Phil Foden is one of those young players that caught the eye during the England U18’s real world World Cup triumph 2 years ago, every time I’ve seen him play since he has impressed, if he was at any other club, he would be a regular by now and in the mould of a Sterling or Rashford, Man City simply have too many good players already, and so I took advantage of this but within FIFA 19.
When I signed Foden last January I expected him to be a backup player, but with Adama and Damm on one wing, and Mojica recently signed on the other, I played Foden at CAM position, and he was superb, and has been a starter in every game since.
Footy games need individualistic players, players with identity that you can instantly notice, that feel different, that you can build an affinity with, Foden has all that, he won’t muscle his way through any midfield battles, but playing just behind the striker he has a great knack of picking the ball up in that hole and creating chances, or latching on to the ball from the edge of the box and snap-shooting, he has great technique and agility and stamina, still being only 22yrs old in-game.
Constantly high performing the heat map shows just how much ground he covers during a match, now at 84 OVR and still developing, possibly a future club captain?
I have already rejected various offers for him, including a £47million bid from Man Utd, We need to be challenging for honours in order to keep him at the club I feel.
Heres a brace of goals scored by Foden in a recent match vs Huddersfield.
Something happened in the following match vs Leicester that I haven’t seen before, the play was stopped mid-game for an injury:
Following the match, The news ticker presented an info snippet regarding the injury
Nice to see the in-game injury followed through and represented in the ‘football world’ of career mode after the match, it’s these kind of details and flow of events that really do make FIFA 19’s CM very immersive and engaging.
Emmanuel Dennis Is firing on all cylinders and is the league’s top scorer with 13 goals in 17 matches, a great signing from West Ham, whom I pursued for a season before getting him, and another player with bags of individuality, a goal scoring machine, here’s a couple of recent goals from him, including the second goal which is a bona-fide 100% overhead bicycle kick.
Heading into late December we are currently 3rd in the league, and in the quarter finals of the Carabao cup, lots to still play for, but we need some cover in the DMF position, I have a few scouts lining up possible out-of-contract players for January, so we will see who pops up.
Final match of my last session we played Liverpool at Anfield, a great, and very tough game, with their speed of play and intricate football its hard to get near them, we was 2-0 down before pulling a goal back to go 2-1, then this happened, to level it at 2-2, we attack on the counter and a side pass to lay in Adama for an open goal….
Unbelievable save from Allison, and instead of levelling it, it changed the game as we want on to be hammered 4-1.
FIFAFX.com 
Did someone hereabouts say ‘bicycle kick’?
I have reviewed the incident in question and I agree with the commentators and the blog-user captioning: bicycle! (Although I’d have been happier if the player’s left leg was slightly more parallel to the kicking leg to begin with, the few degrees of yaw are not enough to rob this fine goal of bicycle distinction.)
Penalty point deducted for the ridiculous celebration afterward. Whatever happened to a brisk handshake whilst running back to the halfway line.
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NG – I’m pleased that ACOBKA (Arbitrary Council Of Bicycle Kick Accreditation) has given the green light to Dennis’s goal, I shall pass the good news on to him !!!!!
That was my fault, i always press and hold buttons and push the RS in different directions after a good goal just to see what kind of celebration will occur, in this situation, i feel the over elaborate celebration was justified.
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True story – I was on YouTube last night (very late last night) and saw a vid called ‘Allison save’ in my recommended, and idly clicked on it, and thought ‘I don’t remember seeing that on MOTD’, then moved on without thinking in the way you do when surfing your YouTube recommendeds at 1am,
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I thought it was a real clip, I mean to say.
Anyway, the growth of individuality in your CM is duly noted and very encouraging. If you told me I was guaranteed even 3 AI-committed fouls per match, I’d consider jumping ship, but of course this is 2019 and there are no AI fouls in any football games anymore. They are Not Allowed.
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Sneaky,and also a true story ….. when I was uploading and setting all the schedules for videos to go live late last night around half past midnight, I forgot to set the Alisson save video to private and i said to myself ‘I bet NG sees this’ – And you did.
But what a save!
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I’m sorry NG – I cannot guarantee you 3 COM fouls in a match, as I just commented over on your blog, FIFA’s one turd is the lack of fouls, caused by lack of CPU aggression with tackling.
Ironic that I have still had more fouls in 5 seasons on FIFA than I had in 20+ combined seasons throughout PES 17/18 and 9 together.
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Paul – Good stuff. Do you pay a lot of attention to the heat maps? I never used to do but always refer to them at half time or if I am losing with the opposition dominating the play. It gives you an indication of what tactics are and are not working.
As for fouls it really is what is stopping the game from being damn near perfect. You are correct as no sliders or anything will make the CPU more aggressive.
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Darryl – I’ve started to use the heat maps to ensure my players are adhering to their positional instructions.
I noticed on Fodens heat map that he spent a fair amount of time in a defensive midfield position, and he’s an attacking central midfielder, I want him forward, he’s no good to me with his lack of physicality being back defending, so am going to instruct him to stay forward and then compare 2 or 3 heat maps before and after to make sure his positioning is correct.
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Paul – indeed as it is the most important but probably most underused tool in the game. I don’t really see folk mentioning it, so was quite pleased to see it come up in your post.
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Darryl – I’ve only really started paying proper attention to it admittedly, but its a great tool for checking positional play and seeing where players have the most impact.
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I have an odd one where I just don’t get what has happened here and how the ball didn’t end up in the net. No matter how many times I watch it I can never figure it out. Later on the game took me back to show the review to say it the ball had not crossed the line. This adds even more confusion as the defender hooks the ball away from the other side of the post. The defender should never have been able to do so anyway as the ball bounces back into him and he should never have been able to stop the ball going back into the goal. Any ideas as to what is going on here I would be grateful.
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Further to this move to 1:23 of the clip and you see the ball on the line and the defender on the other side of the post. Sadly I don’t have more of that shot as I pressed the button to skip it accidentally.
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Darryl – that is a glitch. The ball didn’t cross the line fully that’s why it wasn’t a goal, I zoomed in 250% on the video and paused it as the ball was on the line, you can clearly see a small portion of the bull underneath the cross bar, which runs parrallel with the goal line, meaning a tiny portion of the ball was on the line, which by the rulebook means no goal.
As for the defender clearing the ball, that’s where the glitch is, there’s no way he should have been able to, as the defender was outside the goal and the ball was inside the goal.
Pause the video on youtube at the start where the ball bounces on the line, then use the full stop key on your keyboard to move through the video frame by frame, you will see what I mean.
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Darryl – It seems to be suggesting that the sequence is
1) Defender knees the ball toward the goal
2) Keeper scoops the ball off the line
3) Defender kicks the ball away
Paul – I looked at getting Phil Foden to QPR, but he is worth £10m and his wages were about 2/3 of my wage budget. Maybe next season?
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Chris99 – Foden cost me 21 million and 67k in wages, on a 4 year deal.
Well worth it though, hes currently 84OVR and has an 88OVR potential but it is possible to go higher. Still only 21, I could have more than doubled up on him as I rejected 47mil from Man Utd for him.
You can lower players wages substantially by including signing fees and bonuses such as an extra 300k after 20 appearances etc.
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I couldn’t afford to buy him so I was looking at a loan deal. Just felt the wages were too steep when the squad had other issues.
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Chris/Paul – thanks for that and Chris is right and I failed to notice the keeper scooping the ball out as I was focused on the defender. The keeper really shouldn’t have got to it.
Strange feeling this morning after 31 years of playing FIFA the game has said I have won the title and have included the celebration scenes below. But I haven’t yet as you will see from the league table that followed Chelsea can catch me. Throughout the match the commentary team were talking about me already winning it and the presentation afterwards. Shoddy!!!!
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Darryl – was that league table taken before or after the spurs game ? What was the result when you played Chelsea ?
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Paul – It was after the Spurs game. Even at the start of the game the commentary team were saying that I had won the title. If you listen right at the end of the match they say the result was irrelevant, which is not the case as if I had lost the game then I could have been beaten by one point. I won both games against Chelsea. Does that count first over goal difference?
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Just checked there wasn’t a change of rules. Goal difference still comes first and Chelsea have a better goal difference. It is an immersion ruing bug.
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That’s really odd Darryl, a really bad mistake and one I didn’t think ever happened. Rubber band tables, errors when teams are maybe level, etc but not a clear balls up like that. Is there any possible reason or is it simply fuck up?
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Turf – I really don’t know in all honesty.
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Darryl – from that table in your 2nd vid, it’s pretty clear: if you lost all 4 of your remaining matches and Chelsea won all 3 of theirs, THEY would definitely take the title. The goal difference favours them already.
I don’t think you can count yourself as having won it until you’ve mathematically won it, so yes, that is a substantial glitch in the coding there.
But it wouldn’t spoil my overall enjoyment. Having a football game that accompanies you in your life is about the journey more than the destination.
Premier League on World Class? Congratulations. Mathematical coding glitches don’t detract from that being a great gaming achievement.
(I assume you got at least 1 point from your remaining matches.)
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NG – I have yet to play the last 4 games but can assume I will get a point from the last 4 or at least Chelsea would slip up. No it won’t detract from the achievement but is poor. All I will say if it was PES Paul would be all over it like a tramp on chips. After this season I have 5 more to play and believe it or not I set out with a plan to win the title on WC with at least 5 season left and have a tilt at winning on Legendary in the remaining seasons. Then I will hang up my football gaming boots. There was a purpose to all of this.
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like the plan Darryl, you certainly seem to be pouring your heart and soul into the game
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Abbeyhill – it is my philosophy in life as you have to put your heart and soul into everything you do. Why not?
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Certainly seems a strange thing Darryl. I was trying to work out if there was any possible scenario whereby Chelsea could not catch you.
My only thought was that the game already knew what Chelsea’s future results would be and therefore awarded you the title
Prematurely. Certainly an odd one. Never ever seen that before myself.
Not ideal obviously but if it was me I wouldn’t be that fussed. All you needed was one pint from 4 games to win the title, you was always going to get that.
A poor glitch but in the grand scheme of things I’d take that over no trophy or every match feeling the same.
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Paul – I am glad you said that as the game knowing the Chelsea results in advance was the only explanation I had, which is why I said about killing the magic. In our own minds we don’t want to believe that the game has already programmed in the results of the other games in advance but we do and that is what keeps us playing. The cold hard facts are that it is true and this bug exposes it before your eyes. So to answer your question I would much rather have a missing trophy. A trophy at the end is just superficial but I suppose that is the whole point as everything is but there are times where we don’t want to believe that is the case.
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Another eventful season has come to end. First up I needed a point against Newcastle to actually win my first FIFA Premership title. The commentary team did acknowledge that I needed a point to be champions after bizarrely getting the trophy in the last match. I won the game quite comfortably 1-0 and the players all celebrated at the end of the match. There was no trophy presentation though as the commentary team said I would be awarded this after my last home game of the season. All very odd. Next up PSG in the Champions League semi final and faced an uphill task of trying to reverse a 4-2 deficit from the home leg. PSG are easily the best team I have played so far and won 7-2 on aggregate. Then another league game before the FA Cup final against Brighton. I totally dominated the game but they took a shock 1-0 lead in the first half. Undeterred I kept creating chances and it was no suprise when I found myself 3-1 up. Brighton got a penalty in the second half to make things more nervy but held on to become double winners. Below is me lifting the FA Cup. Next up Legendary difficulty.
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Strange then Darryl. Must be an isolated glitch, as can’t find any other reports of it anywhere on the web happening to other people.
Shouldn’t detract from a great achievement though. The double.
Don’t fancy moving on and trying to take a different team to glory?
The Dec-Feb strangling by the game has taken hold again. Not sure if it’s EA trying to simulate the increased pressure of the Xmas period and after but it’s so noticeable. My team suddenly unable to pass 5 yards accurately in the final 3rd, com teams playing out of their skin etc.
Have you not seen this within your own CM ?
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Paul – I didn’t get it this season but the same thing happened in the last three seasons so I know exactly what you are going through. This season I have had my largest squad and squad rotation seemed to help. I have to say I am moving onto Legendary with some apprehension. I did also fancy playing with a team like Liverpool or something like that for the authenticity of playing home matches in a real stadium. If I get destroyed on Legendary I may not have a choice.
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Great post Paul and textbook overhead bicycle, very impressive. Are you still using the 4-5-1 (or is it a 4-3-3)? I’m still going with it and it’s working well except when I go behind the plan B of pushing the wide midfielders up to wingers doesn’t work so have been switching to a 4-4-2 with AMF and DMF. The AMF i bought blindly from the transfer list of deadline day is the biggest stroke of luck for me so far, he’s old but has made the difference.
Darryl – Congratulations are due and I’m with you on the immersion killing bug, very disappointing from EA. The double is an impressive acheivement on World Class for sure. I’m looking forward to see how you get on with Legendary and there’s always Ultimate if needed, I imagine the AI would be unbearable tike-taka though.
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I’m up to January in Season 3 and the march up the divisions has been halted, currently mid-table on 33 points. I have a few million to spend if I want to without impact on objectives so may bring in a right midfielder but only if I can find one I want. I’m going well against most teams but struggling against anyone in the top 10.
Anyone else find the snow pitch difficult to focus? Remind me of the old ploughed PES pitch.
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Cook – Im still playing the 4-2-3-1 formation, works very well for my play style.
That bicycle kick goal was textbook, I hooped out loud when it went in, more acrobatics from Dennis coming up in tomorrow mornings post 😉
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