How do you pick your team?

I am curious as to how you go about picking your team; is it either:

1) Look at your oppo and decide the best squad to play against their team

2) Form, how well your players have been doing

3) Your best XI, week in, week out, no matter what

4) Rotate your players by fitness purely

I am debating over what to go for; for 1 obviously you are attempting to put out the team that will trouble them the most, however the players you put in could be of lesser overall ability. Also, you are chopping and changing regularly, which can't be good, especially in defence, as the team will not gel.

For 2 you get the players that are playing the best in your squad, and are probably somewhere near your best XI, this can work well e.g. Birmingham IRL. However, what if you have a speedy full back whos not very strong, up against a strong, tall winger, do you drop him for a lesser player, but one who is tall and strong? And a striker who is quick and agile, who is your best forward, up against a strong, quick, tall centre back, or someone on your bench who is tall and strong, who might cause them more problems, but is on paper overall worse than the small striker? etc etc

For 3, in theory you are putting out your best players every week, but oter players dont get a chance, even if they are good, and if their in poor form, then someone else of similar ability could do a better job.

And finally for 4, you are hopefully putting out your fittest team, but what if your oppo, on paper, would walk all over that type of team.

Also, in friendlies do you just play various plyers just to get them fit whatever the team your palying?

And do you ever look at the other teams eleven to decide what team ur gunna play or do you just go by you team scout report?

I generally work off form but fitness is a factor too for me. It's all very well having 8.00 over the last 5 matches but if their condition is 70% it's gonna cause problems.

If my team is having a bad morale crisis, I sometimes put a couple of happy players in. This has actually got me out of a few mid season slumps.

Usually I have a first choice XI in mind and rest a couple of players if they have particularly low fitness of form.

at the minute i dont have enough good players to have squad rotation, so i pick my 11 strongest players and let them do their best.

Usually a combination of form and fitness, although I do always have my strongest 11 in mind for the big games.

Usually a combination of form and fitness, although I do always have my strongest 11 in mind for the big games.

I do this but if during a game I see the opposition side with a slow rb for example, I'll put my fastest winger on his side of the field so I can take advantage

The team I think will do the best job, which is a combination of all four.

For starters, I look at morale and fitness. If anybody is struggling in those areas, they aren't considered.

Then, I think about form and attributes. I think form is more important than attributes to a degree, but there will be times when I need the more skillful player in there to do a certain job. On the other hand, if I'm playing a team with a slow defence, I'll put in my lightning quick but technically lacking player ahead of my skillful winger, for example.

I try to have a first XI and then rotate for fitness (below 95%, which is probably a bit over-cautious. I will give people an extended sit on the sidelines if their morale collapses (in which case I'm generally losing and need to make changes anyway) or if they seem to be lacking confidence like a striker missing CCCs repeatedly. I generally try to avoid having more than 2 people with Poor morale and will only rarely start someone who has Very Poor unless it's an easy game on paper.

I have a squad of about 16 first team players and rotate them on who's the fittest first (depending on mid-week games) and if I have injuries to these 16 players I like to give the youth team players a go. I hate having a long list of first team players to try and keep happy!

If I'm in a league with 7 subs available then I bring in more players accordingly

Best 11 then alter for form and fitness (and occaisionally for formation).

I try and keep the team unchanged as much as possible and only alter when forced to by injury / suspension or loss of form.