A solution to the England conundrum

I notice there have been a couple of threads highlighting the fact that the England team/players are extremely overrated. I tend to agree (nothing to do with my own nation, your friends from north of the border ) and think it would be a problem easily remedied by reducing the hidden attributes of the aforementioned players (ie the Important game and Consistency ratings)

I just find it unrealistic that Engalnd seem to have a lot of world beaters and a massive chance of winning major tournaments when in reality they tend to bomb. I can understand the sentimentality and sensitivity of fans towards players who play for certain clubs but I do believe that something should be done for the realism of the game.

Interestingly, I've yet to see England win a tournament in my own saves. Sure, they qualify with ease, but get no further than the semis.

I just find it unrealistic that Engalnd seem to have a lot of world beaters and a massive chance of winning major tournaments when in reality they tend to bomb. I can understand the sentimentality and sensitivity of fans towards players who play for certain clubs but I do believe that something should be done for the realism of the game.

England do have a lot of top quality players though.

The difference is that in real life they don't seem to function together for whatever reaason. Whereas in Football Manager it generally comes down to just how good the players are, hence they do well in major championships.

This discussion always makes me laugh.

What about how some of these players do so well in the league?

England do have a lot of top quality players though.

The difference is that in real life they don't seem to function together for whatever reaason. Whereas in Football Manager it generally comes down to just how good the players are, hence they do well in major championships.

^This. Drogba and Torres are a lethal partnership on FM but irl even if Torres was in form i doubt i could see them working well together.

England have never won anything on my saves (FM10).

In fact, on my main save, they went through a stage of not even qualifying for tournaments under Stuart Pearce, until Steve Bruce came in and at least restored some pride!

Scotland, however, are totally overrated in my saves! They normally qualify for tournaments () and have even made it to semis and finals of Euro & WC tournaments!

England have never won anything on my saves either.

Yes FM does seem to bias England which is kind of understandable as it is a UK game but recently in my save Steve Bruce was the England manager and he failed to qualify for the 2014 World Cup and got them to the European Championships in 2016 and they got knocked out in the Quarter Finals.

Still they should be world beaters now...............................I'm in charge!

England have never won anything on my saves (FM10).

In fact, on my main save, they went through a stage of not even qualifying for tournaments under Stuart Pearce, until Steve Bruce came in and at least restored some pride!

Scotland, however, are totally overrated in my saves! They normally qualify for tournaments () and have even made it to semis and finals of Euro & WC tournaments!

I agree with this. England never won anything in my game, until I took over and won the Euros and Confederation Cup, got them to number 1 in the world. Then I left, and they are back to quarter-finals at best, and slipped down the rankings.

Scotland meanwhile, have qualified for every tournament, and the Welsh reached a playoff for qualification, only to narrowly miss out. Is that realistic??

England have never won anything on my saves either.

Yes FM does seem to bias England which is kind of understandable as it is a UK game but recently in my save Steve Bruce was the England manager and he failed to qualify for the 2014 World Cup and got them to the European Championships in 2016 and they got knocked out in the Quarter Finals.

Still they should be world beaters now...............................I'm in charge!

I don't think its so much that they're overrated its more that a number of England's stars seem to struggle when playing with each other.

Coming from a Scotsman, England are not really overrated in the game, its debatable where the blame lies for the lack of success from the English national team in recent years but its not because the players are not good enough, the team that went to the last world cup should have done much better. FM doesnt program John Terry rushing off to sleep with his team mates g/f's and causing squad rifts or Capello locking his poor players in their rooms so they cant do what they want and thus moan about how they are treated.

The main problem with England is that they don't bring the youth through in the national team.

Example - Wilshere uncapped at 25 whilst Gerrard still starts.

I understand the experience over youth for clubs, but the AI is poor at planning for the future.

Spain have totally dominated my save in 2027. England have been close and have some world class regens but never seem to do well in competitions. They only won one euros since i loaded the save. A bit realistic if you ask me.

You can make Gerrard and Lampard play well together for England in FM quite easily, something that requires the world's greatest minds to do in reality.

Ability-wise, there's definitely English world-class players out there (Ashley Cole, Ferdinand, Terry, Gerrard, Lampard and Rooney), but the latter three simply cannot play in their best positions at the same time. In addition, whilst these are the cream of the crop, the talent falls off sharply beyond these players - England have several "world-class" players, few "good" ones, and plenty of "average". In addition, in areas where England are lacking, they are really lacking - look at left-wing and right-back, for example.

Then there's the so-called English mentality involving the ball bypassing the midfield (that can't work together anyway, so I'm not sure that's a really big issue).

I'd argue it's the fact that it is far too easy to gel a team at International level, where consistency is a set of players moving through the ranks together for a long time (Spain, Italy, Holland, France and Germany, for example), with proven results, similar mentalities and tactics at club level, and very little chop-and-change (i.e. Capello changes his tactics again and again, and players get into squads and are never seen again frequently).

On the other hand, I think players are roughly accurately rated within countries, but there is a lack of consistency and expectations differ between countries. One example was where someone in the data forum complained that Barzagli was utter rubbish, but that was down to the fact that someone in Germany researched him and he was apparently good enough by German standards, but not necessarily Italian standards. Which isn't the first time where we've seen it happen (i.e. Muntari to Inter).

Cross-border transfers are the only real opportunity we have to see where players compare between nationalities and leagues, but these don't always occur very often.

I only tend to see England winning anything when regens begin to take over the team. On one save they won every World Cup and all but one Euro Cup between and including 2020-2040. I was in charge for 14 of the 20 years though. And we had a huge number of quality players to pick from, somehow the English players count had gone up to about 80% in the league by the time I was done with that save, on last years game.