the ulitmate fm walk though guide

8/3/2019 The Ulitmate FM Walk Though Guide

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Te Ultimate FM Walkthrough Guide

A Complete Strategy Manual To Master Virtual Football Management.

Written by Wonderkid.

Copyright © FootballManagerGuide.com and the individual authors, 2010.

Te Ultimate FM Walkthrough Guide is anunofcialandunauthorisedsource for educational purposes onlIt has been composed independently by FootballManagerGuide.com.

It is not endorsed by SEGA or Sports Interactive Games in any shape or orm.

Football Manager™ is a registered trademark of SEGA and Sports Interactive Games. We arenot afliatedwith Football Manager™, SEGA or Sports Interactive Games.

Tis product was created solely to inform/educate players of the game “Football Manager™” how to become better player. Te contents of this information infringe no copyright laws.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, electronic, mechanical,photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

Distributed in the English language by FootballManagerGuide.com.

No English language version of this guide is to be made available by any other website without the expressedpermission of the copyright owners. If you have received this guide from any other source than

FootballManagerGuide.com, please notify the authors.

No foreign language versions of this guide are not to be made available by any other website without theexpressed permission of the copyright owners.

ranslation requests should be sent to the FootballManagerGuide.com site [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]




- Chapter One -

An Introduction to “Te Ultimate FM Walkthrough Guide”

Tis one of a kind walkthrough guide has been written and constructed by FM beta testers with the aim to help anyone from an FM newbie to a hardcore fanboy understand the way th

game functions. In this guide we’ll cover every aspect of FM and will try to examine thedynamics of the game in a way that will be very easy to interpret.

Te concept behind this walkthrough is to provide a library of advice for anyone who'slooking for a bit of help, some insight or even a new perspective on the game. It isn't solely fotactics and formational structures, it's an attempt to concoct a full and complete view into FMand the mechanics of the game – with the aim to create material which will not only pertainto the current version of the game, but will remain relevant to all future generations of thegame as well. FM doesn’t evolve too much, but when it does, we’ll update the material to

reect the changes (both in e-Book format and via online blogs) – this will allow us to alwayprovide a complete and up-to-date walkthrough guide to FM.

Te intention with this is to create an in-depth publication which will allow you to cultivate your knowledge of the game, but at the same explain the material in a relatable way – after allthere’s no use telling you something that you need to read twelve times in order to understanit. What we'd like to convey the most is that this guide has been published to help expand,not only the way people approach the game, but also the mentality when playing the game. Tis eect of this guide is subjective to how you yourself play the game; you can either take o

board what is said, and adapt it to your own management style – using it as more of a 'hintsand tips' guide, or you can rebuild your entire management mentality and attempt to play thegame from a refreshed perspective. Either way, this guide is only eective if you realise thatthis is a game reaching to be as accurate a simulation as possible; it's not an arcade gameanymore; you can no longer be successful under the old 'click, click, click and play a match'mentality. So, if you want to be good at this game and get the benets from understanding it you need to grasp the real concept of football management – and this is what the e-Book aimto provide.

Tis e-Book is not claiming to be a “Cheat’s Guide to FM” nor does it guarantee you’ll winevery match, but it does guarantee to stimulate the way you think about this game and oer you ideas and means as to how to go about becoming a better manager. At the very least, it will give you reasons as to why you have failed to achieve in the past and some ideas on howto improve or adapt your current methods, in a way which will stop you making thosemistakes again.



With regards to reading this guide – everything that is mentioned in this guide, be it tactics otraining, personality tags, team talks or duties, et cetera – has it’s own section. So please beaware that I will not mention anything in this guide which you cannot nd information abouinside the guide. Everything in this e-Book has been presented in a way whichshouldmake ieasy to read it as a step-by-step walkthrough of the game. Tere will inevitably be similartopics which aren’t immediately next to each other (because they’re involved in dierent stag

of the game), but you can always open up the menu to the side and use those links to scan thentire contents of the guide and take you to the section you wish to read.

Future Updates & Additional Reading Material

As has been said, the intention with this e-Book is to provide a universal manual for everyfuture generation of the game. In a bid to make sure anyone who’s purchased this e-Book no

longer has to spend money on future titles or other e-Books, we will update and cover anynew theories or explanations of the game modules online. Tis gives us the ability to create ae-Book which will give you a 100% accurate guide as of FM2011 and then a 99% accurateguide for future generations – with the 1% of information pertaining to new updates or newfeatures (which could appear in FM2012 and beyond) being covered online:

Via a blog on my preferred fansite – www.footballmanagerfanboys.net or our own site – www.footballmanagerguide.com

Of course, we will continue to update our e-Books to reect any major changes in the futurebut by oering you blogs and articles to complement this e-Book, we aim to remove the issuof youhavingto spend any more money (unless of course, you wish to have a ‘hard copy’ ofthe updated e-Book).

We are also (as you may already be aware), updating the e-Book whenever we can add more tit. Tere's been a lot of work already done on the book, but I've been updating and re-releasing 'fresher' versions to add more into this year's edition. Obviously, with this being therst edition released there are a few things which can be improved, some little formattingbugs have popped up – but I plan on making it as comprehensive as possible over the course

of the year – so I will be updating and adding more into the guide (with a list of changes, so you can see what's been added or removed). Once this guide has been perfected, we'll have afantastic base for future editions – so bare in mind that this is a project which is very good atthe moment, but I intend to make it far, far better for you in the future.

We’d also like to extend an open oer to anyone who feels they need more information, tosimply send us an e-mail. With that we’d try to cover any topics in blogs or articles (possibly guide update) and then e-mail you to let you know the material is available.

http://www.footballmanagerfanboys.net/

http://www.footballmanagerguide.com/


http://www.footballmanagerguide.com/



What I’d like to stress is that we’re oering this as an addition to our e-Book because we wanpeople to have something with unquestionable value. As a result, further work(blogs/articles/updates) will take time to research and produce, so please bear in mind thatthis is a voluntary service and as such, it is something we will provide when time allows us todo so. We don’t want to disappoint anyone, so it’s important that you consider that eventhough we’re selling this guide, it’s production doesn’t allow us to abandon real-life work

commitments (sadly).

Author Notes

Firstly, I want to thank you for purchasing my work. It's been a labour of love for a long timenow and I hope that you're all very happy with what you have. I don't want to promote this aa nal copy; I really want to update and expand upon this book over the course of the year an

I will endeavour to improve what I've published so far – be it visually or informationally.

If anyone has any further expansion ideas, please contact me (details at the end of the e-Book) and leme know your thoughts.

Secondly, I have tried to make this as interesting and concise as possible, without losing theinformation I wanted to convey. I’ve tried to break-up the wall of text with some tables, tobetter explain any instructions (obviously, this isn’t possible with huge amounts of text) – butif you feel the guide can be improved anywhere, have any tips or suggestions for the next e-Book - then please let me know. I have added crib sheets to the book (you can nd them inthe relevant folder) – this is to give you the easiest possible access to the information I assum you'll want the most. I've also added a crib sheet icon to the guide – so, when you see that, it will indicate that there is a crib sheet available for the area of the guide you're reading.

Lastly and most importantly, I hope you enjoy reading this guide. I hope it can provide you with answers to the questions which you may have. I have gone into as much depth as Ipossibly could and I’d like to think that every element of the game is covered in detail, but Iknow you may not feel that is the case – so, if there is anything which you think has beenmissed out, overlooked or not covered in enough detail – let me know and I will try to

improve on that area.

I will be reviewing the guide for next year (I am already thinking about other ways to format the e-Book for the next edition), so any additional feedback, commentary or critique – it all helps. e aimof this guide is to produce something which can become the complete package for all FM users andwith your feedback and guidance, we can improve it beyond what I’ve started here. I'd not like tothink of this e-Book a basic guide, I actually believe it's got some great depth, but I also know that Ican add more to what's here – which is what I will be trying to do as you're reading this!



- Chapter wo -

Te Philosophy o Football Management

Tis game is a simulation of a sporting reality. In order to dene yourself as one of the great

virtual managers, you have to understand how the game functions in reality. Now, a lot ofpeople will pick up the game with arrogance, because of course, they already know how thegame works and they don’t need to learn anything from anyone else; but even the very bestmanagers are learning all the time. So, from here on in, we’ll take a look at the composition oreal football and the way it's played, in order to highlight some things you might not haveconsidered about football management.

In football there are some people who stand out from the crowd – no, not the overweighthooligans with shirts that barely cover their guts(although Wayne Rooney is pretty impressive a

times) –it’s those managers who stand on the sidelines, orchestrating their pawns. Now, mostpeople will look at football as nothing more than an athletic competition, they will watch thegame and focus on the passion and desire to win. However, if you look beyond the passionand the hunger of the players, you will see that there is a greater dynamic at work. It isunderstanding this dynamic which opens the door to the kingdom of managerial heaven.

It’s Chess Not Checkers

If you look beyond the game as a spectator and look at it as a puzzle, you'll have a much betteinterpretation of the sport. As fans we're taught that this game is about passion, hunger anddrive; it's about ghting for glory and never giving up – and I'm not saying that isn't true, buthat description of the game doesn't pertain to anything other than the required mentality ofthose playingthe sport. In order to garner the success of those few managers who have goneto the top (and stayed there), you need to understand the true fundamental value of success infootball.

Firstly, you have to recognise that this game is multidimensional, it's not just about thepassion and talent. Almost every footballer is passionate about the game – and certainly, moroften than not, the players all have enough talent to play in the roles they've been assigned to alent and passion are small advantages(based on the fact that everyone has both to some degree,but some people may have slightly more than others).What actually wins you games isn't just theprowess of the striker, it isn't just the raw emotion of the holding midelder – it's the intellecof the manager; how he plays those players and how he prepares those players.



You’ll have seen it yourself in both the game and in reality – an underdog chopping down agiant. It’s not statistically possible that a player with a ‘20’ for both Finishing and Composure will have less success in front of goal than a player with a ‘15’ for both Finishing andComposure, but just like in the game, it happens in the real world too. How is it possible thatalent and skill hasn’t prevailed, when statistically everything points to that outcome?

Te truth is, football is much like chess. Te player controls the pieces, decides where they goand when they make their moves; any success is due to the mental aptitude of the playerreading his opponent and using what he has on the board to defeat them. In football, it’spractically the same, but with living game pieces. Te manager has dictatorship overeverything at the club – he chooses the men who will play in his team, the style of play theteam will execute, who plays each match; he tells them where they play, how they should playand what they should do; he is the single catalyst which ties every element at the clubtogether.

Once you understand that, it's easy to grasp that football matches are won and lost o thepitch. You can lose a game before you've even touched the football, and like I said above, thegame is multidimensional, it's not all about the players on the eld; it comes down to how youtilise those players, how they are mentally prepared before the game, how those players arepositioned and instructed, how you read the opposition and how you deal with their threats.Everything in football is won and lost because of one man's decision making and his thoughprocess.

With that said, let’s take a glance at football in reality and then we’ll begin to go through themechanics of the game...

A Dose o Reality

Now, I can understand that the perspective of the manager being the real football hero may bsomewhat disagreed with, so I will illustrate my point with an example based around reality. What we are about to look at is a very talented team which was completely undermined by

their manager's inability to dene a tactical approach, utilise the resources he had at hisdisposal and his failure to adapt the team's tactical approach when facing a more astuteopponent. By highlighting this, I hope to show you that even those with everything at theirngertips can faildismallywith the wrong approach.

We’ll go back to the 2010 World Cup; England and Fabio Capello go into the tournament with one of the best collections of players to touchdown in South Africa. Tey have one of th world's strongest mideld duos in Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard, they have one of the



world's most talented and in-form strikers in Wayne Rooney, and a defence which featuredthe very capable John erry, an in-from Glen Johnson and arguably the world's most reveredleft-back in Ashley Cole. Tis is a team with a world-class spine and plenty of talent aroundit; most of the players are in excellent form, the core of the team are champions at the highesEuropean level and yet they perform in such an abysmal manner. How is it possible that thisteam couldn’t beat the likes of Algeria?

Quite simply, Fabio Capello got it horribly wrong. Not only did his 23 man squad featuresurprising inclusions and omissions, but he was also tactically inept for the entire tournamen

Firstly, I want us to examine the team he called up and then we’ll go into the dynamics of hitactics and the reasons why his methods managed to lose England matches before they evenhit the turf...

Positions Players Called Up

Goalkeepers Joe Hart, David James and Robert Green (allegedly the rst choicegoalkeeper –although, only Fabio Capello knew if that was the case).

Deenders Jamie Carragher, Ashley Cole, Rio Ferdinand, Glen Johnson, LedleyKing, John erry, Matthew Upson and Stephen Warnock.

Midelders Gareth Barry, Michael Carrick, Joe Cole, Steven Gerrard, FrankLampard, Aaron Lennon, James Milner and Shaun Wright-Phillips.

Forwards Peter Crouch, Jermaine Defoe, Emile Heskey and Wayne Rooney.

If you look at the team it's got plenty of talent, but Fabio Capello has taken big gambles on

certain players. Firstly, why call up a huge tness risk in Ledley King or the ageing and out-of-form Jamie Carragher, when he had options with Phil Jagielka, Wes Brown and JoleonLescott? Obviously, Fabio Capello wasn't to know that Rio Ferdinand would get injured, but when you pick a squad you have to assume it's a possibility. Fabio Capello didn't even selectadequate cover for the right-back position; he could easily have called up Wes Brown orMicah Richards (who was a revelation at right-back for England not so long ago) – both of whom can eectively play either as a right-back or centre-back, and both of whom were partof more successful teams in the Barclays Premier League that season.



Ten there are the likes of Michael Carrick, Gareth Barry and Joe Cole, who'd been outinjured for a while or not played a lot of football. Carrick was out of favour at Old raordand had been playing second ddle to the likes of Darren Fletcher; Gareth Barry went intothe tournament carrying an injury and Joe Cole was out of form. As a result, England werecompletely lacking in the mideld throughout the whole tournament. Now, there's no doubt

that Joe Cole is the kind of player you’d take a risk on and Gareth Barry had added a solidcore to the England team since Owen Hargreaves got injured, but this decision making leftthe mideld massively unbalanced, with Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard playing togetheand no holding mideld player able to cover the gaps they left in-between the defence andmideld. Eventually, when Gareth Barry came into the team to plug the gaps, he wasexhausted and far too unt to do the job asked of him – as a result, he was hugelydisappointing throughout the tournament.

Lastly you've got four forwards, all of whom are all completely dierent to each other. Now,

variety is good, but it's pointless without the right system. Emile Heskey was called up and was rst choice – even though he lacked pace and composure in front of goal. Full credit toEmile Heskey for his work ethic, but the guy had no real place being in the team (his form was poor going into the World Cup and he rarely played for Aston Villa during the season) –his inclusion can only be down to his physical build – which proved to be a fundamental errobecause England lacked potency not strength up front and Emile Heskey oered nothing inthat department.

aking all of that into consideration and not even addressing the omission of a left winger (inthe form of Ashley Young or Adam Johnson), Fabio Capello had made at least ve selectionfaux pas prior to the tournament. Tat was something that dramatically hindered his ability tselect a solid or versatile team when he was in South Africa – and that was a huge part of theteam's poor performance on the pitch.

If you then take a look at Fabio Capello's tactical plan, you can quite clearly see that he'staking even bigger risks in playing players out of position. Tere is no guarantee that a worldclass central midelder will be good, decent or even eective as a winger – and this is thething you need to recognise – the chain of events that occurred from Fabio Capello's rstdecision to play Steven Gerrard on the left wing, so Gareth Barry could play as anchor man.

Deploying Steven Gerrard out of position on the left wing nulled the team's threat on theank. Instead of choosing to have a left footed winger (or even a right footed winger, who would at least run at the opposition's left back – and thus allow his own left back, in this caseAshley Cole – to cross the ball), Fabio Capello chose to play Steven Gerrard on the wing.Steven Gerrard then (naturally) would constantly drift inside to the centre and end up out ofposition. When this happened a huge gap emerged on the left wing that Ashley Cole had tocover. Tat resulted in not only clogging up an already busy mideld, but it lead to a massive



lack of service for a highly dependent and subsequently ineective Wayne Rooney – who wacompletely isolated and responded by dropping deep to nd the ball.

It’s these events that then caused two players to be out of position, as Wayne Rooney – who was the focal point of England's attack – was dropping out of position and ended up taking all pressure othe opposing defence (because without Wayne Rooney high up the eld, the opponents could push up

and create even less space in the middle of the pitch for England to move into).

Now, England have no left winger, have no forward and are facing an opposition defence which is compacting the space in the middle of the pitch – an area of the pitch whereEngland have four players (Wayne Rooney, Steven Frank Lampard and Gareth Barry)occupying the space. Is it any wonder that Wayne Rooney didn’t score at the World Cup, whteams like Algeria were able to cause England so many problems or why England had an uphill struggle to get near the penalty box of teams who weren't anywhere near as good as them

What I'm trying to convey is this – Fabio Capello's decision making cost the team a good runin the tournament. I've only identied one of his tactical mistakes, but I have highlighted theimpact of the decision to play Steven Gerrard out of position. If you want more examples ofFabio Capello's ineptitude, you can look at the decision to play a tired midelder (who wasonly just recovering from an injury) and not only that, but play him in one of the mostimportant roles in the team (Gareth Barry, as the anchor man). Alternatively, you can look atthe fact that Fabio Capello refused to adapt his tactics based on the way the game was beingplayed out. He was completely ignorant to the other team's tactics; instead deciding that hisown tactics and team were superior enough to thwart the ‘low quality’ of the opposition.

By explaining the aws in England's game plan I hope what you can ascertain is that thesedecisions undermined a team featuring a number of the world's foremost players – and that ithe measure of the eect that a manager can have on a game. On the other side you canexample the likes of Valencia under the guidance of Rafael Benitez (or his rst season atLiverpool, where he won the Champions League, with a very average Liverpool side). You caalso look to Carlo Ancelotti's impact with the ageing AC Milan or his impact with a ailingChelsea team – which had previously failed to reproduce the magic it had under the tutelageof José Mourinho. Speaking of Mourinho, look at his achievements with FC Porto, Chelseaand Inter Milan – he's achieved three titles in separate leagues and Champions League

victories with two of those clubs.

As I've said previously – managers win games – and if you can understand that, you can startto look at how you can have an impact on the game. It’s not about downloading a tactic fromanother manager and grabbing yourself a lazy-man’s training scheme, it’s about taking sometime to impact your own game – and the rewards for doing that far outweigh the time it taketo express a little eort.



- Chapter Tree -

Approaching “Te Job”

When you rst take over a new team it's often very overwhelming, unless you know the team

inside out already. Tere's always a lot to get done and you nearly always forget something, soit's best to start looking at the new job as a step-by-step encounter. ake a step back from the workload and break things down into a few quick to-dos. It’s very important to take a fewmoments to get these things done, because believe it or not, things as basic as setting uptraining or scouting can aect how successful your reign as manager will be – after all, that'sthe job you're doing – leading, directing and training the players to work in the way youbelieve will reap rewards for the club.

Here are a few tips and a brief walkthrough of my own 'new club' routine…

I personally like to spend my rst moments looking at the team, assessing players, seeing whothe best players are and how they would t into a tactic. I like to spend thirty or fortyminutes, simply trying players out in dierent roles and duties, getting a formation createdand trying to nd balance with the players I have at my disposal. From there I make a call asto who I can and cannot use in my team, then begin to move them out of the club and scoutfor replacements. I also use this time to setup set-pieces and get a basic framework in place fodead-ball situations – often this needs adjusting later on, but it's good to get the foundationsin place whilst you're already working on your tactical approach.

If I'm taking over a club who have just sacked a manager, I think it's important to look at how theteam played before I arrived, view their prior results and the way their formation was set out. I usethat as an indication as to not only why they failed, but as a way I can avoid the same pitfalls.

My next step is to get the sta to work – sending the scouts out on tour and getting thecoaches working on training schedules; making sure my sta team is of a high standard andmaking sure my training is at a high level. Tese are vital tasks because they hold an inuencover the quality of your team. If you fail to setup the training, then you’re likely to encounter

injuries, players being trained in general areas (which means they'll improve attributes whichcan be useless to them) and even worse, you'll experience players dipping in attributes – whicis the last thing you want to happen as a coach. If you don’t setup the scouting, you’re notgoing to gain scouting knowledge – which means you’re going to be solely reliant on your owplayer knowledge – and when you’re scouting for new players and you’re not being shown allthe talent that’s on oer, it's going to be a huge problem. Tese are two tasks which seemcomplex and tedious, but they don't take long to setup and if you take the time to get it rightimmediately, you'll not have to constantly adjust them later on.



Once the basic tactic, training and scouting tasks are done and you’ve gotten accustomed tothe team, it’s always a good idea to nish o tweaking the dynamic settings at the club. I liketo go and make sure I have options with feeder clubs and parent clubs – they’re goodresources, as they can aid scouting knowledge, give you an option for shifting a player who yo want to keep (but won't be playing); you can also get good loan deals from parent clubs

(which is always advisable prior to signing any players, as you might save some money by bringingin a loanee)and you have a number of scouting and recruitment benets such as, gettingaround work permits, getting your youngsters experience and also getting coveted youngstersfrom linked clubs into your team; there's a lot of options and benets to working closely withother clubs. Not only can you create ties with dierent clubs, but you can also setup a YouthRecruitment Network, which will really give you an edge when it comes to procuring fresh young talent – it takes a bit of time to get setup, but you only have to click one button and threst is done for you.

By this point, I'm usually ready to start playing matches and so I begin to work on the MatchPreparation module. I nd it best to have one formation and work with the “eam Blend”Special Focus Area, as it has the most benet for learning. Once I've setup MatchPreparation, I'll make sure the workload is nicely balanced with the scheduled training workload(see the “Understanding the Fundamentals of Training” section of the guide for completedetails)and then I'll be ready to jump into the xtures.

e most important thing to convey about this procedure is that it's all about how much eort you arwilling to put into playing the game. Setting up at a new club takes around an hour to do; if youcan't be bothered to spend the time doing that and would prefer to play the xtures – that's perfectlyokay, but don't expect the good results to come your way. As has been said, this isn't an arcade game; you are actually expected to manage the club, the team and the players – which unfortunately requiresome eort on your part.



- Chapter Four -

Understanding the Genetics o a Footballer

Understanding players is actually very simple, but a lot of people take the wrong approach to

scouting and player assessment, which is a critical mistake because the players are the key to you winning anything as a manager. Once you understand how players work inside the matcengine, you'll master this game, because once you know how to read a player, you'll make thebest tactics, you'll make the best judgement calls at half-time and you'll be laughing at howeasy it was to do. Very simply, players in the game are created based on the following keyareas:

1.echnical, Physical and Mental attributes.2.Hidden personality attributes.

3.Current Ability/Potential Ability attributes.4.Preferred Player Moves.5.Position.6.Structure (age, height, weight, et cetera).

It’s the way in which these key components mesh together and function with each other thatdenes not only the player you have, but the type of player you can mould in the future. Let’sbreak the core of the footballer open and take a look at what makes them tick…

Current Ability & Potential Ability

Firstly, we need to quickly look at CA/PA, as it’s this which controls the value of every visablattribute a player has (and the ability they could have in the future). It’s a very easy concept tgrasp, so here it is in a bit more detail…

Current Ability is the measure of a player’s echnical, Mental and Physical attributes in thecurrent moment, whilst Potential Ability marks the level at which a player can reach in thoseareas, as the player grows. Now, CA/PA is hidden from the attributes screen and the only wato get a good measure of it is to obtain scout reports on players(which is why it's important to get exceptional scouts).Tis information is useful, not only when scouting for fresh talent ordeciding if a player has a future at your club, but it's also useful when training players, as it cagive you a good indication of when a player has hit his peak and won’t improve anymore –thus making him potentially useless to you in the near future.



Understanding the CA/PA Attributes

Current Ability and Potential Ability are both rated out of 200 (with 200 being the highestpossible rating a player can have). Some youngsters are rated with negative PA attributes which range from -1 to -10 (-10 being the highest possible rating). Tese negative ratingsassign a range which the player’s future PA will t into. As a result, these players are not

statically dened with a number between 1 and 200 – this makes these players much morepromising prospects – as they have a wider span for growth.

Here’s a quick look at how the ratings measure up…

Negative Potential Ability Expected Future PA (min) Expected Future PA (max)

-10 170 200

-9 150 180

-8 130 160

-7 110 140

-6 90 120

-5 70 100

-4 50 80

-3 30 60

-2 10 40

-1 0 30

As you can see from the above table, not all negative PA is good. An excellent player ebbsabove the 170 CA mark and good players ebb around the 140 CA mark, so the future in-game “Wonderkids” would have a negative PA of either -9 or -10 (or a xed PA around 170-200). Tey won’t always have big CA attributes, but that’s why they’re touted as future stars,because these players are all about potential, even if they're not displaying talent currently.

Please note: CA/PA can also be attributed as '0', which would make the player’s CA/PA completelyrandom.

It’s important to understand that PA is not always a denitive indicator of a good player. Allthese players need to full their potential via training, tutoring and match experience. Playersneed good, benecial training schedules, they need match practice and they need nurturing. I you fail to deliver a good standard of coaching to players with great PA, they'll not reach theipotential and will ultimately be disappointing.



Please note: CA can also decline as well as rise. Once players have hit their peak, you'll startseeing a gradual decline in some of their echincal and Physical attributes – although theirMental attributes do often rise as a result of their expereince. Also note: CA will decline ifplayers are poorly trained, are being left out of the team for long periods of time, or withplayers getting serious injuries(thus getting no match practice). Whilst ageing players cannotrecover their lost attributes, you can improve players who've lost their 'edge' because of

injuries or a lack of practice, but be aware that, as time passes, players won’t improve beyondcertain ages.

Understanding and Interpreting Player Attributes

From a numbers perspective, each attribute is rated out of 20. Tese attributes calculate intopercentages, so for example: if we remove all of the Mental and Physical attributes from theequation, someone with a ‘10’ for Heading has a 50% chance of getting the header right.However, when we factor the Physical attributes into the equation, that chance will increase with someone who has excellent Jumping.

Something very important to consider is that no player is perfect. A player with ‘20’ for everythingwill not be awless – there are mistakes and errors in every player’s game. e key point is this – thehigher the attributes, the will lower the amount of mistakes that will be made.

Attributes can be quite deceiving and understanding them comes down to three importantfactors:

1.Understanding each of the Physical, Mental and echnical attributes.2.Understanding how attributes relate to each other.3.Understanding the less obvious elements which function alongside those attributes.

Don’t worry if that sounds overly complex, it’s very, very easy to understand. Basically, the wait works is like this: Physical attributes dictate the players mould (i.e. whether the player is astrong player, a quick player or an agile player), echnical attributes dictate how well a player



will do something (i.e. tackling, heading, marking) and Mental attributes dictate both theeectiveness of the other attributes (i.e. poor Composure would lower the eectiveness of astriker's Finishing) and they also control elements of the player's mentality.

Let's take a look at point one – understanding each of the attributes, then we'll look at how they relato each other and then nally, we'll look at the less obvious elements which function with attributes.

Dening and Understanding Attributes

Te attributes in the game are labelled very obviously, but sometimes the interpretation is alittle dicult to grasp; sometimes there are even elements which go unconsidered in certainattributes; so here we’ll take a look at all the attributes associated with the players, we'll denhow they function and we'll look at the way theytheoreticallyinuence each other.

echnical Attributes

Attribute Description and Eect

Corners Tis attribute indicates how well a player will execute a corner kick. It’sobviously important to get the best players taking set-pieces, because itcan lead to a goal.

Inuencing attributes: Composure, Technique, Decisions, Crossing.

Crossing Tis attribute indicates how well a player can cross the ball into thebox.

Inuencing attributes: Composure, Decisions, Technique.

Dribbling Tis attribute indicates how controlled a player will be with the ball, when he runs with the ball at his feet.

Inuencing attributes: Balance, Agility, Acceleration, Pace.

Finishing Tis attribute indicates how accurately a player will get a shot on targetor how well placed that shot will be.

Inuencing attributes: Decisions, Composure, Technique.



First-ouch Tis attribute indicates the rate of speed in which a player can controlthe ball and how closely a player can control the ball, when he receivespossession.

Inuencing attributes: Composure.

Free-Kick aking

Tis attribute indicates the level of the player’s ability to take a free-kick, be it a shot or an assist.

Inuencing attributes: Technique, Passing, Long Shots, Finishing, Decisionsand Composure.

Heading Tis attribute indicates how clinical a player will be with the ball in theair.

Inuencing attributes: Jumping, Strength.

Long Shots Tis attribute indicates how dangerous a player can be shooting fromdistance.

Inuencing attributes: Finishing, Decisions, Technique.

Long Trows Tis attribute indicates how ecient a player will be when executing

long throws.

Inuencing attributes: Strength, Decisions.

Marking Tis attribute indicates how well players can cover and null the threatof their opponents.

Inuencing attributes: Strength, Composure, Concentration, O e Ball,Positioning, Anticipation.

Passing Tis attribute indicates how skilled a player will be at passing the ball.

Inuencing attributes: Technique, Creativity, Flair, Composure, Decisions.

Penalty aking Tis attribute indicates how ecient a player will be when taking thisset-piece.



Inuencing attributes: Decisions, Composure, Finishing.

ackling Tis attribute indicates how skilled a player will be at dispossessing anopponent of the ball, without giving away a foul.

Inuencing attributes: Aggression, Decisions, Composure.

echnique Tis attribute indicates how rened a player will be in possession andhow adept a player will be at playing dicult passes, making toughcrosses or playing long balls.

Inuencing attributes: Decisions, Composure.

Mental Attributes


Aggression Tis attribute indicates how aggressively a player will tackle anopponent and how frequently he will get involved in match events. Tisdoes not indicate how physically aggressive a player may be.

Inuencing attributes: – none.

Anticipation Tis attribute indicates how quickly a player can predict an event andreact to a situation in the match (i.e. an interception, getting on the endof a through-ball, et cetera).

Inuencing attributes: O e Ball, Positioning.

Bravery Tis attribute indicates how fearless a player will be during tackles,headers or blocks in the match.

Inuencing attributes: Decisions, Aggression.

Composure Tis attribute indicates how calm and collected a player will be inpressurised situations or when he’s in possession of the ball.




Concentration Tis attribute indicates how long a player can stay focussed in a match.If this attribute is low it will lower the eectiveness of the player laterin the match and will increase the chances of him making errors.


Creativity Tis attribute indicates how gifted a player is at seeing an opportunity aless creative player would not see. It doesn't stipulate how eective aplayer is at exploiting the vision he has.

Inuencing attributes: Technique, Flair, Passing, Crossing, Finishing.

Decisions Tis attribute indicates how astute a player is at reading a situation andthen making the correct decision.


Determination Tis attribute indicates how driven and motivated a player will be to win on the pitch.

Inuencing attributes: Work Rate, Aggression, Bravery.

Flair Tis attribute indicates how skilled a player is at concocting creativeand unpredictable manoeuvres to make opportunities out of nothing.

Inuencing attributes: Technique, Creativity, Passing, Crossing, Finishing,Decisions.

Inuence Tis attribute indicates how inspiring and motivating a player can be tohis team-mates and how much impact he has on match events.


O Te Ball Tis attribute indicates how clever a player is at reading the game andthen nding space which allows him to receive the ball and exploit agap in the opposition's formation.

Inuencing attributes: Anticipation, Decisions.

Positioning Tis attribute indicates how good a player is at reading a defensive



situation and moving into the best position to deal with that situation.

Inuencing attributes: Anticipation, Decisions.

eamwork Tis attribute indicates how good a player is at working as part of ateam and how good a player is at following instruction.


Work Rate Tis attribute indicates how willing a player is to work and how mucheort he displays whilst playing.

Inuencing attributes: Stamina, Determination.

Physical Attributes


Acceleration Tis attribute indicates the rate of speed in which a player can instantlymove from a standing position and reach his top speed (Pace).

Inuencing attributes: – Agility, Balance.

Agility Tis attribute indicates how much exibility and range of movement aplayer has when moving, both with and without the ball.

Inuencing attributes: Balance, Pace, Acceleration.

Balance Tis attribute indicates how well a player can move and stay on hisfeet, how mobile he is in possession and how stable he remains whenfacing opponents or moving quickly in various directions.

Inuencing attributes: Agility.

Jumping Tis attribute indicates the distance in which a player can rise o theground when leaping. A player's height, doesnotgive the Jumpingattribute a boost.

Inuencing attributes: Agility, Balance.



Natural Fitness Tis attribute indicates a player's starting level of tness, how muchendurance a player will have over the course of a season and it can givesome indication as to how susceptible a player may be to fatigue andinjury when over-trained or over-played.

Inuencing attributes: Work Rate, Stamina.

Pace Tis attribute indicates the top speed a player will peak at whenrunning.

Inuencing attributes: Stamina, Acceleration, Agility, Balance, Dribbling.

Stamina Tis attribute indicates how much endurance a player has in the matchand how long the player can perform at his peak level throughout thegame before tiring and becoming ineective.

Inuencing attributes: Work Rate, Determination, Aggression, NaturalFitness.

Strength Tis attribute indicates how adept a player is at holding o anopponent or ‘out-muscling’ them in physical battles.

Inuencing attributes: - none.

Goalkeeping Attributes


Aerial Ability Tis attribute indicates how procient a goalkeeper is at punching andcatching the ball when it’s in the air.

Inuencing attributes: Handling, Jumping, Agility.

Command o Area

Tis attribute indicates how often the goalkeeper will instruct theplayers in front of him and how often he willattemptto claim anycrosses or passes in the box.

Inuencing attributes: Aerial Ability, Handling, Communication, Jumping,Decisions, Anticipation, Positioning, Agility, Reexes.



Communication Tis attribute indicates how well a goalkeeper directs those around hisbox and how well he organises his defence.

Inuencing attributes: Command Of Area.

Eccentricity Tis attribute indicates how outlandish the goalkeeper is. With a high

Eccentricity attribute, the goalkeeper will act more like an outeldplayer and operate with a disregard for his duties (dwelling on the ball,dribbling out the box, rushing out to make challenges, et cetera).


Handling Tis attribute indicates how good a goalkeeper is when in possession ofthe ball, how good the keeper is at catching the ball or holding onto itafter a shot, and how frequently he spills the ball for rebounds.


Kicking Tis attribute indicates the distance a goalkeeper can propel the ball with a kick.

Inuencing attributes: Technique, Passing, Decisions.

One On Ones Tis attribute indicates how procient a goalkeeper is at stopping an

opponent clean though on goal and how condent they will be instopping the opponent scoring a goal.

Inuencing attributes: Acceleration, Agility, Rushing Out, Balance,Reexes, Anticipation, Decisions, Pace.

Reexes Tis attribute indicates how agile, exible and reactive a goalkeeper is when making diving saves. Te higher the attribute, the more likely it isthat the goalkeeper will save faster and more dicult shots on goal.

Inuencing attributes: Agility, Balance, Anticipation.

Rushing Out Tis attribute indicates how well a goalkeeper will come o the goal-line and claim the ball.

Inuencing attributes: Acceleration, Agility, Balance, Reexes, Anticipation,



Pace.

endency toPunch

Tis attribute indicates how frequently a goalkeeper will punch the ballinstead of catching it – even when he can easily catch the ball.


Trowing Tis attribute indicates how accurately the goalkeeper will be able todistribute the ball via a throw.

Inuencing attributes: Strength, Decisions.

Te Attribute Formula

Te genetic makeup of the player looks like this: echnical attributes + Mental attributes +Physical attributes + Preferred Player Moves + personality attributes = the current ability ofthe player.

When you’re in a match it’s a similar equation, but you add another formula to the initialformula: (echnical attributes + Mental attributes + Physical attributes + Preferred PlayerMoves + personality attributes)+ position + role + duty + position comfort + preferred foot +morale + match motivation= eectiveness of player's abilities in the match engine.

As you can see, there are a lot of variables to attributes, but you’ll learn as you read throughthe guide, that it’s not as hard as it seems to be. If you can learn the meanings of theattributes, learn which attributes work together and understand how to read a player'spersonality, then you'll nd this game incredibly easy.



Attribute Logic

So, you know what makes a player function, you understand the genetics of a player and youcan see that a player is far more complex than a few obvious attributes. Now, you need tograsp how these attributes are linked and how you can logically tie them together yourself.

ake for example: Trowing; this can be inuenced by Decisions because a player such as agoalkeeper has multiple options when distributing the ball and his Decisions attribute wouldquestion which player or direction his throw should aim towards. It's going to be a factor when it comes to a player throwing the ball because you want the goalkeeper to distribute theball to the player in the best possible position to keep the ball or counter-attack. Tis is whatrefer to as Attribute Logic – the understanding that one attribute is preceded and inuencedby another attribute in the match engine.

Te match engine executes the player's attributes in sequences. It's basically, one big chain of

events which calculate the Mental, echnical and Physical attributes. It is these reoccurringsequences in the match engine which decide how successful a player will be in dierentaspects of the game.

o make it very simple, this is how it works for a striker who is getting ready to shoot...

Te match engine calculates the attributes in this order: Composure > Decisions > echnique> Finishing.

1.Te player's Composure attribute is calculated to see how calm he is in the situation.2.Te player's Decision attribute is calculated to see where he should put the ball.3.Te player's echnique attribute is calculated to see how the player executes the shot.4.Te player's Finishing attribute is calculated to see how accurately he'd take the shot.

Tat's the very basic sequence before a player takes a shot. Tis should highlight theimportance of the other attributes to a striker – because as you can see, if the Composure islow, he'll lower the chances of making the right decision. If the Decision is low, he might aimat the wrong spot or take the shot too early. If the echnique is low, he might not be able toexecute the correct nish (a chip shot – for example). Now, if the Finishing is low, he mighthit the ball right at the keeper, but if the attributes which precede Finishing are poor, hemight not even get the chance to execute the Finishing attribute at all.



So, how do we –

(a) nd a quality player based on the match engine sequencing formula?(b) calculate all the attributes in each sequence?

Well, to use this formula for scouting and recognising quality players, you need to reverse-

engineer the attributes of (in this case) the striker.

Te rst obvious attribute of a striker is Finishing - however, we now know that Finishing isthelastattribute to be executed in the chain of events. Before Finishing is executed, you'dhave echnique, Decisions and Composure. However, before all of those attributes areexecuted you have other attributes come into play rst.

It can be very useful to be able to calculate a logic chain of attribute execution, as you'd have a muchbetter understanding of the attributes which your players will need in their positions – this can mak

all the dierence when it comes to role and duty assignment, scouting and training.

o work out the match engine sequence, you have to make a logic chain to calculate whichattribute would precede the attributes you know are important to the striker. If you've read thdescriptions of the attributes above, you'll know that, First ouch, O Te Ball, Work Rate,Stamina, Acceleration and Pace will all have a role to play because the striker will be movingaround and looking for the ball (or running with the ball) before he gets into a shootingposition. So, what you do is get an idea of which attributes will be involved in the sequenceand then rearrange them to make the sequence(and thus understand which are the mostimportant attributes for that player)...

Te above attribute chain would be:(Finishing + Composure + Technique + Decisions) +First ouch + O Te Ball + Work Rate + Stamina + Acceleration + Pace.

If you breakdown and rearrange those attributes, you can make a chain of logic and you’d havthe ability to see how goalscoring would work in the match engine.

So, initially the player is looking for the ball to be passed to him...

1.O Te Ball dictates where he moves and where he will be positioned when the ballcomes to him.

2.Work Rate decides how hard he will endeavour to get to the ball.3.Acceleration and Pace dictate how quickly he can get to the ball.4.Stamina will dictate if he has enough energy to get to the ball as quickly as theAcceleration and Pace attributes will allow him to.



5.First ouch decides how well he will control the ball when he gets to it.

Tis is that sequence of events: O Te Ball > Work Rate > Acceleration > Pace > Stamina >First ouch.

Say at this point, the player has the ball. Next you'd need to calculate the attributes which

would decide how he used the ball, after collecting and controlling it.

is would see you add Composure and Decisions to the sequence.

O Te Ball > Work Rate > Acceleration > Pace > Stamina > First ouch > Composure >Decisions.

In this situation, Composure and Decisions will be triggered as the match engine will want tknow how calm the player is when he has the ball and what he will do with the ball next.

After the match engine has calculated the Decisions attribute, it will want to know if theplayer has the ability to run with the ball, pass the ball, play a complex pass with the ball, etcetera... Obviously, the amount of possible calculations are far too big to cover here – not tha you could predict what a player would or would not do with the ball after receiving it anywaythere are too many variables. Still, it's irrelevant; at this stage you already know the beginningand ending of the sequence, which is all you'll need to ascertain which attributes are vital.

So, let's presume the player has been passed the ball and controlled it when he's in the box;that would mean he's got the opportunity to shoot. Now, we've already worked out theshooting sequence, so we'll attach that to the build-up sequence and ll in any gaps so that itmakes sense.

Shooting sequence:Composure > Decisions > echnique > Finishing.

Build-up sequence:O Te Ball > Work Rate > Acceleration > Pace > Stamina > First ouch Composure > Decisions.

As you can see, the sequences slot together nicely...

O Te Ball > Work Rate > Acceleration > Pace > Stamina > First ouch > Composure >Decisions > echnique > Finishing.

Now, some important points to note –

1.You only really need to know the last four or ve attributes in each sequence for every



position. Tere is no way that you're going to be able to calculate all the possibleoutcomes, because you don't know what's going to happen in the match and you're nogoing to be calculating just attributes, you'd have Preferred Player Moves to take intoconsideration, as well as morale, the diculty of the opponent, et cetera. Work out thelatter attributes and look for them in players, this will give you a far greater chance of(a) nding the best possible players (b) creating a team which is far more clinical.

2.Tis is my own Attribute Logic. I may not have added attributes into equations that you would; I may be adding attributes which I think are important and you do not. Tbeauty of this is that it's your own logic. I'm just showing you how it works. You haveall the attribute descriptions to help you understand the way attributes function, youalso have a solid example of how the match engine sequencing works and you know you only need to calculate the last 4-5 attributes in the sequence to nd the bestplayers for each position – with all of that information, it will be very easy for you toreverse-engineer the sequences and put your plans for world domination into eect.

3. If you read the “Combining Duties and Roles” crib sheet or the attribute list above, you'll see that there are a lot of attribute links for each position – use those as a base,but still use your own Attribute Logic so you can factor your own theories againstthosesuggestions.Also, pay attention to the in-game attribute hints because using thosalongside Attribute Logic, makes this concept easy to implement into your game.

4.Tis is covered in more detail later, but remember to factor in how Preferred PlayerMoves will aect players. Tose PPM's can easily change the impact of a player's

attributes in a match (imagine a left-footed winger, on the left wing, who has excellencrossing, yet has PPM's which dictate he cuts inside and shoots on his right foot).

Player Personalities

Player personalities are often completely overlooked, with managers instead preferring tofocus on a player's numerical attributes, believing they're the only basis for deciding howsuitable a player is for their team. However, there are a couple of reasons as to why it’s not

advisable to ignore personalities. Firstly, a personality tag gives you an indication of theplayer’s hidden personality attributes. Secondly, it’s these hidden personality attributes whichcan be a decisive factor on the true value of a player’s visible attributes. Tirdly, they’reimportant factors for tutoring. Below I’ll cover the personality attributes and personality tagsto give an indication as to what they mean and how they can aect a player.



Hidden Personality Attributes


Adaptability Tis is the measure of a player’s ability to adapt to playing in a newcountry or their ability to learn and maintain a new position. It canaect the speed and ease of them settling into a new role.

Ambition Tis is the measure of a player’s craving for success. It can aect hisdesire to remain at a club, which he doesn’t feel matches his ambitions.

Consistency Tis is the measure of a player’s ability to perform well over the courseof a series of games. You will usually see how consistent a player is viahis form rating (if it's erratic, then his Consistency is low).

Controversy Tis is the measure of how outspoken a player will be with the media.

Determination Tis is the measure of a player’s willingness to do whatever it takes tosucceed, on and o the pitch.

Dirtiness Tis is the measure of a player’s stance on playing the game fairly. Ithighlights whether or not a player will break the rules to win games.

ImportantMatches

Tis is the measure of a player’s ability to handle pressure and performin the big games. It can aect matches against big teams or matches inthe latter stages of competitions.

Injury Proneness Tis is the measure of a player’s ability to remain free of injury. It canaect the level of training he can endure before injury; it also aectshow he responds to and recovers from bad tackles in matches.

Loyalty Tis is the measure of a player’s desire to stay at his club. It can aect



whether or not he remains at his club when a bigger team or a morelucrative oer comes his way.

Pressure Tis is the measure of a player’s mental ability to deal with dicultsituations. It can aect his ability to perform during the big occasions

on the pitch.

Proessionalism Tis is the measure of a player’s attitude to work. It can aect his careerlongevity, his approach to training and his conduct on the pitch.

Sportsmanship Tis is the measure of a player’s mentality towards fair play. Ithighlights how ethical a player will be on the pitch.

emperament Tis is the measure of a player’s calmness when involved in specicmatch events – things such as tackles, fouls and bookings.

Versatility Tis is the measure of a player’s ability to perform well in a role he's notcomfortable playing in.

Now, before we get into the denitions of the personality tags and look at how they link totheir personality attributes, it’s important to understand how they function. It’s also veryuseful to know which personality tags indicate the lack of another personality attribute.

Te personality attributes work in the exact same way as the other attributes work. Tey’recategorised into elds and ranked from 1-20 (imagine a fourth column next to echnical,Mental and Physical attributes). Te dierence is that these personality attributes are so

important that it would be unrealistic to show you them in great detail; this is why they aredisplayed as tags instead of numerical values.

Now, this is the complex issue behind the personality tags – there can only be one tag, so themost dominating attribute in a player’s personality will dictate which tag is shown.

So, for example: how would you tell if a player who is “emperamental” has good Pressureattributes? Well, there is no denitive way in the game to ascertain which hidden attributes



have which numerical values – all you can do is exercise some logic. Obviously a player who i“emperamental”, has such a poor emperament value that his other attribute values must bless impressive. Terefore you can only really assess this player as a liability.

It’s not conclusive evidence that he’s exceedingly poor in other areas, as he could have a ‘1’ for emperament and a ‘17’ for Pressure(in this case, Temperament is the stronger attribute because

it's closer to '0' than Pressure is to '20'). Now, because a negative attribute is the strongestpersonality attribute for this player (and every player gets only one personality tag), he's gointo have a negative personality tag – and that’s the overwhelming problem with players havingbad personality tags – it’s impossible to tell how good their other personality attributes are.

Fortunately, thanks to some old test research at SI Games, we can look at some indications as towhich attributes are associated with each tag. It’s not numerically specic because there wasn’t anyconclusive evidence on the diering values, but it’s denitely accurate enough to give you a clear-cutunderstanding of the dynamics of each personality tag (see the “Personality Dynamics” crib sheet).

Personality ags

Trait Description and Eect

Balanced Tis indicates that a player has a well-rounded personality. It’sessentially someone who is not excellent in any specic personalityarea, but at the same time he’s not a liability in any area either. It’s not

really the most desirable trait to have in a player because the playerlacks strong Determination and Ambition attributes, but having saidthat, he’s not going to have an adverse aect on the team.

Born Leader Tis indicates that a player is completely determined and leads byexample. It’s the kind of player every manager would want; he’s highlyinuential and has a strong eect on the players around him.Obviously, it’s one of the best tags any player can have – especially a

captain.

Leader Tis indicates that a player is very similar to a Born Leader, butslightly less inuential and less determined. Again, it’s an extremelydesirable trait – certainly in a captain.



Model Citizen Tis indicates that a player has an almost perfect personality, althoughhe'd not be the best example of leadership material, due to a lackingInuence attribute. Tis is a very determined and ambitious player who is also loyal, professional and is likely to be a very goodsportsman. In my opinion, this is the most desirable trait to look for

in a player.

Perectionist Tis indicates that a player is extremely focussed with regards toAmbition, Determination and Professionalism. He is a player muchlike a Leader, but without the Inuence. Tis is an extremely desirabletrait to have in a player, due to their work-ethic, drive andprofessionalism. Players like this often work hard enough to hit theirpeak and stay at their peak for a lot longer than the less professional

players around them.

ModelProessional

Tis indicates that a player is extremely focussed and well tempered. Tis is someone who doesn’t step out of line and instead focusesentirely on their game; even though the player is lacking someAmbition and Determination, these players often have the ability tohave longer and better careers due to their exemplary Professionalismattribute. Obviously, it's a trait which is most desirable for managers

who want to encourage a well-behaved team.

Proessional Tis indicates that a player is a much like the Model Professional, butslightly less focussed on their professionalism. Again, not a trait thatsignies much Ambition or Determination, but it gives an indicationas to how hard the player will work in trying to become a betterplayer. Obviously, it’s a great trait to look for in a player.

Fairly Proessional Tis indicates that a player is moderately focussed and well tempered.Again, it’s a ‘watered-down’ version of the other Professional tags, butit’s certainly not undesirable to have players like this in the team.Even though they sound rather lackadaisical when compared to theircounter-parts, they’re only slightly less professional than the others.



Level-Headed Tis indicates that a player is quite balanced with regards toSportsmanship and Professionalism. Tis player is rational and isunlikely to get into controversial situations; although it doesn’tindicate much with regards to his temper. It’s not a bad trait to have,it’s quite ‘middle-of-the-road’ as far as personality tags go.

Short-empered Tis indicates that a player has a bad temper and is highlycontroversial. He’s going to be the worst kind of player you can lookto have in your team – on and o the pitch. It’s obviously a trait toavoid.

emperamental Tis indicates that a player is a lose cannon. His emperament is

extremely low and he’s going to be a risk to the harmony of the teamo the pitch, as well as being a ticking bomb on the pitch. Obviously,it’s not a trait you’d want in a player

Conrontational Tis indicates that a player has very low emperament and is also abad sportsman. On the pitch, this guy is going to be a huge problem.Obviously, it’s not a desirable trait to have.

Volatile Tis indicates that a player is a potential risk; his emperament ispretty low and there is every chance that he will cause trouble on ando the pitch. Obviously, it’s not a trait to look for.

Outspoken Tis indicates that a player is controversial and is likely to speak hismind. Tis could unbalance the team and cause trouble in the dressingroom or in the media. It’s not an ideal trait to have.

Media-Friendly Tis indicates that a player is the exact opposite of the Outspokentype. He’ll be quite savvy in what he says and is unlikely to causemany poor media situations. It’s not the worst trait to have, althoughit doesn't indicate what a player will do for you on the pitch.



Reserved Tis indicates that a player is quiet and calm. Tis player is veryprofessional and not remotely controversial; he’s unlikely to doanything but focus on his game. It’s a trait which would be good inany player.

Jovial Tis indicates that a player is laid-back and cheerful. Tis player isgreat under pressure and has a fairly balanced temperament. As itgoes, it’s not the worst trait to have in a player, but it’s not the mostsought after either; it can indicate that a player is a bit too relaxed to work hard, but it has it’s rewards on the pitch in dicult situations.

Light-Hearted

Tis indicates that a player is relaxed. Tis player is great under

pressure, quite determined and also a good sportsman too. It’s a trait which would be good in any player, as this is a player who is good formorale.

Spirited Tis indicates that a player is upbeat. Tis player will be good underpressure, very professional and won’t have a bad temperament. It's atrait which would be good in any player.

Casual Tis indicates that a player is too relaxed to get the job done; he’s not very professional and has poor Determination. Obviously, it’s a trait toavoid.

Resolute Tis indicates that a player is very determined and highlyprofessional. Tis player is very focussed on the task and will be agreat addition to the team.

Driven Tis indicates a player who will stop at nothing to win; he lives,breathes and eats success. Tis player is far more determined than anyother – which obviously, is a very desirable trait to have in a player.



Determined Tis indicates that a player is only slightly less focussed on succeedingat the club than a Driven player. It’s a good trait to have in a player,because he’ll do what he can to win.

Fairly Determined Tis indicates that a player has average Determination. Not an

undesirable trait to have in a player, they’re often slightly moreambitious than their other Determined counter-parts.

LowDetermination

Tis indicates that a player is seriously lacking in Determination. It’s a very undesirable trait because it shows a lack of not only the will to win, but also a lack of Ambition and Professionalism.

EasilyDiscouraged

Tis indicates that a player is completely void of Determination. It’sone of the worst personality tags a player can have.

Low Sel-Belie Tis indicates that a player has low Determination, but is also verypoor under pressure. He’s going to have no condence and thatundermine all his other attributes as a result. It’s a trait you’d belooking to avoid having in the team.

Slack Tis indicates that a player has low Determination andProfessionalism. As a result, the player will make little to no eort totrain or play. It’s a trait signicant of a very lazy individual and wouldbe something to avoid at all costs.

Spineless Tis indicates that a player has low Determination and is poor underpressure. As a result, the player will crumble on the pitch. It’s anotherundesirable trait which will undermine a player’s attributes.

Iron Willed Tis indicates that a player is extremely good with Pressure. Tisplayer is also very determined and mentally strong. Tis is a very goodtrait to have in a player, if not one of the best, as he’s highly unlikelyto crumble on the pitch when you most need him to deliver.



Unappable Tis indicates that a player is good under pressure and has a goodtemperament. He’s a mentally strong player and will be cool, calm andcollected on the pitch. Tis is another fantastic trait to have in aplayer.

Evasive Tis indicates that a player is very good with handling Pressure and is very professional. Tis player will be strong and durable on the pitch.Again, another fantastic trait to have.

Very Ambitious Tis indicates how much a player wants to play and succeed at thehighest level. It’s a double-edged sword, because a team with a lowerreputation would struggle to hold on to this player, but the player willhave a positive impact on the pitch, because he’s aiming to get to thetop. Te desirability of this trait often hinges on whether a club cansign the player or keep the player signed to the club.

Ambitious Tis indicates that a player is slightly less ambitious than those VeryAmbitious players. Tese players are not very loyal to teams who don’tmatch their ambitions. Obviously, it’s a trait which as mentioned

above, has cons, but players with Ambition work hard to realise theirobjectives – thus meaning it’s a good trait for a player to have.

Fairly Ambitious Tis indicates that a player is moderately ambitious, but slightly moreloyal to the club. As you’d expect, he’s a slightly ‘watered-down’ versionof the ambitious players. Again, it’s a trait which will signal a player will work pretty hard to achieve his goals and it’s an attribute which isgood to have in any player.

Unambitious Tis indicates a poorly motivated player. He’s not really someone youshould look to buy – even if he’s willing to stay at the team as a resultof his lack of Ambition. Tis trait signies a player who is unlikely toever have enough gumption to reach his potential. With regards todesirability, it’s one of the worst personality tags to have.



Resilient Tis indicates a mentally strong player who is fairly determined and is very capable of handling pressure. Players like this are very strongcharacters and can be very eective on the pitch, due to their ability tonot give up and not be phased by the situations they nd themselves

in. Tis is a trait which is very desirable in a player.

Devoted Tis indicates a player loves his club and would never wish to leave.It’s misunderstood as are the other Loyalty tags – often highly valued,but when considered, it’s only an attribute you’d want in a player who was already a star. It sacrices Ambition and Determination in favourof Loyalty – both of those traits are the driving force of the bestplayers. It’s an admirable trait, but not a trait that you’d really want in

a player unless you didn’t wish to ever part with him.

Very Loyal Tis indicates that a player is completely loyal to his club, althoughnot as much as the Devoted players. It’s an attribute with merit whenit’s held by a player who you absolutely need to keep at your club. If you’re a big team, this attribute is relatively useless, as it’s indicative ofplayers with fairly low Ambition and Determination. You’d only wantthis trait in a player when you’re at a club where the player could leave

and you desperately need to hang on to him.

Loyal Tis indicates that a player is loyal to his club. As above, it’s a goodattribute for players at teams which need to keep the player. Tis traithas slightly less Loyalty and as a result, slightly more Ambition, which makes it more desirable than a Very Loyal trait, but still it'srelatively useless to teams who’d require a player to be ambitious anddetermined, rather than loyal.

Fairly Loyal Tis indicates that a player is moderately loyal; which as above, isonly a good attribute for players at teams which need to keep theplayer. Tis trait has less Loyalty and slightly more Ambition than theLoyal trait, which would make it slightly more desirable than both theother Loyalty personality tags.



Honest Tis indicates that a player epitomises what it is to be a sportsman.He has an exceptional Sportsmanship attribute and as such willbehave with impeccable behaviour on the pitch. As far as desirabilitygoes, it’s nice to have an honest player, but it’s not always the most

rewarding trait.

Sporting Tis indicates that a player is fair and will behave himself on the pitch– just like the Honest players. Again, it’s a nice trait to have, but it’snot overly rewarding.

Fairly Sporting Tis indicates that a player is moderately fair; he behaves himself onthe pitch and is unlikely to get into trouble. As with the otherSportsmanship tags, it’s nice to have, but not overly rewarding.

Realist Tis indicates that a player is lacking Sportsmanship. He’s quitelogical in the sense that sportsmanship isn’t an overly rewarding traitto have, so he doesn’t opt to have it. With regards to desirability, it’s atrait with no real benet.

Unsporting Tis indicates that a player is completely devoid of Sportsmanship.He’s the John McEnroe of football. With regards to desirability, it’sobviously much like the Realist trait, but worse. It’s not a trait you’d want a player to have.

What you should consider is that these personality tags are only indications of the highest

values of a player's hidden attributes. So, for example: if a player is tagged as “Media-Friendlyit suggests he’s better with Controversy than any of the other hidden personality attributes.Now, “Media-Friendly” is not a bad personality tag, but it’s not really benecial to a player,because that means that Controversy the strongest aspect of his personality – ahead of thingssuch as Ambition, Determination and Professionalism. As a result, we can’t ascertain theratings his more important personality attributes have – which shows that a bad personalitytag doesn’t always mean that player's other attributes are low, it just means that the badattribute is the most apparent and the levels of the player's preferred attributes are unknown.



Now, you should note that these personality tags can change with tutoring, so utilise tutoring to getthe best from a player who may be very promising, but is not showing suitable personality attributes

Preerred Player Moves

As with the personality tags, there is another frequently overlooked element to a player – in

this case, it’s Preferred Player Moves (or PPM’s, for short). Tese moves either indicate aplayer’s ability to exercise a certain manoeuvre or they relate to part of their on-eldpersonality. Below you can see a description as to what each PPM label means.

Preferred Player Move Description and Effect

Argues with ofcials Tis label indicates that a player is highly likely to get involved inconfrontations with match ocials - which can result in the playerbeing issued with a card. Couple this PPM with a poor Aggressionattribute and/or a poor behavioural personality tag, and you’ll havea highly volatile player on your hands.

Arrives late inopposition area

Tis label indicates that a player will delay his entry into the boxduring an attacking move. He’s going to look to hold his run andoer another option as he enters the box behind the rst wave ofplayers attacking the box - this can give the player more time andspace on the ball in a key area.

Attempts overheadkicks

Tis label indicates that a player will attempt acrobatic manoeuvres. Tis is only going to be eective with good Agility, echnique,Flair and Finishing/Passing attributes (depending on whether theplayer is shooting or passing the ball). Tis PPM does not suggest aplayer will be able to execute the move, rather than he is willing to



try the overhead kick – which could easily be a bad thing, if theplayer doesn't have the ability to execute the trait.

Avoids using weakeroot

Tis label indicates that a player will do anything he can to avoidusing his weak foot. It’s a PPM which has both pros and cons,

because the player is most likely to execute something far better with his stronger foot – and therefore be more accurate and moreeective. However, it equates to a lower adaptability in certainsituations (i.e. a striker running into the box, with a small area ofspace in which he can score, but only if he uses his weak foot).

Comes deep to getball

Tis label indicates that a player will drop deeper than his assignedposition to pick up possession. Tis can be both a pro and a con,

because you might not want your lone striker dropping deep andtaking pressure o the opposition defence, but it’s very handy forplayers who have a great ability to utilise possession(players with good Creativity, O e Ball, Technique and Passing attributes).

Curls ball Tis label indicates that a player opts to curl the ball in certainsituations. Tis can be very useful when players are taking shots,playing though-balls or taking set-pieces. Attributes which may

inuence this PPM would be echnique and either Finishing orPassing, depending on the scenario.

Cuts inside Tis label indicates that a player will act much like an “InsideForward” and come into the middle of the pitch, instead ofhugging the line and getting the ball to the by-line for a cross. Prosand cons with this should be rather obvious – you either want a winger to play like Messi or Beckham. In terms of attributes, it

depends on how the player is deployed; if the player is cuttinginside and shooting, then obviously, Long Shots, echnique,Finishing and Dribbling attributes would be more important thanthe Crossing, Dribbling, Decisions and Passing attributes – whichare important for wingers.



Dictates empo Tis label indicates that a player will control the game. Tis PPM ismost useful on players who have exceptional mideld skills(Passing, echnique, Decisions, Creativity, O Te Ball,Anticipation). Te immediate con would be that this PPM isuseless (and even detrimental) in a player who does not possess theability to execute it eectively.

Dives into tackles Tis label indicates that a player has a ‘gung-ho’ mentality to winning the ball. It’s much like the “Argues with ocials” PPM, with regards to it being a very negative trait on the wrong player. Aplayer would need good Anticipation, Aggression and acklingattributes to balance out this Preferred Player Move.

Does not dive intotackles

Tis label indicates that a player has a more logical approach to winning the ball. He’s most likely to stand o his rival and wait fora good tackling opportunity to present itself. It’s obviously a PPM with more positives than it’s opposite.

Dwells on ball Tis label indicates that a player will be very comfortable inpossession and will keep the ball for as long as he can. It’s onlygoing to be benecial on players who have good Creativity,

Composure, Decision and Passing attributes, which allow them tosuccessfully hold the ball and release it without losing it. In termsof it being a con – if a player has this trait and you’re playing aquick, direct tempo in your tactical instruction, then it’s going toconict with that mentality, as the player is slowing the ow of theattack and holding on to possession more than you'd want him to.

Gets crowd going Tis label indicates that a player has a certain inuence over the

crowd. Tis player will get the crowd ‘pumped’ and will give theatmosphere a big boost (in your team’s favour) when he’s on theball. It’s obviously a big pro, if you consider the eect the crowd will have on the team.

Gets orward Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for getting into



whenever possible attacking positions whenever he can. Obviously this can have anegative aect on players who are supposed to be defensivelypositioned at all times, but it’s certainly positive for players who you’d want to get forward and get involved in the attacking gameas often as possible.

Gets into oppositionarea

Tis label indicates that a player will endeavour to get into theopposition’s box when he can. Again, like the “Get forward whenever possible” PPM, the merit of this hinges on the positionof the player who has the trait.

Hits ree-kicks withpower

Tis label indicates that a player will strike a free-kick with power,rather than with nesse. Whether it’s more of a pro or a con is up

for debate, but you'd still want a player to have good Finishing,Long Shots, Free-Kick aking, echnique, Decisions andComposure attributes, when they're taking your free-kicks.

Hugs line Tis label indicates that a player will stay out wide on the touchlineinstead of coming inside with the ball. It’s the exact opposite of the“Cuts inside” PPM.

Knocks ball pastopponent

Tis label indicates that a player will put the ball past his opponentas he takes him on. With this PPM, it’s important to consider theplayer’s Dribbling, Pace and Acceleration attributes, as he’s going toneed good attributes to execute this PPM eciently.

Likes ball played intoeet

Tis label indicates a player’s preference to how he receives the ball. Tis PPM signals that a player prefers to keep possession, rather

than chase passes or deal with aerial threats around him, which canbe a plus with regards to keeping the ball, but it can be a negative ifthis player is a key part of your team and you want to play adierent style of football around him. Tis PPM is much moreeective with players who have good First ouch attributes.



Likes to beat manrepeatedly

Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for taking playerson when he’s in possession. Again, like some other PPM's it’seectiveness hinges on the echnical attributes of the playerthings such as Dribbling, Acceleration, Pace, Agility and Balance.Also, you should consider where this player is positioned and howhe is instructed, because this PPM may not be ideal in a player

you’d preferred passed the ball rather than dribbled the ball.

Likes to lob keeper Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for lifting the ballover the goalkeeper, rather than slotting it to the side of him. Withthis PPM, it’s important to have a player with good Finishing, echnique, Decisions and Composure attributes. Given that it’seectiveness comes down to the situation in which it’s executed, it'shard to say if it's a pro or a con, although in one-on-one situations

this PPM could be very eective, if the player had the ability tosuccessfully execute the PPM.

Likes to roundkeeper

Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for going aroundthe goalkeeper with the ball, instead of shooting rst-time. Again,like the “Likes to lob keeper” PPM, the success rate of this trait would depend on the player’s echnical attributes, in this caseAgility, Composure and Dribbling. As above, it’s success hinges on

the scenario in which the PPM is executed, but it would be mostlikely to increase goal-scoring eciency in one-on-one situations.

Likes to switch ballto other ank

Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for keepingpossession by moving the ball across the pitch when the oppositionbecome too tight on his side of the pitch. As outlined, it’s a veryuseful PPM, but only eective when found in players with goodPassing, echnique and Creativity attributes.

Likes to try to beatoside trap

Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for anticipatingand exploiting an attacking opportunity by timing his runs againstthe last defender. It’s obviously a magnicent PPM to have in anattacking player, who has the ability to execute the PPM correctly.Players with this PPM would require good Anticipation, O TeBall, Acceleration and Pace attributes.



Looks or pass ratherthan attempting toscore

Tis label indicates that a player will opt to play the ball to anotherplayer rather than shoot. Whilst this PPM seems negative, it canhave a big plus when it comes to getting the ball past thegoalkeeper or last defender. Obviously a player's Passing attribute

would need to be good, but Composure, Creativity and Decisions would also be very benecial in any player with this PPM.

Marks opponenttightly

Tis label indicates that a player stays close to his opponent whenmarking him. Tis is a much debated PPM, with regards to it’sstatus as a positive or negative trait. Ideally, players with this PPM will need good Marking, ackling, Heading and Strengthattributes, but beware, these players can be duped by highly skilled

opponents who have an excellent First ouch attribute, a goodAnticipation attribute and a good Acceleration attribute.

Moves ball to letoot beore dribbleattempt

Tis label indicates that a player prefers to dribble on his left foot.It’s not an advantageous PPM, it’s more of a technical quirk - which can be exploited by the “Show Player onto ‘x’ foot” trait.

Moves ball to rightoot beore dribbleattempt

Tis label indicates that a player prefers to dribble on his right foot.As above, it’s not advantageous, it’s the mirror opposite to the“Moves ball to left foot before dribble attempt” PPM.

Moves into channels Tis label indicates that a player likes to look for and exploit thespace between the Full-back and the Central Defender. With thisPPM, you’re going to want players to have good O Te Ball,Anticipation and First ouch attributes.

Places shots Tis label indicates that a player prefers to take shots in a morerened manner than simply hitting the ball with power. With thisPPM, you’re likely to see an increase in accuracy, but attributessuch as Finishing, echnique, Decisions and Composure will stillaect the outcome of the shot.



Plays no through-balls

Tis label indicates that a player opts not to play passes into spaces,instead preferring to play the ball directly to the player. Tis PPMcan be both advantageous (with regards to keeping possession) butit sacrices creative manoeuvres as a result.

Plays one twos Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for performingquick passing manoeuvres with players around him. It’s a verypositive PPM to have in a player, as it will be very dicult fordefenders to win the ball in these situations. Attributes which would benet this PPM would be First-ouch, Composure,Passing, O Te Ball, Anticipation, Acceleration, Decisions andCreativity.

Plays short simplepasses

Tis label indicates that a player has a penchant for performingsimple passes to players near him. It’s a highly benecial attributefor players who are instructed to play short passes, but it’s obviouslygoing to be more of an issue if your team plays a more direct orlong passing game. With this PPM, the key attributes would bePassing and Decisions.

Plays with back togoal

Tis label indicates a player’s preference to play facing his team-mates. Tis PPM would suggest players would be more aware withregards to what’s going on around them and would be better atreceiving the ball as a result. Te downside is that they then have toturn around with the ball (if they receive it). Attributes linked tothis PPM would be First ouch and O Te Ball.

Runs with ball downlet

Tis label indicates a player’s habitual running pattern. With thisPPM, players will look to get down the ank and run at players. Tis PPM can dene the type of player you have – for example: aright-footed player who likes to run down the left, would typicallyprefer to come inside and shoot, rather than reach the by-line andcross the ball. Attributes which help to support this PPM would beDribbling, Agility, Acceleration, Pace and Decisions – Long Shots,



Shooting/Crossing and echnique attributes would need to beconsidered depending on the ‘footed-ness’ of the player and theposition he was occupying.

Runs with ball down

right

Tis label indicates a player’s habitual running pattern. As above, it

is the same style of PPM, except on the opposite side of the pitch.

Runs with ballthrough centre

Tis label indicates a player’s habitual running pattern. Unlike theabove wider running patterns, the central pattern is slightlydierent. Tis PPM would indicate a player tries to run though themost occupied area of the pitch, and as such, this means that aplayer will need good Decisions, Creativity, Passing, Composure,Dribbling, Agility, echnique and Balance attributes.

Shoots with power Tis label indicates that a player likes to hit the ball with power,rather than with nesse. With this PPM, a player sacricesaccuracy for power. However, with good Finishing, Decisions and echnique attributes, this PPM could oer both accuracy andpower. It’s particularly ecient alongside a good Long Shotsattribute.

Shoots rom distance Tis label indicates that a player likes to shoot from outside thebox. Tis PPM can be highly eective in mideld players, certainlythose with good Finishing, Long Shots, echnique and Decisionsattributes.

Stays back at alltimes

Tis label indicates that a player is never going to go forward andsupport the attack. With this PPM, the defence remains stronger,

but in instances such as corners, it’s often advantageous to have abig, strong aerial presence in the box – which could be sacriced with this PPM, as it’s mostly defensive players who have it. Tereare no specic attributes tied to this PPM, but Concentration,Decisions and Positioning would be good in a player who’s sittingback; good Physical attributes would also be a plus.



Stops play Tis label indicates that a player will hold the ball up when heneeds to (i.e. in situations when his opponents are outnumberinghis team-mates). Tis PPM requires good Decisions, Composure,Strength and Passing attributes, as you’ll want the player to notonly hold the ball, but also keep it and use it well.

ries rst time shots Tis label indicates that a player will attempt quick shots in a bidto catch the goalkeeper o-guard. Te pro to this PPM would bethat players have an attacking edge, but the con would be that theshot may be rushed and ineective as a result. Attributes that would aid this PPM would be Finishing, Decisions, Composureand echnique.

ries killer ballsoten

Tis label indicates that a player will frequently attempt to catchthe opposition o-guard with dicult and adventurous passes. Asabove with the “ries rst time shots” PPM, the success of this trai would hinge on the echnique, Passing, Decisions, and Creativityattributes of the player.

ries long range ree-

kicks

Tis label indicates that a player will attempt to score from free-

kicks at distance. Te pros of this PPM would depend on theability of the set-piece taker’s Long Shots, Finishing, Decisionsand Composure attributes. If the player has poor attributes, he’d just waste the opportunity.

ries long rangepasses

Tis label indicates that a player will attempt to pass the ball atrange. As with the “ries killer balls often” PPM, this trait wouldrequire exceptional skills to be successful. Attributes which would

aid this PPM would be echnique, Passing, Decisions andCreativity.

ries tricks Tis label indicates that a player uses his ball skills as a way to getpast players. With this PPM, a player will need to be highly gifted with his Flair and Creativity attributes to successfully make use of



this PPM. Other attributes such as Dribbling, Agility and Balancecould be advantageous.

ries to play way outo trouble

Tis label indicates that a player will attempt to get out of trickysituations using his abilities. As a result, players may require

attributes such as, Dribbling, Acceleration, echnique, Flair,Creativity, Balance, Agility, Strength and Composure, to executethe PPM successfully. If the player lacks good attributes, it’s verylikely that he’ll lose the ball.

Uses outside o oot Tis label indicates that a player will utilise the outside of his foot when passing or shooting. Tis PPM can oer the player anotheroption when on the ball, so it’s obviously useful, but it’s

eectiveness hinges on whether the player has a good echniqueattribute or not.

Winds up opponents Tis label indicates that a player will aggravate his opponents. TisPPM can force the opposition to react negatively towards theplayer, thus resulting in them committing a foul or being carded.

Give some thought to the Preferred Player Moves label a player has and then compare it tothe attributes you think would pertain to the label – for example: the rst PPM in the tablehighlights the dynamics of the “Argues with ocials” PPM and how it would be aected bythe Aggression attribute or the player’s Personality attributes – obviously, it's a toxic mixture.

Just like all of these other bonus traits, you need to exercise logic when you’re training orscouting players with these PPM’s, because PPM's, attributes and personalities – they're allintertwined and can be unstable or problematic when used together (if they're not suited to

each other). Look for balance, use logic and you'll get the best results from them.



eaching Preerred Player Moves

Tese Preferred Player Moves can be taught and un-taught, but you don’t have the ability totrain your players to adopt all of them. It’s very, very important to cull Preferred Player Move

which aren’t suited to your player’s abilities – doing this can radically change their ability toperform on the pitch. At the same time, consider teaching players with good attributes,Preferred Player Moves which complement their abilities – this can allow you to develop abetter player. Consider the combination of Preferred Player Moves and how they’d work witheach other (i.e. teaching a right-footed winger, with very good Physical attributes, goodFinishing, echnique and Long Shots attributes, the “Cuts inside”, “Runs with ball down lefand “ries rst time shots” PPM traits). Tat’s just an example of one extra dynamic you canadd to a player. Tink of Preferred Player Moves as skill moves and begin educating yourplayers on the art of executing them. eaching Preferred Player Moves to players is nodierent to working on a training schedule or the Match Preparation module, it’s all relativeto player growth and it’s an invaluable outlet of training and player improvement for amanager.

It’s also worth noting that some of these traits should only be taught to certain positions; forexample: it’s a shocking idea to teach a central defender the “ries to play way out of trouble”Preferred Player Moves – he’d massively increase the risk of losing the ball in a vital area andconceding a goal – although, generally speaking, if you follow the outline above, centraldefenders wouldn’t have the attributes needed for that specic PPM anyway.

ere’s a lot more to cover, but it’s not all relevant to this section of the guide, so see the “PlayerTutoring” section to read how you can teach the unlockable Preferred Player Moves and also how yocan teach them without having to take up time in a player’s training routine.



- Chapter Five -

Understanding the Fundamental Elements o actics

With a multitude of options, the tactical creation side of the game is quite overwhelming, but

once you learn the meaning behind certain settings, you can easily get to grips with creating your own eective tactics. With that in mind, we'll take a look at the fundamental elements otactics and how you'd go about piecing your own tactic together.

actics in FM are broken up into separate methods of instruction: formation, teaminstructions, player duties, player roles, player instructions and touchline shouts. Whenbuilding a tactic, the immediate issues to deal with are your players. You need to decide howthey're going to t into your tactic or if you're going to build a tactic around what you have athe club. Sometimes, this decision is made for you, so it's best to review the squad fully, see

which attributes your players have and how eective they'd be in a specic role; then begin topiece your tactical shape together and if you need to, hit the transfer market for some players

Formations

Te starting point of any tactic requires you to assess your players to see who and what you're working with. After you've done that, you should have some idea of what kind of formation

you're going to play. Most people tend to opt for a balanced 4-4-2, a more attacking 4-3-3 ora more defensive 4-5-1 – these three tactics are the more popular shapes, but none of themhave to dictate the way you choose to play the game. You could, for example: go with the 451 which oers strong defensive numbers and overcrowds the middle of the pitch (at the expensof the attacking threat of two strikers); with that you could opt to be overly attacking andpush high up the pitch – you don't necessarily need to sit back and counter-attack or playdefensively just because your formation suggests it should be a more defensive tactic.

Te overall thing to remember when selecting a formation is that you should take intoaccount who you have in your team and the strength of those players; for example: if you donhave strong wingers, it's better to deploy your team to work through the middle of the pitch,solidify the mideld and look to get the stronger players involved in the game(although, not the expense of playing players out of position) –it's highly inadvisable to play weaker players justbecause they t your preferred formation. If you can't replace the weak players, look to createshape which has balance, but also potency; don’t give the weaker players a role which they’llstruggle to impress in, give them minimal duties and instead get the better players involved.



You should also remember not to be scared of getting creative or being less orthodox with your tactics (certainly if something doesn't work for you), you can always change it. Whenbuilding your tactic, consider that you need to create a realistic shape; it's important to pondehow easily your defence could be exploited, how well your players can get the ball fromdefence to attack and how eective the shape of the attacking line could be during an attack. Te best formations have balance between the shape of the formation and the players in the

formation.

Philosophy

Philosophy is a hugely important aspect of the tactical setup, as it denes the behaviour of thplayers. Basically, a more Fluid style of play would have the entire team operating in a similarmanner – attacking and defending as a unit. A more Rigid style of play would be the comple

opposite to the Fluid style, forcing the players to do exactly what you've told them(this canhave an eect on their creativity and improvisation);this would see the team would split basedon their duties and roles – with defenders staying back and attackers pushing up.

Tese settings however, operate within the parameters of a player's personality, so don't expecsomeone like Berbatov to start defending o the line during an opposition counter-attack (if you're set to a Very Fluid style), their Mental attributes and personalities still come into play.

With that said, let’s take a look at the settings in more detail…

Balanced – Tis is your best option if you're looking for a middle ground between a Fluid andRigid mentality. With this you'll divide the team into attacking, supporting and defendingroles; defenders will sit back, midelders will sit in the middle to support and attackers willpush up to pressure the opposition (depending on their duties) – this will give you the abilityto set the entire team up in a manner that will allow them to be much more dynamic in theirattacking and defending – without restricting them from being occasionally creative(likeeither of the Rigid philosophies can do)and it will also keep them from being as exploited as themight be with a Fluid philosophy.

It's important to note that this mentality will put more emphasis on the duties and roles youplayers are set to, as they'll be using those as instructions for their positions on the pitch. If you've got a lack of balance in the duties or roles which the players are set to, it will aect theteam movement.



Fluid – With this setting, you give the players more freedom in their position to expressthemselves. Tey will start to play out of their position, preferring to move around theparameter of their area, rather than stay at their dened point in the formation. With thisphilosophy the players will dismiss instruction a little more, as they'll look to use your dutyand role settings as a guidelineof how they should play, rather than as strict instruction as tohow you demand they play.

With this you're likely to see more attacking verve and a more unied team in attack anddefence; the attacking players will be moving around to make space for each other and thedefenders will be coming out of position a little more. Tis is a great setting for those teams with players who are good O Te Ball and have good Anticipation – but realise you areopting to play a less predictable game by using uid movement and creativity, which does havside-eects that will weaken the team's solidarity defensively, as you're moving the team as anentire unit when you're attacking and defending.

Very Fluid –Obviously, this setting is a more aggressive variation of the Fluid setting, withthis encouraging the team to play more in a 'light framework' of their positions. With thisphilosophy, you're going to get the team to abandon all structure from the formation in orderto employ creativity and unpredictability in it's most extreme form.

If you have players with exceptional skills in movement and positioning, you're likely to seethis setting be very eective with those players; but the big side-eect with this style of play ithat the team could fall apart, if their attacking prowess is ineective against the opposition’sstyle of play. Also, with players not in the best position to deal with a situation, you'd be easilopened up for exploitation – because whilst they're trying to create an opportunity at one end you could lose the ball and get caught out on the counter-attack.

Rigid – Tis setting is not demanding players adopt a robotic mentality, they'll just be morecautious in what they do – for example: when a player attacks, another player will be moreinclined to stay back and hold the space he's left unoccupied. With this setting you're morelikely to see the team play a less attractive style of football, but players will keep their shape – which will give you more strength as a unit when put under pressure.

Te issue with this setting is that you're sacricing an adventurous, creative and unpredictablestyle of play for the sake of a more structured and solid unit. Tat's not to say you can't havethe best of both worlds, you can have stability and be tough to break down, whilst at the samtime be creative at the other end of the pitch – but that comes down to the quality of yourplayers and the roles you give them. With this philosophy you'll be cautiously creative, butthat doesn't mean you're going to be radically handicapped in attack; it just means that you will be less adventurous when going forward, to make sure that you're not easily exploited.



Very Rigid –Obviously, this setting is a more aggressive variation of the Fluid setting, whichstipulates that the players have absolutely no room to play the game any other way than theyare directed; they have no creative freedom and they have to maintain their positions as muchas possible. With this setting you're getting the benet of the players sticking to their denedposition and you're keeping the shape of the formation – which will be very dicult for an

opponent to break down and it won't leave players out of position if you're counter-attacked.

Te side-eect of this philosophy is that players won't go out of their 'zone' very often andthey will rarely make overlapping runs or unpredictable manoeuvres – which is very eectivein defence, but not at all in attack – which means you're going to be predictable in what youdo in the build-up play. Tis setting is perfect for making weaker teams harder to break downand oers the manager the ability to keep an 'underdog team' in a game a lot better than anyother setting would; however, it makes things harder when it comes to the team attacking, as you're giving the opposition the advantage of knowing the kind of attacking moves you'll

make before you've made them – which obviously gives them a higher chance of stopping your moves as you're developing them.

Strategy

As said above, Philosophy dictates the spacing between each player, the amount of freedomthe players have to move out of their positions and the dynamic of the team's movement as aunit (i.e. players split between defence and attack or players defending and attacking as oneentity) whilst Strategy dictates the behaviour and mentality of the team. It's this element ofthe tactics module which stipulates how the team will approach and handle the opposition



players. Strategy ties into a team's Philosophy as it's controlling how the team operate withinthe parameters of their Philosophy settings – for example: will they attack the opposition or will they try to contain the threat of the opposition, whilst following the positional settingsthe Philosophy dictates.

You should be aware that it's important to have the right balance between the Philosophy and

the Strategy, because you'd not want them negatively aecting each other. A good example othe impact Philosophy and Strategy can have together would be the Very Fluid settingcombined with the Overload setting. Yes, it would be incredible as an attacking style of play(if it was eective against the opposition and you had players who never lost possession) but, you didn't have those perks, it would be tactical suicide, as you'd be completely disregardingthe defensive aspect of the game in favour of attacking aggressively and being overly creative

So, let's take a look at the dierent Strategy settings and identify, not only how they functionbut how they also aect your tactical settings...

Attacking - Te Attacking strategy does what it says; it's intended to attack the oppositionand create goal-scoring opportunities. With this setting designed to create as many attackingopportunities as possible, you'd be pushing the defensive line higher up the pitch and raisingthe creativity allowances of the team.

Tis strategy also stretches the opposition wide by employing more width and a quickertempo, thus creating gaps in their formation, which are exploited with direct passing andsnappy movement. Obviously, as you'll be widening and stretching your team shape, be awarthat your players will come out of their positions a bit more and you will lose the structure of your formation as you push forward; because of that, this strategy is best suited when you areplaying a weaker opponent, an overly defensive team or when you need a goal, but don't wanto be too 'gung-ho' with your approach.

Contain - Te Contain strategy is eective when you need to throw everyone back intodefence and hold on to your result at all costs. With this setting you’re revoking any attackingmentality for the sake of creating an ultra defensive barricade in front of your own goal.

Tis strategy encourages the team to sit deep and cushion the blow of a heavy attack on thedefence, forsaking any attacking mentality and thus releasing your pressure on the oppositionIt’s ideal when you look like conceding a goal or when you just want to see out a result in thedying embers of a game; but be aware: the Contain strategy is only eective when usedsporadically, as it’s very intensive on your team and will have an adverse aect if executed fortoo long (because you're neglecting getting the ball, keeping possession and then movingfurther up the pitch – which continuously puts your team under defensive pressure).



Control - Te Control strategy is the best way to keep possession and slowly breakdown ateam. It encourages your team to draw the opponent out of position by holding on topossession and frustrating them; then as they come to close you down, you'd exploit the spacthey leave behind them with a decisive pass. It's best suited to those who need to lure a teamout of their defensive strategy, when you simply want to keep the ball (but don't want to be

overly defensive and invite pressure on to yourself) or when you feel you need more controland patience to take the lead.

Tis strategy sits the team slightly deeper, giving them more time and space to move the ballaround, it also drops the passing tempo in order to retain possession of the ball(by not rushin passes or being too direct and thus not giving away possession), as you wait to draw the opponentout of their position.

Counter - Te Counter strategy is the best way to deal with a team who are overly attacking.It allows the opposition to overwhelm you, whilst you wait to win the ball back and then hitthem with a very quick, very aggressive attack. It's best suited to those who need to defend,but don't want to be over-run for the whole game, or for coaxing a defending team out oftheir own position to come on to you, before you then hit them on the break.

Tis strategy keeps the team moderately defensive by dropping the defensive line deeper andnarrowing the width of the team to make the team harder to break down. Tis allows theteam to stay solid at the back, invite pressure onto the team (without being too susceptible tobeing exploited) and gives you the ability to wait for an opportunity to get possession of theball. Once the team has possession, the team immediately switches into a more attacking styl– by employing direct passing and a quick tempo, as players make runs at the opposition goa

Deensive - Te Defensive strategy does what it says; it's intended to be the best defensiveinstruction for holding on to a lead or for a more cautious style of play. It's more suited toteams playing away from home (against fairly strong opponents), when playing someone who's much stronger than you or when playing someone who’s overly aggressive with you.

Tis strategy keeps the team nice and compact by dropping the defensive line closer to thegoal and narrowing the width to make the team harder to break down. However, the team wonly attack after a long build-up of possession, because they will play with a much lowerattacking mentality and a slower tempo. Te main aim is to keep opponents under wraps andaway from the goal.



Overload - Te Overload strategy is the exact opposite of the Contain strategy, as it looks tocompletely overwhelm the opposition with constant pressure and attack. Tis strategyencourages the team to sit higher up the pitch and disregard any defensive mentality for thesake of attacking the opposition. It’s ideal for teams clamouring for a goal or against teams who are constantly defending.

It's the epitome of Kevin Keegan’s Newcastle and their ‘We'll score one more than you’mentality – which is great when it's going well, but has obvious side-eects when it goes wrong; which is why the Overload strategy is only eective when used sporadically; it’s veryintensive and will have an adverse aect if executed for too long, because you'll be extremely vulnerable to exploitation on the counter-attack or exploitation via quick, direct balls toforwards hanging on the end of your high defensive line.

Standard - Te Standard strategy looks for balance in attack and defence; it encourages the

team to maintain its shape and demands they pick their attacking moments carefully, ratherthan go gung-ho. It's best suited to teams who are playing against a similar opponent, orapplied when going into a game you're unsure of(by waiting to see how things develop around you before making a decision on how to approach the opponent).

Tis strategy aims to provide defensive cover and attacking prowess in equal measure; as aresult, all the team settings are all set to the default “balanced” value.

Playing Style

Dening the way your team plays is something you shouldn’t overlook. Tese settings areaected by the other tactical options such as duties, roles, team instructions and touchlineshouts, but realise that the Playing Style options allow managers to ‘ne-tune’ their tacticalapproach and very easily correct any little issues which may be popping up in the match.

Passing Style– Tis dictates the way the team is instructed to pass the ball. A direct passing

style would give the team a more attacking, faster mode of transporting the ball, whilst ashorter pass is more advisable to keep possession. “Default” will allow you to have a balancebetween being quick to the goal and retaining control of the possession.

Something to note: Passing Style and Tempo are linked together. If you play a short passing game,take your time on the ball. If you want to be direct, then play the game with some speed. Direct passing is intended for swift counter-attacking styles of play and short passing is intended for thosewho want to maintain possession and control the game.



Creative Freedom– Tis is much like the Philosophy setting – it denes how much you trus your players to use their instincts and creativity with the ball. If you are concerned that they'renot capable of being productive without following your instructions to the letter(i.e. they havweak creative attributes), then make them play a more disciplined game. Again, selecting the“Default” option will allow you to strike a balance.

Closing Down– Tis allows you to dene the way the team will attempt to reclaim the ball;pressing more would bring your players out of position to go and make a tackle, whilststanding-o more would encourage the players to maintain their shape and wait for the righopportunity to win the ball back. Utilising the “Default” setting would allow a manager tohave a varied style of closing the ball down.

Be aware, both of these settings have side-eects. If you close down, you're putting pressureon the opponent, but at the same time you're abandoning your position and creating space foanother opponent to exploit. If you stand-o more, you're allowing the opponent to get close

to the goal and you're giving them the time to pick out a pass and retain possession.

ackling– Tis allows you to dictate the manner in which the team will attempt to recoverpossession. Being “More Aggressive” instructs a player to go for the ball as soon as he has theopportunity - he will ‘rough up’ the opposition. Being “More Cautious” will tell the players tohold their positions and not dive into a tackle – this makes these players tougher to breakdown or get past.

Tere are side-eect to both settings though. If you're overly aggressive (especially withplayers who have a high Aggression attribute), you're going to get cards in the match. If you'overly passive, you risk not committing to tackles and not getting the ball. If you go with the“Default” setting, you’ll get a balance of being both aggressive and cautious, but you can stillget slight side-eects of either option as a result of sitting on the fence.

Marking– Tis denes the style in which you're going to keep the opposition under wraps.“Man Marking” keeps your players tracking their man, whilst “Zonal Marking” will have youplayers picking up a player who comes into their ‘zone’.

Side-eects with this setting would see “Zonal” markers having to mark more than oneopponent – obviously, this can result in players being unmarked. Whilst “Man” markers woulget dragged out of position whilst trying to pick up their man. Again, the “Default” option would allow you to strike a balance between both marking strategies – but it will also leave you susceptible to the occasional side-eects of both “Man” and “Zonal” marking.



Crossing– Tis species how the man playing the ball into the box will attempt to cross theball. “Floated Crosses” will be expected to arrive at the back post for a header, whilst “DrilledCrosses” will look for a man running to the front post. You can also select to play “Default”crossing, which will attempt to balance between the two options.

Roaming– Tis gives the manager the ability to tell the players to stick to their exact positioor make some movements to nd space around their ‘zone’. “More Roaming” is best suited tothose teams who have good “O the Ball” attributes. “Stick to Position” is advised formanagers who want players to keep the shape of the formation. Selecting “Default” will allowa manager to have players staying mostly in their positions, but sometimes venturing out tond more space.

Specic Instructions

Deensive Line– Tis gives the manager the ability to dictate how high or deep the defence will sit when the team is in possession of the ball. Te higher up the team plays, the morecompacted the team will be in mideld and the less space for the opposition to operate within. Te deeper the line, the less risk of being caught out with long balls over the top of thdefence and thus, less chance of giving players one-on-one situations (whilst at the same timproviding better cover for the goalkeeper).

Width– Tis allows the manager to compact the team or expand the space between players.

Te wider formations allow more space for players to operate in, as the full width of the pitchis used and opposition formations become stretched; the more compacted formations makefor a tighter defence, as there is less space for players to move into near the centre of the goal

empo– Tis can raise or lower the speed at which the players pass the ball. A quick tempocan force the opposition to chase the ball harder, thus making them tire quickly. It can alsocatch the opposition out (with them susceptible to being found out of position). A slowertempo can create better possession, as the team will make less mistakes by rushing and insteacontrolling their passing game.

ime Wasting– Tis allows the manager to set the urgency of the team's mentality. Tehigher the slider is, the more the team tries to play down the clock and stop the game owinthe lower the slider is, the more the team will focus on their tactical instructions and try tokeep the game owing. Wasting time is useful in the dying stages of the game, when trying thold on to a result. Although beware that too much ime Wasting (or triggering the settingtoo early) can cause your team to be too lax and could result in fatal mistakes being made.



Focus Passing– Tis allows the manager to set the areas in which the ball will be played bythe team. If you’re particularly strong in one area or the opposition is particularly weak in onarea, this setting can be very useful for exploiting their formation.

Counter-Attack– Tis gives the manager the ability to have the team sit back and soak uppressure before springing a quick attack on the opposition. Te main danger is that you’d be

allowing your defence to be put under pressure in order to create attacking opportunities, so you’d need to be very well drilled at the back to make this an eective match strategy.

Play Oside rap– Tis gives the manager the ability to order the defence into a uniformedline, which will aim to step up and catch the opposition attackers oside.

Player Roles

Goalkeeper– Tis role will see the goalkeeper act within parameters that encourage simpliciand low risk distribution of the ball. Te goalkeeper will look to get possession and dispatch away from goal to an unmarked player. If he’s unable to dispatch possession to an unmarkedplayer, he will simply play a long ball away from his goal.

Sweeper Keeper– Tis role will see the goalkeeper act with a dual mentality; when defendinhe will aim to perform both as a Goalkeeper, but also as a Sweeper – oering more security tthe defence by sweeping up loose balls around the penalty box; when attacking, he will look ttrigger counter-attacking moves with balls directly to players on the break.

Sweeper – Tis role will see the defender sit behind the defensive line and aim to sweep uploose balls. Tis role will allow more cover at the back as the Sweeper is able to pick upadvanced or breaking attackers and has more time to ponder his tackles and interceptions.

Libero– Tis role is much like that of the Sweeper, but the Libero also ventures forward tosupport the mideld, when the team is in possession of the ball. Tis defender has to beexceptional, as he’s not only the last line of defence, but he’s also an extra attacking-mindedmidelder at times.

Limited Deender– Tis role will see the defender take up a very basic job; he aims to simpl win the ball, without committing a foul and then get the ball cleared out of danger.

Central Deender – Tis role will see the defender get more involved with the ball, as he notonly aims to stop attacking players, but he also aims to keep the team in possession. If he’sunable to nd an open team-mate, he will clear the ball up eld.



Ball-Playing Deender – Tis role will see the defender act with a dual mentality; whendefending, he will aim to perform all the tasks of the Central Defender, looking to win theball and keep possession; when attacking, he will attempt to act similarly to a Deep-LyingPlaymaker – triggering counter-attacking moves from the heart of the defence.

Full-back– Tis role will see the defender get involved in both defending and also attacking

moves. When defending, he will aim to cover the opposition’s winger and keep the player out wide. When attacking, he will aim to perform overlapping runs and help the players in frontof him overload the opposition’s defence.

Wing-back– Tis role is much like that of the Full-back, but the Wing-back is also expectedto play like a Winger. Tis defender usually plays on the ank alone, so he has to be extremeladept at not only performing as a winger, but also a defender. When defending, he will aim tclose down his opponents and win back the ball (in both the defence and the mideld areas) When attacking, he will aim to get into the nal third and deliver crosses.

Deensive Midelder – Tis role will see the midelder perform much like an advancedCentral Defender; he aims to not only protect the defensive line by closing players downquickly, but he also aims to win possession and then hold onto it until the players around himcan get into space. Deep-Lying Playmaker – Tis role will see the midelder act with a dual mentality; whendefending, he will aim to perform similar duties as the Defensive Midelder, looking to winthe ball and regain possession; when attacking, he will aim to perform similar duties as theAdvanced Playmaker, but he will instead initiate attacking moves from deep.

Anchor Man– Tis role will see the midelder perform much like an advanced LimitedDefender; he aims to sit between the defence and the mideld, making challenges and haltinopposition attacks; he will only play simple passes to the players around him and he will rareleave his position to either close players down or support the players in attack.

Central Midelder– Tis role will see the midelder in a position where he’s able to getinvolved in attacking, defending and supporting moves – though not simultaneously, as heisn’t able to perform such an enduring role.

Ball-Winning Midelder– Tis role will see the midelder act with a dual mentality; whendefending, he will aim to perform similar duties as the Defensive Midelder, looking to closedown and win the ball; when attacking, he will aim to perform similar duties to the AdvancePlaymaker, looking to keep possession and create opportunities for players in advanced roles.



Box-o-Box Midelder– Tis role will see the midelder act with a dual mentality; whendefending, he will aim to perform similar duties as the Defensive Midelder, looking toprotect the defensive line, close down opponents and win the ball; when attacking, he will aimto perform similar duties to the Attacking Midelder, looking to get up front to support theforwards with a late run into the box or by hovering deep to make room to receive a pass.

Advanced Playmaker– Tis role will see the midelder or wide forward get into spacesbetween the opposition players and try to, not only create space for his team-mates to passhim the ball (in a bid to keep possession), but he will also fashion chances for his team-mateas he looks to quickly exploit weaknesses in the opponent’s formation.

Wide Midelder– Tis role will see the midelder sit on the ank and aim to supporteveryone around him, as Wide Midelders are required to perform defensive and attackingduties out-wide. Generally speaking, these players aren’t your archetypal Wingers, they’remore like Central Midelders playing on the ank – unlikely to be quick and dangerous,

often relying on their Mental attributes to make up for a lack of Physical prociency.

Winger– Tis role will see the midelder hover out-wide and utilise his Physical abilities tobeat his opponent and to get to the by-line (in an attempt to concoct a crossing opportunity)Not to be confused with the Wide Midelder, the Winger is much more like a wide-playingforward with speed and echnical prociency.

Deensive Winger– Tis role is much like that of the Winger, but this role will also see themidelder pressuring the opposition's wide defender and midelder, with the aim to regainpossession in a vital area of the pitch and then hit the opposition on the break.

Inside Forward– Tis role is much like that of the Winger, but this role sees the InsideForward, drive into the box instead of to the by-line. Te Inside Forward aims run directly atthe centre of the opposition’s defence and open up space for overlapping Full-backs – who will then have space to cross; this can overload a defence, but beware, it can also end up with player running into tight situations he can’t get out of (and thus end up losing possession).

e Inside Forward is best playing on the opposite ank of his strongest foot, as he will shoot moreoften than cross the ball. at's not to say an Inside Forward won't cross the ball, if they're set to a

Support duty they will look to exercise their Crossing attribute more than their Finishing attribute.

Attacking Midelder– Tis role will see the midelder sitting higher up the pitch than anattacking-minded Central Midelder. As a result, the Attacking Midelder will not attackfrom deep and will require exceptional echnical and Mental skills to adapt to the lack ofspace around him. Tis player's job is to create chances both for himself and his team-mates,before the opposition close him down and remove him as a threat on the ball.



requartista– Tis role is much like that of the Advanced Playmaker, but this role will see thmidelder or forward operate with a complete disregard for defending. When attacking, the requartista will drop into holes and drift around looking for space. When defending, the resof the team need to work harder to cover for his lack of defensive responsibility.

Poacher– Tis role will see the forward sit on the shoulder of the last defender, waiting forthe opportunity to break free of the last man and get onto the end of through-balls from themideld. Te Poacher generally aims to score as many goals as he can, and as a result, he’srarely helpful when it comes to building attacking team moves(as he's far more focussed on getting into a scoring position or exploiting a gap, rather than the build-up play).

Deensive Forward– Tis role will see the forward put pressure on the defensive line andchase down loose balls or defenders in possession of the ball. When defending, his aim is tostop the opposing defence having any time on the ball. When attacking, his goal is to keep

things simple and to bring other players into the game(rather than create his own chances,which means that he can be very reliant on his team-mates).

Complete Forward– Tis role will see the forward act in three ways: like that of a Deep-Lying Forward, a Poacher and a arget Man. Te Complete Forward is technically gifted, as well as strong and powerful, which means he will not only score goals, but he’s also looking tosetup his team-mates and get into the right areas to nish o team moves.

e Complete Forward should not be tied down to strict instructions and would be most eectivewhen given the “Creative Freedom” to play the game in his own way, following his own instinct.

Deep-Lying Forward– Tis role will see the forward link the mideld with the attackers; heaims to drop back into gaps in the opposition's formation, collect the ball, hold-up play andthen supply the ball back into the mideld or wide to the anks. Essentially, he’s a ‘hold-up’player, who will buy time for others to get into positions to support him and keep possession

Advanced Forward– Tis role will see the forward as the focal point of the attack; he aims tstay high up the pitch and lead the line. When attacking, he will be required to both score an

create goals. When defending, he will aim to chase clearances or loose balls, as well as winpossession and keep the ball by passing to a team-mate or by creating a crossing opportunity

arget Man– Tis role will see the forward use his Physical attributes to gain an advantageover the opposition defenders. He aims to be a strong presence in the air and also on theground, as he looks to create space and opportunities for those around him.



Duties

Duties set the mentality of the players and how they will behave within their assignedposition and role. Tey come in four dierent settings: Attack, Defend, Support and (in some wider roles) Automatic.

Duty Description and Eect

Attack Tis will increase the amount of attacking manoeuvres a player will look tomake. So expect more runs, more running with the ball and an increase ofpressure on the ball from the player’s position.

Deend Tis will minimise the amount of attacking moves a player makes – forexample: players will not run with the ball and will not make so many forward

runs. Tis encourages a player to stay back and keep in formation, making surethat they focus more on defending than anything else.

Support Tis will encourage players to hold their positions behind the more attackingplayers and oer them assistance ahead of the defensive players. Tey won’t beas attacking as the Attack duty players, instead they will look to be moredecisive, trying to break teams down with timed passes and through-balls.

Automatic Tis will trigger the most appropriate duty depending on the Strategy you’veevoked. When the team attacks, the Automatic duty will adopt the Attackduty; when the team defends, the Automatic duty will adopt the Defend duty,et cetera.

Combining Duties and Roles

Tis is quite a tricky department because you’re mixing more elements into a player’sinstructions, but it’s vital that you make the right decisions with these assignments, because iallows you to dictate how the players focus on their roles. Most importantly, you need to ndbalance between the role you’ve asked the player to undertake and the duties you expect theplayer to full in that role – because the choices you make can have a big dierence as to howsuccessful that player is in occupying that role and exacting those duty instructions.



Goalkeeper– When set to a Defend duty and cautious tactical settings, the Goalkeeper willaim to clear the ball high up the pitch and out of danger. With more aggressive tactics, he wiplay the ball out to his nearest defender, in a bid to keep possession and work the ball forwar

Sweeper Keeper– When set to a Defend duty, the Sweeper Keeper will be extremely cautiou

and will only play counter-attacking balls when they’re possible. When set to a Support dutythe Sweeper Keeper will venture just outside of his box and look to initiate counter-attackingpasses more often. When set to an Attack duty the Sweeper Keeper will travel a considerabledistance from his penalty box, dribbling the ball out into the defence, looking to execute thatdeadly pass.

Sweeper – When set to a Defend duty, the Sweeper will look to stay back and hold hisposition, secure possession and remove any danger that comes his way.

Libero– When set to a Support duty, the Libero will step into mideld where his team-mathave possession, will look to get the ball and then move it on to attacking team-mates. Whenset to an Attack duty, the Libero ventures higher up the pitch, aiming to provide a scoringthreat from deep, as well as looking to create opportunities for his team-mates.

Limited Deender/Central Deender/Ball-Playing Deender– When set to a Defend duty,the defender will stay in line which his defensive partner, mark his opponent and simply lookto stop the ball getting into the box. When set to a Stopper duty, the defender will break freeof the defensive line and will attempt to close down players more often. When set to aCovering duty, the defender will drop a little deeper and act somewhat like a Sweeper.

Full-back– When set to a Defend duty, the Full-back will stay back with the rest of thedefence and will make simple passes into space (rather than move with the ball down theank). When set to a Support duty, the Full-back will support the mideld by getting moreinvolved in the play and will look to cross or execute a through-ball. When set to an Attackduty, the Full-back will be overlapping the midelders and attempting to provide rst timecrosses into the box. When set to an Automatic duty, the Full-back will switch betweenAttack, Support and Defend – depending on the strategy employed.

Wing-back– When set to a Defend duty, the Wing-back will often stay in defence, but willstill try to make crossing opportunities when he’s not under defensive pressure. When set to Support duty, the Wing-back aims to provide through-balls from out wide, as well as providea good crossing service. When set to an Attack duty the Wing-back aims to overlap down thank, run at opponents and create an opportunity to cross from the by-line. When set to anAutomatic duty, the Wing-back will switch between Attack, Support and Defend –depending on the strategy employed.



Deensive Midelder/Deep-Lying Playmaker– When set to a Defend duty, the player willlook to hold his position and keep possession, although he won’t attempt to get forward. When set to a Support duty, the player will then go forward and support attacking moves; he will look for both long shot and through-ball situations which he can exploit as he moves theball out of his half.

Anchor Man– When set to a Defend duty, the Anchor Man will sit in front of the defenceand will act like an slightly advanced defender; he will not support attacking moves nor willhe join attacks; he will rarely venture from his position, as he completely focusses on guardinthe defence.

Central Midelder– When set to a Defend duty, the Central Midelder will sit in front ofthe defence and simply support his team from that position. When set to a Support duty themidelder will look to sit in the middle of the pitch and get the ball to players in front of him When set to an Attack duty, the player will get forward and into the box to support the

forwards; he will also drift out wide to support the wingers and will generally look to generatopportunities for players in front of him.

Ball-Winning Midelder– When set to a Defend duty, the Ball-Winning Midelder willsimply win the ball and give it to a team-mate. When set to a Support duty, the player will trto win the ball higher up the pitch and will get more involved in counter-attacking situations

Box-o-Box Midelder– When set to a Support duty, the Box-o-Box Midelder will notonly support the forwards, get into the box late (in a bid to oer assistance and options toplayers in more advanced positions) but he will also get back to protect the defence.

Advanced Playmaker– When set to a Support duty, the Advanced Playmaker will look tomove into the hole and support the midelders and forwards. When set to an Attack duty, thAdvanced Playmaker will run at the opposition from deeper positions, with the intention ofcrossing or creating a through-ball situation.

Wide Midelder– When set to a Defend duty, the Wide Midelder will drop deeper and will cross from that position. When set to a Support duty, the Wide Midelder will staydeeper and attempt to play through-balls or a cross into the box from a wide position. When

set to an Attack duty, the Wide Midelder will look to play quick crosses from higher up thepitch. When set to an Automatic duty, the Wide Midelder will switch between Attack,Support and Defend – depending on the strategy employed.

Winger– When set to a Support duty, the Winger will attempt to beat the players in front ohim and get into a crossing position. When set to an Attack duty, the Winger will look todestabilise the opposition defence by running directly at them, with the objective of executina cross, a shot or a through-ball.



Deensive Winger– When set to a Support duty, the Defensive Winger will close down theplayers in front of him and will try to recover possession; once he has possession, he willattempt to get past players and get in an early cross for the forwards. When set to an Attackduty, the Defensive Winger will look to destabilise the opposition defence by running directlat them, with the objective of executing a cross, a shot or a through-ball.

Inside Forward– When set to a Support duty, the Inside Forward will cut inside, behind thedefence and will look to create through-ball opportunities or take a shot from distance. Wheset to an Attack duty, the Inside Forward will run directly at the defence, looking to eithershoot, cross or open up passing options as he moves towards the defence.

Attacking Midelder– When set to a Support duty, the Attacking Midelder will help out with defending by sitting deeper, rather than getting into the box to support the attackingplayers. When set to an Attack duty, the Attacking Midelder looks to create opportunities

and get in the box to bolster the attacking options.

requartista– When set to an Attack duty, the requartista is far less defensive than histeam-mates and will be the focus of attacking moves; he will drop into the holes betweenmideld and defence, trying to nd space when he’s not in possession.

Poacher– When set to an Attack duty, the Poacher will sit on the last man, waiting forthrough-balls to be played to him. He will always look to get into a central position for a goascoring opportunity, will run at defenders and will sometimes even cross the ball – mostlythough, he plays little to no part in the creation of attacking moves.

Deensive Forward– When set to a Support duty, the Defensive Forward will drop a littledeeper into the mideld to put pressure on the opposition’s Defensive Midelder. When setto an Attack duty, he will press the defence instead of the Defensive Midelder and will try tpressure the defenders into making mistakes.

Complete Forward– When set to a Support duty, the Complete Forward will look for spacerun at the defenders, take shots from distance, drive out wide into the Winger’s position andplay passes through the defensive line. When set to an Attack duty, the Complete Forward

will lead the line, looking to initiate attacking moves and create chances for both himself andhis team-mates.

Deep-Lying Forward– When set to a Support duty, the Deep-Lying Forward will aim tobring team-mates into play before attacking the box from deep. When set to an Attack duty,the player will look to create chances for himself and the others around him.



Advanced Forward– When set to an Attack duty, the Advanced Forward will look to scoreand create goals, as well as chase down misplaced passes, win possession and pass or cross theball for his team-mates.

arget Man– When set to a Support duty, the arget Man will look to win any ick-ons an will play basic passes to his team-mates to bring them into play. When set to an Attack duty,

the arget Man will lead the line, draw the defenders to him and thus create space for histeam-mates to exploit.

Positioning

Positioning is a very straight-forward area of tactics, but sometimes you need to put a playerin a position that he is uncomfortable playing in. So, here are a few quick indications as to what the positioning indicators mean and how they will aect the player in each role…

Comfort Description and Eect

Natural Tis indicator represents the player’s best position on the eld. Any playeroccupying his natural role will be able to perform at his very best each timehe plays in this role.

Accomplished Tis tag represents the player’s second best position on the eld. Anyplayer occupying this role will be able to perform in a strong manner and



will generally put in very good performances.

Competent Tis indicator represents the player’s most average position on the eld.Any player occupying this role will be able to perform moderately well inthis area, but it’s not suited to any player who’d need to occupy this role

long-term.

Unconvincing Tis indicator represents a player out of his position. Any player occupyingthis role will be able to perform at a decent level, but only for a very shortperiod of time.

Awkward Tis indicator represents a player out of his comfort zone. Any playeroccupying this role will be able to cover in desperate circumstances, but he will be struggling to perform anywhere near his abilities.

Ineectual Tis indicator represents a player completely out of his depth. Any playeroccupying this role will be unable to perform and won’t have anything buta negative eect on the team whilst operating under these conditions.

Set-Pieces

When you nd that you’re struggling to be clinical in front of goal, the importance of set-pieces becomes blindingly apparent. Don’t waste opportunities by ignoring the setup of whatcould be a breakthrough moment in a match.

Te rst objective is to identify the best players at taking each set-piece: corners, throw-ins,

penalties and free-kicks…

✔ A good corner taker will obviously require good Crossing ability, as would a good freekick taker (indirect free-kicks). You need to consider which foot a player would beusing when taking the corner or free-kick, as it would impact on the trajectory of thecross depending on which area of the pitch the set-piece was.



✔ If you are looking for a free-kick taker who would be taking direct free-kicks, he’drequire good Long Shots, Finishing and echnique, as well as Composure, Decisionsand Concentration.

✔ Trow-in takers should have a good Long Trows attribute, as well as Strength andDecisions to execute with precision. Long Trows are most eective in and around th

penalty area.

✔ Penalty takers should have a high Penalty aking attribute, good Finishing, and mostimportantly: Composure and Concentration. Te latter attributes are important toconsider in situations where you don’t appear to have a technically gifted penalty taker

Something to note with regards to set-pieces: good execution is not only reliant on the Technicalattributes of players; Mental attributes such as Decisions, Concentration and Composure will play a

part in all set-pieces to some degree. After all, it’s useless a player being able to hit the ball well, if heopts to hit it in the wrong direction, is unable to focus or cannot adequately control his nerves.

Captaincy

Selecting the right captain for your team can be the dierence between having a strong teamunit or not. Whilst you’re the leader o the pitch, the captain is the leader on the pitch. As

such, you’re going to need the right representative to delegate instruction and responsibility t when you’re not in full control of what’s happening out on the eld.

When considering your captain, the main thing to look for is a high Inuence attribute.Anyone with a ‘17’ or above here should be short-listed as a candidate(as your captain shouldbe mentally strong enough to inuence his team-mates). You can narrow down your candidates by viewing a player’s personality – a “Born Leader” is obviously the kind of man you’re lookingfor, whilst “Determined” and “Model Professional” personalities are also solid choices(personalities should coincide with their Inuence attributes).

If you refer to the “Player Personalities” section of this guide, you will be able to see how each personality would aect captaincy and which attributes would be best avoided when selecting acaptain.



Your choice of captain will not just aect the team in terms of them having a leader on thepitch, but it can also aect their morale, their motivation and can trigger psychological eectin players. Some players will not enjoy playing for a particular player, so it’s important that yoascertain which personalities you have in you team and how the captain will functionalongside those personalities. Te best idea would be to workout which is the most frequentpersonality type in the squad and try to nd a captain to match – this way you’ve got a better

chance of creating a team unit, rather than a team of individuals.

Other important considerations could be how the players at the club view the captain; is youchoice of captain popular amongst his team-mates, does he have enemies within the squad? Would you be upsetting the team by removing the current captain or vice-captain? How longhas the potential captain been at the club? Will your captain have a long future in the team ois he close to hanging up his boots?

Don’t forget to consider the player’s age and experience, it can make all the dierence to install aseasoned captain rather than a rookie captain. However, it's important to consider how long this player will be captain for; you do not want to upset the balance and harmony of the team byrepeatedly appointing new leadership.



- Chapter Six -

Understanding the Fundamental Elements o Scouting

Scouting is a relatively simple process, but it's also very important. From day dot, your team i

on a ticking clock which will eventually render your players useless, so you have to make sure you're one step ahead when it comes to replacing your players. You have a number of avenuesto explore, so take time to make use of the options at hand – for example: it’s imperative that you assign your scouts to search other regions, as this will boost your Scouting Knowledge an will give you a far bigger pool of players to review in the transfer market or player search area

Scouting ips

Firstly, you have a scouting section which allows you to assign your scouts to do some researcin dierent areas of the world. Tis gives you a fantastically easy way to gather information oplayers and to possibly stumble upon a star, without having to do anything but set the area in which you want the scout to search. Tis is something you have got to do in order to boost your global scouting knowledge – which is vital to the amount of player data you will be givein areas such as the transfer market; with this you could scout your entire home nation byassigning multiple scouts to look for players in specic age groups and competitions, or youcould look for global stars by searching for age groups on dierent continents.

It’s always advisable to have as many scouts as you’re allowed to employ and then have all but one ofthem working on scouting (with the spare scout checking out your next opponent).

Secondly, you have the ability to look at any club and assign one of your scouts to review theplayer. Tis is a less eective way of nding talent initially, because it takes time to go througthe whole process (and of course, you’re nding the talent yourself, the scout is just assessingthe level of the player), but it allows you to determine more about a player before you make aapproach – which is something you should absolutely do; there is nothing worse than buyinga player who is going to let you down.

Tirdly, you have a player comparison feature which allows you to view the attributes of twoplayers and see the contrast between them. Tis is something you should look to utilisefrequently, as it gives you a better idea of which player will make the bigger impact on yourteam and it will also take emphasis o the attribute digits – which can deceive anyone intothinking that a player is better than he actually is.



Fourthly, you have the transfer market. Tis is probably the easiest way to nd players who aravailable for your team to purchase. Not only can you lter the players, but they’re listed in a way which makes it very easy for a manager to compare the player’s general details.

Lastly, you have the ability to lter the transfer market via positional attributes and roles (likethe option immediately above, although slightly dierent). Tis is the best way to detect the

talent that any club have and to nd a player to ll any positions that you're looking for. If yocombine the attribute data for the role or duty you want to occupy and lter it via the transfemarket, you have a very easy way to discover the best players in each role(obviously, as said previously, you'd need good scouting knowledge to best make use of this feature). If you couple theplayer search lters with the tick-box showing your own players in the search results, you’ll ga good idea of how potential acquisitions compare to those at your club, which is very helpfu

Building a Squad

People often struggle to know who to buy and what positions to cater for; now it’s even moreconfusing for people since the introduction of the new tactics creator and the more detailedpositions and roles. What you need to do is give it some thought – think about who yourstrongest players are and how much time they will be spending on the pitch; think about which positions will need to be substituted more often during the game; think about theNatural Fitness attributes of your players and how likely they are to tire over the season (and with training) – what you'll see is that you're looking to buy variety and versatility; you'relooking to have a strong rst-team and a strong bench, so you can make adjustments to theteam or the structure of your tactic and still be as strong as you were under the tactic which you built your team around.

You want to buy a mixture of players who can oer you something dierent in each position –this gives you versatility – there’s nothing worse than the transfer window closing and yousuddenly nd that your formation isn’t working very well and you don’t have the right playersfor the new roles you want to employ. So, give it some serious thought as to what kind of role you’re looking for in each position and try to create a diverse team, with players who oer youdierent options. If you need to, train a player in a new position – this can also add versatility

to the ranks.

Also, don’t forget to consider the three attribute categories for each position: Mental, Technical andPhysical. Players who look weak in one of those departments could be strong in another – this often gives that player something totally dierent to oer you. is also extends to Preferred Player Moveswhich can be learned or forgotten (if you wish) with Tutoring.



Below is a brief outline of what you should be looking for in your team…

Goalkeeper– you're going to want at least three Goalkeepers in your team. You should lookto have players who are capable of oering you versatility in their positions and this position no dierent; so try to look for a general Goalkeeper or two, and someone who can play as aSweeper Keeper (or vice-versa, whatever you prefer to do).

Deenders (centre) – you're going to need at least ve Central Defenders. Obviously there ardierent kinds of centrally placed defenders available: Sweepers, Ball-Playing Defenders,Central Defenders, Limited Defenders and the Libero. So remember to mix things up andbuy players who will give you options at the back. You don’t need to radically change yourshape to alter the eectiveness of a specic position; just ponder what kind of versatility you’rlooking for.

Deenders (wide)– you're going to want to pick up four players who can play in these areas.

Ideally, you will want two Wing-backs for each ank and two Full-backs for each side as welIf you opt for backup wide defenders you should try and get a versatile player for each ank(i.e. a player who can play both as a Wing-back and as a Full-back).

Deensive Midelders– you're going to need at least two Defensive Midelders(three, if you're planning on playing more than one Defensive Midelder in your tactic). DefensiveMidelders, Deep-Lying Playmakers and Anchor Men are the kind of players you might want to vary between. You may feel you’d rather have an extra back-up Deep-LyingPlaymaker, rather than an Anchor Man – that's perfectly ne, if that’s what works best for your team; just consider the importance of variety in this pivotal position.

Midelders (centre)– you’re going to need four Central Mideld players (if you play withtwo in the middle) or three (if you play with one in the middle). If you’re playing with morethan two, obviously you’ll need more cover – so look for around ve or six players. Te roles you will want to consider are the Central Midelder, the Ball-Winning Midelder, the Box- o-Box Midelder and the Advanced Playmaker. Most people look for echnical attributesin this area of the eld, but remember that Mental attributes are vital as well. Depending on your tactical shape, give some thought as to how you want these players to move around thepark and the impact you want from them – then factor that into the type of midelder you’re

looking for.

Midelders (wide)– you’re probably going to need around four Wide Midelders (if you usethem in your formation). Make note of the dierence in playing Wingers, Defensive Wingerand Inside Forwards, in comparison to the Wide Midelder; each role oers somethingdierent in wide players, so keep an eye on which role and duty would be most eective in your team and try to add variety, as well as balance to your wing-play.



Attacking Midelders– again, the required number depends on how many you’re playing in your tactic. You have two options in this position: the Attacking Midelder or the requartista. Te benets of the latter is that a requartista can play up front too, so you havesome extra cover for that position; but remember that these roles oer dierent things, socheck the positional descriptions to see what each role would oer to your tactic.

Wingers– just as stated with the Wide Midelders, you'll want four wide men in total; eithetwo Wingers, Defensive Wingers, Inside Forwards or two Wide Midelders, for each ank(depending on your tactics). As with the other wide positions, try and nd versatility where you can (i.e. a player who can play in both wide positions and players who are comfortable oneither ank).

Forwards– again, it’s a exible position, so you’ll want to consider which variation of forwar you need. You have several options: arget Man, requartista, Poacher, Defensive Forward,Complete Forward, Deep-Lying Forward and Advanced Forward. You’re only going to need

around four forwards (depending on your tactical shape); three up front would require arounve forwards, whilst one up front would require three forwards. Before settling on a player,consider their dierent roles and how that kind of forward would work alongside anotherforward (as well as what each forward role will oer you in your tactic.)

If you follow those numbers, you’ll end up with a complete squad. Obviously, any extra playeshould be relegated to the reserve team or loaned out to get some rst-team action.

Something very important to consider is the art of developing players; this is described in detail in th“Understanding the Fundamental Elements of Training” section below, but to basically surmise the point – you don’t need to buy players for each position. You have the ability to train your players andmake them learn new positions, new Preferred Player Moves and you can develop their attributes;so, consider that when you’re looking at buying variety for your team; you may not have to buy players, if you have potential in your side which you can cultivate yourself.



- Chapter Eight -

Understanding the Fundamental Elements o raining

raining is one of those things that most people dismiss as unimportant, after all you can just

download a training schedule, right? Well to be frank, downloading a training schedule is likdownloading a tactic – it might promise the world, it might even have been superb for it’screator, but it’s not tailor-made to your team and that’s why it’s always best to spend a fewmoments working on your own thing.

raining is not simply assigning players to training schedules and then going to play a matchIt comes down to a number of elements which tie player development together:

• Current Ability & Potential Ability

• Te Backroom Sta• raining Schedules

• utoring

• Preferred Player Moves

• Individual raining Focus

• Positional raining

• Match Preparation

As you can see, it's important to spend some time assessing your team, seeing who needs toimprove in each area and then focussing on improving players as individuals rather than as agroup. So, let's look at the variables involved and how to understand player development, the we'll put the dierent training aspects under inspection and see how it all ties together.

Understanding Player Development

As we now know, training is divided into several sectors, all of which combine to make thetraining module. Tese sectors allow you to develop players in specic areas and give you theability to mould a player into the type of player you want. Tere are a number of things whicaect training though, things such as age limitaions, Current and Potential Ability and moreimportantly the way you opt to sculpt your players. Firstly, we'll take a look at the impactingfactors related to player development and we'll breakdown the training module – so that it'seasy to understand how players are developing under your guidance – then we'll go into the ways in which you can develop the talent you have.



Te Dynamics and Functionality o raining

Tis is probably one of the most confusing elements of the whole training module, because whilst you can setup training schedules and see progress when training individual attributes, alot of people struggle to understand how training actually works or how a schedule actually works.

It's important to know that training is basically a way to focus your players on improving inspecic areas. Players will always improve to some degree (unless you rest them from trainingand don't play them),so ignoring training completely and leaving the default schedules inplace will always give you some results. However, the problem with leaving the players ondefault schedules and ignoring their needs as individuals is that the results would not benet your players – they'd be lacking focus in the areas you'd want them to be improving in, withthe player instead improving inallareas. Now, whilst that sounds good, what it means is aplayer is diluting his training to improve in an all-around fashion rather than solely focussingon the attributes he needs for his position (think of a Poacher training his Defendingattributes as much as he's training his Attacking attributes) – this is something which is a bigsetback when you consider that Current and Potential Ability aect the amount of training aplayer can benet from.

Te best way to describe the eects of Current and Potential Ability on training would be tothink of a glass half lled with water. Now, think of the water as Current Ability and the glasas Potential Ability, with the distance between the top of the water and the top of the glass athe maximum amount of room for expansion that the water could reach before the glass islled. What this should make you realise is that there is a limit to how much improvement a

player can make. Now, if you couple that piece of information with the fact that a player isalways improving, then you should suddenly see how important it is to have your playerstraining in the areas which are most important for their positions; because if you fail to dothat, you're wasting the room for growth that the player has – because as time goes on andthey're improving in the wrong areas, you're left with much less room to improve that playerin the areas you need him to be improving in.

Once you understand those dynamics, it shows how vital it is for you to focus on improvingplayers as individuals and not training players in groups based on their positions. Te most

ideal method of training is to train players based on their roles and duties, complementingcustom-created training schedules(tailored to improve as many of attributes required for the player's role/duty as possible)with Individual raining Focus(to improve any attributes required for a player's role/duty which the training schedule is neglecting).Tis does of course mean that you'd have to set up a lot of training schedules, but it's the only way to maximise results. Youcan alternatively create more generalised training schedules(for multiple players to operateunder one schedule), but try to make sure you're benetting your players more than being lazy.



Monitoring and Assessing Player Development

You can see how players are improving via the training tab in their prole. Inside this section you can see how the player is responding to training, how happy a player is with his training workload, how suited to the training schedule a player is and you also get an overview of theareas the player is training in. It's important to not only monitor this every 2-3 months, but

it's important to understand what you're actually looking at, because this is key to maximisinthe results you'll get from your training methods.

Firstly, you want to focus on the player's training graph. Tis is a representation of how well aplayer is developing under his current training schedule, with each bar on the graphrepresenting the aspect of training a player will be able to work on (Defending, Attacking, etcetera). You should be using this as a guideline to, not only show you how well a player istraining under his schedule, but also as a way to improve a player's training schedule until it'sperfect for that player (by adjusting the a player's training schedule focus, you will be able to

lower the less relevant bars in order to raise the more relevant bars).

is is why it's best to have individual training schedules for each player, because you're going to getbetter results by adjusting one schedule for each player, knowing it won't aect another player'sroutine or his training results.

Secondly, you will want to focus on the individual attributes, which you can monitor by usingthe tick-box in the top right-hand corner. Tis allows you to see results of how a player's

attributes have been aected by his training schedule and Individual raining Focus. Usingthis alongside the training graph can give you an excellent insight as to how a player isdeveloping and can give you an indication as to what you need to focus on to improve bothhis suitability to a role or duty, or what you need to adjust in his training schedule to make itmore ecient for him.

Age Limitations

Age can have a big impact on a player’s growth, with players hitting their peaks at specicpoints in time. ypically, once a player has hit the age of 26 years old, you’re not likely to see big increase in his abilities. raining schedules, Positional raining, Individual raining Focuand Preferred Player Moves will all help maintain and slightly improve what’s already there,but you’re never going to see a decent 26 year-old turn into a world-class player.

Also, worth noting are the age ranges when a player will hit his peak. Goalkeepers hit theirpeaks between 31 and 34 years old; Defenders and Midelders both hit their peaks between



27 and 32 years old; whilst Forwards hit their peaks between 26 and 31 years old.

is is a great bit of information for consideration when scouting or pondering who to play; after alif your star goalkeeper is about to nish his career, it might be worth trying to get your future'number one' between the sticks for some essential experience.

Generally speaking, when a player has past their peak you’ll start to notice a decline in theirPhysical attributes, but with age comes experience, so their Mental attributes should rise tobalance the loss of movement. Tis is what can give a player longevity and it's something thaa quality manager will take advantage of, because if you can see that an ageing winger (forexample) is losing his pace, but he's improving his Mental attributes, you could change histraining to make him focus less on the Physical side of the game(taking care not to neglect it,but instead trying to maintain his attributes rather than improve them)and then have him trainin a more central position where his lack of movement won't be a hinderance.

Club Limitations

Something to consider would be the quality of your coaching sta and the standard of yourfacilities. It’s vitally important that you provide the best resources to your players, as withoutthem you wouldn’t get the level of training that you could get via a strong facility and a supercoaching team. Now it's not always possible to build such facilities at your club, nor is italways possible to bring in the best sta, but you should still try to get the best peopleavailable to you and also look to encourage the board to allow you more sta or improve you

current facilities.

ry and work on these areas rather than repeatedly bringing new players into your club; tryand save transfer money for investment into these areas of development and you’ll soon beproducing talent instead of buying it. It can be a risk at times, but if you're condent in aplayer's potential, you can really benet from nurturing talent and creating strong facilities.

Te Backroom Sta

Once you understand player development, it's important to understand the dynamics of yourbackroom setup. Every manager is surrounded by a team of sta who should compensate for what he cannot do – ideally, with the same ability the manager possesses in his areas ofexpertise. Tere will come a point when you must delegate responsibilities and you will wantto trust that your sta will do a good job with something you cannot do yourself; this is why your sta team is so vital to your success and this is why you must take care when you're



recruiting and pruning your assistants.

Right now we'll take a look at the backroom sta, their attributes and their impact on theteam. Once we've broken those areas down, we'll cover some quick tips and pointers, before we look at how sta roles function within the training module and the training module itself.

Sta Attributes


Attacking Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at coaching attackingattributes. Tis is not an indication as to how attacking theirtraining methods or style of play may be.

Coaching Goalkeepers Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at coachinggoalkeeping attributes.

Deending Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at coaching defensiveattributes. Tis is not an indication as to how defensive theirtraining methods or style of play may be.

Fitness Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at coaching physicalattributes and maintaining a player’s tness level.

Man Management Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at co-ordinating theteam around him and keeping players, not only on their bestbehaviour, but also keeping player's happy with their training.

Mental Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at understanding aplayer’s mental state of mind.

actical Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at understanding the



dynamics of tactics (useful for feedback) and how well they cancoach the tactical aspects of training.

echnical Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at coaching technicalattributes and the technical aspects of training, such as set-pieces

and shooting.

Working withYoungsters

Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at coaching anddeveloping young players.

Adaptability Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at settling into a newrole or a dierent country. It’s an indication to how fast they willpick up their new job and perform it at the standard you expect.

Determination Tis indicates how driven a sta member is to succeed in his role. Tis is an indication of how well the sta member will performhis duties and how focussed he is to do a good job.

Judging Player Ability Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at scouting a playerand then drawing a conclusion on his overall abilities as a player.

Judging PlayerPotential

Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at scouting a playerand then drawing a conclusion on their future abilities as a player.

Level o Discipline Tis indicates how strict a sta member will be when coaching

the team and the level of focus he will expect from players whentraining them.

Motivating Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at encouraging theplayers to perform and train well, and how inuential he is atkeeping players focussed on their goals.



Physiotherapy Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at rehabilitatinginjuries and also keeping squad injuries at a low rate.

actical Knowledge Tis indicates how skilled a sta member is at grasping and

employing tactical concepts. It indicates an ability to concoctdierent tactical ideas which other sta members may not be ableto think of.

Just as the importance of scouting was highlighted earlier, the compiling of the backroom stateam is something which will require you taking some time to setup, but it’s absolutely worththe eort in the long term. After all, why spend hours examining where everything is going

wrong, when you can spend ten minutes recruiting a sta team who’d tell you in an instant?

Coaching Assignments

Below you can see an outline of the dierent sta positions at your club and where thesestaers can be assigned in scheduled training. Tis should give you some idea of who you'd bbetter o recruiting for your sta team.

Position Training Category Assigment

Coach You can assign Coaches to both the First-eam and Youth team.Coaches can also be assigned to work on all the other areas oftraining: Strength, Aerobic, Goalkeeper Shot-Stopping, GoalkeeperHandling, actics, Ball Control, Defending, Attacking and Shooting.



First-eam Coach You can assign First-eam coaches to only the First-eam; thesecoaches cannot train the Youth team. First-eam coaches can also beassigned to work on all the other areas of training: Strength, Aerobic,Goalkeeper Shot-Stopping, Goalkeeper Handling, actics, Ball

Control, Defending, Attacking and Shooting.

Youth Coach You can assign Youth coaches to only the Youth team; these coachescannot train the First-eam. Youth coaches can also be assigned to work on all the other areas of training: Strength, Aerobic, GoalkeeperShot-Stopping, Goalkeeper Handling, actics, Ball Control,Defending, Attacking and Shooting.

GoalkeepingCoach

Goalkeeping Coaches can be assigned to work on both GoalkeeperShot-Stopping and Goalkeeper Handling training.

Fitness Coach Fitness Coaches can be assigned to work on both Strength andAerobic training.

Assistant Manager Assistant Managers can be assigned to work on all areas of training:Strength, Aerobic, Goalkeeper Shot-Stopping, Goalkeeper Handling, actics, Ball Control, Defending, Attacking and Shooting.

Something worth noting is that coaches with good Determination, Level of Discipline and Motivating attributes will help improve a coach’s ‘star rating’ in all training categories.

raining Schedules

A lot of people get confused when discussing training because it's not something that's everneeded much attention. It still doesn't really require a lot of eort, but let me explain why youshould work on your schedules and what happens if you don't.

raining schedules are very simple; they're a direction for how you want your players to



improve and how hard you expect them to work on those designated areas. Players willimprove with or without a training schedule – that's why ignoring the setup doesn't result inplayers losing their attributes – player improvement comes from match experience andtraining workload; training schedules are only there to direct the players in which areas you want the player to be improving on as they're fullling their Potential Ability.

Note: the only way to stop a player's growth would be to stop them from playing and keep themresting instead of training. at's why player attributes decline when they're injured or not playing.

At the start of your tenure at the club your players will be assigned to the default trainingschedule. Many managers leave scheduled training as it is or they'll make small adjustments tthe sliders and never touch them again. It’s important that you spend some time working onthe training setup so that you can, not only improve your players, but so you can also easilyunderstand the mechanics of your own system and how your players are being trained.

What's usually best is to get to know your players, decide on which role/duty you will beassigning your players to and then making a schedule for each player (making the settingsrelative to the attributes the player will need most for their role/duty). I know this seemsextreme, but this allows you to tailor schedules to every player and it gives you a massiveadvantage in terms of development because you'll be able to tweak a player's schedule to suitthat player perfectly, avoiding the issue of having to worry about the changes aecting otherplayers. It doesn't take long to get things setup this way and it's much, much easier to managa player's training because you're able to see exactly how well the player is learning from hisschedule(by using the training graph)and then tweak his training schedule, knowing that it won't aect any other player.

Schedule Dynamics

With each schedule you have a variation of workload settings which range from “Light raining” to “Intensive”. Tese workloads are adjusted by sliders, which span from 1 to 26notches. It’s recommended that you look to nd balance in the training schedules, as you canhave a negative eect on your players if you’re too ‘gung-ho’ with the overall training intensit

Te point about balance is the most vital. You should lower anything which is unimportant toa player's role/duty and look to maximise the areas which are most important (covering anyattributes vital to a role/duty which schedules aren't covering by using Individual rainingFocus). Do not go overboard with the intensity though, as workloads which are too high canresult in injuries, which will force the player to stop training.

Something very important to note is that it can take a couple of months before a training



schedule can become eective, so set your schedules up with caution in mind, then everycouple of months, make adjustments –checking the training graph in a player's prole to see howthe player's schedule is working on him and if he's happy with it.

Assigning Coaches o Schedules

Don’t spread the coaching sta thin; you want to keep the training ratings as high as possibleand having coaches occupy too many roles or take on too many responsibilities can make theinput on training ineective – this will make their ‘star rating’ fall. Te aim is to keep the ‘starrating’ as high as possible, yet at the same time make sure you’re not putting all the workloadon one coach.

Te ideal setup would be to have a minimum of two coaches per training category, using

coaches who are not exceptional at anything as 'oaters' by placing them in several categoriesand using them to lighten the workload on the skilled coaches (who'd only be assigned to oncategory). I often use the Assistant Manager as the 'oater', but in some cases the AssistantManager is exceptional in one area of training, so make sure you experiment with coachingassignments and try moving coaches around until you have your optimal ratings on eachtraining area.

Now, it’s not always possible to have so many coaches at your club – you may not have the wages or the board may not allow it – so it’s important to nd a balance between a ‘star ratingand a coach’s workload. It’s better for small clubs to only recruit sta they’d desperately need for example: don’t hire coaches who are only able to work with the rst-team or youth team;get coaches who can cover the entire span of the training groups. You’re not going to get closto having maximum ‘star ratings’ at most clubs, so it’s best to try and work with what youhave; try to get their coaching to a decent standard and then speak to the board on a semi-regular basis, to see if you can get more sta into the club or to try and improve your facilitie

Attributes Improved via Scheduled raining

Area Description and Eect

Strength Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirNatural Fitness, Stamina, Strength and Work Rate attributes. For thebest impact on these attributes you will want coaches with a highFitness attribute to handle the training.



Aerobic Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirAcceleration, Agility, Balance, Jumping and Pace attributes. For the bestimpact on these attributes you will want coaches with a high Fitnessattribute to handle the training.

Goalkeeping Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirGoalkeeping attributes. For the best impact on these attributes you will want coaches with a high Coaching Goalkeepers attribute to handle thetraining.

actics Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirAnticipation, Decisions, O Te Ball, Positioning and eam Work

attributes. For the best impact on these attributes you will want coaches with a high actical attribute to handle the training.

Deending Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirDribbling, First ouch, Flair, Heading and echnique attributes. For thebest impact on these attributes you will want coaches with highDefending and actical attributes to handle the training.

Ball Control Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirConcentration, Marking and ackling attributes. For the best impact onthese attributes you will want coaches with high Mental and echnicalattributes to handle the training.

Attacking Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirPassing and Creativity attributes. For the best impact on these

attributes, you will want coaches with high Attacking and acticalattributes to handle the training.

Shooting Tis area of training will focus on coaching players to improve theirComposure, Finishing and Long Shots attributes. For the best impacton these attributes, you will want coaches with high Attacking and



echnical attributes to handle the training.

Scheduled raining ips

✔ On occasion you will have players who aren't happy with their training schedule. Inorder to change their happiness level you will want to rstly ask the player to try hardin training (you can do this via the interaction feature). Secondly, you might want toconsider lowering their workload – if you can see (via their training tab) that they'reover-worked.

You should be aware that players will react from interaction situations based on their

personality type, so beware that you can upset some players when speaking to them; but it'scertainly worth speaking to players about this because when they accept what you say theywill improve their training as a result.

✔ Youngsters are very delicate and will require much more sensitivity when training. It's very easy to tire and injure young players, so be very aware of this when giving themtraining schedules. You will want to keep things much lighter with young players thanthe more experienced players in your team because if you're overworking your youngsters, you'll stunt their development and progress by injuring them and keeping

them out of training.

✔ In pre-season you won't be playing a lot of xtures, so it's the perfect time to giveplayers more intensive physical training schedules and get them prepped for the seasoahead. During the season however, you're not only training, but you're also playing a lof matches too – both of which will tire the players – so keep that in mind whensetting the physicality of the schedules.

✔ When players are not training, their attributes will naturally decline. A good way to ge

the attributes to raise would be to give the players more intensive training and keepthem out of the team for a few xtures. Once the attributes are back up, lower theintensity and get them playing some games.



Here are a few little tips to make the transition of Positional raining a little bit easier:

✔ Firstly, only have one player learning a new position at any one time. You’ll need toplay a player out of his natural position whilst he learns the new position, which meanhe could have a negative impact on the team whilst taking the time to learn his role.Obviously, you don’t want that to be happening with more than one player at one tim

✔ Secondly, it’s a far better idea to train someone who at least has some experience in throle you want them to adopt. It’s going to be a very arduous task trying to convertsomeone to a new position that is radically dierent to their natural position.

✔ Lastly, try to make sure the new position and role you want the player to adopt is bestsuited to his attributes and Preferred Player Moves.You may have to train or re-trainPreferred Player Moves on some players after they’ve been re-positioned, but it’s completelyimpossible to re-train attributes to a competent degree in a player who is not at all suited to

his new role (i.e. a goalkeeper into a striker).

Player utoring

Player utoring is a fantastic way to ‘fast-track’ a player’s training and abilities. With thisfeature, you’re able to introduce two players and get the more experienced player to teach his young protégé what he knows. Te youngster not only increases his numerical attributes, but

he’s often able to pick up Preferred Player Moves and also adopt new personality attributes aa result of the interaction.

utoring lasts around 180 days to complete, but the great thing about it is that you can have your players tutored and get them learning without aecting their training regimen. Normall when you want to teach a player a specic Preferred Player Move, you’d have to add it to histraining schedule, but this way you do not aect his normal routine. Tere is also anotherbenet of learning Preferred Player Moves via tutoring, because with tutoring you can getaccess to Preferred Player Moves which aren't available via conventional training.

Assigning utors

When assigning youngsters to their tutors, it’s not always clear on who you should pairtogether. Often people assign a youngster to a player they want them to emulate, but there arpersonality clashes and the tutoring breaks down.



You will need to consider a number of things when looking to pair players together:

✔ Firstly, you’re going to need to nd players who have similar personalities(you can ndinformation pertaining to this in the “Understanding the Genetics of a Footballer” section).

✔ Secondly, you’re going to need to consider that the tutor has to be better than the tute

– otherwise, it’s an exercise in futility. Te tutor must hold an attribute advantage overhis protégé, must be older than the tutee and must hold a higher ranking within theclub (Captain, Key Player, First-eam player, et cetera).

✔ Tirdly, you’re going to want to have players paired by their positions (i.e. both playersat least being competent Attacking Midelders).

If you fail to follow these guidelines, you’re likely to cause the tutoring to fail or possibly upset one ofthe players when trying to pair them with the other player.

Te Dynamics o utoring

You have four options when setting up a tutoring relationship between two players:

i."As a senior member of the squad, I'd like you to tutor <player> as I feel he can benefrom your experience."

ii."I'd like you to start turoting <player> as I think he can learn a lot from you."

iii."<player> needs a bit of help in his development and I'd like you to tutor him as helooks up to you as a player and as a person."

iv."Can you help tutor <player> as his development has stalled a little and I feel you coulreally help kick-start his career."

When picking one of these options, you just need to think about what you'd say to the player inreality; basically, don't pick an option which isn't accurate to the situation.



Te Additional Variables & Elements o utoring

Something very important to highlight is that players can alsodecreasetheir abilities whenundergoing tutoring. Tat comes down to the ability of the tutor and what kind of eect he’l

have on his protégé. If the tutor is a bad inuence or has attributes which are lower than thetutee, then he’ll lower the same attributes in his tutee and he will also negatively aect thetutee’s personality – as the youngster copies the tutor’s approach to the game. Also, be wary oPreferred Player Moves in tutors which you don’t want the tutee to pick up. If your tutor hastraits you don’t want the protégé to have, you’ll have to un-teach them via training later on.

Sometimes you will nd that even following the guidelines aforementioned yield negativeresults, it’s impossible to accurately predict how players will interact because their hiddenpersonality attribtues can be vastly dierent (even in cases where a player shares the samePersonality ag as another). Whilst it’s not always an option, you may nd a way around this with other inuences such tutoring players who are friends or suggesting tutoring to players who have you listed as their favourite sta. Tis can have enough inuence over that player topursuade him that the tutoring is the right thing for him, regardless of his personality tags.

Also, consider a player’s Current and Potential Ability levels. Now, you cannot see theseattributes in-game (although speaking to a scout or coach to give a vague idea of the player’slevel of ability), but bare in mind that tutoring does not raise a player’s Potential Ability valuso you cannot tutor a player beyond a certain point. You may be able to add Preferred PlayerMoves to a player’s repetoire but you’ll not be able to incur attribute increases.

Remember, tutoring begins aecting the players immediately; therefore, if the tutoring stops, the players will keep the gains that they made in that period. You also have to realise that selling orloaning a tutee will terminate their bond with their tutor and the tutoring will cease.

After the 180 days of tutoring, you will get a message stating whether or not the tutoring hasbeen a success. You should be aware that the tutoring feedback is mostly based around what

are considered ‘signicant gains’ – for example: if the tutee is learning Preferred Player Moveor getting huge increases in one or two attribtues, he’d most likely get a successful message;but your player could make signicant gains (in terms of more attributes being risen by a fewpoints, instead of a few attributes being risen by a lot of points) and get a negative message.Essentially, gains aren’t always reected in the tutoring feedback – so don’t get too discourgedunless the player completely fails, he might have gained more than the feedback suggests.



Te nal point to make would be that you can (and should) repeatedly tutor your youngplayers. Consider yourself on the clock with only enough time to improve the player before hhits 26 years old (28 for goalkeepers). If you work on nurturing the “Wonderkids” and therising stars with big potential, you can certainly help them reach their Potential Abilityattribute level.

Please note: most players who are over the age of 26 cannot be tutored (28 years old for goalkeepers),whilst tutors must be over the age of 22.

Cultivating A Youth eam

Okay, so this can be a burden – especially when you can just ‘poach’ talent from other clubs –

but it’s far more rewarding mentally (and to the bank balance) to create your own stars. Notonly that, it’s always useful later in the game when regenerated players begin to show theirfaces that you have good talent from your own nation in your team – as sometimesregenerated players from your own nation are pretty shocking later on in the game – so it’sgood to create young talent and work on building a solid future for your team.

So, where to start? Well rstly you need to decide whether or not you want to create amelting-pot of international superstars or a team of home-grown gems. Once you’ve opted fothe route you want to take, you’re going to need to do some scouting. Tat’s all outlined in th“Understanding the Fundamentals of Scouting” section, but a quick tip would be to search fo young players in the nations you’ve selected – for example: if you want only English players, you’d have all your scouts assigned to looking for English players at dierent age brackets (e.gunder 16, under 17, under 18, under 19, under 20, under 21, et cetera) this will allow you toget a far wider span of useful and more relevant player reviews, as each scout is focussing on aspecic age bracket and one nationality. If you wanted to go international, then you’d do thesame as above, but you’d search via one age bracket (e.g. under 21) and then nationality orcontinent brackets (e.g. England, Spain, Argentina, Brasil or Asia, Europe, Americas, Africa,et cetera). Utilising this strategy can nd you the kind of talent you want the club to be builtaround and give you the ability to import then nurture home-grown stars for your club.

Next up, it’s important to pay some attention to the setup of the club and youth system (if yohaven’t done so already). Check your Youth team coaches – are they good enough? Check thefacilities – can you upgrade them? It’s a tad time-consuming, but it can make a big dierenceto the quality of the player you’re getting though the youth system. As covered previously, youcoaching sta are going to require good “Working with Youngsters” attributes and anyonereviewing the youngsters’ abilities are going to need to have good “Judging Player Potential”and “Judging Player Ability” attributes.



Once you’ve done the basic ground work, it’s important to work through what you havealready. Remove any of the players you don’t believe will make the cut – sell them if you can,not, just release them. If there is anyone who’s promising, but not great – grab a scout reportand loan the kid out. If they return from loan unimproved, sell them.

Essentially, you need to consider how a promising player will improve. Are you willing tooversee the youth team games or would you rather assemble a youth team and then loan allthe players out to clubs that will give them match experience? Te most important thing isthat the players are given the opportunity to play. You can have the best training scheme in th world, you can have exceptional coaches, but without match experience the players won’tdevelop in the way you want them to.

ips or Youth Development

Your youth team should ideally be playing the same tactics as the rst-team, as this helpsthem know the formation and settle into the team for when you actually want them to play ia rst-team game. Also worth noting is that loaned out players won’t train with you, so if you’re working on a Youth eam training regimen then it’s going to be useless unless theplayers are in your team and working under your training conditions.

Something else to consider is tutoring. It’s massively benetial for young players to have agood tutor and to have youngsters learning Preferred Player Moves and attributes from bette

players. Find the most gifted players in your team and spend some time working on them; itcan (with some eort) reap rewards. Make sure this is repeated as often as possible!

Lastly and maybe most importantly, you should know that each team in the game has uniquesettings. Some teams have exceptional youth facilities (Barcelona, Ajax, Arsenal, et cetera), bu your team – most likely – will not. Tis means that you will have to work to improve yourfacilities and your setup, because you’re very likely to be at a disadvantage compared to themore skilled youth production lines. What is good about this is that you can keep an eye onclubs who have a real-life reputation for producing great talent and then you can nd yoursel

players who you can import into your club's own academy.

Match Preparation

Match Preparation allows you to not only work on your pre-match setup, but it gives you theability to train your team with regards to their tactical prociency. It’s not an obvious training



module, but it should be looked at as if it was part of the training system. raining covers onl echnical, Mental and Physical attributes, whilst it’s Match Preparation that focuses on theplayers’ tactical abilities as a team.

In order to create a rewarding training routine via Match Preparation, you have to repeatedly work on the same tactical setup. If you work on improving a single formation you will see the

familiarity bar rise as a result of the team becoming more comfortable with that system. Tisis why it’s important not to ‘chop and change’ your tactics too radically when they’re not working very well for you, because your progress will stutter as you make alterations.

Aside from the training aspect of Match Preparation, you should note that the “Special FocuAreas” setting is excellent for exploiting the opposition’s formation or setup. You should lookto do your pre-match scouting (more below) and then utilise this module to make your teamfocus on one method of exploiting the opposition’s weaknesses. It’s important to rememberthat selecting a Special Focus Area will distract the team from other areas of their game, but

you get the Special Focus Area setup to correctly exploit an opponent who are – for example: weak at corners, then you might nd the result is far more positive than simply opting tooperate within your own style of play.

Remember, setting the Match Preparation workload will have an eect on the training workload, so try to nd a balance for your team. It’s all about considering if you want to workon the team as a unit or on players as individuals – then setting the sliders to the levels you want. I’d personally work on the team more than the players, then when the team is at a goodlevel, lower the Special Focus Area workload and focus on improving individuals. Obviously,nding a balance is still vital, so bare that in mind.

Focus Area Description and Eect

eam Blend Tis allows you to focus your players on better understanding howtheir team-mates work with the ball. By using this Special FocusArea, you’re able to build a team unit, rather than have 11strangers playing in your side.

Deensive Positioning Tis allows you to ‘drill’ your team in the art of defence. Te bestteams are always the hardest to exploit in defence and by focussingon this area, you’re able to lower the risk of players being in the wrong position when under pressure at the back and give themdirection on how to function as a defensive unit, rather thanrelying on the defenders to do all the defensive work.



Attacking Positioning Tis allows you to ‘run plays’ with the team. With this SpecialFocus Area, you’re able to inuence the players into attacking innumbers (rather than attacking as individuals). Tis allows you tohave players in better attacking positions when crosses enter the

box or when counter-attacks are being executed. With this you’reable to have your team working ‘in-tune’ when they’re attacking.

Deending Set-Pieces Tis allows you to train the team to be more procient whendefending corners or free-kicks. Having a team who know exactly what needs to be done and how the players around them will bereacting when the ball comes at them is something you will reallybenet from when they utilise this Special Focus Area.

Attacking Set-Pieces Tis allows you to train the team to be more clinical when takingattacking corners or taking free-kicks. Having a team who know where players are going to run or where the ball is going to beplaced can make the dierence when it comes to taking advantageof an attacking set-piece.



- Chapter Nine -

Match Day Preparation, Inormation and Analysis

Te rst thing you should look to do is examine the opposition’s formation. If you really want

to be thorough, have a look at their previous opponents; look at which formations have beensuccessful against them and then check to see which formations have worked best on thepitch you’re playing on. Next, take a look the weather reports for that day and then see if youcan grab any information about the match ocial’s temperament. After all the scouting isdone, you’re going to need to decide on your tactics and players, as well as do your pre-matchteam talk.

Tis is why I’m not really a fan of downloadable tactics or ‘Home and Away’ tactics – they’realways going to based on luck, because they’re not tailor-made to your players’ abilities, your

opposition or any of the match day factors. So, let’s go through the whole process piece bypiece and see what makes match day preparation so vital…

Pre-Match Scouting Analysis & Interpretation

When considering your pre-match preparation, it’s very important to look at dierent variables which will impact on the match; things such as pitch size, weather, the mentality of

the referee, et cetera.

As far as pitch types go, they can make a big dierence to the success of your tactics. Beloware a few key notes to get you thinking about the ways to adjust your tactical approach withregards to pitch sizes; but remember, you have to consider that the pitch size hints will needto be factored against the opposition’s tactical shape too, because – as you can imagine – theopposition’s formation and the pitch dimensions will dictate what kind of formation you’ll beable toeectivelyplay on that pitch.

I don’t recommend radical changes to the formation, but your tactics are the only thing you can adjusto aect the game, so try to nd a balance between making necessary changes and keeping continuityin your formation and shape.



Pitch ypes

So, once you’ve examined the opposition’s shape and have an idea of how they like to play, yo will then need to assess the type of pitch you’ll be playing on and decide how to setup theteam to be eective within the parameters of both the opposition formation and thedimensions of the pitch. Here's some insight to pitch sizes...

Shorter pitches –Tis pitch obviously lacks length, so certain types of passing, such as thelong ball would be ineective. If you imagine the goalkeeper or a defender hitting a long ballon a short pitch, it’s going to go deep into the heart of the opposition defence and you’rehighly unlikely to benet from it(long balls are only ever eective when you’ve got an incredibleTarget Man and enough players around him to capitalise on any lose balls). From a positionalstance, you have to consider that a short pitch will also mean that there is less space formidelders to play in, so your mideld shape should be positioned in a manner which wouldspace them out a little more (but not overly spaced so that the mideld is taken over by the

opposition). Lastly, there is the defensive angle, which would indicate that you could playslightly higher up than normal because there is less space for the defence to cover.

Longer pitches– Tis pitch provides you with more space to run into, but also more space fo you to cover before you can reach the goal. Depending on your opposition’s formation, therearen't really any passing stipulations with regards to the pitch. As the exact opposite of theshorter pitch, the long ball will be more eective, but that hinges on how high the defenceplay and how fast your attacking players may be. From a defensive perspective, you’ll have toplay slightly deeper to cover yourself from fast players or long balls – you can play high up th

pitch to pressure a team, but on a long pitch you’re much more easily exploited with a longball, if you’re not cautious with your back-line. Obviously, a long pitch gives you more space tposition the team, so you’d be foolish not to try and exploit that with the opposition, butbeware of the space you leave between your defence and the goalkeeper.

Wider pitches– Tis pitch oers more space across the width of the surface. You should lookto utilise the anks and make use of the extra space when attacking.If you can’t play withwingers, be extremely cautious with your full-backs and recognise that you’ll be attacked in thoseareas more often than not.Wider pitches are more troublesome in defence, with your back-lin

being stretched out-wide and holes being created in-between the defensive players. ry to bemore compacted in defence and don't let the defensive line get dragged out to the touchline.

Narrower pitches –Tis pitch provides the exact opposite issues as the wider pitches. You’regoing to have less width and space to play a wing-game and it’s going to be dicult to stretca team out, so you’ll have to factor that in when you look at the tactics. Te obvious plus tothis pitch is that it’s also providing you with the defensive benets the opposition have, suchas less space for you to cover defensively and a stronger back-line.



Something very important to highlight with this and the Match Preparation module is that you donot have to radically change your formational shape for each pitch type. You can operate on a narrowor wide pitch by changing the team’s width via Touchline Shouts. You can, of course, alter the shape if you feel it would be best to stop an opponent dominating a game, but I personally don’t feel you shoulchange the shape for each pitch type – as you can see, there are better ways around doing that withou

disrupting your Match Preparation training or your tactical familiarity.

Weather Conditions

A lot of this is obvious stu, but hardly anyone bothers to take the time to actually look at thconditions in which their team is playing. Even if you disregard everything up until this pointhe most important thing to consider about being tactically superior is that you have to factoall the elements and conditions of the match against your own tactical approach. It’s all welland good playing a 4-5-1 with superbly gifted midelders, but it’s not going to be eective oa pitch where they have no space to operate in – is it?

Ten of course, comes the weather. It’s not the most complex of conditions to consider, but itshould be integrated into your tactical approach nonetheless. ake for example: a lot of virtuarain falls upon your muddy virtual pitch and you’re opting to play a short, slow passing game What transpires is not an Arsenal style of play, but a superb plot for a Snickers advert, withpasses not reaching their recipients, defenders sliding past their opponents and Mr. rollingup in a tank, throwing chocolate bars at you and demanding that you ‘get some nuts’. So, how

can the weather aect your tactics? Well, let's take a look...

Weather Condition Description and Eect

Rain When rain falls onto the pitch it will coat the grass with water. Tis water lubricates the surface, so when the ball travels across itthere is less friction. Now, because there is less friction the ball willmove faster and will take longer to stop moving – so if your

players are passing the ball at speed, think about how dicult it will be to control the passing as the ball skids across the surface.

Sleet/Snow When sleet or snow falls onto the pitch it will make the surfacesoggy and muddy. It's far more dicult to pass the ball along thesurface on a muddy pitch because the ball is travelling against a lotof friction (as the mud is very thick and the ball is very light). A



muddy pitch can also cause problems with players, as it's going torequire more eort to travel on a surface which has no solidfoundation (as the mud will move when pressure is put on it).

Sunny/Normal When the sun is out and the rain is not in sight, the pitch will be

dry and rm. A dry pitch will be fairly solid, so when a ballbounces on the surface, it's likely to bounce hard and fast; thisrequires players to have good ball control and good passing, as thepitch can be very unforgiving.

Wind When the wind is abrasive it will begin to aect the quality ofpassing during the game. If you're playing a long passing game andthe wind is strong, you'll see that the ball's trajectory will be

inuenced by the direction of the wind. Tis weather condition will aect not only the long ball passes, but it can aect anysituation where the ball is in the air – situations such as long shotscrosses, set-pieces and goal-kicks.

Give some thought to how conditions will aect players – for example: on a cold day, players who aren't used to those conditions will need good Determination to get through the game;

when players are running on wet or muddy pitches, they're going to nd it dicult to gaintraction (as the surface isn't easy to travel over). Also think about extreme conditions – forexample: whilst snow can be wet and make a pitch soggy, if the weather is frosty, the pitch wibe hard and much more similar to a dry pitch than a wet one.

Preparation Summary

Tis is the moment that now denes who you are as a manager. You’re either thinking that you can’t be bothered to do all of that each game and are thus condemning yourself to a life odownloading tactics or you’re thinking: “Hmm, I’ve not really focussed on that before; maybeif I take a few minutes before hitting ‘continue’ on match day, I’ll not have to go onto theforums and complain about the new patch being rigged to death”. – Okay, that was a verylong and specic sentence; chances are, you’ve not said anything remotely close to that, but you get the point – invest some time and you'll get the results you want; this game wasn'tmean't to be played and conquered in a day.



Opposition Instructions

Whether it’s setting specic marking instructions or directing players away from goal,Opposition Instructions are a key part of your tactical setup. Tey’re arguably one of the mos

skimmed over elements in the game, which is understandable – why bother to take veminutes out from your busy schedule of button clicking and beer sipping to nalise yourapproach to stopping the eect of the opponent?

Yeah, I couldn’t come up with a good reason either.

Tis is the last and nal part of your pre-match tactical setup. At this juncture you’ve gatheredall the information you’re going to need to know about the opposition and you should be

looking to null their best players and their way of playing the game. If you can successfullystop your opponents, then you’re going to have a huge advantage when it comes to kick-o. Tere’s not really a huge amount to detail with regards to Opposition Instructions, given that99.9% of the time you're actually told exactly what you should do by your Assistant Manager

Te best thing I can advise you to do when it comes to the match, is to repeatedly check theAssistant Manager’s feedback. All throughout the game you’ll get an indication as to how thformation is working, which players are doing a good job and which are not. You’ll also getfeedback on where the team instructions are working (or failing), recommendations as to whto do and what to change – and a lot more. Basically, it’s so helpful to you that it feels like you’re cheating. Also, make use of this, not only before the game or when watching the gamebut also at half-time before your eam alks and before your full-time eam alks. Tere arelot of helpful observations made by the Assistant Manager that will help you best handle theplayers an give you priceless hints and tips on what to do in the majority of the situations yound yourself in.

Not only is this a good way to thwart specic players, it's also a good way to stop specic teammanoeuvres – for example: if the team like to attack down the anks, you should show their wingers onto their opposite foot, as this forces them inside and out of their comfort zone. If a

player has a penchant for cutting inside (check their Preferred Player Moves), show him ontothe ank and force him into a situation he doesn't feel happy being in.

Ideally you’ll want to limit how many Opposition Instructions you assign to your players because theywill aect your tactical settings. Too many instructions will alter your tactical approach and couldend up changing the way in which players following these instructions are asked to play.



eam alks

eam alks are part of the FM trifecta of man management, tactics and training. eam alksare a vital part of man management and as such they require some thought and logic in ordeto fully utilise their power – because when they’re used accurately they have the ability tounhinge even the best of teams.

It’s a pretty simple science: Players react to what you say based on their Personalities, theirMorale and their Motivation. During the match there are other small factors such as the prematch odds, the strength of the opponent, whether you’re playing away from home or not, thscoreline and of course, what you’ve said in the pre-match press conference. Still, whenmaking a comment to a player remember, it’s mostly about judging the player, theirpersonality and the situation at hand – rather than overcomplicating the moment by trying tfactor every possible variable against each other. Obviously, as a result of their impact on thegame, it’s important to know what to tell players; so, let’s take a look at eam alks...

Te Basic Elements o eam alks

Generally speaking, the strongest players in the team (personality-wise) will react more tochallenges, whilst the weaker minds will need nurturing(refer to the “Personality Tags” section the guide to better understand this dynamic). You’re looking to give those with a strong mentalit(and good morale) some level of expectancy, whilst you will want to go about removingpressure from those who have low morale or those who are concerned about the match.

Something very important to consider when giving eam alks is the amount of talks yougive to individual players. If you're giving each individual a eam alk, it's going to null thegeneral eam alk you've selected and it's going to set an uneven tone in your talks. You needto focus on a handful of the most noticeable players (good or bad) and speak to them, leavingthe rest of the players on the global eam alk setting. As a general rule, don't stray over 5individual talks; it's best to talk to the main players and keep the team on the same wavelength, as confusing eam alks will be either useless or negative –which is not good!



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Pre-Match eam alks

So, how do we approach pre-match eam alks? Well, we need to remember that the successand the nature of the pre-match talk hinges on morale, prior match ratings, match mentalitieand also player personalities(see Positive and Negative Personalities crib sheet; this makes it easieto ascertain how dierent personality types could react dierently to the Team Talk options).By this point you should have already taken a look at all the Backroom Advice, setup yourtactical strategy and checked your Assistant Manager’s pre-match feedback to see howmentally prepared your team appear to be. It’s important that you ascertain the players’ moodbefore you give a talk because it’s going to have an impact on what you should say to them.

Te overall eam alk should be – as is said above – based on the pre-match odds. Teindividual talks should be based on morale and condence issues. Below is a brief guide todealing with players...

✔ Firstly, don't underestimate the problems complacency can cause you. Players who arecomplacent will require a good dose of reality before kick-o; thankfully the AssistantManager feedback will tell you who is too condent. In these situations you will wantto let the player know that you "expect a performance" and that he's got a job to do.

✔ Secondly, don't underestimate the problems morale can cause you. Players who arestruggling for morale and condence will need to know that you support them or thatthere is no pressure on them to perform. Sometimes this is not ideal, sometimes youneed the team to be focussed on winning and 'Lucas Low-Morale' comes in and force you to make a hard decision – do you tell him that you need a performance from himor do you try to ease his tension? Tere's no sure-re way to answer that; every player dierent. Te best thing you can do is, make a choice, keep an eye on the player andthen assess him again at half-time.

✔ Tirdly, recognise that new players or young players will need to be handled in adelicate manner. Even when there are no visable problems, make sure that you're not

expecting too much of these players too soon.

✔ Lastly, recognise that each player has a personality. Every player is dierent and you caexpect dierent reactions from players as a result. It's best to treat weaker players withdelicacy, whilst stronger players can handle a bit more pressure than most.



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It’s important to note that “morale” is the measure of a player’s inner happiness (based on performances and team positioning in the league, et cetera), whilst “motivation” is the measure oftheir state of mind (based on their mental approach to the match ahead). Don’t confuse these elementwhen following the advice here!

Hal-ime eam alks

At half-time there is a more complex eam alk, because not only do you have the originalfactors (personalities, morale and motivation) to contemplate, but you now have to add thescoreline and match ratings into the equation. Once more it’s best to set an overall eam alkbased on team performance and then highlight individuals who are either excelling or failing

Before we jump into specic advice, there are a few things to make note of with in-matchtalks:

✔ Firstly, check the Assistant Manager’s feedback. It’s vital to both your eam alks andalso your tactics. If you fail to do this, you might as well start rolling dice.

✔ Secondly, it’s important to note that match ratings constantly change – especially whethere is a key moment in the game, such as a goal scored or a booking – so, try to keepan eye on the match ratings as the game is played out, as this way you’ll constantlyknow how the players are performing(it’s a good idea to view matches in split view with player ratings shown on one side and the match statistics or Assistant Manger feedback on th

other side).

✔ Tirdly, those who excel and get praised can often end up having more respect for youas a manager, but remember, if you give inaccurate or unwarranted feedback, you riskannoying or confusing the players and this will disrupt the eect you have on the them– especially at half-time – as players who get demoralised can have a poor game andend up having a negative eect on the whole team.



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✔ Fourthly, if you nd that a player is exceptionally poor, don’t try to ‘x’ him; just bringhim o and put on a substitute who you can motivate to have a better game.

✔ Lastly, remember to give all your substitutes a eam alk. Teir impact could be far

more positive with some instruction. If you don't give a eam alk, there's a chancethings will be ne, but that's not football management, that's Russian Roulette.

So, let’s take a look at the specics of the half-time eam alks…

Firstly, you need to look at the scoreline and compare it to the match odds. Should you be winning when you’re losing? Should you have a stronger lead? Are you doing better thanexpected? – You need to select a global eam alk based on that information.

Secondly, you need to break your talk into four segments (most people do it in this order):

1. What would you say to the player based on the player’s match performance?2. What would you say to the player based on the scoreline?3. What would you say to the player based on the player’s mentality?4. What would you say to the player based on the player’s personality?

You need to take the answers to those four questions, rearrange them and then merge them

into one nal individual talk – which sounds complex, but it’s actually very simple!Read on..

What would you say to the player based on the player’s personality?

You’d immediately have to examine the player’s personality – are they strong or are they weakBased on that you have three potential options: expectation, praise or encouragement? Testronger players, as mentioned previously, can handle expectations, but they generally dislikeencouragement (i.e. “We can win this!”). Te weaker players prefer to have less pressure, so

you’d either want to remove pressure or say absolutely nothing to them.

Now, the next thing to consider is their match performance…

What would you say to the player based on the player’s match perormance?

Generally speaking, any player performing under a ‘6’ would be told he was “Disappointing”,



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(depending on how badly they were playing) and replaced by substitutes who would be told“You can make the dierence” or “I have faith”.

If you were suering a heavy loss, you’d want to question player’s motivation and passion toget the win or you’d inspire them with “You can make the dierence” or be demanding with “ want to see more from you” – again, this hinges on their personality tags.

If you’re losing against a team who should be beating you, you’d want to oer some hope tothe team. Ask better performing players to “Do it for the fans” or tell them “Tey can make adierence”; those who aren’t performing well may be out of their depth and might have abetter impact on the bench. If so, when bringing a substitute on let them know that you havefaith in them or expect them to perform – depending on their Personality rait. Also look tothe strong players (personalities) who you can be more demanding of – they might be able to work some magic in the second-half, if you can inspire them.

If you’re in a deadlock with a team, your talk could win or lose you the game. You’d want to bexpectant against the teams you’re favourites to beat (pre-match odds) and you’d want to beinspirational against those who you had no chance of beating pre-match.

If you’re expecting to win and you’re drawing, let the team know you’re “Disappointed” and tto inspire good individual performances with “You can make a dierence” and condemn poorindividual performances with “Disappointed”.

If you’re expecting to lose the match and you’re drawing, ask the players to win the match “Fothe fans”, still highlighting the great performances in an encouraging way (i.e. “Pleased”).Anyone who’s not playing well would be told they were “Disappointing” or substituted o.Substitutes coming on would receive the same talk as everyone else – you'd motivate them.

Tis is the most important part of eam alks. Everything above is nothing more than ageneral guideline on dealing with certain situations; what’s most useful is this – the eam aformula...

eam alk = personality tag(strong/weak)+ match rating(less than 6/more than 7)+ player

mentality(positive/negative)+ scoreline(pre-match odds vs. score).

If you look at the brackets you see the variable. Now, the rst three segments of the eam aformula has two variables, but the last segment has a variable which calculates what the scoreshould be versus the scoreline you have. So, in Lehman’s terms – what you say regarding theteam talk has to be in-sync with the other elements – for example: we know that suggestingresponsibility in mentally weak players can make them crumble, but there are times when



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we’re losing and need players to step-up and win the match, how is that done?

Well, very simply, you either have to inspire those players without pressurising them or yousubstitute them o – all whilst hoping that the stronger players in the team can put in a goodperformance for you.

What I’m hoping you notice at this point is that eam alks aren’t as repetitive or asunimportant as you may have thought. Every team talk is going to be dierent because the variables aren’t static (scoreline, morale, mentality, et cetera). Some players are too mentallytough for certain talks and some are too weak. A very important player could be mentally weak and may have a terrible game, if you can’t inspire your key man, would you have everthought to have subbed him o for the good of the team? Probably not; who would have?

Give some thought to your talks using that formula as your thought process. If you need to,

experiment a little and take notes of how players are responding to your methods – eventuall you’ll have enough data on each player to give you a denitive answer for each situation(although it might take you until FM3011 to compile).

Full-ime eam alks

Te full-time talks are the easiest to do because at this point the game is over and your onlyaim is to address the players. Ideally you’d want to keep morale as high as you can – so do nobe overly critical of players, but at the same time, you do need to make sure you stop any pooform by giving the poor performers some ‘hair-dryer’ treatment.

Don’t be afraid to let your best players know how happy you are with them after they’ve put ia good performance. As I said above, players will begin to form a bond with managers who asupportive of them. At the same time, don’t be unjust with your comments; players won’trespond well toanycomments about them (good or bad) if they don’t feel that they’re true.

As with the other eam alks, set a general talk for the team based on their performance andthen highlight any specic players for praise or critique. Anyone above a ‘7.5’ would warrant



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“Pleased” talk, whilst exceptional performances (‘8.2’ or over) would warrant a “Delighted”talk. Anyone extremely poor (below ‘6’) should get a “Disappointed” talk.Also, considering the impact of scorelines, you’d want to let anyone below a ‘7’ after a badresult know they were “Disappointing” and anyone above an ‘8’ know that you “Sympathise” o were “Pleased” with their performance. Anyone with ‘6’ or below after a poor result should begiven an “Angered” talk – this is suggested for anyone receiving red cards too – just to knock

their bad behaviour on the head.

ouchline Instructions

As you will know, during the match you have the ability to ‘shout’ instructions to your player We’ll take a quick look at the instructions now, just to ascertain what they do exactly. Some othese instructions are only ‘unlockable’ on specic mentality settings, which means you’ll only

be able to access instructions relevant to the style of mentality you’re currently employing. Instruction Description and Eect

Retain Possession Tis instruction tells the team to keep a hold of the ball at all costs. Tis looks to lower the amount of long passes which often result in wasted possession.

Get Ball Forward Tis instruction tells the team to get the ball into the opposition’s

half and to focus on attacking rather than defending. It puts pressureon the opposition and attempts to nd players with longer passing.

Pass Into Space Tis instruction tells the team to pass the ball into vacant spacerather than directly to the player’s feet. Tis is an attempt to createopportunities by exploiting gaps in the opposition’s formation, ratherthan being obvious and passing directly to players.

Pass Into Feet Tis instruction tells the team to pass the ball directly to a player’sfeet. Tis is an attempt to keep possession, rather than try risky‘loose’ balls into space.

Pump Ball Into Box Tis instruction tells the team to get the ball into the opposition’sbox via long high passes. It’s a rather desperate attempt to overload



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the opposition, but can work if your forwards are strong players.

Clear Ball oFlanks

Tis instruction tells the team to aim their clearances out wide, sothat the wingers or wide players can try to maintain possession ofthe ball, rather than clear the ball directly to the opposition via the

middle of the pitch. Tis gives the wingers a chance to get hold ofthe ball and execute a counter-attack.

Shoot On Sight Tis instruction tells the team to shoot whenever the chance arises(usually outside the box), rather than wait for a better opportunity topresent itself (usually in the box). Often, this is a rather desperateinstruction, but it can prove useful when your opponents are under alot of pressure and are pinned back in their own area.

Work Ball Into Box Tis instruction tells the team to keep possession of the ball for aslong as possible rather than take shots from outside the area. It’suseful if your team is wasting chances or are taking too many longshots.

Exploit Te Flanks Tis instruction tells the team to try and exploit the wider areas ofthe pitch. Tis is only really useful if you’re playing against weak wingers or full-backs, if the opposition is playing without wideplayers, if you’re playing on a wide pitch or if you spot a weakness inthe opposition’s formation.

Exploit Te Middle Tis instruction tells the team to try and exploit the middle of thepitch. Tis is only really useful if you’re playing against teams without a Defensive Midelder, teams without lots of midelders,teams with weak players in the centre, if you’re playing on a narrow

pitch or if you spot a weakness in the opposition’s formation.

Look For Overlap Tis instruction tells the team to try and hold onto the ball whilst waiting for a player to perform an overlapping run. Tis instructionis intended for a wide player, with the overlapping wide player takingpossession and attempting to get more crosses into the box.



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ake A Breather Tis instruction tells the team to slow the pace, relax and hold ontopossession whilst they compose themselves. It’s useful if the team istiring or playing in tough conditions and need to rest briey beforequickly turning up the pace to catch the opposition ‘o guard’.

Play Wider Tis instruction tells the team to widen the spacing between themand expand the team's shape. Tis would give them more width andmore space to pass the ball across the pitch and would help to quellany threat on the wings. Although it will create gaps in-betweenplayers (particularly defenders) which could be exploited, it’s usefulon narrow pitches as it can give you more room to operate in.

Play Narrower Tis instruction tells the team to narrow the space between themand compact the team's shape. Tis would make the team harder tobreakdown and would present less opportunities for mideldpenetration. Although it would leave the team more susceptible toattacks on the ank, it is useful on wide pitches as it forces theopposition to work the ball out wide.

Push Higher Up Tis instruction tells the team to push the defensive line higher upthe pitch, thus resulting in creating less space for the opposition toplay in – which puts more pressure on the opposition. Te biggestissue with this instruction is that the team can be exploited by a longball over the top of the defence or quick opponents can sprint pastthe (often slow) defence, thus giving them lots of space to run intoand usually, one-on-one opportunities with your goalkeeper.

Drop Deeper Tis instruction tells the team to sit deeper in their own half, thusresulting in a tougher defence. Te biggest issue with this instruction

is that the team is likely to invite pressure on itself and have morespace to cover to get to the opposition’s goal. However, it does allow you to absorb pressure from teams playing higher up the pitch and itcan null quick forwards who like to exploit a high defensive line.

Hassle Opponents Tis instruction tells the team to constantly close-down, tightlymark and pressure the opposition into giving the ball away or



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making a mistake. Te biggest issue with this instruction is that itcan be tiring and will draw your players out of their positions.

Stand-OOpponents

Tis instruction tells the team to give the opponent space and toconform to their own tactical shape. It’s intended to give underdogs

the ability to hold their ground against stronger, more technicalopposition and gives them the ability to try to shut out opponentsinstead of taking the game to them.

Get Stuck In Tis instruction tells the team to be extra aggressive with regards totackling. It tries to scare the opposition into passing the ball quickly(instead of inviting tackles on themselves) and thus forces them intomaking mistakes. Te biggest issue with this instruction is that

players will most likely get carded – certainly if they’re not wellcontrolled individuals or are poor at tackling.

Stay On Feet Tis instruction tells the team to stay on their feet at all costs and tonot dive into tackles. Tis will make it tougher for the opposition toget around players and it will stop the team giving away fouls, but italso means that the opponents are allowed more time on the ball.

Play Even Saer Tis instruction tells the team to play without risk. It’s designed tohold on to a lead and encourage a team to contain the opposition. Te side-eect to this shout is that it can have an adverse eect ifused for too long because the team will become very predictable.

ake More Risks Tis instruction tells the team to play for the win, regardless of theirdefensive duties. It’s designed for those desperate to get a goal, createopportunities or for those wanting to go all out in a game. As above,

playing this instruction for too long will have an adverse eect – inthis case because the team will abandon positions and instruction.



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Match Reviewing

Tis is the key to understanding how well your tactics actually work. It’s one thing creatingtactics and studying the dynamics of the formation, but when it all goes wrong, you’re alwaysleft playing a guessing game. Was it the tactics, the pitch, the team’s morale or was it what yosaid at half-time which cost you this game today? Well, there is a very conclusive tool which

allows you to see a number of in-depth statistics about the way your team played their xture

Tey are FM’s equivalent to the OPA stats – the Match Stats and Analysis pages. Tesetools allow you to view an intimate match report, with details of how each player has played,successful runs, shots and crosses – as well as all the failed opportunities too. It’s a brillianttool to assess the aws in, not only your tactic, but also your approach to the game you’ve beeplaying. It could be this which helps you better use a winger in future or it could even help you understand how to be more eective on a dierent pitch type.

Let’s spend a few moments looking through the options available for assessment and howthey function in a way that will allow you to use them to improve your setup…

Analysing the Match Statistics

Shots/On arget/O arget– Tese stats are all pretty similar with their eects. If you’reseeing lots of shots and a low goal ratio, or lots of shots ”O arget”, you might want to adjuthe amount of long range shots the players are taking and try to get them to pass the ball into

the box more often. You might also want to consider looking at the roles in which yourforward players are being deployed. If you’re seeing few “Shots” or few shots “On arget”, you’re going to need to look at whether the team is attacking enough to get into goodshooting positions or if they’re trying to pass the ball into the goal instead of taking shots when they have the time to do so.

Blocked Shots– If you’re getting a high “Blocked Shots” gure, then it’s because you’re beingcrowded out when shooting in the box or you’re shooting from long range and the defendersare getting enough time to move in front of the ball and deect it. o counter this problem

you’re going to want to check your Assistant Manager’s feedback and look to the highlightsfor a reason as to why you’re not getting your shots past the defending players. You will eithe want to try to work the ball into the box (instead of taking long shots) or you’ll want to drawthe opposition out of the box(tips on this can be found under the “Touchline Shouts” section).

Woodwork/Clear-cut Chances– Obviously, these stats are indicative of the prowess of theforwards and midelders respectively. If you’re hitting the woodwork a lot, you’re going toneed to view the forward’s Preferred Player Moves and see how he likes to shoot(tips for



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Preferred Player Moves can be found under the “Understanding the Genetics of a Footballer”section).If you’re not getting enough “Clear-cut Chances” then you’re going to need to look ahow the midelders are creating opportunities. It might be a good idea to increase through-balls, alter your crossing technique or give the mideld more creative freedom. You may nd your mideld is inadequate and might want to look at their abilities to create opportunitiesfor the forwards (you should review their echnical stats and Preferred Player Moves to see i

they could be problematic.).

Long Shots– Tis is only going to need addressing if you’re failing to convert opportunitiesor are getting lots of shots “O arget”. It’s very easy to restrict long shots, but you may wantto increase them – if you’re not using them and have nothing to show for playing a morecontrolled shooting game.

Possession/Passes Completed– If you’re not keeping the ball, you will need to look at how you’re passing it. You may be too direct, you may be passing the ball too long or you could be

playing with too much distance between the players, as a result their passes are possibly beingintercepted or you’re not actually pressurising the opposition enough to win the ball fromthem – in which case Philosophy and Strategy settings would need adjusting(informationabout both can be found under the “Understanding the Fundamentals of Tactics” section).

You may as a last resort need to alter your tactical shape, with the idea of better aligningplayers in the formation to keep the ball. Naturally, this element of the game could be aecteby a player’s ability to pass and stay calm under pressure when they have possession.

Corners/Free-Kicks/Trow-ins– If you’re getting a lot of set-pieces and you’re not noticingmany goals/opportunities from them, you’re going to want to address your routines. Startlooking at who’s taking the set-piece (and if they have adequate ability to execute a successfucorner/free-kick/throw-in), look at where the ball is being delivered to and how the playersare setup to attack the set-piece. Be under no illusion, set-pieces can be vital, so remember to work on them in training and remember to make some eort with the set-piece creator beforthe match. A good set-piece routine can get you a lot of goals per season – goals which couldbe the dierence between rst place and second when the nal game of the season is played.

Fouls/Yellow Cards/Red Cards– If you’re giving away a lot of fouls and are conceding set-pieces as a result, it’s obviously going to be highly problematic. If you’re getting booked or seo, it’s denitely going to need to be addressed. Te obvious things to do would be to rstlylower your tackling aggression. If that isn’t an eective solution, you’re going to need to look the players giving away fouls and either work on their Preferred Player Moves or even look tomove them out of the team (certainly, if they’re repeatedly being sent o or suspended).



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Osides– Tis indicates whether or not your attacking strategy is awed. Obviously, if this ihigh, you’re going to need to build up play away from the player being caught oside or try tdevelop the player to time his runs better (via Preferred Player Moves). Osides aren’tgenerally thought of as something which is a terrible aw, but every time you’re caught osid you give possession away and remove pressure from your opponents, so it is a big problem.

Crosses Completed– If you’re not successfully completing crosses, it’s important to assess where things are going wrong. You’re most likely going to need to either adjust the way you’recrossing the ball or look at who’s crossing the ball. You might also want to look at who the bais being crossed to – as a good ball may come into the box and the forwards may be failing tocapitalise on it. You can watch the highlights to see how your crossing is failing, but also checthe Assistant Manager’s feedback for clues.

ackles Won/Headers Won– If you’re not doing particularly well with either of these stats, you’re going to want to look at the players you have in roles where their objective is to tackle

and head the ball. Identify whether or not the tackling is too weak (therefore the players arencommitted enough to actually winning the ball) or if the players assigned to tackle have poorattributes. If it’s a heading issue, check to see if the player’s are marking their opponents wellenough (you may want to setup specic marking pre-match), check to see the height and Jumping statistics of those who you have heading the ball – they may not be good in the air –but remember, forwards also head the ball, so it could be an issue with your crossing.

If you’re struggling to solve the issue, you should review the highlight footage for a better indicationor watch full length games for the next few matches to fully assess where the problem lies.

Kilometres Run/Average Rating– Tese aren’t the most important of statistics if you’re winning, but they could be highlighting a problem if you’re not winning. Te best way toboost the amount of running your team can do is by working on their tness in training andthe best way to boost “Average Rating” is via good eam alks and a good pre-match setup.

All of that concludes the intricacies of the post-match stats, but don’t forget that you canassess these things at half-time and make changes before the game is over. Tis in itself could

better the statistics at the end of the game. You should also utilise the Analysis tool as well. Ia fantastic way to understand the inner-workings of the way your tactic functions and it’s agood idea to review the analysis after the match to see where things worked and failed. It cangive you a solid indication as to who is eective for you (and who isn't), who needs to work ocertain elements of their game and how you can ne-tune the way your tactic is functioning.Don’t be lazy and overlook it, see where you could be going wrong and make those changes!



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- Chapter en -

Random Toughts

Below you can nd some random hints and tips which I’ve picked up from the game. Tey’re

just things which span from little ideas on scouting players to some pretty useful tacticaladvice.

✔ Tis is my best scouting tip – a Wonderkid tip to nd you a Wonderkid! Manuallysearch the best teams in the world via the team lter. I tend to start scouting the moretalented national teams, simply clicking on their team and then scanning through the young and highly valued players or by checking out their U21 squads. I can’t begin totell you how many gems I’ve found by doing this – and it’s prefect for nding

regenerated players later in the game.

✔ It’s important to maintain a good rapport with journalists. If you’re in their ‘goodbooks’ it can stop you from getting criticism. Tis can ease the amount of pressure youare under from the media.

✔ When instructing the groundsman on pitch dimensions, it’s important to consider how your formation and tactical instructions will work on both a wider and narrower pitchLook at your tactic and then tailor the pitch to best suit the style of play you want to

use at home.

✔ If you’re afraid of losing your star players due to bigger clubs coming in and poachingthem, it’s best to avoid commenting on transfer speculation in the press. Make surethat you’re interacting with them – praising them when they play well and letting themknow (on occasion) that your club matches their ambitions. Also, try to tie down theplayers to contracts with long durations and insert an extortionate minimum releaseclause. At least that way, if the player goes you’ll get some cash for him.

✔ When you need to keep morale in the team high, keep praising your better performingplayers and there’s every chance that they’ll respond by playing well in the next game.If you have a problem with low morale, make sure you’re not overly critical, it won’thelp the situation.

✔ During the game, if you are ahead, but are only just holding on – wait until the matchreaches the 75th minute and then increase the “ime Wasting” tactical setting or



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trigger the “Retain Possession” shout. It’s not advised to waste time before the dyingembers of the game as you’ll become sloppy and give the opponents time to come bacfrom the brink of defeat, but if you trigger it at the right time, you have every chance oholding on to the result you want.

✔ Don't forget to keep an eye on the game during the match. If you spent time watching

how your team play, you can pinpoint anything that’s going wrong. You can also pickup ideas about the way you and the opposition are playing, which can help stop themexploiting holes or it can help you to exploit the opposition yourself.

✔ o evade man-marking, it’s advisable to have your players swap their positions. Tis will make them far tougher to mark and can drag defenders out of position, thuscreating holes for unmarked players to exploit.

✔ Tere is no universal tactic for success, but repeatedly changing your tactics is beyond

unhelpful to your team's harmony and to their familiarity with the tactics you'reemploying. Ideally you will want to stick to the same shape and only tweak the dutiesroles and team instructions. Remember though, touchline shouts can help when youneed to change things without altering your tactical setup.

✔ ry mixing up the passing in your team. Having a team build up play with short andslow passing at the back, then quick and direct passing up-front can often leave theopposition wondering what's hit them.

✔ Don't be afraid to lose. If you're losing or about to play a tough game – just go for it.Attack them and go out with a bang. It’s only one game and if you take the shackleso, your team might surprise you.

✔ Constantly changing your tactic or making radical changes to the style of play willremove all comfort and rhythm the team had with the prior tactic. You should look tond a tactic and settle on it (as best you can) – certainly during a match – otherwise you’ll unsettle the whole team and see even worse results.

✔ When playing a match, not only is it important to consider how the weather will aec your passing movements, but give some thought to goalkeepers too. Whilst yourgoalkeeper may be at risk from a wet surface, the opposition goalkeeper will be proneto the same risks – why not try some long shots and see if you can catch him out?

✔ Pre-match, when discussing your team’s chances in the game ahead, it is sometimespossible to make your team more determined to win the game and prove you wrong if you’ve suggested that they’re not likely to win the game.



1

✔ Give some thought to the match referee’s mentality. If you’re playing alongside a strictreferee you might want to play without strong tackling – after all, you’re more likely tobe sent o or booked if the referee has a penchant for ashing cards.

✔ When contemplating not signing a player due to his weak Jumping attribute, look at

his height; there’s every possibility that he’s tall enough to get away with a lesser Jumping attribute.

✔ Always make sure your players have the attributes to play in their roles. Tere's nothinbenecial about playing someone in a role they cannot perform in.

If you have any good tips that you’d like to get included in the next edition of the guide, check out the

“Contact and Support Information” section of this guide and let us know!



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- Chapter Eleven -

Credits & Acknowledgements

Tis guide might be my body of work, but I have to thank a few people for the research and

testing which they’ve carried out and also for publishing their ndings. Tis allowed me to nonly validate a couple of my own theories, but it also gave me the ability to be a little morespecic with a couple of subjects which I didn’t have a lot of research to support the theorybehind the words.

With that said, thanks to WoIfsong, Pompey_Dan, Crouchaldinho, Bubbabaytuna,StormenDK and Lyssien – all of whom have carried out a lot of research in dierent areas ofthe game and have documented their results over the last couple of years. I’m sure there are alot more people I should be thanking as I’ve read SI Games’ forum religiously for the past fo

or ve years, but looking back at the experiment/research threads that I can remember readinmost recently, those are the guys I was able to track down to ‘thank’.

Ten of course, there has to be a nod to FM-Britain, wwfan and Millie, who inspired me tobegin this project a couple of years ago(I’m only two years late in producing it!).Teir work with tactics has been exceptional for as long as I can remember; in fact to the point where Ican recall being completely overwhelmed when I rst read their work in the actical Teorems & Frameworks ‘08 e-Book. It was an exceptional piece of literature and so in-depththat I struggled read it all. It was in that moment that I decided that I wanted to write

something which could stand proudly next to their work, but something which was easier topick up and read. I can say without a doubt, without FM-Britain’s contributions to this area the game, that this guide I’ve produced wouldn’t be as in-depth as I’ve tried to make it.

Lastly, a big thank you to Jordan Cooper (JordanC), who’s put in a huge amount of time tohelp me get this e-Book distributed. He might be a terrible, terrible comedian, but he’s a gooe-Book distributor ;)

I think that’s everyone, but there are a lot of people who I’ve spoken to and readcomments/posts/blogs from over the years I’ve been around, so a ‘thank you’ to all of you guy who have debated and argued your points with me, it’s only served to produce a morethought-out guide.

A quick thank you to Dennis as well. Some of his e-Book feedback from the rst version hasled me to simplify a few things for the readers and look at the way some information wasbeing interpreted – all of which has been a massive help in this latest edition.



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- Chapter welve -

Contact & Support Inormation

Should you need to contact anyone regarding this e-Book we’d like to make it very easy.

You can nd me (W.) at www.footballmanagerfanboys.net– you can usually nd me lurkingthe forums. I have no Facebook or Bebo or any of that stu, so unfortunately I cannot bepoked. As always, feel free to e-mail me anytime [email protected] I (osomeone else) will try to reply when there is time to.

You can nd JordanC (the man behind the scenes) at www.fm-britain.co.uk. You can grab Jordan on witter (@getsacked). He probably has Facebook and Bebo, and probably MySpactoo (he’s very lonely and never gets out; poor guy) – so denitely track him down and be his

virtual friend.

I also believe you can email the site [email protected]– I’d imaginethat’s for more technical issues, but I’m not the one dealing with it, so again, feel free to emaiabout anything you like – Jordan would really love the conversation.

Important Notice

One last thing I should clarify is that www.footballmanagerfanboys.netis not aliated withthis guide. FM Fanboys is a site which I created and occasionally blog or post at. I no longeradministratethesiteandneedtoclarify–forSIandSEGApurposes–thatFMFbhasno



http://www.fm-britain.co.uk/

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