We Can Win = Seemed Demotivated

Why am I so rubbish at team talks?

They drive me crazy sometimes just as I feel I am getting the hang of them.

The worst offender is 'We Can Win'. Just what does this team talk really mean? :confused:

WWFan, in his excellent 'Team Talks Translated' thread (see it by clicking here) has it down as 'We can win this: This will be a tight match, but if we play to the best of our ability we can win this'.

So, I'm currently relegation candidates. Every match is a struggle.

I go up against fellow relegation candidates at home. The odds are pretty much even. It is going to be a tight match but I feel we can win it. The logical team talk would seem to be 'we can win this'.

What happens? Well, you probably guessed from the title, the team were 2-0 down at half-time with an absolutely awful performance. Managed to fight back in the second-half but it was impossible to come back. 2-1 loss in the end.

Check assistant feedback after the game - three or four players were demotivated by my team talk. Why, why, why?

I can't understand or see any reason for this. In the previous game, we got a great draw away to the 2nd placed team, and I said 'good result' as it was a, well you guessed it, good result! The morale was pretty decent going into the game (good to very good) but nothing that would suggest complacency.

So what does 'We Can Win' actually mean? And just why did this happen? The 'seemed demotivated' feedback drives me crazy and deprives me of points at least once or twice a season.

Am I the only one who struggles with this?

Regards,

C.

I'm not sure but I think you've picked out when it seems to happen.

Its not all about odds though, you need to consider where the media expect you to finish in the league and the same for the opposition.

I think it happens more when you are underperforming and are in a lower league position than expected, the odds reflect this but some (Maybe the more determined/professional) players still expect to win the game.

Perhaps make a note of which players and give individual talks to those players next time demanding more (Expect a performance etc).

Have you not tried giving indivdual team talks to a few players?

I find ticking the "let assistant handle team talks" option is an excellent way of giving good teamtalks.

I hate team talks with a passion, the descriptions are vague and unintuitive and the consequences for getting it wrong are far reaching.

From the description, I likely would have done the same thing. "We can win this" on the surface appears to provide encouragement in what you expect be a tightly fought game.

I'm not sure but I think you've picked out when it seems to happen.

Its not all about odds though, you need to consider where the media expect you to finish in the league and the same for the opposition.

I think it happens more when you are underperforming and are in a lower league position than expected, the odds reflect this but some (Maybe the more determined/professional) players still expect to win the game.

Perhaps make a note of which players and give individual talks to those players next time demanding more (Expect a performance etc).

Good tips there Cougar.

Of course, I realise it isn't just about the odds. I was really basing my talk on several things, including league positions, expected league positions, how likely I thought I was to win the game, as well as the odds etc.

I'm actually performing pretty averagely at the moment as my squad is a little below the league standard but I'm certainly not underperforming. The other team were fellow relegation candidates and predicted for the same kind of position as my team. We weren't that far apart in the league either. That's why it is a bit of a mystery to me as everything was pointing towards 'we can win' being the best talk.

Good tip about the individual talks though.

The three players who were demotivated were resolute, balanced and fairly ambitious. I wonder if that says anything? I can't remember what resolute involves now, except determination (and perhaps ambition?) Could it be that these three players were all too ambitious for the 'we can win' type talk?

I wonder what would have been a more suitable talk?

Thanks for the post Cougar.

Regards,

C.

Have you not tried giving indivdual team talks to a few players?

Yes, I nearly always do this thanks baker.simon.

Regards,

C.

I find ticking the "let assistant handle team talks" option is an excellent way of giving good teamtalks.

Doesn't seem to work for me, I'm afraid. He says 'we can win' for nearly every game! He often doesn't give what I would assume is the best talk. Maybe I just have a poor assistant but following his advice every time has never really worked for me.

I hate team talks with a passion, the descriptions are vague and unintuitive and the consequences for getting it wrong are far reaching.

From the description, I likely would have done the same thing. "We can win this" on the surface appears to provide encouragement in what you expect be a tightly fought game.

Yes, that's what I thought.

I'm trying to find a logical reason for it backfiring. The only other thing I can think of is that the team morale was high after the draw against a leading team in the previous game, and the team didn't need the encouragement perhaps?

Regards,

C.

Crouchaldinho: I don't know if this could be it, but I've noticed sometimes that the Game creates a 'rivalry' aspect between teams fighting for the same positions in the league. Just a thought...

Good thought that Loversleaper. Not sure if it is true or not but it might make a lot of sense.

So you think maybe a 'for the fans' would have been better. Which I suppose, in this kind of circumstance, might make sense (e.g. 'you are up against a rival team, go out there an win it for the fans').

Worth a try next time I find myself in a similar situation.

Regards,

C.

I've had my fair share of bad experiences with Pleased...

Usually most of my players take it as "Good, now you can stop playing", as usually the 2nd half turns into some sort of one-sided game where my players get hammered even by lower league teams.

I only give 'pleased' when leading by two clear goals. Seems to work okay for me most of the time.

C.

Team talks are one of the key factors which split the world class managers to the non-world class managers. You'll learn what to say to your team before,during and at the end of matches managing different clubs, from the foundations of Semi-pro to the world class clubs or nations.

Team talks are one of the key factors which split the world class managers to the non-world class managers. You'll learn what to say to your team before,during and at the end of matches managing different clubs, from the foundations of Semi-pro to the world class clubs or nations.

Errrm, thanks? :confused:

C.

Errrm, thanks? :confused:

C.

lol. I understand your confusion. But I think he means that you have to take the time to know your players. Not all players react the same to different team-talks.

eg. determined players may look differently on "I expect a win" compared to how an ambitious player sees it.

So an idea might be to get to know the mentality of each individual player and then use the individual talk on every player who differs from the team personality.

Also, when buying new players, look at the scout report and only buy players who "should fit in well with the rest of the lads".

edit: oh. also, only use 'pleased' at the end of each, match. In my experience, this is NOT a motivator, only a recognition of performance.

Thanks for translating ulrich87.

Yes, I do tend to study my squad personalities and I do also study the scout and coach reports as you say.

Ever so occasionally, I just seem to make the wrong decision with 'we can win' and I can't quite work out why! :confused:

I had a similar game against fellow relegation candidates come up just recently though and this time I went 'for the fans'. No negative reaction this time.

Regards,

C.

ulrich87 sumed up what I was going to say..

But also I feel the "We can Win this" is also saying that we are not favourites but if you put in a good effort you should get a result. Expect to win is good with lower league teams I find.

Hope that helped..

Team talks are one of the key factors which split the world class managers to the non-world class managers. You'll learn what to say to your team before,during and at the end of matches managing different clubs, from the foundations of Semi-pro to the world class clubs or nations.

And thats relevant to FM and crouchaldinho's post in what way? The question wasn't "what is a team talk?"

Had the same problem as you.

Your thread made me check if the players effected in that match were ambitious, and it turns out they are.

Solution seems obvious. More ambitious players need more ambitious team talks.

I think if the majority of your team is ambitious then the team talk should be a more ambitious one, while the not so ambitious players can get a you have faith.

If the majority are not ambitious then team talk could be set to a realistic level, while the ambitious players can get "expect a performence".

Sounds too simple though.

This is an indication of how bad I must be at team talks...

In the last game I played, my wife kept coming in and out of the room and asking me questions, thus totally distracting me. I was away to one of the best teams in the league. I picked what I would consider to be totally the wrong team talk as a result of not paying attention. Then at half time, losing 2-1, I picked totally the wrong team talk again because my wife was chatting away and I wasn't concentrating. In the end, I get a terrific result and my assistant reports no problems with my talks.

Maybe I should use this technique all of the time?

C.

You need to be using 'I expect a win' as a common option at home. 'We can win this' is best reserved for away matches and only used at home when you're clearly the underdog for the match against superior opposition.

Ask your assistant for advice. Most of the time it's good and I often go with the assistant's advice. He also seems to know when individual talks are sometimes best used. But I don't always choose that the assistant says. Occasionally I will go against his advice if I think it's being too soft on the team or not communicating enough expectation.

You need to be using 'I expect a win' as a common option at home. 'We can win this' is best reserved for away matches and only used at home when you're clearly the underdog for the match against superior opposition.

Ask your assistant for advice. Most of the time it's good and I often go with the assistant's advice. He also seems to know when individual talks are sometimes best used. But I don't always choose that the assistant says. Occasionally I will go against his advice if I think it's being too soft on the team or not communicating enough expectation.

Well, he says his people are all demotivated, he's a relegation candidate, etc. What you write seems to be aimed at top teams, not ones whose players you need to tell that there's "no pressure" just to stop their teary emo-whinging from flooding the pitch.

While I agree that wwfan's thread was very useful, I think this (http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php?t=136819) has helped me understand team-talks more than anything else.

There's a chance that, because you won your last game and morale was fairly good, 'we can with this' increased your players' confidence so much that they became complacent (hence de-motivated). This post tries to explain it, as well: (http://community.sigames.com/showpost.php?p=3578850&postcount=33)

The best way to see the effects of the team-talk is checking in the in-game motivation screens, rather than the assistant's feedback, I've found.

Thanks for posting RT--. I will have a read of that thread tomorrow.

Cheers,

C.

Time for a big rant....

What on earth is the point of this talk? I really can't work it out!

All 'we can win' seems to do for me is demotivate my players.

'Seems demotivated, look delighted' - that's what happens!

And the result is my team getting a hammering!

:mad: :mad:

If anyone can tell me what the point of this team talk is then I'd be very grateful.

Team talks seem to be a little random on influence at the best of times.

'We can win' seems to be the most random of all. I am, in fact, convinced that the outcome is actually random as it doesn't seem to follow any pattern at all.

Let me give a bit of context. I'm at home to the favourites for the title who are also currently top of the league. My team's form has been a bit up and down lately. Confidence is pretty average. The odds for the game are fairly even but the opposition are made slight favourites. My team are at home.

I just can't see what team talk I should be using here apart from 'we can win'.

I'm not going to 'wish luck' as I feel that we might be able to win the game.

I'm definitely not going to tell the team that 'I expect a win' because we aren't the better side and I don't necessarily expect us to easily win the game.

I've no idea what 'for the fans' actually means. This appears to actually be the safest option and no doubt the one I should have picked for this game. But it makes little sense to me!

I'm also not going to use 'no pressure' for obvious reasons.

'We can win this' seems to be the only logical choice. Isn't it supposed to mean 'this will be a tight match, but if we play to the best of our ability we can win this'? :confused: It sounds perfect for this scenario.

I don't even see any pattern to the players who are being affected by this choice. There is no pattern in terms of morale or personality as far as I can see. :confused:

My advice is to avoid 'we can win' unless you want to randomly demotivate your team.

/Rant over

"For the fans" seems to be the safest. It gets a few players going and I've never noticed a negative effect with it.

I usually use "I expect a win" when the players' morale is good and "for the fans" when it isn't.

I do use a lot of individual talks. Probably too many.

I use 'For the Fans' against any of my rivals home or away. But, I read somewhere, that saying 'For the Fans' while having Professional, HIghly Professional or any type of professional squad (Check that in Inofrmation bar) has huge affect, and they'll perform much better.

I tested it a bit in my first season with Man Utd, as I had Highly Professional squad and I can say that it made difference a lot of times.

Hope I helped at least a bit.

Cheers.

Always use "Disappointed" when playing at home and leading at half time does wonders for me, usually resulting in a quick goal right at the start of the 2nd half

Now if none of the talks seem to fit I don't use any at all!

(None) often has a better effect than anything else and often results in a very quick opening goal: Milevskyi has the two quickest goals in the PL, something like 24 and 26 seconds, both came in games where I didn't tell anyone anything before the match

We can win just slightly improves morale, while lowering motivation a bit (maybe it would a tiny bit of pressure too).

Good to use if you're slight underdogs and morale's a bit low, but that's about it. Suicidal if you're favourites and morale's high, because it tips confidence over in to complacency in unprofessional players.

I'd probably have gone with no team talk in your case Crouch (already enough pressure if it's a big game against the leaders, morale not so low that they need a confidence boost, but not so high that you need to worry about over-confidence).

Maybe a 'no pressure' for one or two younger/nervous players, maybe an expect a performance for one or two of the more professional, at a push.

Hey Crouchaldinho,

In your the match in your OP did you check the Assistant Manager's pre match feedback? It might be the case that the players who became demotivated by the 'we can win' talk were feeling overconfident anyway so by telling them 'we can win' that would logically demotivate them.

Always worth checking the ass man feedback pre match

Thanks for all of the answers.

I always check the assistant manager feedback itsallaboutthierry.

I'm afraid I've just come to the conclusion that 'we can win' randomly inflicts the 'seemed demotivated' effect if you are unlucky. Thus, I have decided to avoid it in the future and stick to 'for the fans' on those occasions where I would normally use it as others have said in reply to my posts.

If a player's morale is low, it's generally more imporatnt to make him happy/confident than make him motivated. So 'seemed demotivated, looked happy' isn't always a bad outcome. In FM terms, I'd happily give up the chance of a player 'looking motivated' to avoid the risk of him 'playing without confidence'.

The only thing I can guarantee is that the effects aren't random! Obviously I don't know exactly how things work, but professionalism, determination, ambition, pressure handling, morale, game importance, player and club relationships - all these things definitely factor.

In other words, motivating players is all very well, but the first priority is to make sure they're not lacking in confidence or feeling too much pressure on them to perform. Any team talk which seeks to motivate players typically works by trying to curb their confidence ('expect a win', 'expect a performance', 'disappointed/angry', etc) and/or by adding some pressure ('for the fans!', 'impress me', etc), whereas any team-talk that tries to improve confidence ('we can win this', 'I have faith', 'pleased/delighted') or reduce pressure ('no pressure') will tend to de-motivate them slightly.

'We can win' seems to be the most random of all. I am, in fact, convinced that the outcome is actually random as it doesn't seem to follow any pattern at all.

Let me give a bit of context. I'm at home to the favourites for the title who are also currently top of the league. My team's form has been a bit up and down lately. Confidence is pretty average. The odds for the game are fairly even but the opposition are made slight favourites. My team are at home.

I just can't see what team talk I should be using here apart from 'we can win'.

I'm not going to 'wish luck' as I feel that we might be able to win the game.

I'm definitely not going to tell the team that 'I expect a win' because we aren't the better side and I don't necessarily expect us to easily win the game.

I've no idea what 'for the fans' actually means. This appears to actually be the safest option and no doubt the one I should have picked for this game. But it makes little sense to me!

I'm also not going to use 'no pressure' for obvious reasons.

'We can win this' seems to be the only logical choice. Isn't it supposed to mean 'this will be a tight match, but if we play to the best of our ability we can win this'? :confused: It sounds perfect for this scenario.

I don't even see any pattern to the players who are being affected by this choice. There is no pattern in terms of morale or personality as far as I can see. :confused:

My advice is to avoid 'we can win' unless you want to randomly demotivate your team.

/Rant over

I simply don't use it for the same reasons you have mentioned. Just like that time when the teamtalk "don't get careless" actually meant : "get as careless as you can and conceed at least a few goals". The teamtalk structure is & always has been totally ridiculous, it's too confusing and too influential (to the point it can actually make the right tactical outlook seem totally wrong ).

If SI want to keep on implementing this option then it should be explained better and on top of that it should work exactly how it was explained. No one minds a little homework, but for it to be a total "shot in the dark" is a little bogus...

If a player's morale is low, it's generally more imporatnt to make him happy/confident than make him motivated. So 'seemed demotivated, looked happy' isn't always a bad outcome. In FM terms, I'd happily give up the chance of a player 'looking motivated' to avoid the risk of him 'playing without confidence'.

The only thing I can guarantee is that the effects aren't random! Obviously I don't know exactly how things work, but professionalism, determination, ambition, pressure handling, morale, game importance, player and club relationships - all these things definitely factor.

I understand what you are saying RT-- and I'm not actually saying that I think it's random. It just appears that way to me! I personally don't think 'we can win' works as it should do.

The other thing is the 'seemed demotivated' is always a bad outcome in my experience. If you get one or two players with that, it's basically like giving your opposition a 2 goal head start. That's my experience with it anyway.

I simply don't use it for the same reasons you have mentioned. Just like that time when the teamtalk "don't get careless" actually meant : "get as careless as you can and conceed at least a few goals". The teamtalk structure is & always has been totally ridiculous, it's too confusing and too influential (to the point it can actually make the right tactical outlook seem totally wrong ).

If SI want to keep on implementing this option then it should be explained better and on top of that it should work exactly how it was explained. No one minds a little homework, but for it to be a total "shot in the dark" is a little bogus...

Totally agree Loversleaper.

As somebody who also played a few older FM games, to me 'we can win' is just logically broken in 10 and I guess 09 (and I forgot about 08).

In 07, you'd use "we can win" if the odds were close, to fire your guys up just that little bit. Makes sense.

Now, you use 'we can win'/'have faith'/'encourage' (same **** different names) at halftime on anybody with a 7.5+ rating or who scored (and "don't get careless"/"don't let your performance drop" on anybody in the 6.7 to 7.4 range). Does that make any peculiar sense? Not really. It does have a "yesss, you can play even better, show me!" kinda effect, sure, but why can't I show faith in my kids before the match? But yes, just use 'none' or 'expect' in "normal" matches.

Back in the day, telling them to not get careless at HT pretty much meant that they *would* get careless, so that bit is better, now they "gained focus" and "seemed motivated", but..

(And telling them you're 'pleased' at HT was pretty much suicide in older games, much like today's pre-match faith is)

I found 'wish luck' worked a treat vs the likes of (especially) Man City and (somewhat) Arsenal when I had good enough players but a not so good club reputation, but as I play as big teams, I don't use it too often.

i usually tell them to 'do it for the fans' if its a tough game, i hate when i click 'Ask Assistant' and he tells them pressure is off, but sometimes that helps if theyre a bit nervous, 'pressure is off' play the counter and at half time tell them to do it for the fans, usually works out fine

i think its important to think beyond what youre saying, like think about how morale affects people etc. Telling a player with a low morale to do it for the fans wont work as good as 'no pressure' because he doesnt care about the fans really, hes feeling down about stuff, but if he thinks his performance doesnt matter, he might lighten up a bit

I've had my fair share of bad experiences with Pleased...

Usually most of my players take it as "Good, now you can stop playing", as usually the 2nd half turns into some sort of one-sided game where my players get hammered even by lower league teams.

Yes, I want to cry...

last night it happened to me as well, start of the season we win comfortably our first two games with the same score 3-1, then a mediocre side 1-0 at half time i say I'm pleased and all hell broke loose and we loose the game 2-1 and of course playing almost no football in the process.

I wanted to throw the monitor out, luckily it was 23:34 (or something like that) so I went for bed..

As the FM genre progress i see changes in team talks, but still it lacks something... maybe I can't understand concepts

I'm sure we've all got "pleased" horror stories. So here's mine:

BSP play-off first leg: 5-1 at half time.

If I don't say pleased now, I never will, right?

Final score: 5-3, including a MISSED PENALTY on patch 10.1 for them.

Second leg: 0-2 after 90 mins then by being angry again I finally motivated one or two of them and sneaked through with a late winner.

One word resulted in 135 mins of rubbish football.

Never again.

I've read guides on how to do team talks and they were derived from HUNDREDS of hours of study. I mean, this isn't Obsessive Compulsive Manager.

The problem is that SI is trying to do something (provide a meaningful team talks feature) using totally inadequate means (a limited set of ambiguous multiple choice questions). The result is muddle and frustration.

It's a bad feature and either needs drastic improvement or to be taken out of the game altogether in my opinion.

I believe that the same applies with even greater force to press conferences

'Pleased' only works as an individual talk for me. I usually give my 2-3 best rated players on the pitch the 'pleased'-talk at half-time (if they have a rating of 7.0+) and most of the time they retain or even increase their performance.

After reading through those threads with the SI confirmation that the best option is to say just nothing unless one option is an obvious call I keep on doing just that with great success

I think that the more you play FM, the more you get to understand the way it works, each manager is different and has his/her own style. In real life some are aggressive, some supportive, some sympathetic, which type are you?

You pick up the best way to communicate with your players the same as with the tactics, in my opinion, by trial and error and tweaking little bits here and there. You can 'ask assistant' if you're half-assed about it, or do nothing if you dont care. But if you want to get really into the game, then you're best discovering it for yourself

Yes, I want to cry...

last night it happened to me as well, start of the season we win comfortably our first two games with the same score 3-1, then a mediocre side 1-0 at half time i say I'm pleased and all hell broke loose and we loose the game 2-1 and of course playing almost no football in the process.

I wanted to throw the monitor out, luckily it was 23:34 (or something like that) so I went for bed..

As the FM genre progress i see changes in team talks, but still it lacks something... maybe I can't understand concepts

Then do "don't let your performance drop" on everybody besides those who scored and those with a 7.5+ rating. Have faith in said players who performed well, to inspire them to a yet better performance.

The problem is that SI is trying to do something (provide a meaningful team talks feature) using totally inadequate means (a limited set of ambiguous multiple choice questions). The result is muddle and frustration.

It's a bad feature and either needs drastic improvement or to be taken out of the game altogether in my opinion.

I believe that the same applies with even greater force to press conferences

Yes. Fully agree. But don't count on that happening in the next 2-3 releases at least..

I think that the more you play FM, the more you get to understand the way it works, each manager is different and has his/her own style. In real life some are aggressive, some supportive, some sympathetic, which type are you?

You pick up the best way to communicate with your players the same as with the tactics, in my opinion, by trial and error and tweaking little bits here and there. You can 'ask assistant' if you're half-assed about it, or do nothing if you dont care. But if you want to get really into the game, then you're best discovering it for yourself

The system is pretty broken though, no matter how positively you wanna look at it.