Can't buy a clean sheet

[Joe_nufc]

After promotion to league 2, in my second season, with Wrexham defensive issues have become a real problem. 25 games in and I have conceded in every game And have only managed 13 points despite trying loads of different tactics nothing seems to work. Goals seem to mainly all come from crosses and it's really frustrating any help would be much appreciated or I may have to give up on LLM

Sorry if this is in the wrong place or anything like that it's my first post

[herne79]

Possibly a lot of your problem lies in chopping and changing tactics so often. You say you have tried loads of different ones in 25 games.

Are you downloading tactics? If so then carry on until you find one that works for you (although be aware there is no such thing as plug and play any more).

If you are creating your own (which is the best option), then check out the Tactics forum.

[El Presidente]

For the last few versions of FM I've always found that a good offence is the best defence. In other words if they score 4 we'll score 5. Hence quite often I'll win the title having scored AND conceded the most amount of goals.

[Äktsjon Männ]

I'm sort of having the opposite problem right now...

But yeah, tactics forum is the place to go.

[Spurs08]

Tactical experimentation is for pre-season. By the time the season starts, you should have two or three set-ups the players are comfortable with and which are based on sound logic. Changing constantly now is a bad idea - even if you do hit upon a good set-up, it'll take several matches for your team to get used to it and you're likely to see disjointed performances for that time. Go to the tactics forum, get help crafting a solid tactic, stick to it now and hope for the best - but unfortunately with more than half the season gone, no familiarity and probably a huge points deficit, relegation looks like it'll be very hard to avoid.

[WizbaII]

For the last few versions of FM I've always found that a good offence is the best defence. In other words if they score 4 we'll score 5. Hence quite often I'll win the title having scored AND conceded the most amount of goals.

Hmm, something for me to think about as I feel I've tried almost everything as well. The goals that do go in against me, I feel are sometimes not tactical but low morale. I know it's not the players because I bought the best defenders I possibly could. Then I think, what's the point of having a good tactic if low morale is the decider of the match...I'm not going to spend time learning how to motivate artificial players.

[WizbaII]

Also, I don't understand why people always think the problem is that you are trying new tactics. Of course, if the old tactic isn't working, the answer is not to keep using the same old tactic.

[Spurs08]

Also, I don't understand why people always think the problem is that you are trying new tactics. Of course, if the old tactic isn't working, the answer is not to keep using the same old tactic.

Because of the game's "Tactical Familiarity" feature. If you keep chopping and changing, familiarity will be very low and it will probably not work well even if it IS a good tactic that suits your team. What a lot of people seem to do is try a tactic without much thought, start the season with it, go on a bad run (probably cause yeah, it's not very good), then change every 3-5 games with the logic that "one of them has to be the right answer". How it needs to be done is more along the lines of:

1) Before the start of pre-season, create two or three tactics. Consider the abilities of your players, the overall balance of the system, what you're aiming to do with it and how your selections compliment those aims.

2) Try them out in your pre-season friendlies. Against very weak opposition in particular, look closely at the performance - perhaps using the Match Analysis feature - rather than just the results. If you're playing a possession based system, are you keeping the ball sucessfully, are there always short passing options available, are we taking too many risks on the ball?

3) Make minor adjustments as you go through your friendly schedule - these will often just be changing one role or instruction that you feel isn't working out in practice.

4) Start the season with familiarity high and with you already having confidence in the tactics. It's likely nothing will go too badly wrong, especially since you have the option to switch between them and to continue making minor adjustments if you see there's something which the team could be doing better.

5) Don't panic and make an entirely new tactic unless you are doing badly and you are confident it's due to a tactical flaw you've made rather than for instance a motivation or fatigue issue - for instance, maybe you've realised you've tried to set up a possession based style, but you're playing on awful pitches every week against teams constantly trying to hit you on the counter. If this is the case, make a new tactic relatively early on, start training it, but don't use it excessively until it's more familiar - only if you are comfortably winning or if you're losing with not long to go and may as well make a final roll of the dice. Until then, persist with the current system and try as much as possible to mitigate its flaws - whilst recognising that you've made a big error and that it's unlikely to now be a good season whatever you do, and your priority needs to be to consolidate and keep your job to go again next year.

If you're playing in a league with a winter break, this is also a great chance to make a change if you've made a mistake in the first half of the season. Time it wisely - you are far better off spending it preparing a new tactic rather than bringing one out after another couple of bad results straight after it!

[WizbaII]

I'll take your point about waiting for the tactic to become more familiar first. Makes sense.

[HUNT3R]

That's the thing. If there is an issue, fix it. A poor, fully fluid tactic is far worse than a good, half fluid tactic.

[wardy1976]

That could easily be my screen shot. Last season was the runaway goal scorer and best defence. This season with only x2 player changes. I have 90% draws all season!

[Ferni]

Clean sheet's are not for sale.