[FM11] Heathxxx Lower League Management Approach

[mdornukgi]

Certainly I think it's important to try and maintain levels of finance, especially if you've made a board request for facilities. Having made a request at a certain level of finance, it's quite reasonable to assume that dropping below those levels can realistically put a planned project in jeopardy. As for getting improvements and requests approved in the first place, along with the financial health of the club, I believe the character and type of chairman plays its part too.

It's no coincidence that along with keeping a healthy level of finances, my chairman "Loves the club" and has approved almost every request I've made, even if I've had to give him a nudge after refusing my request at the first time of asking. This is probably the biggest reason people will get different responses when making their requests, from different "character" chairmen. I also don't tend to ask for facility improvements unless we have funds in the bank though.

If you have what I like to refer to as a "hobby" chairman, then sometimes your requests might fall on deaf ears, simply because they're not very ambitious.

I agree with your chairman assessment. It did take convincing of my chairman Derek Pope who is simply "Happy To Stay At The Club". I think i proposed that current players might move on if they couldn't fulfil there development at the squad. Also, i forgot that chairman have their own stats and even though i was in the black, these might have attributed to the board cancelling the plans.

Moving on. I regret not adding more players to my current game as i struggle to find players in the summer and winter transfer windows. If i was to restart again i would certainly add more leagues and players to potentially ease the burden of spending so much time looking for quality for my team. I do admit though i do enjoy it and especially when i come across a gem. I making use of filters used by Matt Knight that have the required attribute for each duty and role and then lowering the attribute rating down while also using my assistants to filter out unlikely targets. [Edit] If you do ask to your assistant manger to filter out unlikely players, do remember according to his attributes you may miss out on players who actually may be willing to come to your club.

One thing that has me pondering constantly is, would it be better to have average attributes across the board for the essential attributes for each duty and role? Or a few high attributes in certain key attributes with low in the other key attributes? This is more focused to the lower leagues than the higher leagues.

[heathxxx]

One thing that has me pondering constantly is, would it be better to have average attributes across the board for the essential attributes for each duty and role? Or a few high attributes in certain key attributes with low in the other key attributes? This is more focused to the lower leagues than the higher leagues.

I think in the lower leagues, it's perhaps easier for players to get away with having high attributes in a few key areas, whilst being average or poor in others. As you progress though, it's probably best to try to cover all bases.

Assessing players I think, is one of the trickiest tasks in FM and there's no perfect answer. I do tend to follow a common theme throughout my lower league saves though. For me, a player must have double figures in all their key highlighted attributes. I also tend to look for other attributes, that whilst not "key" to the positions and roles, are preferences of mine and in some respects, "key" to the type of players I like to sign. The most important of these for me, is always determination. This is not only important as a playing attribute that will contribute to their will to win, but also offers some indication of their hidden character attributes.

Aside from that, in the lower leagues I do like to have good overall mental attributes, good technical attributes that are relative to their role, plus if possible, some decent physical attributes. The latter I believe, become increasingly important as you rise through the divisions.

Here's one to consider though:

For the role he's assigned, his crossing, decisions and technique are good for the lower leagues, but his other "key" attributes aren't particularly good. Indeed, his dribbling, balance and flair are poor. However, he has very strong attributes in other areas that have contributed to him being a consistently good player over the last two seasons.

If you look at his attributes closely, you'll probably see that rather than being a "pretty" winger, using flair and dribbling to beat his opponents, he's more of a powerful type of player who would actually be more perfect in the defensive winger role. As it is, his attributes tie in well with my overall team settings and style of play, therefore it's his additionally good attributes that make him a good player, not just his key attributes, or lack of some of them.

Essentially, there's a lot of personal preference here to consider, but also the bigger picture of how he'll work within your team tactics and instructions. Once you begin to understand what player attributes contribute both individually and collectively, towards how a player performs, you can deviate a little from what the "key" suggestions are, so long as you're comfortable their other attributes will make up the difference for any shortcomings.

[mdornukgi]

Thanks, that does make sense. I always look to develop a determined squad on FM especially in the past 2-3 years. It can make such a difference dealing with these players, in my opinion most integrally during a match as i love to be able lambaste them at half time and get a positive response in matches not going my way. Unfortunately finding a player with good determination and good attributes for there role and duty that will sign for me is proving tricky in light of my teams low rep.

Something else i wanted to mention as another potential tip is the private chat function. I have been utilising this constantly to build a relationships with my players after matches and when players are performing badly in training. When players have achieved a 7.5 rating or above in matches i tell them "You impressed me in the last match, keep it up!'. Anything from 9 above recieves "You were outstanding in the last match, and you are easily one of my key players right now" I have high standards :-D Equally i will tell them that they have underperformed. This leads to "feels he has a good relationship with you" I haven't used the recent form so much but on the odd occasion when last game is not available i might if i believe it is worth it.

Most recently my goalkeeper Jan Sebek had lost attribute points in reflexes and decisions. He is my first choice goalkeeper and states that he is happy with his training schedule. I therefore had a private chat with him.

I have managed to be liked personnel on alot of my players through private chats and this helps when it comes to contract renegotiations and squad harmony. There have been times when players have rejected my praise or criticism but i have managed to turn it around and still gain positive results after with my reply. It can also be utilised on loan players you may wish to make permanent members of your team to smooth negotiations.

[heathxxx]

I think you mentioned earlier that you've just gained promotion to League Two as well mdornukgi. Initially, I was struggling to find anyone worth signing, that would actually improve my squad. What few I did find, either had awful agents to deal with, or wanted wages far in excess of what I considered their worth.

I've done a lot of searching around and with some patience and luck, have managed to sign a few very good players, that didn't want over the top wages. Many of these players are actually domestic based players, or players that should appear even if you're using a small database and few active leagues or countries. A few, have been players who's contracts were running out, or were unhappy or transfer listed at their clubs. These I found manually looking through teams in higher divisions.

Especially during close-season and pre-season, I do spend an awful lot of time looking for players.

[mdornukgi]

I think you mentioned earlier that you've just gained promotion to League Two as well mdornukgi. Initially, I was struggling to find anyone worth signing, that would actually improve my squad. What few I did find, either had awful agents to deal with, or wanted wages far in excess of what I considered their worth.

I've done a lot of searching around and with some patience and luck, have managed to sign a few very good players, that didn't want over the top wages. Many of these players are actually domestic based players, or players that should appear even if you're using a small database and few active leagues or countries. A few, have been players who's contracts were running out, or were unhappy or transfer listed at their clubs. These I found manually looking through teams in higher divisions.

Especially during close-season and pre-season, I do spend an awful lot of time looking for players.

Yep, i've been known to not move a day in game time during an actual day as i've been looking for players. Too much spare time! Don't get me wrong, i've managed to sign players, in fact my squad is now quite huge. I've managed to keep wages low by farming out reserves on loan with 100% wages paid and all having recall options incase of injuries. My wage budget though is being taken up mostly by my star Italian striker Cristian Tiboni who is on 4,500. My wage budget is 15,000! Here is the man who helped me turn the club around. I asked the board to buy him when i was first employed. He's currently out injured.

Just beat Hereford 4-3. They knocked me out of the Johnstone Paint Trophy in the first round. I was 3-0 up at half time and i'm not happy with conceding the goals but thats what happens if you decide to play control the whole match then drop deeper going for more goals. I'm happy with the revenge though and am now sitting at the top of the table on a 9 match winning streak from the start of the season.

[heathxxx]

Blimey, you did well to get Tiboni to your club. Looking at his attributes, it's no wonder he's doing well for you. It's been the same for me with Peter Styvar, though I did manage to get him nailed into a contract for 850 pounds at the start of last season. He was outstanding all season and obviously I want to tie him down with a contract extension. Unfortunately the first batch of negotiations went poorly because of his agent. Will have to wait a month or so to try again, but I want to sort things out before his contract is up at the end of this season.

Interesting you also have goalkeeper Jan Sebek. I've also got him as cover for Thierry Gorée at the moment, but they're both getting equal opportunities to play in pre-season, before I decide who my initial first choice will be. My assistant still picks Gorée as first choice at the moment.

The signings I've made so far, I'm pretty happy with, as they've all provided my squad with strength in depth. I've more or less improved where I wanted to. I'm still looking at additional players, but it's more a case of opportunistic offers on the off chance they'll be interested. My next task is to decide who I'm going to let go. I want to trim the first team squad down from 28 players, to around 20 to 22 players. They're not going to be easy decisions, but when considering I could save over 200k in wages alone moving them on, It's something I'll have to do. Included in those under consideration to move on, are my current captain and vice-captain. Both good players, but both on the decline and I really need to make some space for one or two of my younger players to take over from them.

Good points you made about the motivational aspect of things, especially utilising the private chats. Keeping in touch with your players regularly, really does help maintain good relationships and depending on their agent, you can reap the rewards of any loyalty they feel towards you.

I've also managed to upgrade my backroom staff considerably. All training areas are now 4 stars or better, with only ball control training rated at 3.5 stars. Training facility upgrades have been approved, so really, everything at the club is shaping up nicely and progressing at the same pace as the promotions.

[heathxxx]

My new Brazilian striker Anderson Costa got off to a flyer in front of the home fans, against Motherwell in my third pre-season friendly. A hat-trick and an assist, whilst the interplay between him and Peter Styvar looked excellent. Hopefully this will be a great partnership and carry on into the competitive matches, once the season starts in earnest.

Here's the PKM file for the match - http://www.filefront.com/17740497/AFC Telford v Motherwell (Friendly).pkm

Still tinkering a little tactically, just to experiment with things mainly, but essentially what you see at play in that PKM, is what I'll be starting the season with. The changes principally being those of roles, with the same shape and only the adoption of a "balanced" starting strategy. The three role changes, are use of a Deep-Lying Playmaker "Defend", an Advanced Playmaker "Support" and an Advanced Forward "Attack". On top of having a Target Man "Attack" up front, that's all that's changed with the player roles, from what I posted on the opening page of this thread.

Anyhow, to save me a little time posting up a load of images of my changes, here's the base tactic itself, if people want to have a look.

http://www.filefront.com/17740532/Telford 4-4-2 Balanced 2012 (AFC Telford, Jul 2012).tac

[BazMcCartney]

Aright Heathxxx you old scallywag, thought I'd pop over and see how your thread was going since you spent a fair bit of time on my Dundee United thread last year

This thread has given me the bug to start out at lower league. Im very much a die hard for starting and continuing as Dundee United on FM, but decided to scrap my save and follow on from your experience......and all I can say is the game is much better when you start from the bottom and work your way up, rather than start at the top and trying to work up through europe. Its certainly given me an appreciation of certain aspects of the game that never really concerned me. Tactically i have learned more from my new lower league save than I have ever learned in years playing as Dundee United. I feel my strength on FM has been buying players, I've always had a good eye for picking up players that my rivals in the SPL never could, and produced the best team from that.

However in my 2 seasons at Telford so far, i've combined talent spotting with using the tactics creator, and using shouts for the 1st time, and getting a much richer experience because of it.

Keep up the good work son!

[heathxxx]

I would have thought you might have done a lower league save with Arbroath Baz, being they're local to you... I think Gayfield Park is about the windiest football ground I've ever visited in my life!

Glad you're enjoying a Telford save though. It's a long slog to the top in a save like this, but when you get there, you really know you've built a club up from next to nothing.

Tactics and squad building go hand in hand though, so your eye for picking up good players, will be just as important.

[BazMcCartney]

Gayfield is ridiculous, the weather is always crazy, glad they are 3 divions below United, so not to many trips there!

Enjoying Telford, 2 successive promotions, and 1 cup, just in pre season now for my start to league 2. Im actually at work right now, so will give you a bigger update tomorrow, but needless to say season 1 - Phil younghusband top scorer with 31. Season 2 - Jhon Pirez, free after being released by Man City - top scorer with 34. Guy is a beast!

[heathxxx]

...my star Italian striker Cristian Tiboni who is on 4,500.

After you posted about him, obviously I went and had a peek at him in my own game. He was available on a free transfer from Atalanta, so I decided I'd go for him. He agreed a deal for 2,500 per week for me

So I have three excellent strikers now, that I'll be able to rotate and providing they stay free of injury, giving me a potent strike force for the season ahead.

What this does mean, is that I have a tough decision to make now. Given I play with two strikers, I like to have four in the squad to provide me with cover and rotation options. Both Australian Danny Allsopp and Brazilian Gustavo, have been superb for me on the way to League Two, as they've both performed well and scored goals. I'll have to let one of them go though, because I want to save on the wage budget and don't want to keep an extra player that won't play too often.

Decisions, decisions...

[heathxxx]

Gayfield is ridiculous, the weather is always crazy, glad they are 3 divions below United, so not to many trips there!

Enjoying Telford, 2 successive promotions, and 1 cup, just in pre season now for my start to league 2. Im actually at work right now, so will give you a bigger update tomorrow, but needless to say season 1 - Phil younghusband top scorer with 31. Season 2 - Jhon Pirez, free after being released by Man City - top scorer with 34. Guy is a beast!

Someone else at about the same stage as me then, about to embark upon their first season in League Two. I recall having a look at Jhon Pirez when he was released. Offered him a trial but he opted to join a French CFA side instead.

Going to be interesting to see how we all get on.

[BazMcCartney]

Indeed, which makes this thread all the better as there is a lot of support and advice. Pirez is a good player, and still young enough to work with to (hopefully) become a top striker. You been given a parent club yet? I got Exeter (wow).

[heathxxx]

Getting a "great" parent club and thus loaning some of the best young players from them, is much much harder to do than previous versions of FM. I can remember playing as BSN clubs before, getting Man Utd and being able to loan the likes of Macheda, Gibson and Wellbeck... completely unrealistic.

I'm glad this aspect of the game has been tightened up somewhat, because you're not likely to get those sort of players any more. It's probably still possible if you're very close neighbours though. But given Telford's location, your nearest geographical "big" clubs are going to be Wolves, West Brom, Stoke City, or at a push, Birmingham and Aston Villa. There's more teams closer to all of those clubs though, who would probably stand a better chance of having a "local" affiliate link though.

Wolves were already set with an affiliate deal with Telford at the start of the game, but it was just for friendlies. I soon cancelled that, as it was pretty worthless. The best offered having requested parent clubs afterwards, whilst in the BSN and BSP, was clubs in League One and League Two. None of them were particularly strong clubs, or had any players worthwhile loaning, so I rejected them.

Having asked again during this pre-season, I was offered and accepted Wolves again, but this time it's a full affiliate deal. They've not got anyone I'd consider loaning or can loan at the moment, but they have got some young regens that might be available to me over the next couple of seasons, once they turn professional.

Incidentally, as you're playing with Telford, if you don't already and have a healthy bank balance, keep asking the board for upgrades and improvements to facilities. I've found them quite accommodating to my requests. They bought the stadium at the end of the first season, we're now on our second youth facilities upgrade, plus they've relaid the pitch each season without fail. The only thing they've not accepted, has been my requests to upgrade training facilities. Other than those, I think they had a youth academy already, but can't remember for sure.

Back to "networking" though, I tried a cheeky request for an overseas feeder at the end of last season. They accepted my request, but couldn't find anyone unfortunately. I was keeping my fingers crossed for a Belgian club, having found some awesome African regens/newgens, but it wasn't to be sadly. As I kept the fifteen or so African youngsters on my shortlist permanently, I grimace every time I see one of them inevitably make their way to a bigger club. I did approach all of them in hope, but as expected, none of them could get work-permits. They were all "very interested", which is the saddest part.

I sometimes jokingly think there should be allowances for "political asylum" factored into the game, or that you could arrange dodgy friendlies against Calais, then stuff them in the luggage compartment of the team bus!

[heathxxx]

*groan*

Although someone raised the issue, given the many foreign players in my side early on in the thread, I completely forgot about the following League Two squad registration rule...

[b]Minimum of 10 players trained in England before 21st birthday[/b]

With the great first team squad I've managed to assemble, I've got... umm... four.

So, having spoken about "observation" and "attention to detail in this thread", I've actually failed to do those things myself on a very basic level. My monitor now has a forehead shaped depression in the screen and I'm now having an extremely hard time thinking of which of my many foreign players, I can least do without.

I guess though, that this might force me to perhaps sacrifice some of the older players that are not likely to be first-choice every match, in favour of some of the younger players I fortunately did sign, albeit with only reserve action, loans and future sales in mind.

At this moment in time though, I feel a right...

Edit: Just managed to get it to five players, having re-thought my 4th choice striker, using Australian Danny Allsopp who does qualify, over Brazilian Gustavo. Only five more to find/choose now.

[nmwaldron]

had a bit of fun with my board when asking them to sign a new player (i've tried this a million times and they always refuse), obviously they refused again but this time one of my options to respond was something along the lines of "after all I've done for this club raising it's profile this is the least you could do for me"

Again, they turned me down. Flat broke. Going nowhere. No ambhition.

[heathxxx]

I've not had my board accept when asked to deal with a higher profile transfer either, so you're not alone.

If you genuinely believe you've taken the club as far as you can, it might be worth moving on to another club and a new challenge. It's something I've not ruled out in my AFC Telford save, even though things are progressing well.

Whilst managing Telford, I'm also applying for any under-21, under-20 and under-19 international team jobs I see available. Unsuccessful in all applications so far, which is probably because my reputation is only "national", but I shall persevere.

[RedBlueEagle]

Well I am having some success with this new approach and am loving this way of playing. I am having more success than when I tried plug and play or tactic sets. Frustratingly I still lose silly games. I just lost to lower league Dorchester in the FA Trophy. So with this in mind I'd like to ask a couple of questions regarding your approach to this game and others.

Dorchester have a narrow pitch and we were stronger, taller in all areas. Looking through their team they were definately weaker.

I targetted their weaker players with OIs. I look at composure and if low set closing down, low bravery = hard tackling and full backs and wingers with foot only set to weaker foot if on that side of the pitch. If wingers have poor crossing then I put onto their stronger foot, keeping them outside.

They played 4-1-4-1 so I thought defensive. I left my starting strategy at standard but shouted to go narrow but expoit the wings. They were all over us and scored from 25 yards. I changed to control but that had limited effect and they added another in the second. Everything I did from then on failed including Contain with the pump ball into box, get ball forward etc.

After the game I am assuming they were actually attacking and I should have perhaps gone Counter to begin with.

My other question/s are regarding OIs. Do you target all players with weak Composure, Bravery etc? or just the back line?

What OIs do you use on the striker/s and how do you decide when to tight mark or close down a striker (assuming the scout report has not mentioned how they like to recieve the ball)?

Thanks in advance

[heathxxx]

One problem with the FA Trophy, is that rounds 1 to 4 are December through February. This means that pitch and weather conditions aren't likely to be very good either.

A narrow, opponent that sits deep, men behind the ball and looking to counter, is always a tricky proposition. If the pitch is in poor condition, boggy in the middle and narrow, although you want to try to exploit wide areas, it's difficult to find wide space with the narrow pitch.

I would have probably gone with a more attacking strategy, more direct, but also try to retain possession. I possibly wouldn't have tried to focus passing either wide or in the middle, but left it more open and mixed. In tandem with the more direct approach, I would probably have gone with the "pump the ball into the box" shout, to try getting my wide players trying to fire in early crosses, rather than mess about. I also like to use "pass into space" in these sort of conditions too. Even if opponents are as narrow as their pitch, players looking to play into spaces, try through balls, really doesn't do any harm in my opinion. Especially if you have forwards able to react well off the ball, to get onto those passes and through balls.

It may be that you showed your opponents a bit too much respect this time, rather than try to put them on the back foot early in the game. It's always possible your players just had "one of those games" too, just as I have from time to time. Especially with poor pitch and weather conditions, I like to try to get an early goal. This forces the opponents to chase the game and in poor conditions, player condition levels drop quicker. If you get a goal or two up, you can afford to contain or control the game and you'll often tend to find it much easier to score more goals against a team with poor morale and condition.

As I always have an assistant with decent Judging Player Ability and Tactical Knowledge, I'll always get their opinion regarding opposition instructions, however I will also pinpoint players I've targeted in the media. Pretty much the same weak player attributes you've mentioned, I look to exploit where I can. How many OI's I set though, really depends on how many individual or collective threats I feel an opponent can pose. I try not to go overboard with them, simply because I want my team to focus on the strengths of their play too, rather than entirely focus on nullifying every aspect of their opponent's play. I think too many OI's can sometimes stifle your own team's abilities and play.

Opposing defenders are the ones I try to pressure the most, but it's also important to weigh up how dangerous opposing midfielders and creative players are too. If I spot an opposing midfielder getting too much space to manoeuvre and taking advantage of that space in the middle of the pitch, then I'll sometimes use both tight marking and closing down on him. Be aware though that if your more creative midfielders are the ones closing down that opposing midfielder, you're also reducing the free space they have to do their thing.

Marking and closing down opposing forwards, I have to admit, is often the trickiest to gauge. Usually I'll go with my assistant's suggestions, then review things as the game unfolds. I do find my assistants suggest hard tackling a lot on lower league forwards, due to their generally low bravery. If I'm going to be defending deep, I don't want my defence potentially giving cheap fouls away anywhere near my box. I've no objection to them going in hard higher up the pitch though. So if defending deep, usually default or easy tackling on strikers, but harder if recommended by my assistant, or low bravery forwards, if playing a higher defensive line.

With tight marking, usually it's for more technically skilled opposing forwards, or those who have decent mental attributes, such as creativity. It's important to keep an eye on that opponents movement though, because you don't want defenders getting pulled out of position too much, leaving space for others to exploit. If they're leading your defenders on a merry chase all over the place, it's better to stay with default and rely on their zonal marking capability.

[heathxxx]

I managed to work out my squad to meet the league two player registration rules in the end, though I did have to sacrifice a few players I would otherwise like to have kept in the first team squad. As they were mostly older players and wouldn't be playing, I decided to transfer list them and move them on. A shame really, but there's no way around the rules.

After an excellent pre-season schedule, we went into the club's first ever Football League encounter, away to Bury, with superb morale and cohesion. After a shaky first fifteen minutes, my side took control of the game and came away 4-0 winners. Relegated Charlton Athletic already look like they're going to be the favourites, having opened their account with a 6-1 win over Aldershot.

Having had to sacrifice two of the players I would have used in the Deep-Lying Playmaker "Defend" role, I've changed that role to Ball Winning Midfielder "Defend". Along with that role, I also have the Advanced Playmaker "Support" role I mentioned earlier in the thread. My initial observations are that we're more potent offensively with the role change, but have slightly less bite in the centre defensively, compared to having the Central Midfield "Defend" and "Support" of the previous seasons.

It's all a question of weighing up the pro's and con's of different roles really. If you're able to understand what the benefits and deficiencies are for a role, you're better able to decide what will work within your tactical framework and the players you have available.

I also find myself undertaking quite an interesting "experiment" too. Whilst trawling for players and checking through my scout reports, amongst the reports from my scout tasked to search in Africa, I happened across a 19 year old central defender from Mali. He's got decent potential and plenty of chance to develop his skills, though if you look at the image below, you might notice something a little out of the ordinary about his attributes.

Did you see what I saw in his attributes I wonder?

Well if you didn't straight away, look again and forgetting he's a central defender for a moment, look at his suitability and potential as a striker.

Essentially I looked at the attributes and saw someone who I could develop into a target man or defensive forward. The only problem however, is that the only position he's begun with is central defender. What I'll be trying to do, is retrain him as a striker with new position training, using a striker orientated training schedule, plus I've also set him to focus on his first touch, as that's lower than I like for a forward. Along with his training, I'll be trying to play him as often as possible, though mainly from the bench. I'm simply interested to see if I can train him to at least "competent" or "accomplished" as a striker, given he has both the attributes and free potential to do so if things work out properly.

Incidentally, I've not used any editors or utilities to check any hidden attributes, so other than what I gather from scout or coach reports, I'm flying blind with this one. Depending how I get on with this guy, it might lead me to contemplate looking at other young players I can potentially re-train young players to positions they're not skilled in previously.

[Kevaldo]

This is a fantastic thread that has inspired me to try something different to my usual Newcastle save, which is pretty much all I ever do on each FM! So begins my adventure with Gateshead FC, one of the favourites for relegation form the BSP but just having turned professional, which is a big bonus. The following is a quick run down of my first season in charge ...

PRE-SEASON CLEAR OUT!

I got rid of pretty much every Gateshead player on the books, and all of the back room staff as I felt I could improve on them all easily. This almost backfired as it cost me a lot of money and the pre-season friendly trick just doesn't work with Gateshead as the crowds are too small! The board ended up 'injecting' £110 k on two seperate occasions before the turn of the year and then luckily I had a good cup run which raised a decent amount of cash ...

TRANSFERS IN

These were my transfers for the season, thank god for this thread!

In addition to exploiting the free transfers available and the advice from Heath re French amateurs I also managed to get some decent loan signings. Michael Nelson from Norwich had an excellent spell scoring 10 in 18 (mostly from corners!).

TACTICS

Having an abdunance of strong forwards and attacking wide men I followed your 4-4-2 with advanced wingers system and lined up as follows:

GK Defend: Thierry Gorre

RB auto: David Cowan / Giovanni Songoro

LB auto: Dider Caro / Matieu Welmant

CB limited defender: Abdou Sall / Michael Nelson

CB limited defender: Nicholas Noel / Ben Clark

CM defend: Kuami Agboh / David Meyler / David Biaou

CM support: Arrasen Ragaven

AMR winger support: Ahmet Brkovic / Yohann Guichard

AML winger support: Eric Farro / Joan Simon Edmundson / Ismael Fofana / Yven Moyo

Deep lying fwd attack: Lilian Laslandes / Benjamin Martha

Poacher attack: Samuel Leveneur / Ryan Donaldson

I played Fluid, starting most games with Standard mentality, short passing, more disciplined creative freedom, default pressing, zonal marking, default roam from position

LEAGUE

I dominated the league and at one point thought I might go unbeaten. My first loss was away to Fleetwood in the middle of Feburary (0-2). I followed your advice in using press conferences to try and keep my players on their toes, I increased the pressure in my team talks as the season wore on and used private chats to praise good performances and hammer bad performances. This type of attention to detail is vital in maintaining a motivated squad in such a long season

FA CUP

I had a fantastic run in the FA cup! Both Sheff Wed and Derby were in the play off positions in their respective leagues when I beat them. The Derby game was particularlypleasing as I put pressure on their GK, Stephen Bywater, through the media and he went on to have a shocker! My poor pitch also helped matters and I came out on top in an even game. Arsenal absolutely battered me at the Emirates as expected, even with two U18's playing. Kieran Gibbs bagged a hat=trick and I was just happyto keep the score down to 3!

FA TROPHY

Nothing much to report here. I expected to win this trophy given my superiority in the league and other than a potential slip up away to Braintree we won it comfortably

To be continued .....

[Kevaldo]

SQUAD STATS

Samuel Levenuer was my top striker, bagging 31 in 32 starts from the poacher spot. I also got LOADS of goals from set pieces by simply aiming corners to the far post and getting my big centre backs too attack the far post. Michael Nelson got 10 in 18 on loan, Ben Clark got 5 at the start of the season (when he was in the team) and Abdou Sall got 15, including two hat-tricks! This also meant my corner takers (Ragaven, Brkovic, Farro) got loads of extra assists. Ragaven was excellent in the centre midfield support role ... he is weak and his stamina is poor but his technical and mental attributes are excellent for this level and he had some superb games.

NEXT SEASON ...

Loads of my players are wanted so I might try and cash in on some of them, particularly the ageing foreigners given this league two rule on homegrown players (thanks for the heads up Heath!). I only have about 250 k in the bank and I'm not sure how much this will go up by once all the prize money etc is in, but I can't see it increasing by much, which is a worry. I only averaged under 1000 fans last year so I can't rely on ticket sales to keep me afloat during the season. I do wonder how far it is worth taking the club .... Heath do you try to build the club as far as you can, or do you recognise the limitations and move on before that ceiling is reached? I do like a new challenge but with promotions each season feels like a new challenge to keep the momentum going!

[Kevaldo]

Apologies for the big pictures, first time posting images! I'll make sure to resize in future ....

[heathxxx]

Those pictures are fine Kevaldo, they all fit into the forum page size well.

Recognise a few of those players there too Good stuff though and you're another contributor to the thread that's now in League Two around the same time as I am myself.

As for your question, certainly I would like to take my AFC Telford side as far as I possibly can. This is the only save I've been playing since installing FM11, so I'm already feeling quite attached to it. Normally I'd have quite a few on the go by now. It really depends how things pan out. If I feel I've taken the club as far as I can, then I may well look to move on, especially if I receive job offers from clubs offering a challenge that's hard to refuse. I would probably keep a backup save at the time before I did leave though.

That said, at the moment I can't see myself leaving any time soon.

I've just had one of those horrible games, saturated with poor performances and individual errors from both teams. It was in the Carling Cup 1st round away to Rotherham, who are a division above. We managed to scrape a 2-1 victory in extra time, but it really was an awful match to watch. One of those games where you can feel at a loss to know what to do for the best. Through to the next round, so regardless of how poor the performance was, we won and get another tie in the competition at least.

The draw has given us Leicester City away. They've been 4th and 3rd in the Championship last two seasons, missing out on promotion via the play-offs both times. Sven has since had the boot and Mark Robins is their manager now. They've a very good side, so it'll be a "fingers crossed" job, for sure.

[heathxxx]

Haruna Niang, the young defender with attributes more suited to a striker (see post #420) just made his first start in a match. Away to Macclesfield with a weakened team, due to my conservation of players for the Carling Cup trip to Leicester City a few days later.

5-2 winners and a hat-trick from Niang!

With performances like that, he'll definitely get more games, which in turn will hopefully speed up his conversion and positional ability, from defender to striker.

It's little things like this and the things that are possible, that I love about FM.

[ObaMartins09]

How can you scout Africa when you're AFC Telford?

I wasn't even allowed to go there when managing a Championship side.

[heathxxx]

Here's one I just have to share. One of those matches which reminds me just why I love playing Football Manager so much. Not least the thrills and spills of a classic cup tie.

Carling Cup second round, away to very strong Championship side Leicester City. I'm realistic going into the game, not really expecting to come away with anything, but I'll encourage and cajole every drop of effort from my lads I can muster.

I started the game with "Standard" strategy, but quickly changed to contain, because Leicester were pressing hard with wave after wave of attack. They broke through on the 23rd minute, Martyn Waghorn carving his way through the middle of my defence. At that point I thought "what the hell, I've got nothing to lose..." and changed to "Attack". Although Leicester kept pressuring, we began to create some chances late in the first-half on the counter, but my Italian striker Cristian Tiboni was having a shocker and whooshed two great chances high, wide... and not so handsome.

Half-time I really couldn't fault the overall performance, all things considered, but I lambasted Tiboni who was under-performing with 5.5 rating, suggested a couple of players rating around the low 6 mark go out and "prove a point". For the rest, I chose "no pressure". Second-half kicked off and it was end-to-end stuff. Much to my dismay though, Tiboni clearly hadn't responded well to my criticism, getting through twice more and fluffing his chances poorly. After 58 minutes, I decided to make some changes. I took of both strikers and my ball-winning midfielder. The former to simply try different forwards, the latter for fresher legs in the middle. One of those strikers I'll add, was my defender-come-striker, Haruna Niang as target man.

I kept with the "attack" strategy, used touchline shouts "get the ball forward", "pass into space", "exploit the flanks", to try getting the ball around better on Leicester's short pitch. We immediately began to pressure them more and on the 61st minute, we equalised, with my left-winger Vincent Milito providing a slide-rule pass through the Leicester defence, for my right-winger Yohan Guichard to slot in at the far post.

The game kept going at a frantic pace, both teams getting chances, but Leicester still looking the stronger team, taking the lead once more in the 69th minute. Not disheartened, and again feeling we had nothing to lose, I went for "overload". In the 79th minute we equalised to make it 2-2, with "That Man" Haruna Niang using his blistering speed to get through into space and fire past their keeper. I immediately went to "control" and for the remaining ten minutes, we actually looked the better side, taking the game to extra time.

Extra time began with me setting things to "attack" again. Nothing to lose, so why not? It paid off immediately in the 91st minute. My left winger got clear of his marker, hit the byline and fired in a cross. "That Man" Haruna Niang rose like a salmon and powered his header past the Leicester keeper. Score 3-2 and we're winning!

More end-to-end stuff and I decide to try playing it safe. I don't want to let Leicester press too much, so I opt for "control" again, rather than "contain". Martyn Waghorn proves a thorn in my side yet again, breaks clean through only for my last man, defender Alejandro Meloño to pull him down. Lengthy walk towards the ref and as expected, red card for a professional foul. Now in defensive trouble, I decide to pull my right-back into the centre and my riight winger back to right-midfield. To my dismay, they broke and scored an equaliser in the 102nd minute, with their next attack. My players were exhausted and there was no way we could see out the game on "attack" trying to look for a winner, so I stayed with "control" because rather than try to "defend", I still wanted my players to get forward. All I can do now, is cross my fingers and hope to take the game to penalties, with another half of extra-time to go.

Before the end of the first fifteen minutes though, we break, get a cross into the box, which my forward attack, but the ball comes off their defender Michael Lamey and into the net! We're winning again! it's 4-3.

I'm on cloud nine, but we've still got the second period of extra time to go. My players are absolutely shattered, so I just want them to keep the ball and do nothing silly. Leicester are throwing everything forward and they grab another equaliser on 107 minutes. Oh well, we've been living a charmed existence in this game. I decide to throw caution to the wind again and go for "overload". End-to-end stuff again, but neither side can find that decisive goal. The match goes to penalties.

With two of my main penalty takers already substituted, I don't change the remaining three, but neither do I select the remaining two. I simply leave it up to the players to decide. The lottery of penalties goes against us though and we're out.

I can't fault the effort from my players though, so I tell them "well done" after the match, but I reserve some individual "anger" for Tiboni who rated 5.7 and had been subbed just after half-time and "disappointment" for my keeper Gorée, who rated only 6.0 and had shown weak hands for one of the Leicester goals. Although a shame not to get through, I'm proud of how the team fought their way through the match and refused to give up. There's still a potential run in the FA Cup to come, plus the more realistic objectives of promotion from League Two and maybe a good run in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy.

Anyway, watch the match for yourselves, as here's the PKM

http://www.filefront.com/17753949/Leicester v AFC Telford.pkm

Enjoy!

[heathxxx]

How can you scout Africa when you're AFC Telford?

I wasn't even allowed to go there when managing a Championship side.

Kept (successfully) asking my board to broaden our scouting range.

I'm now able to scout anywhere in the world.

In season one, I was able to scout UK & Ireland, France. Season two they let me broaden that to the rest of Europe. This season, they've let me broaden the range to everywhere else.

It must depend entirely on your club, the board and the chairman. I'm very lucky in that along with scouting range, I've successfully managed to get two youth training upgrades, they bought the stadium and we've never had problems relaying the pitch. They do it every season.

Obviously healthy finances help. The cup runs and prize money, good transfer dealings and keeping the wage budget well below the limit, have all contributed to that. I've also now got eleven scouts employed.

[pilsken]

Im just curious but if you release all your player on free transfers, how do you then manage to play the friendlies without a squad (so to speak)? Or do you cancel them as well? Best regards and thanks for a very intresting reading..

[heathxxx]

When starting a save like this, I'll obviously look first if there's any players I can keep that'll fit my tactical preferences, pilsken. Often there either isn't or I know I can get better players. When clearing my squad, I'll clearly try to sell players who have any value, mutually terminate contracts of those who don't or have nobody interested. Free transfers are the last resort option, failing the others.

Looking back through my fixtures, in that very first season, my first friendly match came a week or so into the job. 6th July 2010 to be precise. That's a long time in football and by that date, I'd already made eighteen signings.

The very first "game" day I'm in the job, I spend searching for players manually. I'll look at who's available on free transfers, look through teams in lower divisions throughout Europe, whilst also bringing in my backroom staff. The very first staff I look for incidentally, are my assistant manager and at least a scout or two. That's so I can get some reports on players I'm looking to sign, quickly. Failing scout reports, I may also bring in free agents on trial, so I can get a coach report.

By the time I click "Continue" on the first day, I've probably shortlisted over a hundred or so players and approached as many as half of them to sign. Obviously I don't sign all of them, but from that shortlist I'll have highlighted and prioritised signings for each position and role within my tactics. If I miss out on my first choice for a position, I'll try for the next and so on.

Setting things up at the start of a save, is probably the longest individual amount of time I spend looking at players. I always think it's important to get of to as good a start as possible though, as how you begin, can set the tone for the rest of the save. Searching for players that can improve my squad is also an ongoing thing for me, though further on in the game, I'll spend more time during the transfer windows looking, than during the season itself. The regen/newgen dates are consigned to my memory though, as they haven't changed much over the last several releases of FM. So for example, when I know regens are due to start appearing in Africa, I'll start manually searching in Africa.

[Vhyle]

Well, first I'd like to say thank you to Heath for this thread. I've been following the first page posts pretty well, but I feel I'm going to use the Sherica 4-3-3 with different starting tactic. The starting tactics I plan to use are the ones you reccommend, because honestly I don't think my team will be able to do what Sherica believes for the tactic, other than that I plan to use the player instructions Sherica has for that tactic. Anyway, on to my team.

Stafford. Honestly I chose them for the uniforms and the interesting team emblem. I've looked them up on their site, and I like their history. I also feel that it would be a treat to get Stafford, who are obscure and very small, into the highest league I can get them into. I also thoguht about just staying with the team, even if they don't get higher than champions 1 or 2, or even champions premier. I really feel I want to build that team because it's very lacking. I feel the team deserves more based on their history, but I'm an American and not educated at all on English Football history. Seems impressive though.

The team is lacking money in a really bad way. I've set up friendlies with Man City, Chelsea and Man U. at 24k each. That should get me some money. The season expectation, consolidation. I have no idea what that means, but I've set a personal goal of attaining at least a top half finish. I feel promotion to BSP would be a mistake and something the team is by far no where near prepared for. Coaches; big problem here as I can't sign any decent coach and I'm stuck with the current staff until I can get additional money. I know this is probably going to handicap me, but I see no way around it. I'm going to just have to suck it up and hope for good finishes.

Normally I'd play Telford, and I have a save as Telford, but I've lost interest in that team and save altogether. I sort of fell in love with Stafford though, and I want to improve them. Advice would be great, as this first season will be interesting for sure.

[heathxxx]

You should be able to improve your squad fairly quickly Vhyle. There's always plenty of free agents and amateur players available if you have a good look around. Don't forget to look at the suitability of player attributes for all the positions and roles you're using in your tactics. This should see you able to gain promotion and at least comfortably survive in the BSP. There's enough players around that are better than BSN and BSP levels that will come.

If your coaching staff aren't up to what you're looking for, try to get them to mutually terminate their contracts. Again, there's plenty better out there. You may struggle initially with how many you're allowed, so you'll likely need "multi-skilled" staff able to handle more than one discipline of training. At this level though, even staff with 10+ determination, discipline, motivation + suitable attributes for the areas of training, should be enough to give you three stars or better.

Financially, don't worry too much about debts through releasing players if you don't need them, can't sell them to anyone, or through releasing staff. Trying to pack your pre-season schedule with home games against bigger clubs should help offset that. If you haggle well whilst negotiating wages for your new players, you should end up like I did, with a squad of players who's overall salaries are cheaper than those they've replaced. Try to get those players on as long contracts as you can. I still have some players from the first season at my club, that are now in League Two and tied to same earnings from the BSN. This has been helpful, as had they been on shorter contracts, they would likely have wanted treble or quadruple what they're earning.

I've not really looked at Sherica's tactics. If they're reliant on the sliders more than the tactics creator options though, you'll need to be confident that you can fully assess suitable player attributes, plus that you're comfortable making slider tweaks, instead of the in-match shouts during games. It depends how you're more comfortable playing and managing things tactically. Since the introduction of the new tactical interface, I never use the slider options at all. About the only options I do use occasionally from the "advanced" options, are occasionally setting my strikers to swap position, or my keeper to specifically throw/kick to one or the other of my full-backs. Everything else I've tried to keep as simple and easy to do, using the tactics creator and in-match shouts.

So whilst I can't answer any questions regarding Sherica's tactics, I can try to help with anything you may try using the tactics creator options.

Keep us posted how you get on though and feel free to ask any questions.

[pilsken]

Thx for the reply Heathxxx. One more question though, when you put a bid on a player, let's say the players value is 25k.. how much are you putting up as an offer? just the value of the player or do you have any tips regarding to get the player bid accepted... because i find it kind of difficult to get player bids accepted sometimes.

I'm often using "Ask asisstant to filter out unrealistic targets"... do you use it as well? (with minor clubs...)

thx

[heathxxx]

Thx for the reply Heathxxx. One more question though, when you put a bid on a player, let's say the players value is 25k.. how much are you putting up as an offer? just the value of the player or do you have any tips regarding to get the player bid accepted... because i find it kind of difficult to get player bids accepted sometimes.

I'm often using "Ask asisstant to filter out unrealistic targets"... do you use it as well? (with minor clubs...)

thx

If a club won't accept an initial cash offer, then I'll try to sweeten the deal with a percentage of next profit clause. If they still don't accept, then it depends entirely on my budget, how far I'm prepared to go with bidding and if the player is worth it.

I do sometimes get my assistant to filter "unrealistic", but I've also signed players without that option ticked too.

[Vhyle]

Thanks Heath. I've restarted my career and will be starting unemployed just to be different. I'll follow the tactics you employ, I feel now that keeping things simple will be better and a greater benefit. I like using shouts, and I'm not much into the advanced tactics stuff.

Regarding training, how do you manage the schedules? Do you just throw them into the GK, Defending, Attacking schedules or use something else? Training is something I want to get down well, so that my sides get the most out of the coaches and out of the training itself.

[heathxxx]

For the very first time in this save, I've been linked to another job. Comically though, that job is Charlton Athletic, currently 10th in League Two, who my side have just beaten 2-0 away.

Obviously they're a higher profile club than AFC Telford, but I've no interest whatsoever. As such, I responded with the "not interested" press release.

After all, why would I leave my Telford team, top of League two after winning all eleven of my opening league games and already ten points clear, with a game in hand. It's not been plain sailing though. Were it not for our ability to score goals, our defensive frailties mean it could be another story entirely.

[heathxxx]

Thanks Heath. I've restarted my career and will be starting unemployed just to be different. I'll follow the tactics you employ, I feel now that keeping things simple will be better and a greater benefit. I like using shouts, and I'm not much into the advanced tactics stuff.

Regarding training, how do you manage the schedules? Do you just throw them into the GK, Defending, Attacking schedules or use something else? Training is something I want to get down well, so that my sides get the most out of the coaches and out of the training itself.

I find that the default schedules actually seem ok, which hasn't been the case particularly in previous versions of FM. During my first season, I used those and everything was fine.

Last season and this season though, I've been taking a look at Raver training, which having read the thread, looked quite interesting. I believe they're still work in progress, but some of the schedules have been very useful for some of my players. Mostly though, I'm leaning back towards the default schedules.

Something I've never hidden, is that although always comfortably tactically, when it comes to training, it's not something I've invested much time or effort. More so something I look into deeper if I'm managing a top club and doing a lot of work developing very high potential youngsters. The fastest attribute gains always come from regular exposure to first team football, though training schedules when customised, can help you shape the distribution of attribute gains, to a certain extent.

[The Icepick]

First of all: many thanks to Heath and all the other people in this thread for so much information!

I've been playing FM since 2000 now (not all versions though), and I've always been a manager in top divisions around Europe. Mostly even the top teams in those divisions. I've never tried a lower league save. I'm currently in a save with my favourite team Vitesse in the Dutch Eredivisie.

I've written a lot of information from this thread down as a sort of "LLM-guide". I feel that sometime soon, I will be starting a lower league save. This thread made me realise that there's a lot more to FM!

I have a question though. How do you find out if a youngster has got potential? Obviously your scout will tell you in his report. But I mean, if you look at a player's attributes, is it possible to see if he's got potential? What do I have to look for? This part particularly seems difficult to me.

KUTGW guys!

[Äktsjon Männ]

I'd also like to thank Heath for this thread

I've not gone properly lower league in FM11 yet as I only recently got it, but I've followed this thread closely and taken notes trying to learn from the experience of others. I'm in my 3rd season with Notts County, currently in the Championship, doing pretty well and just had my first proper fist pumping moment. Had a League Cup fixture against high-flying Bolton (5th in the Premier League). They have a talented squad of determined players on good morale, so no-one to target through the media. Lots of pace throughout their squad so I knew there wasn't much to gain from being too adventurous. Contain it was going to be, with 'get ball forward', 'clear ball to flanks', 'pass into space' and 'exploit the flanks'. Basically I was trying to get the ball behind their attack-minded full backs as much as possible. They scored early from a long shot, but after that we limited them to just one clear cut chance while constantly looking dangerous on the counter ourselves. Poor decision making meant we couldn't really come up with any high quality chances, until in the 84th minute our set piece specialist, former Man Utd youth Oliver Norwood cracked a 30 yard free kick past their keeper for the equaliser. This seemed to demoralise the Bolton players and while their manager was trying to get them to push hard for the winner, we were the ones starting to look more decisive in front of goal. In the 4th minute of added time we got a throw in near their box. Bolton tried to push their defense up but one of their full backs didn't react quickly enough, leaving my Brazilian striker Felipe onside all on his own to notch in a free header for the winner. While not that impressive in context of this thread it was undoubtedly my best result so far in FM11, and in large part thanks to advice gained from this great thread

[heathxxx]

I have a question though. How do you find out if a youngster has got potential? Obviously your scout will tell you in his report. But I mean, if you look at a player's attributes, is it possible to see if he's got potential? What do I have to look for? This part particularly seems difficult to me.

With any player, I always look at the distribution of their attributes. A good example is the central defender I spotted (discussed in post #420), who had attributes more suited to those of a striker. He's quite an extreme example, as I've got to retrain his positional ability. I've had him for four months though now and he's now got an orange circle in the striker position, which is "Awkward". He's played some part, mostly from the bench, in 14 matches so far this season. If I can get him to "Accomplished" by the end of the season, I'll be delighted.

That player aside though, I look at attributes suited to roles and positions. A good scout will give me an indication of potential, but they could have plenty of potential, but no suitable attributes. I'll generally use the highlighted player attributes in the tactics creator as a guideline towards "key" attributes I should be looking for.

Essentially, a combination of those two areas. Scouts reported potential and the distribution of attributes, suitable to the positions they can play.

[heathxxx]

I'd also like to thank Heath for this thread

I've not gone properly lower league in FM11 yet as I only recently got it' date=' but I've followed this thread closely and taken notes trying to learn from the experience of others. I'm in my 3rd season with Notts County, currently in the Championship, doing pretty well and just had my first proper fist pumping moment. Had a League Cup fixture against high-flying Bolton (5th in the Premier League). They have a talented squad of determined players on good morale, so no-one to target through the media. Lots of pace throughout their squad so I knew there wasn't much to gain from being too adventurous. [i']Contain[/i] it was going to be, with 'get ball forward', 'clear ball to flanks', 'pass into space' and 'exploit the flanks'. Basically I was trying to get the ball behind their attack-minded full backs as much as possible. They scored early from a long shot, but after that we limited them to just one clear cut chance while constantly looking dangerous on the counter ourselves. Poor decision making meant we couldn't really come up with any high quality chances, until in the 84th minute our set piece specialist, former Man Utd youth Oliver Norwood cracked a 30 yard free kick past their keeper for the equaliser. This seemed to demoralise the Bolton players and while their manager was trying to get them to push hard for the winner, we were the ones starting to look more decisive in front of goal. In the 4th minute of added time we got a throw in near their box. Bolton tried to push their defense up but one of their full backs didn't react quickly enough, leaving my Brazilian striker Felipe onside all on his own to notch in a free header for the winner. While not that impressive in context of this thread it was undoubtedly my best result so far in FM11, and in large part thanks to advice gained from this great thread

Really, you could class anything below the top division of any country as "lower leagues". Alternatively, you could class even the top division in a minor country, such as Wales or Iceland, "lower leagues".

Even though most of what's discussed in this thread has given examples of clubs starting in English football's 4th, 5th and 6th tier, there's a lot of principals you can take and use at any level.

Good result there against Bolton though. Cup matches against Premier League teams are always tough and to come away with a win is something you can be justly proud of

[Adam Sutton]

whats the best plug and play tatic for lower clubs?????????

[heathxxx]

whats the best plug and play tatic for lower clubs?????????

Have a look through the forum and pick what takes your fancy. I don't think there's such a thing as "Plug & Play" tactics in FM. Ignore the media, team-talks, OI's, tactical changes during games, shouts... at your peril.

I've been using a simple attacking orientated 4-4-2 in this thread though and have adapted roles slightly as I've brought different players to the club. Although I've used pretty much the same system since the start of the thread, I wouldn't call it "Plug & Play".

[Finknottle]

Heath,If you look at my latest post, you will realise that I am still messing about. I have rather belatedly looked at your defensive corner routine. I notice that you have only one man left forward. Please allow me to suggest the following. At present I always leave two men forward. My fastest winger and my fastest striker. If you leave two men up then they have to bring two men back, the idea being that they have less men in your penalty area at a dangerous time. I am now looking to leave three men up, my two wingers plus the striker. My idea is that I now have three outlets from the corner and my opponents have now to bring three men back to cover them. As I am still 'in between' saves I haven't yet tried out the 'three men' theory. What I can tell you, is that it works well IRL. I know this from my own 'unqualified' coaching experiences in what seems to be a long, long time ago. Kind regards.

[heathxxx]

Thanks oescus, I'll take a look at those settings. Unfortunately the one thing my team is lacking at the moment, is players with really good pace and acceleration. My strikers and wingers aren't bad, but the only chance I get to exploit any pace, is when I bring that young defender (I'm retraining as a striker) on, as he has 17 for both.

Set pieces are a bit of a conundrum though and with the new system, I really think any "success" with them will vary a great deal from team to team, with certain things working or not, depending on player attributes.

For example, although a new "OMG Corners" thread appears to have popped up, I think it'll be fairly safe to say that people will still have mixed results with the settings.

[heathxxx]

Having played 19 league games so far in my League Two campaign, my AFC Telford side is cruising at the top, 15 points clear of nearest rivals Torquay United in second place. Played 19, won 16, drawn 3.

All sounds great, but I'm not at all happy with my defence. Indeed, our defence has been our biggest frailty this season. Were it not for the "we can score more than you" capability, this season could be entirely different. We've only kept four clean sheets in those nineteen games, plus the season has been littered with high scoring matches and matches that really could have gone either way, as you'll see from the image below.

I do believe that the biggest contributor to the defensive frailties, are the players themselves. My best central defender is 35 and this will probably be his last season as a key player. His central defensive partner is only 19 and has good potential, but he's yet to realise it. Of my full-backs, one is 35 and is more suited to being a winger, but stuck for alternatives he's the best option I have. The other is 23 and hasn't progressed as well as I would have hoped. He seems to have hit his peak potential, plus is actually and inexplicably declining.

Tactically, it's proven extremely challenging to manage defensively. Having players that bar one or two options, either aren't suited or are on the decline for one reason or another. I've retained my standard defensive settings as detailed in the very first page of the thread. Two full-backs on "automatic" (which I do change to "defend" during matches sometimes), two central defenders, one "stopper", one "cover". Lack of any pace at the back, means I'm having to drop deep quite a lot. Although this has its benefits, it can invite teams onto me. When we are caught upfield, or from passes into space, the defenders lack the mobility to get back into position or shut down opportunities effectively enough.

In addition to the defence being shaky, I don't think the midfield setup I'm using is helping protect them enough. I'm using a ball-winning midfielder and an advanced playmaker in the MC positions. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, this is very much a risk/reward situation. The risk, which can be evidenced by the goals we concede, is lack of real protection in front of the defence, in sufficient numbers. The reward, is extra creativity and support going forward. At the moment, the rewards are just about outweighing the risks.

The conundrum for me at the moment then, is that I want to shore up a leaky defence with more midfield protection, but one of those midfield positions and the player occupying it, has been exceptional. Do I re-evaluate my risk/reward settings? Do I look for a more defensive orientated midfield for the reward of conceding less goals at the risk of losing attacking impetus? It's a question I'm asking myself every match. With my current squad capabilities, it's a difficult decision to make.

One thing is for certain, come the end of this season I'm going to have to reinvent and rebuild the squad. Offensively we're fantastic, but the more defensive part of midfield and the defence itself, is going to need an overhaul.

In other competitions, we're through to an FA Cup 3rd round tie away to now Championship side, Stoke City. They're a side who since relegation have had to sell some of their star players, but have actually made some very good looking replacement signings. They don't seem to be performing though, so it's a game where we could potentially cause and upset.

The Johnstone's Paint Trophy has been something else entirely. We've reached the Northern Final, but comfortably beat League One opponents in all but one of the four encounters. We've seen none of the defensive frailties of the league in this competition.

In other news, I've managed to talk the board into another youth facilities upgrade, plus to expand the stadium. Both are in the "planning" stage, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed both go ahead to completion.

[heathxxx]

AAAARRRGGGGHHHH!

Somehow my Telford save has been corrupted and rolling autosave hasn't backed anything up since the start of the season... back at the beginning of the BSP campaign...

Gutted.

I did manage to repair a corrupted save with FM10 once though, so am praying I can remember how I did that.

[heathxxx]

Well, I've managed to restore a previous backup with Windows recovery tools, but it's taken me back to the start of the season in League Two and my pre-season schedule. Better than the other options I suppose, but still annoying to have lost all my progress in the season I've been talking about so far.

[nmwaldron]

Well, I've managed to restore a previous backup with Windows recovery tools, but it's taken me back to the start of the season in League Two and my pre-season schedule. Better than the other options I suppose, but still annoying to have lost all my progress in the season I've been talking about so far.

Wow...that can be a game stopper for me. I've had that happen before and lost 15 or 20 matches of progress (plus any signings, changes etc) where we were doing well and couldn't bring myself to try it again. Really hope you can repeat the success cause it seemed you were doing really well. I know you spend a heck of a lot of time on each fixture too so that only makes things worse.

I'm the type to blast through the game lol so I'm already past my 400th game in charge of Eastwood. After three years of being 10th place or thereabouts after reaching league 2 with straight promotions I'm giving it one more season to see what happens and then may throw in the towel. Deep in debt (as per usual) and having parts of our stand closed due to maintenance problems almost weekly have only made things worse BUT a glimmer of hope has been our recent performances and we're now on a 10 match winning spree. Thanks to your "wingers wide" formation and some tinkering my players are really relishing in it. I've changed the passing style to direct to try and counteract the poor weather and absolute awfulness of our pitch (the board has never had the money to relay it in 7 seasons despite my constant requests!). I'm actually starting to enjoy playing again Fingers crossed here.

I've played around with media comments, demorilising opposition players but it never seems to work out right for me. The player I target usually gets a hit in morale but even though targeted in the game I'd say about 70% of the times I've tried it we've either lost or drawn playing very poorly. Had the same experience with OIs. It's getting harder now to find weaker players in the areas of bravery, composure etc. but even targeting the ones that I found has never yielded much success for me.

With your defensive problems, I've had the same issues in league two. I probably have one of the best defenses in the league but we have continued to leak goals like a bucket with a football sized hole in it. One of my most consistant performers though at left back is Zeki Fryers. I can't remember from your squad listings if you have him or not but I signed him in my first season as a youngster and he has come along leaps and bounds. Other than Sall who I had to let go a few seasons back. This season I decided to go to town and reshaped the whole defense with new players pretty much and we're doing a lot better. Jason Pearce, Miroslav Stepanek and Lubomier Michalek have all been solid performers for me although in doing so we're way over our 23k wage budget which obviously doesn't help the debt issue but as long as we're winning lol

Best of luck to you in starting your save in league two again, like I said, having been there I know that's one of the suckiest feelings.

[Finknottle]

Well, I've managed to restore a previous backup with Windows recovery tools, but it's taken me back to the start of the season in League Two and my pre-season schedule. Better than the other options I suppose, but still annoying to have lost all my progress in the season I've been talking about so far.

Sorry to read of your loss of save, heath. I've suffered similarly myself but my save losses have been down to me doing somrthing/s wrong. Not being pc literate I can't work out what so I have to start a new save over.

Reference the three men left forward at defensive corners. This is what I've discovered. As suspected, your opponents do pull back three men to cover your three. Also, they have one man in or near to the edge of the centre circle, in your half. I have also noticed that your opponents have only four men in your penalty area for their corners. They can be covered by man marking. This leaves plenty of room for your defence to clear the corner. I have the 'TC' set to 'clear to the flanks'. After five League matches using this method, I have not conceded from a corner, he said tempting fate. I hope that this is of some assistance to you and anyone else. Kind regards.