I haven't played with a national team in FM 06, but in previous versions it was fun if you had that nation as one of your "active" leagues. It wasn't so fun if you didn't. Even if it was an active nation, there are times where I felt the national team was more fun than work.. that being said I've heard there are some significant improvements to the National Side management in FM 06 from the 05 version.

in terms of taking the job?

TAKE IT. it can only help your prestige, and it's a whole nother area of the game that's great fun. I actually got sacked from my first international job when my damm Portuguese side collapsed in the European Championship, but I picked up France right after.

It can sometimes help you find cheap young players to bring to your club team, whose value you can then pump up through international caps before you sell.

I generally find that I tend to be more "hands off" internationally. I generally won't fiddle too much with the tactics, at least until I get comfortable with the team and have a chance to give them some friendlies to get accustomed to the new tactical style.

i do enjoy the international management side of things though

Not being knowledgeable about international soccer, I'm not sure I understand what I'm supposed to do if I take the position. Are players placed on the team automatically?

For me, one of the biggest chores is trying to find young guys to bring onto the squad for international play. I recommend at least assigning your International AM (once you appoint one) to handle the youth squad of the Country you will be managing. At least he can scout young talent for you and then you can bring up the young talent as it matures to the main international squad. International play can be quite fun, and I had a blast when I was managing England in my current career (until they fired me!) :)

Nope, you have to call players up to the team when appropriate. The game will give you prompts as a match approaches and tell you to name your players for the current set of matches.

Here's a player I picked up as a 16 year old. His only position was an 'unconvincing' DC. I gave him two years on the youth squad but there was no improvement in terms of position, but his attributes are great. I don't know where he should be played. He doesn't have the heading/jumping I think a DC should have and his offensive capabilities are too impressive to make him play defence. I had a DL go down in one match and decided to throw him in. He promptly scored a 65 yard (yes - 65 yard!) strike, catching the goalie off his line. I had never seen anything like it. Since then, I've tried him everywhere but I'm not sure where he would be best utilized. Currently, I'm training him as a striker but MC would be better?

Click here...

He's a DC but his skills for the centreback position aren't very good. I doubt you'll ever be able to get him to perform at another position. Typically, if a player isn't showing as "accomplished" at a particular position then I won't start him there.

I'd without a doubt train him as a center middie. He looks like a new Gerrard to me-- a true box-to-box middie who can make a play at any spot on the pitch.

Unlike Koryo, I'm very amenable to trying players in positions they're not rated highly in (or even not rated at all). I typically have a short leash with such players, but I also can get encouraging results.

Ok boys I'm finally seeing light at the end of the tunnel. I'm so damned proud right now that I stuck it out and made it through the learning curve, this is one hell of a game.

I have made it through the freindlies of what will be my first full season and have played my first three regular season matches. Currently sitting tied for first in Conf National at 2 wins and a draw all as an underdog. I'm sure it seems like a small thing to most here but it is a big step for me as it is the result of finally having an understanding of the basics of the game.

It started by selling off palyers I either didn't want or couldn't afford. I then brought in a pretty good striker on a year long loan at no cost to me. Also found what looks to be a future star DC through my scouts and made my first transfer purchase. Now sitting with my 2 wins I was able to secure a real star ML from the Beligian Premiere league on loan, again for the entire year. This kid should really solidfy my team, 20 pass, 16 dribble, 12 decision, 14 long shot, 12 finish, and many other double digit attributes.

The other reason for me seeing at least some success is tactics. Awhile ago
I d'loaded Neonlight's 4-4-2 tactic to get me started. Not any kind of a super tactic just a solid base to build on. I used it through the friendlies and
to this untrained eye it did at least seem to keep the club more organised on the pitch. Then with the season about to begin I sat down and really looked at my players, assessing their strengths and weaknesses, to get an idea of what I thought they could do. I then proceeded to make changes to my tactic based on their individual abilities. I also made changes to the team settings based on ideas I had and the helpful comments of some of you guys here.

The team had 8 or 9 games under their belt using this 443 and so were pretty familiar with it. Then adding the tweaks really seemed to get them going. Right away I could see the play was imroved. We were getting up the pitch
faster and cutting off there offense with a lot more efficiency. A very cool thing to see the correlation between the tactic changes and the resulting play.

I also moved into the training aspects of the game. I set up my own position specific traing schedules and have seen much improvement in my players. Lot's of green up arrows and not many decreases and nobody bitching about the workload being too heavy.

So why do I come here to share this long post with you guys? It was either tell you or tell my wife. Now even if nobody responds to this, that's ok. I'd rather look at the blank screen than the bland look on her face as I told her about my small successes and how great this game is ;)

Sweed - glad you're enjoying the game :D

Be warned though the upper leagues have managers who are much more tactically astute and so more tweaking might be required once you gain a promotion or two ;)

In the lower levels physical tactics tend to work well if you've got reasonable facilities and players who are physically able, as you go further up the leagues most players are physically pretty able and its more about their skill and exploiting weaknesses in the opposition (either tactically or a weak player).

Have Fun,

Marc

Re: James King
To be he looks like a DMC, someone to sit in front of the defense in a 442 diamond formation and control the pace of the game and launch attacks for you ....

Darren Cook (england international :D) one of the regens in my current game is my most important player and plays that role for me.

For the first time since I've started FM '06 and five seasons into a career, I've had a player begin to moan about my matchday comments to the team. I guess this guy doesn't like positive reinforcement like the rest of my team. It's a shame too as I'm reluctant to change the way I talk to the team on matchday as it seems to be working relatively well (got Exeter to League 1). I don't want to have to offload him as he's a pretty good player, but I'm almost wondering if he's a bit of a prima donna who wants special treatment.

dude, you're not nice. Here I am, sitting at my desk, chuckling like a little boy and people are looking at me like I'm crazy. That is so funny because IT HAS HAPPENED TO ME!!! :D

Now my wife comes to me asks me if my little billiard balls are doing great or not. :p to her in that instance.

Seriously, it's amazing how this game draws you in, how you start caring about them little billiard balls, how you try to find a way to work a kid into your lineup, little things... I remember the first time I got sacked by Luton Town in FM2005. I was down for a week, a week real time that is. I had put so much emotion in that team, for three and a half long seasons, and then I felt like the players stopped playing for me. Surreal, just like you can see it in real life...

FM

i try to explain it to everyone, I find myself talking about promotion and they smile and think, "how sad".

Yeah, there is just so much going on all the time. I'm in my first career started umemployed and was hired by Kettering in late March. My intent was to get a job and move through a complete season to get my feet wet, then move on to a serious career. By being hired late season I have been through a playoff, off season, pre-season, and a few regular season matches. So I have pretty much seen what I need to, too go ahead and start a serious career.

During this time I have made many "rookie decisions" that I can now see I would do differently. So starting over with a serious career would be a good thing. Problem is I have become attached to my Kettering lads and now have no intention of dropping them and starting over. I'll live with those decisions and learn from them.

Funny thing about wsm and my wife. I had the game for probably 6 weeks, she was actually with me when I bought the game, and she was walking by the computer while I was playing and says "when did you buy a soccer game?" So I told her "you were in the mall when I bought it and looked at it in the bag." and then in my best Sam Kinnison voice I told her "it's not soccer it's FOOTBALL." She laughed at the Kinnison voice but I don't think she actually got the FOOTBALL comment
:)

I think he could be very good in a Beckenbauer* type role. Play him in central defence, but with passing set to mixed, creativity set to full, forward runs on and no marking responsibilities. Also set him as the teams playmaker. Of course, you'll need to play him in the middle of a three, but I think he could be very effective, he certainly has the talent. Might be a bit of a risk and certainly will be a huge change for your players, so maybe try it out in some less important cup games first.

*For those who don't know, Franz Beckenbauer was captain of West German in the late-60s/early 70s and invented this position for himself. He would defend when neccesary, but his primary role was to spray passes across the pitch from deep lying positions and control possesion and tempo by providing an easy outlet for everyone in the side. He did this with tremendous success at the highest level for 10 or so years, winning both the World Cup and European Championship. Of course, it helps that he as insanely talented, easily a top-10 player ever.

By the way - thanks chaps :D

One of the nicest things about being a developer is hearing people discussing one of your games and the 'people' in it as if they are real ... apart from anything else it convinces me I'm not mad when I'm playing FM and do it myself ;)

/fanboy hat on/
Marc, I know I've been vocal about the digidowload problems/delays but the game *IS* great, honestly. I've said it many time and will say it again. Not many games have kept me playing for such a long period of time, looking for any little period of time I can boot it up. And think about it, the PC is in our bedroom and my wife is currently working the night shift, meaning she is taking a nap from about 8 to 10pm, meaning the computer is off-limit. I'm going insane having to watch TV. I don't want to watch TV, I wan't to watch, as well as participate in the life of my football club unfolding before my eyes.

The great news is that she found a new job and will go back to the day shift on March 14. :D She's got enough TV shows recorded that she'll be watching TV for a few weeks while I get my fix of WSM, weehee :)
/fanboy hat off/

Now, about what I'd like to see added in FM2007 :D

just kidding, I'll enjoy 2006 for now ;)

FM

I'll put my fanboy hat on for a moment also.

Marc, I am 43 and have been gaming since the days of Zork and the Atari 400 -- and was an avid board gamer before that. I have never gotten so much long term satisfaction and enjoyment from a game as I have from the CM/FM series. Thank you guys for making the game I always dreamed of seeing.

OK, hat off.

And Sweed, welcome to the club!

If you've any pet ideas for future versions then I'd love to hear them - won't promise that I'll agree with them or even if I do when they'd get added .... but they'd definitely be listened to and considered (several ideas presently in our games have come from user suggestions).

Marc, did you catch my save problem upthread?


Is there anything I can do, or is the save lost for good?

I don't know if this idea has been suggested in the past before or not, but it is something I've wanted to try.

FM is currently a career mode game. I'd love to see a single season mode. Playing either a World Cup model (32 team tourney, 8 groups, single elimination, all neutral sites or pick a home team) a CL mode (32 teams, 8 groups, home and away, little longer) or Superleague (10-20 teams, home and away, playoffs optional).

Teams could be selected in a pregame start up menu, a combination of national sides and/or club sides using the rosters and databases from New Game Selection.

It still is a single season game so you have to cope thru injuries, players complaining about riding the pine, bruised egos, red cards for fighting and the transfer system would be disabled (it is only single season mode). But with the limited number of teams, rosters frozen when you start (23-25 depending on which format), and no transfer system, the processing speed should fly by. Anyone of these three modes should take a fraction of a full regular season to complete.

Thinking about it now, I know people have talked before about creating your own leagues, but this is different and the same. The competition formats would be the same as currently exist in the game, they just become a new stand alone feature. The only thing different is you would be able to select which teams you play against when you start, or you can let the computer pick the teams (using factors such as nation, region and reputation for example.)

I thought of this yesterday cause I really wanted to play next years world cup and found it took me half an hour just to find the save game close enough to play it out, and I still didn't have the teams and in the groups that I would have liked on there. I don't know if this is doable or not, but its another feature that people would like to see.

Thanks for the responses regarding James King. He's my pet project; I'm trying him everywhere, in all sorts of situations and he hasn't complained yet.

The message is a corrupt game flag (basically it means unexpected data has been found and so the game isn't sure what to do - where possible the game auto-repairs these, but sometimes it justs puts its hand in the air and asks for help) - these are normally down to power fluctuations, bad sectors on the hard-disk etc.

I'm afraid there isn't much you can do to repair it yourself, however if you can host the file somewhere for me to download I'll see if I can get it on its feet again for you (normally can do in around 60% of cases) - if this is possible please email me at [email protected] and let me know where you've put it (sorry you can't email them to me - I blew the server at SI a year or so ago when someone tried to upload a 1Gb file to me (don't ask ;) ) and since then its been capped).

You might want to check out the Xbox 360 Live mode .... its pretty much what you're asking for strangely enough ;)

PS> FM 360 is one 'sku' fits all - ie. any copy will work on any machine anywhere in the world if you're wondering ..

remember that version of microleague baseball when the ball went to that portion of the field, a little video of the action would play. I miss that. Is there ever a possibility to have cinema stuff like that but so many, and so varied that it wouldnt get old? perhaps a toggle option. I think that that would be awesome in this game, with all the teams and colors and fans and songs etc.

read that post this afternoon but nothing was coming as I'd not played yesterday but while playing tonight, and going down 0-1 after only 22 seconds against Chelsea (with newly promoted Luton Town ;)), it occured to me: pre game talks! I love the post game talks and I try to personalize them to what the players have done and sometimes let go my frustration in them. But having pregame talks would be nice to make sure your players don't get intimidated by big games (like this one) or don't come flat on easier games (like say an early round cup game)...

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

Meanwhile, just saw one tiny thing on one of my player's profile. You know where they list things like "pleased at having signed a new contract" or "pleased with the team's position in the league table" and such, well one of my players was just showing a "enjoys the team's style of play". Had never seen that one before and thought it was pretty cool. The guy is a Greek DMC that I bought for a mere $95k fours seasons ago and he's turned out into quite the stud. The guy really is the anchor of my 4-1-2-1-2 wide diamond formation. When he's in there, he controls the defensive portion of our midfield. Maybe the fact he's got a so important position played into his comment, but I felt it was pretty nifty...

FM

The greatest deficiency I see in the current game is the way the fictional name worlds are created. Too much repetition of first and last names, and it impacts gameplay in that it becomes difficult to remember who is who. It seems like this could be done in a more effective way, and also in a way that allows more user control over the name generation process.

Maybe you guys can figure this one out for me: For the past few games, I've noticed that every once in a while, my left striker and left central defender seem to be in each other's places. I've got them set to the pre-set tactics for their positions, and they're definitely lined up in the right place in my tactics. It just bugs me, because that striker is tearing up Conference National and the FA competitions -- this season he has 20 goals in 24 games. It really burns me up when I see him sitting on the D-Line.

Just make sure that in their individual instructions they are not set to swap positions with each other. That would be the only thing I could think of. If not that, then I have no clue.

This is a great idea, FM. Simple, obvious, I'm surprised nobody has brought it up before:) Well done.

HELP HELP HELP GUYS!!

Is there a way to cancel a transfer in 06 after you've already accepted it? Because when the transfer date comes around there is no longer a "confirm transfer" button. And my board has pulled back a bunch of the $$ they were going to let me use for transfers (which is another matter that I would like to bring up with MV at some point...it makes no sense that they did...I only spent what they gave me + what i got from selling players, and yet they accuse me of "extravagent spending?"). So now I have a bunch of players signed to come in on 7/1 and I want to cancel some of the transfers so that I can get the ones that I actually want.

Help guys!

I'm wondering if it will still give you the choice to Accept, Delay or Cancel a transfer when 7/1 rolls around??? It does that when you make a transfer deal while the transfer window is open.

I don't think there's a way to do it up until then, so I think you have no choice to wait, but I'm thinking you'll still have the option.

well i'll try that and see, but i seem to recall that it doesn't this time (from a previous year in this game)

dola

and HOW pissed off was I when Lynel Kitambala scored for France in extra time to give me a 3-2 lead over Brazil in the semi-final of the Confederations Cup, only to have some little Brazillian ass named Dagoberto score TWICE in the span of 3 minutes to give Brazil a 4-3 win??

Damm I love this game.

Check out what settings you've got for corners and freekicks. If you're sending the centerhalfs forward, they may switch after a cleared corner or freekick when the centerhalf gets caught up field.

okay. i take back my financial rant MV. It looks like the money was allocated out of my last year's budget to sign the guys on 7/1 once I committed to signing them, as I have signed them all with no problem.

I have never been given that choice at 07/01 (when the window opens) once I commit to the transfer. If you have the money to do that transfer and have no other complication (roster limit of some sort) then it goes through.

I thought the money went through immediately? Maybe it's a Jan. 1 thing, but when I sold some players scheduled to leave my team Jan. 1, I got the money right away.

There are only two things I'd like to see:

1. Pre-Game Talks (as explained by FrogMan) and;

2. Coach Interaction - other than the training screen, or when you approach to sign, you never hear anything from a coach. My only options are to terminate or renew his contract. I'd like to know if he thinks I'm doing things wrong, dealing too harshly with a player, if I'm not taking advantage of someone's potential, if he's enjoying life at the team, or if he's looking to move on. Coaches have personalities too!

i think just the frequency of interaction needs to be dialed up a bit to even further immerse players.

couple ideas I've had.

How about your local paper/fan website approaches you for an interview on a particular topic and you can choose from a series of responses about things like "how pleased are you with the season? what's the latest on transfer rumors for the club? how have the young players been performing for the youth team? how pleased are you with the season overall?" things like that...the "common questions" that managers have to deal with everyday.

also i'd like to see more ability to interact with the players. how come I can't "call any player into my office" at any point in time and have a conversation with him? Like you can in SaaP for instance...call them in and say "hey you're playing really great lately. keep it up!" or "hey we want to trade you, so it'd be great if you'd put your best performances on now so you can audition for potential suitors." things like that. again, more of the common, everyday-type things.

I guess what I want to see really is to have these things be manager-initiated more than media/player initiated. Because these types of things are in the game, but if they were able to be manager-initiated then people could use them in the frequency that they wanted.

hope that makes sense

After a long layoff, I'm looking to get back into FM2006.

I just am not knowledgable about soccer at all. Basically, I want to start at the bottom of a league, but I don't want TOO big of a challenge since I haven't played a serious career in FM yet.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

I'd pick a league with a fairly high degree of native talent but not a big gap between the top teams and the bottom then. Holland maybe? After Ajax and PSV the rest of the league is on pretty much the same level. Portugal? These leagues also have the possibility of getting you into the Champions League better than say Norway or Belgium or some smaller league like that, and the Champions League = $$

Russia only has two levels, but starting out in the lower division has been very fun for me. There is money to be had, and overall you have a lot of "feeder" leagues to choose from -- Ceska Republica, Slovenia, Slovakia, Ukraine, Belarus all provide a lot of players for the Russian league in my game.

Grrrrr.

*initiate frustrated rant*

Twice now, I have had the game do a forced "quit" due to some silly "WSM is out of virtual memory" error. WTF? Just suddenly, out of the blue, the game shuts down without a chance to save. Whamo, there goes x amount of gameplay and time wasted, and my immersion is shot all to hell. Damn, that's frustrating.

*end frustrated rant*

weird WSU. never seen that happen. sometimes I get a weird like "array access out of bounds" error or something, but it never forces a shutdown of the game...

So I feel like I had one of my biggest accomplishments tonight since starting with this series with CM 96/97. I had decided to take the Canadian national team job at the end of 2010. We started off with a couple of friendlies before heading off to the 2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup. A 5-1 thrashing of Belize was followed by a 1-1 draw with Mexico. That put us in the quarterfinals against Puerto Rico and we squeeked by 2-1 to set up a semifinal against 3 time defending World Cup champs Brazil. I only wanted to avoid a slaughter.

I set our formation relatively narrow to try to pack things tight with the defense and make Brazil cross to penetrate our 18 yard box. But After 1 minute, I figured a slaughter was precisely what we were going to face as the Brazilians zipped forward to take an immediate 1-0 lead. But we managed to stem the tide through the rest of the half to go in only behind a goal. Things remained 1-0 until the 70th when I figured it was time to try to open things up a bit by widening our 4-4-2, moving my playmaking middie to the wing and focusing passing down the flanks in hopes of taking advantage of the holes in Brazil's 3-5-2. In the 82nd, my playmaker gets the ball and sprays a 45 yard direct pass right over Brazil's defense to my streaking striker who finishes to tie the game at 1. I go back to narrowing my formation, but don't go as defensive this time around. We hold out again until regulation time is up. 1-1 after 90.

In the 110th minute, one of my substitute defensive midfielders plays a through pass to another substitute striker who scores on his first touch on the ball. 2-1 Canada. But Brazil hit us right back in the 111th as my keeper gets caught out and chipped from 25 yards away. 2-2 and all I can do is hope for penalties.

Penalties is what we get after the 120 minutes is up. My first shooter steps up and confidently scores. The Brazilian who scored both of their regulation goals takes their first penalty and my keeper saves! We then trade pk conversions in the next 3 chances to leave the score 4-3 after 4 opportunities each. My left back who gave the ball away to gift Brazil their first goal steps to the spot for a shot at the winning pk. He converts! We win the shootout 5-3 and I have my biggest FM win ever and possibly my biggest CM/FM win ever! Final shots on goal 30-10 Brazil. Final shots on target 18-5. But we somehow pull the shock victory.

Of course now we have to follow this huge upset by coming back down to earth for the Gold Cup Final. I almost don't care if we win it or not. Beating Brazil is as good as winning the Cup anyways. I love this game.

Ajaxab...sounds like you got the win against Brazil that I was supposed to have!!

GRRR

dola

congrats though

double dola

an interaction that I love: Now that Ronaldo has retired from Real Madrid I seem to be getting comments from him on a semi-regular basis about what he thinks of upcoming games for my side.

this is awesome. I want more more more! And I want to be able to comment on his upcoming games and stuff.

I don't know what my problem is, but I'm bringing Hammertime back to Cheltenham. He got injured way too much after his stellar first season with me, and I got a great deal for him. I sold him to some second-rate French squad, and he rotted on their reserve team for practically the whole season. They finally wanted to get rid of him, and I'm taking him back.

I guess part of the reason is that the fans and some of my players love him. Also, I think I have better midfield players who can support him. As long as he doesn't get injured over and over again, he might be the boost my team needs.

Or he could be a waste of money again. I can't believe I'm doing this. :)

The order has been restored.

Reading stories like this on these boards is what got me to finally buy wsm\fm and am I ever glad that I did. You can jut feel the passion and excitement that guys have for their teams and players.

Congrats on the big win Ajaxab :)

I think we are all waiting to hear how the final went...

FWIW, this happens to me quite often -- but I figured it's cuz I only have 128 megs RAM.

Nice! Congratulations, Ajaxab!

When I get big wins like that (generally a CL game or a game against Chelsea or Manchester United), I end up jumping up and down, screaming my head off. Thankfully, my extremely understanding girlfriend just nods and smiles when she's witness to this. Curteously, she also will add, "Did your dots do well, baby?"

I appreciate that.

Gold Cup Update

So we draw the US in the 2011 Gold Cup final. But it seems that, like me, some of my players have jetted back to Europe for midweek games. My best middie hurts his thigh playing for Inter against Hannover one day before we're supposed to play so he'll miss the final. Why Inter had to play him is beyond me. My best defender, a 20 year old regen, named Kid Master, bruises a rib in training so he'll miss the final. To top it off, we face almost 80,000 screaming Americans at Arrowhead in KC.

So again, I'm not too hopeful. But in the 14th minute, my pk game-winning left back launches a cross into the box that caromes off the woodwork right to my best heading striker who converts the rebound to give us a 1-0 lead. The US plays a 4-3-2-1 and their lone striker manages to pop one in in the 37th to knot the game at 1. Score remains 1-1 at the half. We just aren't playing that well. Taking off Bobby Convey in the 60th minute seems to spark the Americans as Adu and Beasley begin to torment us down the wings. They set one another up for goals in the 64th and 78th minute. The 3-1 lead proves too much to overcome as we go down in the final.

I'm still proud of the way we played in the tournament though and the Canadian FA is very pleased with our effort. Now if only my Exeter squad could pull through with the same kind of guts and grit to get into the League 1 playoffs.

dola

After I told my wife I beat Brazil with Canada, she asked me if I'd finished the game a la Super Mario. For some reason, I think she wanted me to say yes.

First of all, congrats on your Gold Cup run. I hope to manage an international squad someday, and I would like to have similar success. With that said, I know you're up to 2011 now, but I managed Exeter from 2005-2006, and they were so inconsistent that they took me on a virtual emotional rollercoaster. If you can pull anything out of that club, I consider you a greater manager than I. Congrats. :)

After five promotions in six years, I've gotten Vauxhall Motors into the Championship. Throughout this time, I was on a $10k/yr. contract, grossly underpaid in comparison to other managers in the league and of same reputation. With about two months left on my contact and winning promotion, the Chairman offers a four year deal at $70k per year. Not only was this again the lowest contract in the league, but with a wage bill of $3 million (relatively modest), we were losing money on a monthly basis. We were financially secure because we had made some big sales but I was keeping my eyes open for a spot with a team with more resources. I asked for $140k and was countered with $85k. I rejected, much to the Chairman's disappointment, who thanked me for my time of service.

The headlines then come in: "Promotion-winning manager may leave". My best player is shocked that I may leave and urges the club to find a way to retain my services. After winning Manager of the Year and less than a month left on my contract, I decide to give the board another opportunity. They come back with $210k/yr. and the possibility to increase my wage budget to $8 million (which would kill us). I accept the contract with a wage budget of $4.5 million and $3 million in transfer funds. I immediately sell off $6.5 million in players (which will hurt) to secure us for the next couple years.

Simply put, there is no better sports management game.

If you haven't already can I suggest installing the latest patch - we've improved a couple of things which reduce the memory fragmentation in the game and so should help with this on low-end systems.

Good to know -- now I can play with less nerves and less saves!

Marc,

Found this thread on the SI boards about the different dimensions of pitches in the game as compared to real life.

http://community.sigames.com/groupee...502#1072078502

Now silly me I thought this was like American football and that the pitch had a standard size.

Could you comment on how this actually works in the game?

Does the pitch shown in the 2d mode actually change size?
I can't say that I have noticed but after reading this thread I'll be looking.

Of course to late for this year but for next could the pitch size for each team be listed on the team info screen?

Right now it lists where the team plays so to this non-programer it wouldn't seem to hard to add a line for the dimensions or add it to the line that names their pitch. Of course I could be wrong.

thanks,
Sweed

dola

With regard to pitch dimensions and how strategy should change.

Keep in mind a noob to football here but I thought I'd post a couple of ideas to see how they compare to what others would do in the real world.

Narrow pitch: Incerase the pressure and close down harder since their is less ground to cover and smaller passing lanes.

Wide pitch: Pack in the middle to close off the wider passing lanes. Easy off on closing down trying to keep men between the ball and the goal. If they want to fire away from distance, let them.

Offensively I've got nothing :) Well maybe more through balls on the wider pitch and shorten the passes and try to play ball control on the narrower?

Or is it none of the above :confused:

On a narrower pitch you've got less space, so being able to play one- or two-touch football becomes more important. Also, since you've got less space on the flanks, the get-to-the-byline-and-cross type of winger has a slightly more difficult time, meaning you might want to go after players who cut inside more.

If that sounds like Arsenal then I'm not surprised - Highbury has a small pitch and they're pretty well adapted to it, which might have something to do with their away form (though it's certainly not the only problem).

No idea how/if this is implemented in FM.

Here's another question I've been meaning to ask (thanks for bumping the thread):

I'm in season 2 right now in my career. Last season, I had no transfer budget, and sold about $60K worth of players. Toward the end of the season, I signed a new contract, and my budget went away. When the season was over, I was given a transfer budget of $20K. I'm not too torn up about losing the 60K (or 40K, whatever), but I'd at least like to know that the club took the money, and I was helping out in some way. I've got about 15 games left in the season, and I've sold players to get my transfer budget to $250K. My contract doesn't expire, so I won't need to renegotiate, but will I lose my 250K when the season ends anyway? I'd rather not lose it, but if I lose it and it helps the team be more profitable, I'd be fine with that, too. What's going to happen if I don't spend it?

Displaying pitch dimensions - yeah shouldn't be a problem to do, will put it on the ever expanding list of things to do ;)

PS> Wait until we allow you to water the pitch or simply leave it unlaid (like Chelsea this season) .... ;)

You normally won't 'lose' your transfer budget unless it is considered too much for the board to risk (ie. if you've got 10k bank balance and somehow have a transfer budget of £15m then expect the board to reduce it UNLESS you're a big club and have serious television money or similar incoming in the near future) ....

Any money you have in your transfer budget, including inseason increases do to selling off players, is already factored into the club's bottom line in the finances screens. (So it's not as though you have the money and they take it away for the club to have, the club always has it.) Each season the board evaluates how much money they want to make available to you for transfers based on how much money the club has and how ambitious the board is with regard to spending money. So at the end of a season (the exact date depends on the league you're in) your transfer budget can either disappear or be increased, but it is evaluated and reset at the start of each new season. If you know from previous experience with your board, or you can surmise from a fairly skimpy cash balance for the club, that you will not be getting much money for the new season, then it is sometimes a good idea to make some purchases before the season turns over and your budget disappears.

Thanks Marc for the reply. Between your games and the way you run your company you are creating a very loyal customer :)

Thanks for the responses, guys. I'm off to spend some coin!

okay, need help understanding something here.

I'm managing Luton Town, a fairly modest "former" Championship side that I've brought up to the Premiership for the 2009-10 season. The stadium was at 10k seats or about but the board upgraded it to 15k as soon as we saw the first flash of EPL money, without me asking for it. I thought "oh nice".

Then, while waiting for the renovation to be over, I saw us bleed money like crazy with my $350k weekly wages total on a $300k budget. We seem to have stabilized in the monthly loss now at the end of December but we only have $7M in the bank and I open the January transfer window with only about $500k left of my initial $6M transfer budget.

I'm thinking "it's okay, I don't want to spend much and can't afford any new wages anyway" and on top of it, we're sitting in 10th place while everybody had us pegged as favourites to relegate after promoting through the playoffs from the Championship.

Now comes the twist. It's January 1st and the transfer has just opened. I get the sympathetic message that my board has increased the transfer budget. I'm thinking they can't really give me much but I see they are allowing me to spend an extra $10M :eek: That's where I'm confused. We only got $7M in the bank, does that mean they're allowing me to go in the red? Do they simply figure we can't really suck enough in the second half that we'll relegate?

Anyway, if anybody got a clue, please help me...

FM

I believe, yeah, they are allowing you to spend into debt with the hope of staying in the Premiership. If you do spend the lot, it will likely cut into whatever you can spend in the summer, though.

You should also have a bunch of players coming available toward the end of their contract. They won't help this season but they would be cheap (generally, for nothing). So, if you do spend all your money now and have nothing left for the summer, you may still be able to improve your squad further that way.

daedalus is correct, basically the board have decided that you're doing fairly well and want to ensure you don't get relegated (basically staying in the Premiership will give the club a huge 'bonus' in terms of television money and prize money which will offset their increase in the transfer budget) plus they're also considering if you can nudge up 3-4 places then you might make it into Europe via. the EUFA or inter-toto cup (again nice money spinners).

Bear in mind however that this also shows you have an ambitious board behind you, in some ways this is great (ie. you'll get money to try things) - however it can also mean they want results from you faster ..... or else ;)

Yeah, the more I thought about it, the more it made sense that they were thinking ahead to next season already. The nice $24.5M in TV money in addition to the final position money are two big incentives for them to want us to stay in the Premiership.

On top of it, something I didn't mention at first but remembered afterward. My assistant manager is now reporting to me that he thinks we have a squad that should not do too badly in the Premiership, as opposed to saying for most of last season that we'd have a hard time achieving the respectable position in the Championship that the board was expecting.

As for Europe, it never crossed my mind that the board could want me to challenge for a spot in those as early as this season. Their early expectations were for us to fight bravely against relegation but we're indeed in a spot to maybe snag a place in the Inter-toto Cup. We were in 6th or 7th at one point (after 13 or 14 games) but have dropped a bit, now in 10th after a bit of a slump and many injuries...

More in a second (and third) reply ;)

FM

Wanted to reply to this separately as I find these things fascinating, kudos to you and your team Marc. I'd never experienced this "going into debt because you expect big things to happen in the near future" thing before. Yeah, my QPR board in FM2005 had asked me to get high profile players at times, allowing me to spend overbudget but never had I been told "go ahead, spend, red, no red, no big deal" but now the realization of the consequences of what they're saying are hitting me :)

Hopefully I'll be able to get Kenilworth Road to be expanded over the new size of 15k because if they really mean us to go higher, we'll need a bigger ground :)

FM

daed, you know me, I'm a cheap guy. :D How do you think I got the team to $350k weekly wage total with barely nothing for transfer budget? Yep, Bosman type signing ;)

That's one of the main reason that I like having the choice between a few split of transfer/wage budgets. I usually end up picking a lower transfer budget with a higher wage budget because I trust that I'll be able to get players through free transfers...

FM

Is it possible to sack you current assistant and promote a coach that is currently with your team? If not can I renegotiate his contract (just thought of this while posting:confused: )or would I have to go out and hire a new one?

I started in Conf North and was promoted to Conf National. With the icreased budget my coaches are much better at judging talent than my curretn assman
so I would like one of them to give me the team report instead of old Sh*t for brains ;) I was going to buy the guy out in July but realised my new better coaches hadn't been with the club long enough to be able to render opinions on the players. Well it's now almost October and it's time to make a move if possible. If I'm going to let him go I'd like to do it now so he has some time to find a job before Christmas. I mean after all the man has kids and I want to be able to sleep nights. lol

you can always terminate the contract of a coach or assistant manager but you'll have to pay him a fee (kind of a buy out of his contract).

What I once did in a situation similar to yours is renegotiate the guy that was my current assistant manager to a coach contract. He accepted thus becoming a coach, not an assistant manager and freeing the assistant manager spot which I filled out with a good assistant...

FM

PS: typed my reply before I read the end of your post, good xmas story there :)

Seeking input:

Do you guys find there is a better or worse time to ask for improved training facilities? Here's my situation: I started with Gravesend, did better than expected, but got tired of the diminishing budgets. When Northampton came calling from League Two, with big bucks available to utilize, I gave the Gravesend board an ultimatum, which they answered with a "clear out your desk and don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out" response. Fair enough...off to Northampton Town.

Anyway, now I'm doing well in League Two. The team has very good talent and we are just clicking. It's a great situation to be in. However, I want to see if the board will improve our training facilities so I can boost the Under 18, but I don't want to jump the gun.

Comments?

I ask for stuff when there's a lot of money available, we're making money and usually immediately after I get an email from the board saying how great I am. I don't think I've ever been turned down.

My most recent message from the board was that they are "encouraged by the start I have made" or something like that. Although I still have around $450k in transfer funds and am somewhat under budget on salaries, we are losing a little money at present due to my spending spree when I first arrived.

do you mean the kind of email you get after a big win, like "the board was delighted with the big win over rivals"?

FM

Yep...I have no idea if it makes a difference or not, but I always wait to ask after they come out and make a statement like that.

I'd guess you'd be turned down. You'll need to build up some more good will with the board, make some money and then ask...at least that's what I'd do. My last facility upgrade was at English L2 with my current team and I think I approached the board when they had about 1.2 Million Euros in the bank and we were making about 100,000 Euros a month in profit.

I think finances are very important in FM and that's something I check every month to make sure I'm making money and if not what I can do to turn things around.

I always wait at least a year to ask for anything, and even then it needs to have been a good year. Wait until the board are either pleased or delighted with you, and you've spent at least a season at the helm. For what it's worth I always ask for these things immediately after tv money is awarded as well so that the club is in its best financial shape when the board makes a decision.

I agree with everything stated in here. I also ask for most things right after tv money has been given excepted once where we'd had an FC Cup replay at Manchester United and had received something like $2M for it while we were still in the Championship. At the time it felt like we were swimming in money :)

FM

Good thoughts, thanks.

Is it possible I would be offered an option of applying funds to facilities/transfer/salaries in different percentages? When I was offered the job they stated the available transfer and budget amounts but also said that I would have other funding options to choose from (but I haven't seen these as yet).

when a new year rolls around and they announce the transfer budget, it's then that you can pick another scenario. Don't click "continue" or that option will be gone the next day. It's the only time I've had the choice of anything in that regard and it's always between transfer budget and wage budget. The higher the wage budget, the smaller the transfer one...

FM

Can anyone explain how to properly use a DMC? Whenever I get one on my roster, I immediately try and convert them and use them as a MC. The only time I can actually use them in their natural position is when I'm trying to protect a lead in the last 15-20 minutes, where I switch to a 4-1-4-1. But I haven't come up with a good formation which utilizes a DMC from minute 1.

I <3 DMC's. MOST of the time you can use your DMC's as regular MC's, which is what I tend to do on occasion. In my current career I tend to alternate between playing an AMC and a DMC in midfield and two DMC's in midfield. 4-1-2-1-2 is a classic formation with a DMC, two wing midfielders, an AMC and two strikers. Or a 3-5-2 with either central DMC's or wing DM's instead of playing a 5-3-2 with wingbacks.

does that help?

How many games would you say it takes before players begin to get jaded? I played a guy in 51 games last season and it seemed like it was too many. I'm trying to figure out an optimum number for rotation purposes.

as DaddyTorgo said, the 4-1-2-1-2 (wide diamond) formation is a classic one with a DMC in it. I've found that I like my DMC to have good heading as he's almost like and extra centreback sitting in the middle of the field there. He also needs good passing and possibly good teamwork as he's like the QB in my offense. He often gets the ball from the defenders and relays it to either the wingers or the AMC who'S sitting right behind the strikers.

Often I even go to a 2 DMC formation late in games when I want to protect a lead. The AMC is usually the one I pull out, but I also sometimes go to a 4-2-2-1-1 formation.

Hope this helps.

FM

I have no clue as I don't remember it every happening to one of my players. I guess it depends a lot on the player though...

FM

Yeah, a lot seems to depend on their phyiscal and mental attributes. I try to rotate players as much as possible to keep them fresh all the way through, but if you have a limited squad, it can be tough.

if you can afford "elite" DMC's (ones with good passing and decision-making) you don't even need an AMC. just play 2 DMC's and take the defensive bonus of that

Just to confirm - a DMC or a AMC is perfectly acceptable to play in a MC slot (ie. they'll do fine in that position, although obviously one will be lean more towards supporting the attack and the other the defense).

The alternatives is to use say a 442 Diamond formation which contains both the DMC and AMC roles themselves (very effective formation IF you have the right players present in it imho).

One of my favorite formations recently has been a 3-6-1 diamond. Three centre backs, two wingers, two center middies on the line, an AMC and a DMC, and one striker. It's pretty cool.

I think age comes into play here too. I think young players (16-20ish) get tired if they play that many games in a season.