Do you miss El Enganche? I’m sorry but it won’t come back soon, meanwhile I started to talk about the game in  different ways, you could find me on my FM dedicated twitter account @FM_Old_Skool or on my new  site FOOTBALL MANAGER OLD SKOOL, a gorgeus new place where you could discover my new content for FM12 and the new Football Manager 2013, it deserves a visit, honest.

• Read my new article about proactive tactics in Football Manager
• It’s never too late for a Posh game: a late career waiting for FM 2013

Stay in touch!

Simeon Jackson’s amazing lob, ep.1

Fixtures, ep.1.1

Have a look at this great video.

If you read my last post about team building you should know we’re finally ready to start our Football Manager 12 new journey and develop a tactic, possibly a good one, for Norwich City, the club I’m currently  managing.

After the transfer market this is my squad:

                 27 first team players

This is a very average team with some young promising players, none of them fully developed, as shown by the team comparison screen.

You could see Norwich is a serious relegation candidate, but we’ll try to address that.

I prepared two versions of the same 4-4-2, the first is the attacking one while the second relies more on counterattack, as a rule of thumb the first is the home tactic, the second will be employed on the road, but there will be exceptions, however, from now, we’ll conventionally call them “home” and “away” tactic.

Did you use the tactics creator?

Yes, it’s always the starting point for me, then I like to finely tune my tactic using the old system, manually tweaking the sliders.

I’m not going to  employ the shouts in this Norwich game, basically because utilizing the sliders you overwrite some instructions that make some of them ineffective.

Home and away tactic look the same...

I won’t describe the roles because you see them clearly in the screenshot, I just want to point out that upfront we have a poacher-trequartista partnership as described here.

I changed a bit some roles from default, notably the wingers, I didn’t want them to run too much with the ball or try useless long shots, I prefer to have them involved in my passing game.

Wingers settings

Then I made some changes in the team instructions panel

Home version

Away version

We have more time-wasting and less width for the away tactic, while we’ll try to play a more expansive game at home, I chose to play a short passing game for both versions cause I think it’s a safer option for weaker sides.

The left striker is the classic poacher, fast and with good finishing and composure, I set him as my target man, this way he will receive the ball into  space.

All my four midfielders have been instructed to produce through balls for the attackers.

Target man settings

These will be the tactics for this first season, of course I’m sure they could evolve during this year, a good manager should always be ready to understand and fix what is not working, nonetheless they’re  a good starting point.

Do you want to discover if this tactic could save Norwich from relegation?

You should read my next posts, let’s start the ball rolling!

The begin of my new career with Norwich is a great chance to share some thoughts with you about my tactical building philosophy, I perfectly know there are different ways to play Football Manager, so if you’re an expert manager you probably don’t need my tips, but I like to think there a lot of managers around that would like to know more about my own  approach, that’s why I decided to write these posts.

First of all tactical building and team building are closely related, when you choose a tactic you need the right players to develop your ideas, I usually pick up a tactic, mainly a rough idea of it, then I check the players at my disposal, dividing them in 3 main categories:

1. Keepers
2. Wide players (defensive and offensive)
3. Central players (defensive and offensive)

Look at my Norwich infographic

I sold some players, some of them were not good enough, others simply didn’t suit  my system of play (like Grant Holt, a physically strong but slow target man), remember that I had 3 M to spend for the market but a red bank balance (-700k) so I needed to sell players before I could buy someone.

Red dots on the screenshot show you the players I sold, 8.25 M the total income, some of them spread over 48 months, after these deals the club was financially sound, but my transfer budget didn’t improve that much, the board initially made available only 10% of my  transfer revenue.

If you consider I want to play with a flat 4-4-2 with 2 players per role, you could easily see I was missing some players, at least 9 ( 4 wide men, 5 central), not an easy task considering my budget, but I found some decent players to complete my team.

Some of them came on loan, always a good way to save some money and deeply test your players, of course I didn’t have enough funds to buy any top players, later you’ll understand that the overall value of your team is not the sum of the skills of your players, there’s much more than that, you’re building a football team, not doing maths, it’s vital to have the right attributes in the right place.

Now that I have my men, it’s time to build the tactic, or better, 2 versions of the same tactical framework, want to know more?

You’ll have to read  part two…

…to make it short I just added a google button at the end of every post I wrote, if you like to recommend some content you found here, just select it from the drop-down menu at the end of my posts.

Thanks!

Yes guys, I’m talking about the Canaries, Norwich City Football Club will be my next Football Manager adventure.

After last year unexpected promotion from the Championship, Paul Lambert’s side is having a good season in real life, showing that you can compete in the EPL on a low budget.

This trait matches my philosophy as a football manager quite well, succeeding on a low budget is always enjoyable and rewarding.

In Football Manager 12 they’re really low rated, predicted to be 20th at the start of the season they’re the classic underdog I love to manage.

Quick facts about Norwich City:

• Established: 1902
• Good training facilities
• Stadium: Carrow Road, 27033 all-seater with under soil heating
• Major trophies: 2 Carling cups (1962,1985)
• Transfer budget: 3 M to avoid relegation
• Total player wage budget: 12 M
• Balance: – 700k

Every year the FM community produces some great skins to change and improve SI default Football Manager skin, I just discovered this new one called Farenheit, it’s polished and easy on the eyes, a really appealing dark skin, Download it now and let me know your thoughts.

It’s classy.

Unfortunately my St.Pauli game is finished, I lost that save so I won’t continue my old career, it was good till it lasted.

There will be another save and probably a new tactic, the team?

I’m not going to reveal it now, but I can announce you I’ll be back in the Premiership, stay tuned.