. Not however really playing that much FMM anymore

Glad to hear my storytelling has left a mark on people!

[Leminnis]

Hi @Alfiegillardtfl 

I'm doing exactly that with Maidstone, although I didn't upload any stories nor did I have any major problems with acquiring players on loan or free. If you are interested, I created a post quite a while ago with free players for the Vanarama National and the Vanarama League South/North. It was for Fm23, but some of them are still free and waiting.