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Uncle Sam
So I'm beginning what is probably my final career on FM 2014 before the next version. I'll be starting with my Houston Dynamo using the default MLS format.
-Manager Info
Nationalities: USA, Germany
Favored formation: 4-3-3
Starting Reputation: Sunday League Player
Place of Birth: Knoxville (TN)
-Leagues loaded (Top Divisions Only)
Australia, Brazil, England, Germany, Holland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Spain, USA
-Data Updates
Nic's Data, All International Competitions (as well as two I created for the Dale Farm Milk Cup and Copa America Centenario), and my own data update for USA (club and players only, no competitions added).
Eric Portapotty
No man can juggle a wife and FM. Their too jealous of each other.
Uncle Sam
I want to make my attempt at the Barcelona "style" in the USA. My two primary formations are the 4-3-3 and the 4-1-4-1.
-Mentality: Counter (Will sometimes drop to Defensive, or if the opponent is parking the bus I'll throw out Counter)
-Fluidity: Very Fluid
-Team Instructions
Retain Possession
Shorter Passing
Play Out of Defense
Much Higher Defensive Line
Roam From Positions
Hassle Opponents
Stay on Feet
Use Tighter Marking
-Player Instructions (Role/Duty)
GK (SK/S): Distribute to Defenders
DR/L (CWB/A): Shoot Less Often, Pass it Shorter, Stay Wider
DC (DC/D): Pass it Shorter
DM (DM/D): Shoot Less Often, Pass it Shorter
MCL (CM/S): Dribble Less, Pass it Shorter, Hold Position
MCR (CM/A): Dribble Less, Pass it Shorter
AMR/L (IF/A): Sit Narrower, Dribble Less, Pass it Shorter, Shoot Less Often
ST (DLF/S): NONE
In the 4-1-4-1 everything is the same, except the MR/L have the Get Further Forward instruction added.
Uncle Sam
Yes I am, happily. Although we were recently in a fairly serious vehicle accident and my wife broke her L1 vertebrae and had 2 lacerations of her liver so much of my time this summer has gone to helping her recover. We both broke our sternum so Ive been recovering from that. Thankfully she is back to walking mostly normal, but she still has very little sensation in her pelvic floor. Apparently it takes agonizingly long for nerve damage to heal.
Sorry to hear that mate, hope she makes a speedy recovery.
Eric Portapotty
Will be following this as well.
Uncle Sam
The squad is mostly ready to compete for the MLS title. The biggest weak spot is in central defense.
-Goalkeeper: Tally Hall is a good MLS goalkeeper who has not been capped but has been called up to the national team in real life. While I would like to upgrade the position, he'll do for now. The backup is Tyler Deric, who is serviceable but not good enough to consider as the heir.
-Fullback: Kofi Sarkodie on the right and DaMarcus Beasley on the left. That is a good attacking pair. Kofi is still relatively young as well. Beasley is starting age, but Corey Ashe is a good backup who can give DMB a rest occasionally. In a pinch, Jermaine Taylor can play at either fullback but I really need him in the middle. Also Oscar Boniek Garcia can fill at right back.
-Centerback: This is the sever position of need. Jermaine Taylor is solid, but there is a big dropoff after him. Eric Brunner is outstanding in the air, but his marking and tackling are only a 10. David Horst is a better tackler but somewhat weaker in the air. His positioning is also only a 9. AJ Cochrane and Anthony Arena both look like solid players for the future, but they're a year or two away from being able to contribute.
-Defensive Midfielder: Ricardo Clark is an above average player. Also, Boniek Garcia and Luis Garrido can fill in this spot with little dropoff. Very comfortable with my options here.
-Central Midfield: Several good options here. For the supporting CM, I can play Boniek or Garrido. Servando Carrasco is the desperation option. In the attacking CM, I just about have to consider Alexander Lopez since he is being paid Designated Player money. I can also drop Brad Davis into this position.
-Inside Forwards (AM R/L): On the right, Giles Barnes is the #1 option. Alexander Lopez can also play here to great effect. On the left, Brad Davis is probably the first choice, but again there a number of choices. Andrew Driver, Corey Ashe, DaMarcus Beasley can all play there with little-to-no dropoff.
-Striker: This another position with good depth. Carlo Costly and Omar Cummings are probably the top two choices, but Will Bruin has a decent future there as well.
The squad can compete now, but I also have to start looking towards the future. As weak as the centerback position is right now, Cochran and Arena will be a solid pairing in about 2015 or 2016. Jason Johnson (AMC/ST) is also promising but I may have to send him out on loan so he can get some playing time. And Alexander Lopez will hopefully be with us for a long time. The Academy has a couple of good looking prospects as well, but I'll get into that when I do a scouting update.
van6969
Johno
Best wishes to you and your wife recovery
George14brfc
Uncle Sam
I think the last time I worked hard on the box midfield tactic was FM 11 of 12. That was always how I coached my real life teams but the USSF started pushing for youth coaches to push the 4-3-3 so I switched to that and naturally started using it in FM.
van6969
I remember it was years ago like I said haha I hear ya. where do you coach? what level?
Uncle Sam
The staff is not great. Most of their contracts run out at the end of the upcoming season, however, so I’m OK with letting them stay. With MLS clubs it’s unlikely you’re going to land top notch assistants anyway. I usually just hire young guys who I hope have potential to get better. The board allows me five more other staff, so I’m thinking a second physio, a GK coach, a fitness coach, and a couple of regular coaches.
I only have 1 scout, but scouting for MLS teams doesn’t always need to be overly extensive anyway. I might hire 2 or 3 more.
Training
I don’t get overly meticulous with my training. I pretty much just train each position for a specific role that works the attributes I want them to have.
GK – Sweeper Keeper
DR/L – Wingback
DC – Ball Playing Defender
DM & the supporting MC – Deep Lying Playmaker
Attacking MC – Advanced Playmaker
AMR/L – Inside Forward
ST – Complete Forward
All of those training regiments develop the attributes I want for each player with one glaring exception: The WINGBACK training does not develop passing. There are no training focus roles that work the passing attribute for fullbacks. The WINGBACK focus trains the OFF THE BALL skill, while COMPLETE WINGBACK trains the Flair. I’d rather my fullbacks develop OFF THE BALL so that’s why I’ve made that choice. However, I do want my fullbacks to work on passing as well so what I do is pick 3 months out of the year for the fullbacks to work specifically on PASSING. The rest of the year they train in the WINGBACK role focus.
A couple of other things I do with my training is I set the Intensity for every player to HEAVY. I then go to GENERAL TRAINING and set the Intensity Level to LOW. After my squad has gained full familiarity with my tactics I will also set the MATCH TRAINING slider to one click towards LESS MATCH TRAINING. I want my training to be about developing players. The better skills the players develop the better they are going to perform and the more I will be able to sell them for later.
Uncle Sam
The first place I look when scouting is my Academy team. Right now I have a strong team but they are aging with several of my best players over 30. That means my focus needs to be on securing talent for the future. As I look, there are obviously a lot of high potential players here:
It's always difficult to just go by the assistants opinion on potential, but typically players with 5 stars are safe bets to develop into players at least MLS quality. So these are guys I can sign and count on to be the future of the club. I can loan those guys back to the academy to develop for a season or two, but the Left Back (Olvera) I can probably even leave with the main squad for reasons I will get to in a moment.
Now, when I start sending my scouts I usually focus on a couple of regions and a handful of nations specifically. I usually stay away from Europe unless I find the right player. My favorite place to find international players is Brazil. I can usually get them at a price and there are tons of MLS quality players there.
I also scout Central America. My favorite countries there are Costa Rica and Honduras, but occasionally a quality player will spring up out of Guatemala.
Asia is another good place to find MLS quality players. I have an update for Japan I got from the SI forums, so I don't know if you can get could Japanese players without it. But I do have it and I find contributors from there.
And I often try to beat the European clubs to players from Africa. There are usually a few high quality players from Western Africa to be found.
Trades
Domestic transfers in MLS primarily function as player swaps. Here in the US we call them "Trades". Most trades are player-for-player deals, with one team often also acquiring extra goodies like allocation funds (Basically transfer budget money) or draft picks (we'll talk about the SuperDraft later.
I have specifically had DC United approach me for Corey Ashe:
International Slots are tradeable commodities in MLS. Right now I have 7 slots. I do like acquiring international slots because that means I can improve my squad with foreign players. I need an international slot because I have 8 foreigners, and although I am planning on sending Jason Johnson (Jamaican) on loan to my USL affiliate Pittsburgh, I would like to go find a center back to shore up my defense. However, I HATE temporary international slots. Sure, I might be gone in 5 years, but I just feel better when the International Slot I acquire is permanent. I am open to trading Corey Ashe because I do have DaMarcus Beasley and Jermaine Taylor can fill at Left Back in a pinch. I also have a youngster in the Academy who is the left back of the future and if Ashe is moved that means he will get more playing time. I am going to negotiate the deal to try and make that International Slot permanent, and I'm going to try and squeeze a first round SuperDraft pick out of DC as well. If they reject it, I can count on them or another club making another offer for Ashe.
Uncle Sam
I use friendlies for three purposes: Fitness, Familiarity, and Morale. The only other conceivable purpose for friendlies is to tour another country for marketing purposes. I do that sometimes, but the first year I just want to get my club ready for the first season. For that reason I only schedule minnows. This allows my team to gain fitness and have great success while doing it. Wins improve morale more than draws or losses to equal or better competition. So if I do take a tour, I try to make the opponents weak.
I do not use friendlies to perfect my tactic. The AI does not approach a friendly the same way they do a competitive match. So there is really no point in trying to work out the kinks of my tactics. Whatever adjustments work in a friendly may turn out to be useless during the season.
With all that said, I will sometimes not cancel any friendlies that the computer set up for at the beginning of the game.
The three away friendlies were already set up when I took charge. The two Russian clubs will be a test but they're no Real Madrid, so I will just leave them. All of the other friendlies I scheduled and they are all very poor teams. We should be able to win all of those as I try to get my team fit and familiar with my tactics for the Champions League.
Uncle Sam
-Champions League
I was fortunate enough to be drawn against another MLS side in San Jose Earthquakes for the CONCACAF Champions League quarterfinal. I am going to have several disadvantages starting out. First of all, I began with a Sunday League reputation so the players aren't going to listen to me until we've had some success. Also, we had not yet achieved full familiarity with the tactic, so things weren't going to go smoothly. So it was a help getting to play a team who was at least on our quality level. The first leg was at home, and we played respectable well:
We controlled most the match, really limiting San Jose's chances. Tally Hall only had to make one save. Brad Davis playing the left wing knocked home a short cross from Giles Barnes in the 69th minute and we took a 1-0 lead into San Jose.
We weren't quite as dominant in the second leg, but we were still the better side. We won the possession battle and San Jose did not put a single shot on target in a 0-0 draw that saw us through to the Semifinal to face Club America from Mexico. The other Semifinal is Toluca from Mexico and upstart San Miguelito from Panama.
-Results
March was largely a good month. The league opener against Montreal we completely dominated but couldn't find the net. We held off the Red Bulls in New York for a 2-1 victory. Then we had two games were the guys up front couldn't miss. At Chicago we put away 3 of our 9 shots and at home against Columbus we scored 4 of 9. In the last game of March we went at New York (AGAIN) and this time we were unable to hold our 2-0 lead and the Red Bulls stole a point late. It was frustrating, but I think we have to be satisfied with 4 points from two matches away to New York. They have one of the top 2 or 3 squads in the league. And it was a fine month, putting us 1 point behind Kansas City for the top spot in the East Conference with a game in hand:
Uncle Sam
-Champions League
The Semifinal drew us against Club America from Mexico. We got a nice 1-0 win at home in the first leg after Carlo Costly's goal in the 11th minute. We controlled the game from start to finish and probably deserved a second:
In the second leg we held on for dear life, grinding out a scoreless draw thanks to a missed PK:
In the final we played Toluca, also from Mexico. The first leg was down there, and although they had more shots they were mostly hopeful efforts. Our chances were more well carved out and we dominated possession and earned a 1-0 win:
The second leg was a bit more wide open. Toluca pulled level in the 16th minute but we quickly replied with a pair of goals that sealed the deal and earned MLS its first CONCACAF Champions League trophy:
In June we also learned our draw for the group stage of the 2014/15 edition. We'll play the Montreal Impact (Canada, MLS) and Herediano (Costa Rica).
-US Open Cup
Fixture congestion and World Cup callups have basically forced us to play our backups and youth players in this competition. Our competition has not been very stiff, however. We were drawn into the tournament in the third round and beat Virginia Cavalry 4-2. Next we went to Atlanta and defeated the Silverbacks 3-1. In the quarter final we faced our first MLS opposition in the Cup and beat the Columbus Crew 3-1 to advance to the semi final where we will face the Los Angeles Galaxy at home with a chance to advance to the final.
-MLS
Our league play has been outstanding, considering the players who have been on national team duty and the fixture congestion to boot. We have scored the most goals in the league while surrendering the fewest. However, Sporting Kansas City is 8 points clear of us. We do have three games in hand so three wins would put us in first place by 1 point:
-New Signings
I did make several acquisitions. Most of these players were drafted or claimed off of waivers and will not contribute significantly this season but will solidify our team for the future.
I did manage to find a player in Brazil who is not partially owned by his agent so I could loan him. Sadly, like 11 minutes into his first game he suffered an injury that put him out for months.
These are hopefully the next generation of Dynamo players. Because I have some players called up for the World they are getting a good amount of playing time:
These guys are on loan to other clubs:
Johno
Where can I get the logos you using from?
Uncle Sam