FM13 Arsenal Thread - Victoria Concordia Crescit

[1984mattyd]

what team Philosophy do you use if you don't mind me asking?

attacking and balanced, it can be a bit dodgy sometimes but i guess every formation is, but in that team it got youngsters in

-----------szchesney------------

vrsaljko koscielney vermaelen gibbs

------------frimpong------------------

----------vidal wilshere ---------------

oxlade-----------------------podolski

--------------walcott-----------------

is my preffered lineup, podolski or gervinho can play the aml position, i prefer podolski for his finishing but gervinho for his dribbling, oxlade really does excell at the amr position and where vidal is you can play diaby there fine and he does well there

[dily]

ive kept him on loan..going to use him this season..3 star is what he is predicted to be. think will be a very good squad player and home grown too..

[Carmi88]

Starting to regret my contract negotiating skills... forked out 1.5 million because Falcao was top scorer, and 2.3 million split between Song, Walcott and Falcao for being in Team of the year.

[dily]

added Ginaluca Caprai on a free..comes very highly rated..

[1984mattyd]

Starting to regret my contract negotiating skills... forked out 1.5 million because Falcao was top scorer, and 2.3 million split between Song, Walcott and Falcao for being in Team of the year.

how many goals did falcao score for you and in how many games did he play, is he really worth buying, i have seen him on transfer by request but for his value/wage/other contract stuff i cant seem to bring myself to it to justify it

[Carmi88]

He got something like 14 goals in 6 months when i got him in January, and in the second season he grabbed 27 in the league, and a few in the CL. Can't give exact numbers as im hosting a network game at the mo

[SteveUK]

I drew Schalke, Montpellier and Spartak Moscow, and strangely got Reading too in the League Cup, spooky!

[Big Yellow]

so it looks like the ME is not flawed at all after watching the Arsenal match this weekend LOL!!

so after a bit more tinkering, i restarted again and only made 2 major signings.

i signed cavani and gotze to bolster my attacking options.

i am playing a 4231 narrow formation, with the 3 AM as carzola, wilshere, and gotze (carzola and gotze set as IF in the narrow possitions).

i am utilizing WB on a support role to give me width.

playing on very fluid attacking style, i have gone undefeated till the end of the January transfer window!

when i bring in pod and walcott off the bench, i move the IF out wide.

also have my 2 central mids set on defensive duties.

thanks to Llama for the tips!!

[SteveUK]

Up to 150mil spent, just signed Hummels as he wanted a move to a bigger club, he comes in january, was definitely one of my planned buys for the future so was not an impulse buy, but still i shouldnt be allowed to go shopping

[1984mattyd]

Up to 150mil spent, just signed Hummels as he wanted a move to a bigger club, he comes in january, was definitely one of my planned buys for the future so was not an impulse buy, but still i shouldnt be allowed to go shopping

thats a good buy though, i always want to buy him but when i got kos and vermaelen its hard to want to get hummels unless i play 3 cbs, but burdisso from boca is great for 5mill! and has italian passport

[Big Yellow]

tried signing hummels too, but they wouldnt sell him to me. Probably because i already signed gotze from them.

[SteveUK]

Think the board are crazy they just increased my transfer budget from the initial 38mil to 60mil:eek:

[marks91]

I've started an Arsenal save and trying to manage the club properly after a few other saves resulted in reckless panic buys and tactics being blown apart.

Taken my time setting up scout assignments, tactics, staff etc and just played my first three games;

Won 4-0 at home v Norwich playing a fluid 4-2-3-1

Lost 1-0 to City and 2-0 to Chelsea playing a balanced 4-1-2-2-1

Not the start I was looking for but I'm hoping I can improve by analysing the match stats rather than flying through to the next game hoping I can get back to winning ways!

Not made any signings so far but I think I will focus mainly on the youth as like most clubs, there's a lot of rubbish in there at the start.

This proper management malarkey is giving me headaches. So much to think about!

[Rigga89]

I'm back fiddling about with transfers in August, having grown frustrated with what I'd done previously. I bet Wenger wishes he could do the same

I'm not sure it's quite in the spirit of FM to go back and start again when you've made a mistake, but I want to get off to solid start before I begin rolling with the punches a little more in future.

[gholliday87]

Thinking of starting a new game tonight, planning on playing 4-1-2-2-1...may retrain Theo as an AMC, anyone played Ox as a AMC? My only worry with this formation is width, but hopefully Sanga (when fit) and Gibbs will provide that as full backs on the wing back setting

[Ben_reeson]

Struggling to get Cazorla to play well, I think his average rating is around 6.3.

I'm playing him in the whole behind Giroud at the minute as an Attacking Midfielder, Steve Bould suggests hes struggling to blend into the side

and also he has got hard any assists or goals, I was really looking forward to getting him playing in this game as hes immense but he has failed to impress.

I'm thinking of buying Isco to play centre and playing Cazorla out wide as a retrained left inside forward so he can cut in and unleash some shots.

At the minute my Midfield is

Podolski Cazorla Walcott/OX

Bender Arteta (until Wilshere is fit)

Im 4th in the league after 10 games, but have struggled to see out games even when 2-0 up like we normally get to.

[error]

He could do, or he could not. Determination isn't guaranteed to decrease or increase from tutoring and from experience if two players don't get on there won't be any change; if there is, it's minuscule at best.

Tutoring isn't an easy thing to get right as you can't easily predict if two players will get along or not. Fortunately, players can be tutored more than once so if your Ramsey has lost points, he can still reclaim them.

Didn't realise that, thanks

[error]

Cazorla plays well AML AP (a), I was using him in the AMC but changed my formation and tried him there and is playing much better

[Guest]

Corzorla injured for 5-6 weeks , First season I have unchanged team but not sure who to play in his position?

He was playing as a AP/A in amc position , I have Wilshire,Ramsey,Diaby,Arshavin not sure who's best?

cheers

[1984mattyd]

Corzorla injured for 5-6 weeks , First season I have unchanged team but not sure who to play in his position?

He was playing as a AP/A in amc position , I have Wilshire,Ramsey,Diaby,Arshavin not sure who's best?

cheers

wilshere without a doubt for a playmaker hands down, hes my number 1 playmaker in my team

[max787]

Season 2 update: THE REGENS ARE COMING!

So, season 1 went pretty downhill in the last 2-3 months, loads of draws unfortunately, and I ended up finishing 2nd in the league. During the summer I scouted extensively, signed 12 regens most of which have 5 star potential, I've offloaded a few players to make room for the outstanding regens. I made no first team signings and my squad is very similar to season 1, except the backup team has changed a bit, here is my squad this season:

GK: Chez / Mannone / regen (nowhere near good enough for now)

RB: Sagna / Jenks

LB: Honda / Kohoutek (Promising regen who has very good physical and defensive stats, but his mentals are sorely lacking!)

CB: Verms / Kos

CB: Papadopolous / Mei Feng (Regen who is a CM that I'm retraining to CB, could be an excellent BPD but his height is a worry, only 1.78m)

RM: Chambo (20 flair ) / Theo

LM: Wilshere / Podolski

CM: Ramsey / Arteta

CM: Hamsik / Perez (Awesome regen, only 16 but has incredible stats for his age!)

AMC: Cazorla / Adryan (Developing nicely, now has 17 determination)

ST: Giroud / Bakkali (developing very well, his determination is now 16!! it was 8 last summer)

Next summer I'll be offloading Koscielny, Podolski, possibly Sagna, and depending on how Adryan develops I might get rid of Cazorla as well.

I love Koscielny but he's now a back-up and I went a better mentor for my regens, same for Cazorla, and Podolski isn't worth his wages.

Right now the risk os that I develop my regens to the detriment of team performances (ironic in an Arsenal context), so I need to try and find a balance between results and development. At the moment I have 3 outstanding regens who could become an integral part of the team in 2-3 seasons so their development will be prioritised over the other regens.

[Guest]

wilshere without a doubt for a playmaker hands down, hes my number 1 playmaker in my team

that's what I was thinking , worst time for injury as I'm in a busy period (December)

cheers

[max787]

Can anyone recommend a decent backup CB who would be a fantastic mentor? Minimum of 18 determination + good personality

A good LM mentor would be helpful too.

[1984mattyd]

Can anyone recommend a decent backup CB who would be a fantastic mentor? Minimum of 18 determination + good personality

A good LM mentor would be helpful too.

get burdisso from boca, his determination is 16 but his stats for a backup cb is awesome! argentinian with italian passport and you can get him between 4.5 - 6 mill

[1984mattyd]

Season 2 update: THE REGENS ARE COMING!

So, season 1 went pretty downhill in the last 2-3 months, loads of draws unfortunately, and I ended up finishing 2nd in the league. During the summer I scouted extensively, signed 12 regens most of which have 5 star potential, I've offloaded a few players to make room for the outstanding regens. I made no first team signings and my squad is very similar to season 1, except the backup team has changed a bit, here is my squad this season:

GK: Chez / Mannone / regen (nowhere near good enough for now)

RB: Sagna / Jenks

LB: Honda / Kohoutek (Promising regen who has very good physical and defensive stats, but his mentals are sorely lacking!)

CB: Verms / Kos

CB: Papadopolous / Mei Feng (Regen who is a CM that I'm retraining to CB, could be an excellent BPD but his height is a worry, only 1.78m)

RM: Chambo (20 flair ) / Theo

LM: Wilshere / Podolski

CM: Ramsey / Arteta

CM: Hamsik / Perez (Awesome regen, only 16 but has incredible stats for his age!)

AMC: Cazorla / Adryan (Developing nicely, now has 17 determination)

ST: Giroud / Bakkali (developing very well, his determination is now 16!! it was 8 last summer)

Next summer I'll be offloading Koscielny, Podolski, possibly Sagna, and depending on how Adryan develops I might get rid of Cazorla as well.

I love Koscielny but he's now a back-up and I went a better mentor for my regens, same for Cazorla, and Podolski isn't worth his wages.

Right now the risk os that I develop my regens to the detriment of team performances (ironic in an Arsenal context), so I need to try and find a balance between results and development. At the moment I have 3 outstanding regens who could become an integral part of the team in 2-3 seasons so their development will be prioritised over the other regens.

sounds like how im doing mine but your playing a risk with all your back up as regens, could work against you if you get an injury crisis! i would ditch sagna while u get decent money for him and get varsjko from dinamo as hes as good as or get corchia. do you still have martinez in your reserves?? if you do keep him, his stats will go up pretty well if you tutor him with chez

[Guest]

Is Hamsik good as a ball winning midfielder?

Im also looking at Lars Bender not sure which would cost less?

cheers

[max787]

get burdisso from boca, his determination is 16 but his stats for a backup cb is awesome! argentinian with italian passport and you can get him between 4.5 - 6 mill

Thanks, I'll have a look

sounds like how im doing mine but your playing a risk with all your back up as regens, could work against you if you get an injury crisis! i would ditch sagna while u get decent money for him and get varsjko from dinamo as hes as good as or get corchia. do you still have martinez in your reserves?? if you do keep him, his stats will go up pretty well if you tutor him with chez

Agreed, results are already suffering this season!

Martinez has been sold, but chez's stats are so good, and he's so young, that he'll probably be my GK for a decade

I've been thinking about getting rid of Sagna, I know that I probably should, but he's one of the few current Arsenal players that I actually love! Sentimentality getting in the way...

[max787]

Is Hamsik good as a ball winning midfielder?

Im also looking at Lars Bender not sure which would cost less?

cheers

Hamsik would probably be wasted as a BWM, also, he only has 10 workrate...

I personally use him as a DLP, awesome in that position and scores a surprising amount of goals

[Rigga89]

Very pleased with my latest 2 acquisitions. Fellaini and Cavani both got listed for transfer in August by request but there were no takers. By late September their value and asking price had fallen to £13.25m and £19.25m, respectively. With results beginning to go their teams' way and a chance they'd become happy at their clubs again I didn't want to wait any longer for a possible reduction of just a few hundred thousand more so I made non-negotiable bids of £12.75m and £18.75m. Both are now due to arrive on January 1st, but their wage demands are pretty large. I'm going to have to be quite frugal next summer to make sure I don't cripple us financially.

August transfers out:

Gervinho

Per Mertesacker

Abou Diaby

Andrey Arshavin

Johan Djourou

Lukasz Fabianski

Sebastian Squillaci

Major loans out:

Tomas Rosicky

Andre Santos

Marouane Chamakh

August Transfers in:

Kurt Zouma

David Alaba

Kyriakos Papadopolous

Granit Xhaka

Demba Ba

Paule Quaye

Wellington Nem

Mason Bennett

Mattheus

Sergio Garufi

Neal Maupay

Adryan

Michael Gregoritsch

Transfers coming in January:

Edinson Cavani

Marouane Fellaini

Doria

Alan Dzagoev

Now let's make sure my results match my spending!

[max787]

How much did you pay for Kurt Zouma? I've wanted him ever since the first season but Etienne want 40-50 million

[llama3]

Is Hamsik good as a ball winning midfielder?

Im also looking at Lars Bender not sure which would cost less?

cheers

would be an incredible waste of a supreme attacking talent

[Rigga89]

How much did you pay for Kurt Zouma? I've wanted him ever since the first season but Etienne want 40-50 million

Got him for around £20m, with a few other incentives on top if he does well domestically and internationally. For the first season he's on loan with Swansea.

[1984mattyd]

capital one victory in the final over spurs, 2-1! days after beating ac milan at their place in the champion league knock out round 1 leg one 4-1! top of the league by a superior goal difference with liverpool behind me in 2nd!

[llama3]

Nice work beating Spurs.

[Rigga89]

Season update:

19th Aug - Sp*rs - H - 4-1 win

25th Aug - Southampton - A - 2-1 win

3rd Sept - Norwich - H - 3-0 win

15th Sept - Swansea - A - 3-1 loss

18th Sept - Juventus (CL) - A - 4-1 loss

22nd Sept - Chelsea - A - 1-0 win

25th Sept - Brentford (COC) - H - 2-1 win

29th Sept - West Brom - H - 2-0 win

3rd Oct - B. Dortmund - H - 3-1 win

6th Oct - Man. United - H - 2-0 win.....I didn't deserve this win at all, they had more possession and many more shots but we defended valiantly and really capitalised on the chances we had.

So I've just hit the international break 2nd in the league, trailing City on goal difference. Swansea and Aston Villa make up the top 4. Sp*rs sit in 7th, Chelsea 9th, Liverpool 11th and United 13th.

After a disappointing away loss to Juventus in my CL group I'm in 3rd with 3 points, trailing Juventus and Valencia who each have 4 points. It's a tough group but I should hopefully recover from the drubbing Juventus gave me.

[SteveUK]

So with 18 games of the EPL Played(11 wins, 6 draws, 1 loss to fulham away), im sitting joint top with City on 39 points, United and Everton on 37 each and Chelski on 33.

Am into the Semi finals of the league cup , VS Fulham, with Nottingham forest and Newcastle the other semi final.

In my Champions league group of Schalke, Spartak Moscow and Montpellier, i won 5 of 6 games the loss coming in the final match, Schalke needed a win and for me to beat Spartak away to get through in 2nd place, but i aint doing them no favours:p and stuck out a team of youth, that achieved a respectable 1-0 loss, with Spartak through in 2nd and the germans sulking their way to the euro cup

FA Cup ive been drawn away to barnsley.

Top performers are - Giroud, 17 goals and 5 assists in 23 games. Yarmolenko, 10 goals and 9 assists in 23 games and Walcott, 8 goals and 12 assists in 26 games.

Prepping a bid for Falcao in the 33mil region as hes been transfer listed, as Demba ba and Kweuke have not hit the ground running, though i only bought them to sell on for profit if im honest.

[llama3]

A poor recent run of results, culminating with losing 1-0 at White Hart Lane. Spurs went down to 10 men in the first half, I was gradually controlling the game more and more before a Spurs penalty was given (proven post-match not to be a foul) and Diaby got a 2nd yellow for something he said to the referee. I go on to lose 1-0 to that Adebayor penalty.

[Rigga89]

So I'm really happy with how my team are playing apart from 1 thing; they're never incisive enough on the break. They seem to want to play the patient, probing game around the edge of the area even when they've got a chance to counter and have the numerical advantage. Will checking the counter attack option resolve this or is there more that needs to be done to see that they make the most of breakaway opportunities?

[SteveUK]

You probably need to switch the the style button to fluid/very fluid for those parts of play, course that depends how you view the game, so if you chose counter strategy that should make you counter obviously and then the fluid option should make that strategy quicker, atleast thats how i see it, i could be wrong.

[Rigga89]

It's not so much that, I play most games with a Fluid & Attacking 4-2-3-1 that allows me to dominate possession and territory most games, it's just occasions where we may head a corner clear and it falls to the feet of Walcott/the Ox/Cazorla and they'll burst down the wings towards the opponent's final third with passing options across the box but instead turn back and hold the play up until Giroud, Arteta and Wilshere are there for the pass across the box maybe 25 yards out from goal rather than taking the early pass and catching them off guard.

[SteveUK]

Took Falcao 6minutes to get his first goal, but Giroud didnt want to be out done so nabbed a hattrick, this on the 1st of January Vs Sunderland away, the new year is looking bright indeed

[max787]

Took Falcao 6minutes to get his first goal, but Giroud didnt want to be out done so nabbed a hattrick, this on the 1st of January Vs Sunderland away, the new year is looking bright indeed

Do you play 2 up top? Falcao looks awesome, I can't justify his price though.

[max787]

My 4-4-1-1 tactic has inexplicably stopped working since May basically, It's now January...

I've upped creative freedom, it's a bit better already teams might be playing more defensively against me and my players were too restricted to break through.

[SteveUK]

Do you play 2 up top? Falcao looks awesome, I can't justify his price though.

They wanted 45mil when he first requested a transfer at start of December but it dropped to 33mil, his value is 26mil so i didnt think it would drop anymore.

I have two tactics now, i play a 451 with wingers when i'm away or just generally want to be more defensive, and a 41212(narrow diamond 442 really) with Falcao as poacher and Giroud as Target man, ive only used this tactic in one match so far but we won that 4-0 against sunderland as i mentioned, so fingers crossed it will continue to shine .

[llama3]

nice work there Steve

[Carmi88]

Signed a couple of 5 star regens after the second season, a left back, a right back, a attacking midfielder and 3 strikers, will pop some screen shots up later, just needing a cheap and young centre back to cover vermaelen, djourou and koscielny.

Any suggestions? I was gonna go for a regen but they are all asking for far too much got 23 million to spend but preferably I want to spend under 10 due to previous seasons spending. Only retained the league last year and aiming for a cup to go along with it this time round

[SteveUK]

Kirchoff from Mainz is pretty good, you can get him for bang on 10mil if hes still there, he might of moved to Dortmund, also Burdisso from Boca Juniors looks promising, Mattyd pointed him out to me yesterday, hes around 6mil

[llama3]

I have got 3 new 4.5* regens from the academy. Delighted at that! Need to find a new left back now though.

[marks91]

My 4-2-3-1 and 4-1-2-2-1 formations were not working and I was ready to jack it in.

Then I remembered a tactic I used which worked so well on FM12 with big clubs (which I downloaded off this forum, not mine sadly!) and thought I would give it a go seeing I was desperate. It will probably look familiar...

I starting using this after losing to Man United...

The games haven't been as close as the scorelines suggest and the goals being scored would have Wenger and the Arsenal fans salivating IRL. Even Chakmakh is scoring

Early days I know and I do feel bad that I've not been able to create a tactic what I can call my own but I just wasn't going anywhere apart from out of the running in the league and cups.

The only other negative using this tactic is that it's going to be hard to utilise The Ox within it.

I'll keep going with it for the time being though, well, until guilt starts to get the better of me!

[iArsenal]

So I am thinking about trying to replicate the "Invincibles" of 03-04 and I was wondering if any of you guys knew of players to fill the roles those guys did?

http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/02/12/teams-of-the-decade-9-arsenal-2001-04/

I've looked at this site for inspiration as the tactic that we used back then and I was going to try and use a 4-2-3-1 but 3 AMC's 2 MC's instead of wingers?