I have my midfield full of south American players (Gago , Arouca , Lucas , Anderson) and they seem to play a lot of international friendlies .. i have backup too but they go away for almost 2-3 weeks in February a a lot throughout the year .. Is there anyway i can stop them (withdrawing from squad can make them unhappy) or should i offload a few and get some European players?
I have this problem with a few of my players, I usually withdraw them (they have never got unhappy about that so far) but sometimes if I have no fixtures then I make sure it only for 45minutes. What pisses me off is when Martins goes off to the African Nations cup for about a month, Americans also have competitive matches throughout the season. I think you should just withdraw a handful of them to make sure you can still cope with some of them gone.
With friendlies you can pull key players out but (esp with South American players) they have competitve matches at the worst possible time (champs lge week, etc) and you cant pull yr players out then. If yr team has a lot of South American players e.g. Gago, Cardenas, Saviola you are well and truly screwed
If you can afford to let them play, then let them. If you have a major game upcoming then immediatly withdraw them from the squad. They wont stay unhappy for too long, sometimes you have to take the risk.
withdrawing from the squad can make them unhappy but if you set them to 45mins a game or withdraw them when theres a game you need them for ahead I dont think they will mind..