Football Manager 2020 & FM Touch

[Orikoru]

Now Jadon Sancho's turning me down, didn't even want to consider a contract offer. I thought money could buy you everything? Tough gig managing City

It's not though is it? Haha. I half fancied taking over Dortmund to take on Bayern with Sancho and Haaland there, but I figure if you finish any lower than 2nd you're getting the sack.

 

[Dan2501]

It's not though is it? Haha. I half fancied taking over Dortmund to take on Bayern with Sancho and Haaland there, but I figure if you finish any lower than 2nd you're getting the sack.

You could just manage them well, win the league and not get sacked

 

[Dan2501]

Transfer window done (I think - still a few days left) and this is the starting XI. Net spend £31m. Sold an absolute ton of under-23 players for a load of money and then Otamendi, Gundogan, Stones and Jesus have also left. Squad looking insane. Randomly decided to buy Umtiti so have Umtiti, Laporte, Dias and Omeragic at CB

Liverpool in the Community Shield up first - lost our last 2 games against them, so this should be a good test as to how much we've improved the squad.

 

[Beezerk]

Has anyone won the league yet?

 

[Orikoru]

You could just manage them well, win the league and not get sacked

Don't be silly, this game has only allowed me to succeed with one club, and weirdly that club is Norwich.

 

[Dan2501]

Started another new save Started up as Brentford last night. Really talented young squad and not managed a full season in the English lower leagues this year so thought I'd look to get Brentford promoted and go from there. The first-team looks pretty strong in all honesty, and with just £5m to spend I decided to bring in a couple of players for the future instead of trying to improve the first team. I got in early and managed to pick up Amad Traore and Nicolo Armini on compensation only deals. Traore set me back £825k and Armini £750k, so just over £1.5m spent and we've gained two excellent young players. Armini's an 18 year old CB who has decent starting attributes and a lot of potential and Traore is a 16 year old right winger with pace, agility, dribbling, technique, and with high determination should improve pretty quickly.

That's about all we've done so far apart from bringing in a few new coaches, a new physio and a new HOYD to bolster our staff. Early signs look promising in pre-season, only narrowly lost to Zenit in our first game before winning our next two pre-season games 5-0 and 6-0. Excited to see how Benrahma and Watkins do, Benrahma looks excellent. Rico Henry is a guy I've had in previous FMs as well and always develops into a decent LB, so some decent potential in this squad for sure!

 

[Wolf]

Has anyone won the league yet?

Nope... Well not those of us using touch it seems, best I've done is 2nd in the Spanish league with Valladolid. Yet give me a big team to manage and the game craps itself ?..

I won the Championship with Southampton does that count as winning the league though, or do say Premier league only ?

 

[Dan2501]

Has anyone won the league yet?

I've won a few (but as Wolf says, not on Touch). Won the league in England, France, Germany and Spain in one save in 5 seasons as well as a Champions League, Europa League and a Euros as England, won the league as City 1st season, won 2 Eredivisies in 2 seasons. Doing alright in this years' game.

 

[TheDiablo]

Has anyone won the league yet?

I’m on Touch version and won a fair bit. Below is my Spurs save where I took them over when they came 6th after a few seasons after getting Fulham promoted and Leicester from 14th to 7th in a year

Also running a Colchester game, promoted both seasons with a record point total so in Champ now. Haven’t played for a few weeks, might give it a go this weekend - just think we’re going to get pumped!

Not really sure what all the fuss is about tbh ??

 

[Dan2501]

608 appearances for Camavinga Tidy save that. I've never been able to do mammoth saves that get that far, I just get bored once I win the major trophies. I did 7 seasons as Everton on last years game and got bored once we'd won the League and Champions League.

 

[Orikoru]

I’m on Touch version and won a fair bit. Below is my Spurs save where I took them over when they came 6th after a few seasons after getting Fulham promoted and Leicester from 14th to 7th in a year

Also running a Colchester game, promoted both seasons with a record point total so in Champ now. Haven’t played for a few weeks, might give it a go this weekend - just think we’re going to get pumped!

Not really sure what all the fuss is about tbh ??

*removed pic*

What sort of tactics are you using? Got any screenshots etc?

My third season as Norwich, we're firmly established in mid-table and pushing for Europa places at the minute. We're in 8th at the start of December. I made a couple of tweaks to my player roles which seem to have worked straight away on the short-term evidence. Jude Bellingham was ticking along as an AP(S), I changed it simply to AP(A) and he suddenly clocked a 9.0 performance with a stunning goal and an assist! Donyell Malen up front too had never scored that many goals for me, he had about 5 from 40 appearances (quite a few of them left wing as well but still) - I changed the striker from DLF(A) to AF(A) and he bagged a hat-trick!

 

[TheDiablo]

608 appearances for Camavinga Tidy save that. I've never been able to do mammoth saves that get that far, I just get bored once I win the major trophies. I did 7 seasons as Everton on last years game and got bored once we'd won the League and Champions League.

I was lucky they had him when I joined! Signed Kimmich and Havertz and built the team with those 3 plus Kane

I'm the opposite to you, I struggle starting new saves as just go looking for same players etc. That's why I tried something completely different with Colchester.

Tend to get bored every few seasons, give it a break then come back

 

[Orikoru]

608 appearances for Camavinga Tidy save that. I've never been able to do mammoth saves that get that far, I just get bored once I win the major trophies. I did 7 seasons as Everton on last years game and got bored once we'd won the League and Champions League.

I'm the same on all the manager games through the years. Once you've won a few things it feels like you've completed the save and it's time for a new one. Luckily it looks like I'll never win anything in this game.

 

[Dan2501]

I was lucky they had him when I joined! Signed Kimmich and Havertz and built the team with those 3 plus Kane

I'm the opposite to you, I struggle starting new saves as just go looking for same players etc. That's why I tried something completely different with Colchester.

Tend to get bored every few seasons, give it a break then come back

Fair enough, I guess that's what makes the game so great, you can play it in so many different ways and play all sorts of different saves. One of my mates is like you, loves a long save, he's in 2057 or something in FM19 as Arsenal and is so invested in the save he's stuck with it instead of moving to FM20 whereas I've played 4 different saves this week

 

[TheDiablo]

What sort of tactics are you using? Got any screenshots etc?

My third season as Norwich, we're firmly established in mid-table and pushing for Europa places at the minute. We're in 8th at the start of December. I made a couple of tweaks to my player roles which seem to have worked straight away on the short-term evidence. Jude Bellingham was ticking along as an AP(S), I changed it simply to AP(A) and he suddenly clocked a 9.0 performance with a stunning goal and an assist! Donyell Malen up front too had never scored that many goals for me, he had about 5 from 40 appearances (quite a few of them left wing as well but still) - I changed the striker from DLF(A) to AF(A) and he bagged a hat-trick!

This is from an earlier version of the save just before the mental dominant era so with players you’ll mostly recognise , not much difference to a standard gegenpress. What I will do is tweak it where I have an absolute star player to make sure they’re playing a preferred role, mostly this is changing the fwd role from PF to AF

 

[Dan2501]

Is that Fabian from Napoli? If so, he was superb in my save as Napoli, had a lot of big clubs after him after season 1!

Nice tactic. How does "fairly narrow" in possession work in the match engine? Do you still get plenty of attacking width from your wing-backs? Feels like it could get quite compact and tight in the final third with 2 inside forwards, the AMC and ST moving into similarish positions at pace.

 

[Orikoru]

This is from an earlier version of the save just before the mental dominant era so with players you’ll mostly recognise , not much difference to a standard gegenpress. What I will do is tweak it where I have an absolute star player to make sure they’re playing a preferred role, mostly this is changing the fwd role from PF to AF

Thanks mate. See this is interesting to me, because when I was struggling I read a lot about tactics online, and something they always say is about balancing the attack duties with some support duties in your forwards and so on - but you have all your front four on attack which directly opposes that advice yet it clearly hasn't held you back at all. I've tended to have some success with one W(A) and one IW(S) but you just have both wingers doing the same thing. Food for thought.

 

[Orikoru]

Is that Fabian from Napoli? If so, he was superb in my save as Napoli, had a lot of big clubs after him after season 1!

Nice tactic. How does "fairly narrow" in possession work in the match engine? Do you still get plenty of attacking width from your wing-backs? Feels like it could get quite compact and tight in the final third with 2 inside forwards, the AMC and ST moving into similarish positions at pace.

Maybe narrow is better? Out of curiosity I went to FM Base, looked at the best rated tactics for download. I wasn't intending to download any, but I just wanted to see what sort of set-ups people had. Most of them seemed to use Inverted Wing Backs in the back four for example, so perhaps that width from them isn't necessary at all. Although the ones that had that tended to have W(A) on both sides. A lot of them had two strikers on the exact same role & duty, rather than trying to create a 'partnership' as such - but I'm aware that a lot of these just exploit holes in the match engine rather than working because they should do.

 

[Dan2501]

Maybe narrow is better? Out of curiosity I went to FM Base, looked at the best rated tactics for download. I wasn't intending to download any, but I just wanted to see what sort of set-ups people had. Most of them seemed to use Inverted Wing Backs in the back four for example, so perhaps that width from them isn't necessary at all. Although the ones that had that tended to have W(A) on both sides. A lot of them had two strikers on the exact same role & duty, rather than trying to create a 'partnership' as such - but I'm aware that a lot of these just exploit holes in the match engine rather than working because they should do.

Well yeah, otherwise the inside channel would be far too crowded, you couldn't have an inverted wing back and an inside forward/inverted winger working together, they'd end up occupying the same space, which is why I was curious about playing narrow with inside forwards and an AP, thought it could all get a bit crowded in there. IWBs and W's seems like a pretty well balanced and logical set-up to me, not one I'd use personally, as I like my wingers to get inside and try and get goals, and get my width from attacking wing backs, but no reason why it wouldn't work if you had the right players.

 

[Orikoru]

Well yeah, otherwise the inside channel would be far too crowded, you couldn't have an inverted wing back and an inside forward/inverted winger working together, they'd end up occupying the same space, which is why I was curious about playing narrow with inside forwards and an AP, thought it could all get a bit crowded in there. IWBs and W's seems like a pretty well balanced and logical set-up to me, not one I'd use personally, as I like my wingers to get inside and try and get goals, and get my width from attacking wing backs, but no reason why it wouldn't work if you had the right players.

Agree with you there. One of my main curiosities with this game is how hard I found it to make a tactic that worked, and everyone I asked would give advice about which bits of the system contradict each other and might be ruining etc. But all the time you see people using tactics that fly in the face of the advice and seem to work fine, lol.

As I said I tend to have one Winger and one Inverted Winger - at the moment I have my Winger on the right (usually Buendia), and Max Aarons behind him in a WB(s) role. But maybe I should try him as an IWB and see how that goes. Third season he should be good enough to contribute quite well to the deeper midfield area I should think.