Mid Season Slump

Why is that half way through every season your tactics just stop working?

I don't mean the AI finds a way to counter them either - no - they are all still playing 442's and counter attack with direct passing.

But suddenly my entire squad are now unable to pass a ball. They mill around. Stand still. Dont run with it. Don't cross it. Can't mark. Stop closing down. Don't tackle.

Is this just the 3d view doing a bad job of making my team lose convincingly (e.g. pre gen match results etc)? Because it bugs me that if I change my tactics, we pick up again. Which doesnt really make any sense whatsoever. At least for another 10-15 games when we'll suddenly stop being able to play football and I'll have to change again. And again. And again.

The slump in late december and january is completly normal and realistic if you rotate your team too little. There is a hidden tireness rating and even though it says matchfit on the players they don't perform well if it is too high.

I used to have this probøem before when I used the first team every time I could, I always had a terrible drop in form when we got to the holiday matchprogram. The other players were low on match practice and the used players were tired.

After I started rotating more the whole season, not just when the program gets heavy, I stopped having these midseason slumps

Thanks this is very useful informaiton. Much appreciated.

I always try and rotate my players for cup ties and make sure they don't play more than one game every 3-4 days and dont play anyone with less than 90% fitness.

However I have noticed that sometimes the Ass Man says player look exhausted even when they are not showing as such in their profiles, so I'll start acting decisively on that and see how it goes.

My Brighton team played like BRAZIL for the first couple of months, but proceeded to play like BARNET for the rest of the season:(

Nothing worse than a mid season slump.