FM14 Yugoslavia Challenge – 2013-14 End of Season Update – Champions?

Hello guys! Welcome to my end of season update in the Yugoslavia challenge where we are currently in charge of FK Bratstvo in the second division of Montegro. So if you want to see what tactic I’m using or the transfers I made, go to yesterday’s post which is here.

League Results

I had to change my FM skin to take the screenshots of the fixtures… long story. That is why the background color will be different in these screenshots than my other ones. How could we do over the season? Could we grab promotion?

The fixtures look good, especially in the first half of the season! We went through a bad spell because we were focused on the Montengrin Cup (hint, hint) and the squad was fatigued. Could it be enough to snatch the playoff positions or win the title?

YES IT COULD!! We end up 6 points clear at the top of the table and heading for the top tier of Montenegro! Now to summarize the best performances! Our home 1-0 victory over Jedinstvo was key, despite the fact that we ended up losing to them 0-1 away. We are very close with them. Kom went down in what has to be one of the worst performances I have ever seen from a team. 8 points and -72 goal difference, holy shit!

Montenegrin Cup

I was not expecting too much from this because it invlolved top tier teams but we ended up over-achieving.

A tough earned victory in the first round which only has one leg played, every round past this has two. Frustrating for Kuc to get sent off because we missed him for a couple league games. 

Arsenal Tivat grabbed a lucky win in the first leg. Could we mount a comeback?

Of course! We taught them a serious lesson at home and qualified for the quarterfinals comfortably.

We smashed Zabjelo, leaving them in a tough position for the second leg. Bakoc put on a great show and bagged a brace.

It was much more difficult away from home and they ended up edging the game, but it didn’t matter because we made it to the semis!

An absolutely brilliant away performance meant that we had pretty much secured our place in the final with a game to play.

Cetinje managed to beat us at home but it wasn’t enough for them. TIME FOR THE FINAL!

In the final we faced Sutjeska, who had just confirmed their second Montenegrin First Division title in a row. We were heavy underdogs but could we cause the upset?

Nope. They were the better team from the very first minute and we couldn’t deal with their deadly attack. We can be proud of the run to the final (which also helped our revenue) but in the end it just wasn’t our day.

Best Performers

Djuretic- The right back thrived throughout the season and was good both at attacking and defending. At age 28, he is in the prime of his career and should stick arounf for a few more years.

Igor Bukilic- Our best striker despite the new signings. He scored 27 goals and got 11 assists in the league which is speaks for itself. He didn’t thrive as much in the cup, but still grabbed one goal.

Sasa Medenica- He was a loanee that was here when I got to the club so we won’t have him next season, a big loss. 21 assists and 16 goals, without him and Bukilic we never would have won the league. Great player!

So that is all for this update, hope you enjoyed it!

FM14 Yugoslavia Challenge – 2013-14 Preseason – Welcome to Montenegro!

Welcome to the first update on my Yugoslavia challenge! If you don’t know what this challenge is, go ahead and read my last blog post here. So I just played through the entire first season and today will update you on preseason, tomorrow will be the end of season and midseason review. Let’s get to it!

I started off unemployed with all of the former Yugoslavia countries selected (I had to download databases for some of the countries). There were plenty of vacancies at jobs and I applied for most of them. This is the club I will have my first job at: 

FK Bratstvo, a club in the second division of Montenegro. There is no point in showing the club background because they have not won anything. Here are their facilities:

It isn’t too bad for a Semi- Professional club I guess. We will rarely fill up our stadium but maybe if we get promotion that will change. The pitch is also in a good condition which is nice to see. 

Transfers

Now that we’ve got the boring stuff over with, let’s move into transfers!

So I sold two and bought four. The players that left were useless and just taking up the wage bill, so when clubs offered free with a 25% future fee if they sell them I accepted it. I feel like I made four very good free transfers, here are the players:

Luka Bakoc (Striker)- This guy looks like an excellent striker considering the league that we are in. He is technically gifted and has a bit of pace. Hopefully his finishing will improve over time. At age 21, he could become a very valuable player to the club.

 

Bojan Drincic (Center Back)- Another young player here. Our squad seriously lacked good defenders and Drincic not only added more depth but also is a great future talent for the club. He has the stats needed to be a good center back and I have big plans for him.

 

Ivan Mirkovic (Center Mid)- Not much to say here. He brings some experience to the team and is a good passer of the ball. 

 

Ferid Idrizovic (Striker)- What a player! Keep in mind I took this screenshot at the end of the season so when I signed him he was 30. Very experienced and technically gifted, also capable of finding the back of the net. 

 

Tactics 

 

I created this tactic hoping for free flowing and attacking football, and you will see it ends up working. It is pretty solid defensively and the attack is potent with the SS and CF bagging most of the goals. My hope is to win the ball back in the middle and then give it to our CWBs of striker. 

 

Preseason

We had a productive preseason, winning all of our games and only conceding two goals. Hopefully we can carry that form into the regular season and get off to a good start, things look promising.

 

Overall Objectives

My objectives at FK Bratstvo are to get promotion this season and then eventually win the Montenegrin first season. Obviously if there is a good job oppurtunity that I can’t resist I might leave earleir than I thought.

Thanks for reading!

 

Football Manager 2014 – Yugoslavia Challenge – Introduction

Welcome, welcome, welcome. I’ve been craving a challenge like this for a while and I’m hoping it will be an enjoyable save. The Yugoslavia challenge is one that you don’t see tons of people doing but is is a very fun one.

The Rules

Above are the countries of former Yugoslavia, obviously before the divide. These will be the countries that this save will consist of me playing in. To avoid any confusion, I will list them:

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Croatia

Macedonia

Montenegro

Serbia

Slovenia

The ones that are originally playable in the game are Croatia, Slovenia, and Serbia so I had to download the others in a custom database, so fingers crossed there won’t be any glitches.

So you will start unemployed and have a sunday league rep with ONLY the former Yugoslavia countries selected. The goal from there is to win the Champions League with a team full of Yugoslavian players. So my objective is to build a reputation and eventually move to one of the better clubs in these countries and build a Champions League winning team. Should be a good challenge!

Update Schedule

I will update you every preseason, January, and end of season on this save. Hope you are as excited as I am, thanks for reading!

Football Manager 2015: My Wishlist

Introduction

Now FM15 is still a long way off, but I want to get this lost out early just in case it sparks some ideas within the community which could actually have an effect on the game if SI has enough time to add stuff. This isn’t in any order and involves both small stuff and big stuff. Hope that you enjoy!

Improved Match Engine

Let’s start with something we can all agree on. Despite our love for the game, the overall match engine still needs work to cut out the glitches. Now some people dub the game as “unplayable” and the match engine as “broken” which in my opinion is a bit harsh on SI. I think the graphics need to be improved, the ball physics need to improve, and the keepers need to improve. After that things will be looking better. 

 

Advanced Team Dynamics Info

I still don’t think we get enough information from our little “info” tab on each player. I would love to have a team morale screen where the players are ranked by popularity and each player has a description (about as in-depth as a players bio) talking about their overall popularity along with good and bad relationships. Examples:

“Steven Gerrard is a very popular player in the dressing room and held in high regard. He holds great friendships with fellow countryman Daniel Sturridge and Jordan Henderson. Colin Pascoe (assistant manager) beleives that Steven Gerrard currently doesn’t cause any disruptions within the team and doesn’t need any help with being accepted in the squad.”

“Mario Balotelli is an unpopular player in the dressing room who frustrates other members of the team. He holds good friendships with Adil Rami, although he clearly dislikes Kaka, Montolivio, El Sharaway, and Sully Muntari. Flori Valerio (assistant manager) beleives that Balotelli constantly disrupts the team during training and matches and needs to be talked to about improving his behaviour.”

(These are just examples and I have no idea whether Balotelli likes Kaka.)

These are all things real managers would know from training so I think it would be very nice to have, along with more in depth private chats about players behaviour.

 

Touchline Shouting In-Game

This is something that always annoys me. During a highlight I should be able to say to my full back “drop a little deeper” instead of watching him get skinned by the opposition winger. During highlights you should be able to yell at your team to get them organized. Feel the ref made a bad call? You should be able to yell at him, even if it results in being sent to the stands in severe cases. These are all things that real managers do.

 

More Requests Before Joining a Club

You could demand the club signs a certain player if they want you as a new manager and give them an exact transfer budget that you need instead of just saying “slightly larger” or “much lower”. You could also meet the team captain and if he likes you than you have a better chance at getting the job.

 

In Depth Team Talks

There is a gaping hole in the current team talks, I like praising or criticizing players but there should also be an advice tab for more in depth things such as:

“Ronaldo is causing us serious problems, someone needs to step up and start dealing with it.”

“Try to pass on the ground more because the wind keeps messing up our long balls.” 

“[Speaking to player] Torres, unlucky miss on the 19th minute, don’t be too hard on yourself.”

Now you could say the Ronaldo one can be solved in team instructions but this will actually get the players motivated to stop him, not just “tight marking” or “tackle hard”. I think this would make team talks much more authentic.

 

More Managerial Interaction

I would like to do things such as inviting opposition managers for a bottle of wine, or call them and tell them that their team is a disgrace. Just examples, but you should get the idea. This will make managerial relationships more interesting.

 

FM Challenges on Full Game

I can’t stand how the challenges are only on classic mode! I would like it better if we could play a challenge using the full game and all of it’s complexity. It would make things more interesting and not just a plug and play.

 

That is all I have for now, leave your wishlist in the comments. Thanks for reading!

 

 

Football Manager 2014 – Role Analysis – Inside Forward

Introduction

Here we go, it is my first tactical post. Today I will be analysing the role of Inside Forward, tell you the best ways to make it effective and which kinds of players to utilise it with.

Inside Forwards are becoming a bigger and bigger part of modern football, and now you see many great players in real life such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Eden Hazard, and Gareth Bale thriving with that kind of role. Although those players are described as wingers, their job is very different from more of a traditional player down the flanks such as Di Maria. For example if Di Maria was played down the right he would probably put a cross into the area looking for Benzema/ Morata/ Jese whereas Bale or Ronaldo would cut in and smash an effort at goal. Both roles have up sides and down sides, it is up to you to decide which one will make your team be deadly in front of goal.

Important Attributes to Have 

There is a number of extremely important attributes that an inside forward needs to be able to perform well. I am not going to say exact numbers that attributes must be above because even if 11 dribbling isn’t great for a top league if you are in the Conference North/ South it is excellent.

Pace/ Acceleration: This is absolutely vital for any player down the flanks no matter what role they play. Players who lack this will get bullied by opposition full backs and not be able to cut in quickly enough to get a shot on net.

Dribbling: This one is a bit self explanatory. Your inside forwards will often leave you frustrated if they can’t dribble past your opponent. Many attacks could go to waste this way.

Finishing: The thing that seperates good wingers and world class wingers is their ability to find the back of the net. After they’ve nut-megged the full back, cut inside, and dummied past the center back they still need to put the ball past the keeper.

Long Shots: Against organized and compact teams who drop deep, you will need to have another way of scoring and long shots is certainly one of them. Last year this was key for Gareth Bale when Spurs were struggling to break down West Ham, Southampton, West Brom, and many other small sides.

First Touch: The importance of first touch is often underestimated by many FM players. This attribute is a neccesity for any inside forward.  Without a good first touch, a player will often fail to keep the ball from going out for a throw in, not control long passes, or lose the ball in tight areas.

Cristiano Ronaldo is an example of the perfect Inside Forward.

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The Pros of Inside Forwards

There is lots of positives to using inside forwards in your tactic. First of all, they can expose a slow defence so badly that it will look like a cricket scoreline. Inside forwards can completely stretch a defence and ruin the team’s match plan. They do this by drawing opposition full backs in and creating space for your teams wing backs to get down the flank. This may lead the opposition to either have their center back come out and leaving the middle exposed or having their wide midfielders track back which takes away their attacking threat. Inside forwards although are mostly selfish, but can still get assists from occasional crosses or quick passes in the box. Another huge plus is the fact that they are excellent helping out with build up play. When your team isn’t connecting passes you can get them to drop back and support your midfielders. I will now show some examples of these things in-game using Ronaldo and Bale.

These are the specific instructions I put on Ronaldo and Bale. They are not neccesary but I would reccomend them if you want to really utilise your inside forwards.

Here we see Ronaldo, who was more out wide before, sprint to support Coentrao when he didn’t have any options other than passing back. Not a huge moment but shows that IFs are great for build up play.

Ronaldo again checks in to get the ball out wide…

Cuts in very slightly, you can see Benzema making a great run…

Ronaldo ends up playing a great over the top ball to Benzema, who can’t finish off the chance.

When Bale gets the ball here, 2 players (11 and 10) close him down leaving Carvajal open on the wing.

Carvajal receives the ball with a decent amount of space, which he uses to cross the ball to Benzema who again misses.

Here I just want to show the usefull positioning of both Bale and Ronaldo. When either of them picks up the ball they have plenty of  space to cut in or to accelerate at full speed out wide.

This was a but of a quiet game for our 2 IFs but they still proved to be dangerous assets in certain situations.

The Cons of Inside Forwards

The biggest con of using IFs is the lack of service to your striker. Big target men who like aerial battles will go to waste because they don’t get any crosses to them and usually the only way poachers can score is by doing the work on their own or off of rebouds from the IF’s shots. When you are coming up against pacey and strong defences who drop deep you may also have some problems breaking them down and a couple big players in the box would be much more useful. Another problem I’ve had is that they don’t track back enough leavig my flanks exposed.

Hazard, an Inside Forward, didn’t track back enough against Atletico Madrid and his team suffered. This can also happen in Football Manager.

Formations for Inside Forwards

This one is a defensive 4-3-3 that relys on IFs do to a lot of the creating and goalscoring. If they can do that then you will be able to grind out victories but if they can’t it can mean lots of 1-0 losses or 0-0 draws.

This 4-2-3-1 I’ve used to great success with both Chelsea and Roma. The IFs have much more help on the attack and it gives you some very free flowing beautiful football.

Yep, you heard me, strikerless! Just tested a couple of these formations out last night to great success and this one has an IF to help sharpen your attack. Credit has to go to @MerryGuido for this one (you can check out his blog for more of these: http://strikerless.wordpress.com).

Other formations can be attacking 4-4-2s (more like a 4-2-2-1-1) or 3 at the back formations with wingers.

Hopefully you’ve found this a good read or even are inspired to try something new with inside forwards. You can follow me on Twitter @thekillerpassfm for updates on new posts or make a Word Press account and follow my blog that way. Thanks for Reading!

Welcome to The Killer Pass!

Hello there! This is my very first post on The Killer Pass, the blog that I have just created. So I am just like you: a FM addict who simply loves to play the game for hours and hours. In FM14 I have had two major saves. The first was with Real Socidad that lasted arounf ten years and I managed to win everything. The second is the save I’m playing now in 2026 with Roma. I started at Eastleigh from the Skrill South and brought them all the way to the Premier League but after a few years in the BPL I got bored and resigned from the job. Now I am aiming to dominate the world with Roma.

So yes, I will show you guys stuff from that save throughout my articles, as it has been extremely enjoyable. Along with that, I will give you help on tactics, players to buy, or pretty much anything you want. I am not claiming to be a master at the game, I just enjoy helping people out on their own FM adventures. Posting around 2-3 times per week is my objective, but there will be no exact schedule. I just hope my writing is enjoyable so any feedback is appreciated. Other than that, thanks for reading!

PS. Usually posts will be much longer than this when I am writing about tactics.

My Twitter: https://twitter.com/thekillerpassfm