Wonderkid Factory | Part 1 | Turning Milk Into Cheese

Having completed my Football Manager 2024 Pentagon Pursuit adventure far quicker than anticipated, I struggled for a while to find a new save that would bring us something a little bit different. So I went back to my own 24 Teams to Manage on FM24 guide (shameless plug) and took my own medicine to select an exciting new challenge.

Inspired by our Wonderkid Factory adventure with Envigado FC on FM23, I was particularly keen to take on another youth development challenge. And this time, that takes us to the Netherlands.

Think of Dutch football and you likely imagine the dominant Ajax youth academy that’s consistently produced some of the best players in the world over the last few decades. However, last season, another Dutch youth team achieved something that Ajax never has – winning the UEFA Youth League. (Full disclosure – I first started this save before the FM24 winter update and Eredivisie was broken by financial issues and annoying bugs that weren’t fully fixed in the existing game file, so I had to start again.)

Meet The Cheese Farmers

Our new challenge is to continue that work and use the AZ Alkmaar youth development machine to become the dominant force in the Netherlands and conquer Europe. Our gauge for success will be the Ajax side that won the Champions League Final against AC Milan in 1995, led by academy products like Edwin Van Der Sar, Frank Rijkaard, Clarence Seedorf, Edgar Davids, Frank and Ronald De Boer and match-winner Patrick Kluivert. So the ultimate aim of the save is to win Eredivisie and the Champions League with a team of fully homegrown AZ Alkmaar academy products.

Alkmaar Zaanstreek, better known as AZ Alkmaar or AZ, is a professional club from the city of Alkmaar in the Zaan district in the north of the Netherlands. AZ was founded on 10 May 1967 as AZ ’67 after the merger of local sides Alkmaar ’54 and FC Zaanstreek. It initially struggled financially after signing expensive foreign players but was bailed out by Cees and Klaas Molenaar, brothers who’d played for another local side Kooger Football Club.

The brothers invested heavily, which ultimately helped AZ claim its maiden title in 1981, two years after Cees Molenaar’s death, and three KNVB Cups. This period of success was led by players like Kees Kist, who became the first Dutch player to win the European Golden Boot in 1979 and remains the club’s record scorer with 212 goals, midfielder Jan Peters, defender Hugo Hovenkamp, Danish striker Kristen Nygaard and defender John Metgod.

However, AZ suffered relegation to Eerste Divisie in 1988, just seven years after winning the title. A resurgence followed in the 1990s due to the involvement of businessman Dirk Scheringa, which began with the club returning to Eredivisie in 1998, finishing 3rd in 2005 and moving to the 17,000-capacity AZ Stadion (now the AFAS Stadion) in 2006. In March 2008, manager Louis van Gaal resigned but, after player and director protests, swiftly reversed his decision. And that proved crucial as, 12 months later, a 28-game unbeaten streak and 23 goals by Mounir El Hamdaoui, who edged Luis Suárez to the Golden Boot, led AZ to its second title. Since then, AZ was Eredivisie runner-up in 2020 and won the cup in 2013 and has produced talents like Teun Koopmeiners, Myron Boadu, Calvin Stengs and Owen Wijndal.

Bizarrely, AZ is known by the nicknames Kaaskoppen (Cheeseheads) or De Kaasboeren (The Cheese Farmers), presumably inspired by Alkmaar’s famous cheese market. So our job will be to turn the milk in AZ’s youth academy into cheese.

Meet The AZ Alkmaar Squad

The best player at AZ is striker Vangelis Pavlidis, who’s wanted by the likes of AC Milan and West Ham. Other key players are centre backs Alexandre Penetra, who’s recently signed from Famalicao, and exciting 19-year-old academy product Maxim Dekker, attacking full backs Yukinari Sugawara, Denso Kasius and Mees de Wit, and midfielders Jordi Clasie and Kristjan Beljic. The squad also contains talented young wingers Ruben van Bommel, son of former Dutch international Mark, and Mayckel Lahdo.

However, of those players, only Dekker is an academy product, so our focus is on the promising homegrown talents available. And, excitingly, the potential we hoped would exist at AZ, very much does. That promise is led by attackers Jayden Addai (who I don’t remember being on my previous attempt), Myron van Brederode and Ernest Poku, along with centre back Walter Goes, defensive midfielder Lewis Schouten and goalkeeper Rome-Jayden Owusu-Oduro.

But there’s much more where that came from in the youth sides, which contain five players with 5-star potential, seven more with at least 4.5-star potential, and 14 more with 4-star potential. The pick of the bunch is brilliantly-named full back Saviola Simons, along with winger Wassim Bouziane, striker Yoël van den Ban, full back Elijah Dijkstra and defensive midfielder Enoch Mastoras. Other talents to keep an eye on include midfielder Mees Adrichem, winger Jasper Hartog, midfielders Dave Kwakman and Julian Oerip, full back Sam Dekkers, and goalkeeper Kiyani Zeggen.

What to Expect From Wonderkid Factory II

There was only one man for the task of leading AZ Alkmaar’s youngsters to domestic and continental glory, Brazilian manager Robinho Lazaró. Lazaró has £22m and a wage budget of around £200k per week to work with alongside exceptional infrastructure of 19 youth recruitment and 18 training and youth facilities and 18 junior coaching. His new board expect Europa League qualification through Eredivisie (5th or higher) and to reach the knockout stages in the Europa Conference League.

This series will be a little different from others we’ve run on this website. I’m aiming to go really deep into FM24 with AZ Alkmaar and to focus in closely on the development of our young prospects. So with that in mind, I’m looking at doing season updates every Monday and Friday from now on. Blogs won’t focus as much on results as other series, but more looking at youth intakes and how much progression our young academy stars are seeing. And I’m really looking forward to some new ways of presenting that progression in upcoming blogs.

Hopefully, you’re as excited as I am about starting the AZ Alkmaar journey. And you can join us next Monday to find out how AZ fared in Robinho Lazaró’s first season!