FM10 - Constructing Teams With Limitations Is A Lot More Fun!!

[Pacman Jones]

I have a save right now, as Stoke City, first season to increase my determination I brought in Barton and Kevin Davies to add some extra meat to my bones however only managed to survive relegation by GD that season

[RomaRulez]

Gollum...maybe try that Milan challenge, but restrict yourself to only 1, max 2 first team signings a season, and only release senior players when they are not physically able to cope at the highest level, and encourage them to move into coaching with you. This will allow a gradual change in the squad, whilst keeping the older players around for the Milan tradition. Each signing would have to be very carefully considered.

Good ideas. How do you encourage players to take up coaching? My idea with Milan was to just let contracts run out on any players I didn't want back, namely non-Italians.

[McRobbie1903]

hey

ever time i play FM i always try to get a game with bohemians in the IPL where i try to maintain a team of 6 HG players in my startin line up and see how far I can progress in the champions league. this can be a struggle as players who are described as 'leading players' in the domestic league would struggle to b a squad player in even the SPL. another factor is irelands low co-eff, which means your going to b qualifying from the 2nd rnd even if you win the league.

was wondering if anyone else has given this a go?

[Slothuus]

Nice touch, I'm definitely going to start doing that in future games.

Cool! Remember to make a search in-game to see whether the player is in the database as a staff member somewhere. Also, I always add a picture of the manager.

[KyleBFC]

An idea i used for a game one was to be barcelona (can also be done with arsenal) was to be them and not sign people at all over the age of 18 and just use the youth system and excellent facilities of the club to bring through the best youngsters i can or buy them (under 18) and try get them as good as possible. Then try and get success from the club that way as arsenal and barcelona do in real life by briniging many of their first team through the academy, or poaching them at a young age.

[polskaGOLA]

Except Barca (atleast, can't think of any examples for Arsenal) do buy lots of players over 24.

[RomaRulez]

Instead of Milan I decided to take another stab at Roma. I'm going to use a number of self imposed limits and try to steadily build the team from the youth academy up and see how well I do. Since there's already an official AS Roma thread I'm probably going to start an FM Stories thread so it's a more cohesive story to read as I progress through the seasons. When I get the story thread started I'll post a link.

[Falahk]

Instead of Milan I decided to take another stab at Roma. I'm going to use a number of self imposed limits and try to steadily build the team from the youth academy up and see how well I do. Since there's already an official AS Roma thread I'm probably going to start an FM Stories thread so it's a more cohesive story to read as I progress through the seasons. When I get the story thread started I'll post a link.

be sure to provide updates in the roma thread aswell, we could use some activety

[RomaRulez]

I sure will. I actually decided to start it as a Wordpress blog: http://fm10roma.wordpress.com/

[TacticalGenius]

The rules I've set myself, as Arsenal:

Can only sign:

1) Foreign players age 16 or under (18 for GK)

2) British players age 21 or under (23 for GK)

3) ONE exception per season in an emergency/justified situation. Used it in the 1st season to replace Almunia with Ochoa.

[sniell]

Got a Man U save on the go, given it a little twist to make it more interesting. Basically every player at the club is going to be home grown, and not just trained in england but trained at the club. This means any player in my team either has to have come through the clubs youth academy or signed under the age of 18. Did a similar thing with Arsenal on the 1st patch but lost that save so thought id do it with a better team.

This meant getting rid of the likes of Evra, Vidic, Ferdinand, Berbatov, Valencia etc and replacing them with youngsters. Total transfer income was £85M (although a lot of players were sent on loan so more money to come) and spent £116M.

Current squad:

GK De Gea / Areola / Bouchier

RB Rafael / O'Shea / Neville

LB Fabio / Helan

CB Shawcross / Brown / Situ

CB Evans / Danny Wilson / Pulido

CM Scholes / Gibson / Hazard

CM Fletcher / Rodwell / Shelvey

RM Eagles / El Shaarawy

LM Mollo / Giggs

ST Rooney / Lukaku

ST Macheda / Delfouneso

Signed a few more youngsters and have Wilshire, Rossi and Dodo all joining in the future. Other transfer targets include Pique, Ronaldo and may look to bring Phil Neville and Beckham back home.

[Cullen93]

Trying this with celtic only scottish and irish players

[Eugster]

Inspired by this thread i did the following

Started a new game with Liverpool where i swapped all the foreign players for a british player and ended up with these squads:

Senior

Reserve

U18

Torres

Mascherano

Reina

And i'm not allowed to buy any non-british players at all and should any come through the academy they will be sold or released..also sacked all non-british staff

Staff

I see you've got 3 Irish players in there, I thought you swapped them for all British players.

[Jedzo]

How about this, would it be ok do you think if i constructed a team (in England) of just one solid nationality.

Most people if they go to someone like Man City would have an international dream team but i was thinking more just one nationality. Does it have to be English? Or would you agree if i did maybe all Italian or all Spannish? Or even all African would be not bad?

What do you think?

[Dannyw]

I was thinking starting a Ireland game with someone like Shelbourne. I can make a All irish team with Creativity and Flair around them. I'm thinking about Height for the strikers and A Creative attacking Midfeilder.

[JonnyNUFC]

i'm relatively good friends with Southampton youth player Sam Hoskins, so I'm trying to make him a legend at Saitns!

[norwichaggy]

I always try to sign mostly domestic players. Milan are great for this - the "core" 4 or 5 major players at the start are all Italian (minus Pato and, maybe, Huntelaar). A lot of the squad is also fairly old, so you get a pretty good chance to replace most of the players quite quickly. I've had a very successful 5 seasons with them so far on my save, and the only foreign player I've signed was Lloris due to a lack of quality Italian keepers willing to sign (I did get Amelia as back up though). I won't go into all of my transfers, but as a quick tip - Paloschi starts co-owned at Parma, he finished as Serie A top scorer first season at Parma - they delayed the bidding for another year, then he finished joint top in the second season, and I got him for 9 million. Top quality since then as well. And I've now got Ambrosini, Nesta and Inzaghi on my coaching staff, with Pirlo and Gattusso hopefully joining them at the end of this season, which is another aspect of the game I like a lot, all being Italian.

I have found signing only Italians to be much more fun than my normal games - I've hardly ever got 6 seasons in before, usually get bored and start something else. I'm now thinking of starting a game in either Germany or France and doing the same. France because there are some quality Frenchmen, but I'm not sure you'd be able to attract many of them to a French club. Germany because I think it would be a challenge to have success at the highest levels (ie; champions league) with only German players as I'm not sure there are that many top top quality Germans about on this version.

Anyone tried something similar in France or Germany? Any recommendations? I do like fairly big clubs when managing outside of England, as I like to know who I'm signing and I can't say I'm overly well up in my knowledge of obscure Germans!

[deejay10]

norwichaggy...I know you said you wanted a big club, but maybe try Monaco for the french challenge. They have a strong nucleus of young talented players that will form the spine of the team for years and years. You can just build around that home grown core.

For the German option Werder Bremen spring to mind, with Ozil and Marin the real stars to build around.

[RomaRulez]

Two new updates posted on my blog, including news of a big contract extension! http://fm10roma.wordpress.com/

[SJ234]

Right I did limitations to my last Arsenal save. I had to try and make a profit on all transfers, don't spend big money on players (record was 14mill due to me finding to a regen who was insane) and try and push the youth through like wenger.

I won a Prem title every season, 4 Cl titles, one or two Fa cups and all the other little trophies you get like the super cup multiple

times.

However the Database had minor edits to make TV more like the top CB he is rather than average.

[Prowl]

Right I did limitations to my last Arsenal save. I had to try and make a profit on all transfers, don't spend big money on players (record was 14mill due to me finding to a regen who was insane) and try and push the youth through like wenger.

I won a Prem title every season, 4 Cl titles, one or two Fa cups and all the other little trophies you get like the super cup multiple

times.

However the Database had minor edits to make TV more like the top CB he is rather than average.

I'm doing the same thing....although my only big signing was Adler for 17 million...other than that, I've invested in youth and developing the current crop of young players in the system.

[Mazz]

In my save with Le Havre, I limit myself to signing only French and African players. Doing pretty well so far too, promoted in first season, then finished 10th in the second. I have only signed 3 players who don't fit my limitations - Luis Guilherme (he was going for free, it would have been a crime not to considering his potential!), Josh Lambo and Gale Agbossoumonde (although he is half Togolese, so he kind of counts).

It is very rewarding when you succeed with limitations in place. I'm pretty sure I could have finished higher in the league if I'd had no limitations at all, but doing it this way has been a lot more satisfying for me.

[Thebraid]

how about a 1st team of players all aged 32 or older? would be quite a challenge having to bring in new players each season and only really be able to use them for a max of 2 seasons...

[ITFC 1]

I always like to be lower league teams, at the moment I am Stevenage, and obviously my main goal is to get promotion. I try to keep the core of the squad together, only then do I make a couple of tweeks to it here and there.

If I gain promotion, I intend on using the same group of players, perhaps 1 more signing to freshen things up, because I like to see how the squad I have would cope in a higher league. If I do manage to stay up, then maybe 3 or 4 signings will be introduced.

Ill keep you posted

[skinnymalinky]

I always play with a self-imposed transfer policy.

Ukraine/Russia - Eastern European players only (the talent pool in Russia and Ukraine is smaller than other established European nations so the catchment area is larger)

Belgium - Central Africa

Holland - Germany, Belgium, Switzerland

Portugal - Brazil, Angola, Mozambique

[kingjericho]

i get so tired of hearing about the same players all the time (otamendi, adler, diego renan, dzeko) that when i can finally buy them i dont want to. basically what i do in every team i manage is to try to get the most national players. for example in france its easy to have an all-french squad but in italy (managing sampdoria) its harder, the good players are expensive and i dont have too much money, but i try

[Slapper]

I typically take lessons from losses to an extreme. If I win the league but lose the Champions League on a fluke goal, I'll go analyze everything about that match and completely change my tactics even if I don't really have a need to. Sort of like Ferguson's switching of his squad in the last 15 years or so. It's not as extreme as some of the things advocated on this thread, but I find it enjoyable and realistic.

[deejay10]

Let's make this thread like the LLM forum, but for those who don't want to start managing right at the bottom. Realism is the ultimate aim, so no downloaded tactics. Player naming is allowed.

So that means, different transfer policies and tactics, based on the players already at the club. Only spending what the club generates in profit through transfer, and other revenue. Only signing players based on scout recomendations and club requirements, not perfromances in previous saves.

[deejay10]

In my save with Le Havre, I limit myself to signing only French and African players. Doing pretty well so far too, promoted in first season, then finished 10th in the second. I have only signed 3 players who don't fit my limitations - Luis Guilherme (he was going for free, it would have been a crime not to considering his potential!), Josh Lambo and Gale Agbossoumonde (although he is half Togolese, so he kind of counts).

It is very rewarding when you succeed with limitations in place. I'm pretty sure I could have finished higher in the league if I'd had no limitations at all, but doing it this way has been a lot more satisfying for me.

This sounds like an interesting challenge, and one I plan to do, probably with AS Monaco.

[adamc81]

Just finished my 3rd season with Forest. Haven't deviated from my original 4-4-2 formation vowel. Its based on Cloughs 4-4-2 with everyone having there own jobs and knowing what to do so is very rigid and quite direct; it's functional without any real superstars. 1st season i got promoted as champions, 2nd very much a consolidation year finishing 13th, and the last season which i have just finished ended up 5th - very nearly 4th, so am in the Europa league now which am happy with.

Have kept the wages down, so am just over £350K a week, and just really a solid British unit with the odd fancy dan foreigner as Cloughie would describe them. Have to say it is one of my more enjoyable saves just having a standard tactic and buying determined/loyal players for that tactic rather than buying superstars. If my scout says a player will take time to fit in, no matter how good he is, or how much of a bargain i won't go for him. I doubt many of my first 11 would get into any top squads let alone their first 11 so is helping make me feel my Forest team is very much my own.

[Brian Shanahan]

I have fallen into a pattern on my game, without really meaning to but deciding to keep to it. I can only pay fees for U-19 regens, and all other players are only allowed in on a free. I keep to a strict wage budget (always) minimum £100k under my allowed (without changing it). In the first season I didn't keep to it (as I hadn't fallen into the pattern) but form the second season on I have (except for José Salcedo for £100k and Christian Tanase for £1.7m at the start of season 2). I'm with Betis at the moment, and I'm quite succesful.

I also intend to make every long serving member of my playing staff a coach, scout of physio at the end of their careers, unless they absolutely refuse to stay in the game

[Suggy33]

I, like the OP, like to try a variety of different players, and almost never sign the same player twice.

Am thinking of starting a Lyon save where I can only buy French based players.

A good challenge is BATE Borisov, where you can only have 2 (not sure maybe 4) foreign players in the squad.

[RomaRulez]

I haven't really been able to get into my Roma save. This is like the 4th time I've tried Roma and for some reason I keep losing interest.

But I had a really interesting idea last night. Try taking over a team that the media predicts will be relegated and don't change anything about the team. Keep all the players and backroom staff the first season and try to avoid relegation simply by developing a tactic/formation that fits your team and see if you can manage your way out of the drop zone.

I'm going to take a stab at it with Bologna in Serie A, who are predicted to finish last by the media.

[MeesterCat]

The only real limitation I set myself was to never exceed the up front value of a transfer with payments over 48 months.

I.e. If I offer £2mil upfront for a player, I cannot offer more than £2mil over 48 months.

I prefer to not use the 48 month option at all, but if I do, thats my limitation. From reading the forums, its the heavy use of the 48 month option that skews games towards unrealism. (I do agree that the option itself is realistic).

I've found I generally fall into an O'Neill style of management when it comes to transfers, but thats more of a subconcious thing rather than a deliberate limitation.

I'm just starting a new save with Portsmouth and I fully intend to keep this save 'in the spirit of the situation'.

[swisso]

Only just noticed this thread

I'm in 2019 with Barcelona and limited myself to only using Academy players from 2017 onwards. Sad thing is, Barca haven't had a single player come through who's actually any good.

Not suggesting that Barca are a conveyor belt of talent, but with Xavi, Iniesta, Fabregas, Reina, Arteta, Puyol, Xavi, Busquets, Valdes, Bojan and Pedro all being players of worthy mention in the space of a decade, i haven't seen a single worthwhile player from 2009 > 2019.

Poor regen system? Poor coding?

[MattR1]

I've been doing a save with limitations with Leeds, won the premier league last season, now in season 6, of my starting 11, 8 are English, 2 Scots, and 1 Italian, out of my starting 18, 15/16 count as home grown, looking to have an all English starting 11 within 10 season, already have an academy player of mine with England caps, much better save just keeping it British, my current budget is 40mil and I'm 230k under my wage budget due to saving money and selling the non British players I still had to fire me up the league while I devolped them, been a good save, much better than just buying cheap/free players who in real life would never come to Leeds when I'm in League One etc.

[RomaRulez]

As I wrote above I had a new idea about taking a "sure relegation candidate" and not making any changes to the team, but instead see if I could avoid relegation just by designing a formation/tactic that fits the team. I'm an American who is just learning about Football and tactics/formations, and if you've read my Basel thread you know this is a real challenge for me.

The team I decided to try this with is Bologna, predicted to finish last in the Serie A in the first season. I took over the team, kept the entire backroom staff, and just tried to design a tactic/formation around my best 11 players. I came up with a 3-5-2 counter-attacking formation that excels at playing a fast game because as best as I could tell I had a lot of good, fast midfielders. I've only played a couple of games as of this post, but so far so good. In my first competitive match I beat Placenza in the 3rd qualifying round of the Italian Cup by a 3-0 score. We then opened up the Serie A season at home vs. Sienna and scored a late goal to earn a 2-1 win.

But I got to thinking....ok, this idea works for the first season. What about after that? So here are my restrictions going forward:

*I won't sign any free agents or make any transfer purchases during the first season, unless I have to due to injury.

*Once the January transfer window has closed I'll start looking to try to sign players who will be free agents on July 1st. I'll only try to sign players who I believe are upgrades to current positions, and only for positions where I'm going to lose an outgoing free agent if I don't sign someone. If I sign a new July free agent, my current player is allowed to leave. If I don't get someone to commit to signing by June 1st I'll attempt to resign my current players. If I don't get any player for a position by July 1st then I'll only look to fill that position in the summer. All my funds will go into my wage budget. No transfer purchases unless I have to due to injury.

*Whenever possible I'll attempt to sign Italian players.

*I'll pester my board non-stop about upgrading our youth and training facilities. Already got them to agree to one upgrade of each. Then I'll really work at developing players out of my youth system for the future.

*If I get sacked I'll pick a new team for the next season and repeat the process.

[deejay10]

Gollum...I'm doing something similar with my Atalanta team, although they are quite a bit better than Bologna at the start!

I'm looking at signing mainly Italians, but also scouting the world heavily for players for my youth team. I'm restricting myself to a very strict wage budget and salary cap for each player. My highest earner is on €15k.

I'm only looking at players who would realistically sign for Atalanta - young players from much smaller leagues/teams, journeyman pros, and ageing stars for the mental attributes. I can only spend what I earn in sales/profits, and I'm looking to earn enough to pay off the club's debt. If I get a good enough offer for one of my developed youngers, I'll sell if its a much higher rep club. I'm also looking at keeping most of the side intact, and only changing the first team very gradually. Nearly all players that I sign must fit the salary cap/squad personality/have high determination, teamwork, work rate.

[jsdceltic]

Inspired by this thread i did the following

Started a new game with Liverpool where i swapped all the foreign players for a british player and ended up with these squads:

Senior

Reserve

U18

Torres

Mascherano

Reina

And i'm not allowed to buy any non-british players at all and should any come through the academy they will be sold or released..also sacked all non-british staff

Staff

Given is not British

[joe__the__man]

Aye, nor are Ireland (it's in the name) or McGeady.

[McGougan33]

In all my saves ive kept my squads mostly European, although im starting to just go by nationality now, and hoping i get good youngsters in

[joe__the__man]

My French Lyon team now looks like this:

GK: Lloris

RB: Gassama

LB: Cissokho

CB: Sakho, Agnaou, Bellaid

MCd: Moussa Sissoko, Toulalan, Gonalons, Mehamha

MCa: Pjanic, Gourcuff, Grenier

ST: Remy, Tafer, Belfodil

And my foreigners:

GK: Ayite*

RB: Azpilicueta

LB: Jansen

CB: Fazio

MCd: Sandro

MCa: Jovetic, Pesenti*

ST: Lisandro

I haven't signed any foreigners in ages, but still have 8 in my squad - at least 4 of which I don't want to get rid of anytime soon. It's hard

[jsdceltic]

Technically McGeady is as he was born in Scotland.

[MikelAnderson]

I've started a save in which to recreate Celtics success in 1967 by taking a whole Scottish team and winning the Champions League. A long term save obviously so wish me luck.

[Mazz]

My newest game with limitations - I've resurrected bankrupt Mouscron and plonked them into the Belgian 3rd Division. Due to the bankruptcy, they have no squad or staff, and debts of around £10m. I created an imaginary scenario where a Paraguayan (yes, Paraguayan) consortium has bought the club and pumped in £60m to help the club rebuild itself (£20m of which they gave me for transfers). They have also nearly completed construction of a new stadium (the "Estadio Excelsior") which will open in 6 months time.

I myself am a Paraguayan manager, and my squad and staff will be composed entirely of Paraguayans, no ifs, ands or buts.

So far, I've managed to assemble a pretty good team, with players such as Nestor Ortigoza, Delio Toledo, Marcos Caceres, Sergio Aquino and Christian Riveros all joining. Finding good staff who are willing to join me has been a nightmare though!

My aim is to obviously work my way up to the Jupiler League, and become a top team in Belgium. Also, hopefully at some point I will be able to take over the Paraguay national team and lead the squad that I've raised myself to International glory

[christy06]

I love this idea, and it will work well with my game. Im currently ajax, just started, i have decided that i will sell all foreign players and only have dutch players for the first season. I will only buy Dutch players in season 1, and thereafter i will rely soley on my youth team and players from my feeder clubs regardless of nationality, this way i get to use the Ajax system of having brillant dutch players.

Will keep you updated.

[Danny Dire]

Basically I HATE going to every team and buying the same old players, building similar multinational squads and achieving all dominant success within 2-3 seasons for top flight clubs. Unique restrictions keep me interested, and give each game its own unique style and different challenge.

The best way to avoid this is to play in forgien leagues especially leagues out side europe.

But I know what you mean and I find it easier to do this if you start at a lower team as you generally will always improve you squad with signings.

So many times have I seen people post screen shots with them as Man U and Edin Dzeko has scored, I mean has no one got an imagination.

[Dannyw]

I'm finding these experiences of limitations interesting. Afc Wimbledon. They always been a club what i want to take to the big time. I also want to build the team back up to the heights of the 80's and 90's. What i'm planning with them is build a squad full of free transfers then sell them off. This will be up to the Championship. When i get there i will spend wisely on young players for the future or I bring in exprience Championship players but on the cheap. I will try and bring in an all English team.

[Trilo_G]

I'm considering trying this...

I want to start a save and have an almost entirely english squad (at least as english as I can get), and start winning trophiees with them. What would be the best base team to start with? I'm thinking Aston Villa, but who could I buy to accompany Agbonlahor upfront? Should I go with someone with aerial presence like Crouch, or could I get away with buying other small forwards like Defoe and Chopra?

Gotta love the english base with good players like Young, Milner, Downing, Davies. Any suggestions for first window purchases???

And yes I do love this idea, especially after reading the OP... My CM partnership at Newcastle is Veloso/Moutinho, and my transfer targets for CB are Fazio and Sakho hahaha. My Villa save should bring me down to earth a bit and allow me to set myself a REAL, yet attainable, challenge. I think I'm going to enjoy this...

[hitman19ko]

I'm considering trying this...

I want to start a save and have an almost entirely english squad (at least as english as I can get), and start winning trophiees with them. What would be the best base team to start with? I'm thinking Aston Villa, but who could I buy to accompany Agbonlahor upfront? Should I go with someone with aerial presence like Crouch, or could I get away with buying other small forwards like Defoe and Chopra?

Gotta love the english base with good players like Young, Milner, Downing, Davies. Any suggestions for first window purchases???

And yes I do love this idea, especially after reading the OP... My CM partnership at Newcastle is Veloso/Moutinho, and my transfer targets for CB are Fazio and Sakho hahaha. My Villa save should bring me down to earth a bit and allow me to set myself a REAL, yet attainable, challenge. I think I'm going to enjoy this...

Well I've been doing the same thing, except with Tottenham. I just started making my team fully British and Irish with some foreign replacements in my 4th season.

If you're just starting then you probably won't be able to get a lot of English players because your budget won't be high enough, unless you sell a lot. Also don't even bother trying to sign Gerrard, Terry, Carragher, Lampard, etc. and almost all are never interested in moving clubs and they all plan on finishing their career at their respected clubs.

As for forwards, if you play very well over a few seasons Rooney will most likely be interested in joining your team. He is in my game and the only reason I haven't signed him is because I don't want to spend that much money . Anyway, to start off I would look at players like Crouch, Defoe, C. Cole, Sylvan Ebanks-Blake, and Bent. They are all good players to start the game. You might also like to remember that you have Delfouneso in your reserves, and he has great potential.

If you are aiming towards youth, and would like to buy youngsters then look at players like Welbeck, Jose Baxter, Aaron Spear, Jay Rodriguez, Nimely- Tchuimeni, James Vaughan, Victor Moses and maybe Harry Kane. The two spots England are lacking in depth, in my opinion, are forward, and centre back. They have good players in those spots don't get me wrong, but they don't have many 'world class' potential players. So if I were you I would get the best of those two positions before anything.

My current squad in August 2012 looks like this:

-----------------------Smithies------------------------

Kyle Walker- D. Wilson (Rangers)- Bassong----- Bale

--------------Huddlestone- Palacios------------------

Lennon-----------------------------------Ashley Young

---------------Balotelli--- Agbonlahor----------------

Theres only three non home grown players in my starting XI.

SUBS:

Gomes, Corluka, Woodgate, King, Pedro (Barcelona), Sandro, Lukaku, James Rodriguez, Jonjo Shelvey, Crouch, Defoe, Pavlyuchenko, Christian Pander (Schalke), Phil Jones (Blackburn), and Silvio Proto (Anderlecht).

I want to add more home grown players into my starting lineup, but at the moment there isn't anyone who could beat out my starters.