Setting up a Training Schedule in FM2008

I wouldn’t be embarrassed to say that since the FM series began its journey I didn’t put any of my special quality time into researching the new training system. Well, that’s if you can call it “new” after two-three games in which it remained the same. The reasons, or excuses of why people such as myself neglect such a crucial part of the game is partly because the latter offers easy solutions such as the default training schedules and the automatically assigning coaches. I would have called it laziness, but it is always better to blame the game.


You see, training is important because it gives players an opportunity to trial with actions they usually perform in match. The Italian training approach, for example, is widely-known for its repetitive nature of Italian key elements and moves – bringing the best out of their players.

Clicking on the your ‘Training’ menu will open two optional screens, the first is the main area which we will perform our dirty actions – setting players’ schedules, play with sliders and generally feel important.

There are few approaches to training schedules: 1. Put on default, then complain your players aren’t improving. 2. Download someone’ else training, then complain his schedules don’t work. 3. Read a guide about training, set it up like a parrot, then complain it doesn’t work for you. 4. Read this, then complain about the number of complaints written in this paragraph; Then, complain some more.

Now, seriously, there are two main approaches to training: Positional & Individual. The first focuses on player’s positions and generally based on the assumption that each position require similar group of attributes, thus each group of players playing at the same position can be trained at the same session. The second approach is time-consuming and complicated, and focuses on each player’s strengths, weakness and other variables discussed later on.

Part 1: Positional Training

+ Step 1: Deciding the most important attributes for a certain position; Prioritize them.

The level of each category workload varies depending on the current level the team plays, tactics, and even country. E.g. While we’re used to a high level of typical English central-backs’ aerial ability (jumping – aerobic; heading – ball control;), on more technical countries such as Argentina or even Spain – the most important attributes for a centre-backs will be speed (pace/acceleration-aerobic) and tackling (defending).

Attributes fall into these training categories:

Strength: Natural Fitness, Stamina, Strength and Work Rate.

Aerobic: Acceleration, Pace, Agility, Balance and Jumping.

Goalkeeping: Aerial Ability, Handling, Kicking, One On Ones and Throwing.

Tactics: Decisions, Off The Ball, Positioning, Teamwork and Anticipation.

Ball Control: Dribbling, First Touch, Heading, Technique and Flair.

Defending: Tackling, Marking and Concentration.

Attacking: Passing and Creativity.

Shooting: Finishing, Long Shots and Composure.

Set-Pieces: Corners, Crossing, Free Kicks, Long Throws and Penalty Taking.

+ Step 2: Create 4-9 (depends on how thorough you are) positional schedules. Name them according to positions. (Tip: don’t use long names, GK standing for Goalkeeper will do)

* Suggestion I: Keeper, Defense, Midfield, Attack.
* Suggestion II: GK (Goalkeeper), FB (Full-Back), WB (Wing-Back), CB (Centre-Back), DM (Defensive Midfielder), AM (Attacking Midfielder), WRL (Wingers), FS (Fast Striker), ST (Strong Striker).

After you created the schedules and got yourself a priority list for each position, it’s time to move some sliders. There are 3 different types of slider categories: Physical, Technical and Set-Pieces. One differ from another in its impact on the workload slider* –

Physical (Strength, Aerobic); 1 notch (refers to a click on a slider) on training category is equal to 1 notch on workload

Technical (The rest of categories but set-pieces and physical); 2 notches on training category is equal to 1 notch on workload

Set-Pieces; 3 notches on training category is equal to 1 notch on workload

The sliders themselves have a similar range from 0 to 25.

Training Slider – 0-25 (0 = None, 1-8 = Light, 9-15 = Medium, 16-22 = High, 23-25 = Intensive)

Workload Slider - 0-131 (0 = None, 1-24 = Very Light, 25-69 = Light, 70-109 = Medium, 110-119 = Heavy, 120-131 = Very Heavy)

Now you have all the information you need to create your position schedule. Let’s set-up one for example?Creating a new training schedule...

Position: Goalkeeper

Prioritizing Attributes: (Hint: It’s easier to use the ‘elimination method’, i.e. deciding which attributes aren’t needed)

Attacking, Shooting, Set-Pieces and Ball Control seem to be useless for a goalkeeper, although one may argue that a keeper should train on passing because his distribution is set to ‘Ask Defender to Collect’ – this should not be the focus of his training schedule, however.

Strength: Natural Fitness, Stamina, Strength and Work Rate.

Aerobic: Acceleration, Pace, Agility, Balance and Jumping.

Goalkeeping: Aerial Ability, Handling, Kicking, One On Ones and Throwing.

Tactics: Decisions, Off The Ball, Positioning, Teamwork and Anticipation.

Defending: Tackling, Marking and Concentration.

As you can probably see, it seems Goalkeeping (duh), Strength, and Tactics are the main aspects that a keeper should be focused upon. So, I push these sliders to the very right of medium – 15, while Aerobic and Defending will be on 9 (the very low of medium). Example for Keeper Schedule

The general consensus is that a player training session should never be on intensive, and his workload should never exceed the medium level – UNLESS you’re looking for a drastic change within short time.

As a rule of thumb, make sure your schedules have about a similar workload slider as the default ones – this way you’ll avoid picking up too many injuries and I’ll avoid nasty comments to this article (if any).

* I was trying to analyze the training sliders in reference to the workload slider by clicking on the various slider and watching the effect they had on the workload, this however wasn’t consistent enough for one value. Sometimes a notch on the technical categories increased workload by one, sometimes it took three notches to see any change; I suspect the workload slider wide range (0-131) doesn’t allow to watch any progress through the slider movement, although a progress has been made. I’d be happy to accept any alternative explanations or corrections about this subject.