FM09 impossible or just me?

Iang87

I dominated 08 with a number of formations and found a few gems just this game seems almost too close to the impossible.

anyone got any input on players to sign and maybe a potential formation that doesn't result in you conceding in the 90 minute and goin down to 9 and 10 men every second game.

Well general hints and tips etc

mewso

Well I play LLM (Lower Leagues) but not strictly (There is a whole ethos which I find a bit too strict) so from time to time I will try some tactics posted on the SI forums. Be sure to check out the T&T Framework which does a good job of explaining the whole mentality side of things. I have struggled along for 6 seasons first in the Blue Square South and just finished my second season in the Blue Square Premier. It can be very difficult because even when you think you have a good tactic either homegrown or downloaded it can suddenly go awry. You need to have faith with any tactic for a good few games before you know if it will work. I've come to the conclusion that in the lower leagues basic is the way to go so I'm trying out the Queenz tactic.

As the game is difficult I think alot of players are despairing because they can't win everything with Man City in their first season but I am completely addicted to the game mainly because for me it's a long term thing and I'm happy with some success every few seasons. More like real life in other words. This is not a game to just jump into with Man U and win everything straight away like it might have been in the past.

Ardscoil Ris

You should also note that SI tweaked the code a bit for tactics in FM09. There is no perfect tactic. Downloading tactics isn't a great idea because the people who make them built them around their teams. Who are you playing as? Can you post your team?

leninbenjamin

Iang87 wrote: »

I dominated 08 with a number of formations and found a few gems just this game seems almost too close to the impossible.

anyone got any input on players to sign and maybe a potential formation that doesn't result in you conceding in the 90 minute and goin down to 9 and 10 men every second game.

Well general hints and tips etc

how much tweakin' you do as the game progresses? conceding in the 90 minute sounds like you're playing at too high a tempo, or closing down too much. You've got to be able to slow down those games and retain possession; things like shortening the passing range, stopping your players bombing forward while maintaining a formation that gives you passing options, spreading the play across the field more, adjusting the defensive line so you're teams a compact unit, those kind of things.

the cards almost certainly means your formations aren't tight knit enough, that there's too much space for opposition to exploit between your lines putting your defenders under pressure (assuming it's defensive players, if it's attacking players it's probably more to do with your team talks and motivating).

as for formation, a wide 4-3-3 is imo the best formation one can play (think Ajax and total football). given the right personnel it's about as flexible a formation you can get, overlapping to the high hilt and surging forward runs from all areas of the field, or getting 10 men behind the ball at all times, it's easily done and almost a natural transition. But a lot depends on the wide men. Unlike the 4-4-2, finishing and composure are just as important as crossing and ball skills, and those guys are hard to find. And having fast defenders. You can't do anything fun in FM without fast defenders.

mewso

I would only try the 433 if I was managing a big club with excellent players but then most are it seems On a brighter note I just came up with a 532 thats doing wonders for me and it's my own creation. Even if you download tactics look at them and what they are doing and change them to suit your players or just take some ideas from them.

Now I'm no expert but heres what I would do. Make your tactic basic for starters, chose one of the standard formations, put everything in the middle for team instructions, and make your players adopt the team settings. For their other settings go the obvious route - defenders forward runs rarely, wingers forward runs often and so on.

Now go back to team settings and decide how you want your general mentality to be. I would suggest something a couple of notches above normal as we all want to attack ,

Passing up to you but if managing a weak/lower league team I would go towards direct or even just leave it mixed and perhaps short if it's a talented squad. No matter what chose as passing I normally set my 2 CBs to direct passing because I don't want them prancing about trying to play it out of defence with style. Again thats my lower league leaning but it's a good general rule.

Tempo as a rule for me I keep it slightly to the left because I'm managing weaker players and the faster the tempo the more inaccurate the passes of any type.

Closing down for starters just own-half. With a very fit team the whole pitch can reap rewards but it's too risky in general.

Width is up to you but I tend to alter this depending on the pitch. My home pitch is wide so I play wide but lower it when away at a narrow pitch.

My default d-line is deep but thats very much a reaction to my current situation in the BSP in that teams seem to be quite defensive and I want to invite them out in general and so I tick counter attack to go with that.

In any game I watch on at least extended mode to start with and if the opponent is constantly attacking then I push up my d-line a few notches to try and force them back. I might adjust mentality or tempo slightly too if I think it's necessary. I'm always checking the ass man's comments to maybe set some OI but my ass man just keeps telling me to go in hard on players until I'm murdering the whole opposition so it needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.

Get your set pieces set up right too for a few guaranteed goals. In team settings switch corners to the 6 yard box, then have your strongest best heading defender challenging the keeper, pick two other good headers to attack the near and far post and maybe 3 other players to go forward, leave everyone else back defending. Defending corners, leave the CBs on marking tall players, and apart from the players marking the posts put everyone else bar maybe two players on man-marking. I rarely concede from corners these days.

I came up with the 532 because I think it works well against the 442 which the AI seems to prefer in most cases. Solid defensively and good counter attacking with the wing-backs. I've had success home and away with only minor tweaks required during games.

The more advanced mentality side of things is the idea that you split mentality by either 1 notch or two between each position. A 1 notch gap would be:-

GK - 6
DC - 7
DR/DL - 8
MCd - 9
ML/MR - 10
MCa - 11
STd - 12
STa - 13

I think thats the gist. It doesn't work too well for me in the lower leagues but with a strong team it might be more favorable. I like the simplicity of the global mentality in the lower leagues and how easy it is to switch the mentality of the whole team on the fly. Always fun to go all-out attack and watch your keeper come up for corners

Oh and before I forget always have one of your scouts checking your next opposition. He'll give you a good idea of how your opponents will play, pitch considerations, dangerous players and so on.

leninbenjamin

musician wrote: »

I would only try the 433 if I was managing a big club with excellent players but then most are it seems

it depends. England maybe not, but it works wonders on the continent at lower levels. You just have to find the right players for it. But i did go from league 2 to the premiership with Stockport using the more defensive variations of the 4-3-3.

mewso

leninbenjamin wrote: »

it depends. England maybe not, but it works wonders on the continent at lower levels. You just have to find the right players for it. But i did go from league 2 to the premiership with Stockport using the more defensive variations of the 4-3-3.

Fair play. I wouldn't trust myself to come up with a successful 433 in the lower leagues.

Ardscoil Ris

4-3-3 only works on a pitch with the minimum length and width selected.

leninbenjamin

Ardscoil Ris wrote: »

4-3-3 only works on a pitch with the minimum length and width selected.

bollocks. I do better on bigger pitches than smaller pitches with mine, because my front line are usually incredibly fast. ultimately the actual formation doesn't matter for pitch size, it's the tactics. width, mentality, defensive line etc. that need to be tweaked.

Ardscoil Ris

leninbenjamin wrote: »

bollocks. I do better on bigger pitches than smaller pitches with mine, because my front line are usually incredibly fast. ultimately the actual formation doesn't matter for pitch size, it's the tactics. width, mentality, defensive line etc. that need to be tweaked.

Opposite for me. I found the midfield and formation too stretched on a large pitch. If I ever came up against a team who played a 4-5-1 my strikers never even saw the ball.

I have to disagree of the formations aspect not being tied to pitch size. I would argue it plays a massive role.

Edit: Your scouts even tell you the same if you read their reports fully.

leninbenjamin

Ardscoil Ris wrote: »

Opposite for me. I found the midfield and formation too stretched on a large pitch. If I ever came up against a team who played a 4-5-1 my strikers never even saw the ball.

I have to disagree of the formations aspect not being tied to pitch size. I would argue it plays a massive role.

Edit: Your scouts even tell you the same if you read their reports fully.

you can win with a 4-4-2 on any pitch size. you can win with a 4-5-1 on any pitch size. you can win on a 4-3-3 on any pitch size. that's the beauty of the more recent versions of FM.

if your strikers didn't see the ball it could be because their mentality is too high compared to the midfield, or you're playing too narrow and making it too easy to mark them, or your densive line is too deep.

but remember what i said anyway, my version of a 4-3-3 is one with wingers-come-strikers and playing with a lot more width than the usual 4-3-3 you see. faced with the above predicament i would tend to just push up my defence a bit and use the wings more.

edit: guess you're finally getting to see my tactical approach to the game Ardscoil

Ardscoil Ris

I don't think you understand what I'm saying. Probably my fault for not being clear. Firstly, I agree you can win with any formation on any size pitch, but some formations work better on certain size pitches.

My strikers hardly saw the ball because the five man midfield was outnumbering my three man and the large pitch meant they had more room to move into. My three man couldn't cover the ground.

I did find the 4-3-3 worked wonders on a small pitch with a very quick tempo and short passing. Also the three midfield players need to be strong and decent on the ball. I got it to work, but on away games on big pitches I was stretched. Luckily for me the AI hardly sets their pitch dimensions on large.

Not saying your wrong just giving my own experience on the whole thing.

We should trade tactics and see how we get on with each others.

EDIT: Indeed I am and I'm glad your giving it. I was looking to put alternative views into the guide

Iang87

cool thanks to all of ye it starts to be slightly coming together now, what i'm establishing from everyone seems to be whatever the formation its all about the instructions given to the team.

Anyone have any input on players to look into signing for future that have to be almost trained, its amazing when you take a 17 year old and turn him into somethin spectacular

Ardscoil Ris

Iang87 wrote: »

cool thanks to all of ye it starts to be slightly coming together now, what i'm establishing from everyone seems to be whatever the formation its all about the instructions given to the team.

Anyone have any input on players to look into signing for future that have to be almost trained, its amazing when you take a 17 year old and turn him into somethin spectacular

Shameless self promotion, but I wrote a guide for FM 09 that contains players for the future. From what I remember I included about 8 wonderkids in it.

Can be found here: http://www.thedugout.tv/community/showthread.php?t=53727 Just scroll down to the end of it.

mewso

I always just send my scouts out and sign/shortlist the best they find. More satisfying for me anyway. The LLM effect Crucial to have at least one scout with good judging player ability and judging potential for finding good players and at least one with some tactical knowledge for scouting your next opposition.

after many new games i have finally got the hang of this game or maybe just got a good tactic for liverpool

my current game i am in season 3

season 1

disaster start trying various tactics, my jb status was very insecure at xmas

experimented types of 4-5-1 and it actually worked, had a remarkable turnaround and finished 5th, won the champions league and was runners up in the fa cup
i then sold pennant and mascherano
man city bought maschrano for 38m so i then upset robinho and signed him for 34m,i also signed pandev for 13m
signed guardado (prob wrong spelling) for 13.25, bojan for free and various young prospects,sold agger also and riera.

so my team for season 2 looked like this

torres
robinho gerrard
guardado kuyt
alonso
aurellio skrtel carragher arbeloa

reina

with lucas rotating with alonso and gerrard switching the right to allow pandev to play
signed the likes of daniel sturridge for free too, he was worth 4.7m after i signed him, hes my future transfer kitty
season 2 was unreal, won the league, runners up in league cup, winners of world club cup, beaten in quarter final of european cup to barcelona

season 3

sold aurellio, arboloa and a few others to add to my 35m transfer kitty

signed messi for 38.5, ballotelli for 10m and a few youths, kitty is gone and i only have 25m balance so need to win a lot.

also barca are looking for bojan, going to recoup a lot of the messi fee, real are looking for pandev who is now valued at 16m and babel for 18m

need transfer money for january as marcelo signed a new deal at real and has a release fee of 8.5m

Frisbee

Have you signed defenders or just attackers?
Coz if you've sold Agger, Arbeloa and Aurelio what back line do you have?

Denerick

I played 13 seasons with AFC Wimbledon, getting them up from the BSS to the Championship. My first season in the championship we got relegated.

I have a managerial ethos in every game I play. Either I manage a mid sized premier league (Or oversea's equivelent) or a real bottom of the barrel lower rung side. I generally never shell out anything substantial for a player, preferring to bring in kids from a vast scouting network (My favourite of all time was a young Irish lad from Derry called Chris Cooper, who scored over 60 goals in all competitions for me one season) and build a cosmopolitan team based on youth, pace, technical skills, passing and determination. Who says you don't win anything with kids! In the last game (08) my best accomplishment was winning the Champions League with Worcester (Along with two premierships, six fa cups etc.) In a glorious 21 year reign as manager. 2009 is much more difficult and far too difficult to hammer home a great tactic. I haven't played my game in about 4 months but intend to get back at it in the summer. Takes a lot of you to see your side lose every game, especially when you once did so well!

acontadino

i gave finn harps a sugar daddy in the hopes of building a team to compete domestically and on a european wide scale, but no it just wont work i cant even get promoted from the first division.:rolleyes:

harpstilidie

acontadino wrote: »

i gave finn harps a sugar daddy in the hopes of building a team to compete domestically and on a european wide scale, but no it just wont work i cant even get promoted from the first division.:rolleyes:

I'm finding this game impossible to. As I'm a harps fan I've tried twice to keep them up in the Premier and have failed twice and got sacked both times. Impossible to sign good players as well. Managing Fisher Athletic in the Blue Square South now but can't get into it at all. Havn't played in a while. Finding this game too hard compared to other versions.

The Volt

I too go with a 4-3-3 but it can be more like a 4-5-1 on tough away days. I manage Ross County in the Scottish First Division at the moment. What's vital is a decent DM with high work rate, decisions, teamwork and tackling, two attacking wingers with bags of pace and creativity, balance it out in the middle with 2 CM's with all round ability (Stamina and Strength are crucial at Lower League level) and of course a striker with all the necessities like Compusure, Finishing etc.

There's also a glitch in the latest update that some vintage FM players will be aware of, the corner glitch. Set your two Central Defenders to 'Attack GK' on corners, between them they should hit double figures for the season.

Also, don't underestimate the importance of tweaking players individually, CD's and Full Backs should have little or no creative freedom (Skillful fullbacks can have slightly more) If you've one gem like I have out on the right then give him more creative freedom than anybody.

Xavi6

4-3-3 for me with Shels

As said, the DM is absolutely crucial. There wasn't one in my squad for the first season and a half and I couldn't find someone suitable that was interested. Managed to bag former Crewe stalwart Darren Wrack and he's been a revelation despite being 33/34. Sits there and doesn't move allowing my other 2 centre mids to get forward.

My two wingers/outside forwards are both quality (David Cassidy and Shane Barrett) and between them they get a heap of goals and assists.

Just need to get a top striker to complete the puzzle really.

Also keep an close eye on your youths. I have some really good prospects coming up and am training them well.

acontadino

harpstilidie wrote: »

I'm finding this game impossible to. As I'm a harps fan I've tried twice to keep them up in the Premier and have failed twice and got sacked both times. Impossible to sign good players as well. Managing Fisher Athletic in the Blue Square South now but can't get into it at all. Havn't played in a while. Finding this game too hard compared to other versions.

ye me too..i support finn harps as well:)

anyway what i tend to notice is, that it takes my teams a while to get going. for example managing bayern and the start of the season was so annoying. i just couldn't seem to get any sort of fluidity going.
i expected ribery to take the bundesliga apart, but in december just before the winter break, he had like 1 assist

obviously as i was bayern i was still getting wins and was doing reasonably well in the league, but the goals were not coming.

then first game back after winter break i was away to bielefeld, absolutely ripped them apart, 6-1, with ribery grabbing a hat trick and 2 assists:D
my season became much more exciting after with big scoring games with an awful defence(typical bayern:p) ended up finishing second behind bremen but still exciting.

and this trend seems to be fairly common in all my games.

something i always do when i play fm is change ireland location in editor to central europe, more scope for players i find and domestic league players tend to spread out as well. i always edit the stats of people like murphy, gamble, heary etc.

Dboy85

They made it harder on purpose for the "challenge", pisses me right off:mad:

The Volt

Talk about impossible, I got Plymouth Argyle promoted to the PL in my second season with them. The board gave me a measley 14 million to spend. I've only got one real PL quality player in my team and I'm a dead cert for relegation even after 2 games

I also found that on the 9.03 patch my strikers just wont score, at all.

Iago

I don't think it's impossible, just hard.

I'm playing with Reading and I've just started the 2018-2019 season.

Got promoted in year 1
Relegated in year 2
Won the Championship in year 3
Finished 12th in Year 4
Finished 8th in year 5

after that I spent the next few years finishing around the top 6 in the premier league

2016-2017 I won the league cup, FA Cup & UEFA Cup and finished 3rd in the league

2017-2018 I won the league cup, FA CUP & Champions League, finished 2nd in premiership.

This year I'm hoping for a clean sweep

dsmythy

Voltwad wrote: »

Talk about impossible, I got Plymouth Argyle promoted to the PL in my second season with them. The board gave me a measley 14 million to spend. I've only got one real PL quality player in my team and I'm a dead cert for relegation even after 2 games

I also found that on the 9.03 patch my strikers just wont score, at all.

14 million is generally what newly promoted teams have at best to spend in real life, hence all the yoyo-ing. That's just realistic.

Dboy85

Iago wrote: »

2017-2018 I won the league cup, FA CUP & Champions League, finished 2nd in premiership.

This year I'm hoping for a clean sweep

It does get easier with all the regens but the 1st couple of seasons is a b1tch:pac:

Ardscoil Ris

They definitely made it harder, but it's still too easy in my opinion. Once you work out the tricks in the tactics you can sit back and watch everything unfold.

They have the match engine working fine. It's at a good difficulty now. I think its the of the field issues that make the game too easy. It should be a lot harder to purchase players for starters.