Anyone else playing Arsenal on the Demo?

First things first, this demo has dragged me back from the brink of quitting FM... a major, major improvement. The new tactics is amazing, I am big enough to admit that no matter what I did (or which guide I read) I couldnt get fully to grips with the sliders. So being able to tell my players exactly what style I want them to play is fantastic.

I have managed to recreate the current Arsenal tactics down to a tee (although I am having to use a 4-5-1 to create our 4-3-3)... even to the degree of having goals from all over the park and managing to lose 2-1 to Man Utd at Old Trafford (poor penalty decision and a late Rooney goal) despite dominating the game.

A couple of things that I have to wonder about though... I was told by Pat Rice that my youth team was rubbish, and the only player with any chance of making it was Benik Afobe... which seems odd considering Arsenal have so many talented youngsters in real life and are on the back of destroying all comers in the academy last year. I thought Pat was just exaggerating but sure enough they are being trounced in every game.

Despite Arsenal playing a 4-3-3 to great effect this season in real life, in game I was told by my back room staff that we are better suited to a 4-1-2-1-2 or 4-4-2 (I know that the 4-3-3 is a new formation for Arsenal) with FM normally being so up to date with formations and data the back room staff should surely at least be considering 4-3-3 (or the 4-5-1 I am using to get the same effect) as an option.

Finally, I cant help but feel that Arsenal have been sold a little short stats wise. I came in to find established first team squad players like; Song, Denilson, Gibbs, Vela, Ramsey and Wilshere (those are just the ones I can remember) listed as for loan... further to this my back room staff were telling me that we needed to strengthen (I can only guess to cover for all the first teamers we are looking to send out on loan). Vermaelen has had an ok start but isnt rated by the back room staff at all and hardly has the stats to match his fine start to the season (same would go for Song who looks out of his depth in the DM position). I just cant help but feel that the Arsenal team is based purely on the pessemistic impressions of the media pre-season that they would struggle... has anyone else noticed this? Or am I just looking at it in a biased way... I would be interested to get others opinions from their saves, whether as playing as Arsenal or from how Arsenal are doing in their game.

Vermaelen has unfortunately been shafted a bit because of the game's inability to factor in height..

his jumping/vertical leap is actually outstanding irl, but his height is fairly average so his jumping in game has been shafted a bit. his stats elsewhere are very poor as well :/

i'm in agreement with you.. arsenal is very surprisingly underrated i feel, as opposed to being overrated in the past few games.

Vermaelens stats are as set by the Ajax researcher and if he continues to impress may be revised in January. Any data issues should be kept to the data forum. Cheers http://community.sigames.com/forumdisplay.php?f=165

Vermaelen was rated by the Ajax researcher on the basis of last season's performances. If he continues in his current form then I'd imagine he'll be upgraded in January perhaps.* As for the other players, I think they're fair, if not a tad on the low side. I think Diaby and Denilson in particular appear distinctly average, but seem in reality to be pretty accurate, and still perform competently, if not spectacularly. As for some of the youngsters, they seem to be very good stat-wise, so I'd again go on performances and development over the word of your staff.

I'll wait for the full game and watch them develop over a season to make a proper judgement though.

*Robbie beat me to it.

In the data forum there's a discussion about this. It's based on his ability at Ajax. And since you can only judge him based on his performances in what is (sorry, Dutch fans) a less technically-gifted league that'll be why he got "shafted". You can change his stats yourself with the full games editor or wait for the first update, which I think they've said will include attribute updates (although that may not be until Jan - not sure).

Best to use the Arsenal thread in the Good Players forum for this discussuion please [url-http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php?t=153790] here [/url]