Is International Team Gelling Broken?

I've been in charge of an international side for 7-8 years now and I have a fairly settled side. I make sure my reserves and fringe players get playing time in friendlies and I actually have a very settled squad at the moment, with pretty much every player having 25+ caps. But in all of this time, I have never managed to get to 'good' team gelling.

At the moment, I have the 'not yet developed a good understanding' rating. Not so long ago, it was 'short of operating as a unit'. There seems to be no pattern as to when it goes up or down. I really cannot understand it. I've never managed to get to the 'good' gelling level.

There are some really long standing members of my preferred starting eleven. The average is somewhere around 60 caps with everyone having had plenty of playing time. I rarely make major changes to the squad and I work hard to bring together players with personalities that match the dominant personality within the squad so that they don't have to adapt to fit in.

Had anyone else suffered with this problem? Is the team gelling for International sides just a bit bugged or am I missing something?

Any help appreciated.

Has anyone got any thoughts on this?

Surely I'm not the only one doing some International management?

C'mon crouch you've only given people 8 hours to respond, we have lives outside FM you know

Seriously though I've been in charge for just over two seasons and I have similar message on my AM's feedback but it doesn't seem to affect results.

I find as long as the you don't change the squad much they play ok but when I make large changes a poor performance usually follows.

C'mon crouch you've only given people 8 hours to respond, we have lives outside FM you know

I seriously doubt that.

Thanks for your answer though.

Are you managing England? If so, this is highly realistic, well done SI

I largely agree with Cougar, keep them motivated and stay strong tactically and you should be fine.

Fair one SCIAG. Just seems strange to me that I cannot manage to get the team gelling up to a decent level.

Although I suppose perhaps it is intentionally like this as it is, after all, one of the challenges of International management.

Maybe it is actually impossible to achieve a good team gelling by intent.

That might even be realistic. Imho the World Cup pretty clearly shows that club teams have a much better understanding than teams which are just assembled for around 20-30 days each year with ever-changing players. Even if you have achieved a personal consistency here, these lads just don't train together often enough in that team. Hence I suspect the rl difference of playing quality between the CL and the WC becomes explainable.

On top of that at least it should be the same for all international teams and thus not be an issue which disadvantages you as a human user.

Yeah, checked my Ireland game, been in charge for 4 years and Liam Brady still reckons were short of operating as a good unit.

Not that I'm stopped from winning by that.

Maybe it is actually impossible to achieve a good team gelling by intent.

That might even be realistic. Imho the World Cup pretty clearly shows that club teams have a much better understanding than teams which are just assembled for around 20-30 days each year with ever-changing players. Even if you have achieved a personal consistency here, these lads just don't train together often enough in that team. Hence I suspect the rl difference of playing quality between the CL and the WC becomes explainable.

On top of that at least it should be the same for all international teams and thus not be an issue which disadvantages you as a human user.

I agree. It would be silly if international teams, which play together relatively rarely, were able to gel to the same degree as club teams are.

It does make sense now that I think about it but surely after having a settled team playing together for many years you could get to 'good' team gelling?