[Quickfire Questions and Answers Thread (Tactic and Training Questions Only)]

I suppose this question probably goes here. Would the team instruction "Be More Expressive" lead to more fouls particularly of the kind that results in being carded?

The reason I ask is that I am attempting to tweak a tactical setup that had been successful, but it started developing some issues in linking the defense with the attack and in the attack itself. Basically just an issue of a slightly different mix of players in the midfield who can't run things the same as the previous group. Anyway, I didn't change terribly much on the defensive end except to move a DM up to the CM line to help with the linking issue. I did use the TI Be More Expressive. I haven't used it much before, but I have creative attackers and I want to see if using that helps the attack out. Obviously, having moved a DM up could necessitate other changes at the back, but I want to see how the tactics play out before changing too much. That's where the issues come in -- seeing how the tactics play out.

My normally disciplined backline is suddenly getting a man sent off early in matches. I normally get a player sent off maybe once or twice a season. Since the tactical change, it's four out of five games. And when I say it happens early in matches, I mean early. One guy got a second yellow card in the 22nd minute. In the next game, a player got a red card in the 12th minute. This is severely limiting the amount of information I can gather about how effective my tweaking is. I can and do watch the first few minutes of matches of course, but the information I get is limited by the game situations that come up. And, the post-match reports are rendered useless by the amount of time my team was down a man.

It doesn't appear that there was any need for the fouls either. It's not as if the players were under pressure and it's a last resort to stop an opposition attack. I realize it could be a limitation in the match engine, but it looks as if my players just suddenly decided to have a go at the opponents. When my player got sent off in the 12th minute, the opponent's winger had the ball out wide on the flank. He was held up by one of my midfielders about 10 yards from where an extended penalty box line would have been. My DR who was standing in his line a bit deeper than that suddenly decided to sprint out and perform what I can only describe as a flying tackle on the held up winger for no discernible reason that resulted in a well deserved red card. Could Be More Expressive be causing my players to unleash what I can only imagine must be their inner rage demons that have been under wraps until now? This is just an odd coincidence, right?

[Funny Screenshots Thread]

Not a screenshot, but a video. For context, I was up 2-0 at Chelsea in the second half. If I won the game, I would take over top spot in the league with only five games left to play. Yeah, one of those FM games where it seems you are almost destined to not get the points you need. My team did not disappoint as my keeper made perhaps the worst play that I have ever seen in FM. It starts at about the 25 second mark in the video. The highlight doesn't show how it started. A slow-rolling ball made it through to my keeper. He moved up to the edge of the box to pick it up. Completely flubbed it. The ball bounces off him and rolls out to the wing. The keeper chases after it and attempts to make a tackle on Chelsea's winger who steps around him and hits an easy shot while my defensive line stands around and watches. It was so absurd I laughed and knew that Chelsea would get an equalizer before long.

[So, I just realised I might be really weird]

Props if you call it the Universal Football Association, Inc. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Universal_Baseball_Association,_Inc.,_J._Henry_Waugh,_Prop.