[Goalkeeper with Stamina of 1]

Anyone know the weighting of stamina for GKs towards CA? 1 might be better than 20 if it allows other important attributes to be higher if it's anything other than 0.

[Evidence Based FM's testing seems to show that Match Prep sessions increase the likelihood of losing the next match compared to no training at all. Is this a bug or something else?]

I've been using something similar but have included a few more Defending sessions to try to balance attribute growth a little. Anecdotally it works for me, nice balanced stat growth all round which really does question the in-game descriptions of the training cards. Would be good to see some clarification on this and confirmation whether anything has changed for FM 23.

Also eye-opening to me was that double intensity does very little for growth versus normal intensity, and in one of the comments he implied Recovery is not recommended over Rest. It's really nice to know these things when setting up a schedule.

In the future I'd like to see Max study the effects of Individual Focus, as I hardly ever notice stat gains in this area when I set it and actually feel it harms growth all round.

[Will anyone be buying FM21?]

17 hours ago, orlyzao said:

The game is free right now on Epic game store if you want to play it.

 

Thanks! Just saw this, am downloading it now

 

9 hours ago, Gee_Simpson said:

You didn't buy a game based on other people's opinions of it? Why not try it yourself? This site doesn't = the whole FM player base, and who's to say you would agree with them anyway?

I have the opportunity to try it now so that's great. Mainly the reason I didn't pre-order it initially was that I wasn't excited about the new features, they just seemed like skins on top of a system that already exists. I was then waiting to see whether the new features were worth it, but it never seemed like this was the case. Without improvements in the core system as well, it just didn't seem worth buying.

[Will anyone be buying FM21?]

FM2020 was the first game I didn't buy since the CM days. As a huge fan of the series it saddened me to see so many negative comments on the game and it was the first of the series I didn't pre-order. I kept waiting for positive reviews so I could finally buy the game but that time just never came, and so I'm still playing and enjoying my save on FM2019. It seems to me that the new features introduced yearly are becoming increasingly less exciting while the bread and butter aspects of the game do not improve and in some cases even go backwards. It's a great shame, but I feel forced to take the same approach with FM2021 as I did with FM2020 and wait until I can get a good picture on whether it would be worth buying or not. I really hope it will be.

[The Art of Analysis and Tweaking (The Brazilian Box 4-2-2-2)]

Apologies, I couldn't find the article yet, but I did manage to find uncle sam's old post on this. I took some of his images (hope this is ok) to see if I could understand it better myself.

Here you can see how the formation works how I described where it morphs into a 3-4-3 lopsided diamond.

Here is how he described the diamond part of the formation:

The basic idea is that of a see-saw, when one side of the formation advances, the other withdraws to offer defensive support. This advancing can be the attacking on a flank, or it could be one side of the formation pressuring to win the ball back. The movement should leave you with a diamond shape in the back, consisting of the weakside central defender forming the back of the diamond (almost like a sweeper), the weakside fullback and strongside central defender forming the corners, and the weakside holding midfielder forming the apex or the top of the defensive diamond. This principle can be difficult to replicate in FM because in my experience that weakside fullback wants to dart up the flank and the two central backs always want to play flat. But the idea of defensive support can be there in a general sense.

You can see the way it morphs into a 3-4-3/4-4-2 diamond shape anyway in the image above.

So the way it attacks and defends is actually very similar but the diamond has the advantage in the passing lane aspect when the box formation is actually a box and not a diamond. I think that is the principle anyway.

[The Art of Analysis and Tweaking (The Brazilian Box 4-2-2-2)]

The 442 diamond is not a counter to the shape. I out man them in ever part of the pitch. Why do you think it's a counter shape?

I think it's a counter shape because the natural positions of the midfield diamond cut out the natural passing lanes of the magic box, while the opposite is not true - the diamond passing lanes in midfield are diagonal and free unless the box is broken, at which point it is no longer a box.

I also think it's easier for the diamond to form an offensive or defensive 3 man unit (offensive with the 2 CMs and AM, defensive with DM and 2 CMs) depending on the phase of the game, while the magic box would have to morph into a lopsided diamond to get the same effect. Otherwise, you require a fullback to provide that extra man in midfield if you want to keep the box in offense (which is how I understand the box formation to work - it morphed into a lopsided diamond and had one fullback push up to form a sort of 3-4-3).

Without staggering the box the only passing lanes you have are horizontal or vertical which I see as a huge disadvantage of the tactic. I think this article explains how important diagonal passing is to advance play http://spielverlagerung.com/2014/09/16/the-half-spaces/

I think I read somewhere that explained it more comprehensively though I can't find the article at the moment. I'll try and dig it up.

[The Art of Analysis and Tweaking (The Brazilian Box 4-2-2-2)]

Have you considered what you are going to do against counter formations like the 4-4-2 Diamond?