bad form -- what can I do?

Player performance seems to be very random.

If a player has a good day a striker can play out of position (for example DC) and get a match rating of 7+. If he has a bad day, he will get a rating of 6.3 even if he scored 3 goals in the same formation vs. the same opponent one week ago...

So,... is there any way to influence this "form"...? Does anybody know, how the game acutally works...? All the player interactions seems to be boost morale but seem to be useless to get a player back on form. Morale is not the problem. The only thing that had some kind of effect on the actual performance was transfer listing the player or dropping him to the reserves and simply waiting 2 or 3 weeks...

What do other managers do?

I have gone to the point of not playing my star striker every game, because I want him to perform in the big games. As it is now, daily "random" form seems to be the most important factor in deciding about performance. It doesn't matter much if they are ambitious, relish the big matches, etc. if the game decides they have a bad day... they will get 6.8 max.

It is kind of frustrating to lose a game after setting up the OI and tactics just because 2 key players don't go above 6.8 during the 1st half for unknown reasons.

Main question is: Is there any way to figure out WHY a player plays 20 games with >7.3 followed by 15 games with 6.7 in the same formation with the same settings with the same morale vs similar opponents?!

My striker, Torres usually goes through bad form from time to time, sometimes i change the forward instruction to advanced forward or complete forward see how he does, but what seems to work more for him is sayin you have faith in his ability for the match talk and praising him after a good game.

Players have ups and downs, it's natural they don't play the same in every single match. Also, your opponents might be starting to adapt better to your tactic and target your key players.