FM26 Guide: How to setup a Youth Only Save Challenge

Playing a youth-only save in Football Manager is one of the most rewarding challenges for managers who enjoy long-term projects, squad development, and creating a club identity based on homegrown talent. Rather than relying on expensive signings, you must nurture academy graduates, develop them into first-team stars, and dominate both domestically and in Europe using only players produced by your club.

Setting the Rules

A youth-only save can be tailored to fit your preferred difficulty level, but before starting, you need to set some clear rules for yourself. Here are some key decisions to make:

Can You Keep Existing Players?

🔴 Hard Mode: Sell all non-academy players as quickly as possible. You could try selling them all int he same window but realistically you may need to keep some players for the first season to avoid instant relegation.

🟡 Normal: Keep existing non-academy players but phase them out over time. You could set yourself of rule of never renewing a non home grown player, meaning they should all be phased out over 5 years.

Or you could set yourself rules for how many home grown players you can use per year e.g:

• Year 1: Maximum of 10 non-academy players in the squad
• Year 2: Maximum of 7
• Year 3: Maximum of 3
• Year 4: Fully homegrown squad

(You can adjust these numbers to make the challenge easier or harder)

🟢 Flexible: Or don’t set any specific targets—just see how quickly you can transition to an all-academy team.

What Counts as "Trained at Club"?

When it comes to signing and selling players you need to make some decisions on what counts as a genuine Youth Player. If a player is flagged in the game as “Trained At Club” he may not have actually come from your Youth Academy, he may have just been signed at a young enough age to qualify.

If you're unsure check a players history for example Jack Patterson originally played for two Northern Irish teams so if you were doing a Everton Youth Only Save you might decide he doesn't count and should be sold.

Can You Buy Players?

For most people a youth only save means not buying any players at all and relying entirely on your youth academy.

However you can also add some fun by allowing yourself to bring back former players such as signing Cristiano Ronaldo for Sporting, Kane for Tottenham, Declan Rice for West Ham etc.

Although the lines can get blurry here, some Chelsea fans might try and claim Declan Rice for example (although Chelsea doesn’t appear in his history in game).

Can You Loan Players Out?

Loaning players out can be a crucial part of their development. However you may decide that it goes against the spirit of the challenge to see your home grown players playing in another country. Think about whether you want to avoid loans all together, only loan to local clubs (such Tottenham's link with Leyton Orient) or just not restrict loans at all.

Best Clubs for a Youth-Only Save

If you want to take on this challenge, picking a club with top-tier youth facilities will make the journey smoother. Several key attributes determine how successful your youth development will be.

The clubs Training Facilities determine how well a player will progress while he's at your club. While Youth Facilities, Junior Coaching and Youth Recruitment all determine how good the players coming through your academy will be.

How to Find A Clubs Youth And Training Facilities

You can find the specific ratings for each club by clicking on Club > Facilities

Club Facilities Guide

You can also check our online guide to all Club's Facilities here

Top Teams with Elite Youth Setups

If you want to start at a top club with world-class youth production, these teams are ideal:

• 🇵🇹 Sporting CP (Portugal) – One of the best academies in Europe, producing stars like Cristiano Ronaldo and Luís Figo.
• 🇪🇸 FC Barcelona (Spain) – La Masia has produced legends like Xavi, Iniesta, and Messi.
• 🇳🇱 Ajax (Netherlands) – Famous for their youth development, including Johan Cruyff, van Basten, and de Ligt.
• 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿Manchester United (England) – A strong tradition of youth development, from the Busby Babes to the Class of '92.
• 🇫🇷 Lyon (France) – A club with one of the best youth academies in France, consistently producing stars.
• 🇩🇪 Borussia Dortmund (Germany) – Their youth setup is excellent, with a focus on developing top talent.
• 🇧🇪 Anderlecht (Belgium) – Has produced world-class players like Vincent Kompany and Romelu Lukaku.

Mid-Clubs for a Youth-Only Save

For those who want a long-term road to glory, these mid table / lower-division teams have strong youth setups despite their lower reputation:

• 🇪🇸 Athletic Bilbao (Spain) – A special challenge since they only sign Basque players, making it a natural youth-only save.
• 🇩🇪 Schalke 04 (Germany) – A well-respected youth academy that has produced elite players such as Manuel Neuer, Mesut Özil, Leroy Sané, and Julian Draxler
• 🇫🇷 Le Havre (France) – A second-tier French club that has produced stars like Pogba and Mahrez.
• 🇵🇹 Vitória SC (Portugal) – A strong academy setup outside Portugal’s big three.

Youth Only Saves Are Quicker

A youth-only save in Football Manager is one of the most rewarding long-term projects in the game. Watching academy graduates go from unknown talents to world-class stars under your guidance is a special kind of joy. Even though this could take some time, the game itself can move quickly due to reduced scouting and transfers.

Remember Your Finances and Facilities

Remember that you can choose how your finances are split between the wage budget and transfer budget. If you're going Academy only with no signings then you may as well always keep your Budget at £0 and maximise your Wage Budget

You can redirect transfer funds into wages by adjusting the club’s budget by heading to Recruitment menu and clicking on Recruitment Budget tile

Board Requests

Having good training and youth facilities is key to a Youth Only save, but you can't choose to improve them yourself you have to ask your board.

But don't look at just Facilities there are lots of requests you can make to your board for a Youth Only Save:

• Facilities > Improve Training Facilities
• Facilities > Improve Youth Facilities
• Facilities > Increase Youth Level
• Finance > Increase Junior Coaching Budget
• Networking > Improve Youth Recruitment
• Staff > Increase Wages

To make a request to your board simply click on Club menu and head to Board sub-menu

Club Vision

When you first start a new save you'll be invited to discuss the Club Vision. Make sure to try and remove any objectives related to signing players if you don't plan on doing so, otherwise the board will be disappointed in you for failing to meet these objectives.

You can remove a club vision by clicking the little 🗑️ icon to the right.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments how you prefer to setup a Youth Only Save and if we've forgotten anything.