Football Manager 2013

[itszamora]

I'm still playing 2012 - downloaded the demo of 2013 but didn't really get into it.

Started a save a few months ago starting unemployed but with a high reputation - after a few months I landed the job at Feyenoord, 11th in the Dutch league at the time. Money is pretty tight but there is some excellent young talent, plus the facilities to produce more. Finished 3rd at the end of the first season, but slumped a bit in the second and could only manage 5th, despite scoring more goals and conceding fewer than the previous year. Too many silly points dropped cost us badly, and it was probably only our European run (QFs of the Europa League, knocked out by Man City despite beating them 3-1 at home) that kept me in a job - especially after I tried to jump ship to first Fiorentina and then PSG.

Decided to stay loyal and forget about other jobs for a little bit and we're currently top in my 3rd season, ten games in. No Europe to distract us this season, and now no cup as well - got a CB sent off and the sub I brought on had such a mare that I've decided my experiment with him is over - he's a young-ish player who I kept in the summer despite some decent offers. Kicking myself for doing so - I've now decided he's not ever going to stop being fatally flawed and needs to be shipped out. Hopefully the team that wanted him in the summer will come back in.

 

[itszamora]

Oh, and I've signed a LUDICROUS regen striker from Leyton Orient, of all places. 16 years old and he's already the 3rd best forward at the club. Very excited about him, and an utter steal at £70k.

 

[willyfantastic]

Oh, and I've signed a LUDICROUS regen striker from Leyton Orient, of all places. 16 years old and he's already the 3rd best forward at the club. Very excited about him, and an utter steal at £70k.

got back into fm recently and started a save with Inter (my favourite italian team from back in the day when it was easier as a child to watch football italia then motd), which in theory should be easy seeing as they've dominated italy and europe only recently. however they are currently in a slump, have an old, weak squad by their standards, and no money (starting debts of £400m, little transfer budget and running at a loss until the end of the season, meaning very hard to upgrade/improve anything)

they also ask you to play attacking football, which is fine as most of my tactics are relentlessly attacking, but it means you cant play the patient poyet way, and playing in such a way take up a lot of stamina every game, meaning you need a slightly larger squad to keep it going (especially when youre playing in europa league/cl)

currently in my 3rd season after two 2nd place finishes (an aging milito banging in most of my goals) behind an unstoppable juventus - 1st season kept the majority of the original squad but changed to a 3-5-2 as i wanted to see if i could make y own 3-5-2 tactic that wouldnt ship in loads of goals via crosses

have only spent my money on youngsters where possible (1 handy thing about being a big club is being able to unsettle players you want, who then complain and get transfer listed for around their value, rather than sometimes being around 30-50m) so have got a lot of good young italian talent (verratti, insigne, capuano, perin, immobile) and trying to work in the good youth they have already (longo, benassi, kovacic, juan jesus, ranocchia) paired with steely experience (zanetti/stankovic just retired this season, still have cambiasso, samuel and milito, and brought back Forlan) i have got a very solid squad, with good quality cover around most positions

so far this season me and juventus have been dominating the league until i had to face them and lost, so im now lagging behind coming up to december (juventus still havent lost, they get llorente at the end of the 1st season and he is godlike)
Managed to get money back in order by reducing wages of older players and selling anybody earning more than their ability suggests, plus the youngsters are on smaller salaries that improve every year (as they should)

i havent had as much fun with a save as this one, as there are a lot of very good teams challenging in europe, and the serie a is a very balanced league in terms of teams with quality

 

[Chris_Highwind]

The horrible moment when on transfer deadline day, Liverpool bid team of the year CB Lewis Dunk's release clause

 

[mrbigshot]

The horrible moment when on transfer deadline day, Liverpool bid team of the year CB Lewis Dunk's release clause

Dunk had a superb season for me as we finished 2nd the Championship, and with rumours Southampton were in for him I offered him a long contract with £20m release clause which he accepted. A couple of good seasons later and he's playing for England now!

 

[Chris_Highwind]

Dunk had a superb season for me as we finished 2nd the Championship, and with rumours Southampton were in for him I offered him a long contract with £20m release clause which he accepted. A couple of good seasons later and he's playing for England now!

Yeh he had 2 brilliant seasons for me in the Prem, was one of the CBs in the Prem team of the year last season... completely forgot his £11mil release clause Got 21 year old Josh Stones from Everton as a replacement

 

[The_Viper]

I've downloaded a database which merges all EU leagues into one, it's absolutely brilliant. I started as BHA in Euro Division 3D, and just won the 3A title so I'm now in 2D. They have released several other databases across the continents so if you download them all you can take part in a giant super champions league cup too.

I have Suso, I've also signed Ulloa just this season (2016) and have two beast youngsters, one cypriot and one french lad. I'm playing 4-2-2-1-1 2 dm's, a rm/lm and a CAM behind my striker.

 

[itszamora]

I'm still at Feyenoord on 2012. Now just past the January 2014 window, and, having beaten Ajax in our last game, we're now 8 points clear with 11 games to go. However, having sold a key centre-back in the summer, the chairman decided to sell my hottest prospect (a brilliant Dutch AMC) and star midfielder in the January window. We got a lot of cash, which allowed me to add a bit of depth in other areas for pretty much the first time since I came in, but even so, I think it might mean I move on in the summer, even if we win the league. Although finances would go through the roof then, as not only would we be in the Champions League, but the club's debt gets paid off at the end of the current season. So that might be tempting, I'd hopefully have a lot of extra cash to play with.

 

[ExmouthExile]

Absolutely pissed off with this game today. I just spent 4 hours of my day off getting Brighton up to 2nd in the Championship, 4 wins in a row including an FA Cup win to get us into the 5th round. Then in the middle of talks with Pete Brezovan over his unhappiness at the club, the bloody game crashes to desktop! I know it serves me right for not saving at regular intervals, but that doesn't make it any less annoying. Back to angry birds for me grrrrr!

 

[Eksman]

Ffs brezovan!!

 

[Northstander]

I am doing well, just got Albion to the premiership!

What has pissed me off however was thinking I'd signed Owen up front, despite having talks at the Happy Chef, it never happened!

oh well, back to the drawing board, trying to find out if Kanchelskis is available!

 

[Paul Reids Sock]

I still can't get into this version like previous ones. The mrs is going away with our son in a few weeks so I'll have 5 clear days in which I will give it a good go. I started alright with Brighton and then it all went down hill as I purchased way too many players and couldn't get rid of the others which made them all unhappy

FFSHarley

 

[Brighton Breezy]

Playing the classic version on 2013.

Get miffed with it regularly though.

Any tips of players to sign for cheap at the start of the game and good tactics, team instructions for the Albion?

 

[Chris_Highwind]

28 year old Neymar signed for me for £40million, scores a hattrick as the Albion beat Barcelona in the champions league final 5-1!

 

[brighton_girl87]

Playing the classic version on 2013.

Get miffed with it regularly though.

Any tips of players to sign for cheap at the start of the game and good tactics, team instructions for the Albion?

I won the league in the first season by doing this:

Signings: In the first season I signed Carles Planas from Barcelona B for £275k and three youngsters for free (who all turned out to be useless).

Tactics: I downloaded this one - http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/foot...ka-domination-extreme-4-3-2-1-passion4fm.html

I changed the forward to be a Poacher, rather than a Trequartista.

 

[SULLY COULDNT SHOOT]

When Whitehawk won the Ryman decided to do it myself. One promotion after another and Im now winning league 1. For me, this is the only way to play FM, from the bottom up! The new version does not allow all-winning tactics. You have to be prepared to adapt and use shouts. Took an old Barcelona tactic and and adapted it myself and then made my own shouts. seems to work a treat but only if you get in the players who can play that style. Gareth Bale would be a complete waste at my team.

 

[BBassic]

I decided to give 2013 a final try after getting bored with dominating 2012 and I'm loving it this time around.

Signed Carles Planes and Sergi Gomez from Barca for next to nothing. Netted a nice 3mil for Vicente (easy money and he's not good enough if you get promoted) and play an attacking but patient 4-3-3 where I can stick one of the midfielders into an attacking or defensive role depending on the opposition.

Doing well, top of the table going into January in the first season.

 

[HawkTheSeagull]

If you start off with Albion on FM13 - a MUST buy(ish) is Jamie Mackie on loan, just re-started the game and he bagged 30 goals in a season for me, with Ulloa grabbing 22 and Barnes 15.

 

[SULLY COULDNT SHOOT]

I won the league in the first season by doing this:

Signings: In the first season I signed Carles Planas from Barcelona B for £275k and three youngsters for free (who all turned out to be useless).

Tactics: I downloaded this one - http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/foot...ka-domination-extreme-4-3-2-1-passion4fm.html



I changed the forward to be a Poacher, rather than a Trequartista.

I used to use that tactic but just found it so boring to watch, especially in the lower leagues.

 

[fruitnveg]

I found, after many a frustrating evening watching my team getting destroyed, that old tactics from the previous game did not work. Something to do with the way they've changed the match engine, including collision detection between players (no running straight through each other now!). Anyway, the point is, I wanted my teams to play a slick and more importantly entertaining way. The best tip I found without downloading or copying other tactics was just to keep it simple. The sliders and player instructions can really mess up the flow of a match if used incorrectly, if you don't understand exactly how they interact within the match engine, don't use them.

By jove, it works. In an experimental game i've just taken Brighton from 20th (on 22nd December when I took over from a sacked mr Poyet) to 4th in my first season and won the playoffs, beating Watford 4-1 on aggregate and then Liecester 6-3 in the final. Ok, my defending can be a little sketchy, but they score goals which keeps the fans on side. So far sitting three games into my first prem season, drew 1-1 with City on the opening day, beat sunderland 1-0 next match and scrapped past Colchester in the cup 1-0 (I gave the guys some shit for that, they deserved it).

Basically, don't copy other tactics. It can work for a while, but if you want to do well you need to understand how your team plays, best way to do that is to make them play your way.

Edit: Also, man, that avatar is brilliant