True Football Manager

Hello, my dear readers! The old season is over but the new one is coming up. Understanding the strength of other team I decided to risk a little bit. I reaffirmed board that top half position can be achieved by the football club. Therefore they expect a respectable league position in Premier Division:

Sure, it's hard to gain such result without buying some players better than I have at the moment. I made player research for covering and strengthening the most weak positions in my team: DC, AMR, MC, DL.

What's interesting - the most of the players were signed as free agents (under Bosman rule):

Edson Braafheid is left back with very high mental abilities. Souleymane Diamoutene is strong DRC whom I'm planning to use as central defender instead of Isaac Okoronkwo. Theo Jansen is well-known creative MLC who should be really useful for my team. And there is also another forward Niculae from Romania in the club! But his name is Daniel not Marius. So I have now 2 Niculaes in attack :)))

In my opinion the most important acquisitions for Southampton are following:

Dmytro Chygrynskyi

The best defender of Ukrainian national team. Bought as replace for loaned Pichu Atienza who returned back to Villareal. I suppose Dmytro to become leader of defence in the future.

Romaric

One of the best players of Ivory Coast. Very technical and creative midfielder. By the way, FM 08 surprised me somewhat in 2010 when Ivory Coast became World Cup champion! :))) So I have alread one World Cup champion in Southampton :)

Daniel de Ridder

Holland player with brilliant techniques. He will be used as right winger concurring with Winajldum.

The board gave me $36M for transfers. And I still have $18M after all buyings and sellings made. And the funny thing that I can't spend the money because I passed the limit of wages and cannot afford normal wage for a player :)

 

Anyway I'm ready for a new season and looking forward to try entering top 10 teams of England :)

After the change of tactical approach the results of my team highly improved. And the last 6 matches in Premier League were not an exclusion. 

Among them I would single out the last three matches. The game with Arsenal was kind of loss on a class. All four goals were scored by Robin Van Persie. And I felt how much their players are better personally than Southampton ones. What's interesting the match with Liverpool was very different one. That's because Liverpool is not so strong in my game in the current season. I mean the quality of players and also organization of their playing team style taking into comparison Gunners. Therefore we managed to win the game!

And the last match with Man City was some kind of small festival. The victory in this game provided the 13th position for my Southampton!

You see from Premier League standing that Arsenal has wonderful result of 96 points. And they are really cool team now still having leaders of attack: Fabregas, Adebayor, Van Persie. But I hope that we will be able to gain few points in encounters with them in the next season.

So Southampton is on the 13th position. And that's a real success for debut in Premier League. The club's board is very happy about that:

 

Some words about Southampton players. Of course, the best one is Marius Niculae. He was awarded as Fan's player and became the third best striker of Premier League after marvelous Emmanuel Adebayor and Robin Van Persie:

Benoit Leroy is the second best forward. Though sometimes he was performing as attacking left or central midfielder. Geoffrey Dernis is the best assister in the team. The half of his assists are made from corners when he makes cross and Pichu Atienza (loaned central defender) scores a goal.

For sure, there were few disappointments after the pre-season transfers. The largest one is Marlon King. I thought him to become one of the leaders of Southampton who can do many cool things together with Niculae in attack. But he scored only once in 14 matches. As a result I've sent him to the reserve squad.

Making totals I would like to say that in the next season I'm going to set up higher expectations and achieve success. Therefore it's important to be very active in transfers buying really good players for the team.

So this is the last part of my Position Guide. This one will help you to find other type of forwards in Football Manager 2008 - strong target men.

Most important attributes

Strength – influences on likehood of won headers and ability to hold up the ball.

Jumping – important attribute that influences much likehood of winning headers.

Heading – determines how good your striker can score using his head.

Finishing – vital for every forward. If your forward can’t shoot the ball and score, he is bad one.

First Touch – passing and shooting making just one touch is very good and leads to quick and one-touch goals.

Off The Ball – making good runs into space, taking the best attacking position.

Less important attributes

Height – together with high Strength it will lead to domination in air.

Composure – important when forward is in front of goal.

Decisions – taking correct and creative decisions will lead to dangerous attacks.

Passing & Creativity – good passing and creativity allows to make effective combinations in attack.

Technique – high technique of forward is important for better control of the ball.

Examples of perfect strong forwards

Didier Drogba, Luca Toni, John Carew, Nicola Zigic

I was asked by one of you, my dear readers, to make exploration about cheap player who can be bought to lower league teams. For instance, Coca-Cola Championship and League 1 players. It had taken several days to do that. And I want to represent you its results below:

Fabien Barthez

36 years. Famous eccentric French goalkeeper. Available from free transfer! Must be signed if you do not have good keeper at the start. But be aware of from other clubs being concurrent to sign this legendary goalkeeper.

Marius Niculae

26 yeas. Inverness CT. $425K. Brilliant Romanian striker. I praised him in my blog many times. Marius is the certain leader of my Southampton in Premier League!

Benoit Leroy

24 years. Chamois Niortas. $120K. AMLC/FC.  Rather versatile player who can perform as attacking midfielder and forward. I use him also in my Southampton. And Leroy is one of the best and reliable players in the team.

Stelvio

18 years. Braga. Very young and cheap guy from Portugal. He is a defensive midfielder (DMC). Stelvio costs only $16K! Must be bought!

 

Florian Heller

25 years. Aue. WB/MR. German right flank player. Can perform as either midfielder or defender very well for your, for example, Coca-Cola Championship team. He can be bought easily because he is from German Second Division.

 

Other good players in FM 2008 for your team from a Lower League

Name	Club	Age	Price	Position	Comments
Fabrice Fernandes	Le Havre (FRA)	27	$1.5M	MRL	Very good level of attributes
Chris Cleaver	TPS (FIN)	28	$170K	DL/AMC	English guy in Finnish League
Owen Price	-	20	Free	AMR
Jaime Valdes	Lecce (ITA)	26	$575K	AMRLC	From Chile
Seyfo Soley	-	27	Free	DC/DMC	Gambian
Gianluca Pagliuca	-	40	Free	GK	Legendary Italian keeper
Jacques Maghoma	Tottenham	19	$475K	AMLC	Prospective halfback
Bogdan Stancu	Unirea Urziceni (ROM)	20	$2M	FC	He worth his price. Very prospective forward.
Martin Fenin	Frankfurt	20	$150K	FC	Young hope of Czech National Team
Nicolas Millan	Colo-Colo (CHI)	15	Free	FC	Very young!
Sotiris Ninis	Panatinaikos (GRE)	17	$1.2M	AMRC	Can grow in world star!
Ryan McGowan	Hearts (SCO)	17	$50K	DC	Prospective Australian defender
Oswaldo Chaurant	Deportivo (VEN)	23	$10K	AMRLC	Cheap good midfielder from Venezuela
Liviu Ganea	Dinamo B (ROM)	19	$230K	FC	Prospective striker!
Younoussé Sankharé	PSG (FRA)	17	Free	DM/MLC	Young resilient halfback
Kwabena Agouda	Bnei Lod (ISR)	22	$14K	FC	Cheap fine striker from Ghana
Rudolph Austin	Pormore (JAM)	21	$350K	DRC/WBR/DM	Versatile guy from Jamaica
Lauri Dalla Valle	JIPPO (FIN)	15	Free	AM/FC	Very young Finnish attacker. Can become superb wonderkid in future.
Quinton Fortune	-	30	Free	DL/WL/DM/MLC	Versatile well-known player from South Africa
Gustavo Pinedo	Xerez (SPA)	19	$110K	FC	Fine quick forward

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If you are seeking Football Manager 2010 tactics then I advise you to take a look at my asymmetric one used for Leeds.

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In the previous post I described my new rather fluent tactical approach that helps to gain success in Premier League if you manage weak club (like Southampton, Wigan, Derby, etc.). The main part of this approach is usage of defensive 4-1-4-1 tactics. You can download it from here:

Download tactics

 

And now some description of this tactics. Its formation looks in the following way:

Team instructions

Individual instructions

They are the same as in 4-3-3 tactics. Actually this 4-1-4-1 tactics is created from this attacking 4-3-3.

I just moved MLC and MRC from 4-3-3 tactics into positions of clear attacking wingers: ML and MR. And my 2 forwards (FLC, FRC) were moved  into MLC and MRC positions.

 

Some tips and hints during match

- if your opponent plays more aggressive, has more possession of the ball, set Closing Down to maximal value;

- if your opponent is very strong and you play away, turn on Counter Attack

- For away game Mentality can be set more Defensive.

- For home match you can increase Tempo and  Mentality. It often gives good result.

- If you need more possession, set the slowest Tempo and Passing Style maximally Short.

Today I have some good news about my Southampton. As it was decided in previous story message - my team should operate more defensively if we want to avoid relegation from Premier League. And, of course, I had real motivation for creation of defensive tactics because my team was on the last position when 24 matches had already been played.

Actually, I hadn't created new tactics from the very beginning. I just changed formation of my current attacking one. You can compare both formations:

4-3-3 Attacking                             4-1-4-1 Defensive 

    

So I just moved MLC and MRC from 4-3-3 tactics into positions of clear attacking wingers: ML and MR. And my 2 forwards (FLC, FRC) were moved  into MLC and MRC positions. 

For 4-1-4-1 tactics I have been using Normal mentality without Counter Attacks. Though sometimes playing against strong football clubs like Manchester United I was turning on counter attacks and setting more defensive mentality.

As a result I've got the following row of successful games:

By the way, not all matches were played with new 4-1-4-1 tactics. I decided to setup tactics for every match more fluently. The main rule of my new fluent tactical approach is: If Southampton plays at home with opponent which power is less or equal to power of my team, then 4-3-3 formation is preferred. Otherwise, 4-1-4-1 formation is chosen.

And, for sure, other settings like Tempo, Mentality, Counter Attacks, etc. can be changed depending on separate match and style of opponent team (this is a common thing, I suppose).

So using the aforementioned rule I played home matches with Birmingham, Fulham, Portsmouth, Derby with 4-3-3 formation. Other matches in the screen shot were played using 4-1-4-1 formation.

Consequently you can see very marked improvement of Southampton's position in the league standing:

We are 17th! And having 7 points away from relegation zone. Seems like some kind of great disaster should happen if Southampton doesn't stay in the Premier League! By now I'm starting to think over the prospects of the next season... Waiting it with impatience!

And the last but not least... I want to praise again great striker - Marius Niculae. Most likely you had read about him in the previous posts of my Southampton story. This time I will only give you screen with his current form during the last matches:

What I can say, he scores very often!!! And he does this in Premier League playing against very tough teams. And the most important: Niculae scores many goals playing for my Southampton that is one of the weakest PL teams currently! Imagine how he would perform if he is Chelsea or Liverpool player when world class midfielders would give him a lot of dangerous passes.

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If you are seeking Football Manager 2010 wonderkids then I advise you to take a look at the best list of FM 2010 young talents in the web.

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It's very important to have dangerous forwards in your team. And it's always cool when your dangerous forwards are young and talented. Due to youngness and prospect they can progress much and be developed during trainings into real world stars. These guys are called wonderkid forwards. I decided to make deep search of them in FM 2008.

 

Wonderkids

 Sergio Aguero

The greatest Argentinian wonderkid from Atletico Madrid for this position! But he costs very much ($26.5M) and can be bought only by grand clubs. Brilliant technique, dribbling, speed, stamina and mental abilities. Very well-known attacker among football manager gamers.

There are also some other very high priced wonderkids: Pato from Milan, Wayne Rooney from Manchester United, Ryan Babel from Liverpool. I will not say about them much because the guys are worldwide known (actually as Aguerro :) ) and cost a lot of money.

 Karim Benzema

New young star striker of Lyon. Technical gifted, cool finisher and has very high potential. Will score many goals for you. But only big clubs are able to buy this flamboyant forward.

 Guilherme

18 years old striker of Cruzeiro. His price ($7.5M) is not high for any English or Spanish club that is in the first half of its league. Guilerhme is very balanced and enthusiastic attacker. His best attributes (having value of 17) are First Touch, Flair, Teamwork and Work Rate. The last one is very important for progress during trainings. So Guilerhme can be considered wonderkid, I suppose.

Carlos Vela

One of the young Arsenal stars. Price is $6.75M. Just 18 years old but already possesses very good speed, level of technique and high mental abilities. Should become great forward!

Giuseppe Rossi

Italian striker - wonderkid. Though he plays in Spain for Villareal. Rossi likes to dribble the ball on speed. His great levels of Composure and Finishing tell us that he can score goals very effectively. Looking at values of attributes he already seems to be better than Alberto Gillardino!

Bojan Krkic

Bojan deserves the following adjectives:  Superb. Incredibly talented. Very young (16 years). Fantastically technical. Clever and smart. Barcelona forward.

 

Young prospective strikers

Name	Club	Age	Price	Strengths	Weaknesses
Oscar Trejo	Mallorca (SPA)	19	$8.75M	High technique and speed	Low Anticipation, Creativity, Composure
Theo Walcott	Arsenal	18	$8.75M	Wonderful speed	Average Work Rate and Finishing
Nicklas Bendtner	Arsenal	19	$12.75M	Fine finishing using legs as well as head	Poor Teamwork. High price.
Felipe Caicedo	Manchester City	18	$8.75M	Good levels of Flair, Teamwork, Work Rate and Long Shots	Average Finishing
Mario Balotelli	Inter (ITA)	16	$6.5M	Very young! Good speed, technique and height.	Low Creativity, Teamwork (but they can be trained)
Freddy Adu	Benfica (POR)	18	$5.75M	Famous wonderkid from previous CM/FM versions :) High technical skills and speed.	Low Teamwork.
Genero Zeefuik	PSV (HOL)	17	$1.7M	Low price. High technique, work rate.	Low Bravery. Average Composure.
Victor Moses	Crystal Palace	16	Free!	Good Teamwork, Jumping, Strength. Very young.	Low values of Composure, Off The Ball, First Touch. Totally poor Anticipation (5).
Rhys Murphy	Arsenal	16	$2.6M	Brilliant finisher for his very young age. Balanced forward.	Passing=10 and many important attributes are of 11. But they all will be developed to good level if good training is applied.
Henry Saivet	Bordeaux	16	Free	Very prospective one! Already possesses high acceleration and flair.	Poor Teamwork, Stamina, Passing. But they all be trained :)

The last two parts of my Position Guide is about different types of forwards in a team. The first type is so called "quick forwards". It demands the following attributes to have high values:

Most important attributes

Pace & Acceleration – very important attributes if you need a quick striker. With high values of them he will be able to move faster than opponent’s defenders getting often into the box and having one-on-ones.

Finishing – vital for every striker. If your forward can’t shoot the ball and score, he is bad one.

First Touch – passing and shooting making just one touch is very good and leads to quick and one-touch goals.

Dribbling – ability to get the ball past the opponent using technical tricks on speed.

Off The Ball – making good runs into space, taking the best attacking position.

Technique – high technique of forward is important for better control of the ball.

Less important attributes

Agility – How agile the player is. Most likely accompanied with high acceleration and pace.

Composure – important when forward is in front of goal.

Decisions – taking correct and creative decisions will lead to dangerous attacks.

Passing & Creativity – good passing and creativity allows to make effective combinations in attack.

Flair – ability to perform unexpected flamboyant attacking actions. This gives some diversity during attacks and simply beautiful football moments J

Examples of perfect quick forwards

David Villa, Fernando Torres, Thierry Henry, Robinho, Samuel Eto’o

The first season in the Premier League of my  Southampton story  is still very hard for me. The results are very different but mostly sad. Though we still create rather many moments in every match due to usage of 4-3-3 attacking tactics.

Here I have brilliant 4:1 away victory over Derby, fantastic 5:3 with Liverpool, good 2:1 with Aston VIlla and very important, hard 2:1 win over rival Tottenham Hotspurs in FA Cup. On the other hand there were really disappointing losses like 1:6 to Chelsea and 1:4 to Newcastle. It was also very pity to loose the game with Manchester City with the hockey score 4:5 when my Southampton was leading all the match through.

By the way, look at the results of December: 2:4, 5:3, 4:5, 1:6 .... Seems like I manage some kind of hockey team!!!! :)))

After all the league table look in the following way:

You see Southampton scores a lot goals (being on 8th place on scored goals) and misses a lot too... This is the result of aforementioned 4-3-3 tactics, I think. And, of course, some of you, my dear readers, are right giving me advices to use more defensive tactical formation in comments of this post. Therefore I'm going change the things now and make my team perform more defensively.

Finally, some statistics about Southampton players:

The best two footballers are my forwards: Benoit Leroy and, for sure, Marius Niculae. In the previous posts I talked much over Marius Niculae. And actually he is well-known consistent scorer in Football Manager 2008.

Considering Benoit Leroy I would say that I bought him from the 2nd French League (Football Club Libourne Saint Seurin) for $1.4M. He is good usefule forward for Premier League as I see. Though he can also play well as left winger. Leroy has very fine levels of Dribbling, Technique, Composure, Pace, Acceleration, Finishing - skills important for forwards. Look at his attribute values:

I would like also to singe out loaned central defender Pichu Atienza. At the current moment he is the most reliable defender in the team. And Pichu makes also many good headers from corners scoring rather often: 6 goals in 21 game!

 

P.S. I have took control of Senegal national team after their manager had been sacked. Again, I'm Senegal manager as in my previous Arsenal story :)