MWoolf

Repeating again that you think he needs to be carried defensively doesn't make it more accurate. Let me give you an easy-to-find example of excellent defensive play by Kane, so we're not just talking generalities: Take a look at a highlight reel from Bayern's 1st leg UCL game against Arsenal this year. Bayern's first goal happened because Kane put Gabriel under intense pressure as Arsenal was trying to recycle the ball, forcing a bad pass and a turnover.

You sound like you are basing your assessment of Kane's capabilities mainly on the tactical nightmare that Southgate threw on the field this month. I'm not from England, so the team's collapse in the Euros may not be colouring by views in quite the same way. In my estimation, as someone who has seen quite a number of Kane's regular season games over the years, the Euros are a bad source of data on him as a player Also, I'm confused. Is your position that all of these strikers are luxury players because the tend to hang high instead of contributing defensively? Or are you saying that providing a high counter-attack outlet during transition transforms a player into not a luxury player? Kane is a top scorer despite not staying high and just looking to get in on the end of plays. And he's a good creator as well. And I've seen plenty of regular-season games where Kane presses just fine, and not only against bottom-dwelling teams. Perhaps we will need to agree to disagree

Let's look at a few other strong forwards for comparison, rather than isolating Kane. Here's Vinicius Juníor: Here's Erling Haaland: Here's Dusăn Vlahović: Here's Artem Dobvyk: The key think to note is these players all play on teams that have a LOT of the ball. That causes their comparative percentages against the general population of forwards to look quite low. We would need to possession-adjust all of them for the comparatives to be accurate. In this company: Kane 's Aerials Won are on the low end, but not catastrophically so. His interceptions are by far the best of the bunch. And overall, he looks just fine in terms of defensive stats as a top goalscoring threat at a top team.

I would say that's a little harsh. He is reasonable defensively--although certainly not in the top third of forwards for defensive performance. He can trigger the press effectively, is fairly tenacious one-on-one, and rarely gets skinned. He tracks back well, and seems to (usually) choose his tackes intelligently. In terms of leading the line, he is outstanding at creating space and fashioning chances for himself and others. He passes quite well in the final third. Kane is a big part of why why Sane's goal contributions per 90 went way up this year. Sane scored the same number of goals as last year, but played in 5 fewer games. Definitely not a luxury player who just poaches. The Euros were weird. The whole England side looked uninspired on both sides of the ball, but especially when (failing at) pressing. They looked like they needed a vacation rather than a tournament. England pressed very effectively with Kane up top during qualifiers, so it's not that he or the rest of them are incapable of getting the job done.

Hardly. He got a hat trick against Dortmund in Der Klassiker this year, and had a NP-xG of 0.88 per 90' in the Bundesliga, along with 0.21 xA. He may not be your favorite player, but those are world class stats. In his whole career in Bundesliga, Lewandowski only had one season better than that. Kane scored 3 non-penalty goals against Galatasaray and 2 against Lazio in the UCL, and also provided 4 assists in the UCL campaign. In 2022, he was the sole goal in Tottenham's win over City. And it wasn't a penalty. He certainly seems to struggle in finals, but he's neither a stat padder nor massively overrated.

You mean in the final? One match is hardly a fair measuring stick, especially given the fact that England was under pressure the whole game. Both teams may have played 7 games, but Williams only played 6. Saka played all 7, but was played all over the pitch by a tactically.....eccentric Gareth Southgate. Looking at the full 2023/24 season stats for both Saka and Williams on fbref, Saka was very comfortably the better player. How much of that is due to player ability and how much is the surrounding team and tactical choices would be a fascinating question to explore.

International tournaments are a notoriously bad source of information on how a player will perform in actual league play. Lots of flops have been signed on the strength of a good world cup. I'm not saying anything about the relative merits of Nico Williams and Bukayo Saka, or whether SI got either of them right. I'm just saying that it would take a lot of watching regular season Athletic and Arsenal games to come up with a fair judgement of them.

I am very unclear how they intend to harmonize reputation between men's football and women's football. Is winning with Chelsea Women more or less prestigious than achieving mid-table finishes with MK Dons?

Serie A isn't "elite level?" Or do you mean his managerial performances have been mediocre? That second statement is certainly true. He's been pretty mediocre for longer than 5 years, IMO. Mourinho hadn't managed outside of Spain, England or Italy in 20 years. So, no, 12 months ago I would not have imagined that he was going to swallow his pride and accept an appointment in a second-tier league.

All kinds of people end up managing all kinds of weird places in a FM save of sufficient length. Whether those appointments are 'realistic' is very much a matter of opinion, not a matter of fact. Reality is a weird place sometimes. If you'd asked me 12 months ago, I'd have said Mourinho at Fenerbahçe was 100% never going to happen. Yet here we are Likewise, the real-life appointment of the first women's team manager to manage a men's team in one of the top leagues will be unthinkable...right up until it actually happens. As long as the money imbalance keeps manager salaries relatively low at women's teams, the reverse won't hapen. It really is the economics that will stop it, though, not the reputation. Benitez managing in China didn't happen for all the prestigious silverware on offer.

In re Shouts: My guess would be that SI data shows that many players are using shouts instead of adjusting tactics and changing OIs when the match is going poorly. Removing shouts forces players to focus on the big levers that affect match outcome, rather than repeatedly pushing buttons that only affect the fine tuning. And that seems like a good thing. The problem is, shouts are fairly easy to understand, while tactical adjustments are much harder to understand. The change probably needs to be coupled with some more extensive support for new players in learning how and why to adjust tactics and OIs when things are going wrong.

If you've been playing the game since CM days, then you know that PA is only a guess about how the future might go, not a statement about present quality. It's a numeric way of saying 'we are excited about what this player could become.' The game is saying that Saka could possibly develop into an elite talent given the right opportunities and coaching, but is unlikely to ever be good enough to regularly contend for the Ballon d'Or. Can you point to any specific evidence which would help us understand why you think that SI's scouting team got that guess wrong?

Why is it important to people that real teams win real silverware? Adults rage when their real-life favorite team chokes at the end of the season, too. Why? Sports and games arouse different levels of passion in different people. That doesn't mean there is something wrong with the people who are more passionate about games. You have a very strong idea of how you would like FM to be, and that is great! But you are very dismissive of--and borderline insulting to--people who want a different game experience than you want. And that is not so good.

I completely agree that a game without challenge is boring, and people stop playing. And I think your summation of the "player's journey" of FM is right on the money. What you are describing is still not a faithful simulation of reality though. It's a game with exploitability, but where the ways to exploit adapt over time to keep the player engaged and learning. Having a robust debate over how to keep the game interesting for seasoned players makes sense to me. Demanding that the game faithfully simulate reality instead of being a game, with game-like mechanics and exploitabilities, does not make sense to me. (I realize this is not what you are arguing, but some definitely have).

If you want to see average teams with average budgets and average managers have mid-table or worse finishes every year, you can just turn on the TV or read the paper. No need to spend money on a video game. Every adult is used to not winning most of the time. It's called *real life*, and we get plenty of it day in and day out. The average gamer plays games to escape the disappointing outcomes in reality, not to have those outcomes happen again and again, but this time feel responsible because they were in charge.

I agree 100%. And to follow the thought: This is ultimately a game first and a simulation second, and Zealand's video shows up the fracture between those two goals for SI. I don't think that is a bug or a sign that the game is "broken." Making a game that allows average-skill players to win the Prem means making a game that is exploitable. It has to be that way. So....I would file this under: "Be careful what you wish for." If SI "fixes" the game so that City and Arsenal reliably crush teams like this, it's not going to be much fun for the average player to play FM. Goodbye "Park to Prem" and "Road to Glory."

I can stretch it back to 01/02, but not further: 21/22: Tring Athletic 3-0 Flackwell Heath 20/21: Not competed 19/20: Abandoned at semifinal 18/19: Biggleswade FC 2 - 0 Baldock Town 17/18: Welwyn Garden City 1 - 3 Harpenden Town 16/17: Hoddesdon Town 1 - 0 Wembley 15/16: Welwyn Garden City 0 - 1 Hoddesdon Town 14/15: Berkhamsted 1 - 1 Colney Heath (5-3 penalties) 13/14: Berkhamsted 2 - 2 Ampthill Town (4-5 penalties) 12/13: Aylesbury United 3 - 2 Hadley 11/12: St Margaretsbury 0 - 2 Royston Town 10/11: Colney Heath 2 - 0 Leverstock Green 09/10: Hanwell Town 1 - 2 Aylesbury 08/09: St Margaretsbury 0 - 2 Tring Athletic 07/08: Oxhey Jets 1 - 2 Edgware Town 06/07: Oxhey Jets 0 - 1 Edgware Town 05/06: Oxford City 1 - 0 Leverstock Green 04/05: Harefield United 1 - 2 Potters Bar Town 03/04: Harefield United 1 - 0 Brook House 02/03: Hanwell Town 2 - 0 Harefield United 01/02: Potters Bar Town 0 - 2 St Margaretsbury ETA: best source for early detailed data is here: football.mitoo, but they only go back to 01/02 on cup results.

Presuming you want the CCL's "PREMIER CHALLENGE CUP", here are the extracted data from the website for each of the final matches: Website: Combined Counties League Archive (ccleague.co.uk) Final match result: 21/22: Southall 1-2 Walton & Hersham 20/21: Ascot United 0-0 Redhill (Redhill won 4-2 on pens) 19/20: Does not look like it was completed. The season was abandoned on 26 March 2020. 18/19: CB Hounslow 0-1 Sutton Common Rovers 17/18: Knaphill 3-2 Worcester Park 16/17: Epsom & Ewell 1-4 Westfield 15/16: Camberley Town 1-3 Farnham Town 14/15: Camberley Town 2-1 Colliers Wood Utd 13/14: Hanworth Villa 1-0 Spelthorne Sports 12/13: South Park 0-3 Epsom & Ewell 11/12: Colliers Wood United 0-2 Guernsey 10/11: Sandhurst Town 1-0 Wembley 09/10: Bedfont 0-2 Cove 08/09: Camberley Town 3-0 Worcester Park 07/08: Bedfont Green 2-4 Merstham 06/07: Merstham 4-1 North Greenford United 05/06: Godalming Town 4-0 Merstham 04/05: Merstham 3-0 AFC Guildford 03/04: Nth Greenford Utd 1-4 AFC Wimbledon 02/03: Ash United 0-1 Withdean 2000 01/02: Bedfont 2-3 Cobham

@Michael Sant The file is "Martin Woolf - Romero Unhappy 27 Sept.fm" It's a scosh more than a month earlier than the last, but he's already unhappy. If you need further back, I believe I can find an earlier save.

I'm pretty sure I do. I'll check, and upload it when I get home. I can also try to find a save from around the time when Romero first gets unhappy with his playing time if that would help.

@Neil Brock Neal, Last month, in the bug tracker forum, you said: "On this front, the way our in-game stats are recorded aren't always in line with how real life are recorded, which yes admittedly isn't ideal. But does mean that direct comparisons between the game and RL in some areas isn't really viable." Given this, how are we supposed to interpret the in-game stats? I have found no descrptions or explanations of them in the online manuals, and most are very tersely tool-tipped or not tool-tipped at all in-game. It feels as if SI expects us to interpret them like the real-life stats they are named for. But if they aren't recorded the same way and they aren't directly comparable, then they don't really mean the same thing. Would it be possible to explain what the stats actually mean/how they are recorded, so we players know how to interpret them? Thanks, Martin

I have another instance of broken playing time expectations, in case you need another case to look at. I have a player who was promised regular starter, is getting regular starter, and is complaining. It would be super helpful if either this gets fixed, or if I could have an interaction option that says "You're already getting regular first team playing time. What are you whining about?" File uploaded to the cloud with the name "Martin Woolf - Tottenham Romero Unhappy.fm"