Defending

Hi!

I wonder if anyone else got this problem i am having. The reason why i want to share this "problem" is cause it seems to me something has changed from the demo version to the finished product. I played the demo as a norwegian premeier club called Brann. I bet most of you dont know much about norwegian football, but you could compare it to the english Championship more or less, with a few exceptions. Now, while playing the demo the defending seemed quite good and i was pleased. To some extent the players seemed to be doing what i told them, altho you always need to keep in mind that you cant expect the same out of these players as you would demand from Man U, Barca, Real M players etc. Also, they didnt seem to make horrible misstakes in their own area.

Now, when i've got the full game updated with the 10.1 patch its all gone horribly wrong. I manage Real Madrid now, and you should expect them to behave like the kind of players they are, top of the shelf. But on the contrary, they play like lower league players. I play a 4-1-3-2 system with Alonso as an anchor helping the defence, but still i let in an exceptional amount of goals and i often lose with several goals at home. Most of them due to horrible defending such as running passed the ball, 3 or sometimes even 4 players contending for the same ball even tho i have Zonal Marking enabled. In addition they often let strikers just run straight through my defence and be one on one with the keeper. I have also told my backs to close down on own half, but they just seem to idle in their position until they are challenged and some junior skips passed them like knife in butter. When i say run straight through i MEAN straight through, its like they back all the way and when its a few yards left they do something stupid like "bounce" off to another direction letting the striker score with ease.

I've tried changing to man marking since my defenders have good stats for that particular task. I gave it a try for a few games but it just went from bad to worse and i lost 5-2 to Valencia AT HOME and that was Valencias first win in 9 games! I've also tried adjusting the back line up and down to see if they would close down at different times, but even if i set "close down own half" they refuse to close down. With Alonso as an anchor i practicly have 5 defenders and at this level they should be at least able to carry out simple tasks as closing down or even staying in position. On top of that i notice that if i tell my players to mark and close down a particluar player BEFORE the game starts, its all canceled out when i press play. I did that with Frederic Kanoute and he scored 3 goals before i could even blink, and when i noticed my marking was canceled out it was too late.

The general comeback to these "problems" is adjust your tacs, but i have played CM/FM since the first game saw light in the early 90's so its not like the first team i ever manage, besides i usually play with real madrid so i am "used" to the team.

It is also important to mention that i pay close attention to training and i always make individual schedules for my defenders, midfielder and attackers so that their needs are met and skills honed.

So if there are any constructive comebacks lets hear em!

Ron