Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide & Downloadable Resources In-game generated images & any other Football Manager related items are registered trademarks and/or copyright material owned by Sports Interactive, or their respective trademark and copyright holders. The views expressed here are the views of myself & not those of Sports Interactive or SEGA.
Contents Introduction ...... 6 Getting started for new players ...... 7 1. Squad (the players) ...... 11 2. Squad dynamics ...... 13 2.1 Overview ...... 13 2.2 Hierarchy ...... 14 2.3 Social groups ...... 15 2.4 Happiness ...... 15 2.5 Code of conduct ...... 15 2.6 Team meeting ...... 15 2.7 Player personalities ...... 15 2.7.1 Why are player personalities important? ...... 15 2.7.2 What factors determine a player’s personality? ...... 16 2.7.3 The effect on squad personality ...... 16 2.7.4 List of all player personalities ...... 17 2.7.5 Media handling style and why is it important? ...... 17 2.7.6 Why are staff personalities important? ...... 17 2.7.7 List of favourable player and staff personalities ...... 17 2.7.7 List of personalities to avoid ...... 18 3. The development centre – Creating your own youth stars ...... 18 3.1 Development centre breakdown ...... 19 3.1.1 Overview ...... 19 3.1.2 Loans ...... 19 3.1.3 U23’s/U21’s/Reserves & U19’s/U18’s ...... 19 3.1.4 Youth candidates (Newgens) ...... 20 3.1.5 Youth staff ...... 20
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition
3.2 Youth facilities and youth intake ...... 20 3.2.1 Youth facilities grading ...... 21 3.2.2 Junior coaching grading ...... 21 3.2.3 Youth recruitment grading ...... 21 3.2.4 Nation specific youth levels ...... 22 3.2.1 List of top nation youth ratings in Football Manager 2020 ...... 22 3.3 Developing the players ...... 22 3.3.1 Assessing your prospects - Current ability & potential ability? ...... 23 3.3 2 Mentoring ...... 23 3.3.3 Match time with the youth team, reserves & first team ...... 24 3.3.4 When to ‘Loan’ a youth player out? ...... 24 3.3.5 Affiliate clubs and youth development ...... 24 4. Tactics ...... 25 4.1 Tactical Style ...... 25 4.2 Player roles (what they do) ...... 28 4.2.1 Player roles list ...... 29 4.2.2 List of player traits ...... 37 4.2.3 Player duties ...... 38 4.3 Creating your own tactic ...... 38 4.3.1 Attacking – In possession ...... 39 4.3.2 In Transition ...... 41 4.3.3 Defending – Out of possession ...... 42 4.3.4 Specific player marking ...... 43 4.3.5 Opposition instructions ...... 44 4.4 Set pieces ...... 45 4.4.1 What are set pieces? ...... 45 4.2.2 How do set pieces work? ...... 45 4.2.3 Creating your own set pieces ...... 46 4.2.4 Downloadable set piece routines ...... 46 4.5 Using downloadable pre-set tactics ...... 47 4.5.1 Free downloadable tactic “the Scottish Way 442 Diamond Wide” ...... 47 4.6 Assessing if the tactic is working ...... 50 4.6 Making a tactic based on real life ...... 51 5. Team report ...... 51
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5.1 Analyst Report ...... 52 5.2 Assistant report ...... 52 5.3 Squad Depth ...... 53 5.4 Stats ...... 53 5.5 Facts ...... 53 5.6 Comparison...... 53 6. Training ...... 53 6.1 Team training ...... 54 6.1.1 Chrissy’s training schedules ...... 54 6.1.2 List of all team training sessions available ...... 55 6.1.3 Balancing training sessions ...... 56 6.1.4 Rest ...... 57 6.2 Individual training ...... 57 6.2.1 Individual focus ...... 57 6.2.2 Player role and position training ...... 57 6.2.3 Training of player traits (PPMs) ...... 58 6.3 List of training facilities ...... 59 6.4 Coaches ...... 60 7. Background Staff ...... 60 7.1 The Delegation of duties – hints and tips ...... 60 7.2 Staff filters & coaching attributes ...... 61 8. Medical centre ...... 62 9. Scouting ...... 63 9.1. Scouting menu ...... 63 9.2 Scouting tips ...... 65 9.2.1 Creating a scouting network ...... 66 9.2.2 Feeder and parent clubs aid scouting ...... 66 9.2.3 List of the top countries in FM20 to scout...... 66 10. Transfers ...... 67 10.1 Wage/Transfer budget management ...... 67 10.1.1 Budget adjustments ...... 67 10.1.2 Financial Fair Play (FFP) – European Clubs...... 67 10.2 Player recruitment ...... 67 10.2.1 Where to find players? Poaching youth players! ...... 68
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition
10.2.2 International management ...... 68 10.3 Advice in buying players ...... 68 10.3.1 Transfer tips ...... 68 10.3.3 Signing a player who is not interested in signing for you ...... 69 10.4 Advice in selling players ...... 69 10.5 Advice in loaning in players ...... 69 10.6 Advice in loaning out players ...... 69 10.7 Downloadable player filters link ...... 70 11. Playing the game (post inductions) – Tips and advice ...... 71 11.1 Managing the squad day to day...... 71 11.2 Match preparation ...... 72 11.2.1 Analysis (next opponent – stat pack) ...... 72 11.2.2 Match plans – Scenarios ...... 72 11.2.3 Tactical briefings ...... 73 11.3 Playing a match ...... 74 11.3.1 Team talks and shouts ...... 74 11.3.2 Game management & tactical tips...... 77 11.4 Managing club finances...... 78 11.4.1 Club Income ...... 78 11.4.2 Club outgoings ...... 79 11.4.3 Best practice ...... 79 11.4.5 Improving your infrastructure & sugar daddy owners ...... 80 11.4.6 List of prominent foreground sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) . 80 11.4.7 List of prominent background sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) . 80 11.4.8 List of prominent underwriter sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) 81 11,4,9 List of prominent underwriter (expects return) sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) ...... 81 11.4.6 Affiliate clubs ...... 81 11.5 Leaving a club finding the club and/or country for you ...... 82 11.6 Some challenges to try ...... 83 12. Perspective & final tips...... 84 12.1 Perspective ...... 84 12.2 Deleting hall of fame ...... 84 12.3 Customisable content - Skins, graphics, mods, panels ...... 84
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12.4 Gameplay strategies, philosophy & FM stories ...... 85 13. Future tactical focus ...... 85 Thank you ...... 86
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition
Introduction The aim of this guide is to give new and old players the essential supplementary information and resources needed to play the football manager game alongside the tutorials/inductions provided in-game. The contents pages of this guide will give a list of topics and these are broken down to reflect each segment of the game with relevant resources. This guide is not meant to be an exhaustive, covering all aspects, hints and tips, it is however meant to be a good starting point for players to understand the basics of the game, develop their own resources and enjoy the game. All this information can be found through playing and analysing the game for 20+ years like I have, on forums or via a relevant google search. It’s been compiled alongside downloadable tested resources I’ve created to help people start off on the content creation journey. If you want more detail, the SI Games official forums I cannot recommend enough for amazingly interesting articles from a host of content creators and veterans who love Football Manager. They will present a lot more depth, analysis and discussion than this document could ever hope to achieve. You can check them out on the following link; https://community.sigames.com/ I must state that I may have the occasional thing wrong here (I hope not too many), poor grammar, the odd typo and I am by no means an ‘expert’. I understand and respect why SI don’t release a guide like this to protect gameplay, realism and immersion, which led to a move towards a more intuitive realistic in-game induction system, but I also get why a lot of players want a one stop resource to reference. I hope this guide and the accompanying resources are useful to you, if it has been and you want similar content, or you want to support my work, you can catch it all on my patreon. This guide and the associated resources will be updated each year for free, for every version on patreon going forwards - https://www.patreon.com/comedychrissy
Enjoy, Chrissy Ross
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Getting started for new players When you start the game for the first time, it can be overwhelming just the sheer volume of options that are available. You have 4 game options - “Career”, “Fantasy Draft”, Online Career and Create-A-Club. Career is the generic regular game for which this guide will focus on. To play this click on Career, which will then give you the option of what club you wish to start with and what league. To choose which league you play in and have loaded and to perhaps delay the decision slightly in choosing a club, you can select “pick team later” go to advanced options and choose the leagues you wish to load.
You can also choose advanced options such as using fake players & staff, disabling the first transfer window, preventing the use of the in-game editor and disabling attribute masking. My personal preference is to no use real fixtures, not adding key staff, disabling player attribute masking and prevent use of the in-game editor but you’ll decide in time what suits you. You’ll notice in the top right corner the player count and the estimated game speed. Your computer and how many leagues/size of database you load will influence this. Ideally you have the game speed at acceptable parameters. Start off with one nation loaded, if it is already 1-3 stars it’s perhaps best to lighten the leagues loaded. Once you’ve made the decision and selection of your in-game database, you can then choose the pre-season start date (I would suggest as early as possible) click “start game”. You’ll then be asked to “choose or create a manager profile”. If this is your first time you will have to create a profile. This will involve adding personal 7 | Page
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition details, connecting to your Youtube or Twitter account and your manager’s appearance.
If you have not already done so you will next be asked to choose a club, an international side, both or start as unemployed. At this section you can view all the available playable teams from your database before making a choice.
You’ll next be asked to choose your manager’s style which will give you the option of selecting the in-game manager’s coaching badges and past playing experience to ascertain their coaching and mental attributes, which you can 8 | Page
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition thereafter manually edit. I would suggest prioritising mental attributes such as man management, level of discipline as these will influence how your players behave, alongside motivating and determination, which alongside level of discipline which influence how effective the coaching attributes are for training. The coaching attributes will be discussed in the staff filters and coaching attributes section. You will then have the breaking news, club introduction, team report, transfer & loan obligations overview, the club vision, club culture and the club’s 5-year plan presented in quick succession.
As a new manager you’ll be offered an induction schedule to learn about each element of the game. These tutorials focus on the following subjects; Scouting, Transfers, Training, Tactics, Team Report, Squad Dynamics, Medical Centre, Squad (the players), Background Staff and the Development Centre. To keep in line with the inductions I will provide my take on these inductions and provide resources where relevant for each section, with a “Playing the game post induction” section at the end. Select for all the inductions to be “sent today” and then you’ll next be asked if you wish if you wish to schedule a press conference and receive an advice report from the assistant manager. I’d recommend saying yes to both. After you confirm these, you’ll be requested to save the game, which will automatically be entitled by your name and your chosen club.
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The game will then present you with your inbox which should have up to 16 messages for you to read. These will include your welcome article, introductory advice summary from your assistant manager, all your inductions, a club vision and expectations meeting, pre-season fitness report, squad selection rules and the transfer window status. I would strongly suggest you complete these inductions and view the remainder of this document as you go through the sections as this has been specifically created to complement the inductions and to help expand upon what it is presenting.
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1. Squad (the players) The squad section shows the current player roster for the first team squad, whereas the development centre shows reserves and youth teams. Your squad can be viewed via the players drop down menu, with the standard pre-set set at ‘Selection Info’ as demonstrated below;
Using the ‘Selection Info’ as an example, the PKD column (Picked from the drop-down section on the left), you will see what players are assigned to positions. In the example, none are selected. You will have the option of the player positions and substitutes numbered S1-S12 as listed below the player drop down menu to select. The next column is the INF (Information) column and this highlights injuries, players being rested or on holiday, transfer status, loan status and player happiness if adverse. The next column is ‘Name’ and this is the player’s name, the next indicates the players preferred ‘position (s)’. The 5th column indicates ‘individual player morale’ and the ‘CON/SHP’ column describes a player’s condition and match sharpness. The playing time happiness column is self-explanatory, the ‘APPS’ column lists appearances this season, ‘GLS’ indicates goals scored, ‘AST’ indicates assists and ‘AV RAT’ is with regards to the player’s aggregate average rating across all games. You can select other versions to display relevant player data and there is a custom option available which many players use. To start with the ‘selection info’ layout is sufficient, you will no doubt change this as you play the game.
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You will see at the top right- hand side there are two options to click – one is quick pick (with the associated drop down) and the other is Filter (again with various options when accessed). The quick pick option allows you to select players quickly for games with pre- set conditions which can be accessed using “set guidelines”. My advice is to amend this in order that only players with 90% plus condition are automatically picked. Anything less than 88% you’ll find players gassing out under most tactical systems, which leads to lots of late goals conceded. The filter allows you to change who is viewed in the squad setting, so you can include reserve and youth players if desired. You can also filter the squad by positions, preferred side and you can hide certain players from the view, such as trialists, those not at the club and those that are not home grown.
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2. Squad dynamics
Squad Dynamics, accessed through the ‘Dynamics’ menu, assesses the happiness of the first team squad and the relationships and developed hierarchy of the squad. It is split into 6 sections – Overview, Hierarchy, Social Groups, Happiness, Code of Conduct and Team Meeting 2.1 Overview This section provides information on the team’s cohesion, the dressing room atmosphere, how strong the managerial support is and any issues within the squad. The team cohesion section assesses how well the squad is playing together and it will indicate any on-field cohesion issues that may arise. Player’s that have player together a long time will have good cohesion, if you have an influx of new players, this may be very low and the players will not be blending as well. The dressing room atmosphere is really a dipstick measuring the sense of unity, morale and happiness of the first team squad. Factors that influence this will be individual players happiness with playing time, player morale and reactions to how you deal with themselves and their colleagues, the age disparity between the squad members, the nationality of the squad members and the length of time the players have been at the club. The managerial support section is an indication of your influence and reputation currently with the players and the player’s happiness with your management of them and the club.
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2.2 Hierarchy
The hierarchy demonstrates via a pyramid style graphic the order of leadership and influence throughout the club. This is essentially your squad and club’s culture and identity. What type of players do you want at the club? Ideally you want determined, model citizen, professional or loyal players occupying these roles, as their example sets that for those less influential players. If you replace lots of players, sell or release team leaders and cut influential players and they are unhappy not playing as much as they would like, you will have problems. Think about Roy Keane’s last few weeks at Man United, he was a club legend but Sir Alex Ferguson knew the player’s best days were behind him and when he became a threat to his authority and control, he released him. So in FM if you have a similar situation it may be wise to do likewise or re-apply an experienced player wanting away to become a player-coach with less playing time for example or have a contract be resigned that reflects the low playing time expectations now in place. This of course is just an example, how you manage your players is up to yourself, but every player interaction has an effect on the player and their teammates. If you holiday between games and ignore influential player concerns you will quickly see results be adversely effected.
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2.3 Social groups The social groups section states the main players of influence as a collective within the club. This is a reflection to an extent of the group mentality that is adopted by social groups in real life. The core group is those of major influence over the club, whereas the secondary group are those out with this grouping perhaps due to being newly joined or having vastly differing personalities to the core group members. Interestingly players that are scouted and are “fits” with this social group are suggested by the assistant manager in this section. 2.4 Happiness The happiness section represents a graphic illustration of each individual players happiness. It displays a player’s happiness with promises made, their training, treatment, view of the club, your management, their playing time and how all these combine to present their overall happiness. 2.5 Code of conduct This section details the rules agree upon by yourself and the squad and how misconduct is dealt with. If you are too lenient, you run the risk of players behaviour sliding negatively and poor indiscipline on the field. 2.6 Team meeting The team meeting section is where you go to introduce yourself, set expectations and resolve any issues. Team meetings are your best way to sort out any squad issues that arise due to collective unhappiness, or poor morale. If you have a bad run of results, this is what you use to fix the squad morale but be careful, the wrong tone, or reaction could make things worse.
2.7 Player personalities 2.7.1 Why are player personalities important? A player’s personality in real life will affect his attitude and decision making which FM20 tries to replicate by having the player’s personality influence a player’s relationships with fellow players and staff, their level of ambition and attitude to training, matches and their response to how you interact with them, be it via the media or in person. The personality of a player therefore affects player morale, squad morale and player and squad happiness through the agency of these interactions.
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2.7.2 What factors determine a player’s personality? A player’s personality is a combination of hidden personality traits (which can be viewed via the editor if you so wish) which are follows: Ambition, Controversy, Loyalty, Pressure, Professionalism, Sportsmanship and Temperament. These are fairly self-explanatory as are the two in-game attributes that have an effect which are Determination and Leadership. For myself playing the game, any player filters I create and the main stat I always look at whenever I take over a new club is that of player determination. It is not a sure-fire indicator of what to expect from a behaviour but as a rule of thumb I quickly get rid of low determination players and seek to have a culture of high determination throughout the squad. The rationale behind this is that high determination combined with a favourable player personality, is a sign of a player that will develop and not cause issues in terms of team morale and happiness if they are managed correctly and not ill-treated.
2.7.3 The effect on squad personality The squad’s overall personality can be referenced via the Club-General menu screen. The accumulation of your overall group of player personalities dictates how the overall squad is described and expected to behave and react. It is important because this is essentially the culture of your club, your player’s level of professionalism, their ambition, their loyalty and their determination all dictate this. You should expect this to influence the existing squad, new players signed to the club, youth players coming through and their collective approach to matches, reactions to the media and their interactions with you and the staff. Young players are influenced up until the age of 24 at best/worst, so be mindful of this if your approach is developing youth. Ultimately this reflects the type of team you have. A determined team, which I always aim for, rarely gives up and when results aren’t going my way, I hit the “demand more” shout and a positive response form the determined bunch is given. Now this is just a very brief example but a casual group of players or those with low determination would be expected not to keep fighting for the result.
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2.7.4 List of all player personalities A player’s personality is an overall description of their behaviour and approach. I have listed all the various types in alphabetical order below: Ambitious, Balanced, Born Leader, Casual, Charismatic Leader, Determined, Devoted (Only if presently at their favourite club), Driven, Easily Discouraged, Fairly Ambitious, Fairly Determined, Fairly Loyal, Fairly Professional, Fairly Sporting, Fickle, Honest, Iron Willed, Jovial, Leader, Light Hearted, Low Determination, Low Self Belief, Loyal, Mercenary, Model Citizen, Model Professional, Perfectionist, Professional, Realist, Resilient, Resolute, Slack, Spineless, Spirited, Sporting, Temperamental, Unambitious, Unsporting, Very Ambitious, Very Loyal 2.7.5 Media handling style and why is it important? Media handling style indicates how a player or staff member will interact with the media. These have been listed below alphabetically: Confrontational, Evasive, Level headed, Media Friendly, Outspoken, Plays Mind Games, Reserved, Short-Tempered, Unflappable, Volatile
2.7.6 Why are staff personalities important? Staff personalities are important because if you delegate tasks to the staff, they will behave according to the personality they have and this means if you delegate tasks such media interactions to those unsuited to it, it may result in having a negative effect on the squad and individual player morale and happiness.
2.7.7 List of favourable player and staff personalities Here are what I consider to be the desired player personalities. My advice is to apply these for when you are scouting players and focus only on these positive traits: Model Citizen, Perfectionist, Resolute, Model professional, Professional, Fairly professional, Spirited, Very ambitious, Ambitious, Driven, Determined, Fairly determined, Charismatic leader, Born leader, Leader, Iron willed, Resilient
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2.7.7 List of personalities to avoid Any player with these personalities I would seek to remove form a club as soon as is feasible: Slack, Casual, Temperamental, Unambitious, Easily discouraged, Low determination, Spineless, Low self-belief
3. The development centre – Creating your own youth stars
The Development Centre is where you train, develop and manage the players out on loan, the reserve teams and the youth system of the club. If you are going to play the game long term at any club then investing in youth development is essential to produce your own players, be financially self- sufficient club and to build a dynasty. Developing youth players and having a team predominately of your youth graduates is a very satisfying way of playing and one that I myself advocate, but the question is – How to do it successfully? The following mini guide will explain how the Development Centre works and will give advice on how best to maximise the potential of your youth players.
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3.1 Development centre breakdown
Picture: La Masia – FC Barcelona’s Youth Academy The centre is split up into 6 sectional menus; Overview, Loans, Under 23’s/Reserves, U19’s/U18’s, Youth Candidates and Staff. 3.1.1 Overview The overview section is a quick look assessment of how the loans, reserves and youth teams are doing and provides an appraisal of how many players are on loan, the quality of the respective development squads, which players should be considered as first team candidates, issues that need attention and which players in the development squads are ones to watch. 3.1.2 Loans This section gives a breakdown of which players are on loan, which team they are with, any issues that may arise, when the loan expires, relevant stats of the players on loan and it gives you the option of recalling the players if need be if that is available. It also features a section on loan suggestions to help aid development. 3.1.3 U23’s/U21’s/Reserves & U19’s/U18’s This section has a drop-down menu that replicates the first team squad set up. In this menu it looks at the respective squad, tactics used, squad dynamics, training (both team and individual), player registration, fixtures, previous matches and an overview of all. These are no different from the first team squad sections listed here.
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3.1.4 Youth candidates (Newgens) Every year youth candidates, or as FM players call them ‘Newgens’ are developed by the game and these are your youth prospects that you will have to sign or delegate a staff member to sign. These reflect the coaching staff and nationality. Nationality is important as the ‘nation youth rating’ in conjunction with the ‘game importance’ of football to that nation determine the baseline level of the talent developed in that nation. For example, Brazilian regens will be better than Maltese one. The nationality of the country and the youth development infrastructure that the club has, dictates the quality and quantity of these players. The lower the reputation of the nation, the lower the quality of the player as a baseline. The youth facilities and youth set up does influence this but you can have an elite youth set up at a Maltese club and still struggle to get a world class team of Maltese players. In a nation the club with the best youth recruitment, will on average obtain the best youth talent from that nation. If there are comparable systems, the spoils of youth recruitment will on average be split, with preference give to the club with the higher club reputation. 3.1.5 Youth staff The quality of the staff will influence the development of the players. There is no point in having an elite youth set up with terrible coaches. The development of players is based on a layering of factors and you want the best coaches possible and the best medical staff possible to develop and keep the players in shape. The head of youth development, or whoever fulfils that role at a club is responsible for attaining youth players to the club and will influence the type of player selected and the personality they have. It is therefore crucial that the personality of your head of youth and staff are in line with your club’s culture. 3.2 Youth facilities and youth intake Youth development from an infrastructure perspective is reliant upon the level of the youth facilities & as they move into the reserves and first team the training facilities. These combined with efficient training schedules, excellent coaches and playing time will develop your players. The quality of the youth intake is dictated by the nation youth rating, the importance of football in that nation, the quality of the ‘Head of Youth Recruitment’ and from an infrastructure perspective the ‘junior coaching’ and ‘youth recruitment’, which alongside the club facilities is listed in the ‘Club Info’ main menu.
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A youth intake preview will indicate the quality of the upcoming youth intake. 3.2.1 Youth facilities grading Youth facilities are grading from ‘Poor to State of the Art’ as listed below:
• Poor • Basic • Below Average • Adequate • Average • Good • Great • Excellent • Superb • State of the Art 3.2.2 Junior coaching grading Junior coaching is assessed in quality from having no coaching ‘None’ to having he best ‘Exceptional’ as listed below:
• None • Minimal • Fairly Basic • Average • Adequate • Good • Excellent • Exceptional 3.2.3 Youth recruitment grading Youth recruitment is graded from ‘none’ to ‘Extensive’ and these are listed below:
• None • Limited • Basic • Fairly Basic • Average • Above Average • Established • Well Established • Extensive Youth Recruitment influences the quality of the newgens created in terms of potential ability. 21 | Page
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3.2.4 Nation specific youth levels Each nation in the game has varying youth leagues and levels. The English youth system has however another level of categorisation labelled as ‘Youth Level’ within the game that can be viewed by accessing the facilities section in game. The lowest youth level is 0 (unrated), and then is tiered levels 4 to 1, with level 1 being the top tier. 3.2.1 List of top nation youth ratings in Football Manager 2020 Youth ratings are adjudged from 0-200. I have included a list of the top nations below:
• Brazil - 163 • Germany - 155 • Italy - 144 • Spain/France/Argentina/ - 140 • Egypt – 138 • Turkey – 124 • Holland – 122 • England/Mexico/Nigeria – 120 • Russia – 118 • Colombia – 117 • Portugal – 114 • Japan – 112 • Belgium/South Korea/U.S.A. – 110 To find youth intake’s any given month do the following:
1. Click the globe icon in the top right corner. 2. Select ‘world’ from the top options, not the left side. 3. Select ‘transfers’ in the ‘general’ list. 4. Now click the ‘all transfers’ drop-down menu and select ‘youth intake’. 3.3 Developing the players To develop a player, you need a combination of training conditions (facilities and coaching), the right culture of players, adequate mentoring and match time at a level appropriate for the player. You must then assess if the player fits your club’s culture in terms of their personality and if they have the stats to either player a position or role within your tactical framework or can be trained to do so. If a player does not fit either criteria, you should move them on.
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3.3.1 Assessing your prospects - Current ability & potential ability? When assessing any given player, you are given two ratings, current and potential ability in the form of a 5-star rating system to adjudge them by. Current ability is how much your player has currently developed, potential ability is how well you can expect them to develop, given the right factors. My advice is to take an appraisal of a player’s personality, their attributes, how they fit into the tactical framework you have in place, not just the CA & PA they have displayed. 3.3 2 Mentoring Mentoring is used to develop players using existing players to influence new players, primarily those no older than the age of 24. These existing player’s personalities are key in ascertaining how the dynamic of mentoring will unfold. As a rule of thumb, I always have players with the personalities that represent the club philosophy mentor the youth players. In this instance it would be those with high determination and the personalities that have been previously alluded to in section 2.7.7. You want ideally players with the following personalities to be mentoring your young players; Model Citizen, Perfectionist, Resolute, Model professional, Professional, Fairly professional, Spirited, Very ambitious, Ambitious, Driven, Determined, Fairly determined, Charismatic leader, Born leader, Leader, Iron willed, Resilient
Mentoring is important because player personalities do not seem to develop on Football Manager without this and mentee’s may even develop their mentor’s plyer traits, which is incredibly useful if you are training and mentoring a player to hopefully one day challenge their mentor and fit within the tactical system. When setting up mentoring groups in the training section of the game you should group these players by position with a maximum ¾ players per group and no more than half of the group being mentee’s or youth players under the age of 24.
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3.3.3 Match time with the youth team, reserves & first team It is important to give young players relevant game time. For example, it is more beneficial for a young player to play 30 games in the youth team or on loan than it is to appear 5 times from the first team bench and make little impact. Playing time matters and so does the level it is carried out at but only play players when they are ready for the first team from youth set up. Here is the guide I use when promoting players to the first team squad: Promote the best youth prospects only to the first team, those that can realistically make an impact on games and/or develop with proper mentoring. Do not expose youth players to games they cannot win just to squad rotate. Many mangers are guilty of doing this is cups. Rotate the young players into realistic and favourable games for their development. 3.3.4 When to ‘Loan’ a youth player out? The reserve leagues rarely develop a player, so if a player is too old for the youth team but not quite ready for the first team, loan them out. Chances are you may have to sell them if they aren’t developing and this loan period may increase their value. You should ideally have a feeder club with good training facilities to loan the player out to and playing at a favourable level for their development. Take training facilities and how much a player is being guaranteed playing time into account. There is no point loaning a player out for them to act as back up elsewhere and get no game time. 3.3.5 Affiliate clubs and youth development Affiliate clubs are a great way to develop young players and attain he best young players from other nations. Look for clubs with high reputation, good training facilities and that play at a comparably high level, in order to help maximise the players development. Good affiliate clubs will be ones that give players the opportunity for lots of game time and develop the players.
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4. Tactics
The tactics induction looks at three sections; Tactical Style, Formation & Player Roles. These will be used to help you create a tactical style for your team to adopt, which formation they will use and player roles for the tactic. 4.1 Tactical Style The game’s induction helps you by telling you automatically what tactical systems suit your players by presenting a white thumbs-up graphic next to the relevant tactical styles. These are descriptions given in game as follows; • Control Possession • Gegenpress • Tiki-Taka • Vertical Tiki Taka • Wing Play • Route One • Fluid Counter-Attack • Direct Counter-Attack • Catenaccio • Park The Bus When you select a tactical style game will give you a motion example followed by a description of what formations work best with it, how the tactic works in terms of mentality and descriptions of the team in possession, the teams in
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition transition and the team out of possession as shown below with “Route One” as an example;
It’ll then ask you to choose a formation and it is best to choose one that fits with the tactical style and the game does give you these options. You must however choose a formation that best suits your players available or those you seek to sign. There is no point using a formation that uses a left inverted winger if you don’t have that player or can’t sign one of sufficient quality. You will normally be given the three best formations that suit your team and they will also automatically choose the player roles best suited to that formation and tactical style.
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For example, the ‘Route One’ tactical style suits a 4-4-2, 4-1-4-1 DM Wide & a 4-4-1-1 as demonstrated above. The player role chosen are no-nonsense centre-back at the CD position. It would make no sense for example to have a ball-playing defender as the CD as you are looking to play the ball long in this tactical style which the no-nonsense centre-back does, whereas the ball-playing defend would try to play it out from the back. Similarly. at the opposite end of the pitch a Target Man is one of the strikers, which again is thematic and in line with the tactical style of play as he will be the focal point for the start of any attacks. You can of course change these roles and indeed the formations but I would stick with the pre-sets if you are a new player to begin with. Once you’ve chosen the formation, you will be presented with tactics menu proper. The tactics menu when opened displays the tactic’s formation and the computer can auto assign players to positions if you click the “Quick-Pick” option. The tactics menu presents you with the mentality adopted, how the team is instructed to behave in possession, in transition and out of possession. These, alongside the player roles, will have been dictated by the tactical style 27 | Page
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition which is also listed. You are now ready to play a game at this point with this game assisted created tactic but if you wish to create your own tactic and learn about the player roles in more detail then read on. 4.2 Player roles (what they do) You will notice on the formation screen there are then the selected players within the formation with various coloured dots next to their names. These dots represent the player’s adapted natural ability in the position and player role they have been given. Each position has a variety of player roles and duty that the player is asked to undertake. The pre-set tactics assign those most natural to the tactical style and formation chosen so if you wish to experiment with them, I’d suggest you read the descriptions given not only for the player role but also the duty.
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4.2.1 Player roles list Here is a list of the player roles with the position these roles can play indicated in the brackets, along with a short description of what they do, my personal suggestions for relevant player traits (this is very much just my opinion, please adapt to your tactics) and a real-life example for illustration purposes; Goalkeeper (GK) Description – A goalkeeper’s main focus is in keeping the ball out of the net and protecting the 6-yard box. Real life Example – Joe Hart Useful Player Traits - Plays Ball With Feet, Uses Long Throw To Start Counter Attacks Sweeper keeper (GK) Description – A sweeper keeper acts not only as a goalkeeper but as a sweeper in possession. Real life Example – Manuel Neuer Useful Player Traits - Plays Ball With Feet, Uses Long Throw To Start Counter Attacks Ball Playing Defender (DC) Description – Focus is to defend the defensive area but also start attacks form the back Real life Example – Sergio Ramos Useful Player Traits - Stays Back At All Times, Tries Killer Balls Often, Tries Long range Passes, Brings Ball out of defence, Does Not Dive Into Tackles Central Defender (DC) Description – The central defenders focus is on defending the goal and clearing any danger. Real life Example – Jonny Evans Useful Player Traits - Stays Back At All Times, Marks Opponent Tightly Complete Wingback (DL/R, LWB/RWB) Description – This player gets up and down the pitch in support of attacks and defence. Real life Example - Cafu Useful Player Traits - Gets Forward Whenever Possible, Hugs Line, Runs With Ball Down Left/Right, Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Brings Balls Out of Defence, Hugs Line, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Tries To Play Way Out Of Trouble, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right
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Fullback (DL/R) Description – Gets up in support of the midfield and makes sure he’s not caught out defensively. Real life Example - Gary Neville Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Hugs Line, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right Inverted Wingback (DL/R, LWB/RWB) Description – A wingback that sits inside and plays in the central area of the pitch. Real life Example - Phillip Lahm Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Libero (DC) Description – A libero acts as a sweeper and as a playmaking rolled into one. Real life Example - Franz Beckenbauer Useful Player Traits - Brings Balls Out of Defence, Tries Killer Balls Often, Tries Long range Passes, Does Not Dive Into Tackles No-nonsense Centreback (DC) Description – Is what it says on the tin, No nonsense defending, clearing all danger. Real life Example – Ben Mee Useful Player Traits - Stays Back At All Times, Marks Opponent Tightly, No-nonsense Fullback (DL/DR) Description – Fullback fully focused on defending danger, rarely attacks. A centre half type fullback Real life Example - Joleon Lescott Useful Player Traits - Stays Back At All Times, Marks Opponent Tightly Wingback (DL/R, LWB/RWB) Description – An attack minded player whose focus is on supporting the defence, midfield and attack by providing width Real life Example - Marcelo Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Gets Forward Whenever Possible, Hugs Line, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Tries To Play Way Out Of Trouble, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right 30 | Page
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Advanced Playmaker (MC/AMC) Description – Midfield schemer, who will seek to take extra time in possession in the hope of opening up the opposition with a brilliant pass. Real life Example – Luka Modric Useful Player Traits - Dictates Tempo, Dwells on Ball, Likes Ball Played Into Feet, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Anchor Man (DMC) Description – This player anticipates and intercepts the opposition’s attacking players in the space in-front of the defence and midfield. Real life Example – Sergio Busquets Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles Attacking Midfielder (AMC) Description – A forward player that supports the midfield and attack in the central position. Real life Example – Mesut Ozil Useful Player Traits - Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Ball Winning Midfielder (DMC/MC) Description – Focused on winning the ball back from the opposition. Real life Example – David Batty Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles Box-To-Box Midfielder (MC) Description – All action midfielder, seeks to influence all phases of play, defence, midfield and attack. Real life Example – Steven Gerrard Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Comes Deep To Get Ball, Carrilero (MC) Description – This player moves laterally and is characterised as getting the ball in the centre and moving out wide to stretch opponents. Real life Example – Amadou Diawara Useful Player Traits - Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score
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Central Midfielder (MC) Description – Midfielder who can have a multitude of roles within the team dependant on duty. Real life Example – Frank Lampard Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Deep-Lying Playmaker (DMC/MC) Description – Midfield schemer who seeks to start attack plays whilst mindful of their defensive duties. Real life Example – Andrea Pirlo Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Dictates Tempo Defensive Midfielder (DMC) Description – A player who protects the defence and midfield by seeking to protect the central area. Real life Example – N'Golo Kanté Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles Enganche (AMC) Description – A player who acts as an attacking pivot in the attacking central third of the pitch., creating space and opportunities for teammates. Real life Example - Juan Roman Riquelme Useful Player Traits - Likes Ball Played Into Feet, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Halfback (DMC) Description – Plays between the defence and midfield and is focused on ball recovery, similar to that of a central defender but slightly higher up the field. Real life Example – Eric Dier Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles Inside Forward (AML/AMR) Description – Sits in a narrower position to wingers out wide and cuts inside directly attacking the goal. Real life Example - Neymar Useful Player Traits - Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Crosses Early
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Inverted Winger (AML/AMR) Description – Winger who seeks to cut inside to attack the central channels from wide. Real life Example – Arjen Robben Useful Player Traits - Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Crosses Early Mezzala (MC) Description – An attack minded midfielder who will seek to make an impact in the central final third. Real life Example – Sergej Milinkovic-Savic Useful Player Traits - Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Raumdeuter (AML/AMR) Description – Attacks the space & channels towards the goal from a roaming position. Real life Example – Thomas Müller Useful Player Traits - Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Crosses Early Regista (DMC) Description – Defensive midfielder who controls the offensive play of the team from deep. Real life Example - Jorginho Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Dictates Tempo, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Roaming Playmaker (DMC/MC) Description – Midfielder who always provides passing options centrally to teammates and seeks to spearhead attacks, whilst covering defensively when required. Real life Example – Paul Pogba Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Dictates Tempo, Likes Ball Played Into Feet, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Segundo Volante (DMC) Description – This player is a multi-threat option, defensively aware but also very attack minded from the DM position. An allrounder. Real life Example – Leander Dendoncker Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score
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Shadow Striker (AMC) Description – Operates as the main goalscoring threat of the team. Works well with a forward who holds the ball up for the shadow striker to attack the position. Real life Example – Pele Useful Player Traits - Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Moves Into Channels, Places Shots, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Tries First Time Shots, Shoots With Power Wide Midfielder (ML/MR, AML/AMR) Description – A balanced midfielder, seeking to Real life Example – David Beckham Useful Player Traits - Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Crosses Early, Hugs Line, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right Wide Playmaker (AML/AMR) Description – Wide midfielder who acts as the teams main creative attacking force. Real life Example - Koke Useful Player Traits - Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Dictates Tempo, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Wide Targetman (AML/AMR) Description – Main outlet for clearances and long balls from the back out wide. Real life Example – Mario Mandžukić Useful Player Traits - Places Shots, Shoots With Power, Plays With Back To Goal Winger (ML/MR, AML/AMR) Description – Midfield player who attacks the wide space through pace, passing, crosses or cut backs from out wide. Real life Example – Jadon Sancho Useful Player Traits - Hugs Line, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Tries To Play Way Out Of Trouble, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right
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Advanced Forward (FC) Description – Attacking striker focused on breaking the offside or defensive line to create chances and/or score goals. Real life Example - Gonzalo Higuaín Useful Player Traits - Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Moves Into Channels, Places Shots, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Tries First Time Shots, Shoots With Power Complete Forward (FC) Description – A player that excels in all aspects of forward play, can drop deep, hold up the play, make runs into channels or space and score goals. Real life Example - Cristiano Ronaldo Useful Player Traits - Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Moves Into Channels, Places Shots, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Tries First Time Shots, Shoots With Power Deep-Lying Forward (FC) Description – Forward who operates in a deeper role, seeking to receive the ball and attack the defensive line, whilst bringing into play attacking teammates. Real life Example – Eric Cantona Useful Player Traits - Comes Deep To Get Ball, Places Shots, Shoots With Power, Plays With Back To Goal False Nine (FC) Description – A striker who drops into midfield to get involved in the action but still acts as a goalscoring threat when the opportunity arises. Real life Example – Lionel Messi Useful Player Traits - Comes Deep To Get Ball, Places Shots, Shoots With Power, Plays With Back To Goal, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score Poacher (FC) Description – Pure goalscoring player, solely focused on putting the ball in the back of the net. Real life Example – Ally McCoist Useful Player Traits - Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Moves Into Channels, Places Shots, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Tries First Time Shots, Shoots With Power 35 | Page
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition
Pressing Forward (FC) Description – A forward that puts the oppositions defence and midfield under pressure to regain the ball as fast as possible. Real life Example – Troy Deeney Useful Player Traits - Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Moves Into Channels, Places Shots, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Tries First Time Shots, Shoots With Power Targetman (FC) Description – Big, powerful striker that is an outlet for clearances from the back. Real life Example - Fernando Llorente Useful Player Traits - Places Shots, Shoots With Power, Plays With Back To Goal Trequartista (AMC/FC) Description – Aims to drop into central attacking spaces continually providing an attacking outlet for the team, with little defensive responsibilities. Real life Example – Zinedine Zidane Useful Player Traits - Places Shots, Shoots With Power, Plays With Back To Goal
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4.2.2 List of player traits Player traits (PPMs) that complement the tactical approach, the team instructions, the player’s role and the player’s individual instructions will have more consistent expected tactical results. Here is a list of all the Player traits (PPM’s) available in the game in alphabetical order for you to view; Argues with Officials, Arrives late in Opponent’s Area, Attempts Overhead Kicks, Attempts to Develop Weaker Foot, Avoids Using Weaker Foot, Brings Balls Out of Defence, Comes Deep To Get Ball, Crosses Early, Curls Ball, Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Dictates Tempo, Dives Into Tackles, Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Does not Move Into Channels, Dwells on Ball, Gets Crowd Going, Gets Forward Whenever Possible, Gets Into Opposition Area, Hits Free Kicks With Power, Hugs Line, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes Ball Played Into Feet, Likes To Beat Man Repeatedly, Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score, Marks Opponent Tightly, Moves Ball To Left Foot Before Dribble Attempt, Moves Ball To Right Foot Before Dribble Attempt, Moves Into Channels, Places Shots, Plays Ball With Feet, Plays No Through Balls, Plays One-Twos, Plays Short Simple Passes, Plays With Back To Goal, Possesses Long Flat Throw, Refrains From Taking Long Shots, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right, Runs With Ball Often, Runs With Ball Rarely, Runs With Ball Down Centre, Shoots From Distance, Shoots With Power, Stays Back At All Times, Stops Play, Tries First Time Shots, Tries Killer Balls Often, Tries Long Range Free Kicks, Tries Long Range Passes, Tries To Play Way Out Of Trouble, Tries Tricks, Uses Long Throw To Start Counter Attacks, Uses Outside of Foot, Winds Up Opponents. You can get a player to learn one of these traits by going into the individual player’s ‘Development’ player’s menu and clicking on ‘Discuss new trait as shown below;
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4.2.3 Player duties What do the duties ask of the players: Defend – Asks the player to focus on the defensive third of the pitch. Stopper – Looks for the defender to attack the ball ahead of the defensive line. Cover – Asks the defender to cover the space behind the defensive line. Support – Provides a balance between defend and attack duties. Attack – Asks the player to focused on influencing the final third of the pitch. Automatic – This is dictated by the mentality adopted and is exceptionally useful if you have a tactic whose mentality will change due to situational circumstances.
4.3 Creating your own tactic Creating your own tactic is what I personally find most fun about football manager games and it has evolved with each iteration of the game from championship manager in the 90’s being very simplistic focused on formations, to tactical styles and a more intuitive and reflective system based more in- depth on real life tactical systems used in the game. The process of creating your own tactic is the same as the one the induction takes you through. How much you want to deviate from the tactical styles, formations & player roles and instructions given to the team is up to you. What I will state is there are three approaches to creating a successful tactic in football manager and it very much depends on how you define success in the game and all of them are fine. If you are narrative focused and wish to create a style of football reflected in the game, then I’d say if the players play the way in game as you wish, you are successful in that sense regards of results. If you wish to have a tactic that purely wins games, with no care for style etc then you are going to probably have to assess how the current version of the game’s match engine (the way the game simulates football matches in game) works and you’ll probably focus on tweaking a formation, tactic and player roles to achieve this goal. If that’s your goal and you succeed, then again that’s fine. I tend to go for the third option which is a mixture of both but there is no right or wrong way to play the game, what’s important is that you enjoy it. The next part will look at tactical concepts that are important to be mindful of for all styles of play and if there is a balance you wish to strike as to how the team plays, which is dictated by the mentality chosen. 38 | Page
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The various mentalities you can choose from are represented below and are self-explanatory. The game describes them if you wish to know more;
• Very defensive • Defensive • Cautious • Balanced • Positive • Attacking • Very attacking 4.3.1 Attacking – In possession When you make a tactic, you can consider if the tactic works in possession effectively. For those wishing to play high possession football, you are wanting a system that is defensively sound in terms of shape but uses lower tempo, short attacking passing and good off the ball movement in restricted space to break open the opposition. This relies generally on players having the technical and mental skills to find solutions and to retain the ball. For some tactics you may deliberately want an imbalance. For example, those wishing to play low possession football, focused on getting the ball forward as soon as possible to attack directly, you will deploy a higher tempo, direct or route one passing approach, with as few interactions as possible to scoring a goal. This will generally require players with good physical attributes, who can exploit the fast pace of attacks. Allowing too many players to have a high level of creative freedom will likely see your team fail to adhere to your tactical instructions. Use creative freedom sparingly for full effect.
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The ‘In Possession’ team instructions give you various options on how your team behaves in three distinct areas, ‘attacking width’, ‘approach play’ & ‘final third’. Attacking width – How much do you wish to stretch the opposition when in possession. Approach play – How will you attack in terms of build-up through your tempo, passing and movement. Final third – How you will open up the opposition to get a goal. In terms of how the space is attacked when you are in possession, player roles and player traits dictate this, so be careful they do not conflict with the team instructions given.
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4.3.2 In Transition
Transition is the description of what your team will do when it has lost possession of the ball, what it will be when it has been regained and what your goalkeeper does in possession. Take into account what you wish your team to do in and out of possession before you decide upon these team instructions. The best approaches are the ones that complement each other and do no conflict. Be mindful of your player roles and the specific player traits for conflict also.
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4.3.3 Defending – Out of possession
The out of possession team instructions dictate your teams defensive shape and what marking and style of tackling and pressing intensity is used. Defensive shape – Dictates the point of engagement, the width of the defence and the defensive line held. It instructs the team how much space is to be defended. The marking relates to how tight the marking is, your player roles and player instructions will indicate if man marking is used so be mindful of this. Unless changed the default is zonal. The pressing intensity describes just how quickly the team will engage the opponent when the opponent comes into the area the defensive shape has indicated should be defended. Tackling options are either ‘Stay on Feet’ or ‘Get stuck in’. Again, how the space is defended when you are out of possession is reliant upon the player roles and player traits, so be careful they do not conflict with the team instructions given.
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4.3.4 Specific player marking
The yellow box in the graphic above indicates if a player can be marked specifically or if a position will be marked. This will then automatically make your player adopt man marking to the assign opponent defensively in every scenario except the initial stages of a set piece during a match. The time delay between the set piece instructions for marking and the specific player instructions are not stated but upon experience of playing the game, it tends to kick in around the 3rd phase of a set piece. The first being the initial instructions being carried out, the response to those instructions being the second phase and the third phase normal play being resumed post set play. Please be mindful that the player instructions, team instructions and opposition instructions all influence how a player behaves. View these as layering upon each other, if they conflict you will get erratic results.
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4.3.5 Opposition instructions
Another element to man marking is the opposition instructions set prior or during a game. If team instructions are the group instructions, player roles are the individual instructions within these group instructions, then opposition instructions are further refinement of the individual’s role. In the tactics section you can either do these by position with your immediate opposition being listed in the players section. There are four types of opposition instructions which you can select based on the opposition position: • Tight marking • Pressing Intensity • Tackling • Show onto foot
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4.4 Set pieces 4.4.1 What are set pieces? Set pieces in football are broken down in offensive and defensive ones. You have penalties, corners, freekicks and throw-ins. In football manager, the freekicks are sub divided into direct, direct (with a small chance of a shot) indirect (wide) and indirect (deep). Penalties do not have pre-set routines but the other set pieces have. Set pieces can account for a lot of goals in football manager both offensively and defensively. For many tactic creators and tactics enthusiasts they are the one variable you can rely upon, even if a tactic is not working. Over the years the match engine design team have been improving upon the realism of player movement and we are now at the stage in the simulation where set pieces and on/off the ball movement are very representative of real life. Why is this important? Well because when it comes to set pieces, you can re-create what you see in games. 4.2.2 How do set pieces work? Set pieces are the result of a foul or the ball going out of play causing a stoppage of play and allowing one side to restart the play in possession. A player will then strike, or in the case of a throw-in, throw the ball back into play. Now if it is a penalty or direct freekicks the ball will be struck towards goal. A throw-in, corner, or indirect freekick will seek to have a secondary interaction to result in a goalscoring opportunity or to retain possession through passing. If the choice was a secondary interaction for a goalscoring opportunity this will take the form of a long throw, cross or pass to player who will then flick on, cross or pass to a teammate to shoot or will shoot or head them ball themselves towards goal. If the secondary interaction is defended but the ball breaks again to the attacking team, they can seek again to create another opportunity or retain possession. If it breaks to the opposition, they can clear the ball, counter attack in possession or re-group and retain possession to attain shape. When you create your set piece in game, either defensively or offensively you have to ask yourself what you want your players to do at each stage and set them up according to deal with the initial taking of the set piece.
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4.2.3 Creating your own set pieces In creating your own set-pieces you have to assess the ability of your players and assign them to the right roles. For those taking set pieces you will want to assign those best suited to doing so. The Freekick , Corner and Long Throw technical stats of each player indicate their proficiency. Then you should assign players to whatever roles you wish them to undertake in the set piece. For example, if you wish to mark a tall player, it makes sense to do so with a player with favourable height, heading and jumping stats. The next stage is to assess what is working and what is not working for both the defensive and offensive set ups you have. 4.2.4 Downloadable set piece routines I have included three sets of downloadable set pieces, one which has zonal marking, one which has man marking and another which incorporates both, with effective set pieces for the current and past versions of the game. Please feel free to download these and amend as you see fit, think of these as starting set piece templates for your use. https://www.patreon.com/posts/set-pieces-for-39455478 To check how these are set up, there is a short video which shows each configuration; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljDwL9vC5RQ&t Download these to your ‘set pieces’ folder Windows users: Documents - Sports Interactive - Football Manager 2020 – set pieces
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4.5 Using downloadable pre-set tactics If you use downloadable pre-set tactics from other content creators please be aware that in creating these tactics, they have tested them no doubt under their own conditions. What is important to attain is what these conditions were. On the official SI forum you will see that all tactical downloads have to give a detailed description of how the tactic works. 4.5.1 Free downloadable tactic “the Scottish Way 442 Diamond Wide” If you wish to have a pre-set tactic just to start off with, you can use my ‘The Scottish Way 442 Diamond Wide’ to begin with. I have left the opposition instructions and man marking clear. I would suggest you amend these on a game by game basis. Set piece takers should automatically assign themselves to those that are best suited, but make your DL take left throw ins and the DR take right throw ins. It includes pre-loaded set pieces and the team instructions are as below. Use this as a template and create varying versions for different situations. I will demonstrate how I have mines set up but I will not go into too much detail as I specifically want YOU to create your own tactic. Formation
I chose an attacking mentality as Liverpool are stronger than most opposition teams they will face and should be seeking to dominate any games they play with attacking intent. The formation of a 442 diamond wide was chosen 47 | Page
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition because I wanted a strong defensive base with the back 4 being supplemented with a BWM and two WM’s who will act as a screen across the pitch to opposition players. I like triangular passing, so I wanted this represented in the diamond set up and with inverted wingbacks, I had players who would help overload the central areas in attack, with the BWM staying back to protect the BPD’s at all times. The AM is in a support role as I want this player to defend when need be but also be an offensive pivot for the WM’s and AF’s in attack. The WM’s offensively I wanted to stretch the opposition by going wide, whilst the wingbacks cut inside. The Advanced forwards are essentially both focused on goalscoring in the main and are there to hit the channels and exploit any space they can get to create and score.
In possession I wanted the team to play out form the back, retain the ball until an opportunity arise and be prepared to attack through direct runs and balls into the channels.
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In transition I wanted the players to counter as soon as they lose possession and attack immediately once they have attained it, preferable a high up the pitch as possible, which accounts for the much higher line of engagement and high defensive line. I have instructed the players to stay on their feet but have instruction them in the player roles to tackle hard. This is so they tackle hard to win the ball but are not reckless in going to ground doing so, avoid bookings.
The downloadable link can be found on the link below: https://www.patreon.com/posts/fm20-tactic-way-39455836
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4.6 Assessing if the tactic is working To work out if the tactic is working or not, I tend to get a pen and some A4 paper or a word doc. I’ll have noted down the team instructions, mentality and formation. I’ll then look at the player roles and see if any of them obviously conflict with what I am trying to achieve. For example, Tiki-Taka style tactics rarely have a need for no-nonsense centre-backs. I’ll then pick the best players I feel fit for the player roles and the style of play and watch the game. I will be mindful to get the team talks and team shouts right and then I’ll watch how the game unfolds for maybe 15 games on extended highlights. What I am looking for is a correlation to what I am instructing the players to do and what is being viewed in game. If after 10-15 games the team instructions are not being adhered to, it is either because I have conflicting player roles and/or the players are being prevented by the opposition’s quality, which in itself is an indication that the set up in terms of shape and style is amiss. Games 10-15 I will possibly alternate between extended highlights and watching the full game as between games 1-10 I will already have started making slight adjustments and now I really want more analysis and information to ascertain what is not working and what is. Why 10-15 games? Well, I normally find it takes as many games to work out a tactic’s flaws and weaknesses. Another system I occasionally is a simple check every game of what type of goals are scored and conceded and how. I’ll then proceed to make adjustments to prevent the goal scenarios reoccurring against my team and create more goalscoring chances for them. This involves a lot of trial and error but it produces results. You’ll find your own method in time, my main advice is not to have a kneejerk reaction to any tactic you create or download results wise, give it time and be prepared to make adjustments to get success. The main reason for tactics not performing as expected is because there is a conflict between the PPMs, the tactical approach, the team instructions, the individual player roles and the player’s individual instructions. I would in the first instance check each time first if a team is not playing the way you want.
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4.6 Making a tactic based on real life The following should act as a checklist for ascertaining if the tactic is working or not. My advice is use this as a way of confirming you are on the right path. Ultimately you’ll have your own criteria and there is no right or wrong way to do this. • Working out what the tactic in real life does. • How does this translate in game? • Choosing a tactical style and formation • Team instructions • Choosing player roles/player traits(PPMs) • Is this representative of what the tactic in real life does? Yes/No • Does this work in game? Do you tweak to make it do so?
5. Team report The team report tells you’re the strengths and weaknesses of the squad and picks out the players best suited to the tactic you have uploaded. I find this section to be of immense use to myself in assessing the depth of my squad and understanding what needs improved in the team and what the team’s strengths are. It is split up into 7 sections. • Overview • Analyst Report • Assistant report • Squad Depth • Stats • Facts • Comparison
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5.1 Analyst Report
The Analyst report assesses the teams general performance, goals scored, goals conceded and the formations faced, as well as giving previous game analysis. 5.2 Assistant report
The assistants report is incredibly useful as it gives you the most natural best starting XI for your side using your tactic. It also outlines in detail the team’s collective strengths and weaknesses, which can help you greatly amend tactics to suit your team’s performance and abilities.
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5.3 Squad Depth Squad depth lets you assess the squad and club’s depth in terms of how it suits your formation, tactic and by position. 5.4 Stats The stats section let’s you look at goal attempts, general play, discipline and the goalkeeper and breaks it down to overviews of the team, best player and worst player. It is an at a glance guide to what you are doing statistically well or badly and who to congratulate or blame. 5.5 Facts This section provides player and club facts and records. 5.6 Comparison This section lets you compare your squad to the leagues average in terms of positions and attributes. A good barometer for judging if your team is overachieving or underachieving in your league.
6. Training Training is vastly important in football manager. You can have the best squad in game but if you don’t train them effectively then they will not improve, their stats will deteriorate and they will pick up injuries and not be fit for games. Ideally, you want to use training and the schedules that implement them for match preparedness, to help develop and prepare your squad for playing with the tactic used and to maintain the condition of your players. The training section in football manager is split into 8 sections as listed below:
• Overview • Calendar • Schedules • Units • Mentoring • Individual • Rest • Coaches The overview section provides a snapshot of the current weekly training session, team happiness with the training, training performance, match preparation and states which players are injured and at risk. The units section breaks the team down to positional units of goalkeeping, defending and attacking. 53 | Page
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The calendar is the week to week listing of all the training sessions. It is here that you click on the training style drop down and selected which schedule you wish to use for that week. The custom schedules are available in ‘custom schedules’ but only after you have uploaded and saved them in the schedules section. Mentoring is discussed in detail in section 3.3.2 with regards to youth development. The schedules section is where you select what available schedules are there for your team to use. Once you have downloaded schedules like the ones available in 6.1.1, you have to upload them to the schedules section. This is done by accessing the following menus in-game: Training – Schedules – ‘Select Schedule’ (drop down) – ‘Custom Schedules’ – ‘Get more…’ – (you then select the schedule you wish to upload and click ‘load’ – (it will then appear on screen, click ‘confirm’) – (you will then see it on screen, now click ‘save’) It will now be available for you to select in the calendar section. 6.1 Team training 6.1.1 Chrissy’s training schedules Whilst I have included training schedules for you to use, I very much encourage you to experiment with your own to maximise the effectiveness of your team. The ones I have supplied are very good at achieving balanced improvement but that is not to say they cannot be improved upon. They are as described below:
• Part-time training – For semi-professional teams • Pre-season training – For professional teams • Saturday Match week training – One game a week training • Wednesday/Saturday Match Week Training – Two games a week training Training schedules link – https://www.patreon.com/posts/training-39455131 Download these to your ‘schedules’ folder Windows users: Documents - Sports Interactive - Football Manager 2020 - schedules The training schedules I have provided cover the broadest spectrum of skill development possible, provide match preparedness whilst also seeking to prevent injury and maintain player condition. The in game pre-set ones are 54 | Page
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fantastic and if you are focusing on a set tactic and style of play, I strongly urge you to use the set ups provided by the game on a rotational basis. If your team is struggling with a certain element of their game or your tactic is perhaps showing a weakness in an area, then amend the training to rectify it. For example, if your tactic and team are creating a lot of chances but are not putting them away, have a session in the training week focusing on ‘chance conversions’.
6.1.2 List of all team training sessions available For more specialised training look at the options you have below. These are the various training sessions you can implement listed below: • General - Overall, Outfield, Goalkeeping, Attacking, Possession, Defending, Tactical, Physical • Match Preparation - Match Tactics, Teamwork, Defensive Shape, Attacking Movement, Match Practice • Attacking - Attacking Wings, Attacking Patient, Attacking Direct, Attacking Overlap ( these sessions for attacking training are valuable dependant on your style) • Defending - Defending Engaged, Defending Disengaged, Defending Wide, Ground Defence, Arial Defence, Defending from the Front • Technical – Chance Conversion, Chance Creation, Ball Distribution, Transition Press, Transition Restrict, Ball Retention, Play from the Back • Tactical – Attacking Shadow Play, Defensive Shadow Play • Goalkeeping – Shot Stopping, Handling, One-On-Ones, Distribution • Set Pieces – Attacking Freekicks, Attacking Corners, Defending Freekicks, Defending Corners, Penalties, Set Piece Delivery • Physical – Endurance, Resistance, Quickness, Recovery, Rest • Extra-Curricular – Community Outreach, Team Bonding
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6.1.3 Balancing training sessions The Factors we are balancing are the amount of games per week and the following; • Injury Risk • Condition • Fatigue • Sharpness • Team Cohesion • Happiness Physical training such as endurance, resistance and quickness requires recovery sessions on the same day to mitigate against increased injury risk, fatigue and reduced condition. Recovery greatly reduces injury risk, reduces fatigue, whilst also slightly increasing happiness and condition. The only negative being slightly reduced match sharpness. Rest greatly reduces fatigue, increases condition, slightly increases happiness and negatively reduces team cohesion and greatly reduces sharpness. Therefore, after a game you want ideally to have rest and recovery implement to aid a player’s fitness but also need to subsequently include ‘Match Preview’ prior to every game to mitigate against the loss in sharpness and team cohesion to maintain the balance of the factors. After a match practice session, recovery is also recommended, as it balances out the similar negatives previously mentioned. You will need to amend the training schedules to adapt to games being moved etc. Try and keep to the format given. If in doubt always use the match preview/recovery/rest pre- and post- match settings to keep your squad fit. The rest of the training needs to be balanced in order that all the various attributes can be developed alongside tactics being prepared for. This means that the training should be adapted to suit the tactic you are using which is primarily concerned with the ‘attacking training’ used. In the training sessions I have given I have focused on ‘Attacking Direct’ as it fits in with the ‘Chrissy’s Final 442’ tactic I use but if you have a focus on wing play choose ‘Attacking Wings’, possession based play ‘Attacking Patient’ or overlapping players focus on ‘Attacking Overlap’ on a rotational basis, whatever suits your tactic. Goalkeeper specific training should occur once per week, and during this session outfield players will focus on more individual training. For weeks where there are two games per week, we suggest that you manually implement a rest, 56 | Page
Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition recovery and match preview cycle if it has not automatically been implemented by the schedule. This means checking your scheduling for any changes in fixtures. An amendment to make is if your team suffers a defeat, insert ‘team bonding’ to improve happiness within the squad but do not replace a recovery session, instead use the S2 ‘Rest’ session on a Sunday after a Saturday match but keep the S1 ‘Recovery’ and ES ‘Rest’ session. Note: in order for Match Preview to work, you need a data analyst and for recovery you require a physio, sports scientist or Doctor. 6.1.4 Rest The rest page is important as well to set up. Set individual training to automatic for each player and use the rest page to assign automatically intensity for each player as described below; • For players with <59% condition set to ‘No Pitch or gym work’. • For players with 60-69%% condition set to ‘Half Intensity’ • For players with 70-79% condition set to ‘Normal Intensity’ • For players with 80-89% condition set to ’Double Intensity’ • For players with >90% condition set to ‘Double Intensity’
6.2 Individual training 6.2.1 Individual focus These are non-specific suggestions for what you should train for each position as an additional focus but if there is an area in specific need of attention regarding a player’s development, that you should focus on that as a priority. Underneath these is a description of what each individual focus helps develop.
• Goalkeepers – GK Reactions • Defenders – Defensive Positioning • Midfielders – Defensive Positioning/Attacking Movement • Forwards – Attacking Movement /Final Third 6.2.2 Player role and position training Regarding the training for the Position/Role/Duty drop down menu, it is best left unchecked as if a player plays in the position they will become more natural in the position over time and you want individual training to be focused
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition on attributes as the role suitability will be levelled up with match experience in that assigned role. 6.2.3 Training of player traits (PPMs) The use of player traits (PPMs) in training players is something that absolutely fascinates me and to get the best out of them you really should have an approach in mind, a purpose for each player. This is why I earlier suggested in the players role section next to each role suggested PPMs that I felt complemented the role. However, this is in no way either definitive as quite simply what PPMs you train will be very much in mind with what you want the player to do in the tactical system. What you should definitely do is have PPMs that complement the tactical approach, the team instructions, the player’s role and the player’s individual instructions. If you do this, you will have more consistent expected tactical results. If we were to split PPMS into how they influence a player’s ability to adhere to the tactical style, mentality, team instructions (in possession, in transition, out of possession) and behaviour, then it becomes a bit clearer. As such I shall break them down into these ‘spheres of influence’. Tactical Style - Dictates Tempo, Stops Play Team Instruction (In possession) - Attempts Overhead Kicks, Brings Balls Out of Defence, Crosses Early, Curls Ball, Cuts Inside From Both Wings, Cuts Inside From Left Wing, Cuts Inside From Right Wing, Dwells on Ball, Hits Free Kicks With Power, Knocks Ball Past Opponent, Likes To Beat Man Repeatedly, Likes To Lob Keeper, Likes To Round Keeper, Likes To Switch Ball To Other Flank, Looks For Pass Rather Than Attempting To Score, Moves Ball To Left Foot Before Dribble Attempt, Moves Ball To Right Foot Before Dribble Attempt, Places Shots, Plays Ball With Feet, Plays No Through Balls, Plays One- Twos, Plays Short Simple Passes, Possesses Long Flat Throw, Refrains From Taking Long Shots, Runs With Ball Down Left, Runs With Ball Down Right, Runs With Ball Often, Runs With Ball Rarely, Runs With Ball Down Centre, Shoots From Distance, Shoots With Power Team Instruction (In transition) - Arrives late in Opponent’s Area, Comes Deep To Get Ball, Does not Move Into Channels, Gets Forward Whenever Possible, Gets Into Opposition Area , Hugs Line, Likes Ball Played Into Feet, Likes To Try To Beat Offside Trap, Moves Into Channels, Plays With Back To Goal, Tries First Time Shots, Tries Killer Balls Often, Tries Long Range Free Kicks, Tries Long Range Passes, Tries To Play Way Out Of Trouble, Tries Tricks, Uses Long Throw To Start Counter Attacks, Uses Outside of Foot Team Instruction (Out of possession) - Dives Into Tackles, Does Not Dive Into Tackles, Marks Opponent Tightly, Stays Back At All Times Behavioural - Argues with Officials, Gets Crowd Going, Winds Up Opponents, Attempts to Develop Weaker Foot, Avoids Using Weaker Foot
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Now in understanding how PPMs function, they will not change a player’s ability but they will affect the likelihood of the specific trait being enacted when the relevant opportunity arises. One thing to note is that PPMs that conflict with team instructions and player instructions will not be as frequent. For example, if you have a player with the PPM ‘shoots from distance’ but have the Team instruction ‘Work Into the Box’ and the player instruction for that player being ‘Shoots less often’, then the likelihood of the player shooting form distance is reduced. It will still occasionally occur and it is important to have PPM training that complements your tactical approach. 6.3 List of training facilities Training facility levels range from ‘Poor’ to ‘State of the Art’ as demonstrated below: • Poor • Basic • Below Average • Adequate • Average • Good • Great • Excellent • Superb • State of the Art
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6.4 Coaches This is the ideal set up for coaches. You want 4-5* coaching across the board, with the training being light. The below image shows an example of balanced training.
7. Background Staff 7.1 The Delegation of duties – hints and tips In the staff section of the game you can in the ‘responsibilities’ section, choose what is delegated to the club staff and what you control. In delegating tasks you have 7 main areas of responsibility, which are listed below;
• Staff Responsibilities • Scouting Responsibility • Transfer and contract responsibilities • Media • Training responsibility • Tactics • Match Day There are 90 tasks which can be chosen. My advice is that the more you do, the more control you exert over the club. Delegate the tasks that you don’t want to have to interact with and are comfortable with others dealing with. For example, if you are not yet comfortable with the scouting element of the game, delegate all scouting tasks to the chief scout. If you don’t wish to deal with contracts and hiring staff, delegate these tasks to your director of football. I am not going to tell you a right or a wrong way. I myself delegate everything that doesn’t influence the tactics, team talks, shouts, training, hiring of staff and contract negotiations of staff and players. Everything else I delegate. Now that
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition means my scouting is neglected as are my youth and reserve teams but for this particular save I am currently playing, that is fine as I am due to leave the club soon. In a long term save, with a club I will develop, I will control as much as possible.
7.2 Staff filters & coaching attributes The coaching attributes, alongside certain mental attributes, determine how effective the coaching will be. The mental attributes of Determination, Level of Discipline and Motivating (DDM) have a universal multiplier effect and are essential for coaching and therefore the filters given. The main coaching can be broken up to 4 separate coaching units, Goalkeeping, Defending, Attacking, Possession and Fitness. Goalkeeping has two specialisms shot stopping and handling, Fitness has two strength and quickness, and Defending, Attacking and Possession each have tactical and technical coaching slots. Working with Youngsters applies when working with development centre teams. To attain the staff members, these are the filters you should use for each of the staff. A good tip is to have more reserve or U23/21 staff to help assist in the first team training. The personalities for these filters should be ideally; a) Professional, Model Citizen or Model Professional Or b) Determined or fairly determined if you cannot attain any a) personalities. For the coaching department these are the filters that are applicable: Assistant Manager, Goalkeeping (Shot Stopping & Handling), Defending (Tactical), Defending (Technical), Attacking (Tactical), Attacking (Technical), Possession (Tactical), Possession (Technical), Fitness (Strength & Quickness), Head of Youth Development. Peripheral staff filters not essential to training but needed regardless; Medical; Physio, Sports Scientist Recruitment Team; Director of Football, Technical Director, Scout, Data Analyst, Loan Manager Note. Without a sports scientist, physio or doctor you cannot have recovery sessions and without a data analyst you cannot have match previews, both of which are essential to the training schedules. Even at a lower league club, make sure you have at least one of each as well as a physio.
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Additionally, the Head of Youth Development influences the quality of the youth intake, so it is important that this staff role is filled with a quality candidate. All the staff filters can be referenced from the link below; https://www.patreon.com/posts/staff-filters-39455066 A video explaining these can be referenced in the link below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBP-ILsjRCk
8. Medical centre The medical centre is split into the five sections listed:
• Overview – This gives an ‘at a glance’ picture of the club’s medical issues. • Risk Assessment – This looks at the risk of injury to players and gives a visual look at recent injuries. • Current injuries – An overview of all players currently injured. • Injury History – This provides a view of all injuries suffered by players at your club. This is something I always check before renewing a player’s contract. If a player has a long list of injuries it’s probably best to sell them. It assesses the injuries in terms of severity (major – moderate – minor – slight). • Season Summary – The season summary is another tab I check a lot as it indicates how much players have been injured that season. Again useful for indicating who is injury prone and perhaps should be sold or released. In terms of best practice, if your players are at ‘high injury risk’ then it is advisable to lower their training workload appropriately. Higher the most high- quality sports scientists and physios to deal with and prevent injuries and to aid recovery at the club.
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9. Scouting 9.1. Scouting menu Scouting in football manager is very much about understanding what you need and then going about finding it in terms of players. The ‘scouting’ section of the game is split into 5 sections – Scouting Centre, Players, Assignments, Shortlist and knowledge.
The scouting centre acts as a hub for all scouting-related tasks in game and is where you will receive notifications of recommended players. If you use the filter on this page you can amend the type of recommendations that you receive.
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition specified players. How many players are available for you to approach and scout will be dependant on the ‘senior package’ your club possesses. If you go to the ‘new search’ section, this is where you can access filters to narrow down your search for players. Downloadable player filters for each player role are listed in section 10.7 of this guide.
Assignments is where you can assign scouts to certain scouting duties, be it scouting specific players, competitions, nations or the next opposition. You can through the drop-down menu assess the assignments themselves, scout and analyst priorities.
The shortlist section lists all shortlisted players and the knowledge section indicates the club’s knowledge of the nations throughout the world as shown below:
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9.2 Scouting tips In the ‘Players’ tab the ‘Quick Search’ function is great for quickly narrowing down what players are available to you that are loan & transfer listed, as well as those with contracts expiring or out of contract. For a lot of new managers, I would advise using this to begin with, before diving into deeper options.
For those wanting more detail searches you can create or upload player filters to do so. When creating these filters in game using the ‘New search/Edit search’ menu in the ‘players’ section it is important to search for players for each position based on the key stats and PPMs/player traits that are important for each role, not only the position itself. The reason for this is that you may
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition see a great player attributes wise for a role but they are not adapted to the position you need. If you are willing to buy a young player and retrain him, then you will be able to solve any problem position or role. In terms of acquiring players, if you send your head scout to scout a player if will have a positive impact on them transferring. 9.2.1 Creating a scouting network The more scouts with a broad knowledge of nations you can sign the better. The key attributes for a scout are that of Adaptability, Judging Player Ability (JPA) and Judging Player Potential (JPP). Ideally you want scouts with as high of level of these attributes as you can sign and as many as your club allow. Once you have your scouts you then need to assign them to different tasks and to look for different players. If possible, avoid duplication of scouting areas and try and sign as many foreign scouts as you can to scout as many competitions and nations as you can. Now before you assign any scouts you need to think about what they are looking for. You can amend what they search for the assignments menu and pick the relevant attributes, nationality, age or any other discernible factors you wish to include to narrow down your search. To build up a scout’s knowledge of a certain area have them first scout the region for a year, then specific nations thereafter. I would caution to then have the scout switch between nations as youth intake dates are now varied. Now if you club has a limited scouting range, in the ‘club info’ menu, you can go to ‘board requests’ and ‘make a board request’ then go to ‘Networking’ and there you will be able to request an increase to your scouting range, which opens up the nations and competitions your scouts can look at for you.
9.2.2 Feeder and parent clubs aid scouting If you make a like with a feeder or parent club you attain automatic knowledge of the region and country the club resides in. 9.2.3 List of the top countries in FM20 to scout Youth ratings are adjudged from 0-200. I have included a list of the top nations below: Brazil, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, Argentina, Egypt, Turkey, Holland, England, Mexico, Nigeria, Russia, Colombia, Portugal, Japan, Belgium, South Korea, U.S.A
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10. Transfers 10.1 Wage/Transfer budget management In the ‘financial’ menu of the game you will see in the ‘Summary’ that the ‘transfer budget’ and the ‘wage budget’ are stated and you will also see that you can amend this via the ‘Make budget adjustment’ tab. As with many sections of the game I will reiterate there is no right or wrong way to play but I would recommend that you are mindful of what limitations your transfer budget and wage budget may have. The transfer budget is essentially the fees that can be paid for players, the wage budget is the wages paid to players. It’s not so simple though as when you renegotiate contracts with players or sign players the wage budget will be adapted. 10.1.1 Budget adjustments In a save recently I had no intention of using my transfer budget but I did want to re-sign some players. I unfortunately couldn’t afford their wage demands, so I had the option of adjusting the wage budget to do so. Now in this instance this solved my problem and this is just one example of managing both. You can also amend the wage budget to help increase the transfer budget but again be mindful of negotiating player contracts thereafter. Long term in game it is advisable to live within the financial means of the club. Do not overspend or spend a budget if it is going to put the club into its overdraft. If you are however only there for a season or two it would make sense to go for broke to help get the highest budgets possible. 10.1.2 Financial Fair Play (FFP) – European Clubs UEFA have instigated FFP and this is also relevant to your budget management. If you overspend it will put your club over the FPP threshold and will mean the following season your club will face sanctions such as fines or European bans. The football league also operates a similar system, so be wary of league specific rules relating to finances as well. 10.2 Player recruitment Player recruitment is broken down to two sections. Youth development and signings out with the club. Youth development is covered in section 3.3 of this guide, so this section will focus on non-home-grown club players. If you are a
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Chrissy Ross’s Football Manager Guide FM20 Edition lower league club with virtually no budget or squad you can offer contracts to virtual ‘greyed out’ players from your own team. 10.2.1 Where to find players? Poaching youth players! Most players are found through your scouting network and/or through you manually searching via the ‘Scouting’ – ‘Players’ section as detailed in section 9 of this guide. One thing that I did not know until recently was that you can poach other club’s junior players. This occurs mostly by larger reputation clubs doing so to smaller ones, so if you are at a large lcub it is well worth keeping an eye on those with a lower reputation with a good youth system. Alternatively, if you are at a lower reputation club, you must be mindful that larger clubs may attempt to stela your best prospects. When this occurs an inbox item is received, offering a few details on the player that has been poached. Any poached players will appear in the next relevant youth intake for the club they have been poached for. 10.2.2 International management When you are an international manager you can search for all players of your nationality. Now some may hold duel nationality and if they have not been capped by another nation you can approach them to see if they will play for your country. 10.3 Advice in buying players When buying a player, you should consider the following:
- Does the player represent value financially? Will they have resale value? - Does the player have the right personality and fits in with the club culture?
- Does the player fit in tactically and/or can you re-train them to be of use? 10.3.1 Transfer tips • Be mindful of what you say in press conferences about other managers as praising or criticising them can aid or obstruct transfers. • Searching for transfer listed players means you will find good players available at lower fees and clubs will be easier to negotiate with. Players will also be more likely to sign for their favoured clubs. • Check in the player search for players with contracts expiring but be aware of compensation clauses for youth and development players. 68 | Page
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Alternatively, players on long term contracts will cost a lot more to sign and you will have to pay an inflated fee to do so. 10.3.3 Signing a player who is not interested in signing for you If a player is not interested in signing for you, you basically need to try to unsettle them and “woo them” to be interested in your side. You first of all make a transfer enquiry and/or put an offer in. If he is uninterested you then declare interest. If again uninterested you can, if possible, get a current player (or international teammate) to recommend a move. If the player is still against it, you can attend a game (go to the player’s team schedule and if there is an available date (check via results column) and then make another enquiry/offer and repeat the process. Sometimes this doesn’t work regardless of how many times you perform this, especially if the player’s personality is loyal. I would be careful at larger reputation clubs of doing this too much as occasionally declaring interest in a player can unsettle those playing in a similar position at your club. 10.4 Advice in selling players • If you want a quick sale of a player it is best to transfer list them on a reduced fee. • If a player is injured, wait until he is recovered before trying to sell them or offering them to clubs, as they will generate more interest then. • To avoid losing players for nothing, avoid letting players get to the final year on their contract, sell with a year to go. 10.5 Advice in loaning in players • Sign in players on wages you can afford. • Sign in players that are ready to play straight away. You won’t have time to retrain a player to fit into your system. • Do not sign players as cover only if you’ve agreed in the loan terms otherwise. As it is likely their club and them will seek to cancel the loan if they do not receive sufficient or agreed match time. 10.6 Advice in loaning out players • If you have a small squad and are fearful of injuries, when loaning a player out protect yourself with a ‘Can be recalled’ clause to protect against squad depletion. • Similarly, avoid players you are likely to rec-call being cup-tied by making sure ‘Can play in cup matches’ is not a part of the loan agreement.
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• If a player is sent out on loan and fees are paid, they cannot be recalled. 10.7 Downloadable player filters link Here is a downloadable link for player filters for every single position and role in the game, edited and tweaked by me: https://www.patreon.com/posts/player-filters-39455102 A video explaining these and the staff filters mentioned earlier can be referenced on the link below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBP-ILsjRCk
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11. Playing the game (post inductions) – Tips and advice 11.1 Managing the squad day to day. In managing the squad day to day, you have to take into account that football manager is very much a game that the more time and control you have and put into the management of your side, the better the results. The number one tip for maintaining player happiness is to agree upon realistic playing time for them. Thereafter it is very much a case of listening to player concerns about morale, happiness, adverse team talks, players wishing to leave/play more and managing them as you see fit. If you wish to take this approach do NOT go on holiday between games as you will miss out on these crucial interactions and you CANNOT delegate them. If you go to a new club, don’t change you captain without speaking to the current one and if you can’t keep the playing time promises that have been given out or adjust them through interacting with the player, it is perhaps for the best that the player leaves. Poor morale and happiness is one of the main reasons teams suffer in FM and can cause serious issues in terms of discipline and players playing at their best on match day. An unhappy player is an unmotivated player and team talks and shouts will have less of a positive affect as a result. Rotate your players as is appropriate. Play the second 11 or non- starters/bench warmers in games you are overwhelming favourites, avoid overplaying your stars and give them rest if they need Also, new signings need time to settle in and gel with their new team-mates, so don’t worry if they are not in the core social group immediately but be aware also that too many new signings in a short space of time can mean the tactical stability and morale of the team may be affected. Foreign players may take a while to settle into the club and playing a different style of play, so when signing foreign players make sure they are ‘sent on an intensive language course’ and give them game time to get to know the new system.
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11.2 Match preparation 11.2.1 Analysis (next opponent – stat pack) The stat pack option is only available for league matches and if you have a data analyst employed. It can be found in ‘Tactics’ – ‘Analysis’ – ‘Next Opponent’ – ‘Stat Pack’
The stat pack gives an at a glance comparison of both teams and impact players. 11.2.2 Match plans – Scenarios Match plans can be used to prepare for and against certain scenarios during a match. It can be found in ‘Tactics’ – ‘Match Plans’
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11.2.3 Tactical briefings This is only available if a match preview training session has been undertaken by the team. I view this as yet another level of layering in terms of instructions (team, player, opposition) and it can be a useful tool in combating problem scenarios identified by the scouting team in advance.
It is fairly useful if you wish to emphasise set instructions to players ahead of games and I use it mostly to deal with conflicting player traits that have not yet been retrained.
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11.3 Playing a match 11.3.1 Team talks and shouts Team talks are used to amend the mental outlook of your players to the match scenario. and they can have an exceptional positive or negative difference to your matchday squad. The are split into pre-match, half-time and full-time talks. You have to decide the tone of the team talk and then the content.
In terms of tone you can choose between reluctant, cautious, calm, assertive, passionate and aggressive. Pre-match – It is advisable to choose a tone and content that is in line with the pre-match expectations and is achievable for the players. Telling huge underdogs for example that you aggressively expect them to win, may make some players feel pressurised into achieving an unrealistic result. If your team is the favourite though, it is perfectly reasonable to be more demanding of them. I the pre-match prediction is for a close or even game, then you want to take a more encouraging or inspirational approach to your tone and content. Half-time – If your team is under performing, I would recommend that you are more demanding of them. If the game is evenly matched then again be inspirational and encouraging. If you are romping it by 3 goals or more, then praise them. If you are holding on to perhaps a one or two goal lead then give praise but tell them to watch their performance levels don’t drop. If an individual is not performing, I would be critical of their performance regardless in an individual team talk after the general team talk. Full-time – If your team lost or drawn and it was expected, be sympathetic. If they lost or drawn and it wasn’t expected be critical. If they have won in any circumstance praise them. A player’s body language will indicate how they should be handled. A quick glance guide below tells you the body language and the appropriate response individually to them.
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Complacent, Confident – demanding Nervous – relaxing, praising Frustrated, Aggressive – calming Disenchanted – encouraging
Shouts are used in the middle of the game to encourage a mental response from the players to the game. I normally spam the ‘Demand More’ shout as much as I can but that is just me. As you can see above there are 10 different types of shouts you can give. The success of a shout is dependant on the morale, motivation and body language of each player, so a one size fits all approach like “Demand more” only works if you have a determined motivated bunch of players (which is what I usually have). So please don’t just copy that approach, what you should do to be successful is amend the shouts to the needs of your team.
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The following is a useful guide for judging the effects of the different types of shouts • Encourage – Encourages and inspires the players to do better • Calm down – Tries to settle the players if they are frustrated or aggressive • Get creative – Tries to encourage the players to have more creative freedom • Concentrate – Tries to focus the players and improve their concentration • Show some passion – Encourages the players to be more aggressive • No Pressure – Relaxes the players who are perhaps feeling under pressure • Tighten up – Encourages the players to shore up the defensive shape and be more disciplined • Push forward – Encourages the players to get further forward to overload the opposition • Demand more – Demands more effort and performance for the players. Works best with highly determined and motivated players. • Praise - Lets the team know their performance is appreciated and seeks to improve their morale. You can of course assign team talks and shouts to your coaches and if you do so, allocate to your coach with the highest motivating attribute. There is a great argument for just keeping tactics in terms of team instructions very simple, letting player roles dictate how the players operate and using team talks and shouts to manage games instead of 101 different tactical changes and instructions. My advice is to find your own approach. Team talks and shouts won’t affect a game tactically, they will influence the teams body language and morale though and in turn THEY DO influence how a tactic is performing. I see team talks and shouts as hugely important. If you ignore them you’ll eventually fail, no matter how good the team or tactic.
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11.3.2 Game management & tactical tips. This section is very much my advice based on my in-game experience. It is entirely subjective and open to debate, which I welcome. The following is what I would term good practice for dealing with situations during a game:
• Manage team talks and shouts, do not ignore them and if you don’t wish to do them, assign them to a coach with a high motivational attribute. Constantly changing your tactic will have adverse not positive effects. • If you have a player booked early, the team instruction “get stuck in” and player instruction ‘tackle hard’, chances are that player more often than not is getting sent off later on. To avoid this, take off hard tackling. If the tea or tactic is accumulating an unmanageable level of bookings, consider changing the TI to ‘Stay on feet’ and have hard tackling for the player instruction on. This way your players tackle hard but are not lunging in. • If a player is carrying an injury and gets early booked -that’s a red flag for an impending red card as they are clearly struggling to compete. Substitute them. • Be aware that weather will influence how your tactic and team performs. Adverse conditions such as snow or heavy rain will affect any short to medium range possession heavy tactics. One solution is to change the passing and team instructions to take a more direct approach. • Before you consider changing tactics, assess if your team talks and shouts can have an influence. The problem may be how you speak to your players, not your team selection, or tactics. • Be realistic with your tactical expectations, team talks and shouts. Asking players to win a game as an overwhelming underdog only puts the player sunder undue pressure. • The best form of defence is effective attack. That’s my opinion, if you want to hold onto a lead, praise your players or demand more near the end of the game ad more often than not they’ll score another if they are fit, the morale is good and the body language is positive. • Do not time waste to early. By all means run down the clock but do so in a sensible fashion. If you haven’t used any subs, space them out over the final few minutes in conjunction with time wasting. This should break up the play and waste more time. If you employ this approach before the last ten minutes, chances are the opposition might catch a break, as more often than not, they will be throwing everything at you in a direct fashion.
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11.4 Managing club finances. The finance menu in game provides all the information about how a club is run financially. It has 8 tabs dependant on where the club is based (European clubs will have FFP to consider). The tabs are ‘Summary’, ‘Income’, ‘Expenditure’, ‘Wages’, ‘FFP’, ‘Debts and Loans’, ‘Sponsors and Other’ & ‘Projection’. 11.4.1 Club Income The club’s income will be dependant on the club’s reputation, what league they play in, what nation the league is based in, the type of owner you have and The main ways you can generate money is through competition earnings, player sales, TV revenue, loan fees, merchandising gate receipts and a host of other factors as demonstrated below:
The main way you can generate money is by being successful and so influence TV and competition earnings and by selling players.
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11.4.2 Club outgoings The club’s main routes of expenditure are player wages, staff wages and transfer and signing on fees, dependant on how many players you sign.
11.4.3 Best practice • To make money you should adopt the following principles: • Buy low/free transfers, sell high with regards to players • Develop your own players and staff through training • Sign young players with high potential, sell older players with diminishing current ability • Sell your youth or squad players that don’t make the grade, try not to let their contracts run down • Loan out unwanted players to recoup fees and wages. • Invest in your facilities and infrastructure.
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11.4.5 Improving your infrastructure & sugar daddy owners It is important to develop your training facilities to improve your players and the more you improve your youth infrastructure, the better the players you will develop. There are four different types of sugar daddy owners which are:
• Foreground – This owner will throw money at the club to develop it and will do so until he/she leaves. • Background – This owner will expend enough money to develop the club but will stop investing after a certain competition or reputation threshold is reached. • Underwriter – Will cover any losses made during the season to keep the club afloat. • Underwriter (Expects a return) – This sugar daddy expects a financial return for their investment. 11.4.6 List of prominent foreground sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) • European clubs – Man City, PSG, Monaco, Hertha Berlin, Almeria, Lausanne, Famalicao, Larne, • North American – LA Galaxy, Toronto, LAFC, Atlanta United, • Asian - Guangzhou, Shanghai SIPG, Beijing Sinobo Gho’an, Johor DT 11.4.7 List of prominent background sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) • European clubs – Olympiakos, PAOK, Wolves, AEK, Bournemouth, Rio Ave, Sion, Portimonense, Lugano, FC Andorra, Cova da Piedade, Adana Demispor, Raith Rovers, Austria Klagenfurt, Uerdingen 05, Salford City, Shelbourne, Fylde, Harrogate, Arbeiter Oedt • North American – Juarez, Dorados, Mineros, • South American – Universidad de Chile, O’Higgins, • Asian - Jeonbuk, Shandong, Jiangsu Suning, Shanghai Greenland Shenhua, Dalian, Buriram, Tianjin, Wuhan Zall, Shenzhen, Lazma, Kitchee, Yangon Utd, Binh Duong, Dulo Pengiran, Eastern, Pahang, Selangor, Lion City Sailors, Kedah, Chengdu Better City, Felda Utd, Kunshan, South China, Kelantan, HA Attapeu
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11.4.8 List of prominent underwriter sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) • European clubs – Chelsea, Zenit, Galatasaray, Hoffenheim, Krasnodar, Leicester City, Lokomotiv Moscow, Besiktas, Fenerbahce, Spartak Moscow, Everton, Rennes, Leipzig, West Ham, Young Boys, Southampton, Vitesse, Nantes, Dinamo, Aston Villa, Utrecht, Watford, Sheffield United, Basaksehir, Maccabi Tel-Aviv, West Brom, Zurich, Sheffield Wednesday, Bristol City, Cardiff, Stoke, Middlesbrough, Derby County, Brentford, Dinamo Moscow, Huddersfield, Blackburn Rovers, QPR, Servette, Reading, Millwall, Aves, Atromitos, Arouca, Ast. Tripolis, HJK, OFI, Xanthi, Rotherham, SJK, Inter Turku, Ross County, KuPS, IFK Mariehamn, MK Dons, Sochi, Fleetwood Town, Dundalk, Morton, Queen of the South, Scunthorpe Utd, Torpedo Moscow, Alloa, Waterford, Crawley Town, Derry City, Dumbarton, Dagenham & Redbridge, Lysekloster, York City, Ebbsfleet, Chester, Chorley, Brackley Town, Spennymoor Town, Alfreton Town, South Shields, Altinordu, Kasimpasa, • North American – Tigres, Monterrey, Pachuca, Toluca, Leon, NYCFC, Seattle, Santos, Laguna, Atlas, Tijuana, Morelia, • Asian - KCC, Woodlands, Paya Lebar, Lucky Mile, August First, Perlis, Jurong, Sembawang Rangers, Sporting Afrique, Gombak Utd, Jiuniu, Young Lions, Sarawak, Hong Kong FC, Balestier, Super reds. Kuala Lumpur, Negeri Sembian, Tanjong Pagar, PKNP, Hebei Elite, Sabah, Warriors FC, Melaka, Geyland Int., PBDKT, Hougang Utd, Terengganu, Home Utd, Perak, Tampines Rovers, Al-Riffa, April 25, Al-Muharraq, Jeonnam, Zhejiang, Changchun, Henan, Basaksehir, Ulsan, 11,4,9 List of prominent underwriter (expects return) sugar daddy club owners (playable nations only) • European clubs – Estoril, Amora, Sintrense • Asian - Guangzhou R&F, Hebei, Chongqing, Beijing Renhe, Huanghai, Heilongjiang, Shenyang Urban
11.4.6 Affiliate clubs Affiliate clubs are split into two distinct types. Parent club – The club in charge of the relationship and underwrites the arrangement and is termed the ‘senior affiliate’. Feeder club – The club that provides value to the senior club through merchandising, providing training facilities for loan players, increasing the senior clubs profile in their nation, provides access to young players of foreign nationality, provides first options on the clubs youth recruitment, helps with work permits by taking players on loan and helps improve the clubs scouting network.
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11.5 Leaving a club finding the club and/or country for you When you are looking for a new club or applying for a job elsewhere it is important in the job interview section to give realistic expectations and promises that you can keep and fit in with how you want to play the game. For example, there is no point telling a prospective new club in the interview that you will work with reduced funds if you like wheeling and dealing on the transfer market. Play it your way. There is no right or wrong way to go about this but I will give you tips to have a successful interview, what you do with them or how you use them is up to you: • Tell them what they want to hear. If the club is pro youth development, say you want to focus on that. • Offering to do a job on a greatly reduced wage and transfer budget and stating you can work with less may appeal to some clubs. • Agreeing to work with a director of football and seeking to make no changes to the background staff may appeal to a club. • Stating you will overachieve may impress a club but if you don’t follow through, you’ll be sacked.
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11.6 Some challenges to try So, you are perhaps bored by just normal game saves and would like to spice things up a bit, well here is the section for you. I will present a list of challenges that have been devised by the championship manager and football manager community over the years: • The Pentagon Challenge – The aim of this is to try and win the Champions League in five different continents. • You Can’t Win Anything With Kids (YCWAWK) – Alan Hansen jinxed himself claiming that Man Utd would never win anything with kids, these kids in question being the class of 92 which included Beckham, Giggs et al. Try to re-create the success of developing your own talent by only using your youth system and/or youth signings under whatever age parameter you set yourself. • Homegrown Player Challenges (one region/one club) – Build a club up only using players form that nation or if you want to make it even more specific, one city. Athletic Bilbao only use Basque players. So, you could play as them or Real Sociedad and try to see if you can have success with only Basque players or create your own criteria for your own club. Celtic won the European Cup for example with players born no more than 10 miles away, can you do similar with your club? • The Sir Alex Ferguson Challenge – Take over whoever is 2nd bottom of the Premier league on the 6th of November and try to recreate or best the success of Sir Alex Ferguson’s 13 EPL titles, 2 Champions Leagues and 23 other trophies as Man Utd manager within a 25-year period. • Lower League Management (LLM) Challenge – Take a club form the bottom division and win the top division and then top continental competition. A cracking challenge for those that like playing and building up clubs like Guy Roux from Auxerre.
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12. Perspective & final tips. 12.1 Perspective This section is perhaps the most important. All the above guidance is just that, guidance. It is not infallible and certainly should not dictate how you should play. Play the game your own way, develop your own resources for training, tactics, player and staff filters and visit forums, websites and social media and interact with other players and have fun if you so wish. This game is a simulation, it is not real life. Don’t get hung up on results of your labours and have fun your way. There is no right or wrong way to play, just your own. If you are not having fun and want help, then engage with others on the forums and/or elsewhere and you’ll find as a community we are a helpful bunch. This guide should hopefully help you with most questions you have but there will no doubt be a lot it doesn’t cover and this is where the SI Games forums linked below should be your first point of contact: https://community.sigames.com/ I moderate at present the ‘FM20, Tactics, Tips & Advice’ page on Facebook, so if you love chatting about all things FM tactics wise and have any specific tactics questions you can get advice back from our fantastic community at - https://www.facebook.com/groups/337566209786057 12.2 Deleting hall of fame If you want to know how to delete the Hall of Fame and you are a windows user go to this folder; Users - Public - Public Documents - Sports Interactive - Football Manager 2020. There's the hall_of_fame.dat file. Delete it and you start afresh in terms of recorded title wins etc. This will not affect current saves however. 12.3 Customisable content - Skins, graphics, mods, panels You can find some beautifully created graphical mods by Gaz (aka wkdsoul) via his website: https://fmwkdsoul.wordpress.com/ Any other content you’ll easily find on the official SI forums or via steams community downloads section for the game.
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12.4 Gameplay strategies, philosophy & FM stories If you want some amazingly interesting tactical content then check out the fantastic Guido Merry’s website strikerless. It focuses on gameplay strategies, philosophy, scouting, tactics and FM stories. I will submit the odd article there every now and then. https://strikerless.com/
13. Future tactical focus A more in-depth assessment of the tactical analysis and tactics in general will be available for free on my patreon for FM21. This document will be amended and updated for FM21 with that tactical analysis becoming a companion resource to this document. I appreciate that the length of this may seem a lot but I left twice as much out relating to football tactics, which I love chatting about and studying. I quite simply had to keep this guide relevant to the game, so to those that have been following my tactics content the last 5-10 years, I apologise for this omission.
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Thank you Thanks for taking the time to read all of this, If you have any follow up questions you can always catch me on twitch or twitter and if you have liked the content you can choose to subscribe to my Patreon, which is the best way to get similar content, tactics from myself, plus updated versions of this document going forwards for each version and I would be exceptionally grateful; https://www.patreon.com/comedychrissy https://www.twitch.tv/comedychrissy http://www.twitter.com/comedychrissy Any and all support is massively appreciated, please feel free to share this document far and wide. It’s free and forever shall remain so, the patreon is just for those that can afford to donate and support me. Have fun playing FM Chrissy Ross #Wearethecommunity
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