Career 'Director of Football' (DoF) Mode - Swansea Career (FIRED!!)

[DanEnglish]

Season 2 (attempt six?)

Ok - so I’ve attempted our 2nd season around five times now … and have been fired each time. 

This time it’s DIFFERENT ✅ ! We’re playing a more defensive 41221 + we’ve got ex-Man Utd’s Phelan as our new AssMan.

 
Transfers:
Great news - after making big bucks from selling three players - we’ve got THREE STARS joining us, plus another FOUR squad players.

Spoiler

THREE SOLD
Bye bye poor performing DC Helik, DL Sanusi + versatile Croatian DRLC Smolcic

THREE STARS IN

• GK - Greek 28 year old Vlachodomis (spelling?)
• DC - Ukrainian wonderkid Zabarnyi
• ST - backup striker Scamacca

FOUR SQUAD players in

• Cheap DR/Ls Laryea + Rafferty
• Cheap MCs Mannsverk + Doyle Hayes

 
Early Season:
Optimistic. Positive. HOPE !!! It is looking good …

Spoiler

4th after six games? That’s fine ✅ 

It looks like a sea of green ✅ 

Even the media love us ❤️ 
 

 
Mid Season:
It just gets better and better … right … RIGHT?!

Spoiler

Our #1 Greek GK went out injured TWICE before November 🔻

Our backup keeper (last season’s first choice!) just hasn’t performed to the same standard …

Then Czech wonderkid Hlozek has been injured - only playing two games in the season’s opening few months… backup Cornick is decent, but not as good!

… this all gave a pretty worrying run of form …

 

 
Finale!

Spoiler

10th is NOT GOOD.

Both fans + the media started to criticize us … 

… but we’ve got time to turn it back around … 

Ah. Maybe not. Fired. AGAIN.

 
Thoughts? 🙂 

Edited September 25, 2022 by DanEnglish

[StuartM]

Ouch! Holidaying seems to be a bit of a problem... what were the squad dynamics like? Player wise you seemed to have done some seriously good business. Its a bit of a conundrum!

[Ariza8]

6 hours ago, DanEnglish said:

Season 2 (attempt six?)

Ok - so I’ve attempted our 2nd season around five times now … and have been fired each time. 

This time it’s DIFFERENT ✅ ! We’re playing a more defensive 41221 + we’ve got ex-Man Utd’s Phelan as our new AssMan.

 
Transfers:
Great news - after making big bucks from selling three players - we’ve got THREE STARS joining us, plus another FOUR squad players.

  Hide contents

THREE SOLD
Bye bye poor performing DC Helik, DL Sanusi + versatile Croatian DRLC Smolcic

THREE STARS IN

• GK - Greek 28 year old Vlachodomis (spelling?)
• DC - Ukrainian wonderkid Zabarnyi
• ST - backup striker Scamacca

FOUR SQUAD players in

• Cheap DR/Ls Laryea + Rafferty
• Cheap MCs Mannsverk + Doyle Hayes

 
Early Season:
Optimistic. Positive. HOPE !!! It is looking good …

  Hide contents

4th after six games? That’s fine ✅ 

It looks like a sea of green ✅ 

Even the media love us ❤️ 
 

 
Mid Season:
It just gets better and better … right … RIGHT?!

  Hide contents

Our #1 Greek GK went out injured TWICE before November 🔻

Our backup keeper (last season’s first choice!) just hasn’t performed to the same standard …

Then Czech wonderkid Hlozek has been injured - only playing two games in the season’s opening few months… backup Cornick is decent, but not as good!

… this all gave a pretty worrying run of form …

 

 
Finale!

  Reveal hidden contents

10th is NOT GOOD.

Both fans + the media started to criticize us … 

… but we’ve got time to turn it back around … 

Ah. Maybe not. Fired. AGAIN.

 
Thoughts? 🙂 

Those dip in form is crazy. Don't know what to say - I'd say injury destroy your team maybe? As it happened to Vlachodimos and Hlozek

[DanEnglish]

5 hours ago, Ariza8 said:

Those dip in form is crazy. Don't know what to say - I'd say injury destroy your team maybe? As it happened to Vlachodimos and Hlozek

You are right. Injuries have a HUGE effect. The dips in form are directly related to injuries to key players. Hlozek seems to get injured a LOT even on “low” intensity training 😞 

I guess the AI AssMan isn’t good at managing fitness / preventing injuries?!

9 hours ago, StuartM said:

Ouch! Holidaying seems to be a bit of a problem... what were the squad dynamics like? Player wise you seemed to have done some seriously good business. Its a bit of a conundrum!

Agree - holidaying is a problem, and rightly so. We won’t want FMM players to holiday through saves + get records, so it needs to be a “low performance” way of playing FMM. But this is particularly poor!

Squad Dynamics:

Spoiler

Pretty poor dynamics - especially for Morale which has a big impact - mostly driven by this guy …

Hloze’s morale + loyalty is terrible, and as an “influential” player, it does make a difference.

Especially as the club has no “team leader(s), so Hlozek’s negativity influences the squad more.

[DanEnglish]

Squad Analysis

After being fired six times (?!) during this 2nd season - here’s a quick tactical analysis which may be contributing to our problems …

 
Attack 
Sesko! Hlozek! Leonardo! With three great wonderkids upfront, why do we only score 1.6-1.7 goals per game? 

Here’s our attackers’ attributes for the start of season 2.

• Firstly, our sole striker Sesko. See the yellow/orange box on the top right? That’s showing you that he’s NOT a great TM in the Championship 🔻 Sesko’s aerial, strength + aggression are the same or LOWER than most Championship first team DCs (14-16 for each). Sesko is NOT that good … yet.

• STRENGTHS - in the green box, you can see our front three (ST, 2x IFs) are fast finishers ✅ 
   
• WEAKNESS #1 - but there is poor passing + little creativity in these front three 🔻 we need someone like Tadic!
• WEAKNESS #2 - on the far right you can see another red box - the stamina and teamwork is pretty average, so I assume that we’d have a weaker press 🔻

 
Defence 
With plenty of solid 3 star center-backs, I was surprised to continually concede 1.2 to 1.8 goals per game. Why?

• Low Pace - that first column tells us a lot. Four DCs have only 11-12 pace 🔻 while the faster two were either sold (Smolcic) or loaned out (Sykes)

• Poor Passing - they also can’t play a passing game / pass well out from the back - with between 9-12 passing 🔻 not ideal. 
   

Thoughts? 🙂 

Edited September 26, 2022 by DanEnglish

[DanEnglish]

Lessons Learned

WHY WHY WHY ?!
We have been fired six times. What have we learned from this ‘Groundhog Day’ as a Director of Football?

————————————

1. Holidaying
It seems that (a) holidaying gives much worse performance than (b) playing the season yourself or (c) editing in a manager to … er … manage the club.

This is a good thing - it makes a DoF career harder, you need to be even better to succeed against the odds.

 
2. Leagues
A DoF career is much harder if you only have one league loaded (e.g. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿England), as you have fewer players / bargains to pick from. 

Loading multiple leagues - especially 🇪🇸 Spain with its release clauses - would make a career easier.

————————————

 3. Style / AssMan
As @Ariza8 suggested, you want the best Assistant Manager possible. Natural, gold, and preferably with your preferred formation. 

• For realism purposes - I would only hire staff who were “interested” (in the search / filter) in joining our club - which meant only silver + bronze staff were available in season 1. This makes it harder. 
   
• Tip - this may mean you change / upgrade your AssMan each season (or half-season!)

 
4. Style / Tactics
Aligned with your choice of AssMan - you’ll need to setup your preferred tactic. The AssMan definitely uses your formation - so decide early on if you want a 41221, 4231, three at the back, etc.

• Note - I’m not sure if the AssMan uses the player roles + tactical instructions which you’ve setup, or perhaps not. Is best to setup it up and ‘hope’!
   
• Tip - as you’re on a tight budget - perhaps do NOT setup an attacking, short passing game! As likely your players won’t have the technical nor mental attributes to do it
   
• Tip - do NOT setup a high line if you plan to have slower center backs - e.g. young wonderkids or experienced bargains. Lower pace DCs will struggle to cope with a high line + speedy opposition STs !

————————————

5. Player Selection
Aligned with your chosen tactic - you’ll need to draft a new squad. I decided a bottom half Championship club gets £50m + £100k/week wages. It’s not much!

• I suggest you invest in a core squad of 15-18 players. Enough to cover a few injuries. But maybe leave some backup spaces unfilled, to invest in later.
• Plus buy some bargain players who you can loan out + sell on for good profit - this is how you’ll raise cash to reinforce those backup positions later on.
• ONLY buy wonderkids who’ll play in the first team - if their CA isn’t high enough, then the AI AssMan won’t play them, so they won’t develop and grow.

 
6. Player Injuries
Having our #1 keeper injured punished us in both the 1st + 2nd season ⚠️ Losing star DC Pablo + star IF Hlozek to injuries also hurt our form ⚠️ 

So you’ll want some capable backups - plus remember those bargain players you loaned out? If you have an injury crisis in one position, you can recall them 🙂  

————————————
 
7. Team Dynamics
This is a difficult one. Some of the better cheap players have terrible personalities.  

Hlozek is the cheapest attacking wonderkid (who the AI would start), but his negative influence hurt our squad.

You have a choice:

• Do you prioritise (more expensive) good personality players? 
• Or squad of normal price / normal personality players, with a few cheap good personality elderly players added on?
• Or you accept (slightly cheaper) poor personality youngsters, alongside cheap mentors? 

 
8. Team Leadership
On the other hand - perhaps you can afford a True Captain. First team players who are strict leaders, positively influencing the whole squad. 

This would be Captain Henderson at Liverpool. Players like this …

————————————
 
9. Do NOT Holiday
This seems to contradict my first point - but I actually only holiday the matches (‘next day’), otherwise I usually press ’CONTINUE’ through the season.

This allows you to respond immediately. Injury crisis at center back? Recall your spare DC from loan.

It also means - when you get fired - that you can attend the Board meeting yourself (and ‘save’ beforehand!)

 
Summary
Just some lessons and suggestions which I’ll learn from - may be interesting to you.

Have you learned anything else which I missed?! Please share 🙂 

Edited September 26, 2022 by DanEnglish