Idea for expansion of training, player interaction and PPMs/

I was thinking that one of the most overlooked aspects of Football Manager is the direct and continuous interaction between player and manager. This has been aleviated to some degree with team talks, mentor system and the reward/criticise options in FM2008, and I have just seen a screenshot that allows you to ask a player to learn PPMs in 2009, however I would like to suggest some different ideas that could expand on this considerably.

My first idea is Season Expectations for each player in the squad as determined by the manager. At the start of each season, during Pre-Season training, I would like to specify for each player areas of the game I think they should work on, or achievements I want them to aim for.

An example of this would be "Darren Fletcher syndrome." When Darren Fletcher first emerged into first team action for Manchester United he was a gangly thin rake of a boy with a decent right foot, a lot of heart and a bit of a fear for tackling Premiership brutes. He was never going to be a Sol Campbell, but he has since become something of a midfield firebrand, bulking up to a level of physical strength that gives him the courage to try and compete with any player in midfield. He lacks tackling and positional finesse, but he is no action man prima donna fairy like mister Beckham was in right-centre midfield. Darren Fletcher is an example of a player that has had to work hard on specific areas of his game for seasons at a time in order to play a role within a team.

Another example is the famous "Ronaldo bet" at the start of last season, inspiring a trully awesome but highly selfish season long display from a player of then huge potential.

These are examples of a manager interacting with players on long term goals in different manners to produce the best from each. One is the result of season after season of specific hard work on the training pitch, the other is an example of inspired motivation in pre-season interaction. Both are examples of appealing to the players specific personality to achieve a particular goal for the team as a whole.

This is something I would like to see implimented if possible. Pre-Season player interaction could involve the usual player interaction style of options we currently see, with options ranging from inspired success to dismal failure, as well as helping the manager to avoid players becoming upset and disgruntled through an inability to explain longterm plans to them.

I do not want to see high potential gangly and rakish 20 year olds becoming upset through a lack of first team action and intense physical training, if it means they can achieve their desired and my desired ambition of becoming a future squad rotation player in key positions.

My next idea is something I call "Next Match Temporary PPMs." Alot of these can be covered by tactical instructions but not all of them can. A player may lack the ability to carry out certain instructions, but a manager should not be deprived of the ability to utilise those instructions. Specific teams and specific players require specific strategies to deal with, strategies that top teams will spend days or weeks on the training ground practising for one specific game. It is my view that PPMs should either be trainable for the next match or otherwise selectable for specific matches and trainable throughout a season and indeed a career.

The above two ideas are combined in my final idea, "Training Ground Management". Some people have called for 2D and 3D training like a match day, others have spoken on how long this would make a Football Manager week. It is perhaps realism gone too far. My suggestion is a take on player interaction, PPMs and coach report feedback. I would like to see Long Term Tactical plans, Short Term tactical plans, general player morale and the effect of matchday teamtalks combined under an improved manager-player training interaction.

Each day of training could begin with the manager speaking and interacting with each player, or the squad in general, much like a teamtalk. Instructions would be given, morale would be managed, and at the end of the day the assistant would report back with a comprehensive training report. Temporary PPMs and temporary quick, short improvements in attributes could be gained through good management, as well as increases in time to learn PPMs, increases in injuries, drops in morale and even squad player jealousy could all be factors involved in the managers pre-training pep talk.

It is my view that the training ground and not the media is where the bulk of player management is carried out. We are moving from the era of players, money and tactics to coaches, morale and custom designed teams and squads. In order to simulate management at the player and tactical level, it is necessary to develop player training into a method of player management and squad design. It is my view that it is time to take the vast majority of player interaction options and to integrate them into a comprehensive training system that combines general area training like we have now with indepth manager-player interaction and player customisation. If I could speak to my players on a daily basis, and if my interaction had an effect, then we would have Football Management simulation covered to a high degree in every relevant area.

you've deffinalty thought a lot about this!

i understand what your saying, but i think a one-on-one preseason talk to every player could not only be a bit time consuming but probably be hard to add- im guessing. could tyou not just set their training to work on tackling etc.?

and to be honest- a first team coach is there for a reason. you hire him to coach what you tell him- leaving you time to talk to the media and handle transfers!

Some good ideas there but as the guy above me said, it's a little time consuming.

I like the idea a lot.

At the minute I find training far too boring and monotonous.

The idea of setting up training routines by way of sliders is, in my opinion, nonsense.

Sure I can use them successfully and I know what I'm doing, but there's just not enough to do in the training side of FM. And the monthly coach reports are stupid too.

Why do we have to wait a month to find out how well our players are training?

And in saying that, this doesn't make sense:

Assistant Manager's training report

Players who trained well:

Player A (Tactics)

Player B (Strength)

Player C (Attacking)

Players who failed to impress:

Player X (Defending - Although he's a striker!)

Player Y (Aerobic)

Player Z (Attacking - Although he's a Goalkeeper!)

The training ground is where an awful lot of a manager's work is done IRL, yet on FM this area is sadly lacking any depth whatsoever.

I'd like the ability to really "get involved" in training and to shape and mould my players in the way I see fit.

I just was having some thoughts about training and it stemmed from being offered an international manager's job in FM08. I was reflecting on how little there is to do when you manage an Intl. side on FM.

My thought was that Intl managers are not trying to teach players skills and get them to improve fitness, etc. They're all about:

1) getting the players to play well together

2) getting the team used to playing to their tactics (which might be vastly different than they are used to with their clubs)

3) preparing for the opposition on the training pitch

It does seem to me that FM needs some more in the way of training interactions each week. Now I hate to point to a game that is probably in most ways vastly inferior to FM, but NFL head coach 09 apparently has a system where each week in training you can have your team prepare for certain aspects of the game as follows

1) work on a specific tactic that your team is likely to use

2) prepare to defend against certain tactics the other team uses

3) your team will perform better that week (and somewhat in later weeks) based on what things you focus on that week in training, in fact you can't even run plays (I don't think) if you've never practiced them and they are much less likely to succeed if you haven't practiced them.

(this is all how I understand it to work, since I have never played NFL Head Coach)

Now I also realize that is for a game where teams play 20 games per season including friendlies (called pre-season over here) and I wouldn't want the training thing to be long and add unduly to the time it takes to play a season, but I think it would be a good addition and give some valuable addition to the international manager as well.