Pacey Strikers with Average Technique

Does no one else think that Walcott is terrible on FM08, he's only quick and that's it... how come his scout report suggests that he will be a leading premier division striker when his technical attributes are disgracefully bad for a premiership striker, including dribbling and finishing. I have also found this with similar WIngers/Strikers like Issiar Dia... i don't understand why they have such a huge impact on the game and score plenty of goals when their technical abilities are rubbish.

He's pretty good on my game. It's 2010 and he's just starting to establish himself at Chelsea. (Yes, Chelsea. Turns out he did want to go there after all!)

Does no one else think that Walcott is terrible on FM08, he's only quick and that's it... how come his scout report suggests that he will be a leading premier division striker when his technical attributes are disgracefully bad for a premiership striker, including dribbling and finishing. I have also found this with similar WIngers/Strikers like Issiar Dia... i don't understand why they have such a huge impact on the game and score plenty of goals when their technical abilities are rubbish.

The fact that your scout says he will be a leading premier division striker suggests he expects him to improve - technical attributes are the ones that improve rather than things like pace.

You don't always need great technique to be a good goal scorer though. Raw pace can take you a fair way, although I have seen plenty of similar strikers who my scouts say will be fantastic and I look at them and think they look more suited to running the Olympic 100metres than even being part of my Scunthorpe team, nevermind a leading Premiership team!

I've mentioned it before, pace means way too much in the game. At the start of my career game I signed a LW with 20 pace/acceleration and despite his other attributes being just about OK, he was averaging 7.89. Of course pace is important, but it does seem to mean too much in FM.

Raw pace, he is young so give hime time.

Just look at Danny Haynes, he is a player of raw pace but his finishing is not the best but he is young and improving every game but he has the ability to become a very good player.

I've mentioned it before, pace means way too much in the game. At the start of my career game I signed a LW with 20 pace/acceleration and despite his other attributes being just about OK, he was averaging 7.89. Of course pace is important, but it does seem to mean too much in FM.

There are plenty of wingers/strikers IRL, especially at the lower levels that have relied purely on pace and had little technique. A few have made it to the top levels, but not many. I think FM suffers as its difficult to show the lack of technique with a blob.

Dennis Rommedahl...

A few do make it, but it's such a drastic difference when you compare the player in question to my other LW who has had to bench warm most of the time.

Pace does seem to be overly stated in FM2008 even an average player with top pace and acc will score loads, think Abonglahor even before patch 8.0.2 beefed him up a little.

Walcott is exeptional in that he is as fast as a whippet and still has time to add the craft and guile to his game so i think your scout is correct

I think FM suffers as its difficult to show the lack of technique with a blob.

Watch his first touch.

I've got some guys whose first touch is out into space, and easy for a marker in attendance to nip in, shoulder him off the ball, and clear.

I've got some guys whose first touch brings both blob and ball to a complete halt, allowing a marker to close him down and requiring him to start up from "stopped" if he tries to put a move on.

I've got a couple guys whose first touch is always into a dangerous position, allowing them to burst past a marker in close attendance, but close enough to their feet that now they're in motion.

Technique + First Touch, I figure, in game attributes.

There are other cues, too - how close to his foot does he keep it while dribbling? Are his shots placed, or straight to the keeper? Are his passes crisp, or are they often wayward?

The CA model has acceleration and pace heavily weighted so Walcott's other attributes are 'handicapped' by his max values in this area. Within the current model Walcott at CA 186 looks like this

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/1922/walcottprofileca186ou5.jpg

If hypothetically the match engine and CA model remain fixed for the next two versions, and Walcott has a breakout season where he bangs in the goals then for his technical attributes to increase to reflect his improved finishing ability some other attribute is going to have to drop. So you might find if this does happen then Walcott may get relatively slower in the FM world depending on how the researcher jigs his attributes to fit the CA model.

The use of CA is also the reason scout reports rate him highly (always note the effect of weaker foot, acceleration and pace).

The CA model has acceleration and pace heavily weighted so Walcott's other attributes are 'handicapped' by his max values in this area. Within the current model Walcott at CA 186 looks like this

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/1922/walcottprofileca186ou5.jpg

If hypothetically the match engine and CA model remain fixed for the next two versions, and Walcott has a breakout season where he bangs in the goals then for his technical attributes to increase to reflect his improved finishing ability some other attribute is going to have to drop. So you might find if this does happen then Walcott may get relatively slower in the FM world depending on how the researcher jigs his attributes to fit the CA model.

The use of CA is also the reason scout reports rate him highly (always note the effect of weaker foot, acceleration and pace).

With those stats he should score 20+ a season (target man, run onto ball = goals) for the user (any top league).

Am I to take it that acc/pace use up more CA than say finishing/composure? Is this true of all physical stats compared to technical/mental stats? Do you have any idea of the ratios between the three stat types?

Based purely on changing CA with FM Modifier and seeing how the game adjusts these attributes:-

Acceleration/Pace/Agility/Balance is roughly 3 to 1 of other attributes. Try it yourself and you'll see what I mean. Take any player, take a screenshot of his profile in FM Modifier, increase his CA by 30 points, holiday for 4 weeks or so, take another screenshot of his FM Modifier profile and you'll see how the attributes are adjusted by the game to reflect his new CA.

There's more to it though (outside of this artificial improvement) when you take into account

- positional based weightings

- how training schedules influence where CA points get placed

- playing time has an impact on certain mental attributes (decisions, anticipation, off the ball, positioning, composure, concentration) and physical attributes (stamina and strength)

So yes with those attributes Walcott would bang in the goals but the point still stands that even if I boosted him to CA 199 his finishing/composure/technique will never be 20 because of the weighting effect of the physical attributes and weaker foot and how the CA model limits combinations of attributes for a given position/combination of positions.

but in the screenshot his technical ability is average, in theory he should miss a lot of chances because his actual ability to play football is shocking. I am an Arsenal fan and i personally think he is an average player in real life also, he loses the ball way to much and he can't pass the ball further than 5 yards without hitting the other team. I can't see him becoming an England international with such average ability, unless he does start actually start growing physically. At the moment, he gets shoved around too easily and can't play his way out of trouble, which leads to him losing the ball. This is not reflected in FM at all where he breezes through players... he has done it on occasions (Champions League vs Liverpool) but not regularly enough to justify 20+ goals a season and the status of "leading premier division striker".

Romanian Banel Nicolita is another example due to his pace and second foot ability, his technical ability doesnt looks like a Romanian international, but an average youngster

Depends on the league, depends on the player. In the lower leagues physical players like that are a godsend.

I find in the top leagues on FM it's possible to make fast players work, I bought a 20/20 accel/pace player and used him as a sub, he was terrible in every other way (probably wouldn't get into a team a league below) but as a late game sub he was devastating. Fast players are alot more useful out wide.

I find this annoying also. A player like Walcott will never fully develop his technical and mental skills since most of his CA/PA is tied up in pace and acceleration. The system should allow once in a generation players who are good in every category.

In 2010 Walcot scores loads of goals for me at Inter because of his exceptional speed.

The rest of his attributes are not too bad such as finishing, dribbling and determination.

Does no one else think that Walcott is terrible on FM08, he's only quick and that's it... how come his scout report suggests that he will be a leading premier division striker when his technical attributes are disgracefully bad for a premiership striker, including dribbling and finishing. I have also found this with similar WIngers/Strikers like Issiar Dia... i don't understand why they have such a huge impact on the game and score plenty of goals when their technical abilities are rubbish.

he is overrated in real life with loads of pace that is why he gets the goals as his pace causes teams problems.

he is overrated in real life with loads of pace that is why he gets the goals as his pace causes teams problems.

what problems does he cause in real life? most of the time he works a good position then gets the cross or shot all wrong. This isn't reflected on FM because he scores too many goals.

The CA model has acceleration and pace heavily weighted so Walcott's other attributes are 'handicapped' by his max values in this area. Within the current model Walcott at CA 186 looks like this

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/1922/walcottprofileca186ou5.jpg

If hypothetically the match engine and CA model remain fixed for the next two versions, and Walcott has a breakout season where he bangs in the goals then for his technical attributes to increase to reflect his improved finishing ability some other attribute is going to have to drop. So you might find if this does happen then Walcott may get relatively slower in the FM world depending on how the researcher jigs his attributes to fit the CA model.

The use of CA is also the reason scout reports rate him highly (always note the effect of weaker foot, acceleration and pace).

Does Walcott look like this in the start of the season? At my game he is far wors than that, the only things that are above the 15 where acceleration and pace.