Enjoying the game thus far, but...

As a big critic of 08, unlike some others I've actually found 09 to be a pleasant surprise. The patch completely fixed the injury bug for me, and despite a few hitches I can't see how I could ever go back to 2D viewing. After some tweaking I've managed to find a tactic that is working somewhat, although I'm only 15 games in so I'm waiting to see how I play when the team gels properly.

However, a few things I've noticed with the ME, and just wondering if anyone else is getting the same issues?

1) Long balls, particularly punts from the keeper, seem to elude central defenders nine times out of 10. Just about every punt down the middle ends with a striker collecting it goal side of the defensive line, even with a deep DL and/or a sweeper. This happens for both the AI and the human user and is extremely frustrating.

2) Players take a huge amount of long shots, even when set to 'rarely' and more infuriatingly, when passing options seem to be available.

3) Every shot that misses gets the commentary "how did he miss that?", "he should have scored" etc. I even got this with a diving header from the edge of the box!

Other than these, enjoying myself so far, but it never takes long with me for the toys to go out of the pram. There are some smaller, more common things like players pausing and getting robbed, and the old "gap between defence and midfield" chestnut, but I haven't really had too much trouble with the former and I just ignore the latter.

I agree with most of your points and have similar views of the game thus far.

The gap problem is easy to fix. http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php?t=61144 check this out for an excellent guide. I wonder now how I ever played 08 without it.