Career Scratch Tries The KDB Challenge [Attempt 4 Complete]

[Scratch]

After not doing that well in my Liverpool Front Three Challenge attempts, I thought I might give @Rob's KDB Challenge a whirl:

Basically I need to get KDB to score and assist as much as possible in a single season, but only league games count.

KDB has always been a favourite of mine in the game - well more precisely, his regen has been a favourite of mine, I could never get him to join Celtic or Newcastle for any of my 1KC attempts, but his regen would pop up mid save and made a fine right winger or central midfielder...

I'm planning to give it two goes, as I'm wanting to test a couple of my existing tactics with it:

1. My 1KC tactic which doesn't lead to many goals, but gives the right winger a lot of assists (my best is 99 in all competitions) - I'll convert KDB to a right winger and have him pump in the crosses.
2. My TT tactic which gives a lot of goals and assists all rounds (144 league goals in my Liverpool Front Three save) - I'll convert KDB to a striker and play him as a T in middle of the front three.

In each attempt, I'll have two squads that will alternate each game. KDB will be in the saved selection for both squads, but I'll swap him out for non league games.

I've actually finished the first attempt now (will write it up soon) and started the second and having I'm a lot of fun (although the non league games are a bit of a drag now!).

 

Edited November 18, 2020 by Scratch

[Scratch]

Attempt 1

Alright let's jump into it! This time I'm using my 'famous' defensive 1KC tactic, which doesn't lead to many goals, but gives the right winger a lot of assists, so the first thing I did was put him on retraining as a right winger. I didn't screenshot when he finished retraining, but it took a couple of months (but I played him there from day 1).

 

The Strikers

After that, I had to find him some strikers to cross to. That means players with high Aerial ability. Here's the thing though - there just aren't any good strikers in the game with 19 or 20 Aerial... I generally train a youngsters up to 20 Aerial over a couple of years, but they don't score much at the beginning. So this approach was looking dodgy from day 1. 

In the end the best option was... CR7! He has 17 Aerial and wonderful Movement and Shooting, etc. Even at 34 he is a magnificent player. So I bought him and he was clearly our best option. I also bought Haaland, Calvert-Lewin and Zirkzee, all of whom should be able to improve their Aerial fairly quickly. 

At first I was alternating Ronaldo and Haaland, but Haaland was quite disappointing - didn't score much and his Aerial didn't develop at all. So for the second half of the season Ronaldo started all league games but was subbed off with KDB. Calvert-Lewin was also poor and hardly developed at all (I guess he's not as good in FMM20 as he is in RealLife20), wheras Zirkzee didn't score much, but at least got up to Aerial 18 by the end. 

Ronaldo got 44 goals from 36 games, Haaland 15 from 29, Zirkzee 8 from 28 and Calvert-Lewin 6 from 20.

All in all, I'd use Ronaldo again for a 1 season challenge, but probably none of the other 3. Well actually I did sign Zirkzee again for the next attempt, but only as an 'off bench when we're winning' option. 

 

The Others

I'm now getting really good at the transfer side of things for a 1 season career and I'm getting more and more ambitious each time.

Part of the equation is selling players and I basically sold a whole bunch this time around: Aguero, great striker, but too short for this attempt; Sterling, great player, but I only need a KDB back up on the right; Sane, good left winger, but threw a tanty when I signed Coman for the right leading to Coman being and outcast from day 1; and so on and so on. 

Actually I wasn't familiar with Man City's squad in FMM terms. I know they are all great players, but I was taken aback by the number of players with problematic characteristics. A bunch of players not up for league games, or whinging about this or that, or labelled a disruptive influence, or unprofessional, or not up for big games. I mean really, the best approach is probably to sell them all and get more levelheaded players.

Anyway, here are my transfers (but somehow I only got the first page of each, sorry):

Spoiler

As you can see, once you start selling some of those players, you have quite the kitty to go out and sign a bunch of stars like Ronaldo, VVD, Milinkovic-Savic, Varane, etc.

 

The Results

A mixed season:

We won the CL, the League Cup and the League, but we only scored 85 goals in the league, lost the Community Shield and got knocked out of the FA Cup early. Here are the individual screenshots (missed the League Cup final):

Spoiler

 

The Injury

A single 10 day injury, so not too bad:

 

The Man

Here's what he looked like at the end, a little worse for wear from that injury (only 10 days with a bruised thigh, but players these days are so flimsy:

 

The Score

So... 43 assists in the league (not bad) and 9 goals (pretty disappointing). I'd projected 40-ish assists (but was hoping for more), plus 10 goals from penalties, 10 from freekicks and 5 from open play. But we just didn't score enough as a team and weren't attacking enough.

In some ways that's not a surprise, given this us a defensive tactic, but I was hoping for more. I think where I went wrong is that when I've used this tactic in a 1KC, I'd have to watch the opposition closely and change to a more attacking tactic if they were too defensive and this wasn't generating shots. However for the last few months or so I've been using my DT and TT tactics which are much more plug and play and I no longer micro manage games.

I think if I tried this again with Ronaldo the number 1 from the start and changing the tactic where necessary, then I'd do much better. But next, I'll be be trying my TT tactic and am hoping that that will give a better result as it's much more attacking.

Anyway, attempt 1 is done and my final score for it was 52 points.

Thanks for reading!

 

Edited November 9, 2020 by Scratch

[Rich]

Nice first attempt mate, loads of assists, I’m sure you’ll find a better solution for goals on your second go, massive overhaul of players as well, I like it, you’re making me want to try again 😁

[Scratch]

20 minutes ago, RichD said:

Nice first attempt mate, loads of assists, I’m sure you’ll find a better solution for goals on your second go, massive overhaul of players as well, I like it, you’re making me want to try again 😁

Thanks mate. Haha, yeah, have another go! It's a fun one. But really for this one you sort of need to sell the whole team. With the Liverpool Front Three one you can just keep most of the squad if you want, but these players are dodgy. Like this:

Disruptive influence? I think there are a couple of those, a whole bunch of unprofessional players, etc. At least it's fun to put together a new squad. 😄

[Rich]

3 minutes ago, Scratch said:

Thanks mate. Haha, yeah, have another go! It's a fun one. But really for this one you sort of need to sell the whole team. With the Liverpool Front Three one you can just keep most of the squad if you want, but these players are dodgy. Like this:

Disruptive influence? I think there are a couple of those, a whole bunch of unprofessional players, etc. At least it's fun to put together a new squad. 😄

Before starting challenges and things on here, I never used to look in to these things and I can say you’ve had an influence on how I play the game and try and get rid of these kind of players myself now, next time I do the challenge I’m sure I’d go about it in a completely different way next time, look forward to seeing how you do with your TT tactic 😁

[Scratch]

1 minute ago, RichD said:

Before starting challenges and things on here, I never used to look in to these things and I can say you’ve had an influence on how I play the game and try and get rid of these kind of players myself now, next time I do the challenge I’m sure I’d go about it in a completely different way next time, look forward to seeing how you do with your TT tactic 😁

Thanks mate, blushing now. I should put a disclaimer in here that none of us really know how much affect these players have. They often still perform pretty well, so maybe it's only minor... You may do just as well or even better to just ignore all those messages and push on. But me personally, I can't stand having those players in my team! You're either for the team or your out the door!  🤣

[Rob]

A really interesting first attempt. It’s a weird squad at City. It’s excellent, but full of players who benefit in roles not suited to challenges, such as Sterling and Sane who are awesome IFs. It’s a decent squad for Strikerless challenges though!

[Scratch]

3 minutes ago, Rob said:

A really interesting first attempt. It’s a weird squad at City. It’s excellent, but full of players who benefit in roles not suited to challenges, such as Sterling and Sane who are awesome IFs. It’s a decent squad for Strikerless challenges though!

Thanks mate. Fell short of what I was hoping but really interesting to try it nonetheless!

And yeah, I've been complaining about the players' attitudes, but the roles of many of them don't fit my way of playing (especially the IF thing). That was especially the case with this tactic, a little less crucial next time around. I kept Sterling and Sane and played them as Wingers. Sterling swam, Sane sank and I just sold him at the opening of the Jan window...

[Scratch]

Attempt 2

The first time around was disappointing, but this time I'll be using my more attacking TT tactic and retraining KDB as a forward. He'll play as a T in the middle of a front three, hopefully both scoring and providing. And of course he will be on penalties, free kicks and corners.

First though we need to talk about his partners in crime.

 

The Strikers

These are the lads who will help him get assists, so we need the best we can get.

After Ronaldo's success last time around, I tried to buy him again. This time however he cost a lot more (I never worked out just how much) and I ended up giving up. I did come back for him in Janaury and got him for £96M and he was good for a month or so, but then his form dipped and he lost a couple of points of attributes all round, and he ended up as a back up striker with only 11 goals from 20 games.

That was fine, because we had plenty of other good strikers. We kept Aguero (26 from 34) this time as it wasn't so much of an Aerial focused tactic. We bought Lakaku (32 from 37) and Aubameyang (35 from 39) who were great. Thomas Muller (15 from 34) was a decent backup. And we had Embolo (12 from 37) and Zirkzee (7 from 43) as young backups coming off the bench while the others rotated.

A pretty decent group of strikers if you ask me...

 

The Others

Once again I sold a lot of the arrogent, disruptive, lazy players that Man City has and bought the best I could find. Some were familiar (as in I used them last time): VvD, Havertz, Maier, Zaracho, Telles, Livakovic. Others were new: Roberto, Tah, Modric, Willian, Lainez, Aarons, Diaby.

Spoiler

They mostly performed well, except for two issues:

• Aging: Ronaldo performed so well in attempt 1 and didn't seem to age. Milner did well in my Liverpool Front Three attempts and didn't seem to age either. So I bought Ronaldo ago again (as mentioned above), kept David Silva and bought Luca Modric. All three aged signficantly. Modric was such a bust that I sold him in January for a third of what I paid for him, just to clear away his £450K p/w salary as we were over budget. 
   
• Conceded a lot of goals: I think playing Livakovic turned out to be a mistake (even though he's been great for me in the past) and Tah was dreadful. 

But generally I was happy with the squad.

 

The Results

The results on the other hand weren't so good. 

Domestically we won everything, but we lost 5 games and conceded 57 goals in the league, which was 20 more than when I used the same tactic with Liverpool. We scored 20 less than than the Liverpool attempt too, meaning our GD was 40 goals worse off this time around.

In Europe, we came third in the CL group stage, bounced down to the Euro Cup and still couldn't win that (we got knocked out in the semi). Full result screenshots here:

Spoiler

We mostly played well and won easily, but we never humiliated teams 10-0 like in the LF3 challenge and every so often we would just ship 5 or 6 goals and get thrashed...

So a pretty disappointing and frustrating season all round. But how did the lad do?

 

The Man

No injuires this year! And it took him until 9 November before he was comfortable as a striker:

He finished the season looking like this:

 

The Score

This is how he did:

So, 31 league goals and 32 league assists, giving a total score of 63 points.

A definite improvement over attempt 1, but still a bit disappointing. I'm left wanting to try this again, but perhaps with a new tactic. The ones I use are generally very heavy on the wing play. Maybe I need something where I drop the wingers and move them into the central midfield. Not sure if I'll have another go or not yet though. 

Anyway, thanks for reading!

 

[Rich]

That’s all that matters is KDB performances and he did great mate, I know the frustration of always wanting more, like yourself I always use wingers, it’s a good one to try again and have an experiment with different ways of playing etc. Look forward to seeing whatever you try next 😁

[Rob]

Excellent attempt and best of luck for the next one.

[Scratch]

19 minutes ago, RichD said:

That’s all that matters is KDB performances and he did great mate, I know the frustration of always wanting more, like yourself I always use wingers, it’s a good one to try again and have an experiment with different ways of playing etc. Look forward to seeing whatever you try next 😁

Thanks mate. Yeah, the lad did good. I feel like I could get more out of him, but that's down to me, not him.

I feel like I want to attempt it again, but also I mgiht attempt the LF3C again. Just now though I've started up a Celtic save and I might see what sort of squad I can put together now I know how to really push the boundaries of the transfer market. Not sure I'll actually play it! Maybe I will just to see how many goals we can get in a year. 

added 0 minutes later

19 minutes ago, Rob said:

Excellent attempt and best of luck for the next one.

Thanks mate, I might do it again this year, but if not, I'll definitely try it again next year!

Edited November 10, 2020 by Scratch

[Rob]

It’s quite interesting how people have approached this. I reckon your first attempt, slightly tweaked, would get you a massive score.

[Scratch]

Just now, Rob said:

It’s quite interesting how people have approached this. I reckon your first attempt, slightly tweaked, would get you a massive score.

Yeah, I was thinking about doing that again too. I think I need someone like Ronaldo, but also a better alternative (maybe Lukaku or Aubameyang who both worked well this time). Then I need to actually manage the games a bit and switch to the more attacking approach when it's not working.

But then I do sort of thing that fitting the challenge to the tactic (rather than the tactic to the challenge) might not be the best apporach and that I should find a tactic that gets the ball playing through the middle more.

We'll see, I'll be back at some point! 

[Rob]

You’ve made me want to have another go at it though! I may carry this one over to next version too.

I genuinely love seeing how people approach stuff.

[Scratch]

3 minutes ago, Rob said:

You’ve made me want to have another go at it though! I may carry this one over to next version too.

I genuinely love seeing how people approach stuff.

I'm counting on it being back next version! These short ones are sort of addictive (as well as a lot of fun!).

In fact I wouldn't mind more like this. I was thinking about a Chelsea ex-wonderkid one - play Havertz, Werner, Pulisic and Tammy Abraham together and total up the amount of goals and assists. They've all been wonderkids (to varying degrees) but are all in the 21-24 age range now, so no longer fit the strict definition of a wonderkid. You could probably put Mason Mount in there too, but there's a limit to how many you can fit in!

[Scratch]

So attempt 3 didn't go so well. I tried again with my 1KC (mega assists) tactic and assembled two very good teams:

 

But I ended up killing the attempt mid way through (after 17 games), because he just wasn't getting enough points (less than 1 per game):

 

So that really didn't work. I think he needs to have better forwards than that to pass to. For my assists 1KC Vignato was passing to a player who'd been trained from scratch, had 20 Aerial, and honestly had better attributes all round than any starting player in the game.

 

What did I do? Start again immediately witth a new tactic (using KDB as a striker again, like attempt 2 above): 

This is my TT tactic, with the wingers transformed into central APs. I also changed to Narrow and passing through the centre. Basically all my tactics up until this one have relied on wingers crossing the ball into the strikers and I don't want that for KDB. I'm hoping this way the ball will come through the middle to KDB who will score or assist.

I'm in January now and it's looking good. On track for high 60s or low 70s if he keeps this up.

Played the first half of the season with the following players around him: Aguero, Salah, Sterling, Lacazette, Werner, Gabriel Jesus and Pellegri (who is surprisingly hold his own and already the best header at the club, which is useful for corners). 

In January I sold Gabriel Jesus who was under acheiving and brought in CR7 who I've had mixed results with, but is still better than Gabrial Jesus even if he deteriorates a bit (he was still at peak levels when I bought him). I also did a straight up swap (plus 50% sell on fee) of Lacazette for Harry Kane. Not quite sure how that works as Arsenal was supposed to get 50% sell on, but I swapped him away...

Anyway, currently lining up with Sterling (AP), Ronaldo, KDB and Salah on team and Aguero (AP), Pellegri, KDB and Harry Kane on the other. Not bad. We'll see how he goes. No injuries so far, touch wood....

 

[Rob]

I can imagine there’s a lot of team goals with that latter team! 

[Rich]

Some great attacking options there mate, hoping you crack it this season! Like you said with your previous attempt, no player starts with the stats you can get with younger players eventually, makes such a big difference training up players to what they need for them huge numbers, I used Vignato for my DT and he was unreal with his crossing. 

[broodje kip]

Interesting squad there. Looking forward 

[Scratch]

1 hour ago, Rob said:

I can imagine there’s a lot of team goals with that latter team!

Probably about 3.5 a game. Not bad, but I've definitely scored higher. A lot of it is going through KDB though which is the point.

[Scratch]

13 minutes ago, RichD said:

Some great attacking options there mate, hoping you crack it this season! Like you said with your previous attempt, no player starts with the stats you can get with younger players eventually, makes such a big difference training up players to what they need for them huge numbers, I used Vignato for my DT and he was unreal with his crossing. 

Thanks mate, not going to threaten your score, but hoping for 70.

Yeah I had Vignato at 20 Crossing and Unuvar at 20 Aerial on the other end and that was in Scotland, so it was just different level to what I can make happen here...

added 0 minutes later

13 minutes ago, broodje kip said:

Interesting squad there. Looking forward 

Thanks mate!

[Scratch]

Attempt 4

Okay, so I've just finished this. As mentioend above, this is the tactic I'm using (my TT tactic with the W's converted to APs):

I find that with this configuration of the front three, the central T gets the most chances. He runs through the middle of the forward line, supported on both sides and behind by players with good movement and creativity etc. Short passing and working it into the box means they often pass between themselves in the lead up. Of course the others pick up goals too, but he's often involved in those as well. 

 

Transfers

I've given away much of the story above, so here is just the list of transfers:

Spoiler

A pretty decent squad all round.

 

Results

I won't include all the screenshots, just the overview. It was a good season, but we fell short in the CL (going out 3-1 on aggregate to PSG):

 

The Player

This is what he looked like at the end of the season:

Once again I had him on low impact training and he dodged getting injured. He did get hit during the game and have his condition drop a lot, and started the next game with a condition of 89%, but he didn't miss any games.

 

The Results

This how he did:

A lot of goals in the league (44) and plenty of assists (28), giving him a score of 72 points.

 

And if you are wondering how the rest of our star studded forward line went:

• A good return from Salah who was class in the AF role alongside KDB.
• Pellegri was great for his age, developed well, had 17 Aerial and scored a lot from KDB's corners.
• Werner was better than he looks, because he became a full time sub, lowering his numbers, once we brought CR7 and Kane to the club.
• Aguero mostly played in the AP position, so his numbers aren't bad either.
• CR7 was class before getting injured in the last game, not losing any attributes and scoring almost a goal a game. 
• Sterling did well from the AP position.
• Embolo decent off the bench.
• And Kane... Well, it was disappointing that he couldn't get onto the screen above, but he ended up with 5 goals and 5 assists from 15 games - from memory that's a lower goal ratio than Lacazette who we swapped him with, but happy with his assists.

But all of them pale in comparison to the legend that is KDB...

 

[Rob]

Excellent score. I shall add you to the board. Did you unsettle Sarah to get him so cheap? I find unsettling a bit inconsistent as whenever I offer after  sometimes the clubs seem to forget he is unsettled. 

Much you’d change for next time?

[Kun Aguero]

That 975m spent😂

Amazing score!

[Rich]

Great season mate and great score, loving the formation you have, super attacking which makes this more fun. The totals you sold players for and brought players in for is superb, 30m for Fernandinho and Trent and Mo that cheap is great work. Be interesting to see how these kind of challenges go on the new game 😁

[Scratch]

1 hour ago, Rob said:

Excellent score. I shall add you to the board. Did you unsettle Sarah to get him so cheap? I find unsettling a bit inconsistent as whenever I offer after  sometimes the clubs seem to forget he is unsettled. 

Much you’d change for next time?

Thanks mate. I do often let a bid fail to try and unsettle players, but I can't remember if Salah got upset or not. And yeah, sometime teams will leat a player go cheaper if they are unsettled, other times it doesn't make one bit of difference to them.

Anyway for Salah, I followed my normal formula: offer list price or below, then when they counter bring the price right down to a little over list price, close the negotiation screen, open it again and then make the offer and they will come back with the real minimum they will accept (or they might reject it if you are too far away from the real minimum). Then lower the price to a touch over 66% of that, close the screen again, open it again, add 50% sell on fee and make the offer. So if I got him for 104M then Liverpool wanted 155M or 156M. Which probably is cheap for Salah? I don't think I've ever bought him before!

But I have noticed in some saves you can get a player for a good price and the next time around the club hold out for a lot more. This was the November DB if it makes any difference (can't really see why it would though). Maybe it depends on who else is in the squad to cover them if they sell them? Not sure. 

I probably won't do this again now (in 20), but I think this was easily my best attempt - having a purpose built tactic helped. Things I'd change? Maybe make the central midfield line a little better. All good players there, but not as strong as the 4 players in front of them. And maybe I'd get another hot young striker given how well Pellegri did... But probably not much else at this stage.

 

[Scratch]

1 hour ago, Kun Aguero said:

That 975m spent😂

Amazing score!

LOL, thanks mate - and that 975M doesn't include Kane for free in a swap with 124M rated Lacazette! I really put a lot of effort into getting the best squad money can buy...

[broodje kip]

Great score that mate!

[Scratch]

51 minutes ago, RichD said:

Great season mate and great score, loving the formation you have, super attacking which makes this more fun. The totals you sold players for and brought players in for is superb, 30m for Fernandinho and Trent and Mo that cheap is great work. Be interesting to see how these kind of challenges go on the new game 😁

Thanks mate. Yeah, I think I'm set on attacking formations from now on. I had trouble going back to my Defensive 4 3 2 1 in attempt 3 - just too boring. 😄 We'll have to see if they still work in 21 though!

With the squad building, I probably spent more time on that than playing! A lot of the deals had to have several attempts, so it was a lot of work. Of course I can only push it that far because of the little steps you can take (explained in response to Rob above) to get the best deals, not sure if that will be possible in 21 either and even if it is, maybe the team dynamics thing will stop me doing it... But we'll see, I still expect to do a lot of wheeling/dealing... 😄

added 0 minutes later

3 minutes ago, broodje kip said:

Great score that mate!

Thanks mate. I was pretty happy with it. I mean I would have been happier if it was a little bit higher, but I was just aiming for 70 and I made it, so really happy.