FM15: Southampton F.C. - #WeMarchOn

[RTHerringbone]

PIs for the 4-1-4-1 were:

GK Pass It Shorter, Fewer Risky Passes, Distribute To Centre Backs

DL/R Pass It Shorter, Fewer Risky Passes

DC Pass It Shorter, Close Down Much Less

DM Close Down Less, Pass It Shorter

ML, MCL, MCR Shoot Less Often

ST Shoot Less Often

[arsenal1975]

Pool is offering 33,5M (9M upfront) for JWP. I made him captain in the summer (starting 2nd season). Thoughts?

[RTHerringbone]

It has been a while, and I realised I hadn't posted a thing about season four, so here it is:

A proper clean up of the trophies, a nice big stadium capacity and upgrades to facilities too. The league ended with a defeat late on to ruin our chances of emulating Arsenal's Invincibles season.

A great league season with the most goals scored and the fewest conceded, implying that the 5-3-2 worked a treat

On the back of that, transfer activity for season five have been as follows:

The P-SG offer for Clyne was just silly as it can rise to over £55m when all instalments are paid, considering I can pick up the younger Stones for less than half that, the coffers swell again.

The delay in posting was partly because my head was turned by a Roma save, but that wasn't clicking as well as this save. I will flit between the two, but I'm enjoying a good start to season five having reverted back to a slightly tweaked 4-1-4-1, so I'll see how we go.

[Chasjs]

I've signed Tah on loan from HSV with a £7m option in my second season, seems like a very promising player. He's young, big and strong. He's currently 4th choice behind Shawcross, Dier and M Keane. My issue with him is his stats, His Marking, Heading, Tackling and Positioning are all in the 11-13 range, as are his First Touch, Passing and Technique and his concentration is 9. Contemplating either retraining his position or giving him heavy training in on defensive stats.

And no deal on JWP. It'd take something ridiculous for me to contemplate selling him and even if I did I don't think I'd be able to attract the calibre of player I'd need to replace him with just yet, even with all that money to spend.

[john1]

Good to see you're back with Saints RTH

[danthemanwhocan]

SO i am in my second season with Soton. Sitting top. Unbeaten with no losses and one draw.

Will post screenies when I get home. I took a massive risk with getting rid of almost everyone except, Prowse, Clyne, Targett, Cork and Schidy and I thnk a few more.

But I did bring in, Depay, Bakkakali (FT), Grealish (FT), Savitsky (FT), Delle Ali, Gaston Gil Romero, Balanta, Peruzzi, A romanian Keeper who I cant remember, and a few more signings.

[danthemanwhocan]

Pool is offering 33,5M (9M upfront) for JWP. I made him captain in the summer (starting 2nd season). Thoughts?

I would keep him. Has been sensational for me.

Only way that would tempt me is if 65-95 percent were upfront. I hate clause ridden transfers

[rjxhart]

How is everyone playing Pelle? He's so horrible for me, tried all sorts of roles, PIs and TIs to accomodate him but I just can't hit it, so I'm playing Long upfront and relying on him and my AM's for the goals. What role do you play him in? PIs? What formation? etc.

Thanks :o

[RTHerringbone]

Pelle was more than effective as a CF (Support) in a 4-1-4-1 for me. I sold him after a season, but that was just because I thought I could sell him for a decent wad and sign a longer term replacement for the same money.

[RTHerringbone]

Flying through season five now. From a squad management point of view, its beginning to get interesting. I sold the likes of Coates and Mammana as they were stop gap players whilst we improved. However, I'm finding the big clubs circling now. Clyne went, but Alcacer has also gone since Arsenal offered a huge sum for him which could rise to £63m. I signed him for £16m so its a massive profit, and he'll be replaced for around £7m.

I'll probably sell Correa as I'm committed to the 5-3-2 and he isn't great in the central MC or ST slots. In scouring Brazil, I spotted another decent young playmaker / striker to replace him too; again in the £7-10m bracket. I have re-signed Luke Shaw for £21m (which includes £2m that goes straight back to us!) as he was listed by request at United. Lucas Moura could be sold, as his performances are attracting attention so his sale value can be pushed up easily. Money isn't an issue for us now, but I can see my usual tendency of selling "real" players to replace them with newgens kicking in. I would expect to have a fully newgen squad by season nine.

[Britton5]

Decided to start a save as Southampton now and I want to prove I can manage a smaller club. Going to set up 3 tactics for myself. 4-3-3 dm, 5-3-2 and 4-3-3 2dm's. Hoping that these can be used efficiently during my reign as manager. Any ideas of how to employ them and who to buy would be appreciated.

[RTHerringbone]

What does a 4-3-3 with two DMs look like?! :confused:

Flat four, 2 DMs, a MC then AML/R and ST?

[Britton5]

Yeah thats the one mate. On paper looks like it could work

[RTHerringbone]

At the start, Saints have a decent squad but with some lack of quality depth at the back. That would be the area to focus on at the start, because the starting squad is good enough to service those three systems from the midfield forwards. If you lose a central defender to injury or suspension, it can become tricky. I'd say you'll struggle to get enough quality into the back three of a 5-3-2 with the default squad.

[Britton5]

Thanks for the advice. I am looking at bringing in some better defenders and i don't trust 3 out of the 4 CB's that i start with.

[heron]

What does a 4-3-3 with two DMs look like?! :confused:

Flat four, 2 DMs, a MC then AML/R and ST?

I presume a bit like Holland used in 2010/12, like described here: http://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2010/aug/04/the-question-is-4-2-1-3-the-future

[Britton5]

My inability to convert chances is so frustrating. 17 shots, 10 on target and 0 goals.

[Britton5]

I presume a bit like Holland used in 2010/12, like described here: http://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2010/aug/04/the-question-is-4-2-1-3-the-future

Yeah thats the one. It is a pre-set formation on the game.

[Britton5]

Cant get any of the formations to work for me no matter what even though 2 of them are the correct formations for my squad

[Bigpapa42]

My inability to convert chances is so frustrating. 17 shots, 10 on target and 0 goals.

There are typically reasons why those chances aren't being converted. Use the statistical analysis in game and make sure you watching the matches. It can be the attributes of your players, and no just Finishing but Composure, Decisions, etc. If you getting chances but aren't scoring, they probably aren't that good of chances, even if the game counts them as Clear Cut Chances. Almost any goalkeeper is going to be able to stop a shot if its hit right at them. And the more players the opposition has back, the more likely they are to be able to clear it off the line, block it, and even get rid of a rebound off a save.

[Britton5]

Ive started playing the 5-3-2 formation and i've started to play better and scoring more. Buy yes, I agree, some of them aren't clear cut chances

[Wildie]

Nearly at the end of my third season - throughout these seasons I have found it frustratingly difficult to offload players that I don't want - Tadic, Mane, Pelle, and a few others.

Each season I have had threats to my job, but then had a great end to the season and finished 6th and then 5th. In the third season, Europa League football has affected me and I am in 9th place with 3 games to go. I have a very youthful side - players like Druissi, Barkley (who I got for 18m to replace Schneiderlen who I sold for 24m), Hughes, Druissi, Zaha (on loan as a Support striker, his pace is fantastic, finishing less so!) Gaston Gil, Liam Moore, Balanta etc are doing well - but I have squad players demanding 1st team football which I cannot give and then the established players start to support them! I am going to get rid of these players in the summer (if possible) and rebuild. Trying to identify some good English talent and Regens into my squad players.

[Emersonlfc]

Ruined my last Saints save as the board started messing me about at the end of season 2 despite finishing in the champions league spaces. I have since tried to start new saves with different clubs but to no avail. Alas, I have decided to start a new Southampton save in the hope of finishing what I had started.

I have the added knowledge of knowing the areas that I feel need strengthening for the way I play so that's a bonus. I've always wanted to manage Charlie Austin so he becomes my first signing of the year. He is followed by Balanta and Romero. Suso comes in on loan to help bolster the AMC/AMR/AML roles. While Coric and Jovic come in for the future. I tried to sign a RB/RWB but unfort my targets weren't interested in me just yet. I have took the decision to retrain Cork as one in the hope of giving him more games so he won't be as unhappy as he was during my last tender.

Boric is my only out this year as I don't think I need to be wasting my wages on him lingering on the bench when Gazzi can do that job. I tried everything to get rid of K.Davis but no one was interested and he won't leave on a free. Frustrating.

Pre season has went well and I have opened up with a draw away to Hull on the opening day of the season and a 4-1 away win at Burnley. An Away fixture at Port Vale in the cup was squished in between, we ran out easy 2-0 winners in what was, a completely rotated squad. Yet to play in front of my home fans which is a bit of a bummer.

Here's to a long and successful period as Saints boss.

[RTHerringbone]

A couple of screens to update on my fifth season so far, which is unbeaten after 27 league games, but I can remember all to well what has happened in recent seasons

One of my XIs looks like this. Same basic system as posted back on the last page or so. I'm really enjoying how it plays out, and have seen no changes to the ME that should impact it, as it is well balanced and doesn't focus on one particular way of creating goals. One positive sign with the new ME is that I'm seeing much tighter reactions from goalkeepers after initial saves, so things look good.

Not as many newgens as I want yet, here's the brightest prospect, the unfortunately named Zitinho Very young, plenty of room for improvement.

EDIT - And then I tempt fate by posting this, and lose 2-0 at Juventus in the CL

EDIT2 - And then I got knocked out of the FA Cup in the 6th round at New White Hart Lane! I should know better than to post updates

[RTHerringbone]

Season five has come and gone. We lost out on the FA Cup but won everything else we entered, and broke the 100 point mark in the league for the first time:

Things are going so well, that I am getting bored and it is time to shake things up. I usually do this one of two way: a tactical rejig, or a clearout of the squad. Having already switched from a 4-1-4-1 to a 5-3-2, it's time to send a few players on their way. I want to be newgen only as soon as I can, and I've already recruited three players without necessarily knowing who needs to make way for them

More are on my radar, but I'll need to start shifting a few to raise more funds, as these guys are not coming cheap at all. It seems that hoovering up young players on the cheap is less easy than it used to be.

EDIT: Got the guy I really wanted too:

[john1]

Some great regens there RTH.

[RTHerringbone]

And there are more

A frenetic transfer window ahead of season six saw the revolving door at St. Mary's almost fall apart

In addition to the four above, plus the already acquired Zitinho (who I'll show below) I signed five more newgens, bringing the total in the first team squad up to ten. I'm not hanging about! I'm finding that serious money is having to be paid to lure high quality players to the club, which is only reasonable. Fontaine and Daniels both cost £41m :o

Nicolai was £33m, Ozturk £21m. Carlos being the "cheapest" at £4.5m. In all, we have forked out a monstrous £176m in this window to revitalise the squad. My habit of rotating the whole XI from game to game continues, and now means that I'll have 5 newgens in each XI. To balance the books, some big names had to go. They were, at the oldest, just 25, but this policy of refreshing the squad with newgens only needs to be ruthless. We have said goodbyes to Romero, Samir, Telles, Butland, Stones, Savic, Kranevitter, Silva, Barkley and Depay. R

omero was signed for £9m and sold to Madrid for £60m. Stones' fee rocketed to the same extortionate value (having signed for £21m a year before) as Juve were flush for cash after we acquired Misischi and Cavaliere from them. Last to leave was Depay on transfer deadline day, with United handing over £55m in straight cash to acquire the 25 year old. Fees received topped £300m, with just Silva going for less than value (Lazio paid £22m for the £28m rated player). Offering out players for above their value seems to work most of the time for me.

[Klew721]

Starting a long term save as Southampton. Any tips/suggestions?

[RTHerringbone]

Starting a long term save as Southampton. Any tips/suggestions?

1. Do it.

2. Buy a defender or two.

[Klew721]

1. Do it.

2. Buy a defender or two.

Any suggestions on who to get? I have £14 million transfer budget.

[RTHerringbone]

Any suggestions on who to get? I have £14 million transfer budget.

Scout for DCs. You have Targett and Bertrand on the left, and Clyne on the right who will do well.

In the middle, Alderweireld and Fonte are great, Gardos also good but Yoshida perhaps less so.

I wholly recommend using the Role filter feature in scouting so you can pre-populate a search with the ket attributes of a Role.

[Ben111]

Had a brilliant save with Soton last year... contemplating going for it again.

[Ronhaar]

Some tips or suggestions for DC's at the start for fairly cheap money.

Erik Sviachenko - 1.7m Release Fee Wages around 20k

Tore Reguinssen - 1m Wages around 20k

Martin Hinterreger - Not Sure around 2m

Along with any 1 or 2 from above, Look to Get one of Dragovic/Balanta/Mussachio/Nkoulou.

[Ronhaar]

I have started my Long Term Soton save which will most certainly run till FM 16. Will post a detailed update later.

Quick Overview

Sold 3 Defenders + as mentioned before cancelled Loans of Alderweireld and Bertrand + Sold Davis and Cork.

Brought in around 10 odd youngsters + 5 or so established first team players.

Will put up an update with Screenshot and Tactics later

[leschko]

How is Forster for you guys doing?

In my save he is struggling so right now i prefer the experience of Boruc,

i'm 19 games into the 1. season and i think about signing values as i could have him for around 100k p.W.

At first i wanted to sign Horn and develop him into one of the greatest but he signed a new deal with Cologne,

Can you guys recommend a good Keeper that will can take the 1. Team place of either Forster or Boruc?

(my other targets are the common Leali, Scuffet etc. but maybe they will be a bit to pricey, are there any german keepers with release clauses?)

[john1]

Leschko - I would definitely recommend Timo Horn. Was superb for me with West Ham.

[leschko]

unfortunately he just signed a new deal with Cologne and now his release clause is set at 44,500,000 mil.

so i think i have to sign valdes!

[RTHerringbone]

Time to restart my spamming of this thread

First up, a link to something I wrote on my blog all about the 5-3-2 I'm using:

http://whenseagullsfollowthetrawler.wordpress.com/2014/12/17/a-change-of-course-4-1-4-1-to-5-3-2/

That gives way more detail about the system than I have in here, and can hopefully add a bit of detail to help you see why we're doing so well.

Season six is following in the same pattern as before, with some great performances but possibly more defeats than I'm used to, which may or my not be attributable to using so many young players.

Latest results include the first three match defeat streak of the save, but fortunately all games were ones we could have won on another day, so I'm not too concerned. Around those results, you can see just how tight we are defensively and that is helping our league positioning well.

I'm utterly delighted by the goals conceded count so far. It's way better than anything we've achieved so far, and in spite of a General Discussion thread implying you can't defend well The youngsters are phenomenal, a rundown of their performances is here:

[john1]

Wow, that's impressive RTH.

Will be reading your blog shortly

[leschko]

Time to restart my spamming of this thread

First up, a link to something I wrote on my blog all about the 5-3-2 I'm using:

http://whenseagullsfollowthetrawler.wordpress.com/2014/12/17/a-change-of-course-4-1-4-1-to-5-3-2/

i would like to use this tactic in my safe, could you make it available via download? i couldn't find a link or something else on your blog

[RTHerringbone]

Sorry, I don't do tactic uploading, but there is more than enough detail in that article to get the Team Instructions, Roles, Duties, Mentality and Team Shape nailed, plus an idea of a number of the Player Instructions

[leschko]

Sorry, I don't do tactic uploading, but there is more than enough detail in that article to get the Team Instructions, Roles, Duties, Mentality and Team Shape nailed, plus an idea of a number of the Player Instructions

i just used your tactic once, i think it fits okay to my squad, but how are you using tadic?

i also think that i will take the shoot less often PI off from the strikers, would like to see them shoot more often

[RTHerringbone]

i just used your tactic once, i think it fits okay to my squad, but how are you using tadic?

i also think that i will take the shoot less often PI off from the strikers, would like to see them shoot more often

I'm in the sixth season - I got rid of Tadic about three years ago!

[RTHerringbone]

Season six signed off. A tighter league in terms of points than previous years, which I'll attribute to the number of youngsters. Standout in this image is goals conceded. Absolutely astonishing stuff.

Defence remains a fairly non-newgen area, so this can only head South as my plans take shape. We have Shaw, Mayke, Varane, Jedvaj, Balanta, Kongolo and Bazoer as "real" players in defence. Maybe is being replaced in the summer, replaced by this fella for £8m. Mayke is 27 and valued at £21m, so should realise a like-for-like profit:

We missed out on the FA Cup and Capital One Cup this year (defeats by United and City), so the CL Final against Barca (for the second successive year) was a real key game for me. At 1-0 this happened, in the 85th minute:

Looks fine? All under control? Not when a bug roots Cavaliere to his spot and Messi bangs in a late equaliser

Fortunately, the balance of play was rewarded in extra time, though we were aided by Barca having one man off injured and one hobbling about (and we attacked that very flank )

Next steps are to flog Mayke and find some more newgens to replace real players.

[john1]

Good win over Barca Shame your keeper didn't come out enough to stop Messi

[RTHerringbone]

My shopping list looks interesting. One signed:

Cost his £3.9m release clause. He lacks in some areas, but I'm pretty sure he'll do OK. Will replace one of my bench warming Brazilians.

This next one, is really, really, really special. I will gladly pay a ridiculous sum of money to get him and am happy to test United's resolve - their starting price is £156m, :o

[RTHerringbone]

I have signed Makelele! He was not cheap! Any guesses as to the price paid? It was all up front, with no installments or add-ons.

Mayke went to City for £34m and I'm now trying to shift Barbosa and a central midfielder as I'm aiming to introduce an academy graduate this season.

EDIT - I have also settled upon a vague tactical switch for a season or two down the line, so I need to be mindful of that when continuing on my newgen-only squad building plan.

I'm utterly committed to a back three; I think it achieves great things in terms of defensive solidity and ball retention. My new way of playing has been influenced by the book I'm reading (Universality by Matthew Whitehouse), specifically comments in that about the return of the dribblers to modern football after an era of conventional wingers back in the early 2000's.

As such, I want to introduce that attractive, attacking and mobile wide play, and also make use of the new Raumdeuter Role in FM15. My first stab at it will be along these lines:

GK (D)

DC (D)

DC (D)

DC (D)

DM (D) - I will be using Makelele in this Role

MCL RP (S)

MCC CM (A)

MCR (BWM (S)

AML IF (A)

AMR Raumdeuter (A)

CF (S)

It lends itself well to the current profile of the squad, though I will need to retrain players to the AML/R slots as only Misischi (I think) is competent out there at the moment. It is a risky system as there is no real flank coverage, so it will test the defensive narrowing of a back three well. Having three MCs in a line does help to cover the flanks a little, but I may need to employ some specific man marking on our outer MCs to more aggressively mark AI wide men. I'm prepared to give this a go because the last update did improve the way Attack Duty AML/R players position themselves when defending.

The balance of the CM trio in terms of forward runs is key. I know the IF (A) will cut inside with the ball, so I don't really want the CM (A) on that side, and as I'm unfamiliar with the Raumdeuter, I don't want to affect his movement too much by having the CM (A) on that side either! The downside of having the CM (A) through the middle is that it means my Roaming Playmaker could be dragged out of position if I choose to go down the man marking route. Lots to consider, and I really need to just watch their behaviour when out of possession to see how well we cover the flanks, and then in possession to see how the outer MC movement fits with the AML/R.

If we go down the man marking route, I'd rather have the Roaming Playmaker in the centre of the CM line, to allow the out of position MCL/R to regroup before we start to build an attack.

I haven't even looked at players with attributes for these two wide Roles recently, so I'm hoping that an attribute-driven search will reveal a few crackers who didn't fit the Role profile of the 5-3-2 and so were completely off my radar. There is still cash in the bank, in spite of Makelele's arrival, so the closing weeks of the pre-season of the 7th season could be interesting. I need to be careful as I have doubts about the proposed system (haven't really thought about Mentality, TIs or PIs yet) so I don't want to carve through the squad if it isn't a viable system.

[Klew721]

Here is my squad only a few weeks into the season. I just got Jay Rodriguez back, so I will have to figure out who to start up front.

[slakey]

Decided to start a So'ton save.

Already got some young talents on the radar that I would love to bring to the club but no finances and I want to see what I can do with the assigned players for the first season.

The guys I've put on the shortlist and will follow how they progress are:

- Jack Grealish - Aston Villa - RW

- Alexsandar Mitrovic - Anderlecht - ST

- Josh Murphy - Norwich - LW

- Youri Tielemans - Anderlecht - CM

- Riechedly Bazoer - Ajax - CB

- Ruben Neves - Porto - DM

[RTHerringbone]

Have already ditched the plans for a switch to a 3-1-3-3 mentioned in post #247 above

In the pre-season ahead of season seven, we were on a tour of South Africa, so not facing really top level opposition.

Whilst we won the matches, on our return to England we took on Forest at the City Ground in a friendly, and battled to secure a 2-1 win where the lack of flank cover was brutally exposed. Against a strong side, we'd have lost by 2 or more goals.

So, I looked to tweak the 5-3-2 / 3-5-2 and I've decided that I just can't improve on it as it balances so many good things - three at the back, shuttling wing backs acting as hybrid midfielders in a midfield five, central midfield dominance with 3 players and a mobile front two creating space for onrushing midfielders.

Will be interesting to see just which real players I let go last night when I load up tonight, because I can't remember, apart from Bazoer to Barca for £32.5m! I think five players left which more than covered the incoming players. Only picked up one player with a view to him operating at AML/R but he was by trade a MC positioned AP who would have needed position retraining anyway.