The loan manager in football manager is part of the development and recruitment team, with the main role of overseeing the players you want to send out on loan and keeping track of their development and performances outside the club.
The loan manager will send you a weekly round-up of the performances that your players who are out on loan are putting out.
The report is quite detailed with things like player form, happiness and game time being tracked.
It makes for easy reading on who is having a productive loan, and who needs to be shifted to a different club for more game time.
The role is fairly new to FM, but it is a great addition for anyone who prefers the game to mirror real-life football as closely as possible.
Just like the Technical Director, a loan manager in FM is fairly expensive, and depending on the level of your team, hiring one is not always a viable choice.
In my current Leeds United save, I am shelling out around £15,000 weekly which if I was managing in the Championship or the much lower leagues, I would instead save that money and put it towards signing a player that would propel my team towards promotion.
However, the riches of the premier leagues make spending £15,000 weekly on a quality loan manager that will save you time a straightforward decision.
However, just as anything in football manager, you have to restrict your loan manager according to your preferred guidelines, otherwise you will be severely disappointed and might think the role is useless and does more harm than good.
How to Use a Loan Manager In FM
In order to properly use a loan manager, you first have to gauge the level of the league you are playing at, the facilities that you have, and the quality of players that your youth teams have.
Once you have done this, you can then scale the following guidelines to suit your team;
- Head over to the Staff page and follow this path: Responsibilities > Transfers & Contracts > Offer to Clubs > Choose U18 (or any team you want)
- Once you are on this page, set the parameters according to the amount of football, nation and facilities you would be happy with your youngsters getting regular action at.
- For the playing wage percentage and unused wage percentage, set it at around 50% or lower if you are managing a big club that pays big wages that other clubs might not be able to match. Scale the percentage upwards if your youngsters are on relatively lower wages.
- Do not go below regular football for playing time, your youngsters need as much football as they can handle once they turn 18
- You can leave the nation blank, however, if you need your youngsters to play in a certain nation for gaining citizenship or a work permit, select that particular nation here.
- Select a league that is suitable to the level of your youngsters, a championship level player would likely have a torrid time if he is thrown in the Premier League when he is not ready.
- Facilities are important. Good facilities make players develop faster, however, you might find no takers for your players if you set this too high and lockout clubs that are willing to take a chance on your youngsters.
- For the remaining options, set them depending on whether you might need a particular youngster in the course of the season, just in case one of your senior players suffers a major injury and your team does not have particularly good depth.
Failing to customize this area according to your preferences will have your Loan Manager accepting all manner of loan offers that do not make sense for the development of your youngsters.
However, once you do this, you will enjoy a much easier time with your loan manager sending out players that need game time to suitable clubs offering ample playing time and boast of good facilities.
All you need to do is add the players you need to go on loan to the Development List, then your loan manager will handle the rest.
Loan Manager Attributes In FM
Just like any other role in the game, the highly-rated loan managers will give you the best possible outcomes in various scenarios, whether negotiating for more playing time for your youngsters or getting them to a big club with good facilities.
For best results, pay attention to the following attributes when signing a loan manager in FM;
- Judging Player Data
- Presenting Data
- Man Management
- Judging Player Ability
- Judging Player Potential
From the above attributes, the loan manager is a blend of a data analyst, scout and manager. Getting someone who is excellent in all these areas is not going to be easy or will be very expensive.
Therefore, you will need to make some compromises in order to bring in a loan manager that you will be able to afford.
Personally, I normally pay less attention to Judging Player Data and Presenting Data attributes, as I feel like I can rely on my knowledge to identify a player who is not performing well while out on loan.
Man management however is out of my control which makes it a key attribute to take note of, Judging Player ability and Potential ability come next as the loan manager should more often than not make an accurate assessment of which players stand the best chance of making it at our club.
Getting a loan manager with good attributes in addition to the parameters you set in the Transfers and Contracts section will save you considerable time, especially if you are that kind of manager that has a loan army, similar to Chelsea under Roman Abramovich.
In conclusion, having a loan manager will make it easier for you to handle players that are out on loan or identify which ones need to go out for more game time.
However, if you are managing a smaller club with limited resources, you probably also have a few youngsters who need loans which you can handle with ease.
For smaller clubs and clubs in the lower leagues, it is better to save the wage you would use on a loan manager and put it towards investing in your squad.
