Creativity and Flair.

[dz47]

SFraser, some of the goals in those PKM's are just top shelf! I think i might have to have another go at a 4231 with Arsenal, and thinking about being very un-wenger-like and splashing some cash for Aguero to play a 'fun' save before Fm11!

By the way, have you retrained Berbatov to be accomplished at AMC? Surely he's not performing like that with an 'unconvincing' rating (which he has for amc on my game)?

[...Eternal Sin...]

SFraser can you upload your tactic?

[Collzy]

or the settings of all the players? this has got me curious and looks like it would work fantastically well with arsenal who are full of creative flair players.

[Chrisy177]

I really like your guide, SFraser.

So basically, you need Creativity to see the pass, Flair to try it and Passing to execute it. I'm definitely going to including those attributes when I'm searching for a good winger now - thanks for writing this!

[cragswfc]

Chrisy177 don't forget to add decisions to put that great ball in

[Flohrinho]

That's brilliant.

I am no Ajax Amsterdam scout but in FM those are the very things I consider vital in my team, though I would tend to consider speed to be less important when you have Intelligence and look for "Teamwork/Workrate" as a priority. If you can't have speed, look for strength instead.

But Technique, Intelligence and Personality are the absolute essence of my own save. I guess that is why I am one of the few that would happilly continue to use Ryan Giggs long after his strength, acceleration and pace has dropped into single figures.

"TIPS" is just about the best tip I have read in a long time. Thanks for that.

Glad I could give you a tip since I get so many great tips from your threads usually.

But to further this what would you consider to be important for a player to be considered to be an intelligent player?

I have noticed that either a low flair or creativity rating tends to lead to the scout notice that the player has very poor playing intelligence.

My question now is which attributes would you consider to be really important for this area and in which order?

My scouting system at this time uses the values flair and creativity for intelligence but probably decisions and anticipation should play a role here?

And as far as the Speed goes I think one could also put off the ball in there as a substitute since I consider this to be one of the major attributes of a player to make the right run at the right time.

Really would appreciate some opinions on those attributes.

[mdbussen]

Glad I could give you a TIP since I get so many great TIPS from your threads usually.

Wordplay...?

But to further this what would you consider to be important for a player to be considered to be an intelligent player?

I have noticed that either a low flair or creativity rating tends to lead to the scout notice that the player has very poor playing intelligence.

My question now is which attributes would you consider to be really important for this area and in which order?

My scouting system at this time uses the values flair and creativity for intelligence but probably decisions and anticipation should play a role here?

And as far as the Speed goes I think one could also put off the ball in there as a substitute since I consider this to be one of the major attributes of a player to make the right run at the right time.

Really would appreciate some opinions on those attributes.

I would value Acceleration and Agility (in that order) far more than pace in terms of "Speed" for the purposes of TIPS - obviously Off the Ball and Anticipation are great mental skills to be able to use this acceleration to the fullest capacity.

[John_Cro]

I saw one guy asking so I'll also ask. Can you please upload your tactic so I can compare it to my way of thinking?

And I do think you are one of a kind, keep up the good work.

[Karnage94]

I saw one guy asking so I'll also ask. Can you please upload your tactic so I can compare it to my way of thinking?

And I do think you are one of a kind, keep up the good work.

The large majority of roles and instructions are up there, posts #17 and #23 I believe. It's just a case of finding the information you need from the thread to compare it to your way of thinking.

[John_Cro]

Yes, it is. But there are no instructions for GK, FB, CB and wingers. So basically, there are only information for MC, AMC and FC.

While I can make a guess about their instructions, it would be much nicer to have the tactic right away and experiment with it.

[grimness]

Check post 23. Also right fullback is shown so you copy that to LB and adjust it to his skills, so for Evra you add RWB. Tweak it according to your players. I use keeper on defend and default centerbacks. Play around and you'll see that it isn't too hard

[lucatonix]

One thing I have noticed is that with more creative freedom and high flair strikers, you get more extravagant finishes. For example, Higuain was one-on-one with the keeper and he moved the ball to his left foot when completely free taking the keeper by surprise and left him with a relatively simple finish.

For his second goal he took a very early volley into the top corner rather than dribbling towards the goal.

[mikcheck]

SrFraser i've seen your matches and i really like what i saw. I have two doubts regarding to my tactic and it would be nice if you could help me.

I play a christmas tree formation ( 4-3-2-1 no wingers). So if I wanna play only trought the middle with the 2 amc's providing passes for the strikers. I guess so that move into channels option wouldn't bee good for this ?

The other one is. I have both amc's with the same role and duty I dont know if it's better to have one different than the other.

Thanks.

[Flohrinho]

SrFraser i've seen your matches and i really like what i saw. I have two doubts regarding to my tactic and it would be nice if you could help me.

I play a christmas tree formation ( 4-3-2-1 no wingers). So if I wanna play only trought the middle with the 2 amc's providing passes for the strikers. I guess so that move into channels option wouldn't bee good for this ?

The other one is. I have both amc's with the same role and duty I dont know if it's better to have one different than the other.

Thanks.

Well one of the major ideas of letting your players do the good stuff if they are good players indeed is to just assign a standard role to them for the AMC it would be Attacking Midfielder and give them a lot of creative freedom.

How well they will utilize that creative freedom is down to how good they really are as explained in SFrasers posts.

So basically what you want to do is asign the standard role, set your team instructions to more expressive and shape the form of your formation in attack with the "Run From Deep" slider.

I usually limit long ranged shots and crosses to "sometimes" since I don't consider both to be very effective but the rest remains untouched and I only tend to give certain players different instructions when their attributes command it.

I also set the creative freedom of players that aren't really blessed with creativity and flair to a lower setting since they often tend to do stupid things if they have to much creative freedom which can hurt especially if your defenders do stupid things.

Yes, it is. But there are no instructions for GK, FB, CB and wingers. So basically, there are only information for MC, AMC and FC.

While I can make a guess about their instructions, it would be much nicer to have the tactic right away and experiment with it.

I don't think we will see a tactic from SFraser since he explained that he doesn't play a plug & play style and changes his tactic every time to match his opponent, which I consider indeed to be a very effective strategy overall, since it doesn't automatically guarantee you success but in the long run helps you to understand the game and the tactics way better.

It's only since the time that I play this style myself that I learned how to respond to problems I see on the field and how to shape my attacking and defensive play the way I want it to be.

So basically follow the advise SFraser gave in his posts, don't set up to complicated tactics, let your team move as a unit and shape your attacking game via the "run from deep" slider of the players and the defending formation via the "closing down" slider you will see that you will learn to understand how to respond to what you see on the field very fast.

[ZdlR]

Just thought I'd give this thread a boot and also add my two cents.

Whenever I've used an AMC with good flair, creativity, decisions and anticipation, the player has not only had creative freedom within the 'much' zone, he's also had an attacking mentality, forward runs rarely, try through balls often and direct passing. He should not move into channels or roam from position. This keeps him in the hole but ensures that his first thought is to create a goal-scoring opportunity for the strikers. He might well lose the ball because he is being rather cavalier with possession, but it really is the litmus test as to whether his attributes are up to the job in this match. If he consistently wastes possession, the defenders may well be doing a good job of closing him down or marking the attackers - but it could just be poor decisions or execution. What you should find is that, the majority of the time, he plays a ball forward that could have yielded a goal scoring opportunity. Perhaps the striker just didn't anticipate the move?

There are other types of playmaker, of course. What I described above was how I set up an aging Pablo Aimar at Benfica. Angel Di Maria operates next to Aimar in the same team. He is the AMCl to Aimar's AMCc. He is instructed to roam from position, move into channels, cross the ball and try through balls but, primarily, I want him to stay available (no forward runs) and run at the opposition defence. He is my saida - exit - player. He is the outlet that turns defence into attack in a single touch - receive the ball and skin the impetuous marker.

Whereas Aimar is playing a creative role, Di Maria's is more of a flair role. I see creativity and flair as the ability to create for others or themselves, respectively. This doesn't mean that a through ball can't have flair or a mazy dribble doesn't have creativity, I just think the two operate in different spheres. Creativity adds options to the players and allows them to see extra possibilities that players with lower creativity wouldn't see. Flair, on the other hand, affects the execution of the move. Not really the quality of the execution - that is down to the technical attributes alone - but the manner of the execution. The first-time through-ball over the defender to the onrushing striker requires creativity to see the pass, flair influences the likelihood he will try it and technique, first touch and passing dictates the quality of execution. A player with low flair and high creativity - SFraser's Carrick, for example - would likely see the opportunity but decline it as their (lack of) flair naturally simplifies their game. This is why it is so important to choose players with creativity and flair only if they have the technical attributes to pull the moves off. Think of C. Ronaldo in his first two seasons at Man Utd. Bags of flair - trying tricks left, right and centre - but technical ability too low to do much but lose possession much of the time.

[heathxxx]

With the mention of Carrick, I just have to add, that as a deep-lying playmaker, he's arguably one of the best in the game since FM09.

When I've played Man Utd saves and used him in the same sort of position as SFraser shows, his average ratings, pass completion and assists have been phenomenal.

Now if only he could emulate the way he performs in FM

[mdbussen]

Think of C. Ronaldo in his first two seasons at Man Utd. Bags of flair - trying tricks left, right and centre - but technical ability too low to do much but lose possession much of the time.

Great post in general, but I wanted to debate this point Ronaldo always had very impressive technique but lacked the mental understanding of the game in order to make the right decisions. He also probably had low "creativity" in that his field vision when he was younger is not nearly what it is now. He would get the ball and his first thought would be to entertain or try the impossible rather than understanding that oftentimes this was not in the best interest of his team. He could often pull of these ambitious tricks because he had the requisite technical ability - but there usually wasn't an end product because these tricks wouldn't advance the ball upfield or allow him or his teammates to receive the ball in a dangerous position.

I would compare 18 yr old Ronaldo with Nani's current self - lots of flair, lots of technique, lots of pace, but inconsistent and constantly making poor decisions with the ball.

[ZdlR]

A fair point, well made

Another thing that has occurred to me: creativity generates a list of possible actions that a player can take and decisions affects the quality of the choice made, relative to the players current mentality settings - a good attacking pass differs from a good defensive pass, which differs from a good possessional pass. However, flair skews the decision toward the more flamboyant and audacious. So, there is great importance placed on having good decisions on players with high flair and creativity. Players with high creativity and decisions, but low flair, can keep possession expertly, given the right tactical settings. This is why Carrick's low flair actually a positive, not a negative aspect of his game.

[mikcheck]

SFraser how are you doing with your tactic ? cheers

[The Tactician]

By the way, have you retrained Berbatov to be accomplished at AMC? Surely he's not performing like that with an 'unconvincing' rating (which he has for amc on my game)?

Answered your own question there I imagine

[The Tactician]

With the mention of Carrick, I just have to add, that as a deep-lying playmaker, he's arguably one of the best in the game since FM09.

When I've played Man Utd saves and used him in the same sort of position as SFraser shows, his average ratings, pass completion and assists have been phenomenal.

Now if only he could emulate the way he performs in FM

Carrick's low flair actually a positive, not a negative aspect of his game.

I don't disagree with any of those two quotes but Carrick with high flair would be an Xavi-like player imo. He's certainly good enough techniclly to pull off those passes and can see them but decides not to execute them. With attacking/normal mentality, you'll see him have high pass completion and the occassional assist but you won't see a quarter (he has 5 flair) of what he is capable of. If he had 20 flair, you could limit him to what he is now with low CF. You can't however, make him play with 20 flair whereas of he had 20 flair you could make him play at 5 flair.

[ZdlR]

You have a point, certainly. But, surely, limiting a player's flair (through the creative freedom slider) will also limit his creativity. So, you can currently have Carrick play at 5 creativity and 5 flair or 17 creativity and 5 flair. But, with 20 flair, your options are lots of creativity and flair, or little of both. The two are controlled with one slider. The reason why I then say that low flair is good for Carrick is because he is a deep-lying playmaker for me, currently paired with Fletcher more often than Hargreaves in a 4-2-3-1. With a lot of flair, I would expect that he would lose possession at least as many times as he pulled off an audacious pass. This is because Xavi trumps Carrick for more than simply flair - mentally and technically - not least of all in his near-perfect decision making.

[SFraser]

Just to jump into this debate for a minute.

I'm not sure how much either of you are into watching full match replays of each match but you build up a particularly great sense for how these two attributes work by watching players in detail over a long period of time. There are ultimately clear differences between Creativity and Flair, and Creative Freedom.

Creativity is vision, no two ways about that. Creativity is the ability to players to see passes, see options. Creative Freedom does not directly affect Creativity, but Creativity is not an attribute that defines a decision or a choice but an ability to have options and choices available. By far the best way to understand Creativity is to play a high Creativity player with high Creative Freedom and then play a low Creativity player. Both players can play a good pass, in my own save I sometimes have Nani playing a great throughball but the passes he is capable of are significantly more obvious passes. Particularly when he gets closer to goal with more defenders around his ability to pass the ball declines because the passes are harder for him to see.

What is quite interesting about Nani is that he is an exceptionally high Flair player in comparison to the rest of his mental attributes, he has Passing 12 and Creativity 13 with Flair 18. You would think that this is a recipe for disasterous passing, but the truth is that he has a pretty high Pass Completion Ratio of 74% in the league. This is because he cannot see the flamboyant passing options, he cannot see that defence ripping throughball from 30 yards outside the box, so he doesn't attempt them. If his Creativity was higher and he could see more Passing options, his Flair would kick in more in this context and combined to poor Passing attribute would indeed see his pass completion ratio drop rapidly.

Where Nani's Flair does kick in is in the context of his other high attributes, his 17 Dribbling and his 15 Longshots. He is actually quite a dangerous "striker" style player, and he regularly fires very dangerous, very vicious and fairly accurate shots at goal, or he can dribble around a few players then dribble around a few more and get inside the box. These are not necessarilly the best Decisions overall, but again because of his low Creativity he is not going to make poor Decisions to hit holywood passes. He can only see the simple pass, relatively speaking, and so will only try the simple pass. He can however attempt the mazy run, the first time thunderbolt volley, and is good at these. So his return of 11 goals, 5 assists and 74% pass completion in 14 starts and 18 substitute appearances is not bad at all. A goal every 130 minutes on average from this player combined to a high pass completion rate is very good stuff actually, and this is despite him looking like a bit of a dud for a team of my calibre.

By contrast, check out this player:

There is no doubt that Gourcuff is significantly more dangerous with an assist every 2 games and a goal every 95 minutes but despite his superior attributes in terms of Passing ability he has a significantly lower pass completion ratio of 59% overall at club level. That is the payoff of swapping a steady midfield metronome for a decisive "make things happen" player. He doesn't play poorly at all when it comes to passing, he is great in midfield, but he does have the slightly tendency to go looking for the defence ripper because he can see the defence ripper. Indeed he can see just about everything on the pitch and is therefore genuinely lethal. The problem is that his Decisions do not quite match his Vision, Flamboyancy and Passing ability so he has a habit of trying too much when a simpler option is the better option.

Now look at this player:

You would expect Ozil to be the better playmaker than Gourcuff, slightly higher Anticipation, slightly higher Passing ability, slightly higher Flair, much superior Decisions. This is the irony though, sometimes a "poor Decision" to hit a throughball of little chance is met by a howler in the part of the defender, sometimes the opponent is tired, lacking concentration or himself makes a poor Decision to try and intercept a pass instead of pulling back to a sound position.

I'm not saying this is an absolute truth, that you should go looking for mistakes as a way to goal, and nor am I saying that this is the only difference between Ozil and Gourcuff. What I am saying though is that between the two players Ozil is the better playmaker by a small margin but Gourcuff is the one that goes out onto the pitch and through a combination of slightly inferior Decisions, superior Determination, and superior Workrate is the player that is most likely to make something happen. He is the one that goes out, takes more attacking risks, and due to his supreme abilities is capable of turning a slightly inferior Decision into a goalscoring chance.

Carrick unfortunately has been injured for 2 months and is out of action so there is not alot of feedback to give on this player, particularly considering how slowly I play the game despite playing it regularly.

What I can show you is the league table so far for my third season in this particular save:

I am roughly 2/3rds of the way through this campaign and have scored 86 goals. A clear 30 goals more than the second highest scores in the league. I work that out as just about 3.5 goals per game so far. I have scored 4 or more goals in 13 competitive matches, and 7 or more goals in 3 competitive matches, in a save where the world and his wife plays me to defend and defend with a passion. My highest goalscorer has 31 goals in 38 appearances so there are no rediculously unrealistic superman performances kicking around here. No 50 goals in 25 starts in this save, in this system.

What really kicked the entire team into such a high offensive gear, combined to the immense quality of my players, was the roaming across the board combined the generic and relatively conservative instructions. It is an extremely mobile team that still maintains its general shape and with mobility and immense passing quality comes a unit, a group of players that cut apart defences with vision, pass-and-move football and teamwork rather than any particular superman player taking on the world and beating them hard.

As I said in my opening post it is easy to become bored watching a one-dimensional attacking side. Take Chelsea in real life for example, free scoring with a daft amount of goals but it is amazing how boring they can make this immense attacking football look. My team is also free scoring but there is no shortage of brilliant football. Creativity is a genuinely fun attribute to build a team around. You do however need to understand it in the context of other attributes and other players, you can make an average player with some decent strengths perform brilliantly, but you can also waste a lot of the ball if you are not carefull in your selections and analysis of players.

[SUCK IT]

SFraser do you Play Gourcuff in the Advanced Playmaker Role?

[SFraser]

SFraser do you Play Gourcuff in the Advanced Playmaker Role?

No I either play him on the Right Wing or as a Central Midfielder. The roles and duties I tend to tweak quite specifically although I leave the sliders alone and simply flick through the roles and duties untill I find the preferred combination of sliders. The rest I set up manually.

What is quite noticeably about Gourcuff in the Central Midfield role is that his positioning is not as high as Carrick while his Off The Ball is higher, and he tends to drift more away from the Central position instead of roaming into space through the middle. Again though it's not an absolute, just a greater likelyhood of Gourcuff pulling into a wider area than Carrick would do. I do think that Positioning and Off-The-Ball are key attributes when it comes to the effect of roaming behaviour. If you want greater "positional roaming" as in moving around into sound team based positions for the maintainance of shape, passing options, and positions to defend against potential counter-attacks then you would require a high Positioning attribute for your roaming player. Off-The-Ball will tend to make a player roam into more attacking areas.

I would imagine the ideal player would have high attributes for both Positioning and Off-The-Ball and I have noticed that by midfielder with 17 positioning and 14 off the ball has a tendency to spend most of his time roaming around in central midfield but also makes very sound off the ball runs at key moments into holes in the defence. This is despite having RFD Rare.

[SUCK IT]

Thanks for the reply SFraser, going to look at setting something up like this in the future

[ZdlR]

SFraser, other than watching matches in full mode (which I also do as its benefits outweigh the time invested), what else do you do that takes you so long to play the game?

[SFraser]

SFraser, other than watching matches in full mode (which I also do as its benefits outweigh the time invested), what else do you do that takes you so long to play the game?

The short answer, when I am playing FM, is keeping this up season after season:

Keeping a First Team Squad of 25 players fit, happy, on form and playing well game after game is a bit of a challenge. 2/3rds of the way through the season and there is a not a complaint, a whinge, a concern to be seen. Barring one injury and one player back from a very nasty and long injury there is not a player lacking match fitness, an obvious backup veteran getting upset about his role, a newcomer failing to settle or any really stand out issues with form and performances.

It is to this date in my entire time playing FM by far my most well run and throughly enjoyable team. You can see just how much of the original squad remains, and ultimately everything I have written about, discussed and debated here and elsewhere I have been putting into practice. Taking the game at this pace and with this degree of care and attention to detail means I don't get very far very quickly, but I get there knowing my players inside out and seeing every inch of what the game has to offer.

Getting this kind of thing to happen also takes a lot of time and care. Technique, Composure and Creativity increasing in my young, hot-shot striker who was somewhat deficient in those areas, let down a bit by his inability to remain calm under pressure and really strike a ball sweetly. So those are the areas I look to increase first and it takes attention to these details to achieve it.

And look at the attributes improving in this young attacking midfielder:

Creativity and Flair!

As much as FM is a tactical game, a football simulator, I have said all along that it is also an absolute beast of a roleplaying game with plenty of interaction between manager and ingame characters and hundreds of tiny little details of personalities to be tweaked and studied and to get involved with. For me the matchday is the culmination of all the little things done beforehand, it's where my players go out and display what an awesome club from top to bottom this club is, and it's my job to ensure that it is that awesome.

You see Jaume and Ozil at "Good" Morale? Well it's my job to fix that, that's where I need to step in. Jaume is "Optimistic about his future at the club" which means I need to give him a game soon and then praise him and he will perk up and be "Enthuisiastic about his future at the club". It doesn't take much, but it's still all there if you know where to look and how players react and what that tiny little difference means by studying players and paying attention to them. He is only 17 and a little bit unsure about how highly I think of him, so I'll put the proverbial arm around his shoulder and let him know he is a top young striker. Might even give him a start in the next match in the FA Cup against Everton because he is genuinely that good and it will prove my faith in him, but it's also a bit of a risk as he does lack Composure and it will be a fairly high pressure match. So decisions to make.

So between that and writing all those rather wordy threads and posts about what I am seeing in the game, a season doesn't go by fast at all.

[kajito99]

Brilliant thread SFraser. Just wondering about Rooney in this tactic. Obviously he has very good creativity and flair but also the physical attributes to overpower an opponent aswell as outwit them. His goal tally is inevitably very good but I was thinking whether his main role given his phenomenal team work and work rate is to create space for the likes of Gourcuff and Ozil? Being the top scorer AND top assist-maker in this team of creative genius is something pretty special. I would imagine he has roaming on and mixed instructions?

[Bippu]

As much as FM is a tactical game, a football simulator, I have said all along that it is also an absolute beast of a roleplaying game with plenty of interaction between manager and ingame characters and hundreds of tiny little details of personalities to be tweaked and studied and to get involved with. For me the matchday is the culmination of all the little things done beforehand, it's where my players go out and display what an awesome club from top to bottom this club is, and it's my job to ensure that it is that awesome.

Sir, here I completely agree with you. In fact, I am even more extreme than you, although a lot less skilled and knowledgeable. I focus on these aspects and leave the less important matches in the hands of my Assistant Manager (he has to follow my tactics, of course). I try to make sure that I manage the side efficiently and when my ManU side goes out to play the likes of West Brom or Blackpool, my AM can get me a victory on his own. And that even if I reserve 2 slots out of 11 for my youngsters in these matches, I can still win.

I also differ with you on some other counts. I let my AM handle the press conferences because he is really good at that. Sometimes I play mind games or try to make a player not renew his contract who would otherwise only be available to me for something like $100M. All this is a lot of fun. To me, the only thing better than this is to see your team beat Barcelona 5-0 at home.

I am also a huge fan of youth development. I have started using your training theory to make personalized schedules for my future Thurams and Rooneys. A 16 year old with 14 marking, 16 tackling and 15 heading/jumping but 8 strength? Well, let's see if we can do something about. If not, he can always bring in some cash in the future. Unfortunately, this takes a long time and I will have to wait to see how sweet the fruits of this effort are.

Brilliant thread, of course. As usual

[SFraser]

Just wondering about Rooney in this tactic. Obviously he has very good creativity and flair but also the physical attributes to overpower an opponent aswell as outwit them. His goal tally is inevitably very good but I was thinking whether his main role given his phenomenal team work and work rate is to create space for the likes of Gourcuff and Ozil? Being the top scorer AND top assist-maker in this team of creative genius is something pretty special. I would imagine he has roaming on and mixed instructions?

You are not far off at all, here are his instructions:

Tactically speaking he is a "lone striker" in terms of formation position, but his instructions drop him slightly deeper relative to the rest of my team. By that I mean the tactical distance between the Striker and AMC is less than the distance between AMC and CM. So a slightly withdrawn lone striker. The key element here is that his tactical role is a cross between Striker and a Creative Forward so he has RFD Mixed, TTB Mixed, RWB Mixed, high Creative Freedom and Roaming. This is a role that enables a player to operate as a striker or as a link-up man for supporting runs and players.

Attribute wise that is precisely what Rooney is, a "Creative Spearhead" so to speak. He is not a pure striker nor is he a Berbatov style trequartista type player, but is in my opinion just about the perfect blend of all attributes necessary to make Rooney the ideal "modern forward". Imagine a cross between Eto'o and Ibrahimovic in terms of style, a striker one minute and a creative link-up man the next. Then add to the mix Rooney's excellent movement, his brilliant workrate, teamwork, aggression and determination. This is a player that concedes some technical finesse in return for a blend of striker and creator mental and physical attributes, finished off with a near unsurpassed level of involvement, action, will-to-win and work ethic for the team cause.

While you could say that Rooney is a jack of all trades and master of none, at the same time he is also the perfect hybrid player for playing the modern centreforward. He can threaten defensive lines directly with his movement and pace as a striker, he can function as an outlet for the counter-attack with his willingness to work for the team and chase passes and offer himself as an option constantly, and he can function as a playmaker either at the head of attacks playing that final killer ball or dropping slightly deeper to receive the ball. If ever you wanted a genuinely ideal lone striker, in my opinion Rooney is that player.

Ofcourse his lack of Technical Finesse is a weakness, but when absolutely everything else is going in his favour barring height for a forward then it is very little weakness at all. His attacking strengths outside his Technical Finesse are near perfect, made all the better due to sheer versality and capability of the player in those various roles.

If you look at the way football itself, in real life, is evolving with Messi and Ronaldo being "the ultimate wingers" and scoring 30+ goals a season as if they were strikers, then the actual centre forward role in football is becoming ever more a place for the creative players capable of playing intelligently against large numbers of opponents in close proximity. Strikers are moving towards the wing areas and the "number 10" or the creative deep forward is moving up to the lone striker position. And when you look at football in that context, in modern patterns of evolution of roles and positions, then Rooney with his creative ability, physical ability, workrate and team ethic, and his ability to actually threaten like a genuine striker soon starts to look like he might just be the closest thing to a "perfect modern forward" around. And so employing him as a "modern forward" in such a great team reaps the rewards of his abilities and lends weight to the validity of the idea. Atleast in FM anyway.

And that also helps to explain the performance of my wingers in terms of goals. Both Nani and Gourcuff have a tremendous goal return given their actual striker abilities but then they are operating in the ideal "modern striker" positions, which is down the wings. I am considering very much adding Aguero to this side but as a winger and not a striker, to have a genuinely utterly lethal striker with sufficient qualities in Creativity and Passing ability operating down my flanks. That might be a tad gamey as everyone goes for Aguero, but at the same time if the underlying concept is correct then Aguero on the wing could quite easilly kick the attacking quality of this side forward yet another level, far beyond anything achievable by playing Aguero in either the striker or AMC slots.

[kajito99]

So Rooney basically plays as a complete "false" forward with multiple options (including wingers with a more attacking mentality?) to supply as well a having the choice to go it alone. with his deficiencies in the air I assume you supply him to feet or do you not use a target man? I'm loving the Aguero idea btw - I would imagine he would be an improvement on Nani and indeed take your team to a whole new level of intelligence.

Just want to throw another question your way. Obviously with intelligent players like you have at your disposal less is more. So mixed instructions and much creative freedom is the way to go. However for players with average decisions but good creativity and flair would you be more likely to dish out the oftens for RWB, TTB and CB if they had sufficient attributes in these areas?

[John_Cro]

Very impressive, indeed. One of the football geniuses.

Cheers

[ZdlR]

However for players with average decisions but good creativity and flair would you be more likely to dish out the oftens for RWB, TTB and CB if they had sufficient attributes in these areas?

I'm not SFraser, nor do I hold the same gravitas as him, but I'll take a stab at this. It depends on what they can achieve technically. Players like Newcastle's Jonas (c:9, d:8, f:13) or Kazenga Lua Lua (c:12, d:6, f:17). These two are so one-dimensional it is terrifying. The temptation is to have them run with ball often, cutting inside from the AMR or AML position and playing the shortest and simplest pass they can. Giving them a fairly high mentality will mean that they take players on with their dribbling (I find a normal mentality makes players reluctant to go on mazy dribbles or try to beat their man). But it also means that they will be more likely to lose the ball. Giving them a moderate creative freedom will increase the likelihood that they will disobey your orders and do something utterly stupid. They are, to all intents and purposes, quite useless.

I guess I'm just angry that my beloved Newcastle are so hamstrung in the first season - lots of overpaid wastrels that you simply cannot get rid of but aren't good enough once you escape from the Championship (which is a relatively easy task due to the club's reputation) The AI frequently turns them in the new West Brom, anually vascillating between promotion and relegation.

[Frag]

How do you use your wide men ie. Ozil and Gourcuff? I can't seem to make my wide players work as effectively as I'd like. They either stay out wide too much or come inside FAR too often and therefore, ruining the shape of the team. I've watched a couple of your PKM's and really like the way your wide players play. Any tips?

[SFraser]

Just want to throw another question your way. Obviously with intelligent players like you have at your disposal less is more. So mixed instructions and much creative freedom is the way to go. However for players with average decisions but good creativity and flair would you be more likely to dish out the oftens for RWB, TTB and CB if they had sufficient attributes in these areas?

That ultimately depends on your own personal style. Do you want players taking these risks that might just come off, or do you want them keeping it simple so they don't give away possession too easilly? My personal style is to take those risks with players, even particularly poor ones. I do this because poor players can develop, poor players might actually offer something to the team you wouldn't expect like for example Nani actually being nearly unstoppable when running with the ball and having one hell of a long range shot on him, or you can say "well it's not working son" and move the player on.

Ofcourse if some particular player is really wasting the ball all the time for no effect then yes I will take a reactive approach to controlling his on pitch behaviour, but I very rarely pro-actively manipulate action behaviour. If you manipulate action behaviour before you understand the player then you are not really seeing what he can offer properly. I take a pro-active approach to shape, strategy, general footballing ideas for my team but I take a very reactive and very liberal approach with my players. I would rather reduce a players crossing or throughballs than reduce his ability to pull something special out of the bag in every other area.

But that's just me though. I have my very own particular philosophy and style when it comes to FM. It's not necessarilly better or worse than anyone elses approach, but I think people may find it useful for me to explain my approach to FM in this manner. It's not all about fine tuning vague behaviour sliders and hunting for the elusive perfect combination of action instructions, it's just about watching and reacting and watching again and reacting again and so on untill you have automatically tweaked your ideal system without trying to figure it all out like a mathematical equation.

How do you use your wide men ie. Ozil and Gourcuff? I can't seem to make my wide players work as effectively as I'd like. They either stay out wide too much or come inside FAR too often and therefore, ruining the shape of the team. I've watched a couple of your PKM's and really like the way your wide players play. Any tips?

This would be an ideal example of what I was talking about above.

-A slightly higher than mid point width for my team so my wide players are neither excessively wide nor narrow but tending towards a bit of width as width helps to create space for attacks.

-About 3/4 of maximum attacking mentality as I want my players higher up the pitch leaning towards attacking football without being excessively so.

-Very high closing down, near to maximum, as I want that ball back.

-Passing style towards the Direct side of Mixed, so it remains Mixed and players can do what they like but with a tendency towards the attacking pass.

-Very High Creative Freedom, maxed if possible as that's how I like my football, Creative and players Free to express themselves.

-Tackling Easy as the timewasting opponents will fall over at the slightest hint of anything other than a perfect tackle, and because my wingers will probably be skinned if they dive in at the first sight of the ball.

-Run From Deep Mixed, I want them to try to split the defence when it looks on.

-RWB Mixed, likewise they can try to skin a player if it looks on.

-TTB Mixed, yet again same as the above, it's another option for them if they want it.

-Longshots rare, this doesn't stop them trying longshots but it does mean they will only do it when it looks like a real golden chance. Or the only possible course of action but I rarely see that cause for longshots in my team.

-Crosses rare, again the same as above, my team isn't the best in the air or at converting crosses so it's an option only when it's a glorious and completely unmissable opportunity to deliver a perfect ball.

-Cross from Mixed, if they are only going to cross when it's a brilliant opportunity then they can do it from wherever they like.

-Cross aim Mixed, a bit pointless telling them to aim at a specific aerial weakling when the whole crossing system is set up to only occur when it's a glorious chance.

-Wideplay Normal. This is a key one as wideplay normal allows the player to go inside or outside as and when they choose. It doesn't force them into the channels either. It gives them wideplay freedom.

-Swap Position No.

-Marking Default. This will change as I use my shouts to control defensive behaviour.

-Tight Marking Default for the same reason.

-Roam From Position, a resounding yes. Move around, exploit space, go wide if there is space wide, go infield if there space infield, just make sure you move around.

-Hold Up Ball, no. No need for it as my Tempo is not excessive and I want to play slow football when slow is best or quick football when quick is best. You wont get many sound, sensible, short one-touch passes with HUB kicking around.

The overwhelming majority of these instructions are just generic guides to a general style of play. There is very little specific detail beyond a focus on creative attacking play with plenty of movement and plenty of options. None of this needs to be absolutely notch perfect, just guide the team in the direction you want to play. In this case a creative, attacking, pass-and-move game with the opportunity for the odd flash of a peachy dribble or a defence splitting throughball or a sneaky run from behind the fullback whenever it looks like a good idea.

[mdbussen]

Another fascinating post with a lot of insight Most of it is very easy to understand but there are couple of points I wanted to highlight/get more clarification on:

-Wideplay Normal. This is a key one as wideplay normal allows the player to go inside or outside as and when they choose. It doesn't force them into the channels either. It gives them wideplay freedom.

I found this very interesting. If I am reading this correctly, it is your contention that "Normal" wideplay instructions, rather than instructing a player more or less to move vertically up and down the field relative to their "normal" position as shown on the tactics diagram, actually allows them freedom of movement with regards to wideplay? While setting a specific wideplay instruction actually acts as a limiter on their movement by preferentially instructing them to drift wider or narrower even if this is not where the "space" is on the field?

-Roam From Position, a resounding yes. Move around, exploit space, go wide if there is space wide, go infield if there space infield, just make sure you move around.

I have asked this before but never received a clear answer - how does Roam from Position work with respect to the wideplay instructions (as well as RFD or other positioning instructions)? I had always heard that Roaming more or less "unhinges" a player from taking up a static position on the field and lets him use his ability to take up positions in space but if this is true than it would appear that setting RFD or Wideplay instructions on a player who also has Roaming ticked would be useless.

It seems to me that the more likely effect is that ticking "Roaming" causes a player to roam in the space around what his normal "position" would be on the field, so that setting Wideplay instructions would cause him to Roam wider/narrower than normal while setting RFD would cause him to tend to roam further up the field. This is only a theory though...

[The Tactician]

SFraser, do you use Anderson much? You mention him a few times and I see in one of your screenshots you still have him but I was doing something similar to this and played him as a hard-working deep-lying playmaker and he just played an outrageous through ball to Rooney which we won 1-0. He has attributes such as: Dribbling 15; First Touch 16; Passing 15; Technique 17; Creativity 14; Flair 14; Anticipation 13; Off-The-Ball 13; Teamwork 15 and, bar jumping, some if the best physical attributes on the game. I'm training him intensively on tactics to try and improve his mentals but he is capable of some superb play.

Also, I often use Scholes and Giggs but I was astonsihed to see, as from the beginning of the game, Scholes has flair 10 whilst Giggs has 17, Giggs regularly outshines him on FM and has more assists and apps consequently. At the start of the game, how did you get the best from Scholes? At the moment, Giggs is a key player and usually a must in the starting XI whereas I find myself leaving Scholes out unfortunately. Later on, if it's okay with you of course, I'll show some screenshots of some of the play in my games because it's outstanding at the moment following some of the principles in this thread!

[tobbie]

Sfraser, Will you upload you're tactic please. I would like to play with it.

[andrjam]

Sfraser, Will you upload you're tactic please. I would like to play with it.

Mate his tatcic is practically laid out for you in the first few posts with screen shots just copy it into your own tactic easy =)

[rotfleo]

Mate his tatcic is practically laid out for you in the first few posts with screen shots just copy it into your own tactic easy =)

ye man because upload the tactic is harder ah?

[themadsheep2001]

he isnt going to upload a tactic because he adapts to each game as it comes. there is more than enough here for you create a framework for your own side

[grimness]

All the instructions are in this topic so it's not that hard to replicate it and use as starting point for your own.

[rotfleo]

for example i cant find the defenders instructions ...

[grimness]

First of all I didn't want to sound patronizing or anything like that. Point of this thread is to show how basic instructions can be used for players playing their own game.

For centerbacks just use default settings. Since there is screenshot of individual mentalities they are probably both on default Defend.

I have used SFrasers way of setting instructions and tweak things with shouts like Play wider or narrower, Exploit flanks or middle and Take a breather, but mostly Retain possession or Get ball forward.

Influenced by this thread I also started big club save and took Inter as I wanted to have relaxed game. I brought only one player and that is Affellay from PSV as I needed depth in front four.

Instead of using tweaks to the basic tactic I choose players. If I needed inside forwards I played wingers on wrong foot and they would cut inside when they felt or if I needed width I used them normally.

For heavy games I had counter tactic made in TC without any tweaking except Exploit flanks or middle.

I didn't want any micro management as I felt this is pretty much realistic way to play. Even not that creative player will do his job regardless of high creative freedom as he won't know how to fully use it. I haven't seen Muntari or Marigga trying anything spectacular. If I needed two powerful defensive players I'd just put them in the game and they would do their job. Win the ball and move it forward without any eccentricity.

[Jenko_EFC]

That was a really good read SFraser. Thoroughly enjoyed it I also enjoyed those PKM's. Call me "sad" but I liked pausing play when a high flair player got the ball and thinking about what he's going to do with it!

In regards to creativity and flair, in my Everton save, I have grown a particular affection towards off the ball and anticipation for my forwards, creativty and flair for my creative players and prioritise decisions and positioning in my defensive players. I like movement in my forwards, creativity in my supporting players and want good decisions mainly in my backline. I don't have a particular system, though.

Really like that Sandro, immense player. I like Jack Rodwell as a holding player as he has decent stats there already but he has 5 flair and 8 off the ball. His off the ball can be trained up and isn't that important but I would like him making a few RFD's but his flair can't be trained unfortunately and is similar to Carrick in that respect. Whereas Sandro is awesome with more than double that.

[Romanista1994]

That was a really good read SFraser. Thoroughly enjoyed it I also enjoyed those PKM's. Call me "sad" but I liked pausing play when a high flair player got the ball and thinking about what he's going to do with it!

In regards to creativity and flair, in my Everton save, I have grown a particular affection towards off the ball and anticipation for my forwards, creativty and flair for my creative players and prioritise decisions and positioning in my defensive players. I like movement in my forwards, creativity in my supporting players and want good decisions mainly in my backline. I don't have a particular system, though.

Really like that Sandro, immense player. I like Jack Rodwell as a holding player as he has decent stats there already but he has 5 flair and 8 off the ball. His off the ball can be trained up and isn't that important but I would like him making a few RFD's but his flair can't be trained unfortunately and is similar to Carrick in that respect. Whereas Sandro is awesome with more than double that.

Good that you mentioned Rodwell, as I have a question about him for SFraser.

My question is, if his defensive stats in your game were to be good enough would you partner Sandro with Rodwell in the centre of defence in the future to acheive that ultimate sexy play?

Rodwell's creativity and passing are decent and he is already able in the CB position, while his low flair might hinder him higher up the pitch.

And I agree with Jenko, this thread was an excellent read.

[Chase Failey]

sorry for the brutal uppage

was wondering if anyone had tried fraser's ideology in fm11? looks very tempting

[grimness]

I believe many did. It works even with non-world class players. Ofc some moves can't go as often as with top teams but still it can be entertaining. You won't overachieve but also you won't fail badly.

[...Eternal Sin...]

SFraser how you set the 2DC's? When we have FB's set as wing back attack is hard to set up 2 central defenders how you deal with this? And what instruction you have for the second MC? I think he need to be a player ho can destroy opponnent attacks and help in defence.