AceAvenger

Blinded by (a lack of scouts) Had to start this series with the quintesential Gothenburg sound. Peaceful earache is how At The Gates would describe it. Manager The manager for this save will be Tomas Lindberg, the frontman for At The Gates. Lindberg actually moonlights as a social studies teacher in real life. I guess here he'll be giving that up for the Swedish second division. The Squad Goalkeepers Nothing special here, Mathias Karlsson will be undisputed first choice. He also seems like the best choice to be captain with his leadership, although I would prefer an outfielder (but there is nothing to back it up that it's more effective in FM). He's also got decent throwing, maybe I'll try to utilise that to start counters. Center-backs Definately needing reinforcements, Only 3 natural centerbacks and 2 are slightly below the standard required. Boris Lumbana is the pick of the bunch, with Hultqvist's jumping reach potentially being very useful. Wing-backs Got a lot of options here. Andersson and Moenza look like undisputed starters, with their excellent physicals for this level. This will be an area with more than one exit as I try to rebalance the squad. Central Midfield Now we see our two key players, Nikola Laden and Adnan Maric. Laden looks like he will be the creative fulcrum in midfield and Maric looks like a real goal threat with his physicals and PPMs. Forwards Yursuvat is really good striker for our level, he might not look like much but his attributes are very balanced in all the key areas; Finishing, First Touch, Anticipation, Composure, Acceleration, Pace. If I can find a good foil for him upfront, someone huge and can hold the ball up, I think he can do really well. One sticking point though, he's got one year on his contract and he doesn't want to renew. I have to make a decision whether to stick to him and potentially lose him for free, or cash in and find a replacement. It all depends if I can find the replacement or not. Speaking of finding players. Look at the barren wasteland that is my recuitment team. That is the first thing on the agenda to fix at GAIS. Pre-season What an obscenely long pre-season. Well at least I'll have a lot of time to prepare for the new season. The Svenska Cupen group stage matches are sprinked along there too. I'm not too bothered about that. The board just want to reach the group stages and that's already been done. Only the top team qualifies for the quarter final, and I don't think we'll be able to top the best team in Sweden.

Infernal Origins to Worldwide Appeal Our story starts in Birmingham, in 1969, with a band named Earth. One day at their rehearsal studio, they noticed a queue at the theatre next door. The theatre was showing Black Sabbath, an anthology horror film which starred the great Boris Karloff in the twilight of his career. They came to the realisation that it was "strange that people spend so much money to see scary movies". Inspired by what they had seen, they decided to make the musical equivalent of a horror film. They used dark lyrics and an ominous, industrial sound, inspired by sounds of industrial Birmingham at the time. They changed their name, released their self-titled debut album Black Sabbath, the first heavy metal album. A new genre of music was given an unholy birth into the world. Since that monumental album, there have been era defining metal scenes from around the world. From the new wave of British heavy metal in the late 70s, to the thrash metal scene in the Bay Area in the early 80’s, to Florida’s death metal scene in the mid-to-late 80’s. Fast forward to 2021, 145 out of the world’s 195 countries contain an active metal band. When you look at who the largest producers of metal, according to Encyclopaedia Metallum, you’ll see that the United States is by far No. 1 with 17,557 bands. Their closest rival is Germany with 5,726. Ranking Country Bands Percentage of Total Bands 1 United States 17,557 21.62% 2 Germany 5,726 7.05% 3 Brazil 4,173 5.14% 4 Italy 3,623 4.46% 5 United Kingdom 3,244 3.99% However, on a per capita basis, there is one region that seems to love metal more than the rest. No prizes for who guesses correctly, these northern lands are almost infamous for being metal heads. Ranking Country Metal bands per 100000 people Bands Population 1 Finland 42.613 2,381 5,587,442 2 Iceland 31.900 113 354,234 3 Sweden 22.228 2,281 10,261,767 4 Faroe Islands 21.177 11 51,943 5 Saint Pierre and Miquelon 18.793 1 5,321 6 Norway 18.277 1,007 5,509,591 That’s right, it’s Scandinavia. Okay, what does this have to do with Football Manager? Well, I’ve been meaning to start a career and document it for a while. Recently, I’ve also been really diving into metal having watched a criminally underrated series on the history of metal on YouTube. So, I decided to create a Franken-monster of my two interests. The idea is to start a career where the restriction is to only sign players from countries where metal is most prevalent. A redditor (of course) in 2012 used Encyclopaedia Metallum and the CIA world fact book to find out which countries had the most bands per 100,000 people. The list was updated in 2021. For the purposes of this save, I’ll only be signing players from the 13 nations with the most metal bands per 100,000 people, with leagues playable out of the box. The list of these countries is as follows: Austria Canada Chile Czech Republic Denmark Finland Greece Iceland Norway Portugal Slovenia Sweden Switzerland With these restrictions, I’ll be leaving out metal Meccas like Brazil, Britain, Germany, and the U.S. It’s very unfortunate but it’s the only way I can systematically gauge which countries love face-melting riffs more than others. The Gothenburg Sound Gothenburg is Sweden’s second largest city, situated on the west coast of Sweden, overlooking the Kattegat. It’s a maritime city, with the Gothenburg port being the largest in Scandinavia. It’s also an economic hub, with companies such as Volvo, SKF and AstraZeneca (boo Corona) having headquarters there. It also has a rich sporting history, with the first football match in Sweden being played there. The Gothia Cup hosted annually, which is the largest football tournament in the world by number of participants. The Gothenburg International Film Festival is also the largest in Scandinavia. More importantly for us, the Gothenburg metal scene from in the early 90s was supremely influential. It was a small, very tightly knit, death metal community with bands playing in basements and youth clubs. Unlike the death metal found in the underground Florida sphere, they produced death metal with a more melodic nature and the world loved it. Gothenburg “became the new Tampa and the genre received a new lease on life.” In Flames, Dark Tranquillity and At The Gates were the big three at the time. The trio released 3 seminal albums within the space of 3 months: The Jester Race, The Gallery and, Slaughter for the Soul, respectively. At The Gates’ album Slaughter for the Soul was particularly significant as it is widely seen as the precursor to metalcore. Sweet, can we stop talking about metal and get to the bit where you play FM? Alright, so this is where the fun begins. If it wasn’t clear before, I’ll be managing in Gothenburg, Sweden. There are three professional clubs in Gothenburg: IFK Göteborg GAIS Örgryte IS The club I’ll be managing is GAIS, due to what apparently looks like a punk rock culture being popular amongst the fans. It’s not metal but a lot of metal took inspiration from hardcore punk. Göteborgs Atlet- och Idrottssällskap Wiki

Malaga have a lot of their youngsters will extremely high attributes, leading them to have recommended CAs much higher than they're actual CA, sometimes even higher than their PA. When you load up a save, their attributes are reduced, however this sometimes leads to greatly imbalanced players. Maybe it would be better to give them more well rounded attributes, including filling in the null value attribute, to they can be more well balanced, hence realistic, players. Also, Malaga have 7 null value General Sponsers in the editor, again it doesn't affect the game, just thought maybe you guys would want to clean that up.

Josh O'Connor at Hibs has his height at 186cm, when it should be 180cm according to the club website. https://www.hibernianfc.co.uk/player/josh-oconnor Also Jamie Gullan has higher Positioning (10) than Off the Ball (6), which is quite strange for a striker, is that supposed to be the case?

I'm going to repost what I said in the previous thread: Also I'd like to highlight that they belaboured the point in the Tweet about his goal against Celtic that he is a "left sided defender", therefore that could be an indication that he's left footed. Also maybe give him some competency at left-wing back, as he's played there when Hibs played in a back 3, against Aberdeen, Celtic and Rangers.

I've been looking at the Hibs players in preparation for a save when the game is out, and I've noticed one peculiar thing. Josh Doig, who is a left back in the game, and on his profile on the Hibs site that says he's "comfortable at centre-back, left-back or left wing-back", is right footed. Now granted I've never seen him play but it's odd to see a defender who plays exclusively on the left be right footed. I've tried to find footage of him playing to confirm and all I've found was 2 minute video. In that video you can see he dribbles with his left foot almost exclusively, an indicator that he prefers using his left foot, albeit he does take a shot with his right in the video. He also scored a goal against Celtic in a friendly with his right. I know the latter two pieces of evidence is contrary to the point he is left footed, but the fact he uses his left foot to dribble, even when he is cutting inside, is a strong indicator that he is left footed. I could be wrong, but maybe it's an oversight by the Hibs researcher who made a simple mistake when putting his footedness. Currently he's very strong with his left and reasonable with his right, it should be swapped.

Amazing, thanks for the response!

Hibs have a partnership with Charleston Battery in the USL Championship, so they should be one of their affiliated clubs in the game. Is it past the cut off point for the database in the full game or can this be put in? https://www.charlestonbattery.com/news_article/show/1131964?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=11.10_PressHibsAnnounce

@Zemahh Amazing work as always, I have to commend you on how well you protray your ideas and knowledge of how the tactics interface works. I also can't thank you enough for letting us know about that Monchi masterclass, I'm 7 episodes in and loving every second.

Boots on the Pitch In this post I’ll be covering the player roles and specific Player Instructions (PI) that I use. Let’s start from the top, our attacking duo. Strikers In my RB Leipzig save (I went for the best team for this tactic to see if it can cut it at the top), I had 3 strikers to choose from. Timo Werner, Yussuf Poulson and Patrick Schick. For “Turbo” Timo, I went for Pressing Forward (Attack) because it has all the things I want from the spearhead of the attack, such as Get Further Forward and Moves Into Channels (much like the Advanced Forward), but it also has Close Down More and Tackle Harder hardcoded, which is what I want from my ‘front 5’. When it came to who supported him, I picked roles that suited the player. For Yussuf Poulson, the combative, ultra-physical machine, I went for Pressing Forward (Support). It had the PI that I need for the focal point, Holds Up Ball. The other hardcoded PIs were Close Down More and Tackle Harder, which is, again, what I want. When it came to Schick, I set as Complete Forward (Support) which has Take More Risk, Hold Up Ball, Move into Channels, Dribble More and Roam from Position. The Hold Up Ball PI is there, but married to PIs that make use of his better technical ability. The jury is still out on Roam from Position, I didn’t try whether having him set as a Deep-Lying Forward (Support) with Dribble More selected would be more effective, especially against sides that leave space to counter. In that case, he will most definitely be the focal point, as he will be positioned centrally and not floating about the place. Roams from Position would be more useful if I’m up against a parked bus, with Schick trying to find pockets of space to drag out defenders. Unfortunately, Close Down More can’t be selected, so it was a case of sacrificing the effectiveness of the press to get the best out of Schick’s abilities. In terms of performances, Poulson did better; the Dane won us possession further up the pitch the most which lead to a lot of goals, which is invaluable. However, I do like what Schick has to offer with the ball at his feet, so I feel it’s a sacrifice worth making. I didn’t select Tackle Harder either, truth be told. The same is true for all the other players in the pressing block. This was actually an oversight, as Tackle Harder would help them win the ball back more. However, maybe with their poorer Tackling, this would contribute to more fouls than more ball recoveries, so more ‘research’ should be done into this. Midfielders Here is where stuff gets interesting, especially when it comes to the diamond (4-3-1-2). I’ll start with the two most important roles there, the Attacking Midfielder (Attack) and the Deep-Lying Playmaker (Support). When it comes to the AM(A), the role adds literally nothing in attack. Every since my first tactic (4-4-1-1 2DM), I’ve struggled getting attacking output from the attacking midfielder. I’ve tried the AM(A), Shadow Striker and Advanced Playmaker (Attack) to no avail. The only thing that worked for me is when I played Dani Olmo instead of Emile Forsberg, who is the better player in the game anyway so it makes sense he’ll play better. What this role has to offer though is when you’re defending. I set it to man-mark a specific player, the DMC of the other team in a 4-1-2-3, which nullifies him to the best of the team’s ability, hampering the oppositions ability to play out of defense. I also set him to Close Down More to be a part of the pressing block. It dawns on me as I write this as they are quite contradictory instructions, as how can he press when he’s specifically man-marking a player. Hey, it works, if you want to be tactically sound, I’d remove the close down more and leave the other players to press. As for the DLP(S), he’s also set to man-mark, but one of the two MCs in the 4-1-2-3, specifically the one set as a playmaker. This is most effective if the opposition player is an AP, as he won’t drop back as much and drag your player out of position. But why set the DLP to man-mark in the first place, why can’t you set one of the other MCs to man-mark, especially the one on the side of the opposition’s playmaker. Well, when it comes to man-marking in FM, the marker doesn’t give much thought to what is happening around him and just marks the player he is instructed to do so. In a narrow formation (without anyone wide other than the fullbacks), this means if you set one of the outer MCs to man-mark, they won’t help the fullback on his side defend, which means he can be doubled-up on easily with the oppositions advancing fullback. That is no bueno, it’ll leave you open to attacks on the wing. Food for thought: If your AM and DLP are particularly good markers, setting the Mark Tighter PI would be a wise move. Another important point is the wingers in the 4-2-2-2 DM, They both have Sit Narrower to achieve that box I was talking about. Whether they are set to Inverted Winger or Wide Midfielder is dependent on their stronger foot. If they’re ‘on the wrong side’, i.e. their stronger foot is on the inside, then I went for IW(A), which has Cuts Inside hardcoded, along with Dribble More and Gets Further Forward. If they’re on the ‘right side’, i.e. their stronger foot is on the outside, then I went for WM(A), with Gets Further Forward and the option of Dribble More if they are good dribblers, but in Marcel Sabitzer’s case, he was not, so it wasn’t picked. Close Down More was also picked. The Box In the case of the double pivot in the 4-2-2-2 DM, the Segundo Volante was instructed to Close Down More and Get Further Forward, to be a part of the pressing block and provide line-breaking runs respectively and the Deep-Lying Playmaker was set to default. The best way to understand out roles work together is to read this guide written but @llama3, which will be the best thing you’ll read today, far better than this. For clarity, the following positions in each formation are set to Close Down More: Defenders For the wing-backs, the choice between Complete Wing-Back and Wing-Back is dependent on how good the player is at dribbling. If he is good at dribbling, have him as a CWB, as it has dribble more hardcoded; if he isn’t a good dribbler, have him set as Wing-Back, but with Stay Wider selected. NB: Having Stay Wider selected on for WB is only important for the 4-2-2-2 DM, as the Team Width is very narrow, you want your fullbacks to provide the width. In the other formations, the Team Width varies from Standard to Fairly Wide depending on the Mentality, so it is not important to select Stay Wider, but you could do so if you please. The selection of their Duties is formation specific. For the 4-2-2-2 DM, they’re both set to Support but with the Looks for Overlap TI will increase their individual mentality to Attacking. In the 4-3-1-2 and the 5-1-2-2 WB DM, the fullback/wingback with the Attack duty is paired with a Carrilero on his side on Support to cover his forward runs. The other fullback/wingback is on support to cover for the Mezzala’s attacking runs. The key thing here is balance. As for your central defenders, the roles are self-explanatory, the important thing is not to have any of them on Cover duty. This will make the offside trap ineffective as they won’t be keeping a unified line with one defender dropping off.

Amazing stuff, this will be very helpful to anyone who's new to the game, even some of the veterans! Also the title reminded me of the best tactics threads in this forum, made by one of your countrymen @VinceLombardi. I think you'd find them very interesting.

Football with wings If you ask a German football fan which entity is despised the most is Germany, he will probably tell you it’s Dietmar Hopp, the co-founder of software giants SAP and financier of TSG 1899 Hoffenheim, but a very close second would be RasenBallsport Leipzig. The thing they have in common, apart from them vitriol they get from fans all across Germany, is a man. That man is Ralf Rangnick. As mentioned previously, he was one of the first coaches to use the doctrine of ball-oriented pressing in Germany. Leipzig before Rangnick was a very different beast. Matthias Kießling, a blogger who has followed RB Leipzig since 2010 on his website Rotebrauseblogger.de recounts a tale of mismanagement before Rangnick was in charge. “Until Ralf Rangnick took over in 2012, management had no strategy and was pretty much dependent on [Red Bull CEO] Dietrich Mateschitz’s mood.” “The club signed tons of former Bundesliga and second division players, who were over-the-hill, and were paying them as if they were still playing [up there] without getting the appropriate performance in return.” Kießling says. “All those mistakes were over when Ralf Rangnick came in. He implemented a clear philosophy at both Salzburg and Leipzig, hired capable staff, and made sure that Mateschitz’s influence on day-to-day business went down to close to zero.” References: https://thesefootballtimes.co/2019/03/06/the-money-before-the-fame-rb-leipzigs-troubled-journey-to-the-top/ Caffeine-Induced Madness (On a Football Pitch) Rangnick may not have the most illustrious career as a coach, with no major honors to his name except the Pokal with Schalke, but his effect on German football is far reaching. The most telling sign of his influence is the number of coaches currently in the Bundesliga and abroad who were under his tutelage. The list is extensive, with coaches like Marco Rose and Adi Hütter at home in Germany, Thomas Tuchel in France and Ralph Hasenhüttl in England, with his most apt pupil, a man many of you know very well, Julian Nagelsmann, who was with him at Hoffenheim and now succeeded him at Leipzig. Here I will be focusing on Nagelsmann’s current rein at Leipzig, which borrows heavily from what Rangnick was doing before him and also adding his own unique twist. Pressing Just as they were under Rangnick, Nagelsmann’s Leipzig are pressing machines. While they only rank 4th in overall pressures in the Bundesliga according to FBRef, when adjusted for possession they rank first comfortably. The key to their strategy comes from their front four players, who press the ball as soon as the ball is lost. One of their central midfielders, usually the human Duracell bunny Laimer, goes to join in the pressing action while his partner holds his position and man marks to prevent a pass to the closest opposition player to him. Attacking Build-Up Play Nagelsmann brought a more cultured approach to build up play to Leipzig’s game. The use a basic, but effective positional play where the center-back will pass it to a full-back who has moved wide, and then the full-back will play the ball to the winger who has moved narrow who can then lay it off to an oncoming central midfielder. With the advancing full-backs wide and indented wingers in the half space, there is distribution of the team is varied enough so that the attack does not become one dimensional. Leipzig still play a vertical game, when looking at the total progressive distance (distance towards goal) of their passes as a faction of the total distance of their passes, RB Leipzig have the 3rd highest value of all teams with an average possession of greater that 50%. Counter-attacking Upfront, RB Leipzig usually play with a hold-up player to aim at to bring it the advancing midfielders or to release ‘Turbo’ Timo Werner. This can be either Poulson with his physicality or Schick with his technical ability. Their defensive shape adds to this as they line up with a 4-4-1-1 defensively with Schick or Poulson in the no. 10 role. When they win the ball back, they usually look for one of them. This also brings up a facet of their game where they look for the ‘up, back, through’ passage of play to initiate their attack, where Leipzig play the ball up to an advanced player with his back to goal, who lays it off to an on rushing player facing goal to play it through to the other attackers who have rushed ahead. Translating that into FM RDF on FMScout made an amazing recreation of Nagelsmann at Leipzig on the FMScout YouTube channel. He beat me to the punch (serves me right to take 2 months write up the tactic) but I learnt something very valuable from his recreation. Formations For this recreation I went with 4 formations: 4-2-2-2 DM 4-3-1-2 5-2-1-2 WB 5-1-2-2 WB DM The opposition’s formation and style dictate which formation I use, as well as their stature. If I’m playing against a possession focused team that use a 4-1-2-3 (i.e. Bayern or Leverkusen) I use the 4-3-1-2 with specific player instructions, which will become clear later. If I’m playing against a 4-4-2, I use one of the 5 at the back formations, to have an extra man in central defense and an creative player either in front or behind the midfield line. Against a 4-3-1-2 I use the 5-1-2-2 WB DM, again for the extra defender and to have a DM to nullify their AM. Against everything else I use the 4-2-2-2 DM. This is what I do, based on my flawed logic, so if you find yourself going for a different match plan, by all means go for it. Team Instructions Let’s recap what we want to achieve: Smart, but intense, pressing A vertical form of positional play Swift counter-attacks with a focal point For the first point, the pressing system has changed. The TIs were set to: Out of Possession Defend Narrower Much Higher Defensive Line Much Higher LOE Use Tighter Marking Use Offside Trap In Transition: Counter-Press I kept the D-Line and LOE instructions but kept the Pressing Intensity to the default level. How come? Well I opted to use split-block pressing, meaning I will use individual Close Down More PIs on my 4-5 most advanced players, encouraging press the ball more urgently, leaving the rest to preserve their defensive positions. This allows for more defensive solidity, without sacrificing our pressing potency. Also, with the Positive mentality, the default Pressing Intensity is set to Slightly More Urgent anyway, so the rest won’t be exactly having afternoon tea. @Experienced Defender has a fantastic thread of how to set up your side defensively and I definitely recommend everyone to read it. The offside trap also remains which fits in well with out high defensive line, and Defend Narrower keeps us compact when we do not have the ball. Compactness is key, as we don’t want the other team to play through our middle, forcing the to play wide where we can use the touchline as an extra defender. NB: The Use Tighter Marking TI is used only if your team includes players that have good Marking and, more importantly, are quick. The TI will help you win balls back quicker as your players will be better positioned to do so, but if they aren’t fast enough, being tighter to your opponents will mean that there is a greater risk of players losing markers due to their pace. To achieve the second point, the style of play of the ball, I went for the following: Positive mentality In possession: Play out of Defense Focus Play Through Middle Higher Tempo In Transition: Distribute to Center-backs The Positive mentality with a Higher Tempo and the default Passing Directness will allow my team to play the vertical style of football, while not playing direct balls to force turnovers like a team coached by Rangnick would have done. Play out of Defense and Distribute to Center-backs will allow my team to have a more controlled build-up play when we have the at goal-kicks but will have our full-backs free to support from more advanced positions. @Rashidi has an amazing video on the different set-ups you can use for your goal-kicks. NB: When the 4-2-2-2 DM is used, the following instructions were also used: In possession: Overlap Left Overlap Right Much Narrower The 4-2-2-2 DM specific instruction are there to provide the ‘box’ in midfield, with the very narrow width (which is what I took from RDF’s interpretation) while also ensuring the uniformity of the midfield individual mentalities with the Looks for Overlap TI. Here is a great guide to individual mentalities and what they do in the game. Achieving the third point is simple: In possession: Pass into Space In Transition: Counter Easy enough, the Higher Tempo and Positive mentality will factor into our counter-attacking set-up. The focal point will be achieved with the player roles, which will be clarified later on. Team style w/4-2-2-2 DM: Team style w/other formations: I also developed a style which is used when you are the underdog, and is mostly used with the 4-3-1-2 and the 5-1-2-2 WB DM. Cautious mentality In possession: Play out of Defense Pass into Space Higher Tempo In Transition: Distribute to Center-backs Counter Counter-press Out of possession: Defend Narrower More Urgent Pressing Use Tighter Marking The though process behind this is: Cautious mentality to ensure we’re not giving the ball away needlessly, inviting pressure on us The rest of the Tis are there to ensure we’re still threatening on the counter, with Pass into Space, Higher Tempo and Counter. The D-Line and LOE are lowered to the default setting to set ourselves up in a medium block, with an increase in Pressing Intensity to offset the drop due to our lower mentality. This is to counter rapid attackers, to deny them space to run in behind. More importantly, we allow the opposition to have the ball in their defense, as usually they will be good enough to break our press, but we do not surrender the middle. We want as many players in the middle so they do not control the game. Note the lack of overlapping fullbacks, even with the 4-2-2-2 DM. This is so that I don’t overcommit and get caught out in defense. NB: I usually just start the game with this mentality, if all is going well and the shot count is similar, I switch to the Positive team style, otherwise I tinker with the formation until I nullify the opposition. I also switch to this to grind out a lead, but only if the other team are getting lots of shots later in the game. If the other team is not offering a lot in attack, I usually stick with the Positive team style. If, however, I'm in the lead and the other team bring on a fresh striker who is quick, I always switch to the Cautious team style, to deny him that space to run into. Here is a great thread on mentality and game plans that explain how to approach a match. Team Style: References: https://statsbomb.com/2020/01/examining-rb-leipzigs-style/ https://statsbomb.com/2019/10/the-incredible-tactical-rb-leipzig-machine-part-one-a-uniquely-versatile-attack/

Absolutely amazing Zemahh, I love the idea and how you went about achieving it. Your thought process is so clear and all your ideas are laid out so well. Top drawer stuff. You've honest given me so much food for thought for a defensive tactic with my upcoming save. What do you do for opposition instructions? I ask because I was reading knap's megathread and I saw a post about the importance to have your most advanced midfielder/deepest lying striker mark the opposition's deep-lying playmaker or equivalent to disrupt play. Maybe that would be a perfect job for your AP in the upcoming iteration of your tactic?

How have I missed out of this thread for this long, amazing content. After 14 years of playing FM, I didn't think I'd have anything left to learn (except the match engine that's still a mystery to me) but I'm glad to say I've learnt so much by reading through your thread. Honestly hats off to you Ben, KUTGW! I don't know if I have the full grasp of this. RCA (recommended current ability I'm guessing) is affected differently for different attributes depending on the position, therefore, for example, increasing a striker's finishing will 'cost' more CA points than doing the same thing for a full-back. Furthermore, from the mental attributes, increasing aggression, determination, flair and (most interestingly) off the ball will have no effect on CA. We need to get an academic prize going to acheivements in FM, because @Mikaelinho just won it.

Jimbo your dedication is phenomenal, you're 25 years in and you're still planning for the future. I honestly enjoy reading your stories more than playing the game sometimes. Hopefully you do win a continental competition will Ton Pentre before you go on your EFL and PL adventures.