[FM21] [Experiment] Ambition, Determination and Professionalism influence on overall team performance

[Orion_]

1. Introduction

In this experiment we will check impact of Ambition, Determination and Professionalism on overall team performance. Idea for this experiment came from discussion about impact of those 3 attributes on youth players development while it's influence on players game performance was unknown. In the end we want to develop players that are good on pitch and not only on paper.

2. Game setup and testing environment

In this experiment I've decided to use Liverpool F.C. with Knap's Parisienne tactic and using option to holiday the whole season. Other things that were set to not disturb the experiment:

• all first team players attributes (Ambition, Determination, Professionalism) were set using in game editor and then their attributes were locked preventing their changes throughout experiment
• option preventing player manager to be sacked was enabled
• individual and team training was designated to assistant manager
• all contract and transfer features were designated to player manager so there was no players coming in or out during the test
• testing time was 1 season (earliest possible starting date in England up to 30th May 2021)
• only 1 playable league was enabled (English Premier League) and all competition that Liverpool F.C. was not participate match details was set to 'None' to reduce processing time

As our outcome value we will use amount of points that team gathered in domestic league during the whole season. Information about winning or not certain competition is just an additional data. In the beginning I wanted to add it somehow to output but then I realized that it can be random in some cases so for example in Champions League it all comes to luck in draw but I've decided to add this data anyway just so others can see it since I already simulated all season and the data is available.

Competitions that were counted in are Domestic League, Champions League (so being dropped to Euro and winning it does not count), FA Cup and Carabao Cup so in perfect season team can win 4 competitions.

Every attribute set was simulated 7 times. Attributes were set as (A - ambition ; D - determination ; P - professionalism):

• [A - 15,62 ; D - 15,35 ; P - 15.62] Control group with default players attribute values (used team average as label)
• [A - 1 ; D - 1 ; P - 1] All attributes low
• [A - 1 ; D - 10 ; P - 10] Low ambition
• [A - 10 ; D - 1 ; P - 10] Low determination
• [A - 10 ; D - 10 ; P - 1] Low professionalism
• [A - 10 ; D - 10 ; P - 10] All average
• [A - 20 ; D - 10 ; P - 10] High ambition
• [A - 10 ; D - 20 ; P - 10] High determination
• [A - 10 ; D - 10 ; P - 20] High professionalism
• [A - 20 ; D - 20 ; P - 20] All attributes high

3. Results

3.1 Average domestic league points

3.2 Competitions won

4. Analysis

When it comes to league performance we can obviously see that when all attributes are 10+ there is no significant difference in domestic league points achieved. The most interesting thing is that attributes set with very low ambition (A1 D10 P10) achieved similar number of points as average and better setups. Even if we compare low ambition setup with all high setup the difference is only 4,3%. So on average having determination and professionalism higher than 10 doesn't change the output dramatically (8,3% difference between D/P 10 and 20 with Ambition set as 10 and 4,3% when Ambition was set as 1). Interesting part is that set with very low ambition got higher number of points in league than average group where difference was only ambition value.

Very low professionalism drags down team points achieved by 19,22% when compared to average group and 24,9% when compared to control group.

When we take a look at competitions won we can see that key factor is sum of all three attributes with determination having least impact of outcome.

5. Conclusion and free thoughts

Experiment showed that most important attribute from all three tested was Professionalism having biggest impact either on domestic league and cup performance. Indicating second most important attribute between ambition and determination there is no obvious winner if we only compare the results of this experiment. Ambition had lesser importance on domestic league results but higher in cups. Personally I'd suggest going after determination because of 2 main reasons. First of all it's not hidden attribute so it's visible to manager in players tab. Second thing is that ambition affects player salary expectations and player with high ambition may be forcing leaving for a bigger club more often so when we add those two factors and the assumption that determination has no drawbacks it makes it more desirable attribute than ambition.

Additionally if we sum up the results with other experiments (Source) it turns out that professionalism is a key attribute for player development and then senior team performance.

Thank you all for reading and have a nice day!

Spreadsheet for those interested in detailed numbers

Edited March 26, 2021 by Orion_
Cups counting explanation