How to lose on purpose?

No, i'm serious!

My team just refuse to get knocked out of cup competitions. I offer a high league and low cup bonus. I replace all 11 starters with reserves, give them the "Wish Luck" or "You can win" talk (which according to some research threads are the worse talks to give), set the team to "Contain" and Take a Breather for the whole game...and yet we still get the win!

As a League 2 side, i'd like to get knocked out of the cups early to avoid having a huge fixture list late in the season. But no, we always beat the League 1 clubs, and against the Championship sides the team fights to exhaustion and manages to win! Eventually of course, we draw Man Utd and get thrashed, but that always kills morale, and prompts the board to remind me of the disappointment every month until the summer

Short of playing my keeper up front and putting my striker in goal (which should also kill morale when we get thrashed), what could i do to suggest to my team that maybe we should reduce our fixture list a bit by bowing out of the cups?

Is there an anti-Diablo tactic?

use old magyar 2-3-5 tactic that way you can lose in a blaze of glory!

I use wish luck virtually every game and have won way more than I think I should?

I threw two games at the end of the season once, I had already won the league and was trying to relegate my rival. I just played a lot of youth players and went ultra attacking until losing, then ultra defensive to try and lose. It worked, but only just.

I'd rather earn money through a cup run than worry about a busy fixture list.

play an ountfield player in goal

I tried to lose once because I could get a better draw in the next round if I lost this particular game. i put my strikers in defense and defenders upfront and some very weird ultra attacking tactics.After the first half I subbed my GK for an outfield player. The final result was 1-1

I'd rather earn money through a cup run than worry about a busy fixture list.

I'd rather get promoted and make more money every week, but hey, to each his own...

I actually just lost (finally!) to Bristol City, who made their best effort to gift me the win at the very end by scoring a brilliant own-goal from long range to make it 1-2. I had 17 shots (2 on target) to their 3 (2 on target)!

Now just have to get knocked out of FA Cup and Johnstone Paint, and i can keep the squad fresh for a promotion run!

EDIT: Now out of the Johnstone's Paint Trophy...played all 6 of my goalkeepers as strikers/midfielders, and only lost 1-0 on an absolute fluke goal! (My defender got the ball near the end line outside of the penalty area, tried to clear it, cleared it straight at the opposing striker, who deflected it straight at my goalkeeper (who is normally a striker), who then deflected it off the crossbar and in! The goal was awarded to the striker.)

play an ountfield player in goal

That doesn't always work! Had to replace my injured goalkeeper with an outfield player once on the hour mark and we were 1 goal in front but the AI team didn't have 1 shot after I made the change.

As long as you are only fielding reserves in the cup, a long cup run should not impair anything you wish to achieve with your first team :confused:

Be careful what you wish for. A few losses might lower morale enough that you won't even get promotion.

Play to WIN the game, people...

On FML i once arranged a lose-to-win tournament where you had to lose the match in order to get the three points. It was a league of ten teams and the worst team won the prize at the end. It was really hilarious and a bit surreal - once we perfected the tactics we had games where one team often scored over 100 goals.

I seem to remember the 0-2-8 formation was popular with everything set to rigid attack.

Goalies were a problem as the game insisted you had one (even if it was a outfield player) but once the game started you could move him up field too which helped

@rancer890

That's why i ask. I want to throw the cup game, without losing 6-0!

I'd rather lose close to a team one division above me, then advance to the semis and get crushed by Chelsea just in time for it to affect the promotion stretch run!

Set your goalkeeper to mark theirs.

^ LOL...that's brilliant! Gonna try this in a friendly ASAP

Play 0-0-0-5-5.

Or stick Fernando Torres up front.

Chas!

Want a team that sacks over 21's. Want to deliberately lose cup games.

Don't you ever play a normal game?

if you are winning with reserves, i dont see how this is a problem for your league matches.

Play Heskey

Warn againts complacement(cant spell it sorry) in halftime... never fails me I lose every time even if I'm up 4-0 or something

Easy, play everyone in backwards position. Gk in FW, Defenders, FW/MF etc.

if you are winning with reserves, i dont see how this is a problem for your league matches.

I use a strict squad rotation system via the "selection" menu, so while i am winning with the 2nd squad, i can't get them back to 100% in time for their next match if i have three games in a week. In addition, sometimes the fixtures are set up in a way that i would be forced to play the 1st team in a cup match, or else play the 2nd team twice in 3 days, one of which would be a league match. I always plan the rotation in a few matches in advance to try avoid these issues, but then there are also injuries to consider. My board doesn't consider the cups important, i don't consider them important, but for some reason my players play their little hearts out!

Chas!

Want a team that sacks over 21's. Want to deliberately lose cup games.

Don't you ever play a normal game?

I'm playing FM 2011 keep in mind. I've had this game so long at this point that i need ways to make it fresh and less predictable! This save has actually been a lot of fun, despite the morale issues.