Rashidi

@Tsuru When the match seems to turn away from you, do you spend any time looking at the roles and duties of the opposing team? I normally do and react. Its important to recognise how a change in a role can impact your own system. In all my systems now I never use "counter", at least I try not to. If I am the stronger side I normally elect to move teams around with "hold shape" and just use my tactics roles and duties to control the spaces so that in the event that we lose the ball in possession, we are suitably positioned to win it back. The positional play feature on FM is very strong, in fact too strong imho for people who can spot how a role/duty change can impact the opposition. I will release a video and do a post on the forums within the next few days to explain this in a bit more detail.

Full match when my friends are over and we are having beer and they wanna bet on the result.

As some have stated instructions are a tendency to do something more or less of. A players role could have an instruction that says “always stay back”, but that instruction might not kick in sometimes because of the overall tactical instructions you use or the mentality you are on. It is one of the biggest issues in the game that the descriptors of the game themselves can be misleading and this in turn can lead to issues of misunderstanding through no fault of the novice player and it certainly annoying that one needs to turn to the forums or dig through threads to find a developer saying that instructions are a “tendency”. This game is meant to simulate human behaviour which is why there will be times in the game a player will disregard your instructions, which is why you will get the response it is a “tendency” to follow an instruction. This tendency is likely to happen more or less of the higher the mentality used. For example, since a higher mentality also increases creative freedom. A players attributes say aggression and low teamwork can also influence behaviour. Then we have team instructions, like the defensive line and the block used. Any one of these can lead to players not following your instructions. In Football Manager there is no such thing as “Never” and “Always”. The sooner you come to terms with it the easier it will be to understand the game.

The AI has its own set of tactics, each manager has up to 3 formations it can use during a game and whether they choose to or not depends on the manager's style of play and attributes.

If you are going to link a video, I would advise you to involve a discussion on how your use of specific roles/duties, team instructions help you achieve the style you want. Failing which this post will need to be moved to the community links and fansites subsection of the forum, this includes blogs too.

These aren't issues I am facing. which definitely suggests that the issue causing your keeper to underperform lie elsewhere. Historically my keeper has performed well. Over time our team got better. This season he has been performing well above expectations I do expect my keepers to have at least 76% save ratio and his are well above that with a good expected goals prevented number too, and if you look at the rest of the keepers, the top sides in my league are all showing keepers doing well. The coach reports on my keeper also tell the same story. Keeping clean sheets are also not an issue. A lot of this is down to how my tactical system is set up and more importantly how I react during games to what the opposition are doing. My game is reactive, if I see the AI making a role change, I will react. Its not difficult to do that. I am not advocating changing your tactic to something else, but recognising when the AI has made a change and how you can adapt. Things I have done include: 1. Maintaining my system but changing my DM from RPM to DM 2. Using OIs to shut down threats 3. Doing substitution changes tactically. We have some of the highest possession in the game and we also lead the league in possession won which shows how well we dominate games. And even when we dominate so comprehensively we hardly give away any quality shots against us. Now if these are the numbers my keeper is generating which are completely different to the OPs then the issue cannot be match engine related.

The most important thing about having a high possession tactic will ultimately depend on how good your own players are at keeping the ball under pressure. What is high possession? >75% possession or between 55-65%? You ca achieve it by being smart about your choice of roles, duties I play with a poacher and 2 wingers on attack duty in my high possession 433 system. High possession is also about Rest Defence which is about your team looks when they are attacking. Does their shape allow them to regain possession easily? My advice keep things simple at the start. Use as few TIs as possible. My system generates a lot of possession even on high tempo, because I avoid two key things: I do not use AFs and do not employ Counter.

Traps don’t affect your width, they affect the body positioning of your players opening up angles. So a trap outside encourages players to show opposition towards the flanks. And then with the right roles and duties you could try winning the ball there. I find it more effective to use OIs to identify specific players to target and then apply things like show feet to show them away and hard tackle to make it harder for someone to dictate play. Stop and Invite crosses do have the effect of adjusting your defensive width.

A pressing trigger is the event that encourages a player to leave his position to take on an opposing player. An example - a loose first touch.

I said it’s relative to the league you are in, so it needs checking whenever you play the game. How in the world should I know the averages in YOUR game. Stop being lazy and looking for the easy way out. There is some effort required with the game. Otherwise go play tic tac toe.

Attributes are relative to the league you are in. If everyone in that league is at 12 and your player is at 8 your player is weaker relative to the league. So check the team comparison attributes in the game from the data hub to see how your players stack up to the rest of the league.

OI targets a specific opposition player. PI targets your own players and instructs them to modify their behaviour. OIs, TIs and PIs work synergistically with roles and duties, traits and Mentality. You can't think of OIs and PIs as zero sum instructions. In other words, if you told a player to play it shorter but your team instructions are play more direct and he is playing as a No Nonsense CB, then his role predicates that he might not always play it short. So a player instruction tends to modify the behavior slightly or more depending on what you choose. The only exception is tackle harder and ease off tackles. That is simply an instruction to go to ground to make a tackle or stay on your feet. There is no degree for a tackle, and this in turn is influenced by a players attributes, the role you have chosen and the overall mentality of the team. So while some may think or assert that a player instruction overrides a team instruction, the more accurate explanation is that it has a tendency to change it slightly, and this in turn will be affected by your mentality and the role. Finally PIs and OIs in turn have to work with other team instructions. For instance if you were to trigger press at maximum for the whole team, and then chose to play a system with a much higher defensive line and a high block, you could end up creating zonal overlaps. This means that more than one player will be asked to react to a pressing trigger. So if an opposition player turns his back and shields the ball, and he is in a zone that potentially has 3 overlapping opposition players, then all 3 might get closer, which in turn opens up space that could be exploited should your players fail to force a mistake that results in a turnover in possession. If I played a low defensive line and a high block there is a gap between my backline and attack. Now if my attack had nothing but attacking duties and my backline was all defend duties, then I might see failed transitions resulting in players running at my defence and the strikers not coming back in time to support. In this case, an aggressive trigger press might get me in trouble. But since my backline is so deep, I need to ask them to defend right? Then in this case I could apply hard tackling to the backline as a PI so they would commit being the only line of defence. Another option could be for me to use OIs and just tell them to specifically target wingers only with hard tackles. When I do that the OI kicks in whenever that opposition player enters the zone of one my players. IF for any reason my striker was helping to defend for some reason and he was next to the winger - he would hard tackle, if his attributes were in the right place. OIs, TIs and PIs are just parts of a tactic, the whole of any tactical system includes mentality, roles and duties too.

I normally don't like doing analysis like that, and I have to agree that the data hub is useless when it comes to deep analysis. The information is there but one needs to dig through all the clutter to break down the relevant information. Let me begin like this: Average xg per shot is not useful, because it can be wildly inaccurate. Its as useful as a paper condom. What I do is look for trends and to do that I need to go over each shot and then check whether its from open play or not. I only take open play shots and keep set piece ones separate. With that done I then look for good quality xG chances which are at least 0.21 which is a good chance, clear cut should be closer to 0.47. Here is a sample analysis for 3 games where I do this, and then also assign my own xG buildup scores to identify players in my team who are involved in high goal scoring chances, assigning each an xG value too. This way I can nail down the high performing players in my squad. I did explain this recently on a stream. For two seasons I was wont to use Miguel Reyes in my team as a central midfield attacking player because he failed my height test:-). Each season I failed at the last hurdle to win the title. And then when I started doing xG buildup analysis, I found out that: 1. He was involved in nearly EVERY high scoring chance we created from open play, but this wasn't being reflected in open play key pass assists which is absolutely criminal but understandable if you know how SI compute that. 2. Even when our average xg was a low value, our quality chance creation was still superb. That xG of ours which was 0.76 was a good day against the title favorites who were reduced to 0.22 in that game, but we had one clear cut chance in open play which we scored and then another from a corner. The following season we started every match with Reyes, and we had a 75% win ratio on the way to the title, only losing twice the entire season. I am not a big fan of using average xG, it is possible to do a deep dive into the numbers in the data hub, but it will take time and it can be rewarding, but unfortunately I can understand it won't be everyone's cup of tea. It would be good to have this kind of feedback from the data hub, instead of having us dig through it ourselves, it is certainly a job i expect Data Analysts to be doing instead of managers. I just do hope that more and more people stop using average xg as a benchmark, its woefully inadequate.

A 4231 much like any formation that uses wingbacks runs the risk of leaving flanks open during transition failures. There are several ways to create better transitions that give you more options in attack yet, at the same time, provide cover down the flanks. 1. With both wingbacks on support or even attack they need to be fit and fast. It’s a high price to pay. 2. The SS/CF option is nice, issue come with controlling the centre with an attack duty in the AM tier. Sometimes it struggles requiring a really strong presence in there. There is one option and it’s something I do with a 4231- create a build out pattern that’s a 3-2, it can offer very good defensive coverage down the flanks giving you more options. It isn’t about how many players rush up in support it’s about how you dominate the final third forcing sides to deal with relenting pressure and you can get this done in one example. If you use a IFB in defence you have a third defender who can protect the flanks since He positions himself in the half flanks. I have done a video on the IFB(D) and can link it if you need. LFBx2 and a libero can give you a 3-1 buildout, then with a DM role like a DLP or a DM then you have your 3-2 build out. The role beside the DLP can now be a SV which is basically a box to box midfielder. You now have the base for a good “Rest Defence” when you are attacking. The use of the IFB now allows you to be more aggressive in your choice of duties in the final third. If you are have a strong 3-2 you can use IW(A) on both sides to feed that SS/CF pair, but I much prefer using W(A) on both flanks pinning back opposing fullbacks and a poacher AP(S), with this shape I get a 3241 in attack. You will see more central attack patterns as well. Finally with you so high up, you can dominate a lot of teams with high possession. Seeing 70% and higher will be normal at home at times edging as high as 80%. And with Hold Shape you will patiently probe these sides into submission. It’s something you could consider apart from all the other good advice shared.

Let be be perfectly honest, you came in here threw a childish tantrum so yeah, normal people usually don’t listen to tantrums. You make a lot of sweeping statements expecting a response. FYI, SI do read the threads, they do engage when posts are respectful and constructive. Amongst the moderators I am probably the most critical, frequently doing videos that claim certain features of the game are poor, but I also put forth arguments showing why and then suggest alternatives. And you know what, the majority of people who are respectful get a response. Sometimes I get responses that bite. On one occasion I even got 'corrected' by Miles himself, because he felt that my criticism was unwarranted, which to be fair it was. When people make negative comments about the game but aren't doing it like you, they sometimes get invited into private discussions with SI. Do staffers read reddit, steam reviews, watch youtube vids critical of the game? Yes they do. This forum is but a small fraction of the total users of the game, if you want your voice to stand out, then be respectful and constructive. There are plenty of other forum posters who are extremely critical of the game, but they are at least respectful and SI do engage with them. If you are expecting them to respond to your tirade, I doubt they will.

I am sorry who are you again? Your view too counts for nothing. So don’t expect a lot of devs to come in running to engage with you.

We don’t allow direct links to external sites but you can discuss content from there without links. Generally there are plenty of sites out there with football manager content some are blogs, YouTube channels etc. How accurate some sites are depends on their efforts in checking how accurate their sources of information are. This is the only place that has direct official responses from SI staffers.

I respect anyone who takes this approach for every game. It’s a helluva way to play the game, I’ve done it once or twice but like you said it can be time consuming, it’s both proactive, reactive and rewarding at the same time when it comes off.

ChatGPT sources its answers from guides written by people on the web and not all guides are accurate. On a stream I challenged chatGPT, gave out wrong answers, and then I gave other sources that were accurate, chatGPT then corrected itself. The only way ChatGPT will ever be right is when the person querying it already knows the correct answers which renders its use for tactics moot. Where ChatGPT can be strong is research, and that’s how I use it. I’ve used ChatGPT to help with my Dr Jit tool, I’ve also used it when I was doing research on other aspects of the game, but I had to continually verify the answers. U can check its sources for information all the time, there are so many areas of info about the match engine which aren’t in the public domain, its make me wonder how people can assume that it knows what it’s talking about.

I play a 433dm on my streams. Typically I shut down most formations that seek to play out from the back, I use OIs to tight mark one defender, their deepest lying centre mid and I trigger press the other defender and hard tackle him. It usually works. They can never build out. If they are playing more defensive variants like a back 5 with a DM then it’s harder forcing me to switch to a 4231 where I can use an AMC. Using OIs again I shut out their DM apply pressure on the backline with a higher block. So far I haven’t had a defensive team keep a ball against me. They usually get routed.

They aren’t ordered in priority

Like others have said Coaching qualifications, world rep, attributes and then personality

I would politely disagree. In my latest Twitch streams I have been playing a challenge where I need to use ordinary players against sides that have players running around breaking every rule in the game. There is one team that has 7 players including a keeper with 200 CA/PA. All his attributes are 20. Not every team is like that but just enough to make it difficult for me to finish in champions league spoots. There are around 90 of these players controlled by subscribers who opt to spin wheels to add on to their attributes. i have no option but to use normal players. It took me 6 seasons to build up a wonderkid factory with my own players who developed into players who could help. My last 20 games in the league I was unbeaten, I strung 8 clean sheets in a row on the way to our title. Doing all this with opposition instructions to shut down players, reacting to subtle AI role changes that would completely turn their tactics around, opting to use a player who hugged wide when my other inside cutting winger ran into traffic. When I saw a super newgen, that’s what I call my subscribers players, cutting inside as an IW to score an early goal, I immediately showed him to his other foot to keep him wide. We won that match. Tactical changes during matches played a big part in me winning the league. So yeah if you pay attention to the highlights you can flip the script and turn things on its head for the right result. For years FM was a game just about changing mentality or the tactic, it’s not the same game anymore. The game has obvious flaws, the data hub is useless in my opinion, I only use it to check what the opposition formation is. I use it for nothing else. I don’t think this was a fantastic version of the game, but the engine while it still has some flaws ( no indirect free kick options), it’s still fun to play.

This is an extreme solution. 1. Copy your SI folder in C: Documents/Sports Interactive/Football Manager 24 to the desktop 2. Delete the folder in C:Documents 3. Start the game, it should rebuild the folder in the Documents directory 4. Go to desktop, to your backup folder, pick a save, then add the save to the games folder in C:Documents/Sports Interactive/Football Manager 24/Games 5. Start the game again, play it and see if the same issue re-occurs. If it happens again, my recommendation is to raise this as a bug. Its the first time I've heard of this issue myself.

I think the 4231 and the 433 are easier to score with and win consistently. You need to continually adapt with the 442 to win every game. It’s easier with the 4231/433 as they can naturally go 3-2 or 3-1. And in those systems while my strikers can finish, the lone striker in my 4231/433 bags more goals than in a 442 where the goals are shared between both strikers.