DK10

I've been a huge fan in the last 2 FMs of the big targetmen since Red Star is my favorite team and Zigic was/is an amazing one.

Anyway last season i was in Leauge 2 in 2032 and I've been getting defenders with good jumping 18+. I decided to start playing one at ST and training him into a ST. He had pretty bad attributes except 18 or 19 in jumping and 13 in heading.

During games he would regularly win 25 headers a game. He finised the season with about 15 goals and assists. Anyway he ended up with the best average in L2 at around 7.8. He still missed his share of headers at goal. Probably should have scored a goal a game at least. He still lead my team in assists with his flick-on headers and he should have had more, one of my strikers (leading scorer from year before) scored 5 in 40+ games.

I played a formation with 3dc 2mc aml amr 3st with barrows on the wingers. I set it up using the advice in this forum. The team led the leauge in scoring and allowed about .7 goals a game. Won L2 and got promoted.

My point is, has anyone used a targetman that was originally a DC? You can find plenty with high jumping. Once I can a afford a better one in a year or two I plan on getting someone with 19 or 20 jumping and 15+ in heading. Should make for a goal machine as long as he takes to the ST training.

So any suggestions or advice in using targetmen or comments about the situation?

micro-ice

i dont know if this helps but when i was playing as chelsea i tried using ballack as my target man when drogba was injured and he turned out to be the perfect target man because he has 20 for heading and 20 for jumping. so maybe you can actually use someone who has amazin target man attributes as a target man.

deadlydevices

I did a simply experiment with this... in my fist year I purchased about 20 various positions, defenders, wingers, dms, etc. who had high jumping stats and were young and retrainable.

I found that players with offensive capabilities, such as attacking midfielders or wingers trained to be a striker very fast. Out of about 7 defenders, within 4 years only one had become accomplished with the striker role.

Either way, the defenders finishing stats never rose so it would not work THAT well in the longterm, maybe only as replacment for an injured or something along those lines. However a winger with high jumping and heading when retrained might become good.

But at the same time targetman arent that hard to come by, just search for tall players and they will almost always have high jumping stats.

DK10

True, but there is a big dfference between a player with jumping 20 and jumping 17. Many ST in my curent game have 17 for jumping but 20 is what makes them dominant and able to beat any defender in the air, and right now there are only a few 19+ ST in the game.

And regarding the finishing? Should heading not affect the players chance of scoring on a header rather than finishing? If a player has 1 for finishing but 20 for jump and heading and gets 3 point blank headers at goal a game I would think he should score once.

And the retraining issue; last years DC with jump 19 and head 12 is now an accomplished at ST and a better technically DC with 19/17 ratings has begun to play and train this year (10 games in) and is awkaward already. So as long as they are at about 21 or under they will learn the position in a year or less.

Still a good experiment to consider. All I want from the targetman is to score the headers and flick on passes to the other 2 ST. Hopefully in a few years I can afford a youngster with planty of potential that can be moulded into a jumping terror.

Also as a sidenote from all of this I have discovered is that by having 3 DCs with all jumping 18+ while having other mediocre ratings my defence plays much better than it looks on paper since the CPU can not score on headers or crosses with any kind of frequency so it really limits their options. It has definately made me look for physical stats first when evaluating players.

crouchaldinho

DK10, as you can probably tell by my name, I am a big fan of the target man type of player! I think they are undervalued in the game as they are not the most beautiful players in terms of style and grace. Anyway... on to my points...

I have definitely found this to be true. Having a good target man was the main reason that I managed to get St. Albans City promoted from the conference to the championship.

I have found that a targetman works especially well when playing counter-attacking, defensive, direct football with a deeper defensive line. It isn't beautiful, but my St. Albans City team was set up to defend deep and then hoof direct balls up to my big striker with jumping of 17. I was always the underdog, so found this to be especially effective.

I think the most important stats for a target man are jumping, heading, strength, first-touch, technique, off-the-ball, bravery and anticipation. In that respect, I guess that a DC could be retrained - I have tried it once, but to no avail.

My current target man is good at jumping and first touch, but has no pace.
I often wonder if I should set the 'target man supply' option, or leave it at mixed?
My reasoning for leaving it as mixed is that he could have balls played into feet, as his first-touch is 15+. However, it would be no good for the players to supply through balls to run on to, as he's far too slow for that! What are your views on this option?

Another point of interest for me - do you play with the 'use target man' box ticked?
During my most successful spell with St. Albans City, I set my target man on the player roles list but didn't tick the 'use target man' box.
I have been experimenting with this and have generally found that ticking the 'use target man' box to be uneffective.

I would be most interested to hear your point of view on these points.

Crouchaldinho

DK10

I leave supply to head since my TM are slow and essentially DCs so they lack technical skills to dribble effectively.

I play with the TM box ticked because I want the TM to be either getting a cross or be in position to flick on the ball. Although I wish there was a way to tell my wingers to dribble and cross to the mans head when he is right in front of goal. Even though my settings tell them to do this they do not do it as often as I'd like or they cross to other areas.