There is a home field advantage. I don't know if you'd say it is too much, I think it is realistic. You can't always use the same tactic in the away match, especially against a powerful league opponent. I usually make my tactic much more deffensive because it is geared heavily towards attacking. The defensive switch usually gets me more of a counter attacking style. You can't go into each game the same.
Re: Football Manager I guess you're all beyond the "FM anonymous" stage--and back off the wagon. But I'm still on the wagon, after two years. It's been two years since I last played FM (when it was still CM!). I had a big deadline to meet (a book manuscript to finish) and I decided I wasn't going to get done if I bought the lastest CM, as I had every year for the four years previous. In those 2 years off FM/CM, I've finished the book and had time to conceive a child (my third, a baby girl who is almost a year old now: clearly I wouldn't have my baby girl if I'd been at my computer screen that night hunting for bargains on the transfer lists...!) Now I'm waiting for FM 2006 to come out to see if I get back on the addiction again--or if I should start to write another book instead. Still, I check the SIgames site from time to time, remembering all those fun hours I spent managing Aberdeen, Bayer Leverkusen and assorted teams in the Welsh League. For those of you with time to read, the book is available here: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...f=sr_1_1/102-4662583-7071349?v=glance&s=books Yes, there is a life beyond Football Manager. But everytime I see the latest fixture list for the real-life Champions League, or for the Libertadores, I think: Wouldn't it be fun to try and win it all with Barcelona or Boca this year...
Re: Football Manager Wait, you've won the Pulitzer Prize and you're posting on Bigsoccer about your addiction to FM/CM? Now I have a story for my wife. Nice to meet you.
Xabi Alonso is ridiculously over-rated in the game IMO. Yeah, he's good, but in FM he's probably the best around, along with the Beast Baptista and Mascherano. I find that with him just infront of my backline and with my fullbacks playing in a flat back 4 (ie no arrows to midfield ), I can afford to have 3 very attacking midfielders in the team. On the home advantage note: I think I'll start playing with 2 defencive mids and only 1 striker in the away games. It's ridiculous! I also think it's slightly over-done. Surely, after whacking Liverpool 4-1 at home, loosing 3-0 to Portsmouth away in the very next game.... I'd find it totally realistic if it happened once in a while, but it's like every other away game is a huge dissapointment. Sure, (in the real game) you have to change your style for big away games, but how often do you see United or Arsenal play away to the West Broms of this world with a 5-man midfield, keeping Rooney/Reyes on the bench so they can keep out the much feared Baggies strike-force?
I generally don't make any formation changes while playing away and have a fine away record with any team I manage. The only time I ever change the actual formation is when I'm a lower level team playing agaist one of the top teams such as in cup games. Then I'll sometimes go from 2 strikers to 1 target man and move the other one back into an attacking mid role while dropping another mid into a DM role (for a total of 2DMs). The key in non-mismatch away games is to just play a bit more defensive. I find that just reducing the attacking mentality a few points, increasing the pressure on the other sides ball carrier and reducing the space between your mids and defense is sufficient to get wins on the road. You might want to experiment a bit with counter attacking if you have the right kind of players. I use it when I expect the other side to really push my team back into our half. I think part of the problem people have in away games is that the flaws of their defense become obvious. When you play at home you'll usually have the ball more and playing in the other side's half. This can make it seem like your defense is more sound than it really is. The flaws get exposed on away games and can look huge if you combine that situation with failing to suitably adjust your tactics to offer the defense some asistance.
Well, time for another update as I've been playing a lot of WWSM this week. I'm still with Liverpool and marching through the tough February schedule. Since I won Europe last season, 08/09, I qualified for the World Club Championships. I won easily against an Asian team and Independiente from Argentina to take the Cup back to New Anfield with me. I was disapointed to see it didn't give any points towards my HOF manager status; I stayed at 500 even. I'm in the final of the League Cup after an exciting home and away series against Man U. I think the aggregate score was 7-5 after I beat them 5-2 at Old Trafford and then lost 3-2 at New Anfield. So that cup final is coming up. I've made it to the 5th round of the FA cup after a strong 3-1 victory over Chelsea. I was bounced from the Champions League after group play. Benfica and I were tied with 8 points and I had a much better goal diff and I stayed in third place. I thought it was an error. So instead I am playing in the first knockout phase of the Euro Cup (UEFA Cup changed its name I guess). Hopefully I'll be able to win it because I never have. In the Premier League things have not been going as well. Arsenal is the run away leader. With all of my other club matches around the world, I have three or four games in hand. I'm currently in 5th, but if I get the full 9 or 12 points I'll be up to second or third. Arsenal seem to be running away with the title, but I still have them in the schedule and maybe I can gain some ground. I'm worried I don't have the depth to compete in all these competitions, and win. Landon Donovan is still one of my star forwards, but he's had some minot injuries and an extended international call up. Juaquin has never really settled in and my $35 million purchase of him doesn't seem to smart. Xisco is still one of the best players in the Premier League and is challenging for the player of the year award with an average rating fo 8.10. Over 8 for the third season. Robinson is my keeper, but recently he's let in some bad shots. Hopefully he can regain his form for the stretch run. Heilb has been strong this season but is also struggling to find his fitness. Cisse continues to score amazing goals. He's up to 20 on the season, his 4th consecutive season with 20+ goals for Liverpool. Tonight after work we'll trudge on. Hopefully I can report some new hardware tomorrow morning.
Interesting... I dont change my formation unless I want to... and usually I only do it to accomodate new players... at one point i was playing a 343 to accommodate all my forwards, Ruud, Rooney, Cassano, Ronaldo, Berbatov and playing them in a kind of rotation but then I swapped formations so I could groom young defenders in a 442. Funny you should suggest switching to more defensive and trying counter-attacks. I always have the Counter Attack strategy on, unless I'm playing a really crappy team who wont ever challenge me. Maybe 1/3rd of my goals come from CA. All that's necessary for that is 1 aggressive pacey winger a good midfield passer who sits deep and a forward who is fast who has good off the ball skills... Its weird, but I hardly ever dominate possesion in a game... like once every 15 matches or so I'll have 65% possesion but most times I win by just a few percentage points and on occasion I lose... I play my tempo at slow and have my passing set to short, alot of contradictions, but I have 3 or 4 genius' on the pitch at all times and I want to hold possesion so I have it on short passing, but I still want them to have time to do their thing u know? My formation which I've used off an on, and what I'm currently using looks like this... --------------------Ruud/Berbatov Cassano----------------------Rooney/Ronaldinho/Rossi -----------------------------------------------------Ronaldo/Sneijder -------------Baptista/Ronaldinho/Messi ------------------------------------------Mascherano Evra---------Chivu----------------Rio---------------Miguel ----------------EspenJohnson/Sorensen Its very unbalanced, but I like it because it suits my players and its flexible enough to play 2 wingers, 1 target and a withdrawn, or 1 winger 2withdrawns and a target, or - to play without a target altogether and have skilled players everywhere...
I think you'll find that difference between your strategy and the one I mentioned is largely down to the caliber of players you generally play with. I almost always play lower level sides anymore (winning with Arsenal and others near that level just got too easy) and thus don't have access to players that work with strategies like yours. For example, on my last side I had no quick forwards (just 1 good but slow targetman, a few kids who were all around average, and a weak old guy sniper) and my midfield passing was so-so at best. If I played a strategy like yours, my team would just give away the ball too often and given my so-so GK and young defense I'd lose a lot. If you are finding the game too easy with teams as stacked as yours, you might consider dropping down a league (or 6). Its fun and might take you out of your comfort zone strategy-wise.
lol... i see what u mean... its not too easy, i just dont find the need to change strats... I'll be weaning myself off FM anyway, as I'm starting an exercise regimen to get me in shape for the release of WE9.
I guess it was bound to happen, I've been fired from Liverpool. We lost in the League cup final, were in a battle for the final Champions League spot, were still alive in the UEFA Cup and had just beaten Man U in the sixth round of the FA Cup. The board wanted to be doing better in the Premier League I suppose. So I'm unemployed and trying to get to the summer. I figure I'll either grab something in the end of season firing season or go on holiday until the first firings of the new season. We're just about at the end of the 10/11 season so it might be a little boring for the coming days.
7-18-2011 I am appointed manager of Nottingham Forrest. I'm replacing English icon Glenn Hoddle in the hot seat. We're in the English Championship so I hope to get them promoted to the Premier League in one season. I have $7 million in available transfer fees so it will be a challenge.
I'm thinking of starting a new game now. My United team is romping to league titles year in year out now, but I'm yet to win the CL in this game! Eliminated each year by Milan, Barca and Bayern. With the resources available, I deem this a failure. I think I'll start a game as Southampton, I once won the league with them (unfortunately it was in an "experiment" game where I had made a brilliant Brazillian talent and put him in the team, eventually selling him for 52m and using that to build my league-winning team ). Maybe I should start unemployed, I've never tried that.
It is almost January 2012 in my game. I'm sitting in third in the English Championship with Forrest with 40 points from 23 games. I really want to get into second place to challenge for the top of the Championship. I really don't want to have to play in the playoffs for promotion. I'm about 7 points behind Leicester is first and I can't remember who is in second. If I can get promoted I'll stick with Forrest. If I can't I'm going to shop my services around the world. Here is my record as of 2012: 1 World Cup (Argentina) 2 Champions League Titles (Barcelona & Liverpool) 1 World Club Cup (Liverpool) 2 League Titles (Barcelona) 3 League Cups (Barcelona) There are some other charity shield type wins in there. My manager points right now are 500. I'm the second best Spanish manager of all time. I think I'm 16th in Europe.
I got Nottinham Forrest promoted. With about 10 games left in the season I was firmly in the challenger spot for the 2nd, auto promotion spot. However, the next 5 games put an end to that hope as I tied all but one. The top of the table was tight, after Leicester who had pulled away to win the English Championship. So all of a sudden I was fighting to keep in the playoff race with 5 games to go. I think the lowest I got was 8th place. It all came down to the last game of the season, and I won to get back into 5th place. So my 2 leg playoff tie was with Portsmouth. We tied at home and then won, 1-0, on the road. That put me into the final against Brighton. I won that easily, 3-1. It feels really good to get promoted. It didn't feel as good when my new transfer budget was announced, $2.5 million. I need to get some solid reinforcements and that's all I get?!?! I know we're not rolling in it but if I'm expected to keep them up I'd like a little more, please. I requested it and the board didn't budge. So I'm trying to get some strong players from those who didn't win promotion or are falling from the Premier League. No one yet. I'm also going to look at some young loanees to strenghten the side and of course some free transfers. My plan is to stick with Forrest so long as it is clear we're staying up. If I can battle it out and get to the middle of the table, great. If I'm in a WBA 2005 type situation, I'll jump ship around the middle of the season if the right vacancy comes up. Chelsea just replaced their boss, but it was right before the playoffs and I wanted to see if I could win them, and I'm glad I stuck around. Ultimatly I'd like to turn Forrest into the class of the Premier League by improving all the facilities and team, but I'm not sure my cheap ass board will let that happen. We'll see.
I always enjoyed playing with Forrest. Good fan base, easy to attract free agents... and before the last patch they had great talent to start off with like Michael Dawson. Definitely one of my favorite teams to play with
ive managed some pretty crazy results lately playing with unorthodox formations. hope you dont mind the space taken up with pictures: This is my current formation, tend to do really well away. Might turn off wing back runs, and add down arrows to the 2 MCs if i am protecting a 1 goal lead away vs the likes of manutd/acmilan etc. My previous formation, and most successful formation to date is this one. Havent had to change anything in game, or before games. Huge wins, including 11-1 vs ManUtd, and great defending. 24 league clean sheets, 3 of the games where we conceded, it was because we gave away a penalty.
I was just offered and accepted the head coaching position with Spain. I figured I couldn't pass up the chance to take my home nation into the World Cup. I'm still juggling Forrest but if they start tanking, I'll go with Spain exclusively. Euro Championships 2012 just ended and I guess the Federation wasn't happy with the previous coaches work. I was also offered the Portugese head job but I turned it down. I didn't want to follow in Mourinho's footsteps.
I was offered Portugal post and I took it , thinking of quitting United for a bigger challenge, while keeping Portugal post. 75 yard strike, lol! That's never happened to me. Your formation is a killer, man. 9 goals in one game by one player! 42 assists! It's crazy.
I decided to pick this up after a couple years away from the game...it's good to be back. I gave myself a bit of a challenge by picking Fortuna Dusseldorf, who start out in the Regionalla North (German Third Division). They've got a sizable monthly bank loan that runs until 2010 and as a result, the transfer kitty is pretty minimal and so is the wage bill. My first season I made some decent pickups, including paying 140K Euros for a young Bulgarian, Enyo Kratsochev. It was quite a deal, especially considering that that was half my total transfer kitty! He wound up scoring 25 goals, basically powering my team to promotion to the Bundesliga.2. I also picked up South African Sipho Nunens on a free. Most of the season was spent playing a 4-4-2 with no runs from the back, 1 central DM, 1 central M (Nunens) and two attacking wingers. I actually wound up playing a rotating cast of left wingers at the right wing position, as I was an idiot and picked up 5 players who could play left wing and not a single one who could play on the right. Second season and I only get 375 Euros for the transfer funds. I wound up not even using most of it as most of my transfers were frees, including another Bulgarian, Aleksandr Mladenov, a dead-ball specialist who at one point manages a first-half natural hat-trick, where all 3 goals came from free-kicks. Which is good, because Kratsochev wasn't nearly as effective against the tougher defenses, scoring 9 goals all year. My board had somehow decided that since I had gotten the team promoted, that I was expected to make mid-table, even with my incredibly small transfer funds. For comparison, nearly every other team in the Bundesliga.2 is splashing out 1 million Euro transfers every year and the TV contract is 3 million Euros, which caused the club to raise my transfer fund to 420K Euros. Thanks guys. So of course, at the end of the year Fortuna is struggling and the board is starting to make grumbling noises. With 8 games to go, we're 1 point above the drop zone and I'm about to get fired. Incredily, the team responds with a 7-game unbeaten streak to finish in 11th of 18th and my neck is saved. The third year, the transfer fund is increased...to 650K. I'm really looking forward to getting this bank loan out of the way. One of the good things from the previous year though is that the club has moved to a larger stadium, regularly drawing crowds of above 20K. Transfers are again concentrated on frees and loans, the only actual transfer being an older German Dmid, Ronald Schmidt. Joining him in the center, on a free, is Gavin McCann, who seemed to show no interest and then jumped at my contract offer at the last minute. To accomodate both of them plus Nunens, I switch formations to 3 in the back, 2 up front and 5 in the middle, with 2 central Dmids, 1 Central mid and 2 attacking wingers, only now they're drawn back to the halfway line rather than starting in an attacking position. The team continues its outstanding form from the end of last year and with 6 games to go in the season, I'm top of the league with a 15-12-1 record, having only given up 13 goals. I'm 2 points from second and more importantly, 9 points from 4th. The top 3 go up and there's no playoffs, so I'm thinking that I have a reasonably good chance to go up. Whether this team can survive in the top division (and whether I'll get the money to build the team) is another question. The real highlights of the third season are from the German Cup. I get lucky draws in the first two rounds and take out 2 Regionalla teams, only to get drawn with Werder in the 3rd round. D'Allesandro scores a 30-yard laser with 40 seconds gone and when they score again on a rebound in the 25th minute, I figure the game is done. I put on some youngsters and tell them to attack. Kratsochev scores just before halftime on a fluke header, giving me a little bit of hope. In the 78th minute Mladenov smashes in a free kick from a ridiculous angle and it's game on. Still playing somewhat defensively, I am dismayed when the game goes to extra-time only for Bremen to score again. Throwing everybody forward, I am rewarded with a 118th-minute goal from a 19-year-old on loan from Dortmund. Not having any decent penalty takers, I pick who I can and close my eyes. What follows is the worst penalty shootout ever, my team triumphs with a 2-1 score over 5 penalties. In the Quarter-Finals, we draw Hannover. Going to an ultra-defensive formation, we squeak through regular and extra-time in a goal-less draw. Going to penalties, my team inexplicably goes up 3-1 through 3 kicks, giving us 4 chances to win the game. In heartbreaking fashion, the Hannover keeper saves the next 3 kicks and the 96ers bury all theirs, crashing us out of the cup 4-3 on penalties. If anybody has any suggestions on how/who to hire when picking coaches, please let me know. All of my scouts have their contracts expiring at the end of this year and none of them has an appraisal stat over 12. I'm thinking that it should be fairly easy to pick up scouts that will work better for me; I could be wrong though.
Galen, an impressive run to be sure. In terms of picking up staff. I usually find it hard to get anyone of quality without luring them away from other teams. I don't feel like there are enough out of work coaches to fill positions. If I were you'd I'd try to start signing new staff before the other contracts run out. That way, if you fail, you can resign your current bunch.
Just got back from a 2 week holiday in Ayia Napa, and im now ready to lunge head first back into FM, as I left things prior to my holiday I am in my 2nd season, promoted to the Championship with Blackpool and after 3 games without a win we are third bottom, im confident of staying up however as the team is playing well, we have just been unlucky against some top sides, hope to get David Jones on another season loan (had him last year he was great but lost place in team at the end) to compete with the impressive Keith Southern, upfront my 17 yr old prodigy Sean Patterson (38 goals last season aged 16) is forming a great partnership with both Daniel Sjolund and new arrival Konrad Nowak. Im at work now, just cant wait to get home and take off where i left things. Im coming home baby, Im coming home
Well, I managed to get Dusseldorf into the Bundesliga. We actually wound up pipping Bochum for the Bundesliga.2 championship by 2 points on the final day, despite playing a reserve squad for the final 3 matches. The board decided to cough up 1.4 million Euros for my transfer fund, which was mainly spent on picking up Knavs, a veteran central defender, from fellow promoted club Bochum. Two weeks later, the board chipped in a further 1.1 million Euros, which I'm trying to pick up a keeper; although there isn't much quality out there for that kind of price. Which is a problem because my keeper situation is currently a competition between a mediocre veteran and a promising keeper who, at 19, is probably too young to become a first-team player. On the loan front, I did pick up this Italian 18-year-old who's valued at 8 million Euros, has a Finishing of 20, a Heading of 20 and a Long Shot of 15. Of course, his Stamina is 7, meaning that he'll play the role of the marksman coming on with 25 minutes to go. I also picked up some well-needed depth at center-mid and center-back. Free transfers brought over a decent Serbian attacking midfielder and to my astonishment, both Daniel Bierofka and Christian Tiffert, which makes my team 2 deep with wingers on both sides. Just like Chelsea! Well, minus the great players and depth at every single position on the field. Let's move on. What I'm worried about is that the board has given me 'mid-table' as a goal, which seems to be a very tall order, especially considering the relatively small transfer kitty and our overall lack of depth. I wonder if getting 2 promotions in 3 years has lead them to expect too much. I really expected/wanted them to say 'battle bravely against relegation'. Especially since I don't think I have enough reknown to get hired if they sack me. Ah well. That's how it goes sometimes.
I no what you mean, i got promoted in my first year from league one to the championship, now im in the championship i have been given the "fight bravely against relegation" line, in fact im mid table doing well in the cups, but my squad is small and we are probably over achieving so to speak. I just know next season the board will ask me to crack on, maybe get a playoff spot, when in reality my team is over achieving and next year will be a different story unles they stump up the funds, which is unlikely. Oh well, i guess in this regard, its much like real life, one good season and the board goes bannanas.