A FM Old Timer
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Tottenham 3-6 Liverpool – Recreating Liverpool’s tactic
After watching this game on TV and seeing how fluid the Liverpool team were in their movements, as well as how they exploited an under strength Tottenham side, I wanted to see if I could attempt to recreate the tactic within Football Manager. It’s worth saying that tactics, roles and team shape can and do […]
The ‘Juan’ in the Box – my take on a 2-3-5 tactic
Even before the release of Football Manager 2024, there was a lot of discourse about the new match engine and how it would enable positional play. It has allowed for formations within a tactic to now vary greatly from when a team is in possession to when it is out of possession (or OOP for […]
The Art of Moving On
I wrote a blog piece on this site for Football Manager 2023 called ‘The Art of Squad Building‘, in which I looked at a number of factors I utilise to initially improve, and then maintain, squad depth and quality. These included the importance of having a balanced squad, with little inequality between wages; player personality […]
The Art of Player Data Analysis – FBref style
In previous iterations of Football Manager, I’ve used data analysis to assess player performance at the end of a season by extracting data from the game due to a lack of analysis within the game. Since then, data analysis has become a key feature, with the additions of recruitment and performance analysts. This has been […]
The Art of Youth Development – Football Manager
Following the release of my previous in “The Art of” series, “The Art of Squad Building“, I had a number of people ask me questions regarding youth recruitment and development, so this post is going to expand further into the approaches which lay the foundations of youth recruitment and development that I look to utilise. […]
The Art of Squad Building – Football Manager
This blog acts as a follow-up, sister piece to my previous entry – The Art of the Signing. In that blog, I went through the various considerations that I undertake when deciding upon bringing someone into my squad. It hinted heavily about the importance of having a strong sense of harmony in a squad, and […]
The Art of the Signing – Football Manager
This post originates from a signing I have already made for my Bayer 04 Leverkusen side. I was appointed as manager of Die Schwarzroten after I was resoundingly sacked by the board at Genoa for starting a striker in a Coppa Italia game against Inter, whom I’d previously promised not to play due to poor form. […]
Football Manager 2023 – Genoa CFC: Mister (2)
Ad Maiora Semper Ciao, and welcome back to the second half of the first season at Genoa CFC. In this piece, you’ll read about the winter transfers, see how we finished off the second half of Serie B, and the financial impact of being in Serie B alongside my transfer business. Winter transfers After the […]
Football Manager 2023 – Genoa CFC: Mister (1)
Nuovi inizi Ciao, and welcome back to my first review of my time as Genoa CFC Mister. Below, you’ll read of the nuovi inizi (new beginnings) and how I’ve already begun to assert my way on the club both on and off the field. Staff and Transfer Dealings Assessing a new club is never easy. […]
Football Manager 2023 – Genoa CFC
Coming to decide upon a Football Manager save is typically never an easy process, especially given the amount of teams that are available to manage straight ‘out of the box’. Though, I guess that should really be straight from download these days…. However, for me, this year wasn’t that much of a challenge at all. […]
Finances in Football Manager – Southampton 2026-27 Quadruple Review
Having completed a season in which Southampton FC won (almost) everything, missing out only on the European Super Cup, I thought it worth a blog post to see how this affected the finances of the club, and what this could enable the club to achieve with regard to infrastructure, player recruitment and improvements within the […]
Finances & Football Manager
Those readers who follow me on Twitter (@afmoldtimer) will possibly already know that I’ve been keeping a record of the finances in my Southampton save. As someone with a background in finance and a degree in Economics, it’s probably no surprise to anyone that I have focussed on and enjoyed writing about player/team data within […]
Football Manager 2022: 4-3-1-2 – Third-man runs
I made an early decision to take a break from the Football Manager blogging scene, besides my guest blogging piece for FM Grasshopper where I took a deep dive into his trequartista using the available data to show just how well he had played. I’ve chosen not to diarise my save largely down to time […]
AC Le Havre – 2027-28 Season Review: Ligue 1 Ou Rien?
After last year’s highest ever Ligue 1 finish for Le Havre and a Champions League Final against Chelsea, it was time to see how far this side that I have put together could go. It feels like most of the pieces of the puzzle are there now, we just need to overcome the behemoth that […]
AC Le Havre – 2026-27 Season Review
After a tremendous season in Europe last year with lifting the Europa League, albeit with one to forget in Ligue 1, I was keen to continue the 4-2-3-1 formation. As a team, we are full of more skilled, technical players with pace and stamina to play a pressing style of football that we simply didn’t […]
AC Le Havre – 2025-26 Season Review
Transfer Update & Amortisation Knowing full well that Manchester United were not going to continually agree to the renewal of Hannibal’s loan, I’d already sought out his replacement in Cüneyt Gür last year. However, when Borussia Dortmund came in for the midfield orchestrator, he was understandably keen to leave to a club playing Champions League […]
AC Le Havre – 2024-25 Season Review
The 2024-25 season was a very successful one, relatively speaking. After achieving European football through league finish last season, we managed the same feat again with the latest campaign, improving our finish from 6th to 4th – as a result going through to the Europa League in 2025-26. With only PSG attaining more possession than […]
AC Le Havre – 2023-24 Season Review
The previous post, released some time ago now thanks to the impact of workload in real life, hinted at the prospect of European football for Le Havre. In the very next season, so it came to pass – we qualified for the UEFA Europa Conference League. The clubs first foray into continental competition. With an […]
AC Le Havre – 2022-23: Sailing out to a European waters?
The 2022-33 season saw us fall into an initial slump, with poor results against our opponents in the opening fixtures, seeing four defeats in the first seven games and only two wins. This form saw us sat in 15th. Only after around nine games did we find our rhythm. Reducing the number of goals conceded […]
AC Le Havre – 2021-22 Season Review
HAC Foot – Safe Haven in Ligue 1 The winter break saw HAC Foot in 8th place and it is there that we finished in our first campaign in Ligue 1. Quite some effort for a team expecting to be relegated back from whence we came. The second half of the season actually went better […]
AC Le Havre 2021-22 Mid-Season Update
HAC Foot Steps Having been promoted to Ligue 1 ahead of schedule, and having spent only around £4m in improving the squad, the bookmakers had us in the bottom five of the league after we made our additions to the squad. The Board and the players weren’t holding out too much hope when it came […]
AC Le Havre 2020-21 – La joie de vivre
Ligue 2 – Fais toujours de ton mieux même si personne ne regarde After the change in formation to the 433DM Wide, rolling goals against, i.e. average goals conceded over a rolling period of 10 games, plummeted to well below 0.5 goals per game. In part, it was this up-tick in the number of clean […]
AC Le Havre – Youth Intake 2020-21
Youth Intake 2021 – A golden generation…? As you see from the image below, there appears to be at least one incredible stand out player from this year’s youth intake. Sébastien Briand is a versatile, tough 15-year-old who looks set for the big time, if not with HAC Foot, then with a big team in […]
AC Le Havre 2020-21 Mid-Season Update
This mid-season update sees a review of the transfers that were made in the opening transfer window and how the season has progressed thus far at HAC Foot. There’s also a sneak peak at the youth intake. Transfer Methodology & Practice With a limited budget and no room in the wage budget, the available transfer […]
Football Manager 2021 – AC Le Havre
For Football Manager 2021, I’ve decided upon AC Le Havre. Given the addition of xG to the Football Manager series, this save and indeed this blog was going to continue the focus on team and player metrics as per the approach I adopted for FM20. However, as FM Stag has documented in FM Slack, metrics […]
FM21 Is Coming
For those that followed my AC Milan save in Football Manager 2020, you may have been wondering who I’ve chosen for Football Manager 2021. Keep reading to find out what I have decided. Data Analysis within Football Manager 2021 Given new data available in FM21 compared to previous editions, I am keen to further integrate […]
AC Milan – 2022-23 Season Review: La Risoluzione
You read this after the 2022-23 Champions League Final. AC Milan have just lost to Manchester City at Wembley after a 119th minute extra time goal by Bernardo Silva secured the trophy for the Citizens, after Piątek had missed a penalty in normal time. Within two days AC’s double scudetto-winning manager was fired. Why, you […]
AC Milan – Season Preview 2022-23
Before the new transfer window opened, AC Milan owner, Paul Singer announced his retirement, triggering a sale of the Club. This news was somewhat of a surprise in terms of his retirement but it was not a total shock as takeover rumours had been doing the rounds for some time. Indeed if you have read […]
AC Milan Tactical Set-up 2021-22
This post sets out to look at the tactical set-up of the double scudetto winners, AC Milan. Below you’ll see the players from the squad with hyperlinks to their metric radars – click on those to open a new window if you are interested in seeing them. Goalkeeper – Sweeper Keeper (Support) AC Milan academy […]
AC Milan 2021-22 Season Review
The 2021-22 Serie A season saw AC Milan defend their title, with a six point gap to second placed Napoli. I Rossoneri improved upon their points total, picking up an additional two, and maintained their frequency of clean sheets when compared to the 2020-21 season. With 69 goals scored (one fewer) and 15 goals conceded […]
AC Milan 2021-22 Summer Transfer Window Update
At start of the Summer of 2021, the squad performance was evaluated both holistically and individually. Personnel within the squad were identified as requiring an upgrade in the positional sense, most notably in the left-sided attacking midfield slot. Following a relatively poor showing for both Rebić, whose loan period ended, and for De Paul, whose […]
AC Milan 2020-21 Season – Player Analysis Hub
The player analysis initially started out as just one blog post but it soon became evident that it would have to be a series of blogs with one central hub. Each image below is just a sneak preview of the content within each of the three posts and all images are click-able to take you […]
AC Milan 2020-21 Season – Player Analysis: Defenders
Central Defenders AC Milan employed a flat back four throughout the season, using three main central defenders: Alessio Romagnoli, Mateo Musacchio and Mattia Caldara. The stand-out performer of the trio was the Club captain, Romagnoli. Whilst his pressure adjusted (PAdj) tackles/90 and key tackles/90 were very low (12th and 16th percentile respectively), he was won […]
AC Milan 2020-21 Season – Player Analysis: Central Midfielders
Central Midfield The central midfield trio play different roles within the tactical set-up, with a single pivot as a deep-lying playmaker, and the other two as a box-to-box midfielder and a mezzala. As such, the player radars look very different to one another. Sandro Tonali stepped up to the starting eleven at AC Milan when […]
AC Milan 2020-21 Season – Player Analysis: Attackers
Wide Attackers The attacking wide men in the AC Milan side play in the inverted winger and inside forward roles, depending upon who is playing in the various positions. The players drive at the half space in between central defenders and full backs before looking for a cross/shooting opportunity in the inverted winger role, or […]
AC Milan – 2020-21 End of Season Update – Club Focus
Having lost just two games before the Winter break, AC Milan were sitting atop Serie A. The squad had gone through something of a transformation, as clubs with a higher reputation, such as Liverpool, Manchester City and Real Madrid, picked off some of their best talents. Five players left, three of which were first teams […]
AC Milan 2020-21 January Transfer Window
The January transfer window found AC Milan top of Serie A, well above the target set by the board for the 2020-21 season. Having only lost just the last two games prior to the New Year, the Club had also qualified out of their Europa League group with SK Brann, Zenit St. Petersburg and GNK […]
AC Milan Squad Analysis & Summer Transfers
The previous post explained the reasoning for the choice of AC Milan. This post will look at the approach to squad analysis alongside player recruitment and retention. With a desire to use data to evaluate squad performance and inform player trading decisions, the game has been holidayed for a full year to 1st June 2020. […]
FM20 – The Preamble and Save Reveal
Serie A has been in relative decline for a number of years now, with Inter Milan the last Italian side to win the Champions League under Jose Mourinho back in 2010. The treble-winning side came after Internazionale racked up losses of in excess of £1bn over the preceding decade, funded by oil-backed Moratti, who openly […]
Central Attacking Midfield & Centre Forward
The attacking central midfielder in the Reggina line-up is set up to attack, designed to permeate the box, confuse defenders, and find space with their runs with a goal-scoring focus. Playing in behind a sole striker, a complete forward, link up play is important to make quick plays and progressions. Belgian international, Wim Janssen, joined […]
Winger Metric Analysis
The attacking flanks of the Reggina side are a key fulcrum to their tactical style of play. Providing width and a pincer movement when attacking the opposition area, the create and score goals. The right-sided winger is set to support, taking up a slightly deeper role than his counter-part. This twin attack, with the full […]
Central Midfield Metric Analysis
Central midfield is where the heartbeat lies within Reggina’s side. Great emphasis is placed upon the passing and vision attributes, looking to unpick the locks of deep-lying defensive tactics that opposition managers utilise to try to nullify their attacking strength. Whilst the Reggina style of play involves fast attacks, countering quickly with players encouraged to […]
Full Back Metric Analysis
Welcome to the first blog piece using Football Manager’s available statistics to assess Reggina squad players following their 2031-32 Serie A and Champions League wins. First up, the full backs: Right backs, Bongiorno and Speri, have both come through the Reggina academy. Bongiorno was identified straight away as a hot prospect and someone likely to […]