Affiliates

Just wondered if anybody had any info on choosing your own affiliates. The board have allowed me to pick my own affiliate but no matter which club a choose, they come back and say no.

So far i've tried :

Teams without parent clubs
Teams with reputation 1 whole star below my own club
I've tried praising managers of teams that i'd like to be affiliated with

None of these seem to work, I wonder if the whole affiliates system just doesn't work in football manager. The only time I seem to get an affiliate is when I ask my board to do it on my behalf, they come back to me no problem.

Please, if anyone has info on this subject i'd appreciate it.