Multi-skilled Defending Trainees

This is a sort of training with goal to get multiskilled defenders. The plan is a bit detailed, so make sure that you read it closely. First part is to train defending, then go for playmaking and at the end passing training. Important to train defending first, as this is the slowest training form. The goal at the end is to get players who got brilliant on all these 3 areas. They should be around 22-23 years old at that time.

Same strategy can be done on other forms for training, like scoring and playmaking training.

Get talents

What kind of talents you should buy depends a lot of your budget. Let's say you don't have too much cash to spare. Then you try to get useful players for lowest price as possible. Thing is, in the long run there isn't too much difference between a player who is inadequate in the 3 main areas versus one who are passable there. This is because the lower skills train faster than the higher skills.

To get a roughly good picture how good the trainees are, I calculate an index on them. It is simply to summarize the 3 main skills. (Inadequate defending, playmaking and passing give 5x3 = 15 in index.) I have also extended this to take other skills in consideration: - Wing -> +1 in index for inadequate wing, and additional 1 for every skill above inadequate. I.e passable wing give +2 in index. - Set Pieces - +1 in index for trainees with set pieces skill at inadequate or more. - Speciality - +2 in index for having a speciality So, a player with inadequate on all the 3 main areas, inadequate wing and set pieces, and a speciality will get 19 in total index.

This goes for players who are 17 years old. I use as a thumbrule that a 18 year old trainee should have around 3 more indexpoints on the mainskills than a 17 year one.

Age	Mainskillindex	Example
17 year	14-19	2x solid and 1x inadequate
18 year	17-22	1x excellent, 2x solid)
19 year	20-25	2x formidable, 1x solid)
20 year	23-28	2x formidable, 1x outstanding

I also did a calculation on how long time it takes for different kind of players to reach brilliant in all 3 main areas. In average we talk about 30 days difference for every index. Which means about 4 weeks of training.

Age	Mainskillindex	Reach brilliant in all 3 areas
17 10 days	index 12	Approxmately brilliant around 23 years and 63 days.
17 10 days	index 15	Approxmately brilliant around 22 years and 102 days.
17 10 days	index 16	Approxmately brilliant around 22 years and 72 days.
17 10 days	index 17	Approxmately brilliant around 22 years and 47 days.
17 10 days	index 18	Approxmately brilliant around 22 years and 4 days.
17 10 days	index 19	Approxmately brilliant around 21 years and 96 days.
17 10 days	index 20	Approxmately brilliant around 21 years and 66 days.
18 0 days	index 21	Approxmately brilliant around 22 years and 28 days.

Training

To maximize the training, use a formation with 5 defenders. Which means 5-3-2. 5-4-1, 5-5-0 or 5-2-3.

First season

Investments: - 10 trainees. (Ex 3x inadequate with other subskills and speciality). Let us call this group "Group A".
- Useful players on other spots. A smart thing is to buy some cheap old players with good experience. 1 keeper, 1 ving, 2-3 inner midfielders, 2 forwards.

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	10	Around 17	Inadequate	Inadequate	Inadequate	15

You will get 14 or 15 weeks with defending training and 1-2 where you should train passing. Since you only get 1 match in the seasonbreak, it might be smart to use 5-5-0 and get passingtraining to all trainees. Through passes is a little bit slower than normal passing.

Skillpop: The first year you will probably get up to 3 pops on your players. Which means around excellent defending, inadequate passing and inadequate playmaking.

Status end of the season

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	10	Around 18	Excellent	Inadequate	Inadequate+	18

Second season

Continue with the same. Also this year you might get close to 3 pops, even though most of the trainees will pop twice. Which means you will have outstanding defending with passable passing (passing training in the season break) and inadequate playmaking.

Status end of the season

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	10	Around 19	Outstanding++	Inadequate	Passable	21

Third season

The trainees have turned 19 years old. Now you will see that it requires more weeks for every pop. So you can train your players in defending half the season, and see how far they have reached. You should now have many players with around brilliant skill. Let us say you stop after half of the season.

Now you can switch training type. Normally you will go for playmaking, which require 3-5-2, 4-5-1 or 5-5-0. You get 6 players trained each weak at 100%, and 4 at 50%. So if you have players that seems better than other, make sure these are getting a 100% spot. There are other ways doing this. You can have 1 to play at an inner position every match, then you swap the wingers and the other inner midfielders halfway in the match. This should give 1 player 100% training, and 4 players 75%. Which means 2 players on 100% and 8 on 75%.

If we do as most of the player will do, we will get 2 new groups:
1. Group A - Will only contain the 6 players getting 100% training.
2. Group B - Will only contain the 4 players getting 50% training.

Anyway, the rest of the season you will get 1-2 pops on playmaking on each player. Depends what their subskill is. Let us say 1 pop.

Skills in the end of the season

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	6	Around 20	Brilliant	Passable++++/Solid	Passable++	23-24
B	4	Around 20	Brilliant	Passable	Passable++	23

Fourth season

Now the trainees turn 20 years old. Still the lower levels train fast. Playmaking is a little bit faster than defending, and you should be able to get up to 3 pops this season with the players in Group A. The players in group B should be able to get up to 2 pops if they are lucky.

Skills in the end of the season

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	6	Around 21	Brilliant	Outstanding	Solid	28
B	4	Around 21	Brilliant	Solid++++/Excellent	Solid	25-26

Fifth season

21 years old now. If we say 2 pops on the 100% trainees, and 1-1.5 on the 50% we are quite close I guess.

Skills in the end of the season

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	6	Around 22	Brilliant	Magnificient	Solid++	30
B	4	Around 22	Brilliant	Formidable	Solid++	27

An option here is when the players in group A have reached brilliant playmaking, swap them with players from group B, so the players from group B reach brilliant playmaking faster.

Let us say that all are on brilliant playmaking at the end of the season.

Sixth season

22 years now. Now there is passing training. With full training here, you might get 3 pops this season. (16 week with passing training) So your trainees should be on Outstanding++ passing. But, you have 16 training spots with the fastest form for passingtraining each week. So you should get 5-6 new trainees that you train in passing. At this point you have to chose if you are going to sell these trainees or if you are going to use them in future. If you are going to get a buffer of cash, you could sell, and the players you buy up for using the last trainingspots in passing training, you train in defending in future. This could be players that already have good playmaking skill. You then train them up in passing, So if we say 3 levels in passing here this season, and another 3 next season, then you continue with defending training.

Example of trainees you can buy for the extra passing training

Ability	Level
Age	19
Defending	Inadequate
Passing	Inadequate
Playmaking	Brilliant
Winger	Inadequate
Speciality	Something

Skills in the end of the season

Group	Amount trainees	Age trainee	Defending	Playmaking	Passing	Index
A	10	Around 23	Brilliant	Brilliant	Outstanding+++	32
B	6	Around 20	Inadequate	Brilliant	Excellent	24

The 10 fully trained players can then be sold (when they have reached brilliant passing), and you take the same process again.

Seventh season

You now have 6 players left which you want to train further. And you can continue training passing, or go over to defending. If you continue train passing, make sure you buy up 10 new players, where 4 of them are going to be trained further. If you go over to defending, you buy 4 defender trainees.

And that's it basically.