Tactical Troubleshooting

leninbenjamin

in my 10th season now and it's all going horribly wrong... well not too bad, but i could be doing a lot better.

won the league the first 5 seasons in a row, but then there was a gradual decline and i haven't won one since. i know i'm doing something wrong, but the thing is i just can't tell what it is. i was pretty static with my tactics to begin with, had a nice attacking 4-3-2-1 that worked wonders. then all of a sudden it loses it's effectiveness, so i've been trying new things on and off for the past few seasons. 4-2-3-1, 4-4-2, 5-3-1-1, 4-3-3 among others... nothing really works. I Thought I finally cracked last season when I took a Juventus that I inherited in the relegation zone a season earlier and finished a point off the league leaders by varying a 4-2-3-1. but this season the same approach isn't working... or anything really. And I can't tell why, because a defensive approach, attacking approach or somewhere in between all tend to yield the same results. dominate teams home and away, 10% more possession on average, 3 or 4 times as many chances, but they might get two decent chances in a match and put them away where my team fires blanks.

Now it's the end of October and I'm mid-table and stumped... I just can't see what I'm doing wrong. any ideas of what i should look at for figuring this out? I'm thinking instead of tactics it might be something stupid like media or team talks... but again, changing my approach hasn't really helped.

Mr.Nice Guy

Sounds to me like your tactics aren't the problem if you are dominating games home and away. Maybe it's the personnel that needs a shake-up?

You mentioned that the opposition tends to get one or two chances and scores. These wouldn't be through corners by any chance? Because there's meant to be a bug in the game that allows for easy goalscoring at corner kicks. I saw a post on another forum where a guy had worked out how to exploit it perfectly and people were acclaiming it and saying they were getting bags of goals. One guy had a defender who played 46 games and scored 35 goals from corners. Another had scored 20 in 75 games. Maybe that's playing a part in your troubles?

I can repost his corner tactic if you want to give the AI a piece of its own medicine? Haha.

leninbenjamin

it's not usually corners but i can see that they are a problem in the game, and i've had a few defenders scoring upwards of 20 goals a season myself, actually my third season with Chelsea Terry and richards bagged upwards of 50 between them. i scored around 200 that season in all competitions...

i'm not sure if it's the personnel either. the player ratings are usually good, and last year my currently misfiring forward got me over 50 goals. my scouts/coaches (with good judging player ability/potential stats) tell me all my starting 11 and quite a few of the subs are quality players... maybe i'm relying too much on them though?

edit: more often it's long range shots from the edge of the area that i conceed...

kramerica

Mr. Nice Guy,

Could you post the link to this tactic?? My mouth is watering in anticipation...

In my game 50% of my corners are sent to the near post and headed well wide of the near post, DESPITE my selecting of far-post, and 6 yard area in the corner options, and not near post... I might score 4 a season from them??

Peyton Manning

I think he may be talking about a very succesful corner tactic that was posted on the FootballManager.net forums, and its pretty damn good, it goes like this:

1. Find your best corner taker. Set him as your default corner taker, and set his 'attacking corner' option under individual settings to 'Go Forward'.

2. Find your best header of the ball (high header and jump ratings) and set his 'Attacking Corner' option (under individual settings) to 'Challenge GK'.

3. Next, find your second best header of the ball, who also has a fairly high pace rating, and set his attacking corner option to 'Attack Near Post'.

4. Then, find your NEXT best header of the ball, also helps if he has fairly good pace, and set him to 'Attack Ball from Deep'. (if you happen to have 2 good headers of the ball, you can set 2 players to do this).

5. Pick a player with good anticipation and finishing (usually your best striker) and set him to 'Stand on far post').

6. Pick a player with good crossing abilities and have him as the 'Short Option'.

7. Pick a player with good first touch/ball control and long shots as 'Wait Outside Area'.

You'll have 2/3 outfield players left - make sure you set them to 'Stay Back'.

You will get so many goals froom corners with this. When I was managing Spurs, it was inevitable that Id score 2 or 3 corners a match (Kaboul, Woodgate, Lescott, Hutton and Berbatov scored bucket loads from it).

Hope it works out for you, it most likely will.

leninbenjamin

Archimedes wrote: »

I think he may be talking about a very succesful corner tactic that was posted on the FootballManager.net forums, and its pretty damn good, it goes like this:

1. Find your best corner taker. Set him as your default corner taker, and set his 'attacking corner' option under individual settings to 'Go Forward'.

2. Find your best header of the ball (high header and jump ratings) and set his 'Attacking Corner' option (under individual settings) to 'Challenge GK'.

3. Next, find your second best header of the ball, who also has a fairly high pace rating, and set his attacking corner option to 'Attack Near Post'.

4. Then, find your NEXT best header of the ball, also helps if he has fairly good pace, and set him to 'Attack Ball from Deep'. (if you happen to have 2 good headers of the ball, you can set 2 players to do this).

5. Pick a player with good anticipation and finishing (usually your best striker) and set him to 'Stand on far post').

6. Pick a player with good crossing abilities and have him as the 'Short Option'.

7. Pick a player with good first touch/ball control and long shots as 'Wait Outside Area'.

You'll have 2/3 outfield players left - make sure you set them to 'Stay Back'.

You will get so many goals froom corners with this. When I was managing Spurs, it was inevitable that Id score 2 or 3 corners a match (Kaboul, Woodgate, Lescott, Hutton and Berbatov scored bucket loads from it).

Hope it works out for you, it most likely will.

that's pretty much what i'd been using. i hadn't refined mine as much but it got me bags and bags.

Mr.Nice Guy

Yeah that's the tactic. It's well handy.

Tusky

Why would you want to use a tactic like that though ? Its basically a bug in the game. Having your two center backs score 50 goals a season between destroys any realism that the game creates.

Mr.Nice Guy

Tusky wrote: »

Why would you want to use a tactic like that though ? Its basically a bug in the game. Having your two center backs score 50 goals a season between destroys any realism that the game creates.

The computer will score goals like that though as well. I see it as a way of evening the score. I do wish the bug would be corrected but I don't think there are more patches in the works or are there?

kramerica

Mr.Nice Guy wrote: »

The computer will score goals like that though as well. I see it as a way of evening the score. I do wish the bug would be corrected but I don't think there are more patches in the works or are there?

In fairness I dont think this is a cheat as such, I mean look through the tactic, it all makes common sense football wise. Make your best headers attack the ball, duh... best striker on back post, best crosser for short option, best long shot outside box? Its not rocket science. I didnt have to change things all that much from my current tactic as I had set things roughly like that from my own thought-box :mad:

And also, I've played 5 games with settings exactly like this, 1 disallowed goal from it so far. Granted I'm usually winning headers/gaining some attacking advantage from them much more often but that may be as I'm focusing on corners more, expecting this to work. I dont hold out much hope of goals from corners normally, I think you score too LITTLE from them in FM08.

Oh yeah, I've 8.01 game running, dunno if that negates the tactic slightly, but I dont see my centre backs outscoring Rooney anytime soon somehow!