What am i doing wrong?

Hi,

I have been playing football manager for around a year now, i bought FM08 a couple of months after release and just bought FM09.

My only question is i dont know how to 'beat' the game! I try and look after each player and make sure they are match fit and happy to be playing for the club, and change individual players tactics every game depending on how i want them to play, and change formations regularly. After doing this i still only get a very reasonable run out of the team, for example i am playing with a club that is expected to at least be in a play off position, but i find myself starting to slide down the table after about 10-15 games??

Help!

Cheers

First, I don't think anybody really "beats" the game. Even very experienced managers tend to have slumps in form at times.

The note about "change formations regularly" worries me; I find tactical consistency to be more valuable than formation change - your players will play poorly if asked to play in an unfamiliar formation.

Tactically, the most common situation is for a club to do well at first, but bog down as teams "recognize" them as a threat and take a defensive stance against them. The best article on how to counter this phenomenon is wwfan's Tactical Theorems and Frameworks '09

However, let's assume that your tactics are good and your squad is good enough. There's still the matter of motivation, team talks, etc. These are a crucial component of the game, and a miscue or two can start a slump such as what you're describing. I strongly recommend Communication and Psychological Warfare.

Finally, don't make radical changes in the squad; a given group of players seems to take about six months to "gel". A club that hasn't gelled tends to be very inconsistent and frustrating to the manager. Patience with your existing squad is eventually rewarded!

me too,

probably change tactics too often.

I, unlike many others, use the same tactics and change little during the game.

First, I don't think anybody really "beats" the game. Even very experienced managers tend to have slumps in form at times.

The note about "change formations regularly" worries me; I find tactical consistency to be more valuable than formation change - your players will play poorly if asked to play in an unfamiliar formation.

Tactically, the most common situation is for a club to do well at first, but bog down as teams "recognize" them as a threat and take a defensive stance against them. The best article on how to counter this phenomenon is wwfan's Tactical Theorems and Frameworks '09

However, let's assume that your tactics are good and your squad is good enough. There's still the matter of motivation, team talks, etc. These are a crucial component of the game, and a miscue or two can start a slump such as what you're describing. I strongly recommend Communication and Psychological Warfare.

Finally, don't make radical changes in the squad; a given group of players seems to take about six months to "gel". A club that hasn't gelled tends to be very inconsistent and frustrating to the manager. Patience with your existing squad is eventually rewarded!

Well said, my thoughts exactly

My experience is that a small amount of small changes seems to work well, Much like irl, your squad needs to get used to playing a set of tactics, large changes to these tactics require more learning, hence worse performance.

It is worth playing the same formation in a subtley different style home and away ie slightly more defensive when away. I also play my away tactic when playing far superior opposition at home.

Like real life managers who want to be successful these days, you have to 'earn your badges' - that means really study the tactical aspect and all the ins-and-outs of managing a football team. Translated into FM terms it's as Amaroq recommends. Mant posters moan that they don't want to syudy a 50-page manual; they just want to fire up and win everything. That's fine for a game, but Life ain't like that, and FM is Life!

Only way to actually have a long unbeaten run is to manage to shop players that's way too good for the league. That is easy in certain leagues, like the Belgian Third Division or the Swedish Second Division, where there's no foreigner limits and the national players are, to say it mildly, quite damn sucky.

In more advanced leagues, well, you'll always face the problem of having bad form sometimes. I would suggest no major changes in tactics, since that'll just confuse your players. Rather, you should rotate some players in the same tactic, as that way you bring in players in better form (hopefully).

I would say that typical mistake is to leave your starting 11 same for very long period. If you have a good run, these players will get overconfident and your team-talks that otherwise would work great, give opposite effect.

You have to at first find winning combination of your main players and tactics and then every game try to keep your team attitude fresh. Rotate 1 or 2 players to give everybody fair share of time on the pitch, but also to keep your main 11 fresh and motivated to give their best in next game.

In FM 08 I was very reluctant to change my winning squad, but in FM 09 I feel that fatigue and motivation has more effect. When 3 games are played in 10 days, you can't start with same 11, because they're too tired to perform on maximum level. Give everybody their time on the pitch and generally it won't hurt your team's results.