Rashidi

The AI sometimes does a poor job of recognising the number of attacking players in a set piece. I am not sure if the AI is confined to always have X number of players in a wall. I always look for a numerical advantage when taking and defending set pieces. I don’t think the AI does that all the time. If I were to leave set pieces on default then, there might be too many players in the wall. Hopefully when FM25 rolls in we will see more dynamic marking arrangements recognising numbers of players. Having said that we also need to accept the risks of pure zonal set piece marking too as evidenced by this weekends EPL action. United’s defeat was down to a horrific sequence of actions that started with their poor defensive setup during a set piece. The set piece creator isn’t perfect but it favours the human player who takes big risks with easy payoffs. Hopefully it’s a bit more balanced in FM25.

Its actually pretty simple to set up tactics now that have some roles not moving as a result of positional play and others that do. I love using DMs, BWMs a DLP, and a BWM in central midfield. Each roles offers something slightly different without being encumbered with positional play either.

I’ve had friends who’ve seen me play FM and are only interested in the match day experience. Most are put off with the spreadsheet feel that the game has had over the last 20 years and I for one am glad that we have ditched the “Home” screen in favour of a portal where I don’t need to deal with an “inbox” and spend each turn skipping messages and only responding to necessary ones. Personally I’ve wanted a UI that felt like Oracle’s cubes, and with the tile UI interface it seems like we can have a top down approach to drilling for information. And instead of being saddled with detailed information, and having to ascertain what’s necessary and what’s not, we now have a UI that simplifies things. Naturally SI only revealed the design pages so there is plenty more to come, I for one remain guardedly optimistic and will only have a concrete opinion once the game is in my hands. I do have some concerns and these involve immersion. While I understand the need to rework how touchline shouts will be implemented within the overall game flow, I do hope we don’t have to wait till it’s reintroduced in FM26. That by far is the BIGGEST form of immersion in the game for me. I like the sensation of feeling that my shouts matter. Since the current implementation of shouts has always left questions unanswered, I feel that the best way of kicking them back in again is via cutaways. Each time a shout is used, the game could cutaway to the manager gesticulating, this could give developers the change to code the script to recalculate from that moment onwards. It’s also a great way to showcase our eye patches, earrings and watches. I look forward to getting my hands on FM25.

Physical attributes have been king since the days of champman, nothing new there. There have been plenty of examples of people achieving things on FM doing things in a different way. Some choose attacking styles, others decide to follow self imposed rules. However you break things down, the game gives everyone an option on how they want things done.

There isn’t much headroom, he has almost reached 95% of his CA and change now will happen incrementally.

Its Role Suitability and positional familiarity. I wouldnt be too concerned with RF since thats a function of how well distributed his attributes are for the role. You should be more concerned with positional familiarity. They will make mistakes if they are unfamiliar with the position. How well they perform the role is a function of their attributes and the other roles and duties around them

I think if i can get 1-2 per game in exactly the halfspace I am going to be happy, most times i get them closely to the wider channels and this is done with the underlap instruction with focus play. Halfspace crosses inside the penalty area are common in FM

Penalty taking isn’t the only attribute that’s considered for successful conversion. There are other attributes taken into consideration like consistency, pressure, composure.

Basically this set up has no one moving into advanced midfield doing rotations, just wanted to illustrate the way the IW moves on support and attack duty. On support he will be narrower and more creative, on attack he will be narrower and more driven to get into the area. When you use any role that forces a rotation, his positioning might be slightly wider but not as wide as a winger. The video starts with the IW highlighted. Plus I dont understand the reason for wanting him to move into a channel. Width affects how your attacks can play out as well. If you are unsure about what to expect, just play width on normal. IW support and IW Attack.mp4

If you have an IW and you have an SV pushing up and you are telling your team to be narrower in width and he has the sit narrower PI. I will never expect him to beat the FB on the outside, I will almost always expect him to come inside and sometimes even run laterally across the defensive line but in the general direction of the penalty area.

A "rotation" happens when one of the roles impacted by the positional feature gets used. You are using a 4231, with a SV and an IW. The SV triggers a rotation, when the team enters the final third, the SV shifts up the pitch, moving the AP to the right and the IW slightly wider to accommodate that rotation. If you are using an IW in a 4231 without a role in the MC or DM tier that does not trigger a rotation he will not move as wide as one that has a role in MC/DM that rotates into the AMC tier.. An IW by nature of his role will always be standing narrower than a winger, this positioning can be further impacted by the width team instruction and the sit narrower team instruction.

You have IWs and a mezzala. Those are creative roles and you are adding a playmaker to that too. Try it out see what happens and learn from it. Choose the role for the style of play you want and find the player to fit the role. If you want to use him as a AP then give him options to do something with the ball. A wide winger to stretch play or an IF to get behind the defence. Different roles give you different outcomes.

It’s learning a position and having the attributes to play a role. When you train a player in a new position it takes time. Any player can play in any role, how well he does that depends on his attributes. Best option train him in the role, but if he has capped his CA then over time you might see a small redistribution of attributes towards the role that is being trained. I would suggest playing in the role he is most suited to. The CM(A) role is fine if your goal is to make him do third man runs into the box and become a late threat.

If you choose counter then at higher mentalities the team is willing to risk trying to push the ball forward to risk a counter even if it’s a bad idea. So you could get rushed chances. If you choose hold shape the team will try to keep a more cohesive shape allowing it to move the ball in hopes of prying a defence open, this could lead to better goal scoring options if are playing on mid tempo settings as well. If you elect not to use either instruction leaving the option unchecked then the team will exercise its decision making attribute to determine whether it should counter or not. Ultimately the roles and duties you choose and having players with “stop ball” and “dictates tempo” will influence this further. AI generated counters will still happen under any option too. Personally I play it unchecked for most cases and only opt for counter when I am playing a low block.

The AI does try and copy your formation if you become very successful but I don’t see it happening all the time. And if it does copy it won’t be “downloading” your tactic but adopting the themes of the system. What the AI needs to do, and this is where balancing is an issue, is adapt and react to your in game changes. For example, you are always sending 10 players forward for set pieces, then the AI needs to defend with 10 in the area. Tactically though it’s a lot more debatable how much it should adapt. Some managers like Gasperini, never adapt to what other managers do and others like Areta might play 20 formations in one game. Ultimately as a start, what SI need to do next season is improve how the AI deals with defending set pieces. I am sure there are other areas that can be improved, but that would no 1 on my bucket list.