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As a few people thought I cheated in my Sheffield United Project I decided to show you exactly how I went about the success I did but hopefully in a lot more detail as I explain about the tactic, formation, setting and training that I have choosen. The people who know me best on here know I don't cheat and never will but what I do is study the match engine a lot and watch games in detail to see how solid I am. Many people think its too time consuming to look at the game you just played in detail and look at the stats, but its worth every minute of it if it brings you success. Id rather spend 20 minutes looking at something and see how I can improve it or see how exactly I lost/won a game. After a while you become pretty confident on how the game works and know exactly how your team will play and what changes you need to make before something even happens. Geetting this understanding of the match engine is not that easy though but its something we all can do.
After all we all have the same tools available, the main factor is just how long you want to spend learning about the game you are playing. However saying all this, you don't need to have a degree to understand this game at all, all you need is a little understanding of what the game settings actually do if you change them. Some are easier than others to understand than others though so it might be a little confusing at times. If you are unsure about a setting the best think to do is load up the game play a match and only alter that one setting, that way you see a visual representation of what it does. It gets a bit more complex the deeper you get though as certain sliders have an effect on a different slider and so on.
This thread will be pretty much on going so it will never be completed fully and might have times that there is nothing new posted for a while, depending on how busy I am with other things. It is also worth noting that this is my way of playing the game and might be totally different to someone else's, however you might learn one or two new things or find an idea you might like to try out yourself. The beauty of Football Manager is there are many ways to play the game and in my Sheffield United Project thread I tended to change my settings almost every game depending on what the scout reports say. But in this experiment I am going to try and play one particular style as much as I can regardless of what the scout reports say. Remember this is just a certain way that I want to play for this particular experiment, its one that I think is the easiest to understand and most effective. It is not a guaranteed way to always win or be that successful. While I will be outlining and discussing what I have done, you will still need to have a basic understanding of the game if you are to try and replicate this method.
If you don't understand something that I have written about in here or have any questions ask them in this thread and I will try and answer them when I get time. Please also try and remember this is a very time consuming effort and I am doing this in my time that I have spare, which means certain days/weeks I will have more free time that others so will be able to update more frequently that others. Don't be surprised if articles keep popping up too explaing what different aspects of the game are, as I feel a few could be created in here as I discuss certain things. So rather than posting a new thread I may aswell keep it all in one place as it will make much more sense when you read this thread then, everything should be in one place. I might also make the game available to download at a later date, maybe after I played 4 or 5 seasons.
As this is going to be my career game its obvious id choose Sheffield United. They are probably one of the favourites to gain promotion from the Championship but I still feel it will be a challenge as my squad is not that great in all fairness and I will need to bring a few fresh faces in as my squad is not that great. So obviously straight away that could have a negative effect on my teams performnaces but i'll touch upon that more a little later. One of the first things I need to do is look at my squad and transfer budget and decide which positions I need to priorities and improve or add depth too more than others. I then need to look at who is available and see what deals I can trash out. I'll not touch on the transfer part of the game much as it would belong in a different forum then, so I will try and keep it tactic related. Before I get started on the training side I need to decide which formation I want to play, but thats the easy part for me. One look at my squad and I can see its more suited to a 422 than anything else, so I'll go for a 442 diamond (41212) to begin with and see how it goes.
I also have the style in mind that I want to play, I want to play fast tempo and direct passing. So to utilise this more I am going to need a defensive formation or the first notch of normal, with a deepish defensive line and counter attacking on. I don't care what shapeor system the opposition play I want to dicate how I play and force the opposition to adapt to me not the other way around. So already I got a pretty good idea of how I want to play now it just a case of waiting for my friendlies to start and see how it goes. Its worth noting that th results of friendly matches are not relevant, its just a good way to see your players gain match fitness and see any potential a formation might have. If you loose all your friendlies its no big loss and not a real indication of how good a tactic is.
So don't be too hasty to change things in the friendlies if you think a formation as no potential at all. I normally just play the mentality, tempo and passing way I want to play in friendlies but not change any other settings until the first day of the season. Then I sort of already know what settings certain players should have, so I assign them to them before my first game and watch the first match in full mode. This way you can change things you are not happy with and get a real idea of whats working and whats not. Then its down to you to get rid of all the faults and try and improve on the settings for the next game. Its not uncommon for me to watch the first 3 games in full though, I do this as one week my team could be over performing or under performing then then week after play completly different again. So you need to make sure you are reacting to the general play of things and that your team are not just having a good or bad day.
I like playing fast tempo and direct passing, I feel 99% of English teams are better suited to this style regardless of how good a squad you have. But like always we all play differently but I always seem to have the better success playing this way, even when I am one of the better sides in the league. And in Europe it is deadly, as not many European Teams play at a fast pace, so I find it gives me the advantage in most cases. But again its just my personal preference and playing this way does have downsides too just like any other way. One of them being possession, its very rare you get over 60% playing this way, but anything over 55% is good in my eyes. As I will be using direct passing and fast tempo It might be best if I explain how you can play a possession game if you wanted too. That way I cover all bases then and if I change my mind for some reason further into my game atleast I have already explained both sides of the coin. I'll explain a bit more about possssion below;
Possession is one of the most important factors in football and is what influences games and allows teams to dictate a game. Possession on its own won't win you a game as other factors determine that but its a tool that needs to be used correcty so you can reap the benefits from it. As possession is worked out in a percentage on Football Manager its a good idea to keep a close eye on this during a game and spend a few minutes analyzing how you used the possession and where it was most effective for you and most importantly how it was used against you. It is possible to have a low amount of possession and still do well in a game but you need to remember that if you do not have the ball then more likely the opponent does and we all know how costly that can be at times.
If you want to play a possession game then you need to remember a few key factors like;
Shape of the Formation Passing Style Tempo Width Weather Conditions Home or Away
[bHow good your squad is[/b]
These are the most important parts you need to look at closely to determine if you can play a possession game or not.
Formation and Instructions
Why would this matter?!!
Well it actually matters a lot because if the shape is not right it becomes increasingly difficult to keep a good amount of the ball. The midfield is a vital part of most formations and is the basis of where most of the possession is won and lost during a game. Take a flat 442 for example; its a real solid formation and doesn't have many weaknesses compared to other formations such as the 343 or 532. So the shape of the formation is essential as you want players close together and be confident of moving as a unit. In theory the more bodies you have in the middle of the pitch the better chance you have of keeping possession, well in theory. The more you stray away from the traditional formations the harder it becomes to keep possession. Its not impossible but just becomes more complexed.
Passing is also a major factor, the more longer or directness of a pass the more chance of it being intercepted by the opposition or it being hit out of play. If you want to keep possession then you need to start by sorting your goalkeeper out, as he is a big percentage of the possession your side will have It's pretty pointless trying to keep a possession game if your goalkeeper is set to long passing and distrubiton is set to long kick. Ideally you would want himset to short passing and maybe set his distribution to defender collects. I say this because if you watch a game on Football Manager, you will see the goalkeeper gives the ball away quite often, when he hoofs it up field. So by setting him to the settings I said earlier it decreses the chance of him giving possession away cheaply.
Tempo is equally important aswell, by having a fast tempo game it means you will need players with very good stamina and good fitness if you are to play the full 90 minutes at a fast frentic pace. A good example of real life football played at this pace would be the English Premiership, compared to the Italian's who generally play a more patient build up style. The Italian way would be far better suited to a possession game, as build up play is slower, so therefore it should be more accurate with the distrubution of the ball (player stats allowing of course). As tempo and passing are linked in the game, when you set one you should consider setting the other simliar. I'm not saying a fast tempo game cannot work with short passing as it can, but it won't be as good as lets says fast tempo and direct passing for example. Playing a fast tempo game means you want to move the ball forward often and quickly and try and put the opposition on their back foot.
I will leave it at that for now and not go into too much detail at this point about the other aspects I mentioned above, because I feel stuff like width, weather etc will crop up a few more times yet and I don't want to find I am repeating myself too much.
It really is as simple as that for me, everything else just doesn't matter especially tactics. As the tactics you use will have to be changed for the first competitive game you play anyways. I like to play six or seven friendlies to build the players stamina up but if I got a big squad then I do double that, just so everyone in my squad gets match fitness and their sharpness back and not just the starting eleven. You can always cancel some of the friendlies if you find your squad as got fit much sooner than you anticipated. If at all possible I always like to have the last week before the season starts free, so my players can all be at 100%.
As I will be playing a 41212 formation I need to ensure I have;
2 Keepers
4 DR/DL (2 each position)
3 DC's
2 DMC's
4 RW/LW (2 each position)
2 AMC's
3 Strikers
Now as I don't have a big budget some of the players I buy to fill these positions will only be bit part players and will only play if I have injuries or need to rest a few players. Until I get a really big squad I tend to keep the same starting line up all the time throughout the season, so I also need to make sure the training schedules I will be using allow me to use the same starting eleven whenever possible. I also like having a few of my back up players to be a bit different from everyone else in my squad. By that I mean someone who might not play a full 90 minutes, but if I need that little bit of magic can come on a change a game. These days I prefer to play with two fast strikers as I feel pace and accelarion outweigh most other stats and due to the way I will be playing this is ideal for me.
So I like to have a striker who is good at jumping, heading and is very strong as a back up. Incase I feel like mixing things up a bit, this way I can use a targetman in the game I am struggling in, and get him to hold the ball up a bit. In the midfield I like players who can play as a team and who are not individual players. However having a player who is individual minded is a good option for the bench especially if its a winger or a attacking midfielder. As you can see I like to get these sort of players in pre-season ready for the start of the season. I won't touch upon this too much yet, but I might go into more detail about the players on my bench and how I fit them into tactics and speak about the instructions I give them once the season as actually started.
Training is somewhat underated or undervalued by many users but for me it plays a vital role in how I perform during a season, let me explain a little more. If my training is too intense then my players are more prone to pick up injuries and I also increas the risk of player burn out during the last quarter of the season. Which can be costly especially when you don't have a big squad or can't afford to bring back up players into the club. So if I am doing well in cups and the leagues then I might use a less strenuos schedule meaning my players are more fitter than if I picked a more heavy work load for the players, which would make them more tired and injury prone and also mean id have to rotate my squad a lot more. Training is also useful for the development of players especilaly the youngsters. If you have a decent training schedule then the players under the age of 24 should see a massive improvement compared to the players above 25 in terms of stats. After the age of 24 its more about maintaining the stats the players have and maybe building on them steadily. So don't expect to see massive improvements on older players as it will be less noticeable.
I'm unsure how training works on FM08, but I'm guessing its not that different from FM07 if at all. So I will experiment for the coming season with pretty basic schedules for positions. I will create schedules for; Keepers, Defenders, Midfield. Wingers, Attacking Mids and Strikers to begin with and maybe make them more role specific further down the line. I'm not doing that now due to me hopefully replacing all my squad within the first 1-2 years in charge and depending on what success I have. As long as my players improve the first season I will be happy. Although I might alter the schedules after a few months if I find them not suiting my players at all, but I'll have to see how it goes.
Pre-Season training is something I have never done on CM/FM at all and I am guessing it will pretty much be the same thing this year. My schedules are normally quite physical to begin with so I think its best that my players use the schedules I created all year round. I know some people swear by pre-season training and will think I am probably mad, but I honestly have never seen the need for it and think my players still improve well and stay fit all season. But if you are one of the people who would prefer a pre-season training schedule then just make sure your plyers do lots of physical training and you can't go much wrong. Just be sure to keep an eye on on any injuries you might get as the schedule could be too intense, if it is then try lowering it a bit if you find a few players are getting the same type of injuries. Its also a good idea to do that all the time too, that way you know if an injury is caused by training or not. If its a training injury don't be too scared to mess around with the settings and make it less intense. Id rather change it sooner than later as these things always seem to appaer when you already have a few key players out.
Here are the schedules I will be using to begin with;
Also an important factor that some people don't take into consideration is International football. If some of your players are in the World Cup, Euro's or Copa America etc then you need to remember to give these players an additional break when the competition is over. If you don't then they will be tired for most of the season and you will have to rotate them far too much. So id recommend giving them a break of around 3-4 weeks, which means they will miss most if not all of your pre-season friendlies but they should be able to play the start of the new season.
Another thing worth noting too is that if a player is out injured its normal for his stats to decrease short term, especially if its an injury what keep a player out for a long period of time. But once the player resumes training it shouldn't take too long for his stats to rise again.
As there is only so much I can do before the game is released and patched and hope to add to this with a few more articles before I get stuck in over the next week or so
I notice some of the schedules are on heavy. during the season if you reduce them, i.e. during the busy christmas period, do you reduce the whole schedule or just strenth and aerobic ?
Originally posted by Northstand:
I notice some of the schedules are on heavy. during the season if you reduce them, i.e. during the busy christmas period, do you reduce the whole schedule or just strenth and aerobic ?
Well as I'm not starting till I get the full game and had it patched I cannot possibly say asI don't know how my players will be when I get to Xmas time. It all depends on how the players are reacting to the schedules and there condition etc. Then id decide what to change, but as the moment theres no point me speculating about what I will and wont be changing
Schedules look quite heavy but I think I read somewhere you saying that you don't have that many injuries with these schedules. However when I have heavy schedules I usually see 3-4 injuries a week on players
Sheffield United Project FM08 
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