Approaching the middle of March and league form has been awful, a few draws and mostly defeats have seen us slip down to 20th in the table, perilously close to the relegation zone, but the signing of Emmanuel Dennis at CF and Jonathan David who can play on the wing or as a Striker, have given us a bit more potency in front of goal, w are going to need their goals if we want to stay up this season.
Leeds Utd were the side that were defeated in order to put and end to our poor run of draws and defeats, always nice to get one over on Leeds, even a virtual Leeds side.
A double-header awaited as we played Leeds firstly in the league, then again straight away this time in the FA Cup, securing back to back wins lifted the lads and gave us fresh belief heading into February.
Highlights are shown below.
A defeat away to Bristol City and a draw at home to Norwich wasn’t the best form heading into our visit from Premier League side Crystal Palace in the FA Cup 4th round, Extra training sessions were put on in order to get the boys focused and match-sharp, I also fit in time to do an interview for the local rag.
Palace were duly despatched 2-0 in a game that we had to fight hard to earn anything from, they were strong and organised but had a bad day in front of goal, Roy cut a frustrated figure on the sidelines and booted a few of the water bottles at the final whistle.
We are turning into a cup team, and need to transfer some of the focus and discipline we show in those matches across to our league form, our position isn’t acceptable and the fans demand more, rightly so, as do the board, me and the players.|
FA Cup highlights vs Palace shown below
As I said in my interview, we are trying to. build a solid base and platform from which we can push on next year to mount a serious title challenge, I think the fans know that this year is about setting a template, getting in the players we need and taking consistent, steady steps towards next season, they have been brilliant so far this year, always giving the lads their support on the pitch.
Tuesday saw EA release their first title update on the PS4, after positive reviews from PC players that had it a week previous, I’m not sure, but the game feels much harder since, defending seems to be more manual and the COM teams are closing down like Liverpool at Anfield on a European night, I’m having a tough time of it at present.
FIFAFX.com 
Emmanuel Dennis is a very good signing based on his real-life counterpart and his replications in other football games. Is he signed permanently?
Nice to see Coynborough doing well for himself. But not sure if the business side of football will end well for Dodo!
Hopefully a Cup run will fend off any threat of the sack if you finish bottom half. Who is up next?
Jay
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is that you Jay? is that a typo in your name?
I’d never heard of Emmanuel Dennis, but he’s fast, and can finish.
Coynborough’s business is flourishing, can knock out 25 properties in a day!
Since writing this post, I’ve played the last 16 round of the FA Cup, and the subsequent replay after the draw. I beat Villa on Penalties in the end to go through to the quarter finals. Draw hasn’t been made yet.
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Paul – I forgot you could be relegated in CM in FIFA. If that happens, what will you do? Suck it up or start again? Parachuting Forest into the Premier League yourself is still an option.
Poor old Colin Coynborough. Fate is cruel.
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NG – If i get relegated and somehow keep my job, I will carry on.
If I get sacked, I will find a new club and carry on.
No restarts.
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Great post Paul and thanks for the free salad/sandwich coupon. It is indeed sad to hear about Colin. I bet he’s a bloody good window cleaner though. No lack of elbow grease.
What’s your chairman’s target for you this season. I’m guessing getting the sack is still a thing in CM although hopefully it’s a little fairer than it used to be.
The high pressure opposition doesn’t really come across in those highlights, or were these matches played before the patch?
What is it now, two weeks since FIFA 19’s release day? If those PES pangs aren’t happening by now then maybe this really is the one to bring balance to the footy gaming force.
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It is me, Jay. I signed off as Jay to counter the fact my WP account is TheFalseLiberty (I am TheFalseLibero on Twitter). Both are references to my fledgling career as a reporter that quietly ticks alongside my full time and proper employment.
Good news on the Cup. I was once sacked on FIFA 17 after back to back promotions purely for being midtable in my first season in the Champ instead of higher. I played as Mansfield and my transfer policy was to only sign Saints and Ex-Saints players.
Can you still buy career mode add ons with the in-game FIFA points?
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Use it wisely Shed, expires soon!
My objectives were outlined in the first post on here, but basically thy were:
– To sign a youth player to each of the 4 positions – Completed
– To sign a ‘Crucial’ forward player – Incomplete as when I signed Dennis, I chose ‘Important’ as his role, because I wasn’t sure how good he would be and had other CF’s to pick from too
– To finish in automatic promotion places, ie 1st or 2nd – Incomplete as can be.
My Board rating is now under 60.
I have no wish or thought to play PES 19 Shed, so thats a good thing, no flip flopping.
I will test it out once the fabled patch hits though.
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Jay – Yes you can add career mode rewards from the EA catalogue, such as top scouts, replay matches, billionaire investment etc, but I haven’t touched any of them.
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I am currently a few games off the January window and sat in second. I had a few post update games this morning and the pass speed has obviously been raised. Not sure if this a positive? I also think the defending felt more manual and the game a bit tougher as a result. This morning I was plotting who to sign on a Bosman and which players to train up for the latter part of the season. Also brought in some loan players (Brewster included) to have a bigger squad for a promotion push.
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Hey Darryl. Doing well.
Not sure if pass speed as such has changed but more the way the ball travels. It’s less ‘ball rolling on a waterlogged pitch’ now and the ball veolocity is more natural.
Definitely feels harder.
Transfer search confuses me.
Free agents list is only ever Indians and other poor players.
Also if I go to search and literally just specify a LM then shouldn’t the results return all LMs in the game ? It doesn’t seem to. Just a small selection even though there’s no filters applied and transfer status is set to all ?
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Much nicer looking newspaper Paul, less glossy and more newspapery. Good to see Mrs Ximilez has got herself a career.
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BTW that newspaper is starting to remind me of http://www.framleyexaminer.com/pages/clas011
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Cheers Chris99 – good spot on the Ximelez Easter egg. It was Mr though. Of PES Fame. 😉
That Framley paper does bare similarities.
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Not doing much better myself despite being the division top scorers that they remind me of at beginning of the match. I’m not rattling through it as quickly as you though Paul. Penalties both for and against are hurting me and also wonder goals from the AI. Mason Mount needs to be taken out in the first minute of the return fixture after the pair he stuck past me.
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You must be doing at least Ok to be the leagues top scorers PRS ?
PNE are the leagues best team so far. They dicked me 4-1 on professional.
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Aah, I saw the drawing and thought it was his wife. Pedro is of course the masculine form of the name.
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As we didnt get first names with the old defaults in PES Chris, I just went for random names that fitted their nationalities could be a Franco Ximelez, or a Simon Coynborough for all we know.
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I was but starting to bite now. Think I need to rethink my tactics. Lacking in a plan b and getting over run in midfield
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Paul – I really never bother with free agents for that reason and spend a lot of my time August to December scouting for players who’s contract is expiring through the GSN. With regards to LM players I was searching for LM players who were transfer listed the other day and only got one. I will look later to see what happens when the filters are off.
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Paul – I had a look when I got home and I get it now. If you search for LM for example it will only bring up players who only play as a LM and not other positions say LM/CAM etc. I get the rationale behind this as if you had too detailed a search you would see all the player attributes, contract details etc. This would make the Global Transfer Network redundant. So if you want to search for transfer listed players or free agents you are best taking the position filter off or search all midfield players. I do happen to love the GSN as you will remember and me doing a guest post on your old blog. It is my hub of my CM and have a specific plan all year round.
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I recall you (Darryl) passing on some very good advice one year (2015?) on fifa’s scouting and how it generated a lot more players than you may find manually. I certainly struggled to get anything other than dross every time I searched the frees – way too many non-footballing nationalities (for want of a better term) represented. The FIFA fake players are awful too.
Was I the only person to try and link to thevoices.biz? I’ll be visiting TGI tomorrow too.
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For session variance in PES I think there’s formation variance in FIFA. Changing your default one every 5 or so games seems to work wonders.
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Hahaha Turf. Brilliant. You deserve a prize for that. I made up the voices.biz when I was photoshopping that advert. Class.
Darryl. I do remember that post and wonder if you’d fancy doing a guest piece updated for FIFA 19?
If I search for LM. As the only filter I’d still expect to see every LM in the game though. And I don’t. No famous players or anything ?!
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Good to know PRS. Will try a few tweaks. I have my attack/defense levels set to specific formations.
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Paul – your relegation fight is emerging as the story of this CM so far.
I’ve been following the forums reaction to the patch today – always interested to see what a developer will do to a football game post-release – and I’m confused. Has it or hasn’t it affected gameplay?? There seems to be a general agreement that the patch has affected gameplay, but didn’t EA specifically say they weren’t going to touch it?
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Formation switching was put forward as quite a big thing in FIFA 17 I think. EA stated that the AI teams would learn to counter a consistent formation, so having two or three team sheets with differing ones was the way many youtubers went.
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Turf – it was for Fifa 14 when a number of us abandoned PES 2014 after the PS4 came out. I seem to think Paul’s girlfriend bought him the console and Fifa for Christmas.
Paul – I would be happy to do that. Work is busy at the moment so couldn’t commit to any deadlines or anything like that. I could put something together say in the next few weeks and you could put it on whenever you see fit. Would that sound OK?
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EA did state that they haven’t made fundamental game play changes, but there has absolutely no doubt been small tweaks, such as passing speed and the way the ball travels across the pitch, there is less ‘drag’ now, before even in good conditions it felt like the ball was travelling over a wet pitch, would roll fast then suddenly stop, now its much more natural, you see the ball roll fast, then gradually slow to a stop.
Defending also definitely feels more manual m and more difficult.
Darryl – thats fine mate, anytime when is good for you, is good for me.
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Re. the year of PES2014 and FIFA14, that was the year I took off from my blog and I also abandoned PES2014 in its post-release state and went over to FIFA14 for several months. I remember playing it from late November and all over Christmas and through to the new year. And it wasn’t even that great a FIFA, IMO – it was decent but it was the only footy game on the new console.
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I remember that year not so fondly too NG. The abomination that was PES14. I don’t even remember much about Fifa 14 so it couldn’t have been that remarkable.
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Paul – you did sing Fifa 14’s praise at the time but I think that was because of your feelings towards PES 2014 more than anything. The game itself was a big leap from Fifa 13 because it felt new on the new console and there was a big difference in presentation with an overeall to the career mode, which was very basic in Fifa 13 by comparison.
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Paul – I like that you can get relegated in the championship. When playing fifa it’s something one takes for granted (at least I do / did) but it ups the stakes by a huge margin. One of the many things fifa does very well.
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What I love this year is the variety of goals and here is a selection from this weekend:
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Some nice goals there Darryl and agree. The variation in which you can score, both situation wise and actual shot types and finishes is really good. Always something different.
Liked the meat behind that header.
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Darryl – those replays are pretty amazing – FIFA19 the best looking and best moving footy game ever?
That header has some proper Harry Maguire-style meat behind it as well. There are a few headers on ‘the other side’ but they tend to be fairly weak and close-range.
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Love the variation there Darryl. Is the cpu similar goal scoring-wise?
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Today’s post will be delayed until tomorrow unfortunately as I’ve been away all weekend so haven’t played any games or had time to put a post together.
Will get one done tonight ready for posting at 10am tomorrow.
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Great header. Looks like you have the same generic effort at a manager as me Darryl
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PRSGAME – I always go with the generic manager as I can’t be doing with the messing about.
NG – I think so as FIFA has taken football gaming to a new level this year.
Paul – I am going to send you an e-mail as I have drafted that guidance for you.
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