RIP Steven Fraser (SFraser)

Posted on September 22, 2011 by Thomas

It’s very rare when you are part of a community that exists solely online that you are shocked or sincerely saddened to hear of the death of someone that you never met personally. But today I logged on to the Sports Interactive tactics forum to the shocking news that of early August SFraser had died.

The news was a little slow getting to me due to the fact I wasn’t playing or writing too much about the game over this time I had no reason to go checking the SI forums so forgive my lateness on the issue.

But I felt that it was only right to pay respects to Steven Fraser because of the influence that he has had on this very site.

If you don’t hang around the Sports Interactive forums you probably know very little about Steven, but a passionate Manchester United and Football Manager fan he would debate in-depth and with steel his view regarding both. Considered one of the forefront thinkers in Football Manager tactics he embraced the simulation aspect of Football Manager and wrote many guides that informed, educated and entertained.

Infact much of his writing has inspired a lot of my latest posts. As you will have seen me mention in a lot of his ideas of staff and youth development all of which ideas I wish to take further in 2012.

His opinion and personality could really heat debates up and may not have pleased everyone he was someone that everyone held with great esteem and respect and what a better tribute could their be other than his own work? All of which you can find below:

Back Room Staff: What They Are Good At and How to Use Them

A Guide To Developing Youth 

Meet The System

How to Meet The Next Season

Analysing the 4-2-3-1: Why Your Playmaker Should be Upfront

Creativity and Flair

Shooting with Power versus Places shots

A Guide to Mentality

Other Threads SFraser Started

I like the idea I seen in the tribute thread of making Steven a coaching regen for Man U in the game… I think a subtle and fitting tribute for what he has contributed to the community and Sports Interactive.

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Football Manager Pundit – going forward

Posted on August 29, 2011 by Thomas

The days between the announcement of Football Manager 2012 and it’s release are the days when each Football Manager player will look to the future, start wrapping up their current careers. Football Manager sites will take the time to plan for the future. For us it is just like a real managers Pre-Season.

Football Manager Pundit will almost be 2 years old when the latest game is released and I would never have thought that I would reach this point and we would actually be fairly popular with most readers. Despite the downturn in activity the site still continues to grow and sees me interact with 550 people are Facebook and 965 people on Twitter and over 5,000 people still visit the site on a weekly basis.

I think FM Pundit has lost a bit of strategy and direction and as a result has tried to do too much which has resulted in us doing too little.

With 2012 I want to re launch the site, one the is easy to get around and offers what you want. The next couple of months I won’t be playing Football Manager 2011 and instead looking forward to FM2012. I will continue to deliver you news but I want to get the site back to what it does best. Taking you through the ways in which I play the game looking to learn and apply new strategies and have a bit of fun.

So therefore not much will be posted from now and the release of the new game, I will continue to keep you up-to-date on the developments coming out of Sports Interactive towers.

But tell me what do you like about FM Pundit, what would you like to see in the future? Post you comments below.

Also keep up to date with me on Twitter and Facebook.

Posted in Miscellaneous | 8 Comments

Football Manager 2012 Preview [VIDEOS]

Posted on August 15, 2011 by Thomas

Sports Interactive today have released two video to whet appetite for the new Football Manager game that will be out later this year.

What do you think? We have a look at the new match engine, a few of the camera tricks look like some nice simple additions and a change to further adapt the home screen.

 

 

Key new & improved features for Football Manager 2012:

Transfers & Contracts – significant changes to the transfer and contract systems, including loyalty bonuses, better implementation of amateur and youth contracts, an improved transfer centre and the ability to lock areas of the contract negotiation when you aren’t prepared to budge. This helps you to manage your budgets and gives you flexibility in what you offer money hungry players, or agents, as incentives.

Scouting improvements – using several real life scouting reports, a new in-game report has been devised which includes squad analysis, tactics information and information about goals scored and conceded alongside lots of other scouting improvements, giving you all the information you need to prepare before kick-off and throughout the season.

3D Match Improvements – new animations, a whole new crowd system, improved weather system, more stadiums, plus two brand new cameras – “Behind Goal” and “Director Cam” as well as all other camera angles being reversible – meaning you can watch and analyse every aspect of every game.

Manage Anywhere, Anytime – the ability to add or take away playable nations in your saved game as often as you want. Manage in that country at the start of the next season- meaning you don’t have to stay in the nations which are chosen by you to be playable at the start of your career.

Tone – a whole new level has been added to team talks and conversations, with the new tone system, which allows you to specify the way you want to say things – be as cool as a cucumber by saying things calmly or throw tea cups around by saying things with passion. There are 6 different tones to choose from with specific comments per tone.

Intelligent Interface – a new adaptive layout system, which means the higher your screen resolution, the more info is easily at your fingertips. The new interface also contains new filters, customisable columns, a new tactics screen, and lots of new overview screens.

Brand New Tutorial – standing separate from the main game, a mode to help new players find their way around the game easily, whilst also offering tips to experienced managers on how to get the most out of the game, as well as a new in-game “how to” system.

On top of these key innovations, there are lots of areas of the game that have had huge improvements, such as the media system, press conferences, the youth system, newgens, the social networking options, friendlies, international management and many more which will be detailed in a series of video blogs over the coming months, alongside more information about Football Manager 2012.

Posted in Official Announcements | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

A Team of Trusted Advisors – Building the Backroom

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Thomas

With the Scouting Network setup, the staff to man that network in place the next step was to put together the team that would look after those players and me helping develop the players of now and tomorrow.

The SFraser thread discussing the roles of the backroom staff in has given me new perspective on how to look at the role of all staff within the side. No longer do I see coaches as a means just to develop the players as best as possible star rating within training. No longer will the convenient plug and play of coaches do, to get the most out of development of the side I will be a little more wise in my appointments.

The backroom staff will be built not only to help develop my players in training but to help give feedback, the appointments should be ore tailored to your needs as a manager and not just the best trainer.

Continue reading →

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Liverpool FC: The Start of a Revolution – Scouting Network

Posted on July 22, 2011 by Thomas

When Football Manager 2011 was released in November 2010. Liverpool were under Hick and Gillett control, spiralling out of control in debt and for me and fellow fans things were looking grim and as a result I never really bothered with Liverpool, until now.

What a difference a few months can make. The situation at Anfield is more positive and we at last can look forward to the new season, we have money, we have competent owners and we are beginning to put a team back together instead of selling off our best players. What Liverpool are putting together in the long-term is pretty interesting. Recruiting young players with plenty of potential, with a clear strategy and the use of moneyball principles which has been in vogue as of late. It’s a good time to see what I can do with Liverpool for my latest save as what Liverpool are doing has very close ties to what we have seen at Udinese and although there is clear difference I think that I can use what I have learned during that save and apply it to Liverpool as well as looking for a new challenge.

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Posted in Strategy | Tagged , , | 6 Comments

Tales of a Football Manager: Edinson Cavani to Manchester United

Posted on July 2, 2011 by dylan

This is a guest piece from Dylan O’Neill, you can find more from Dylan at The Football Department

So I was playing Football Manager last night. No biggie, just a casual ending to a casual day. Picking Manchester United as my team I came with a plan. That plan was to chase down, if necessary, stalk Napoli’s Edinson Cavani to persuade the Uruguayan to the Red Devils. August 21st was quite possibly the greatest day of my football managerial career. Landing Edinson Cavani for the handsome sum of £24.5m, quite a bargain in my opinion considering the reckless spending that goes on in the outside world. My reaction to his signing was that he’d get off to a flyer but that wasn’t the case. It very rarely is the case, in fact.

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Udinese Spotlight: Christian Eriksen

Posted on May 18, 2011 by Thomas

Many in England will know Christian Eriksen from his recent friendly against England, he was outstanding sitting behind striker and took many by surprise. He was the best thing on show that night, despite an impressive first start from Jack Wilshere.

Eriksen has also been gaining great plaudits in Holland, Frank De Boer giving him more responsibility since he replaced Jol. Christian has not disappointed helping Ajax to their first league title in 7 years. A little more on Eriksen can be found at TTFootball, the 19 year old looks to have a bright future and De Boer and Cryuff look to build the future Ajax side around him.

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Best Contract Money Saving Tips

Posted on April 18, 2011 by Thomas

Buying players and paying for their wages is no doubt the largest outgoings you have at your club. Players get greedy, clubs command huge fees for the best players and you want to succeed, paying anything in the that search. But once you get that success without a decent transfer policy that success can soon disappear as you run out of money and your team starts to age. One way though to save the pennies is to make sure you use those contract negotiations to get the best possible deal for your accountant.

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Posted in Strategy | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Crunching the Numbers: Udinese Finances

Posted on April 8, 2011 by Thomas

3 seasons in I am still at the helm of Udinese Calcio, playing great football and putting a strong side together to take on the Italian elite. Young, valuable and ambitious.

My 2nd season I fought hard for a Champions League place right to the wire. The final game of the season I went into a game with Roma in good form, beating the sides around me it had taken me to a unthinkable position of being able to make 3rd place.  Drawing the game was enough to see me take 4th and the final Champions League spot, a win would would make 3rd certain. Losing would mean that I had to rely on either Sampdoria or Juventus losing.

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Posted in Strategy | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Exploiting Your Resource, Exploiting the Market

Posted on March 8, 2011 by Thomas

A few months ago I spoke about the most efficient transfer policies and how they could be applied to Football Manager, all of which was aimed to get the best players at the best prices.

Many confuse these ‘moneyball‘ techniques with not spending money or scrimping as much as possible, but that is not the case. The approach is to look at players and find the value in those players. You can buy a player for £100m as long as there is value in that signing.

Liverpool recently sold an out of form 26 year old striker for £50 million. Before bringing in two strikers who are on form and younger at 22 and 24, exploiting the market. Many have argued that these players were over priced, but crunching the numbers will see that only £8m net was spent during January and gained two player for one and hopefully in the long run will become more valuable as a result.

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