vrig

Love a WM(s). It's a great place to put the guy who can just kick the ball really well. JWP in past versions was my go to, but this time round it's been Bruno Fernandes in a 4411. I've been toying with a similar role setup to this as a potential 4231-killer. The positional play rotations with that midfield should - in theory - give you a 3v2 right in front of their defence in possession. A half back wouldn't be my choice for DM though. Surely somebody's gotta maintain the illusion of staying in midfield?

As has been pointed out, you don't really hear from their owners directly at all, which would be reflected with those attributes in game. In direct relation to football matters, they aren't exactly hard-line. The other way of looking at it is that the values accurately reflect their treatment by sports outlets, without SI having to go through the faff of giving every owner an "Ability to keep the media in their pocket" attribute.

Lower tempo is pretty much the first in possession instruction I pick for any tactic in which I want a lot of the ball, especially with a top team.

You've got loads of options and if, as you say, the the tactic is doing well on the whole, you might want to try a softer touch rather than shifting a load of working roles to boost a single player's rating. Maybe he doesn't need the stay wider PI? He'll already be hanging pretty wide without it in that setup. Or maybe you could just add an under/overlap on his side, to encourage him to hold onto the ball and wait for support? Maybe just getting the AM(s) to move into channels and roam would get the IW a bit more support? Personally I'd try one or two less invasive tweaks before throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

In fairness, you might not even really need attacking duties all that much. Roles like the MEZ and CWB that you've added are already pretty good at attacking space even on support, and players like Gouiri will naturally get on the end of chances with their traits. I do love a good extreme possession tactic, although I myself tend to stick an advanced forward or a target up top to give a direct alternative. There's no reason that you would have to do that though.

Took some time off FM and came back with a fresh Man United save in the last couple of days. First season done, and it's gone pretty well. Maybe a bit lucky that City and Liverpool didn't have their usual wrangle around the 90-point mark, but still pretty happy with how we played, especially since it took us til the 4th league match to record our first win! Beat the latter in the Carabao Cup final, and wrapped up the FA Cup against Palace (the only team besides the big two to beat us in the league) to bag three trophies for the first season. We fell at the quarterfinals stage against Real Madrid, although it was a close-run thing. We couldn't capitalise on a good 1-1 at the Bernabau, losing 1-0 in the absence of suspended Casemiro at Old Trafford. Over the course of the season, Hojlund was great up top: 33 goals in all competition certainly isn't bad, but my physios now regard him as an injury prone player owing to a recurring hamstring issue, so I'll be badly needing to get somebody in to rotate with him if I didn't already. As for transfer business, the first window was disabled, but there was some movement in January: Varane left for a good fee, Donny out on loan with a mandatory buy, and Malacia out to Newcastle. I didn't bother replacing Varane in the winter window, as Maguire and Lindelof were both playing pretty well and it was an area we were coping alright with. As you can see, however, Todibo will be joining in the summer. With Andre and Oosterwolde, I wanted to try out a couple of signings I hadn't made before, and they're both pretty interesting profiles. Andre is obviously a pretty good midfield prospect and was able to chip in with some goals and assists from midfield, despite that not really being his game. I can see him being a good midfield partner to Kobbie Mainoo, who himself had a productive season - 32 appearances with 15 of them coming from the start. Oosterwolde was a bit of a wildcard. Basically I wanted the option of playing with an inverted role on the left side of defence, and Malacia isn't really suited to that, so I traded Dutch for Dutch. My scouts didn't really rate him, my coaches don't really rate him, and I'm not even sure if I really rate him as anything more than a filler. But he's quick, strong in the air, and has a great personality at 22, so I thought why not? He's started well, playing mostly as an IWB, although he's probably more suited to IFB. This was probably the first choice XI over the course of the season: The spot next to Casemiro was a bit of a revolving door, with Eriksen picking up a few injuries. Mainoo played most of his matched in that role, but Andre - who I initially had down as more of a long-term replacement for Cas - really did make it his own towards the end of the season. We also got some great results with McTominay in there in big games against tough opposition. Fernandes on the right worked a treat as well by the way. It took a while for me to settle on that tactic, with it starting life as a standard 4231. but after firstly going 4411 and then playing around with Bruno's role a bit, it just kind of clicked. There is now Saudi interest in him though, so we'll have to see how that goes. I don't think I'll be able to get anyone to match the "Beckham" role he plays in the team, so I would have to shuffle things around a bit if he were to leave. One option could be to move Mount out to the right and get a #10 who can dribble, but his crossing is pretty poor. I do still have Antony and Sancho knocking about if I want an actual winger, but I've just enjoyed having an auxiliary midfielder there. Aside from that conundrum, I'm after a striker. Ivan Toney is there as a HG option and Guirassey as a cheap one, but I'm not completely sold on either just yet. I'm also keeping an eye out for another left-footed defender to cover Martinez and/or Shaw. By and large, though, it'll be who goes out that dictates who comes in. I'm really hoping somebody bids for Sancho. He kicked up a fuss halfway through the season and tried to lead a revolt. It was pretty funny when the players complaining about my treatment of Sancho mostly consisted of youngsters I had promoted in order to give them the odd match. I sent a couple of them out for loan, dropped one or two back into the U21s for a bit, and sold Joe Hugill, Mutiny resolved and Sancho has no friends - still bloody stuck with him though!

I've only done a 2-3-5 with the centre backs staying where they are. Never even thought to do it with an IFB, so just chucked it on in the second half of an FA Cup semi final I was losing. Instant goal for the Libero and onto the final we go. Cheers mate

I think if you highlight 'manager' in their staff roles it comes up with all their preferences.

Somebody just forgot to press Ctrl+a

Clear dishonour! A ritual sacrifice must be made - I nominate whoever missed the penalty in the 'crash' timeline. The Training->Seppuku option is there for a reason.

Is the bolded a new feature I'm missing?

Is it though? In one situation you're behind closed doors and in the other you're yelling at them in front of the whole world. Some players might not want to be reamed out in front of their children. Some might find it distracting.

Hope they score a goal. As far as I'm aware, anything you say to a moody git will only make them more of a moody git, which is pretty true to life really.

Tried the 'Focus' shout? It'll give them all tiny red mutinous faces but, anecdotally, it seems to cut it down for me.

Literally the only way to kill it after the mutiny gets underway is to change your tactic into one that doesn't use the position in question. You then get a message saying that the ringleader is no longer unhappy due to recent signings that have been made, despite nothing of the sort having happened. Forces an unnecessary and often fundamental compromise. Also doesn't work if they decide you need a sixth or seventh goalkeeper, obviously. Edit: "kill it" was a bit strong actually. All 17 of those players now believe I treated my captain unfairly somehow, and so the crap training and hissyfit reactions carry on. At this point I'm only really carrying on the save to see what happens next. It is mildly entertaining seeing all of the game's issues occuring at the same time, but I don't think I'll be sticking around too long .

Interesting approach to solving the player revolts over squad depth. They now occur at a club with no money, in the middle of takeover talks, in a disabled first transfer window, who also happen to already have 5 attacking midfielders. "Sorry lads, we've got no money. I have faith in you lot regardless." "That's not good enough. Me and 17 others are a combination of let down and hurt, and will now reduce our training performance by 35% across the board. Also, anything you say to us in future, especially during matchdays, will make us disappointed or angry, if we simply aren't interested to start with." "Good chat."

It's possible, but I've just had a couple of broken fingers on a fresh save this morning, so while I might just be very very unlucky, I dunno if a restart will actually solve anything.

I know Chansiri is an absolute basket case, but is it not overdoing it for him to expect a midtable finish from a penniless Sheffield Wednesday who are predicted to finish 21st in the game, and are currently rooted to the bottom in actuality?

On the bright side, my players all seem to know about the issue too. They had a full on revolt because I only had four goalkeepers in the first team squad. The AI has become fully self aware at last!

I get the general point about ambiguity, but surely that one doesn't take much figuring out? The 'final third' section has 3 options, one is shooting on sight, another early crosses, and then WBIB. Is it not fairly obvious that if you tell the team to focus on doing one of those 3 things, the team is less likely to do the other 2 as often?

First season done, and it's only a mild improvement on Ten Hag's first campaign – a third place finish and an FA Cup victory that took beating Liverpool in the final. As for the Champions League, I really thought we were gonna win it after coming through a group with PSG and Milan, before beating Bayern Munich 6-2 on aggregate. Unfortunately we came unstuck against Inter, which was weird because I usually do pretty well against narrow back-3 systems. In retrospect, I probably over-tweaked. Still a very satisfying campaign, and I felt like I got a lot out of the whole squad, using 33 players in the league as I aimed to give everyone a chance. An unbeaten home home record, leading for set piece goals, plus a bit of deep defending here and there, all gave the season a bit of an early Jose Mourinho vibe, which was a nice change of pace. Hojlund did very well, winning every Young Player of the Month award from September to December, and again in May. With 21 goals and 11 assists in 39(5), he was far and away our biggest direct contributor in all competitions; only Rashford, with 18, reached double figures for goals alongside him. We did have a lot of rotation, forced and otherwise, so the goals were generally pretty well spread out besides those two. While scoring 85 goals in the Premier League – more than all but Asthmatic Athletic and 115 FC – we conceded 37 times, which wasn't ideal. Can't call it much of a surprise though, given I was constantly picking Maguire for his aerial ability in the the opposition box, and that we had to replace Varane halfway through the season. Lisandro Martinez was also poor at centre back, largely due to him not being able to win anything in the air. He was shuffled to left back pretty early on, which was something that worked well in FM23, but with his pace downgraded this year and his mental attributes not adequately making up for it, that didn't pan out either. Determined not to sell one of the few players I really like in the current squad so early, I ended up using him as a holding midfielder, which very much softened the blow of Casemiro being out from October to February. Despite that injury layoff, Cas scored 9 and assisted 4 in 23(4), splitting his time between the DM(s) and VOL(a) roles. As many others have found, Scott McTominay is a bit of a secret weapon. He kept Mount out of the volante role for much of the season, but the former Chelsea man got plenty of gametime himself thanks to his versatility. 15 G+A put him one shy of McTominay for direct goal contributions. Kobbie Mainoo's integration is worth mentioning too, with 3 goals and 6 assists in 11(19) a good base to build on next term. As alluded to earlier, I took the Saudi cash for Varane in January. With no money made available by the human embodiment of herpes, the £100m I got from Al-Ittihad was effectively my January transfer budget. With Licha moving upfield, a lefty was needed at the back, so in came Goncalo Inacio. Harry Maguire remained an every-present, but with no cover for him (Lindelof has been used almost exclusively as an IFB) another defender was required, and £16m for Leny Yoro was an absolute steal. He even had a growth spurt within a month of him joining, so he's absolutely dominant in the air now, which was clearly pretty important for the way I'd been playing. There were three other January signings: one being Adam Wharton, who went back on loan to Blackburn, and another, Assane Diao, a young winger who my scouts/coaches absolutely do not rate. But he has a pretty interesting spread of attributes, a great personality, and cost just £200k. I reckon I can develop him into a half decent striker with a bit of time. So plenty of youth coming in, but I had to balance out my first signing – the return of David de Gea! Onana got an injury in November, and, while he was fit by the time January rolled around, his absence put the heebie jeebies in me, so I was looking for a backup. At £30k-a-week, you can't go wrong with Dave. Donny van de Beek (£9m to Everton) and Martial (subsidised loan to Nice) left the club, as did a few youngsters on loan. Amad was among those, as I had a hard time justifying giving him gametime ahead of players who had impressed during his injury. Planning for the following season, I decided to keep with the youth ethos. Deals were pre-agreed for Valentin Barco (£8.2m) and Gabriel Moscadero (£18.5m). Barco came off the bench to score against City on his debut in the Community shield, and I can see him getting a lot of gametime at left back, on the wing, and even in midfield. This is the first FM in a couple of years where I've been able to load more than five leagues without an unbearable slowdown, so I was already planning to raid South America sooner or later. 18-year-old Roony Bardghji joined for £9.5m and looks good enough to start already. I'm also adding another young Scandinavian in the form of Sverre Nypan (£5m), with that deal going through in January after he turns 18. Naturally, I need to improve upon last term's defensive record, so a relegated Marc Guehi is joins for £45m. He has the attributes to play all across the backline, and will probably play mostly on the right. Speaking of pace, it was quite obvious that we needed more of it out on the flanks than Antony or Sancho can offer. The returns when Rashford and Garnacho play are way out in front of those two, so I wouldn't have minded letting go of both. The real-life Sancho saga, his massive wages, and what I can only assume from his reactions is a single-digit value for handling pressure, would have made him ideal to shift. As it happened, Antony (who hated me) ended up going to Bayern Munich instead, and with him departing alongside Lindelof, Malacia, and Wan-Bissaka, I raised £111m. Bayindir went to Saudi Arabia for a £13.5m, with United-trained Gollini coming in on a free to help with the Champions League home-grown quota. Pellistri had done pretty well in the first season, but a £15m bid came in for him and I ultimately decided that he wasn't really good enough to be taking up a spot in that CL squad. Marcos Leonardo will take it instead, after I met his £14m release clause. Also in, some Dutch keeper on a free because every time one goalie goes down, another one soon follows. The biggest departure of the summer was Casemiro, the third of my players to head to the Middle East, with £76m coming in for him, £30.5m of which was used to sign Khephren Thuram as a replacement of sorts. All of that leaves me sat on a £200m transfer budget heading into the Premier League opener, but short of departures or some tragic performances/injuries in August, I can't see myself adding anyone else. If I do go to market, I'll probably be looking for some experience, since this is now a pretty young squad. We also managed to FM a full strength City in the shield despite picking up a few injuries in preseason: With the youngsters coming in not being quite as physically imposing as the old guard being phased out, there will be a bit of a shift this season towards a style of play more focused on speed and skill. I do plan to keep selecting aerial threats though, especially for the bigger games, so McAssassinay and Harry MagFire will both have roles to play. It usually takes me a couple of weeks to get through a season, so finishing one in three days and sorting out a load of transfer business ahead of the next goes to show just how much I'm enjoying this save!

Agree with this, although personally I only really drop the mentality if I'm very nervous. Mentality affects all 6 instructions that my team are working towards familiarity on, so I typically favour the 'toggle options' when tweaking. I'd also add that it's a good idea to watch who the opposition are subbing on. They could be bringing on a target up top, which might affect how you engage crosses, they might bring on a fresh winger to go at a tired fullback, which might merit a sub of your own in reply, etc.

Probably, yeah. Something you could try that should be non-invasive to the rest of the setup could be having the LWB aim crosses to the near post, where your goalscorer is.

They can be an aerial threat if they have good jumping reach - that's what counts, rather than height. Having said that, I've noticed that Lisandro Martinez is regularly getting set to attack the front post ahead of players who would be far better suited to it. I presume it's to do with his high aggression and bravery - another two attributes that supposedly contribute to being effective in the air. Unfortunately, they don't seem to help the little scrapper actually win any headers in the game.

I think the key is to play unwanted players into some form. I'm only after starting out yesterday and just entered October, but Maguire, Lindelof, Varane, McTominay, Eriksen, Dalot, Wan-Bissaka, Van de Beek, and Martial are all wanted by other clubs already, even with a couple of 1-year clauses triggered. I've been doing a lot of match-by-match tweaking and picking players in a 'horses for courses' kinda way, which is a far more pragmatic approach than I normally have to the game. FM keeps changing its mind as to whether I'm a Park the Bus or a Wing Play manager . But it does seem to be sort of working as the only match we've lost was against Leicester in the Carabao, where I probably went a little overboard on rotation and was subsequently beaten on penalties. By the way, just as a minor tip for set piece coaches - renegotiating Eric Ramsay's contract so that it's his only job instantly bumps him from 3* to 4. It's no loss, as he 's not well suited to a split role anyway. I tried getting the Brentford guy at first, but he decided to stay put, and that little workaround coincided with an instant improvement in scoring from corners.