James.Clench

1. Manager-F.A interaction

Managers in real-life can interact with the board and the press, just like in the game, but they can also interact with the F.A. This option would be ideal when you've just been robbed by a dodgy referee/linesman, and you want to complain about him, have him banned from refereeing your matches, etc etc, plus there should be an option to complain about fixture congestion, in the hope that some matches which your team only has one days rest for could be moved. It would also be good for some of the darker side of football matters (explained later) Asking the F.A to investigate a transfer of a player, if you suspect he was “tapped up” Hence, you as a manager might also be accused by the F.A. of “tapping up” a player and you will have to deal with that.

2. Request TYPE of feeder/parent club

At the minute there is only one option, simply to request a feeder/parent club. I think it would be better if you could request what type of feeder/parent club relationship you want i.e.

Request feeder club for quicker work permits
Request feeder club for merchandising benefits
Request parent club for local link
etc etc....

Instead of having to hope the board come back with the right kind of match, taking it one step further you could even specify a club, and for what reason you want to be affiliated with said club.

Regarding the Merchandising side of the game, the board could be a little more pro-active in trying to make the club a bigger global brand, this could be done by the board requesting that the club tours a certain country in the pre season friendlies, so to help get a better reputation in Asia or the U.S

3. Better Board-Competition interaction

I can tell the board how I think that my team is going to perform in the league, i.e. Winner, title challenge, Europe, mid table, etc etc, and they will gladly adjust the transfer budget accordingly, but I have no way of telling them how I think my team will do in the F.A cup, League cup or Europe, they just set a minimum standard. If there was some way of telling them that I intended to play youngsters in the league cup, due to too having to many fixtures, and we might get beat early on, then this would stop the constant monthly summary reminders of how the board where disappointed that my team were knocked out in the first round. There should also be better recognition of a "tough draw" I drew Chelsea away in the first round when managing Newcastle, and was beat, yet the board where still very disappointed.

4. More Board-Stadium expansion options

At the minute I can only request that the stadium be expanded, and if the board concur then at the end of the season they tell me how many seats they are adding. At the point when the board come back and concur with you, there should be a further option as to decide how many seats you would like to see added, and then show you how this will affect the clubs finances. i.e.

+2000 seats costs -850,000 from your transfer budget
+5000 seats costs -2.5million " "
+50 executive boxes costs £2million " "
Build new 30,000 seater stadium with expansion for extra 10,000 seats costs £50million
" 40,000 " " " 20,000 " £75million
Making stadium covered costs £10million
Adding under soil heating cost £1million

(Ignore the accuracy of the costs, there just used as an example)

5. Transport and Accommodation options/budget

Again this would probably be in the board interaction section, as they would have the final say. When I was considering this point I thought it was a slightly minor one, but if you think about it travel and accommodation for away games are quite important, weather you choose to travel by minibus and stay in a bed 'n' breakfast or travel by private jet and stay in a 5 star hotel it will probably affect your players. Just like when requesting that the board expand the stadium, they could come back with a list of options. i.e.

Request board purchase and travel by a team bus +£1000 match day costs
Request board that the team travel by plane (economy class) +£10,000 match day costs
Request board that the team travel by plane (first class) +£100,000 match day costs
Request board that team travel by private jet +£250,000 match day costs

Request board that team stay in 3 star hotels +£20,000 match day costs
" " in 4 star hotels +£30,000 match day costs
" " in 5 star hotels +£50,000 match day costs
" Team has own chef, masseurs etc +£80,000 match day costs

(Again, ignore accuracy of costs)

6. Security

I only put this in as an after thought, mainly due to its potential link with crowd trouble, pitch invasions, streakers

Request board that on match day there are extra stewards
Request board that on match day there are extra police



7. The Darker side of Football

7.1 "Tapping up"

"Tapping up is a major part of football. As Brian Clough once said, "we [Nottingham Forest] tapped more players than the Severn-Trent water board!" In the game however it is probably the most inaccurate feature, I can click on any player I desire and tell the press that I am going to do my utmost to try and sign him!! This is blatant tapping up, and regardless of weather you signed the player or not, you would probably be fined for saying that, especially if the other club complained. “Tapping up” in real life comes in two forms. A milder form of "tapping-up" involves a manager letting his admiration for a player at another club become known, perhaps by hinting at his interest while working as a pundit on a game the player is taking part in, "he's the sort of player any manager would be very keen to sign", or by lavishing praise in programme-notes when the two teams meet. There is also the "source close to the manager"-type newspaper rumors which in many case originate within the club and are intended to flag an interest while retaining plausible deniability against charges of tapping-up. This kind of “tapping up” is already available in the game and, as in real life, doesn’t usually lead to a player been transferred. The more blatant “tapping up” could be done in the game by allowing an option to Approach the Agent, here you would tell him that you want to sign his player, and ask him to make it happen, If the player is interested then he would come back to you with a price, a wage and his cut, if you accept, the player would hand in a transfer request, and suddenly be unhappy at his current club, then you would make an legitimate offer to the club (you could probably get the player for a slightly reduced cost) then the transfer would go through

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Approach Agent
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Make An Offer
Get Scout Reports >
Remove Scout Reports
Remove from Shortlist
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Player Interaction >
Compare With >
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Misc >
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7.2 Agents and Agents fees

In the game, all that an agent does is tell you how much his player would like a week, and now and then show you a video of his player, when in real life they play a much greater part.

1. There should be a point during a transfer where it shows you how much money the agent is getting/wants, and you should be able to negotiate this

2. If your trying to get rid of a player, and you don’t want him to find out that your trying to off load him, you should be able to approach the agent and ask him to canvas potential clubs to see if they would be interested, I hate it when you offer a player to clubs and no interest is shown. Then you’re stuck with a player who’s unhappy, and sometimes (if he's popular) other team members get the hump! The downside to this might be that it costs a small amount of money, and could take a little bit longer

3. If you’re trying to buy a player there should be the option to Approach the Agent (as illustrated above) instead of the club. Sometimes clubs have very little knowledge that a player is about to leave them, due to the Agent being in control of the transfer, Again, Approaching the agent on his own should be an option if the player is unhappy at a club/wants to move to a bigger club, and has asked for a transfer request, but the club are reluctant to sell, so you approach the agent to push through a deal, this would be slightly different to “tapping up” as the player has already expressed a desire to leave the club, and on the players personal bit it might say something like “has instructed his agent to find him a new club” or “wants to move to a bigger club” (think Anelka to Real Madrid)

4. If you’re trying to buy a player there should be the option to Approach the Agent (as illustrated above) in conjunction with the club, this would give you an edge if many clubs are interested in signing a player i.e. If ten clubs all have offers accepted by the club, it’s the team who talks to his agent first/offers him more money who have an increased chance of getting the player, this wouldn’t guarantee a player moving to that club, i.e. If Man Utd, Chelsea and Newcastle were bidding for a player, he is less likely to go to Newcastle(generally) but if Newcastle offer the agent more money, it might change the situation.

7.3 Match official bribery

If you clicked on the referee you could be given the option to bribe him, this would be a MASSIVE MASSIVE risk and probably wouldn’t happen between A.I Managers, but that’s not to say that bribery doesn’t go on, just look at Italy. As Noel Coward said in the Italian Job “Camp Freddy, Everybody is bent!!”

7.4 Players “life style” choices effecting their game

At some point in every professional footballers life, of the field events have affected his performance on it, yet this isn’t shown in the game at all, except for the option of allowing a leave of absence to a player for personal reasons. In real life however Jermain Pennent played football whilst been electronically tagged, Wayne Rooney sleeps with grandma’s and not to mention Joey Barton’s brother Racial murdering someone with an axe!! Ok so these may be extreme examples to say the least, but some players do recreational drugs, a few get done for drink driving, and even more get hammered on nights out and appear in the tabloids. This could be done in the game by having the press report on a player’s behaviour, then there would be an option for you to take appropriate action, e.g. a fine, suspend him, issue a warning. Quite simple really.

7.5 Crowd trouble and Hooliganism

This would be tied in with Security (section 6), i.e. once in a blue moon a fan could run on the pitch and tap Dida, or something like that then you would have the option to ban him for life or however long, then request more police, stewards at match days from your board, this would also be the case for pitch invasions and streakers Basically if your match day security is too low then these events are more likely to happen and you will get fined, so you should request more security at match days from your board.
Many clubs have fanatical fans (sometimes called Ultra’s) especially in Spain and Italy and definitely in Turkey. Some clubs like Lazio for example should be recognised on the game for having problems with this and hence have a greater chance of having match day security problems. More severe punishments could be having to play matches to a reduced capacity, or even behind closed doors. Either way I think S.I should make an attempt to put this in the game. This could also be reflected in the making a request to the F.A.(section 1) If your team is due to play a “troubled” club then there could be an option that you could request that it is played behind closed doors, or moved to a neutral venue.

8. Building Academies Abroad

This would only affect the rich clubs, but an option to build an academy abroad so that each year you would get a new batch of youngsters from that country, in that academy, it would work a bit like a feeder club but you wouldn’t be relying on that clubs Youth setup to train the youngsters.

Thanks for Reading

theking1

With regards to your feeder clubs idea this is already in the game once you've been at a club for about a year they give you the option.

A lot of what you suggest can't be implemented for legal reasons (darker side of the game)

But i think you should be applauded for coming up with constructive ideas which is quite refreshing on this forum at the moment

Amaroq

That's very well-written, and I appreciate the time that you spent to write it, and format it nicely. :thup:

Good stuff so far. If I recall, the "complain about a referee" was removed for legal reasons; I would love to see that resolved / brought back, as I think it was an excellent feature. With the modern game's referee-statistics, we could certainly use it to modify some of the most extreme referees (strict / laid-back) towards moderation.

Some way of dealing with fixture congestion would be excellent; in particular I want the ability to say "No, I don't need this rescheduled" early in the season. For example, the Club World Championship - I often send a second-rate side to, and I don't want to postpone a Premiership match for it.

Agree with you so far - in a real conversation with the board, I'd be able to explain why I want a feeder club or parent club.

This might be going too far - I do like the fact that the feeder-club decision is in the board's hands, not mine; its a good game-balance mechanic.

Agreed - I suspect that pre-season tours are more the board's responsibility than the manager's.

The other thing I'd like in this area is the possibility of tours that aren't against the local competition: for example, Man U, Celtic, Barcelona, and a few others did a tour of the U.S. a couple years back. Kind of like a "friendly cup", only, played abroad.

Strongly agree; this feature is in its first year so its not too surprising that there were a few faults with it. Its worth its own thread entirely, I suspect - and I'm sure SI are aware of it, and looking at some fixes for the patch, and others for FM'09.

.. I'm not sure that's particularly realistic - again, its very much in the board's hands, not the manager's IRL.

If you give too much stadium-control to the manager, it'll have the same "fatal flaw" that Premier Manager '98 did: it was always always always in your interests to build the biggest stadium expansion you could afford.. so you always did.. so it was never an "interesting decision".

There is a nugget of an idea, though - like with requesting a feeder club, it might be nice to be able to request under-soil heating, etc, instead of just having the basic "request expansion" option.

This whole section sounded very "game"-ey, a bit too close to "deciding the price of hot dogs" for my taste. I suspect it - and

would both be under the auspices of the board, not the manager.

I don't think SI have any interest in going down this path, at all.

More, I doubt they would be able to even if they wanted to: most licenses include prohibition against this sort of thing.

The Serie A, for example, isn't going to want to sell their license to somebody whose game asserts that there is bribery, match-fixing, tapping-up, and hooliganism going on .. whether there is IRL or not.

Similarly, FIFPro isn't going to want to license the use of player names for use in a game which might have those players get arrested, banned for drug use, etc.

Beyond that
Yeah, but nobody's been able to design a good part for them in a game, yet. Let's see...

Irrelevant - IRL, the contract is between the player and the agent; the team has no say into that number.

How is this different from "Offer to Clubs" and "Place on transfer list"?

Since, IRL, there isn't a real "transfer list" maintained anywhere, these options have to be representing involvement by the player's agent - in fact, that's also got to be why transfer rumours show up in the media and why the player gets unhappy.

But... it doesn't. Again, the team doesn't pay the agent a red cent. His contract is with the player.

Huh?

With the exception of a "minimum fee release clause" or an expiring player on a Bosman, this is illegal. What you've described in this section is "tapping up" - and that's not going to happen for the reasons listed above.

Sounds reasonable - but how many clubs have actually done this IRL?

. . .

Overall, :thup:, interesting points and again much appreciated that you took the time to write them.

Bodis

1. Complaining to the FA about a referee was in the game a few versions ago, but was removed for one reason or another (some legal thingymajig)

As for your hints about the "dark side" of the game, this has deliberatly been ommited by SI. The reasons stated were on the lines of; not wanting to cast a negative light on the game and encourage users to follow bad examples. Also that the game should focus on the management of a foorball squad, not the outlying issues relating to human nature. There's also a legal aspect of it, as real names are being used and SI could easily get sued from a real life players/staff if their "names were dragged through the mud" in a PC game.

2. I read somewhere on here that if the board really like you they will offer you this option (could someone confirm this please?)

3. Agreed :thup: This would be a natural advancement of the new confidence feature. I would like to see the board be able to disagree with your choice of only playing youngsters though, if they feel it will hamper the clubs chances.

4. Irl the manager is not involved in the minutae of these decisions, and as such would be better left out of the game imo.

5. A travel secretary is responsible for these issues irl, and (unless something is really out of whack) I dont think the manager could/would interfere. (the setup will vary from club to club depending on size of course, maybe the manager has more input in a small club?)

6. Again I feel this would fall solely under the board's control. I guess of course that the manager could always make a request, but I dont really see how this would matter either way as pitch invasions etc aren't and wont be included in the game.

7.1. The only way you can tap up a player is through the media. SI most likely wont advance this feature (see dark side comment).

7.2. Agent involvement is severely lacking in the game and I would like to see alot more of it in future versions :thup: I'd like to see SI "team up" with an agent to get input on how things work irl.

7.3. Nope, see "dark side" comment at top of post.

7.4. Though I dont see this getting too far out of hand there are the occasional comments now about players beeing seen leaving a pub in the early hours, and that being the reason why they are late for training. Don't think we'll get more than that tbh.

7.5. Nope. Dark side again.

8.0. If this happens irl then it can surely be added to the game. How to best implement it etc could possibly be given a thread of it's own?



Other than that I'd like to say well done on a post you've obviously put alot of though into :thup: And seeing as you're new to the forum I just want to add that you shouldnt get too dejected by my negative comments as I obviously dont speak for SI. I'm only sharing my own views and views that have been expressed/discussed before

Bodis

And as per usual I'm well behind other people commenting I blame fatigue

Omnislash

I think some of these ideas could be just little "Frills" which alot of the players wouldn't really care about. The detailed stadium expansion plan and accommodations seems to be something that Fifa Manager would do. However I still believe it'll be a good idea if you have the option to choose instead of you have to choose one of the options.

I think more agent interaction would be good, especially if you're somehow able to persuade a player through his agent.

Eg. A player who have no interest of joining your club, you can't really interact with the player directly since that's probably illegal. But you can talk to his agent and pass on the message. Such as:

You're a small team now but you're very ambitious.
this player is only a hot prospect for his club right now but you're able to offer him immediately first team football.
The player can have a very low minimum release fee clause.
Promise the player if a club with a higher reputation came enquiring about him you won't ask for a ridiculous fee.

These things all happen IRL. Good managers convince unlikely players to come to their clubs all the time. (eg. Owen to Newcastle, Beckham to LA) Now how to implement the AI well would be a big task. But I do believe it could add alot to the game.

Oktober

Actually, in terms of players 'off-field conduct', I've seen it rarely reported around here that some regen players have had issues with it. Missing training through 'illness' and being spotted at 3am at a bar, but only with regenerated players, like last year's negative alliterations.

Cavenagh

It wasn't legal reasons. Instead the practice changed to there being a Referee Assessor in the stands, observing and reporting back on the referees performance. So the managers no longer could directly complain to the FA, though they could moan in the media (but not in the game media when it was removed).

However, at the same time the mangers were issued with a score card to mark the referees with. That may still be in operation, and to add it into the game would at least give the player the impression that they are giving feedback.

isuckatfm

I don't know if has to do with how much the board like you but you do get a message stating 'since you have been at the club this long the board will allow you to select the type of feeder you would like us to search for' or words to that effect.

That's a good idea but I don't know about the practicalities of implementing it as in theory you would have to introduce a numerical value representing reputation of every single club for every single nation in the game. This might add to the processing time considerably as instead of increasing a single number for each club it would have to do it for every country in game. Or maybe there's an easier way to implement it?

IMO the universal reputation value does the job reasonably effectively in an efficient manner.

This is a good idea that others have called for but I do think it is in the game just in a more subtle manner. Basically as your scouting knowledge grows you start to find more youngsters being promoted from the youth academy of differing nationalities than the league you are playing in. A positive that would be gained from SI introducing in a more obvious way with the academies is that it would reduce the issues people have with not getting enough home nationality youth players through.

Your ideas about the sinister side of the game would enhance the realism but I think SI refrain from putting hooligans/bribery etc. in the game on moral grounds. Personally I'd like to attend a match as a manager for one of my rivals, sit with their fans and then incite a riot so the game gets called off and the points awarded to the other team

With regards to the extra input on the financial side (stadium expansion, travel expenses etc) I too would like to see more control givrn to the manager but the general response from SI is that managers don't have a say in this in real life. In my opinion if that is their stance then they need to make the Board behaviour a bit more intelligent since finances plays a major role in deciding if you get the sack. Why would a manager (in real life or in the game) get sacked when he keeps the wage budget under control and maintains a positive net transfer spend yet the club is in the red because the board decided to spend x million on a new stadium?

:thup: I haven't patched the game so I don't know to what extent it has been improved. I think it wouldn't be difficult to introduce a reference point to team's reputations when judging these things. At the moment there is contradictory statements with respect to the match confidence and competition confidence. It wouldn't make sense that the fans can be happy with a good losing performance against more illustrious opponents but the board are disappointed that you didn't meet their expectations.

James.Clench

Thanks for your comments, I'm not dejected at all, I told people to tell me what they thought and I appriciate it, plus you did give me 3 :thup: and your semi pro!