Conor O'Hare

@Neil Brock @Jack Joyce Interested in seeing a response from SI on matters raised on discussion. Personally I don't think it's anything to do with teams defending too narrow etc, this is part of the problem...But the biggest problem is static strikers who don't make any movement to drag teams out of shape. If there was more attacking off the ball movement, I believe we'd see Strikers involved more with higher goals/assists and then higher goals being scored across the leagues. I doubt it's going to be fixed but would be great to hear an official word from SI on if it's done for this year.

I've just made my final post on the state of the FM19 ME from what I can see....I feel the data and evidence I've provided is well put across and I've performed multiple saves and multiples seasons over the last few days and the results tend to always be the same. Football is a decisive issue and this game is also. Some people will view the issues I've raised as a small drawback, but for me it kills the enjoyment. Frustrating as this is the only real complaint I can find in this years game. Here's hoping 20 brings back the enjoyment for me.

TBH, I've been running more tests on this. I'm currenty running a holiday save and so far simulated 3 full seasons, the issue seems to be strikers not being involved in games enough. It continues my trend of strikers struggling to hit more than 20 goals a season when the top scorer should be around 25-30 for 3 full seasons. But my new thought is that strikers aren't involved in games at all as shown by their assists. In each season, the top goal scorers only manage around 2 assists. Now looking at the top scorers of the last 3 Premier League seasons. 2017/18 - Mo Salah was top scorer and managed 10 assists. 2016/17 - Harry Kane, top scorer and managed 7 assists, now Kane is more of a poacher than a creator but even with his mentality he still gets assists and is involved in games in a way the FM19 Engine doesn't seem to replicate. I also looked at second top scorer in this occasion as I know Lukaku is a creative striker for his team mates and he managed 6 assists also. 2015/16 - Harry Kane, top scorer and managed one assist. This stat favours the game's method. I also look at this years season in progress. Aguero is currently top scorer with ten games to go and has already managed 6 assists...So his goals and assists for this season is likely to be above what this game can replicate. So critically comparing a few seasons, the ME is not replicating a style of football we see IRL. Strikers just don't seem to be involved as much as they are IRL or in previous versions. I loaded up FM18 to look at similar stats. Higher scoring goals, strikers getting involved and assisting team mates. A more realistic approach to football. I'd really appreciate to know what SI's position is on this, did these types of trends come up for them or in the private beta or is my game just creating regularly anomalies that doesn't correspond to the data other games is outputting....For me having strikers that are useless and offer very little product doesn't strike me as very entertaining or rewarding game. I'm not going to attack the developers are bash the game as I love the game but I don't see me playing this game this year with the state it's in and the only person that is losing out here is me, and thats frustrating as it'll be a long wait until October for FM20 which I always end up buying despite the fact I don't start playing properly until March when the final DB is ready.... Kudos SI for developing my heroin.....A game that frustrates me and annoys me yet I can't wait for my next hit all the same.

I'd be interested in knowing if there's anything further planned ME wise, is there any point in then testing and raising any issues we find at present or is it a case of waiting to see what FM20 gives us.

It's unfortunate your issues haven't been fixed, but I'm on about the people complaining about match engine issues. There has only been 3 threads posted in the Match Engine bug forum. I'm also not going to comment on the salary, 400k is about £7600 a week. Considering the weekly salary of players, I don't know if paying close to 8k a week for an ex player with a high reputation is considered high. I'm not saying it is right, but could be easily explained.

Why are more people not reporting issues in the bugs forum?

I think this is also somewhat supporting there is an issue. How many players in your games are hitting the 30 goal mark....Or even the 20? I'm aware that one test is not enough to provide evidence, which is why I'm running multiple tests to get a more clearer picture. In both games no player has managed to score 20 goals in a league season. The Premier League has only ever had 3 seasons where the top scorer has scored less than 20 for context.

Thats even worse than mine by the looks of things. I'm going to run 3 more saves and report back on this. I believe 5 tests should be enough to provide some conclusive results, as I know people tend to think these things are just exceptions to the norm.

Well I'm glad to hear that, based on the comments in the feedback thread and the result of my two holiday sims thus far, it does seem to be a problem with no player scoring more than 20 goals a season....Again all AI controlled so not "my tactics".

I'd recommend FM18. All joking aside, it seems that strikers are struggling to score this version of the ME. From what I've seen all strikers seem to play similar and there's nothing seems to be able to do to remedy this...Good news is this affects the AI. So if you manage to figure this out, your team will then be overpowered and have a huge advantage over the AI.

I opted to run another save to look at this again, maybe my first game was just a dodgy season. The results were worse! Looking at the top 4 spots. Can you tell me when two teams finished in the top 4 with less than 60 goals in the Premier League. The closest season with a goals scored column like this was the 2015/2016 which was acknowledged as one of the worst Premier League seasons ever....Man City just about made top 4, United finished 5th thanks to throwing away a 2-1 lead against West Ham with a few games to go (last ever match at Upton Park), Liverpool finished 8th and Chelsea finished 10th, and neither Arsenal or Tottenham managed to mount a serious title challenge to Leicester (not trying to sell Leicester short but this was a poor EPL season with the big clubs struggling). The other seasons have featured much higher scoring leagues, with the lowest goals scored out of the top 4 teams being equal or greater than the highest scored in the 2015/16 freak season, I believe 2005 was the last time a team managed to finish top 4 with less than 60 goals. The top scorers in the League in this save is even more damning: Top goal scorer with 16 goals in the Premier League is such an obvious issue I'm not even going to comment on it, what I will comment on is on an individual player One of the deadliest strikers in the Premier League manages 4 goals? I'm going to run a 3rd save, and if SI would like each save, I'll gladly provide them. I've seen SI defend their stats in comparison to injuries, woodwork, crosses completed, goals from crosses etc....How can they defend this. I would be genuinely interested in SI's take on this.

Interesting that you say this, but how do you explain a league season completely AI controlled where this happens after 38 games. Looking at the top 4 spots. Can you tell me when two teams finished in the top 4 with less than 60 goals in the Premier League. The closest season with a goals scored column like this was the 2015/2016 which was acknowledged as one of the worst Premier League seasons ever....Man City just about made top 4, United finished 5th thanks to throwing away a 2-1 lead against West Ham with a few games to go (last ever match at Upton Park), Liverpool finished 8th and Chelsea finished 10th, and neither Arsenal or Tottenham managed to mount a serious title challenge to Leicester (not trying to sell Leicester short but this was a poor EPL season with the big clubs struggling). The other seasons have featured much higher scoring leagues, with the lowest goals scored out of the top 4 teams being equal or greater than the highest scored in the 2015/16 freak season, I believe 2005 was the last time a team managed to finish top 4 with less than 60 goals. The top scorers in the League in this save is even more damning: Top goal scorer with 16 goals in the Premier League is such an obvious issue I'm not even going to comment on it, what I will comment on is this. One of the deadliest strikers in the Premier League manages 4 goals?

I just ran a full detail simulation of the English, French, Italian, Spanish and Dutch Leagues to gauge the number of goals. I opted to look at this as I felt my own strikers weren't scoring enough. I will give a more in depth analysis of the EPL as that's the league I know best, and I can compare stats very easily using https://www.premierleague.com/tables First of all the league Table Liverpool won the league with 96 goals, that's actually pretty good and no complaints there. Based on Liverpools goals thus far and with ten games remaining, Liverpool are unlikely to better the Goals For that the Game has simulated that they'll hit. Arsenal on 82 Points is very high, again they'll be unlikely to finish higher than this in real life. 3rd and 4th is an issue. Man City managed 57 goals and Man Utd hit 64. At this point in the game City have exceeded that goal total with 10 games to go and United are close to that with ten games to go. Safe to say both United and City will end up with a lot more goals than the game simulated. Also compare this top 4 with top 4 of Premier League seasons gone by: 2017/18 Table Man City (106) Man Utd (68) Tottenham (74) Liverpool (84) All goals are considerably lower than what is simulated here. I see that Uniteds goal total in the 18/19 simulation is similar to the goals scored in 17/18, but lets not understate the influence of Mourinho's football! 2016/17 Table Chelsea (85) Tottenham (86) Man City (80) Liverpool (78) The goals this season were much less than what we seen last year and should expect to see this year but are higher than what the game simulates. In review, I'd estimate that overall team goals are slightly too low and need a slight tweaking. By and large no team should expect to break into top 4 without breaking at least the 65 goal barrier (70 seems to be the best average) or close to it. City with 57 goals is the biggest proof in my opinion that this is off, as last team to finish in top 4 without breaking at least the 60 goal barrier was Liverpool in 2005/06. In looking at the top goal scorers Not one player breached the 20 goal mark, the last time this happened was in 2008/2009. Reviewing through the top goal scorers every season, the top scorer has usually broken around 25+ goals The top scorer in this league with 18 goals has often been enough goals to secure you a top 4/5 finish. I'm also concerned with the players in these. Aguero has scored 18 already this season and has only twiced finished a season with less than 20 goals since he came to England. Harry Kane has also never finished a 30 game season without hitting at least 20 goals and he hits 14 (granted Spurs had a bad season). I've also looked across the other leagues. 18-22 goals seems to be the average high....Which is no where near accurate. If SI would like to look at this save, I can upload it and they can review the stats themselves. Thanks

The scoring seems way too low for me. Issue seems to be excessive amounts of shots on goal with low conversion to shots on target, with an even lower conversion of goals. I holidayed a quick mode to test something, top goal scorer in Premier League was Sadio Mane with 26 goals across a 38 game season....I'm also concerned that strikers don't assist enough. For example in the mode I noticed above. Sergio Aguero scored a miserable 19 goals and assisted 6 times. Those are more or less his stats at this point in the season. I'm now running a new holiday to check on the major leagues running in full detail. I'll report back to SI to show my results compared to real life scenarios. Although I'm fairly certain they won't fix it *I understand it's a complex issue, and fixing one thing will break another* But I'm fairly certain I'm not going to bother buying FM19 because of this breach in realism....This will be the second time in 3 years I've not been able to enjoy a game because of an issue that affects realism, and perhaps it's time for me to take a break after playing every year since CM 98. Here's hoping that if my efforts don't help get us a fix for this yeats, then SI can at least fix it for next years.

Thanks for your input, but would prefer clarification from someone at SI.