BoxToBox Posted October 25, 2016 Share Posted October 25, 2016 Lozano! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LPQR Posted October 25, 2016 Share Posted October 25, 2016 congrats, great progress so far! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Daniel_ Posted October 25, 2016 Share Posted October 25, 2016 Fantastic stuff, all hail the Kaiser! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 26, 2016 Author Share Posted October 26, 2016 11 hours ago, BoxToBox said: Lozano! Yeah! I've obviously heard that he's pretty good in FM16 but I've never taken the plunge with him until now, hopefully he'll work out. 10 hours ago, LPQR said: congrats, great progress so far! Thanks mate. The challenge now is to sustain it and make a run at Europe. 9 hours ago, _Daniel_ said: Fantastic stuff, all hail the Kaiser! I'm glad there was another storyline for me to get my teeth into with the save, other than RBL being east Germany's Man City or Chelsea. I think 4 years is a reasonable timescale to land the Champions League and Pokal. So hopefully he can make a clean sweep. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 26, 2016 Author Share Posted October 26, 2016 Whilst i think we have improved the quality of the squad, I'm definitely going to revert back to a counter-attacking system for next season. Possibly a counter/structured 4-4-1-1 to try and get the most out of the physical and mental strengths of the squad. Real have tabled a £38m bid for Kimmich and he's unhappy and wants to go. We'd more than double our money in just one season and whilst he did okay for us as our DLP-D, he wasn't fantastic. As a contingency, I've tabled a £30m bid for Goretzka... I'm thinking he can be a RPM, B2B or CM-A alongside Dahoud as our DLP-D and with Pulisic as our AMC to link the transitions to Selkie who I'm thinking of switching to AF-A from DF-S. It kinda works in my head but we'll see how it looks in the ME. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LPQR Posted October 26, 2016 Share Posted October 26, 2016 a Goretzka - Dahoud - Pulisic triangle in midfield sounds out of this world. I'd go for using Goretzka deep, maybe even at DM as a regista or a DLP, a CM(S) for Dahoud (with playmaking instructions) and Pulisic, well... that's a debatable one, and it will also depend on your system Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 26, 2016 Author Share Posted October 26, 2016 Just now, LPQR said: a Goretzka - Dahoud - Pulisic triangle in midfield sounds out of this world. I'd go for using Goretzka deep, maybe even at DM as a regista or a DLP, a CM(S) for Dahoud (with playmaking instructions) and Pulisic, well... that's a debatable one, and it will also depend on your system Yeah, it sounds fantastic but it's getting them all in the right roles and duties. Initially I was thinking DLP-D For Dahoud, RPM-S or B2B for Goretzka and AM-S with dribble/risky passes for Pulisic but yeah, Goretzka might be better suited as the 'sitter' and have Dahoud's playmaking a little further forward. I'm planning on going 4-4-1-1 counter/structured. Sit deep and hit teams on the break with the pace of Selkie, Hahn and Burke, with Pulisic as an advanced pivot and out ball and Dahoud spraying the ball around from deep with Goretzka getting forward to support. Like I said, it works okay in my mind but it's getting the right combinations in the ME. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LPQR Posted October 26, 2016 Share Posted October 26, 2016 2 minutes ago, davehibb said: I'm planning on going 4-4-1-1 counter/structured. Sit deep and hit teams on the break with the pace of Selkie, Hahn and Burke, with Pulisic as an advanced pivot and out ball and Dahoud spraying the ball around from deep with Goretzka getting forward to support. interesting. You don't necessarily need to play with a counter mentality even if that's the style of play you want to achieve. Plus, I think that would limit your team exploiting other phases of play given that you definitely have a very versatile set of players with really good ability overall. Think of it this way, by employing a counter mentality, your team will rely mostly on exploiting space the opposition has left behind. First of all, do you have the pace, off the ball and decision making in your squad to exploit that? Are they the best attributes in your team? As mentioned above, these three players you have in midfield are great passers of the ball with really good overall intelligence, so why not balance the type of football you play to enable you to 1. exploit the pacey players (if you have any) when there is an opportunity to break, and 2. exploit the passing ability in midfield when in possession? A standard mentality will be a good starting point and a normal/slightly deeper d-line. For example, with somebody in your midfield trio given the responsibility to try more direct passes coupled with a couple of players attacking the space behind the opposition will exploit one possible style of unfolding counters: exploiting the fast players making runs into space. A second possibility/style of counter-attacking would be fast, short passes between your midfielders as they move up the pitch. This requires appropriate role-choice and managing the transition correctly, however given your players are really good, they shouldn't require too many instructions to be able to do that based on their ability of reading the game. Additionally, think of what your team is doing when in different phases of play: for example if you look to hit the opposition on the break, this means you will be absorbing pressure and defending space for the majority of the match. How does your team do that? Same goes for the other phases of play, and they're not necessarily easy to categorize as 'defense, transition, attack, or possession'. Think of it as 'situations of play' that you will notice unfolding in specific/patterned manners. Hope this helps Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 26, 2016 Author Share Posted October 26, 2016 4 minutes ago, LPQR said: interesting. You don't necessarily need to play with a counter mentality even if that's the style of play you want to achieve. Plus, I think that would limit your team exploiting other phases of play given that you definitely have a very versatile set of players with really good ability overall. Think of it this way, by employing a counter mentality, your team will rely mostly on exploiting space the opposition has left behind. First of all, do you have the pace, off the ball and decision making in your squad to exploit that? Are they the best attributes in your team? As mentioned above, these three players you have in midfield are great passers of the ball with really good overall intelligence, so why not balance the type of football you play to enable you to 1. exploit the pacey players (if you have any) when there is an opportunity to break, and 2. exploit the passing ability in midfield when in possession? A standard mentality will be a good starting point and a normal/slightly deeper d-line. For example, with somebody in your midfield trio given the responsibility to try more direct passes coupled with a couple of players attacking the space behind the opposition will exploit one possible style of unfolding counters: exploiting the fast players making runs into space. A second possibility/style of counter-attacking would be fast, short passes between your midfielders as they move up the pitch. This requires appropriate role-choice and managing the transition correctly, however given your players are really good, they shouldn't require too many instructions to be able to do that based on their ability of reading the game. Additionally, think of what your team is doing when in different phases of play: for example if you look to hit the opposition on the break, this means you will be absorbing pressure and defending space for the majority of the match. How does your team do that? Same goes for the other phases of play, and they're not necessarily easy to categorize as 'defense, transition, attack, or possession'. Think of it as 'situations of play' that you will notice unfolding in specific/patterned manners. Hope this helps Thanks mate. I'm not in front of the game right now but we do have really good pace, acceleration, workrate, teamwork and aggression in players such as Selkie and Burke in particular and the likes of Hahn and Lozano and Werner not far behind. Again it's all in my mind and i'll be doing some testing in preseason tonight but I'm thinking we sit in a low block, absorb pressure, then when we transition the ball should find it's way to our playmaker (Dahoud), who can then hopefully release Selkie or Burke with a through ball or feed it into Pulisic, who can turn and run at the defense and/or play it through to Selkie, Burke and whoever else is piling forward with the 'counter-attack' is triggered. Thinking of: Counter (deep/compact-fast transitions to exploit pace/space) Structured (to create depth and to keep the block/two banks of four intact and minimize wasted possession) SK-D : LFB-A CD-D BPD-D RFB-S LWM-S DLP-D B2B-S RW-A AM-S AF-A It's going to be 'fun' figuring it out. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 27, 2016 Author Share Posted October 27, 2016 After a little gameplay last night, I think I've settled on Goretzka as DLP-D and RPM-S for Dahoud. They seemed to really affect the game in those roles. Pulisic only really seemed to get involved as a T-A, opposed to an AM-S but I guess that's because T-A is a 'playmaker' role, so he attracts the ball and I guess in a sense, that's what I want. I'm definitely going to re-think going from counter to standard, with the possibility of dropping my CMs into the DM strata. And possibly going to fluid, as as well as having a squad of fine athletes, most of them are pretty mentally and technically astute. We did okay on counter/structured, something like 7 wins and 3 draws in all comps but our best performances were against a really good team, where we suckered them on the counter and a really poor team, where superior ability I think was the difference. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 29, 2016 Author Share Posted October 29, 2016 2017-2018 Preseason & Winter Transfers We were pretty restrained for the second season running in the transfer market. Again, we didn't add much depth in terms of the first team squad but we did up the quality a little I think. The big story of course was Kimmich's switch to Real and in turn, our capture of Goretzka. Kimmich, whilst he played a big part in our title triumph, seemed pedestrian and whilst he kept things ticking over and shielded the back four, he didn't really impose himself on games, so I thought that £38m was a good deal for us, especially as he was pushing for the move too. We payed a little more than I wanted for Goretzka and originally I didn't see him as a direct replacement for Kimmich at DLP-D, though that is where he has ultimately ended up. I don't know if the stats show Goretzka as an upgrade but he certainly seems to be more dynamic and energetic, which is how we like to play. Alena and Ziyech join on loan from La Liga and are basically cover and replacements for last year's loanees, Advijaj and Van Ginkel. As is Upamecano, with us not picking up the £15m option on Rudiger. The young Salzburg centre half looks a decent prospect and we have a £2.5m fee agreed, which we may well exercise with Compper not getting any younger. Heise and Ziadi are youngsters our scouts liked and Weis comes in as our backup keeper, when Muller became unhappy that we'd rejected Dortmund's initial bid. Their bench must be nicer than ours. Lozano I mentioned earlier. He comes into our wide midfield rotation, with Poulsen making a move to the Premier League and WBA. A pretty straight forward preseason, as we bedded in our 4-4-1-1 Counter/Structured formation. We also lifted the Super Cup on penalties after a close affair with Leverkusen, who needed the playoffs to remain in the Bundesliga last season. Horn making a crucial save in a tight shootout to give us the win 5-4. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 29, 2016 Author Share Posted October 29, 2016 2017-18 Hinrunde. We started the season slowly, grinding out a 1-0 win over Wehen in the Pokal and we snatched victory form the jaws of defeat against Wolfsburg. That would turn out to be an important win for us by the time the winter break came. We deservedly beat Bayern and squeaked past Hannover before destroying Karlsruhe. The counter tactic wasn’t really cutting it. We weren’t losing but we were only just beating teams that we should now be bossing. I switched to a Standard/Fluid system for the game against Schalke, who have struggled mightily since losing Goretzka. That game began an 8 game winning streak, where we only conceded 1 goal. Selkie has been on fire again during the Hinrunde. 18 goals in 23 games. A little streaky at times and both he and Werner miss some chances. I’m hoping they’ll develop more of a killer instinct, though I am tempted to buy a top forward. We slipped up with draws against Hoffenheim and Leverkusen before smashing struggling Dortmund and Stuttgart. As you can see form the table, it’s not only Dortmund who are struggling. Bayern sacked Ancelotti just before the winter break, replacing him with Mancini. Champions League. We made life difficult for ourselves by drawing our first 3 games but we ground out a win at home to Porto and then smashed Sevilla 3-0 away in a fantastic performance and then ensured qualification with a comfortable 1-0 win over Molde, which was one of those games where our forwards just couldn't take their chances. Lyon await us in our first foray into the knockout phase. Squad As you can see we've had some notable performers... Klosterman, Orban and Halstenburg at the back. Dahoud, Burke and Hahn in midfield, along with Selkie up top, have all performed at a high level. Can we sustain it after we return from our training camp in Qatar? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoxToBox Posted October 29, 2016 Share Posted October 29, 2016 Looking like a mighty season. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alerion Posted October 29, 2016 Share Posted October 29, 2016 I am honestly surprised Upamecano is still at Salzburg in the 17/18 season. Normally he gets bought by the big english clubs in the first transfer window, atleast thats what happens to me all the time... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 29, 2016 Author Share Posted October 29, 2016 4 hours ago, BoxToBox said: Looking like a mighty season. Let's hope so! We're flying at the moment! 1 hour ago, Alerion said: I am honestly surprised Upamecano is still at Salzburg in the 17/18 season. Normally he gets bought by the big english clubs in the first transfer window, atleast thats what happens to me all the time... Yeah, I was a little surprised he was there and glad that he was listed for loan too. There's not a great deal of flexibility in terms of moving players around within the Red Bull group unfortunately. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 29, 2016 Author Share Posted October 29, 2016 Winterpause. There was good and awful news for us during the winter break. The 'Scottish Bale', Oliver Burke, won the European Golden Boy, which was a pleasant surprise. He's developed wonderfully over the last couple of seasons and chips in with his share of goals for us too! However the mood was dampened when club captain Dominik Kaiser did his cruciates in our last warm up game before the Ruckrunde. That's him done for the year. Hopefully he can make a full recovery and the boys are desperate to win the Bundesliga, Pokal and Champions League for their injured captain! To help lessen the blow of losing Kaiser, we splashed £15m on Barcelona's Portuguese midfielder, Andre Gomes, who will cover for Goretzka and Dahoud, much like Kaiser did. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoxToBox Posted October 29, 2016 Share Posted October 29, 2016 Not Kaiser! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alerion Posted October 29, 2016 Share Posted October 29, 2016 45 minutes ago, davehibb said: Yeah, I was a little surprised he was there and glad that he was listed for loan too. There's not a great deal of flexibility in terms of moving players around within the Red Bull group unfortunately. Its different in FM17 tho, atleast between RBS/RBB and Liefering. I am able to "buy" players from FC Liefering for literally 1 Euro. Not sure if its the same between RBL/Salzburg tho, I might need to try this out. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 29, 2016 Author Share Posted October 29, 2016 1 minute ago, Alerion said: Its different in FM17 tho, atleast between RBS/RBB and Liefering. I am able to "buy" players from FC Liefering for literally 1 Euro. Not sure if its the same between RBL/Salzburg tho, I might need to try this out. Ah, let me know if you test it out. It'd be interesting to know whether it's possible to arrange loans and transfers more easily between them in FM17, as opposed to the first option on transfers in FM16. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 30, 2016 Author Share Posted October 30, 2016 15 hours ago, BoxToBox said: Not Kaiser! I know... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 30, 2016 Author Share Posted October 30, 2016 More Highs & Lows... Pretty much unexpectedly, we smashed Lyon 7-0 in our Champions League knockout round first leg at the Red Bull Arena. That's a new all time record win for this young club and a quarter final tie with Real Madrid is the reward. Obviously, FM then had to kick us in the nuts with the news that Andre Gomes, our shiny new replacement for the injured Kaiser, is now going to be sidelined for an extended period himself. But... Look who we have elevated to the first team squad to cover for Gomes... I was hoping Breier might have sprouted another inch or so but the starlet of our first youth intake doesn't look out of place in the first team squad. He looks to be developing nicely. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoxToBox Posted October 30, 2016 Share Posted October 30, 2016 Dang, he's coming along nicely! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Daniel_ Posted October 30, 2016 Share Posted October 30, 2016 Fantastic win over Lyon, Breier is looking bloody good for a 17 year-old! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
abulezz Posted October 30, 2016 Share Posted October 30, 2016 Man, I want a Breier in my save! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
davehibb Posted October 31, 2016 Author Share Posted October 31, 2016 9 hours ago, BoxToBox said: Dang, he's coming along nicely! 9 hours ago, _Daniel_ said: Fantastic win over Lyon, Breier is looking bloody good for a 17 year-old! 9 hours ago, abulezz said: Man, I want a Breier in my save! He looks like the real deal doesn't he!? I just hope he makes it to 5'6" or 5'7". I just gave him his debut and he did look tiny. I might have to take a screenie and post it up. EDIT: Interestingly enough, for someone who's only 5'5"... He has a decent goalkeeper rating of 3. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.