Too many shots in FM15. Any change for FM16?

[isignedupfornorealreason]

One thing people forget is that pointing out statistical 'normality' doesn't mean that the game is representing the statistical norm properly.

Saying stuff like: "Well in real life 1 in 25 shots are goals and in FM 1 in 24 shots are goals, therefore this game is perfect and jubbly wubbly' is completely irrelevant if the method of reaching that 1 in 24 doesn't line up with what one might expect in a football match over time. That's one of the reasons I've a serious aversion to statistical "stress testing" that developers do, because falling in line with 'averages' doesn't mean that it is doing it even-handedly. Hence, you'll end up with spikes and peaks and troughs where teams shoot 40+ and then sod all but that's considered acceptable because it falls in line with the statistical average.

- Yes, it's the fault of tactics, yes it's the fault of the AI set up and how the whole thing works, no it doesn't mean the game is fine or working as intended and no it doesn't mean people deserve the 'eh, it's statistically fine, it's just the way you play it that causes this' as an off hand respond. But, that may just be my view as I do feel that if these issues are arising that's not strictly entirely the fault of the player but partly the fault of the developers, especially with the (surely it is) accepted (now) comprehensive lack of resources, guides and manuals outside of this forum. You can't blame the blind for being blind if no one is illuminating the way in-game. >_>

[themadsheep2001]

One thing people forget is that pointing out statistical 'normality' doesn't mean that the game is representing the statistical norm properly.

Saying stuff like: "Well in real life 1 in 25 shots are goals and in FM 1 in 24 shots are goals, therefore this game is perfect and jubbly wubbly' is completely irrelevant if the method of reaching that 1 in 24 doesn't line up with what one might expect in a football match over time. That's one of the reasons I've a serious aversion to statistical "stress testing" that developers do, because falling in line with 'averages' doesn't mean that it is doing it even-handedly. Hence, you'll end up with spikes and peaks and troughs where teams shoot 40+ and then sod all but that's considered acceptable because it falls in line with the statistical average.

- Yes, it's the fault of tactics, yes it's the fault of the AI set up and how the whole thing works, no it doesn't mean the game is fine or working as intended and no it doesn't mean people deserve the 'eh, it's statistically fine, it's just the way you play it that causes this' as an off hand respond. But, that may just be my view as I do feel that if these issues are arising that's not strictly entirely the fault of the player but partly the fault of the developers, especially with the (surely it is) accepted (now) comprehensive lack of resources, guides and manuals outside of this forum. You can't blame the blind for being blind if no one is illuminating the way in-game. >_>

Except they dont just do statistical stress testing. not even close. And er, no one has said its perfect, in fact there are two specific areas mentioned that need work. Not entirely sure what your point was.

[MBarbaric]

i believe isignedupfornoreason might be on to something here. however, i'd add another thing that wasn't mentioned before which i believe significantly influences how the goals are scored. it is most underdeveloped part of ME that SI will have to look into sooner or later. that is pressing and closing down. it might have improved slightly during the years but it is far from how it looks in reality. my concerne here is that altering pressing and closing down significantly in ME will completely unbalance the ME which is main reason SI didn't do mcuh about it if you compare it to other parts of the ME.

here is a school example of closing down

[video=youtube;AtIAhX5xhLs]

now compare this to your average game in FM and you will see FM is far, too far away from reality which unbalances what stats in game are telling you.

[themadsheep2001]

i believe isignedupfornoreason might be on to something here. however, i'd add another thing that wasn't mentioned before which i believe significantly influences how the goals are scored. it is most underdeveloped part of ME that SI will have to look into sooner or later. that is pressing and closing down. it might have improved slightly during the years but it is far from how it looks in reality. my concerne here is that altering pressing and closing down significantly in ME will completely unbalance the ME which is main reason SI didn't do mcuh about it if you compare it to other parts of the ME.

here is a school example of closing down

[video=youtube;AtIAhX5xhLs]

now compare this to your average game in FM and you will see FM is far, too far away from reality which unbalances what stats in game are telling you.

Pressing (and defensive engagement as whole) is something that has been looked into since FM13, its arguably the hardest part of the ME to code as a large amount of defending is jostling rather than a full tackle engagement, that required better physics. I think they also need to expand how they instruct closing down in the tactical interface, its too unwieldy as it stands.

[MBarbaric]

the biggest part of defence is not tackling nor jostling. in fact what defenders are thought on individual level in real is delaying an attacker, closing space/passing lanes, and only then comes tackling as last effort. what you ideally want as a coach is to force a mistake from opposition. this is done on whole team level. shifting of the team in dependence of ball position, teaching the individuals positioning on the pitch and timing when to leave the defensive line to close down and direct the opposition to less dangerous areas of pitch ultimately forcing them to give away the ball.

the problem is that it wouldn't maybe be so difficult to simulate good defence (lines movement and closing down). it might be trickier to simulate bad defence. i will try to explain...

for example how would you decide when the defence becomes solid? after 4 weeks of training, five...? how about amateur teams who have less training time? it simply has too many variables from individual players to coaches and to make it properly translated into ME you'd need the whole new module for coaching defence which would become completely new game. problem is, without proper closing down/pressing system in FM we will never have a close to real football ME.

[akkm]

the biggest part of defence is not tackling nor jostling. in fact what defenders are thought on individual level in real is delaying an attacker, closing space/passing lanes, and only then comes tackling as last effort. what you ideally want as a coach is to force a mistake from opposition. this is done on whole team level. shifting of the team in dependence of ball position, teaching the individuals positioning on the pitch and timing when to leave the defensive line to close down and direct the opposition to less dangerous areas of pitch ultimately forcing them to give away the ball.

the problem is that it wouldn't maybe be so difficult to simulate good defence (lines movement and closing down). it might be trickier to simulate bad defence. i will try to explain...

for example how would you decide when the defence becomes solid? after 4 weeks of training, five...? how about amateur teams who have less training time? it simply has too many variables from individual players to coaches and to make it properly translated into ME you'd need the whole new module for coaching defence which would become completely new game. problem is, without proper closing down/pressing system in FM we will never have a close to real football ME.

Thats an excellent post re the essence of defending. Look back at the likes of Maldini, Baresi, Cannvaro...it was their anticipation/reading of the game/positioning/concentration which effectively closed down space/passing lanes preventing tricky situations arising in the first place and elevated them above most other defenders...that is pure defending. After that the individual's traits get utilised to help defend certain situations/players by heading/speed/tackling/leaning on them using strength etc/pressing.

If you look at currently why standards of defending have dropped off significantly it is because the elements of anticipation/reading of the game/positioning/concentration are lacking in defenders now...take kompany for example last year and even at his peak...he relies on his pace/power a lot to defend situations and players rather than the purer elements aforementioned. The majority of defenders not even able to call on kompany's power and pace are in an even worse situation these days.

I'm talking about individual defending primarily there.

[themadsheep2001]

Thats an excellent post re the essence of defending. Look back at the likes of Maldini, Baresi, Cannvaro...it was their anticipation/reading of the game/positioning/concentration which effectively closed down space/passing lanes preventing tricky situations arising in the first place and elevated them above most other defenders...that is pure defending. After that the individual's traits get utilised to help defend certain situations/players by heading/speed/tackling/leaning on them using strength etc/pressing.

If you look at currently why standards of defending have dropped off significantly it is because the elements of anticipation/reading of the game/positioning/concentration are lacking in defenders now...take kompany for example last year and even at his peak...he relies on his pace/power a lot to defend situations and players rather than the purer elements aforementioned. The majority of defenders not even able to call on kompany's power and pace are in an even worse situation these days.

I'm talking about individual defending primarily there.

There is a lot more focus on technical coaching rather than defensive basics, and it shows in Europe.

[themadsheep2001]

the biggest part of defence is not tackling nor jostling. in fact what defenders are thought on individual level in real is delaying an attacker, closing space/passing lanes, and only then comes tackling as last effort. what you ideally want as a coach is to force a mistake from opposition. this is done on whole team level. shifting of the team in dependence of ball position, teaching the individuals positioning on the pitch and timing when to leave the defensive line to close down and direct the opposition to less dangerous areas of pitch ultimately forcing them to give away the ball.

the problem is that it wouldn't maybe be so difficult to simulate good defence (lines movement and closing down). it might be trickier to simulate bad defence. i will try to explain...

for example how would you decide when the defence becomes solid? after 4 weeks of training, five...? how about amateur teams who have less training time? it simply has too many variables from individual players to coaches and to make it properly translated into ME you'd need the whole new module for coaching defence which would become completely new game. problem is, without proper closing down/pressing system in FM we will never have a close to real football ME.

I was talking about the physical engagement, not the defensive positioning ibeforehand. I actually think the former is more easily dealt with, but also requires better tools in closing down. The current manner imo is not good enough to give you that level of defending

[akkm]

On the shots issue. I've posted on this several times and there are some good posts above and some of the issues mentioned are certainly valid.

Some of what is seen in FM tho indicates there are other factors at play. I tried one game using Barca Vs Bayern Munich using contain tactics with barca and still had circa 30 shots. So this was against Bayern Munich...that simply shouldn't happen.

Its definitely more prominent with higher quality attacking players despite instructions which should discourage taking shots.

Overall the shot count is not a result of striker always getting isolated and taking a pot shot it isn't always a result of AI deep tactics either. Its certainly a combo of things to a point.

A bigger factor tho given certain instructions...essentially which would encourage a patient approach trying to enable the mental/technical qualities of high end technical/creative players players/teams should not be taking so many shots as a course of action in games. That they still do is indicative of other factors coming into play such as of a lack of patience/decision making/passing options/ineffectiveness of skilled players to maintain possession in the top third/ineffectiveness of attacking highly technical and creative midfielders high up the pitch/players & teams lacking the inclination/propensity to recycle possession.

I'm not saying none of the above happens of course just that they don't happen with the continuity/persistence that they should given instructions/quality of players at one's disposal. To be honest even without quality players I think it should at least be attempted (ie a patient/probing approach) more often with instructions regardless of the actual success...ie as a course players should be trying it if asked to do so if tactical set up should enable/encourage it.

Certainly though for the likes of Barca, those players simply won't shoot so often resulting in an off the wall shot count...given instructions if they don't succeed so be it...just try, try and try again !!!

[Svenc]

You need look no further than the number of tackles made a game to find that defending overall is arguably the number one area where the game is the farthest from football. That's an area where one-way-action sims that otherwise portray a highly idealized version of football where every shot is on target, are in some ways superior in many ways, no doubts about it. Those are games that don't really deal much in decision making either, as AI difficulty level determine how and how quickly AI opponents react if it's not you and your pad and your always 100% 360 degrees overview over anything going on around every player on the pitch, and so if you're looking for constant Fifa-esque "sweet goals" as some other thread has it, one must play Fifa and will continue to do so. However in terms of defending, positioning, closing space and collectively pressing players... in small doses the patterns of that are more realistic, which sounds funny if you consider that in those games there's goal scored like every three minutes. Still even five years old versions of PES had that pretty nicely modeled, overall. Never been the best player but it was immediately apparent on the higher levels of difficulty how hard it could have been to break even mediocre sides down and get in a shooting position.

That's something that is can be critizised with ease. As far as the game is concerned everybody who argues it is the player's input if he constantly has a load of shots and converts little is still 100% correct though. This likely won't change 100% until FM has truly modeled physical contact of bodies too. And yeah, that is one area where FM definitely hugely trails behind Fifa or PES years easily. The overall patterns of play though not so much. The good thing is that SI have had contact to actual football people from day one (some ex-high-level internationals are even actively involved in data research), which started with Ray Houghton back in the day giving feedback on individual player behavior. No it's not merely some statistics thing, and there's a reason why they ask for pkms and feedback of minute to minute action when they request a bug report.

I was talking specifically about the final third. The way I set up with my Napoli team for example means there are always two deeper midfielders available for a pass, two playmakers from different angles occupying different areas, movement into the box from three different angles and a forward dropping/drifting plus two wing backs hugging the touchline. In theory they could keep recycling possession without ever having a shot because the options are always available. What actually happens is that sooner or later the players will try and execute a move or if one is not available they simply shoot. There's not much wrong with that, that's how football works after all, but in those games between a giant and a minnow it highlights the tactical issues and sometimes questionable decision making through these mental shot counts. Too much space, too little patience.

It's not very intuitive (perhaps the opposite), but if you remember the sliders and you you could get even attacking players having a lowlish mentality (more sideways and backwards passes), it's better doable too. However as you say, it's a sim of football, not handball where there's minutes on end of play just moving back and forth without anybody ever applying much. From my experience, for all the faults in FM's defending and concepts that are yet to be implemented, you're pretty pushed high up the pitch even against lowliest of opponents. This highlights another thing too though, as watching from play it's apparent that a favourite AI team has a tendency to switch to the higher pitched mentalities available too and is nowhere near as "creative" as a human player could be when trying to implement a fitting style of play. The AI takes the mentalities at "face value", whereas experienced users know that aggressive mentalities lend themselves to forward play far more (no matter if short or direct, control mentalities and above hugely favour forward passes) vs. the opposite on the other end of the scale.

[video=youtube;W5y93yRYj7I]

If anybody really wants to have a go, you don't need to count overall shots to determine averages. It's all in the team report->stats page. It's preferable to have everything simulated fully though, as the shot count includes stats of ALL games the AI team has played, not just the league or anything specifically. Number divided by number of games (which becomes apparent from some of the stats, i.e. the number of clean sheets displayed in X matches), presto. It seems above 20 for the top teams indeed. Again, some of that will be inherently match engine, no doubts about it. However your own shot counts and especially conversion, that's something you're doing if it is off the charts.

[akkm]

There is a lot more focus on technical coaching rather than defensive basics, and it shows in Europe.

I read Gary Neville say something similar and the two aren't mutually exclusive. I know what he meant in that he was saying players didn't get level of detailed training he alluded to receiving himself...ie what way to face/foot and body positions defending certain angles/crosses etc and that time spent wasn't the same. That's not really why its happening anyway to be fair. There is a drop in standards across the board in football...it seems like it is almost accelerating too.

Look at the dearth of top quality strikers around...there's also a shortage of quality dribblers/shortage of quality creative players...so if the level of technical training was affecting defensive basics to the detriment of defending then you'd expect not to see a drop in quality technically and even a potential improvement...this is not happening..despite the focus on technical training.

If you watch a game of football you'll see the basics are being done at a lower level these days...it is common place to see poor touch/control/players unable to make simple passes/players turning the ball over more easily and more frequently.

The one thing which has advanced is the fitness of players and that side of things and arguably the level of professional preparation. It's not down to pressing or the physicality of the game either which is affecting the technical side of things as there are far too many instances of players in isolation and under no pressure not being able to do the basics at good or even competent level.

Re the focus on technical coaching again. Take Italy for example...by all accounts you read of italian football they still have a high focus on the tactical/defensive way of things yet the standards of defending are poor there these days and compared to its heyday defending is actually dreadful

Looking back to the heyday of Baresi and Maldini etc...the level of technical players such as donadoni/savicevic/boban/van basten etc was far higher than it is now despite there being a higher focus on technical training now !!!

[bleventozturk]

I haven't read the entire thread, but I just wanted to add that an important cause for this happening in FM is that the defending teams hoof the ball way too much compared to real life. Just look at the pass conversion rates for the center backs of defending teams. All the clearances they make count as a pass and they end up with very low pass conversion rates. As soon as they make an interception, they just kick the ball out, many times even when they are not under pressure. That needs to stop. It just gives the ball back to the attacking team, and they keep coming and coming. There should be a lot more passing between defenders, and playing the ball out with shorter passes from defense. Or mid range passes to the wings where you have wingers waiting, instead of aimlessly kicking it out. Only when they are in pressure they should do that.

As a consequence of this, like in every FM, in this version also playing with a defensive tactic is not rewarding, and playing with aggressive tactics very rarely gets punished. To prove this, just look at all the online games, and you will see that all those experienced FM players use highly attacking tactics even if their team is one of the weakest in their division. If they attack, they lose 3-2. If they would try to defend, they would lose 4-0. You just keep attacking, and as soon as you have better players, you start winning those games 3-2, then 4-2, 4-1, eventually reaching total domination, averaging 30-40 shots a game and scoring 3-4 goals a game.

In my personal game this doesn't happen to me, only because I want to have a more realistic simulation and because I keep using balanced tactics that produce realistic shot counts and scorelines. SI should really focus on improving not only defending, but also playing out of defense for underdogs, and significantly decrease the amount of balls kicked aimlessly up the field back to the opponents' stoppers. The overly attacking tactics should be possible to punish.

[MrPompey]

I agree with some of the stuff here but the key bit for me also is AI tactics.

So, putting all your men behind the ball giving up position is one tactic. However if we look real life tactics of the managers of the poorer teams they have and can utilise lots more options. A key one of these options is pressing. Many so called better teams have been undone or at least frustrated when the lesser team presses the better team off the park giving the opposition no time on the ball, force mistakes and recover possession.

Now we come to the key bit for me.....fitness does not seem correctly represented in the ME. The modern professional footballer is trained to athlete standards. Too often we see in game players not reaching full fitness and losing fitness far too quickly. When you play a pressing game, and lets face it many of the premiership lesser teams will do this all game and have players fit enough to do this. So lesser FM teams attempting a pressing game will tire far to easily and not reflect modern player fitness levels IMHO

Something else to be looked at for FM16, or likely now FM17 in its own right but also as a valid AI defensive option that can be employed without burning out players so quick as FM's ME does

[bleventozturk]

MrPompey, putting all your men behind the ball is one tactic, for sure. When I apply it, I observe that it is still somewhat effective in terms of clogging the passing lanes to prevent the opponent from getting into goal positions easily. The issue is, imo, what happens after the weaker team wins the ball. Once the mentality is set to anything below 'standard' in the ME, that equates pretty much to defenders hoofing the ball and giving it back to the attacking team.

In my experience the only way to properly defend and then have an actual attempt to start an attack, is to play with higher mentality still, but assign more defensive roles to the players, and use more defensive TI's. I have had some success doing this, but this does not happen with AI teams. By description (in the game), teams use for example control mentality in matches they expect to win. And that is all driven by the reputation system in the game. Lower reputation AI teams select counter or lower mentalities against bigger reputation teams, and without proper play out of defense while using those mentalities, they keep giving the ball to the stronger opponent, which eventually results in the higher reputation team piling up their shot count.

[Svenc]

MrPompey, putting all your men behind the ball is one tactic, for sure. When I apply it, I observe that it is still somewhat effective in terms of clogging the passing lanes to prevent the opponent from getting into goal positions easily. The issue is, imo, what happens after the weaker team wins the ball. Once the mentality is set to anything below 'standard' in the ME, that equates pretty much to defenders hoofing the ball and giving it back to the attacking team.

That's not true. Whilst more defensive mentalities by default makes defenders prefer to look for direct options more, as the in-game text on the mentalities describes this pretty correctly, this can be tweaked by TIs und PIs. The lower mentalities given to players make them prefer safe options, they are encouraged to clear when one such isn't on too -- one of the reasons why experienced users recreate possession based styles precisely actually with lower pitched mentalities, same as when trying to stretch an opposition -- far more backwards and lateral passes and less of a push to get forward ASAP. They're not fixed playing styles nor defending styles, anyway. This seems counter-intuitive in some parts (why go "defensive" if I want to attack?), in others not so much (Why go attack and expect anything else but a barrage of forward passes and players constantly pushing towards the goal). But is also in parts semantics: Though it is recognized by the very originators of "Tiki-Taka", like Cruyff himself, that playing keep-ball is in parts simply a defensive thing ("If they don't have the ball, they can't score"), by Spanish standards, playing and back and forth, weaving endless patterns has become part of football culture, and hoofing the ball would trigger whistling. Whereas on British soil, booting the ball upfield was made a fetish, even a fundamentalism right at the top of coaching courses, in particular that of yesteryore, it would get booed off the pitch and be recognized for something else entirely and rather trigger frustration.

When players just hoof it, it can be the result because they're simply under pressure and lack composure, and this is tweaked constantly if you looked at patch notes -- it should never boil down to just your input anyway as this isn't Fifa were pushing button means obeying orders, but players interpreting them to the best of their ability. Or it can be because engaging into possession based moves may be a very risky choice when you're pinned back, as laying the ball off to the next guy can immediately put him under pressure. Getting pinned back can also happen either by choice and tactics -- but sometimes it simply is because a team is on the back foot as it's simply outplayed by superior opposition too. It's absolutely possible to riskily "build" from the back even if you're pinned back though, on any mentality. As is the opposite. As you say though, and as has been argued in here too, that's not the way in which the AI appears to operate. Might be work a look at how often defensive mentalities are used for the AI and then coupled with "drop deeper" shouts plus any "more direct" "clear it" TI's though, and to which extent, which is a dynamic thing as every AI manager has given different bias into the DB... probably even coupled with a Target Man who isn't at all able to hold up play long enough for a side being pushed back to move out either by lack of skill or by opponent player quality and tactics (obviously more difficult to be effective in that scenario when the opponent always has a number of players who didn't at all commit forward). Plus a lone forward apparently always being on attack duty hurts such sides and tactics more than it does Guardiola in his 4-1-4-1 with the mighty Lewandowski who can easily keep up the ball too. The general dynamicism is pretty great as it means that no AI opponent operates exactly the same but it has its pitfalls as it may not always result into something well thought out, or holistically sound. The aforementioned choice in duty greatly plays into this too -- having four two five defend duties or anything isn't an inherently bad thing, as those are the only players that will always stay behind the ball and such greatly influence the level of risk being involved, but it needs part of a holistic set-up or at least short-term strategy.

Additionally, and this is why quality analysis is important rather than merely looking at stats: FM considers any header clearance a failed pass, and this is the no. 1 reason why passing stats for defenders can be so low. Take a look at the passing analysis of such a match, and you'll find a huge amount of red dots straight into the box, and clicking them you'll see defenders heading clear crosses in most of the cases. If a side truly is pinned back, the CBs will have a very low number of passes anyway, and the majority of those will be such header clearancees. This is coupled with that even if you try to provoke it, you'll never get them as involved as Boateng, Benatia, Pique et all, backs that make more passes as the midfielders -- there's the tendency, and as I understand it one that is wanted, that play is comparably quickly cleared from the back, and as such whenever a CB is on the ball, he prefers to lay it off to a midfield player ... and from there it comparably rarely goes back. That's why you'll also see some limited interaction in between the CBs, like them interchanging passes back and forth, as often happens in football when they're looking for options to open the next attacking move, or simply as time wasting tactics, which a side who simply tries to frustrate may engage in. That's not to say wasting time by playing keep-ball is impossible, it's just that this rubs off on passing stats of CBs in ways in which it wouldn't necessarily happen in a real match.

[bleventozturk]

..., that's not the way in which the AI appears to operate.

And this was actually the main point of my post. With a lot of (sometimes counter-intuitive) TI's and PI's it is possible to create different styles under different mentalities, but AI is not capable of creating those combinations, only human players can. Having said that, I still think there are way too many aimless clearances in FM compared to real life. Only in extreme pressures players in real life look for just clearing the ball and don't even care where it goes. Most of the time, they try to clear it towards a teammate still. It is also true that attacking play in FM is far more rewarding than defending play style, and the balance between those needs to be drastically improved imo.

[Svenc]

And this was actually the main point of my post. With a lot of (sometimes counter-intuitive) TI's and PI's it is possible to create different styles under different mentalities, but AI is not capable of creating those combinations, only human players can. Having said that, I still think there are way too many aimless clearances in FM compared to real life. Only in extreme pressures players in real life look for just clearing the ball and don't even care where it goes. Most of the time, they try to clear it towards a teammate still. It is also true that attacking play in FM is far more rewarding than defending play style, and the balance between those needs to be drastically improved imo.

That's a subjective thing and I personally would SI to trust on the input they get from their actual football people rather than merely us fans. It's certainly not as drastic as it would make insisting on playing Tiki-Taka from the back at all times impossible, even in situations in which the opponent is all pushed up, forwards are into space and available and playing a neat little possession ball into the feet of the DM immediately puts him under pressure instead (taken from a most recent video in which a guy complained about Fellaini... he should have complained about the guy making the pass before that, no matter if the cause was tactical or no, this should be more likely to happen depending on such)

[video=youtube;VyVY_Jg7vwg]

It's easier in parts to set up attacking tactics in parts because of what I outlined in the screenshots in the post from 22-08... which also shows why inherently attacking formations are so popular, they have always been: No matter what you do, you have players supporting one another in the final third as opposed to a 4-1-4-1, where the forward can be isolated and there are lines rather than the thing being stacked. Prior to the last patch, defenses centrally could be easily overloaded with lots of attacking players, but that has improved. I wouldn't conclude much from how the majority of humans play the game. Firstly, players have always focused on possession and shot statistics, and conclude that against football logics dominating those in the majority of cases = job done, which is also a source of frustration as regardless of AI weakness and everything, the AI still takes some points from matches it just drops off with poor teams too, doesn't it? You will win some and may lose some, and eventually will getter players and win more and more and dominate more and more of those stats but that's going to happen either way if your transfer tactics are up to scratch. Individual player quality is a very important thing, despite some claiming otherwise.

Dominating those few stats is not going to happen if say your aim is to draw an opponent out and hit it on the break. Secondly, defending isn't just all dropping off and conceding space, it is a balancing job. Plus it can be equally just keeping the ball from the opponent without aggressively pushing forward, which is doable, but would require a dynamic play style that from experience humans aren't bothered with to that extent... i.e. naturally it requires you to take a lead first to switch to something a tad modified, else you won't take the points. That said, I'm personally certainly of the opinion that a side that just drops off and rigidly keeps shape should be harder to outplay as it currently is now, as posted previously too. The Bayern - Hamburg match despite the final scoreline from last week would be another higher profile example, first half in particular, and Hamburg barely did anything going BUT hoofing, but it's been already posted. Totally agree that defending overall should be top priority overall. In football, it's easier to defend than it is to attack. FM in tendency has got it the other way around.

[mchbitil]

I just watched AI game, MC vs Chelsea. Shots: 13-14, on target: 4-7, score: 0-1. Not too many

[mchbitil]

Another game, I (MU) vs Norwich. Very one-sided, 33-5 shots, but 1-1 clear cut chances. At least I won, losing this game would be tough luck .

Not sure if this is bad tactical decisions on my side or just luck. I played Attacking and Control mentalities, with very attacking-minded tactic.

[iAlwaysWin]

Another game, I (MU) vs Norwich. Very one-sided, 33-5 shots, but 1-1 clear cut chances. At least I won, losing this game would be tough luck .

Not sure if this is bad tactical decisions on my side or just luck. I played Attacking and Control mentalities, with very attacking-minded tactic.

in the old champ games when you seen match stats like this it meant only 1 thing, the opposition goalie played a blinder to keep so many chances and shots out, but now in modern fm's super goalies are very rare, now i can pretty much guarantee if this game ended a draw or norwich sneaked a win, there defense ratings would be in the high eights or even nines.