Striker problem

With the new patch, I've not really had any problems with morale or anything else that seems to get brought up on here every other day. My strikers however, are something different.

Every game I'm having 20-25 shots, with only 2-5 on target. It's just silly, my strikers all have good composure, finishing and off the ball, yet they cannot finish. It's not just a slump either; I'm over halfway through the season and this has been an ongoing thing since day one. I've even changed my tactic to try and make it better, and even with numerous CCCs per game they couldn't hit a cow's **** with a banjo. I never had this problem on the previous patch. I wouldn't mind if it was just a slump, but it is literally all of my strikers all of the time and I'm getting tired of it now.

With the new patch, I've not really had any problems with morale or anything else that seems to get brought up on here every other day. My strikers however, are something different.

Every game I'm having 20-25 shots, with only 2-5 on target. It's just silly, my strikers all have good composure, finishing and off the ball, yet they cannot finish. It's not just a slump either; I'm over halfway through the season and this has been an ongoing thing since day one. I've even changed my tactic to try and make it better, and even with numerous CCCs per game they couldn't hit a cow's **** with a banjo. I never had this problem on the previous patch. I wouldn't mind if it was just a slump, but it is literally all of my strikers all of the time and I'm getting tired of it now.

long shots stat.. it annoys me as well because players like nani and rooney score these in real life often.

i try work into box etc, it works for some but not others

I was remunstrating in another post that 4-4-2 was the easiest formation, then someone told me you have a greater chance of conversion from a cross to any other option. Whether this is true or not, you can decide for yourself?

long shots stat.. it annoys me as well because players like nani and rooney score these in real life often.

i try work into box etc, it works for some but not others

Rooney doesn't score long shots very often.

he hasn't recently, but is very capable of it.

I don't think it's patch-related, or at least it is not an effect I have noticed since the patch. In the second season of my new post-patch save, Daniel Sturridge (my main ST) just led the league in % of shots on target, according to the stats page. He was third in goals scored -- behind Torres(!!!!!) and Rooney.

You have designed your tactic to create as many shots as possible in a match, because according to what you see in 3d that's a good thing.

It is not!

Design your tactic to create as many chances as possible that ends in a CCC or goal! The difference is great when it comes to overall efficiency.

Ive only played using this patch, my Leicester team are top goal scorers and moral bar a couple is generally pretty good, ive always noticed i have a high percentage of shots to goals on all the older versions, i just use the shouts if its getting excessive, work ball into the box and get ball forward always work, i use 442

I've just lost to West Ham 1-0, they scored through a penalty. I had 14 shots, 1 on target, they had two shots, one on target. Story of the season.

Any advice on designing my tactic to create more CCCs?

I've just lost to West Ham 1-0, they scored through a penalty. I had 14 shots, 1 on target, they had two shots, one on target. Story of the season.

Any advice on designing my tactic to create more CCCs?

* Play slow football when you're not countering their attack. You need to wait to find the right opportunity for a through ball or good cross and not rush forward.

* Don't have too high attacking mentalities up front - from click 17-20 the strikers tend to shoot from any angle and behave selfishly.

* Find the correct width where your strikers and/or wingers approach the goal from the "good angles", but aren't colliding with each other.

* Don't let your players shoot from a distance.

* The more sliders which are set to "often", the more robotic the players will be and the more is up to your tactical genious and less up to the quality of the players. Bad players may be confused if you set everything to often. Try to limit their options and rather give them more creative freedom instead.

* I really can't understand how people can succeed with TC tactics and standard roles. They are terrible, all of them! People do succeed, however...

* Don't let your players shoot from a distance.

If you block players shooting from distance you are ignoring an area where approx 33% of goals come from in real life.

You are also making it much easier to defend against as the opposition can sit back and hold position more making it harder for your attackers to find space.

* I really can't understand how people can succeed with TC tactics and standard roles. They are terrible, all of them! People do succeed, however...

The TC is designed to work with the ME so it makes sense to use them.

If you block players shooting from distance you are ignoring an area where approx 33% of goals come from in real life.

You are also making it much easier to defend against as the opposition can sit back and hold position more making it harder for your attackers to find space.

The TC is designed to work with the ME so it makes sense to use them.

In theory and in real life that's how it does work. However, in FM goals from long shots are very rare and hardly related to the long shots attribute at all. They are lucky strikes, so to speak, and they will occur regardless of the player instructions. As such, the only thing that you do when you instruct your players to shoot "sometimes" or "often" is to increase the instances of shots not ending in a goal. This will help your shot statistics, but if you have good distance shooters the opponent's keeper will save a lot of them and eventually play a good game because of this. The result is that he may experience the match of the season, making it almost impossible to score.

In my experience, 30-yard screamers are "created by" excellent form, excellent morale, Determination and Flair rather than a good long shots attribute and Shoot from Distance set to Often. I have yet to see statistics showing that the long shots instruction set to Often will give you more goals from distance. Until I do I will advice people to turn it off and ignore the Long Shots attribute.

However, in FM goals from long shots are very rare

Only for those that do their best to stop them happening

and thats before you also consider the increase in set pieces from taking long shots which is where another 33% approx of goals come from.

EDIT

On top of that there are also deflections and rebounds that lead to other chances inside the area.

I have a few suggestions. All or none of these might help. This advice is more oriented towards scoring goals in general rather than making sure you put away chances you are creating. Anyway, I hope that at least one tidbit might be useful:

> Start with a somewhat slow tempo against worse teams. The quality of final ball is liable to be better.

> Consider playing slightly narrower. If you play wide your strikers will tend to drift and receive the ball out on the flank, and then have to do the hard work of creating a chance under pressure. In a reasonably narrow formation they will drift more naturally into channels and generally approach the goal at angles from which it is easier to score. .

> Get your players (especially your fullbacks/wing-backs) to ping through balls. I find crosses to rarely be effective in FM unless you possess quality wingers. Even then I find your wingers tend to score more headers at the far post then target men manage.

> Make sure your strikers aren't both running channels. One doing so is fine, but if both run channels the chances tend to be of a lesser quality as the strikers playing channels tend to be pushed wide of goal by the covering centreback. Keep at least one on 'Normal' wide play with a fairly attacking mentality.

> Make sure that your strikers Attacking bar isn't set too high. 17-20 will make them very, very selfish.

> Make sure that both strikers don't have the same Att/Def instruction! Doing so will make them much, much easier to defend against as they will roughly move together, making them easier to mark. Setting one to a mentality around the midpoint ('Normal') will see them drop into space and pull defenders out of position.

> Set your strikers to cross the ball into the centre. This will see them cut back the ball more often for easy finishes.

> Make sure your strikers aren't closing down too much. In my opinion the FM defaults are far too high and strikers tend to get dragged out of position too easily as a result. The problem is that when a striker wins a ball it becomes very difficult for them to do much with it unless you have wingers or midfielders who are very on the ball.

> Consider changing to a different formation if you are using 4-4-2. My experience with the formation in 11 & 12 is wildly inconsistent. But generally speaking teams that defend correctly can usually nullify your strikers by keeping tight and forcing them wide. Switching to 4-4-1-1 is a safe bet. Dropping a man into attacking midfield is difficult for both defenders and midfielders to deal with, while putting a lone striker up front also creates marking problems.

> Consider removing any responsibility to defend from your wingers. In my experience wingers are so pants at defending from wide in the current iteration of FM that you might as well use them as wide attackers. I personally have them harass the opponents back line and hurl themselves forward whenever an opportunity arises.

Thanks a lot ToffeeViola (Everton & Fiorentina fan per chance?) and BiggusD, gonna try and implement some of those suggestions into my tactic. I'm pretty well set in every other area of my tactic, just the attacking players need work after going up to the Prem.

Probably should have mentioned I don't use wingers, rather rely on the full-backs to exploit the wide-areas in my otherwise narrow formation. I used to have them both set to attacking mentality in the lower leagues, but since the Champo/Prem, I've been forced to change this to support. I'm currently torn between using my favoured 4-3-1-2 formation and the 4-1-3-2. The striker problem is slightly improved with the trequartista present in the 4-3-1-2, but not by much, so I've been using the 4-1-3-2 for the majority of my time in the first Prem season. This has resulted in me having the second best Goals Conceded after Liverpool (just 12 goals after 21 games) but the strikers are isolated and I'm relying more and more on set pieces or my (CM)BWM/support who has a knack for getting forward and scoring scrappy goals. I tend to fine that more central players are most effective in FM so will take your advice especially on the width and wide-play of the forwards.

Also never knew how important the sliders are, got quite a bit of tinkering to do methinks...

Thanks a lot ToffeeViola (Everton & Fiorentina fan per chance?)

Yes, you hit the nail on the head!

Good luck with your game Tell us how you got on!

I used to have the stance of just setting the long shots of all the team to rarely to avoid them wasting possession cheaply but i've stopped doing that, it helps on getting goals out of nowhere, corners, deflections, and it's also important to avoid losing possession cheaply instead of just having a shot at goal.

Normally when i play against a team that is just parking the bus i use the shout to work the ball into the box so i can have more quality chances though.

Yes, you hit the nail on the head!

Good luck with your game Tell us how you got on!

Ah great, I'm also a Fiorentina fan Going to see them play Napoli at home in February, can't wait.

i love work the ball into the box, with quality players, or a team that plays often, it looks fantastic, omly got east stirling and man utd playing like that (which is interesting, because i got the same forwards and winger on another save that i have on my east stirling and not much is happening)

good passers, set a fast striket to attacker, and your second on to support, i have on my united save rooney constantly threading balls therough the central defenders for hernandez to score. granted rooney is not scoring, but hernandez has scored 8 in 2 games