'Player X has misplcaed many of his passes straight to the opposition'

Simple question, any ideas how to stop him doing this? It's always my centre halves who seem to have this problem.

Its usually a midfielder or wing back for me but I usually tell them to change their passing style to short until they start passing better and then change it back to mixed.

Might change depending on the player though.

I used to see this in my old tactics before I became educated in the nuances of the current tactical framework.

Most centre halves I manage have their passing set to 'direct' as it stops them taking risks with passes they don't possess the technical capacity to complete.

Try that; see if it works.

Let us know how it goes fella...

It's because your CB are clearing the ball off the danger zone, hence "misplacing" their passes. Your CB will generally always have a lower pass rate. You can increase their creative freedom so they are less likely to punt the ball forward, but that can be dangerous.

I have an issue with this. Whenever I am Fulham, I always play Dickson Etuhu in front of the defence with him popping short range passes about. His passing stats are always around 80% yet my assistant always says he is misplacing passes.

He's probably misplacing a high number of passes because he is MAKING a high number of passes or he is not close enough to either the defence or midfield to make an accurate short pass. The distance between them is too big hence he loses possession.

As someone mentioned here, read the tatical framework document. It'll make sense of alot of fustraiting things in the game.

"He's probably misplacing a high number of passes"

No he is not, he has 80% of the passes going to the right player!

"He's probably misplacing a high number of passes"

No he is not, he has 80% of the passes going to the right player!

Right...but if he's attempting a hundred passes a game, then your AssMan is noting that he's misplaced 20 - which is a lot of passes to misplace.

Think in absolute terms - that's what Colorado was trying to say (I think).

Even if his passing is 80% accurate, he could still be one of the principle places in which you are losing the ball.

OP-wise, I used to get this a lot when I had a deeper defensive line, and very defensive-minded CBs with RWB rarely - they try to get rid of the ball as soon as they get it, but without passing options, they just hoof it out.

I find it helps to have your players on RWB mixed. If they've got defensive mentality then they won't muck about and try to play like wingers, but it does mean that you don't get the annoying situation where a player stands in acres of space, turning from side to side looking for a pass, and then hoofs it to nobody.

Or just watch the highlights in "Full Match" for 10 (game-time) minutes and see what each players passing options are when in possession - then adjust your tactics accordingly.

This usually occurs due to two possible problems:

1. The player's passing instructions are not matched to his skills. Most CBs unfortunately do not have great passing stats. Thus, when they are set to direct/long passing they tend to hoof the ball all over the place, most likely to an opponent. Shortening their passing usually does help to get rid of this problem (usually does for me).

2. Your tactics leave the player isolated. The other cause of this problem is when the player is isolated in the tactical system. If your CBs are set to short passing, but there is a big gap between midfield/defence then chances are when they are on the ball, they are looking for a short pass, but cannot see the option because everyone else in the team has pushed up too quickly. They then dally on the ball, looking for a short option, before finally being closed down, resulting in a rushed pass that again goes straight to the opposition. Try to make sure that if you are playing shorter passing that there are always options available for players on the ball.

There is one other possibility: The player is just naff. Slightly harsh, but unfortunately sometimes it's true. The player in question just might not be up to scratch, hence he is constantly misplacing his passes.

Tactically speaking, I tend to always play 4 at the back, as this means that a CB usually always has 2 options. Their mentalities are not too far apart (between CB and Full-backs) to make sure that the FBs aren't pushing forward too much. I tend to find that short passing works well for CBs, as they will look to play the simple ball and keep possession, which is something that I like. If they are a bit more high-skilled and have a good eye for a pass, direct may work - otherwise, you can set "attempts through balls" to often, and the CB will then play short passes unless he thinks he can get one of your forwards free into space.