Collapse in the league from your world class side- baffled

Aloha. Have endured two collapses this season, and am open to all interpretations of why. Playing as Aston Villa in a 3 player online game, with diego, guilherme, kompany, owen, young, hamsik, barry, davies, ferriera etc etc etc (very classy squad), I had a season where I had all the top teams in a row.

Twice, from game 1-7 and from game 20-27 I consecutively beat ALL the top sides, being firmly in control of the games, and then TWICE, from game 10-18, and 30-38, I endured baffling collapses in performance and results against relegation fodder. Diego, Guilherme and Kompany- star players- deserted and got habitual 6's or made heinous errors, and we general 'felt' as if we had no chance in these games against southampton, sunderland, we even lost 1-8 to a 15th placed reading.

What bothered me was that it happened twice. mid and end season...

In my first season with Villa I came third and reached the knockouts of the CL through a difficult group.

Since then i've developed a good-working side with a tactic they are used to, so i just can't understand the collapse. I really felt fated to lose those games.. leading 3-1 against sunderland we conceded 4 to lose, conceded 8 against reading, southampton beat us... you name a **** side they destroyed us.

After beating all the top teams, i was in a league winning position twice and am really considering some type of reputation bug/calculation that game to destroy me... which is not a way that i've ever felt about the game before.. it's just that the seeming quality of my players/squad deserted me twice at the same stage of the season... coming around 5th one point off first both times...

As i said it's a multiplay with another human player everton in third.

Aloha. Have endured two collapses this season, and am open to all interpretations of why. Playing as Aston Villa in a 3 player online game, with diego, guilherme, kompany, owen, young, hamsik, barry, davies, ferriera etc etc etc (very classy squad), I had a season where I had all the top teams in a row.

Twice, from game 1-7 and from game 20-27 I consecutively beat ALL the top sides, being firmly in control of the games, and then TWICE, from game 10-18, and 30-38, I endured baffling collapses in performance and results against relegation fodder. Diego, Guilherme and Kompany- star players- deserted and got habitual 6's or made heinous errors, and we general 'felt' as if we had no chance in these games against southampton, sunderland, we even lost 1-8 to a 15th placed reading.

What bothered me was that it happened twice. mid and end season...

In my first season with Villa I came third and reached the knockouts of the CL through a difficult group.

Since then i've developed a good-working side with a tactic they are used to, so i just can't understand the collapse. I really felt fated to lose those games.. leading 3-1 against sunderland we conceded 4 to lose, conceded 8 against reading, southampton beat us... you name a **** side they destroyed us.

After beating all the top teams, i was in a league winning position twice and am really considering some type of reputation bug/calculation that game to destroy me... which is not a way that i've ever felt about the game before.. it's just that the seeming quality of my players/squad deserted me twice at the same stage of the season... coming around 5th one point off first both times...

As i said it's a multiplay with another human player everton in third.

There are a number of issues that may have an effect on the team;

Jadedness after playing such high profile games at the start of the season and seemingly pulling off the unthinkable.

Team talks that work against higher opposition can have the reverse effect against lower oppostiion.

Complacency because of the opposition.

Fixture congestion, especially in the periods you are talking about given FA cups outings, Carling Cup outtings and a heavy turn of year league schedule.

mmm hence what annoys me- i rotated and rested players, was not in europe, and knocked out of one cup early despite making FA cup final.

I have finally, with all possibly humility, mastered team talks home away low/high opposition, after a long time.

and... there were two issues- players who RARELY perform something other than 8 like Diego/Guilherme (EPL young player of the year and young player of the months for at least 50% of the season) were on six habiutually and despite rested in the games before.

Add to that that despite being on 7's, our defenders were conceding 4 per game and we weren't holding possesion- i really had to struggle to beat the 19th and 20th placed side...

Has morale dipped? Is another club interested in them?

There are many factors that can lead to it happening but tbh it happens to everyone and IRL. Every season I suffer a slump after the 44 day long winter break in Germany, morale isn't high and fitness isn't tip top, it is annoying but I compare it to the likes of Arsenal atm.

no and no, they are both devoted players and love me/the club. i've never experienced anything like it in fm.. which is why for the first time i'm considering all those stupid reputation theories that i've never bought into..

it just seemed results/performances had very little to do with player quality. The overall quality of passing & general stuff can't have added up to anything but an utter domination of possesion and chances against the likes to southampton and co, but alas!

Probably more one for the tactics forum and I don't usually go in for specifics on individual players, but since you mentioned Diego I've been managing Werder Bremen for 1½ seasons and he was magnificent first season, scoring 21 goals with 34 assists, yet even with all that he was prone to having short runs of games where he just didn't perform despite pplaying to an amazingly high standard in the preceeding games.

I tried criticising him in the media and other things, cajoling and encouraging him in team talks etc, just man management really although it was only of limited good effect - he seemingly returned to is very best form after a few games anyway without it really being connected to anything I did.

So, in a more general case, some players are like that - they perform consistently well over a long period then consistently average over a short period with no apparent reason. Very few players perform to a high standard throughout the whole season.

Basically i think i was cut down by something.

The came seems to have made progression (intentioanlly or not) much slower this time around: scouting is another fine (and annoying) example of that. You can only scout within your reputation it seems, my great scouts will still never deliver me a world class player because of Villa's rep.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by pauly15:

Basically i think i was cut down by something.

The came seems to have made progression (intentioanlly or not) much slower this time around: scouting is another fine (and annoying) example of that. You can only scout within your reputation it seems, my great scouts will still never deliver me a world class player because of Villa's rep. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

But that's understandable. Why would a scout recommend a player that he thinks you have no chance of signing because you aren't big enough? Not all clubs have the budget or reputation to justifiably scout worldwide (without the aid of videos of matches etc).

When you play all the top teams they will come to you, looking to play good, open football and try and grab a win. If you have a "classy side" I am presuming you play open football? So when you come up against a big team you will play football and they will play football and whoever plays better football and whoever is more solid will win.

But when you come up against a poorer team they will tighten up and will be very difficult to break down. (Barnsley Chelsea is an example of this). So you will be consistently trying to play football against them and play it around but they will remain sturdy and your players will get ever more frustrated and will lose concentration. The opposition will also look to play counter-attacking football and if they have a tall or fast striker, this kind of football amy work.

Your top players will be even more frustrated that they are unable to play the football they want. Kompany will feel rushed at the back (he is a defender isn't he) and if closing down is high and there forward is fast he will be prone to making mistakes as he will feel under pressure. Maybe you should look back over the goals and see if there is a pattern. Then make tactical changes according to your observations.

Im stumped over the 8-0 though.

yeah- and 1-0 losses i could understand, but we are conceding more that that... 3-4, 1-3... 1-8:>:>

The hole in your theory is that we are not even in control of games- it's like we drop 7 levels and i don't feel in control

Maybe you need to look into the mid field. In a game against lower opposition it is going to be hustle and bustle and the middle fo your midfield may not have the physical ability to cope with players putting tackles in. If you have got players in the midfield who are extremely good passers of the ball, the opposition will look to close down your midfield to stop them passing the ball. The last thing a poor team wants against superior opposition, is for them to be able to pass the ball around and get a good ryhthm going so they are going to be in your face and perhaps, your two central midfielders are not up for a battle and will then become pretty much useless. Maybe, you may want to look at having one defensive midfielder in a 442 system who will come and battle away, giving yuor attacking midfielder the space to pick out a pass.

This may also help break a team down. If you can create the space in the midfield then your midfielder will be able to pick a pass and find your wide players.

Your only other real option is pretty drastic. You could go like-for-like and play a tight battling game of football and maybe make the team do something they do not want to do, and that is play attacking football. You could sit back and play counter attacking. So whenever Barry gets the ball, he could immediately push the ball forward and maybe set up ashleigh (sp?) young, who has the pace to scare any defender

This is the first bit of tactical advice i've give and it may well be useless

Blips always happen IRL too.

Just look at what Arsenal are going through at the moment 6 games without an EPL win when untill that point were the best side in the EPL.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">The hole in your theory is that we are not even in control of games- it's like we drop 7 levels and i don't feel in control </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Emphasis added.

This is why I think the game really needs to message a bit more about what is going on behind the scenes. Its all well and good to have a system with such complexity that players get overconfident, etc, but when we can't tell what's going on, as in pauly's case, it is nothing but frustration and despair: when we feel out of control, it either

a.) Feels like the game is purely random numbers, and nothing we do matters, or

b.) Feels like a conspiracy: the game is out to get us!

This is the sort of position where I'd really like to see our Assistant Manager speak up, and let us know some of what's going on.

. . . .

Pauly, I'd suspect from what you've said - because of the way you're succeeding against the best opposition, and frustrated by lesser opposition - that

a.) Maybe you have mastered team talks against the better opposition, but not the lower opposition - re-read Wolfsong's.

b.) Maybe you need to work on a "Control" style tactic (e.g., an adjustment of your current tactic for those matches which you expect to win handily) - re-read wwfan's TT&F

c.) Maybe you need to work on the media-handling side of things to get the best out of your stars - re-read Communication & Psychological Warfare

I mean, that 1-8 defeat sounds .. first, amazingly frustrating .. but second, it sounds to me like the sort of game I get if I get the pre-match media, the pre-match team-talk, and the half-time team talk *all wrong*. Even so, I think its ridiculous - one of my earlier posts on this topic contained the line "Was that 0-9 thumping really necessary to make the point?" .. so I do know exactly how you feel! However, its been a long while since I've had one like that, so I think I've "solved" whatever I was doing.

There may be other factors going into it - selection of captain, simple youth of your squad (young sides tend to be a lot more susceptible to streaky performances both good and bad), overtraining, complacency, simple inconsistency, etc.

(Consistency, of course, is a hidden attribute, but young players in particular tend to have it low, with veterans gaining more and more of it.)

this is what annoyed me- it's a very balanced formation, 4-4-1-1, with barry in left midfield playing tucked in, hamsik as MC-DMC, and guilherme AMC who has 18/18 for teamwork/workrate.

What annoys me is that it seems to be the time of the season rather than any tactics that have disrupted me.

for the record: i've read wolfgang's thing.

and i approached game 10-20 and games 30-38 differently. same results.

Oh, I was figuring you had read it, that's why I said "re-read"; I certainly find myself getting something new each time I look at the three threads linked to, depending on what problems my side are facing at the time.

it's happening again and i'm convinced it's a reputation bug or something similar.

Having been sacked as aston villa for coming 5th and reaching the FA cup final (great work SI after 3 patches) I took over tottenham. Am currently top of the league after 15 games or so...

It starts away to blackburn- everything is the same, all the action zones, possesion, shots, stats in my favour, dominating, but just one look at the highlights and i know i'm not going to be winning this game. I score in the 44th, they in the 45th, i give the right team talk and despite changing time wasting and attacking-ness of the side we get no meaningful highlights in the last 30 minutes.

If your tactics work and you get too high up with a low reputation or something, i'm starting to think there are just games where you have very little chance of winning regardless of your side.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by pauly15:

it's happening again and i'm convinced it's a reputation bug or something similar.

Having been sacked as aston villa for coming 5th and reaching the FA cup final (great work SI after 3 patches) I took over tottenham. Am currently top of the league after 15 games or so...

It starts away to blackburn- everything is the same, all the action zones, possesion, shots, stats in my favour, dominating, but just one look at the highlights and i know i'm not going to be winning this game. I score in the 44th, they in the 45th, i give the right team talk and despite changing time wasting and attacking-ness of the side we get no meaningful highlights in the last 30 minutes.

If your tactics work and you get too high up with a low reputation or something, i'm starting to think there are just games where you have very little chance of winning regardless of your side. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

There are lots of FMers who can't take the failure after succeeding for a long time in FM. Just calm down, don't be frustrated if you things are not going your way and you'll be alright I guess. No team/player in the world (even in real life) can perform out of his skin for the WHOLE SEASON. (unless the player is Mr. C.Ronaldo)

I know what you mean - all I can think of is that the players who went out and played so well against the top teams and beat them suddenly looked at Reading for example and got complacent. It could be the team talks I suppose along with all the other things mentioned above.

I suppose it is easy for the players to become un-motivated when it comes to playing Reading compared to when played Chelsea.

I have a hunch that Amaroq is right in bringing up the matter of consistency. The game will, depending on each player's consistency, select "x" number of games where a player will not do so well. A couple (or whatever) of dips in your team's form during the season, could mostly be down to the coinciding (for two or more players) of these low consistency dates the game program has chosen randomly.

i agree with FF that it is difficult to accept when you have a dominant tactic/side that suddenly starts losing. I guess what gets me more than anything is the nature of the loss, the domination and the missing/non-event performances from quality players that bothers.

Dominating in action zones etc but getting no highlights for large sections of the game annoys me significantly.

What is more annoying is that this has not happened to me before in any previous FM- i skipped the last one, but in the previous ones i found it FAR easier, if you had a quality side, to move up the table over seasons based, from what i could see, solely on your quality.

in this one i think it's so much harder- in older games you could basically be guaranteed a title or close in the league in the second season- especially if you know players you like to buy when starting. in this one it seems to cut you down regardless of players

Add to that the Scouting, which seems to scout within a range of players relative to your quality/reputation- You will never get the same scouting results as man utd if you are aston villa despite using the same scout- and i'm not talking about players that wouldn't be interested- i'm talking about youth.

basically- all in all, there seems to be so many caps that slow you down from progressing too fast in this version.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by pauly15:

i agree with FF that it is difficult to accept when you have a dominant tactic/side that suddenly starts losing. I guess what gets me more than anything is the nature of the loss, the domination and the missing/non-event performances from quality players that bothers.

Dominating in action zones etc but getting no highlights for large sections of the game annoys me significantly. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Like what happens to Liverpool? They go out and play brilliantly against Inter, but then struggle against lower Prem sides. By the way I'm not a Pool fan - I'm SAFC

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by The Gaffovski:

I have a hunch that Amaroq is right in bringing up the matter of consistency. The game will, depending on each player's consistency, select "x" number of games where a player will not do so well. A couple (or whatever) of dips in your team's form during the season, could mostly be down to the coinciding (for two or more players) of these low consistency dates the game program has chosen randomly. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

the game doesn't chose a random amount of games where a plyaer players rubbish.

it basis it on a variety of realistic stats.

tiredness (over playing or over training)

morale

other palyers around him.

otherwise you could just keep on playing someone or a whole team knowing full well that after 10 games or so theyw ould start to do well again.

which just does not happen.

also if it was a randomly predetermined amount of games that a player would lose form then no matter what you did it would not have an effect.

so when i change my tactics slightly, or i lower the training intensity of my player whos struggling slightly, or i give him a rest for a few games or tell him to buck his ideas up or telling him i have faith this wouldn't have an effect on getting him back to performing.

but it can do.

yes, its a problem in 08, no matter how good a side you build up there are always inconsistencies, and I do meritocratic rotation so players do get a bit of rest over the course of the season. challenging for promotion/league is easy. actually getting it is something else entirely.

my guess is your tactics suit playing big sides, the moment you play a bad side your team cant do it - a bit like middlesbrough (although in fairness they have vastly improved of late)

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postie:

the game doesn't chose a random amount of games where a plyaer players rubbish.

it basis it on a variety of realistic stats.

tiredness (over playing or over training)

morale

other palyers around him. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

To be fair, that was an assumption on my part, so there may be something to what you say, but..... see below -

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postietherwise you could just keep on playing someone or a whole team knowing full well that after 10 games or so theyw ould start to do well again.

which just does not happen. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

except that's exactly what I do, and it works. Usually after 3 matches the team picks up again.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by The Gaffovski:

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postie:

the game doesn't chose a random amount of games where a plyaer players rubbish.

it basis it on a variety of realistic stats.

tiredness (over playing or over training)

morale

other palyers around him. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

To be fair, that was an assumption on my part, so there may be something to what you say, but..... see below -

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postietherwise you could just keep on playing someone or a whole team knowing full well that after 10 games or so theyw ould start to do well again.

which just does not happen. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

except that's exactly what I do, and it works. Usually after 3 matches the team picks up again. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

really? someptimes i suppose it works as with everything there is more than one way to do something.

but others will say that their team suddenly hit a bad patch (they dont change any of their tactics or players) and then wonder why their still loosing 20 games later.

there are allso many reasons why your team would pick up their results after 3 matches of no changes.

you could have met another team with even worse problems than your own.

life can look random but there's always a reason. just like in FM

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postie:

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by The Gaffovski:

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postie:

the game doesn't chose a random amount of games where a plyaer players rubbish.

it basis it on a variety of realistic stats.

tiredness (over playing or over training)

morale

other palyers around him. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

To be fair, that was an assumption on my part, so there may be something to what you say, but..... see below -

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by postal postietherwise you could just keep on playing someone or a whole team knowing full well that after 10 games or so theyw ould start to do well again.

which just does not happen. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

except that's exactly what I do, and it works. Usually after 3 matches the team picks up again. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

really? someptimes i suppose it works as with everything there is more than one way to do something.

but others will say that their team suddenly hit a bad patch (they dont change any of their tactics or players) and then wonder why their still loosing 20 games later.

there are allso many reasons why your team would pick up their results after 3 matches of no changes.

you could have met another team with even worse problems than your own.

life can look random but there's always a reason. just like in FM </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Good point- problem with FM is that things that can be relatively minor irl have a huge effect in the game. When you consider that in FM there is a miriad of seemingly little things that can be the cause and well, you have a mess.

Without any feedback it makes things even worse for many, and rather than these effects build up it does feel as if a switch has suddenly been switched on.

I personally avoid all this by ignoring media interaction and allowing my assistant manager to do teamtalks, and when a tactic goes wrong I go back to the defaults.

Do you think real managers do this- especially when they have world class players? Of course not, the quality shines through- unfortunately this doesnt apply in FM.

This game needs a thorough reboot as the foundations SI keep piling stuff onto are very weak.

I think player condition/tiredness is the big factor in this. Every season I've played, we've encountered a poor run, usually throughout February.

The only times this didn't happen were due to unusual circumstances:

1. Instead of my usual 5-8 pre-season friendlies, I forgot to schedule any. Sure enough, we were shocking for the opening six games but were then undeafeted.

2. My reserves got eliminated from every cup at the first attempt, so my first choice XI didn't even get a cup game as a sub. The result was that we didn't have a single bad run in the league.

This could all be coincidental, but maybe a player on 93% condition is far more tired than a player on 97%, despite the stats being seemingly negligible.