Offside module and player/match stats

I'm sure there has been loads of discussions on this before, but I can't find any especially current so people can feel free to post random flames

I have watched ~75% of my Werder Bremen team's games over the last couple of seasons in full match mode so I tend to see far more offside rulings than I would watching only key highlights and I have to say that if the programming of the offside module can't be made more realistic I would much prefer it if incorrect decisions are never made. I know that would be unrealistic, but no more so than the current case were I see numerous offsides called each match that no referee in the world would give in real life so it is no more realistic and is guaranteed to really irritate FM players.

I've seen offsides given when a player is just inside his own half and also when there are some 4 or 5 players a good few yards closer to the goal than the striker - not just when the ball is played, but throughout the whole process - the striker never moves anywhere near offside at all.

Most frustrating and most common of all though is my Bremen targetman who gets called offside a few times per game when he is quite blatantly being tightly man-marked goal-side by a defender. It is totally inconceivable that he would ever get called offside in real life in that case because the linesman could not fail to see the defender as well as the striker

On a separate note entirely, I would love to see a few more (or different) stats for players and for matches:

Cross Completion % is a total irrelevance to me - I'd far rather see the absolute number of crosses completed (and the number attempted possibly) because 50% cross completion when you have only managed to attempt 2 crosses all game is to me a lot worse than 30% cross completion when you have attempted 20 crosses.

Similarly I would like to see crosses as a player stat along with passes, shots and all that stuff.

Also, I like the stats they have been showing during Euro 2008 telling us how far each player has run during a game - I'd love to see that added, plus any other interesting stats. They are mostly cosmetic I guess, but I like to study the stats from time to time in my games.

Yeah i agree. I would prefer Referees to get it right 100% of the time in the game. I think tyring to program the Refs to make mistakes now and then is bad news.

It's one of the biggest challenges of creating a sports simulation. How to code fallibility without it looking contrived (see the numerous AI cheating posts) or ridiculous. When it fails to get this right it makes it that much harder to suspend disbelief.

As for the extra match stats I'm all for it but I wonder to what extent the GUI impacts on these decisions. For example I can't see any reason for not having more goalkeeper specific stats in the match other than the impact it might have on the layout. Having said that I suppose there could be more technical reasons like memory usage, database structure under the hood etc.

especially to crosses as a stat in themselves.

i think that the refs should have a small percentage of mistakes. i recently had a match as Barcelona where 4 goals had been ruled out, 1 offside and 3 fouls! it was very frustrating as i only drew the match and didin't no ir the fouls acctually happened or not.

the reason people dont look offside when they are is because of the match engine, it'll look to us like they are offside when they are not

Originally posted by htygyr:

the reason people dont look offside when they are is because of the match engine, it'll look to us like they are offside when they are not

If the match engine doesn't accurately reflect what is happening in the match then it is pointless.

And if SI can't get it right in 2008, with 5 years of trying, god help them. And the future of this game,

Originally posted by htygyr:

the reason people dont look offside when they are is because of the match engine, it'll look to us like they are offside when they are not

I accept that when we are talking the kind of small distances that referees and linesmen get wrong in real life, but something as basic as a striker being man-marked goalside can't possibly be just down to the match engine view, nor can a player who has 4 or 5 other players yards closer to the goal than he is.