Losing Champs league finals

[Davidgraham83]

Can anyone better this losing streak in finals?

[Federico]

That 2022/2023 final is the cherry on the top of the cake

But I feel for you, that streak would have caused me another keyboard broken...

[Davidgraham83]

They beat me to the league on the last day of the season too. I needed the win.

Fiorentina scored in the 94th min to make it 2-2. Then I lost the final 7 days later, after largely dominating the game. They did the double.

Edited May 16, 2020 by Davidgraham83

[thehig2]

had similar bad luck in cup finals in a Newcastle save, I was posting my progress on this thread

From page two of the thread I started posting updates

[BuryBlade]

I feel your pain. On FM20, I began with a terrible final record in European competitions.

Sporting Lisbon - lost 1-0 to Liverpool in the Champions League Final

Dinamo Zagreb - lost 1-0 to Arsenal in the Europa league final. Lost 1-0 to Liverpool in the Champions League Final. Lost on penalties to Man Utd in the champions league final.

Thankfully I’ve won the thing 4 times since but it felt for ages that I was always going to lose the final.

 

[Davidgraham83]

Update. The next season, I got knocked out the semi's. I've now tweaked formation and won two in a row. The drought is over.

Have to say, the win was far more rewarding knowing I didn't restart any of the finals or anything like that.

[noikeee]

You're a more patient person than me. I'd have thrown the computer out of the window tbh. 

[kr10]

On 16/05/2020 at 21:26, Davidgraham83 said:

Can anyone better this losing streak in finals?

You know that the game is scripted and unfair when Juventus wins a European cup final 

[kr10]

On 16/05/2020 at 21:26, Davidgraham83 said:

Can anyone better this losing streak in finals?

In all seriousness, I’ve found 2 things to work: 

1. I made a small tweak to my tactic to make it more possession focused - in the knockouts I would usually win big at home and scrape a draw away, without doing much, mostly because of low possession and poor pass completion % because of the away game environment. Some losses in finals were also due to this. So I made my passing style a bit shorter to keep the ball more and play a less risky game in possession. This made a big difference.

2. Equally Important conferences. While my assistant handles these during the entire season, I take over for the last 2 games of the year (including CL). I’ve found that what you say has a big impact on player mentality going into it. My assistants words would make my players “cocky and overconfident” in warmups, which is white frankly ridiculous considering it’s a European final. Once I took over my players entered the game focused and did a lot better. 
 

Finally, look at the big game stats of your players, as well as consistency, recent form, and morale. Any player who is inconsistent or doesn’t enjoy big matches is immediately sold, no exceptions. 

Edited May 28, 2020 by kr10

[yolixeya]

1 hour ago, kr10 said:

My assistants words would make my players “cocky and overconfident” in warmups, which is white frankly ridiculous considering it’s a European final.

It is not ridiculous. Many people say that Barca was cocky and overconfident in the build up of 1994 CL final as they were widely considered to be favourites to win that match. It can happen.

[metallimuse]

On 19/05/2020 at 13:35, BuryBlade said:

 

Dinamo Zagreb - lost 1-0 to Arsenal in the Europa league final. Lost 1-0 to Liverpool in the Champions League Final. Lost on penalties to Man Utd in the champions league final.

 

 

How many years in did it take you to achieve this? I'm in my first season in the Croatian second division with dreams of achieving this.

[BuryBlade]

Europa League runners up in season 3 I think. Won my first CL in season 9, having lost 2 finals before that. Used a very defensive tactic in Europe, basically playing for 0-0 away from home. 
 

I built the team by buying low and selling high and using the academy. The facilities at Dinamo are great so I got lucky with my youth intakes providing some players over the years. 

[metallimuse]

31 minutes ago, BuryBlade said:

Europa League runners up in season 3 I think. Won my first CL in season 9, having lost 2 finals before that. Used a very defensive tactic in Europe, basically playing for 0-0 away from home. 
 

I built the team by buying low and selling high and using the academy. The facilities at Dinamo are great so I got lucky with my youth intakes providing some players over the years. 

Ooft I don't think I'll be doing it that quick .

[Travis Bickle]

Unlucky. My only advice is, high pressured games there are some factors you can influence:

1) Players with higher mental attributes, better personality types, consistency, enjoy big matches etc WILL make a difference. 

2) Your shouts are also important to keep the players either fired up or calm depending on your style.

3) Make sure everyone's morale is really high before the game. 

4) I always defend set pieces as training before a big game since it's where the game usually does you. 

5) Approach your press conference well.

6) Tweak your tactic if there is cause to. Don't do it if you're not a massive underdog or something imo. 

7) Watch more of the game so you can see where things are going wrong.

[kr10]

Another key thing to do is to train every possible match preparation training before a final, and 3-4 sessions before CL knockout games. 
 

Between set pieces and match prep, there are about 7-8 total sessions that can improve the performance of the upcoming match 

[Amnesia92]

I've seen Ai liverpool lose three finals in a row 

I was playing as real Madrid and won 3 champions leagues out of 5, losing one to man city and the other to my rivals Atletico Madrid.

Would of given up losing more than 2 in a row though to be honest mate.

CL finals tend to be pot luck.

 

Edited May 29, 2020 by Amnesia92

[sporadicsmiles]

In my current save I have been undefeated for 2 seasons domestically. And then I keep losing to Liverpool. Twice in a row in the Champions League knockouts now. Once in the quarters and once in the semis. On the plus that trend means I lose in the final this year! 

I feel for you though. I hope you break that streak. 

[interesti88]

What about losing Copa Libertadores finals? 

I took over Gremio middle of the season and guided them to the Copa Lib final against a dominant Santos team who already won the league the current season and last season and was also in the Final of the Copa Lib last season too. 

 

I expected them to dominate the match and I was just happy to get the team to the Final overcoming a 3 goal deficit in the semi-final against Palmeiras winning 4-3 on aggregate. We took the lead in the ’56 but it was short-lived becuz they equalized after 10 mins. We then got an early goal in extra time and was waiting for the final whistle when Santos picked off a bad pass back to the keeper and scored in the ’120. The last-minute of extra time they equalised! It goes to penalties and we miss 2 kicks to lose the Final. 

[kr10]

On 28/05/2020 at 15:22, yolixeya said:

It is not ridiculous. Many people say that Barca was cocky and overconfident in the build up of 1994 CL final as they were widely considered to be favourites to win that match. It can happen.

Agreed, but... Milan were missing both Baresi and Costacurta, and were on a horrid run leading up to the finals. I think they hadn’t won any of their last 8 league games up to that point, whereas Barcelona had just lifted the La Liga on a ridiculous run of form. In that circumstance maybe I can agree that the players could get complacent. 
 

on FM, I am playing against a fully fit and in form opponent who has usually won the La Liga or Premier league (or PSG). Yet, because my assistant says something wrong, the players suddenly get complacent - this is despite 90% of my squad being model pro/pro/model citizen. 
 

I find this to be a bit unrealistic, as highly professional players should not be getting influenced so much by what an assistant says in a press conference. In general, I would like the game to slowly move away from press conferences as it is an unnecessary burden, and the match engine should reflect its lack of importance. 

[yolixeya]

1 hour ago, kr10 said:

I find this to be a bit unrealistic, as highly professional players should not be getting influenced so much by what an assistant says in a press conference.

We can't really say how much it influences them. It might be a small effect but when the two very strong teams meet in the final that could be the difference.  When I lose, I'm never sure is it because of something I said in the press conference.

They are professionals but they are also people and not robots and get influenced by things around them. They feel the preassure and the preassure is really high in CL final. It would be foolish to add to that preassure even if the press conferences have a small effect.

[Federico]

41 minuti fa, yolixeya ha scritto:

They are professionals but they are also people and not robots and get influenced by things around them.

In FM they're not human, they are mathematics code. Press conferences in FM have an impact but not that kind of impact.

[yolixeya]

7 minutes ago, Federico said:

In FM they're not human, they are mathematics code.

But you agree that in real life even professionals can be influenced by what is happening around them? FM is just trying to emulate that.

[Federico]

Yes of course. But look at Italy 2006. Nobody would have bet 1 cent on them, and we won the trophy. It's extremely unpredictable how a human can react to things around them, and in my opinion coding this into software is not possible. So for me comparing real life reactions to FM reactions is not such a valid argument.

[yolixeya]

But you could make the case that Italy would be more fired up to win. Italian football was disgraced at that time because of Calciopoli and they were also fighting for the honor of Italian football. But yes I agree with you, everything about football as well as human nature is unpredictable. I do believe there is some effect of randomness in the FM coding as well.

It probably isn't perfect but I don't have issues with it in this case. But for example coding AI behavior is something else and it always becomes apparent that there is no real intelligence behind the decesions made.

[Federico]

There's also another thread discussing about reactions and how they could lead to a wrong direction while giving you a positive feedback apparently. But I don't want to go too much off-topic now.

[Nobby_McDonald]

On 16/05/2020 at 16:56, Davidgraham83 said:

Can anyone better this losing streak in finals?

That makes my poor playoffs record look like chicken feed.

[BuryBlade]

My record in finals goes from bad to worse. Since my previous post earlier in the thread:

FC Midtjylland- lost in the Champions League final 3-1 to Barcelona

FC Midtjylland- finally won in the Champions League final 2-1 v Bayern 

Ajax - lost 1-0 in the Europa League final to Arsenal

Malmö - lost 1-0 to Atalanta in the Euro II cup final despite outplaying them (15 shots to 1)

Hate playing European finals so much. The amount of 1-0 defeats is soul destroying.

[Unknown Hacker]

In my current FM20 save I won my first 6 European finals (3x Champions League with Watford, 1x Europa League & 1x Champions League with Hertha Berlin, 1x Europa League with Napoli).

I then lost 3 Champions League finals in a row with Napoli. 6-0 to Man Utd, 2-1 to Man Utd (after being 1-0 up with 5 minutes to go), 4-1 to Man Utd. It got so bad that I had to move on as I couldn't face it any more. Man Utd were an absolute juggernaut but it was still gutting. I ended up managing England for 14 years to recharge.

Then I ended up at Sevilla and won the Europa League in my first full season, breaking the duck. But a few seasons later I ended up back in the Champions League final and lost on penalties to Liverpool. Then the next year Man City did me 1-0.

2 seasons later (with a dodgy 1/4 final loss to Benfica in between) I managed to finally win it again after 25 seasons and 5 final defeats managing 2 different clubs against 3 English teams.