Lord Rowell

Bold and numbers my edit for reference / visual. 1. I'm observing this myself in a 10 yr Dortmund save. I have a 23 yo with a PA of 193(!). Yes I am looking via the in-game editor because I'm genuinely curious. He's currently 171 and progressing 8-10 per year. Interested to see how close he can get to 193. He's been mentored to death including by Harry Kane - next point coming up... 2. I've often thought the way you do re. older players. However, I signed aforementioned Harry Kane age 34 for my Dortmund save. I only ever played him in midfield. He was like Pirlo for me for 2 seasons. Training performance of my players shot up across the board. I'm certain his signing made a massive help to me finally winning the UCL. I wanted to keep him another season but he sadly retired. I also have now an old Kalvin Phillips, he's been superb for me - buys me time when I'm a club that still don't have amazing financial backing. 3. I have arranged to re-sign Erling Haaland - age 31 - that's a self-indulgence tbh but he does have natural fitness 20 so we'll see how it goes.

If I've signed a player from another country, different footballing culture, language (hence learning) I might expect 1 season or maybe more before I see the best of them. It depends on a lot of things.

I think if I was his manager I'd be very concerned about his personaility. "Fairly Determined" means yes he has high determination, and nothing else. Everything else is bang in the middle (not good enough for elite football) or lower. Its almost as toxic as "balanced" which is a not good personality type. My priority for him would be mentoring groups above all else. If you can find in your team a good mentor for him that's great. Re. everything else about him, he's so so good - if necessary I'd consider signing a senior player / veteran on high wages just to mentor him to try and help him be the best he can be.

I think you might want a DLF(A)? But re. your original question, as has been said, the game reflects roles that are trained IRL. Another consideration - if SI allowed 100% customisation of roles and duties, it'd be impossible for AI "managers" to cope with that when playing your side as it'd be against infinite combinations.

The little tick to the left of the player at the very top. Just check you haven't done that anywhere else on the list - its very mouse-sensitive. I've done similar myself a lot. If you've ticked someone where you've already said "not interested" then it'll block you from doing that option for other players. It's the same for "scout more" etc. I could be wrong, but worth suggesting / saying.

Depends on my current save. I skipped FM18 because I was so engaged in a long-term save with Nuneaton. Also depends on what the new features are and if I decide to buy, or wait for the next one. I'm quite into a Dortmund save at the moment and will play at least one more season as I got Haaland coming back to us! At other times, I've taken things as far as I wanted, even gave it a break for a while and then dove straight in with the new release.

Apology accepted and I genuinely appreciate this, thank you @Nic Madden As said, nope. @Nic Madden I have respect for, showed humility and apologised in the right way and it all good now after out dialogue. However, you @themadsheep2001went after me so now it's on you and I expect you to apologise as well. I will add its far worse IMO for you as you went after me to ask for an apology that was unreasonable to ask for. I would expect if we are doing reasonable behaviour to put it here at minimium, and I expect right of reply.

@Nic Maddenactually took the time to reply to me privately and we had a pleasant dialogue. It was absolutely appropriate to tag Nic Madden in the context. I have no intention of apologising and very much object to you asking me to do so here.

Aprreciate the reply here and the reply you gave me in priviate - thank you.

No, flat out, that phrase "level up" has been chosen deliberately and I'm appalled with SI and all at this.

This is very very naive.

If you're going to use a political phrase in a promo video then SI have made it political. It was their choice, an ill-informed one.

I watched the promo video via Twitter a few mins ago. Lots of it really good but one thing has infuriated me. Use of phrase "levelled up" @Nic Madden its a politically toxic phrase given the lie and lack of investment in the North, I'm disappointed in you for using it and that it was used in the video. A shame as the rest of it is all good stuff.

Life doesn't always work like that. Severe setbacks for anyone can have a detrimental effect on their mental health, for example, and sports people are most certainly not immune from that. I also agree with some of the other contributions here in this thread. Mentoring can be significant - should be noted though that Determination isn't the be-all and end-all. That might go down but others in the background e.g. Professionalism, ability to handle pressure, may be going up. The mentoring reports in staff meetings wlll often give you an indication here.

No. Last updates are in March. There are other sites that do these updates though.

Play them as much as you can in whatever games possible.

Just replying purely on the bit in bold. As you may be aware there are a number of community retro-databases out there. Many are much older than 10 yrs ago and go right back to the CM days. As you say the attribute impacts were very different as were the attributes themselves. For a 90s database, typically defenders have technique and passing as low as "1" - it creates some interesting dynamics in the match engine. They're a great nostalgia trip for the community of course and we appreciate the work contributors make on this but yes, you're absolutely right re. the ME.

Not replying re. moderation but in respect to your suggestion @phd_angel I'm not posting the link here or the name of one particular site as I don't know if its approved on these forums, but in short, there are "retro databases" done by the community. As always, search engines are your friend. I have PM'ed you a link to give you a start point.

It's all in the link / blog below from Miles Jacobsen. https://www.footballmanager.com/news/how-weve-changed-fm22-address-war-ukraine

The world cup does expand to 48 teams. No Champions League changes - I think when FM22 was coded UEFA were still sorting out the finer details. I would suspect the change will occur in FM23 (for 2024 of course).

Re. your 2nd point. No, he (assuming the person is a "he"?), he's not entitled to someone writing a book to be tailored to his specific questions. If he is frustrated, that's his personal issue and y'know, there are other guides out there. Or, he could work things out for himself He's not entitled to anything at all.

Looks really great Cleon. Only dipped into it so far but I'm sure I'm going to find this both enjoyable and useful, based on what I've seen of your previous work on FM.

Karim Adeyemi is right-footed IIRC. While its not a hard and fast rule, IFs or IWs are usually better cutting in using their stronger foot. So for Adeyemi, might be worth playing him on the left rather than the right. Also, and this is just a very personal view, but he has ferocious pace, so I'd consider using him on an attack duty so he can get behind the defensive line / break offside traps. I've got him at Borussia Dortmund now (2027) he's an absolute monster for me, almost as good as the long-departed Haaland. Though I do use him in a very different way as a poacher (my tactical set up is very different from yours though).

I've yet to discover for myself. Signed him for Borussia Dortmund in January 2027. He went off to African Nations Cup. Came back. Played 1 game. 2nd game he comes off bench for last 15 minutes and breaks his leg! Was a wonderful player for me in FM21 though.

This is a very good point! In fairness to SI, I think, esp. as they're adding more and more data / analytics as football IRL has evolved that way, it takes time to include this in the player ratings in a way that is balanced. May well be they're working on this and other metrics.