Help in Breaking through the Championship.

[SabbeH03]

Hey guys.

Of late I've been playing a LLM save, taking Chelsmford City from BSS up through the leagues. I got to the Championship and am now into my 3rd season there (its just about to turn 2021) and i just dont feel I am getting any more progress.

Board room aside with the fact they wont do anything to help the club I just cannot get results when I need them in the league, or the cups. If i play a team in a lower league than me that i should really batter, with good morale I tell them I expect a win, they'll more often then not scrape it by the skin of their teeth, rather than batter them

If i get a fixture against someone whos lower in the championship than me, or around the same position then I can kiss goodbye to any kind of result nothing I can say can motivate them, but heroically give me a fixture against anyone from the top 3, or the Premiership and i'll give them a good fight for their money!

overall I just cannot get results with the players, they're perfectly good, easily top half of the championship, but I'm currently sat 15th, and the same can be said for the past 2 seasons beforehand. I just cannot get anything out of them

I have tried multiple different formations and tactics, several from here (yes I gave them time to blend in and get fluid with the formation) but still, no result at best, i'll put a new formation in, they'll win the first 3 games, then thats it, wont win again with it once they get close to fluid and i need another formation....

anybody have any sort of advice that may help? or does anybody even want my save file, see what they can scrape outta these guys?

 

[jnoodles]

I don't know about you but I tend to find morale plays a massive part in getting results. I tend to try and keep the whole 1st team squad happy at all times.

A good trick is to schedule loads of tours for your reserves to places like Luxembourg, American Samoa etc etc. That way if players in your 1st team squad are lacking morale, just make them available for one or two of the games against far inferior opposition and they should come back with much better morale with minimum impact on their match fitness for your championship campaign.

 

[SabbeH03]

I don't know about you but I tend to find morale plays a massive part in getting results. I tend to try and keep the whole 1st team squad happy at all times.

A good trick is to schedule loads of tours for your reserves to places like Luxembourg, American Samoa etc etc. That way if players in your 1st team squad are lacking morale, just make them available for one or two of the games against far inferior opposition and they should come back with much better morale with minimum impact on their match fitness for your championship campaign.

Morale is more or less fine, with the exception of one or two players who just played like utter utter.... well you know where i am going with that... they then had the good graces to turn around and say "i'm not happy we're underachieving" causing their morale to plummet.

its as bad as my last post on here, about a week ago i had a similar problem in my first championship season. we'd just promoted, was predicted to lose horribly in the league and relegate, instead we finished in top half. yet the players were unhappy we were "underachieving"

Cocky gits

 

[iNickStuff]

What is your squad's personality? With these kinds of things, it's best to look at the team, and pick out your best eleven, along with substitutes you are most comfortable with. With that, you can focus on their games to get them better and for the team to play better, because it's your best eleven. The same can be said when you are finding that your players are not performing to the standard that they should be. You can then look at their personalities, and then have a little more focus on them and try to get their morale back up.

Putting that aside, tactically, you will need to do a couple of things.

First of all, if I were you, I would wipe out all of the tactics being put in place (out of the Tactics screen, out of the Match Preparation. You can keep them if you want, but save them first) and then find out your best formation. Whether it be a 4-4-2, 4-5-1, 4-2-3-1 (etc.) pick one. It's best to find out from your backroom staff, or formations your team struggles against. Once you have done that, the team's strengths and weaknesses should be applied.

For example, if your team are quick, good passers and have good technique, you could try a 4-2-3-1 with a decently-quick tempo, a high line and wide play out to the wingers. If your team is tall, strong and aggressive, you could try a defensive 4-5-1, with man-marking central midfielders and fast wingers to counter on the break, whilst having a tall target man to take on headers from crosses or corners.

Once you have created the formation, create a second with small tweaks, eg. if you chose attacking, you could make one that is counter-attacking, so that when you are away from home, you can use that one instead of using the attacking formation all the time. After all of that, put the first formation in the first box, and the tweaked formation of the original in the second box. Once done (assuming that you put on Team Blend in pre-season or you haven't bought anyone recently) put the workload on High.

Play this for a good 15-20 games, and see how the results go. If you are higher than 15th, then it's obviously working. If not, look back. Go back onto the matches that you lost or games that you drew. Look at it and analyse it. It's good to do this because you can look at some of the flaws in it and some in the players, whether they are playing in a role or duty that doesn't suit them, or the tactic is not holding up against opposition teams.

I have written articles on possession and counter-attacking, so you might want to look at them. They are here and here. Sorry about the monstrous reply. Hope this helps though.

 

[SabbeH03]

thank you Nick! I will certainly give it a go.

our best finish in the Championship was around 10th so i'll take that as a marker rather than 15th if thats ok!

the teams personality is ambitious so i spose that does contribute to my solid underdog form, but only well i'm a massive massive underdog as generally I am the underdog all season long.

I had been using a 4-5-1 of late, not far different from your suggestion, but with attacking center mid's rather than man marking defensive ones.

my Striker is the perfect target man for that kind of formation, unfortunately in the 9 months i've had him he has scored 5 goals, 3 of which were penalties. my other striker, stat wise is appalling compared to him, but regularly bangs in goals so its not all bad there.

I will certainly give what you have said a go though, thank you so much!

Now all I have to solve is the injury plague I have to suffer.... players are JUST starting to come back from a pre season friendly injury... I swear i played rotherhams rugby team rather than football! i left there with 4 injured players, the shortest being a Month out, the longest being 6-7 months.

FML!

 

[iNickStuff]

thank you Nick! I will certainly give it a go.

our best finish in the Championship was around 10th so i'll take that as a marker rather than 15th if thats ok!

the teams personality is ambitious so i spose that does contribute to my solid underdog form, but only well i'm a massive massive underdog as generally I am the underdog all season long.

I had been using a 4-5-1 of late, not far different from your suggestion, but with attacking center mid's rather than man marking defensive ones.

my Striker is the perfect target man for that kind of formation, unfortunately in the 9 months i've had him he has scored 5 goals, 3 of which were penalties. my other striker, stat wise is appalling compared to him, but regularly bangs in goals so its not all bad there.

I will certainly give what you have said a go though, thank you so much!

Now all I have to solve is the injury plague I have to suffer.... players are JUST starting to come back from a pre season friendly injury... I swear i played rotherhams rugby team rather than football! i left there with 4 injured players, the shortest being a Month out, the longest being 6-7 months.

FML!

Good luck with it. I can give you more advice whenever. Just message me.

 

[SabbeH03]

Well I think thats my career over...

after a 6-2 battering at Molineux i went to criticize a loanee for his 3.9 performance...

He disagreed and thought he was treated unfairly.

No less than 6 members of the first team have turned around and are unhappy with the way he has been treated...

Thanks for the Help Nick, but I am so close to calling it a day on this save!

 

[nellyboo1]

the loanee you have get rid of back to his team, any loanee who dont perform should be booted off your team and told to get lost lol, they only ruin morale.

but rather then call time on your save, if your not getting the thrill with your team, why not leave them for another job that will potentially grow into a better team or u could do wonders with?

 

[SabbeH03]

He's usually a solid performer so i was hoping it would be a one off disaster for him. just tried to say he was dissappointing and he kicked off

and by calling it a day I mean to start a new save in general, nothing to say i cant keep this one somewhere and come back to it!

 

[W4FC B3N]

You should have a brilliant reputation! Have you had many offers to go and manage other clubs?

 

[SabbeH03]

You should have a brilliant reputation! Have you had many offers to go and manage other clubs?

3 offers off the top of my head.

Huddersfield (34 Million Transfer, 275k Wages Championship)
Bristol City (12 Million Transfer, 325k Wages Championship)
QPR (11 Million Transfer, 425k Wages, Championship.... almost league 1)

I just dont feel like ditching a team i built and made what it is today

still cant get an international job to save my life though

 

[W4FC B3N]

I think the international jobs are looking for someone who has managed at the top level for a few seasons. I say stick with it and make that your new objective! You've done excellent so far, would be a waste to give up, imo.