Thanks for jumping on this Crow and looking for various suggestions
Point 1. Player TImeline - what is the player timeline now as people see it?
For this, I would say similar to many posts here. Irrespective of when managers actually play various ages, youth players are only top quality/selectable for nat from mid-19s-21. I would be quite shocked if an 18 have ever toured at nat level. I would say a similar theme is in Senior levels where sure many managers play younger players for finances or while building, but they are not top level competitive or anywhere near nat selection between 21-25. Essentially players are then just in a growing phase until 19 and once they pass 21.
I think it would be really great to see some gun players come through at completely different ages.
Point 2. 21-24yo - What to do with them while we wait until they are 'better'?
While new comps for u25s would be interesting, it doesn't solve the problem of clone builds - it just gives us something to do with them while they continue to build. For me, the ideal would be finding ways to make them playable in the current system.
Point 3. Clone Builds - How do we not train the players the 'same' so there is more variety?
As others have suggested, way more talents and also traits (late bloomer etc etc). Across a whole range. Like people said, big match etc etc but also ones that might activate inside a game of what's happened. For instance 'Pressure Builder', if a bowler gets a maiden, then their chance of getting a wicket in the following over increases by x%.
Faster acting prodigy talent (or the tiered structure mentioned) would increase the range for youth players by making them playable at 18 at national level. This would then convert to the senior system with players at 23-24 becoming selectable ahead of some at 27,28,29. Similarly the various traits that people mentioned like those that are super good until 26 then lose skill earlier or those that might retain skills longer. So one talent would make a player nat level at 23 but they would crash out at 26/27 and another talent would have a player train at normal speed but then keep their skills + growth all the way to 35. Then nat sqauds could have 24yo and 35yo in same team.
I really think so much can be done with form and exp to make squads be much less set and forget for the season. Certain levels of form could even trigger various 'pop up' talents that the players keeps until their form drops. These could be 'On Fire Bowler' or 'In Form Batter' where they continue to receive more benefits to their overall/in game actionables so for instance a boundary hitter who is in form then would have their talent increase in percentage or a NBB would increase the effectiveness based on the form also.
For me, if more things are tied to form and exp, then it makes so much more of the game change from week to week and be much less predictable as if a player is in form they will have various new aspects or if they're out of form the opposite and you might even be best benching a player 2 weeks to recover their form back to base level etc.
Note, form would have to be slightly evaluated to avoid Div 3/4 players getting insanely good form and being way overpowered. Good performances in Div 1 would need to be adequately weighted where a 30+ player run score in div 1 is equivalent to a 80+ run score in Div 3/4 or whatever the correct calc.
Scotland Youth Assisstant s54 - Present