Football Manager 2018

[OctoberRaven]

Speaking of crazy challenges, my next game will be with a team in the bottom division of a random country, with a formation based solely on the best fit for each of my starting XI regardless of how much it makes any kind of tactical sense, and with all team talks and press conferences done based on the results of a random number generator.

Also my team will all have nicknames taken from Ultimate Muscle characters.

[The Lusophone]

Using the league megapack data I linked a while back, I've started a game in the Ivory Coast, as manager of the amusingly named AESC Mimosas. This is the team that produced the Toure brothers, Eboue and a host of other Ivory Coast players.

[Benji]

10 hours ago, MadJack said:

AESC Mimosas

What a sparkly and zesty name.

[OctoberRaven]

so closing out the season narrowly keeping on top of the table.

go 1-0 in the first half against the #2 team

opt for a defensive formation

aaaaand they get three past us in the last five minutes.

my reaction:

 

[Hobo]

On 1/14/2018 at 19:49, Hobo said:

So, this happened

The second leg was a 2-2 draw.

I played a second string team too

[Benji]

Anyone know if an update to include Serie D is available for FM18 yet? I want to give the San Marino challenge a shot.

[The Lusophone]

5 minutes ago, Benji said:

Anyone know if an update to include Serie D is available for FM18 yet? I want to give the San Marino challenge a shot.

https://sortitoutsi.net/downloads/view/37730/italian-serie-d-for-fm18-by-elcobra

[Benji]

Awesome, thanks.

[Hobo]

Mad Jack booking benji up with the D

[Bigal]

Hartlepool update - we're up to the Championship after finishing 2nd. Special shout-out to Aaron Lennon, who ended up being a great signing.

[Benji]

Does anyone have a link to a resource advising what tactics to use with what attributes? I'm trying to get out of the habit of downloading and tweaking tactics to fill what I think are gaps and actually creating tactics for myself.

[MDK]

17 minutes ago, Benji said:

Does anyone have a link to a resource advising what tactics to use with what attributes? I'm trying to get out of the habit of downloading and tweaking tactics to fill what I think are gaps and actually creating tactics for myself.

There was a comprehensive guide on sortitoutsi or somewhere like that but that was for an older one. I dunno how much the engine has changed and if the same tactics work. I've noticed that I can get a tune out of a 3 man defence with Orient but never been able to in others.

Alternatively, buy this book. One of the best I've read, very interesting in a very nerdy way.  

[FLiam]

Just finished up my second season with AC Milan and my main thoughts on managing in Serie A is "fuck Juventus". 

Last season they won the league with 102 points, this season they were much worse, only picking up 95. I finished with 12 more points than last year, but still nowhere close on 78 in 2nd. 

Made the Champion's League quarter finals, knocking out Man City 2-1 on aggregate in the First KO round, including a 1-0 win at the Etihad that I was happy with. Then I drew Real Madrid in the quarter final, went 3-0 down in the first leg at home before pulling 2 goals back in the 63rd and 81st minute before receiving a penalty on 86 minutes. Ricardo Rodriguez stepped up and it was saved and then Asensio made it 2-4 in stoppage time. I was subsequently hammered 3-0 at the Bernabeu. 

Money in Serie A is tight, Juventus seem to be the only team that can splash any cash. I currently have a negative £20m cash balance and this is before the club spends £18m on a pre-arranged transfer of Franck Kessie. 

Suso is an absolute machine for me, scoring 26 goals and assisting 16 from the right-wing. Obviously all the big teams are after him, I could cash in but think it will be suicidal at this point. More likely to try and bring in some cash for André Silva as I have Kalinic and Cutrone who score their fair share of goals too.

Due to a surprising lack of funds, this was my transfer activity last summer:

In: Borini (£5.25m, pre-arranged), Kalinic (£17.75m, pre-arranged), Stefano Sturaro (£6.25m), Kwadwo Asamoah (free), Jonathan Biabany (free), Andreas Pereira (loan), Axel Tuanzebe (free), Davide Zappacosta (loan), Harry Winks (loan).

Pereira was a bit of a revelation on the left flank, annoyingly I missed out on signing him on a free to Espanyol. Zappacosta was very solid at right back and made an attempt to sign him permanently but Chelsea wanted £195m for him so I told them to fuck off.

My transfer activity this summer will probably be made up of loans unless I can raise some money from player sales.

[Benji]

I really can't get on with the scouting and player search system this year. It's not that it's bad, it just feels like a massive change that I'm not used to. Doesn't mean it couldn't do with a little bit of streamlining tho on the search function.

[Bigal]

One thing I hate is the way assignments are set up. It used to be that I could leave it to the Chief Scout to sort, but I could add assignments when I felt like it. Now I have to change the responsibility for setting assignments back to me before I can add any. It just feels needlessly cumbersome.

Also, my Hartlepool team are currently 2 points inside the relegation zone of the Championship with 10 games to go. We've been on a couple of terrible runs, so I honestly don't know if we'll get out of it. Defence is the problem, and has been with every team I've managed in FM18 - my teams tend to score plenty of goals, but concede far too many. Any tips for tightening up defensively?

[Gazz]

Scouting in this version is really poor and counter-intinuative. Examples are I ask a short-term focus to find a backup goalkeeper, under 24 and English homegrown and I get recommendations for 30+ year old French and German players or one of my scouts who is scouting England and on a Saturday with a full league program, he's watching Boreham Wood U23s who don't have any real players.

[Hobo]

Went to second place Waterford Utd's home ground two days before a Champions League game against Monaco. T

I rested pretty much the entire first team. Tyler Roberts and Clinton N'Jie our top scorers were not playing (They've got like 40 goals combined for the season). We were 5 points ahead with 4 games in hand. It almost backfired when Waterford took the lead. We equalized. They took the lead again. We equalized.

Then Paddy Madden, in the 90th-minute, scores a winner for us! Parkvilla go  8 points clear with 4 games in hand!

Tempted to just play the reserves now for the rest of the season and see if we can avoid getting spanked in the CL. We got a group of death. Dynamo Kiev, Monaco and Broussia Dortmund. Already lost 3-0 in Kiev.

 

[Baddar]

38 minutes ago, Gazz said:

Scouting in this version is really poor and counter-intinuative. Examples are I ask a short-term focus to find a backup goalkeeper, under 24 and English homegrown and I get recommendations for 30+ year old French and German players or one of my scouts who is scouting England and on a Saturday with a full league program, he's watching Boreham Wood U23s who don't have any real players.

Yeah, but just wait and see what they do to the scouting next year!

[Lineker]

@Gazz @Colly

[The Lusophone]

On 22/01/2018 at 16:04, Baddar said:

Yeah, but just wait and see what they do to the scouting next year!

Is this sarcasm? Surely year on year improvement in yearly released games is a good thing...