Hey everyone,
I know the free agents lists for the beginning of the game. But what are your strategies for the following seasons... how you find good free agents. Currently i`m in the Japanese league and its really tough to locate good free agents due to my scouts..
Any recommendations or experiences
thanks
Here is a little description of what I do....
I abuse the trial system at the end of every season. Go to the pages for each league in your country (and any other countries of interest), and to the transfer tabs. Switch the filter to 'released players' and sort by date. Then you can see when all the players have been released following the expiration of their contracts (obviously you can only do this after their contracts have expired, so make sure you know when that is and wait until the day after this).... The reason I say go to each league rather than each nation is because you don't want to look through players released from clubs that aren't at a level of interest to you (eg you don't want to be looking at players released from a 6th tier team when you yourself manage a 2nd tier team).
Then, I just offer all the players trials. Cheaper than actually scouting them (obviously). You'll also be able to gauge their interest in joining your club by the fact of whether they agree to the trial or not. You'll be able to flick through multiple reports from various coaches (assistant managers) to see just what they all think of him (rather than relying on the report of one or two scouts). And, finally, you'll be able to see their training performances to judge whether or not they put the work in during their time at the club.
There is a limit to how many players you can have on trial at your club at any one time (I believe the board sets it, but they don't actually give you a specific figure). What I do is I offer 20 players trial moves at a time. Some will reject, some will join. Of those that join, I immediately cancel the trials of those who are not good enough. This will make sure that you have plenty of space to offer more trials to the next block of players.
As I work my way through the released players' lists for leagues/nations, I then look to narrow the set of players at the club. I let the trials expire and then I pick the best of the best to offer extended (typically 4 week, because you can just cancel at any stage in that period anyway) trial periods. While these players are still at my club, I can then pick a priority list of who gets contract offers first, and then go about looking to sign the players I want.
Hopefully this helps.
