As the game has developed with teams like Barcelona hitting so many passes, and at pace, modern defending has had to become more ‘ball-focused’ – that is to say the very best defensive units look to close down space and force their opponents into making a difficult pass. They do so knowing that the increased the likelihood of a miss placed pass will lead to an interception and, thereby, a turn-around in possession.

The use of covering defenders has also become more prevalent. Should an opponent look to run at their marker a good defender will show them outside or onto their weaker foot, holding them at bay until support arrives.

All this is a far cry from the age of the enforcer and a predilection for man-to-man marking. Former Liverpool manager Bob Paisley once said “It’s no use winning the ball if you end up on your backside” – he knew of all the likely outcomes following a tackle ultimately only one could benefit his players.

If a player goes to ground then there is the risk that his challenge will be mis-timed, failing to win the ball or conceding a foul – either way the opposition retain possession. Even if the defender’s challenge is good, and the ball is won, there is still a chance that it will run free to another opposition player.

So if we were to study the immediate outcomes following a tackle in a game Football Manager what would we find?

You can see from the charts above that in a game between Blackburn Rovers and Wolverhampton Wanderers around 45% of tackles led to possession being won, the rest of the time the ball ended up at the feet of an opponent or out of play.

Compare this to the outcome following interceptions in the same game and we find that the defending team gained possession in over 73% of these occasions – a significant increase, and if we study another game (Tottenham versus Manchester City below) we find little deviation in the results.

And when we factor in the number of times a challenge resulted in a foul and a free-kick (or penalty!) for the opposition the figures of possession gained are even lower, with the ball being won cleanly on between 30 and 37 percent of occasions (see below).

Now consider that all of the data above excludes missed tackles and missed interceptions, it depicts the outcomes of successful tackles and interceptions only. On average the four teams completed 96% of their interceptions but just a third of their tackles – this means less than 30% of all attempted tackles resulted in the defending team gaining possession!

So how do we set-up our Football Manager teams to defend in a more modern, ball-focused manner? Defenders who can read the game are a must have and this requires high mental attributes – particularly anticipation, concentration and positioning. Then there are the tools of modern defending we can employ – pressing high up the pitch, covering defenders, zonal marking, a more rigid philosophy and cautious tackling. Conversely, you may want to avoid very high back lines, pressing central defenders and heavy tackling.

It may take a little while to get things right but the statistics show that if you aim to play a possession based game you would do well to consider your defensive approach.

This article as with so many others that I have written has come after I found inspiration in the ‘real’ football world. Where though did I get the inspiration? From Michael Cox or Jonathan Wilson? Perhaps from Jose Mourinho, Andre Villas Boas or Marcelo Biesla? Well not quite. The inspiration for this article actually comes from the tactical lessons of one Harry Redknapp…

On his arrival at Spurs from Real Madrid Rafael Van Der Vaart is said to have been stunned at the lack of tactical preparation carried out by Redknapp and his staff. He couldn’t quite believe that the extent of the tactical instructions handed out before the match was to ‘enjoy yourself’. This is an approach that has earned Redknapp a certain amount of criticism from those that have come to view tactics and systems as the be all and end all of football success. Given the form of Spurs over the last two or three years though maybe we need to take another more in depth look at why they are performing so well? The answer as I see it is that they have mastered the asymmetrical symmetrical system that allows each individual player to maximise their talent to the overall benefit of the team as a whole.

This is a way of setting up your team and system that can easily be transferred to FM as I can show using Spurs as the ideal example.

THE STARTING SYSTEM

Now to start making a little more sense. As you can see I have split the pitch vertically down the centre with the exception of the AMC and ST. Each of the other players has an opposite which lends us the symmetry although the players on the left will be mechanised to play and act differently from those on the right. The AMC is the only player that can drift into each area comfortably linking and knitting the overall system together while the lone striker pins the system by maintaining a high position and creating space in which the others can play.

Here you can get a better idea of the general movement that I am trying to mechanise into the system. On the left hand side of the pitch Gareth Bale should be free to cut inside using his pace and power to break through the defence. Since Bale is vacating the left side of the pitch Assou Ekotto needs to be free to push up the flank hugging the touchline as he goes. The left central midfielder is Modric who of course needs to be allowed to display his creative instinct whilst connecting with both Bale and Assou Ekotto. On the right side of the pitch Lennon will stretch the play by hugging the touchline and pushing right up the pitch. Kyle Walker will also push up the field but to stop the two from occupying the same space on the pitch Walker will be free to cut inside when he attacks providing another angle of attack for the team to take advantage of. The right central midfielder Parker is the most static player in the system sitting slightly deeper but still being able to connect with Walker and more tenuously Lennon.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

Here we have an example of play that has been built up on the left of the pitch and Gareth Bale in possession is cutting in from the left touchline leaving the space for Assou Ekotto space to push into. Van Der Vaart in the AM position has shuttled across from the centre to provide a connection with Bale. As the ball moves through Van Der Vaart to Adebayor and finally finds its way back to Bale as the cuts through the defence. It’s also interesting to note that as the play starts Modric is available in space to provide a passing option and defensive cover.

This time play is on the right of the pitch as Parker feeds Lennon who proceeds to stretch the play by attacking down the right of the pitch. As he does both Parker and Van Der Vaart move over towards the right hand side of the pitch to offer both passing and cover connections. The deeper threat comes from Walker pushing forward but coming in off the wing to the channel again giving us options to shift the angle of the pitch.

Now a more complete picture of how the two different setups work as one. As the ball is shifted infield to Modric in the centre he has three immediate passing options with Van Der Vaart and Parker in their conventional positions but Bale having come right in off the left flank pulling defenders with him and emptying the space for the left back to move into. On the opposite side of the pitch you can see that Lennon is still stretching the play on the right flank giving us a variety of options.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

It’s common for FM players to try to build symmetrical systems having the notion of the importance of balance drummed into them by football on T.V. There is nothing at all wrong with that but I hope I have shown a few of you the advantages of thinking in terms of connecting your players in such a way that you maximise their talents. There is absolutely nothing to say that you have to mirror instructions across the pitch in order to maintain a balance to your tactic and side. In this perhaps there is something to be learnt from Harry Redknapp.

You will find more of Lee’s work shortly at SupportsInteractive.com – a ground breaking new FM site. If you’re quick you’ll be able to sign up to take part in their BETA testing, it promises to be an event that no Football Manager fanatic should miss out on.

But how important are these personal and coaching attributes in determining how the A.I. teams will perform? What would happen if we were to take one of the game’s greatest A.I. managers and put him in charge of a lowly ranked club?

With these questions in mind I set up the following small experiment… to remove Sir Alex Ferguson from the comfort of his Old Trafford office and to put him in charge of Accrington Stanley, a club synonymous with anonymity and one expected to struggle to stay in the football league.

“Accrington Stanley, who are they?…”

“Exactly!”

1980’s advert for milk

To set up the experiment conditions I turned to the Football Manager Editor – whilst my Sir Alex Ferguson retained all of the main attribute scores, I did have to make some small concessions.

Firstly, Fergie starts the game at the ripe old age of 69 and this leads to him retiring after a season or two – so that I could measure his performance as Accrington manager over a sensible period of time I was forced to turn back time, giving Ferguson back the very best years of his life.

Next I had to eradicate the massive reputation that Ferguson had deservedly amassed over the past 30 years or more – after all, the project would be pointless if, after a few weeks in League Two, he was offered a lucrative contract at a big name side!

Therefore my Sir Alex starts this experiment with a “Home Reputation” of 85 (out of 200) and a “World Reputation” of 30. I also went about removing the legendary status the Scot enjoyed at Manchester United, Aberdeen and East Stirlingshire.

Finally, I set about awarding Fergie the same terms and conditions that his predecessor at Accrington had enjoyed – a £1200 per week one year rolling contract. A quick look at Stanley’s finances will tell you that the club can’t afford the massive £80,000 a week he was on at Manchester United!

But, it seemed somewhat churlish to rescind Fergie’s knighthood – so he will remain Sir Alex Ferguson throughout the experiment.

THE CONTROL

In order to effectively measure my Sir Alex’s progress I needed a control – that is a game run for the same time period but with an unaltered database, this allows us to compare the fortunes of Accrington Stanley with and without Ferguson at the helm.

This is how the control game played out over twenty seasons:

In 2012 Accrington Stanley narrowly avoided relegation from League Two, finishing twenty first in the division – a year later, however, they dropped out of the Football League as they ended the season in twenty third position.

The club then spent five years in the Blue Square Premier League before gaining promotion back into League Two at the end of the 2017/18 season.

Accrington spent the next three years in League Two finishing 15th, 17th and 14th respectively before suffering the ignominy of relegation once again in 2022 – on this occasion the team finished rock bottom.

It would take Stanley seven years of Conference football before they could reclaim their place amongst the ninety-two league clubs, going up as Champions in 2029. The momentum stayed with the team as they finished 6th and 2nd over the final two seasons.

THE EXPERIMENT

In our experiment Sir Alex Ferguson had a somewhat slow start to his career with Accrington Stanley, ending the 2011/12 season in fifteenth position. There was steady improvement in the following year as the team finished two places higher before they finally clinched promotion in 2014 by finishing third.

Sir Alex oversaw two turbulent seasons in League One, in 2015 Accrington avoided the drop by a single point but found themselves unable to repeat this feat in 2016 when they ended the campaign in twenty second place and were relegated.

The manager’s class shone through, however, as the side were instantly promoted back into League One in 2017 – where they remained for another eight years before beating Crystal Palace 1-0 in the play off final to lift themselves into England’s second tier of football.

Fergie then set about establishing his team in the Championship, between 2026 and 2030 Accrington Stanley finished 19th, 11th, 9th, 9th and 10th respectively. Then, in 2031 (the final year of our experiment) came Sir Alex’s finest achievement – promotion to the Premier League, beating Ipswich 5-3 on aggregate in the play-off semi-finals before hammering Everton 3-0 at Wembley.

As we can see from the graph above, Accrington Stanley faired considerably better under the stewardship of the experiment’s Sir Alex Ferguson than they did in our control game – achieving four promotions to take a seat at the top table of English Football. What makes this accomplishment even more remarkable is that Sir Alex spent a grand total of £2,429,700 on transfers and even made a net profit of £8,266,300 on all dealings!

Proof then the personal and coaching attributes of the A.I. managers can make a substantial difference to the success of the Football Manager clubs they are in charge of. What I find most surprising, however, is that Sir Alex spent all twenty years of the experiment at Accrington Stanley with no other club expressing an interest… now how could that be?

Those of you that are familiar with my previous articles on FM will know that I have written about the 4-4-2 tactic before in an attempt to show that the system can still be considered current in today’s age of 4-3-3 and 4-2-3-1. This time around I am going to show that 4-4-2 still has a place on the tactical bookshelf of the contemporary FM player as a purely defensive setup.

Rather unsurprisingly the idea for this article came from an interview I heard by Jonathan Wilson. In the interview he talks of the defensive strengths of the 4-4-2 with the traditional two banks of four operating as a tight unit and two men in attack meaning that when the play transitions into attack you don’t have a lone striker isolated in an attempt to hold the ball up but rather a pair of strikers that can connect to force a chance or even a set piece in the opponents half. The argument will always exist and indeed is one that I have made myself that with two men in central midfield the 4-4-2 will always struggle to cope with the modern player ‘in the hole’, here however I hope to show that this floating midfielder is not necessarily the scourge of the 4-4-2.

THE SET-UP

For those of us that grew up watching football in the 90’s the above graphic is one that was synonymous with Match of the Day. The traditional English 4-4-2 with two banks of four spread across the pitch to provide width and defensive cover and two strikers – preferably one little one large – to offer attacking threat and options, this is the setup that is now considered outdated by most football journalists and pundits. Indeed any manager still playing the 4-4-2 is leaving himself open to ridicule and criticism for lack of tactical aptitude as soon results go against his team. As I am about to show however the rigid inflexible 4-4-2 still has a place in FM.

TWO BANKS OF FOUR

Setting up defensively the biggest immediate strength that we have is that with a back four and a deep lying four-man midfield there is very little space for the AI to exploit. By employing a deep line in defence and making sure the midfield drop back as well we are immediately nullifying the threat posed by the floating No.10 than operates in between the lines by squeezing the space and denying him room in which to work.

Here we see the perfect example. The defence is forming a line spread across the pitch with very little space in between the players, which the AI can use for a through ball to a quick striker. Even when the left centreback steps out of the line to engage the forward in possession of the ball the connection between right centreback and leftback remains strong. The midfield is also formed up in a line although with the centre situated deeper allowing extra cover for the centrebacks whilst the wide midfielders retain a higher position to engage the opposition wingers or attacking fullbacks. It’s clear to see that the strong connections both in the centre and out wide make it extremely difficult for the AI to break our defence down via quick incisive through balls limiting them to long shots or crosses thrown in from wide areas.

This time we are playing against Rome and their agile skilful front three. Again the familiar characteristics are in place with the defined defensive line facing up tightly to the attacking three of the AI. This time however you can see that one of our deep central midfielders has stepped out to engage Taddei in possession of the ball. In doing so our midfielder has further limited Roma’s passing options. There is no easy through pass to neither the central striker nor the left winger due to the positioning of our players. The obvious pass is slipped through to the right winger but again the positioning of our left back and left midfielder means that he will be quickly squeezed and possession will be turned over.

In defence then the deep 4-4-2 certainly has its strengths. Let’s be honest though the vast majority of FM players are not interested in purely defensive setups (myself excluded) and so there has to be some attacking advantage to the system.

LINKS IN ATTACK

With one striker you run the risk of being put under constant pressure as he struggles to hold the ball up when vastly outnumbered as the play transitions from defence to attack. With two strikers playing close together in the 4-4-2 though you are always giving yourself a chance in the attacking phase.

Here we have a perfect example of the two strikers working in tandem to create space and move the play into the oppositions half. As the ball is cycled from defence one of our deep midfielders (Gallopa) is about to take possession. Our left striker (Crespo) will move into the wide channels to receive the pass thus emptying the space in the centre of defenders and allowing our right striker (Giovinco) to move forward and provide a connection that the two strikers can utilise to build the attack. If you are using this system then consider what types of strikers complement one another best and indeed with the TC, which predefined roles you can select for the best possible outcome.

Here you can see that we have had to defend deep to withstand a prolonged period of pressure from the AI. Despite the extremely deep defence and midfield we still maintain two attackers in close contact albeit with Giovinco sitting slightly deeper than Crespo. When the Milan attack eventually breaks we are in position to take advantage of the fact they have pressed so high up against our defence and midfield. The ball is immediately cycled by Gobbi to Crespo who again moves into the wide channel emptying the central zone of defensive players. Giovinco is able to quickly move into a connecting position and we have the basis of an attack from a position of extreme defensive vulnerability.

The 4-4-2 then for me is a system that is far from dead within football and certainly from within FM. It may be that we simply have to approach the system differently with a different idea of what we are looking to achieve from its use. For the purposes of this article I played 10 competitive matches in Serie A with Parma and I leave them undefeated in second place having conceded only three goals (two corners and a penalty). There is no doubt that this is not a system that allows you to reproduce the attacking verve of Barcelona but for me being able to sit and watch a system that I have designed to operate defensively gives me as much if not more satisfaction as watching a player reach 120 short passes in a match. The FM player today shouldn’t be afraid to compromise on style if it can lead to a greater degree of substance on the pitch.

You will find more of Lee’s work shortly at SupportsInteractive.com – a ground breaking new FM site. If you’re quick you’ll be able to sign up to take part in their BETA testing, it promises to be an event that no Football Manager fanatic should miss out on.

*with the computer A.I managing each team.

All of the real life data has been gathered using the Statszone iPhone app’ from FourFourTwo magazine.

Today we’ll be taking a closer look at Peter Crouch’s performance for Stoke against Spurs, as well as the passing of Chelsea midfielder Juan Mata versus Manchester City.

First up is Crouch. Employing a 4-4-2 formation Stoke came out on top at the Britannia Stadium, winning the game 2-1. Over in our Football Manager fixture, virtual Stoke also beat Spurs using the same formation with a single goal deciding the match.

The real life Crouch was a handful against his old club, his height and ability to hold the ball up making him a constant target for his teammates. This is reflected in the fact that the player was involved in more aerial duels than anyone else, winning 6 of 13 headers (46.2%).

In our Football Manager game we see Stoke utilise the big man in a similar manner, the virtual Crouch involved in 15 aerial challenges (albeit three made whilst defending). However, he did achieve a higher success rate by winning 11 of these headers (73.3%).

What is also interesting to note is the distribution of Stoke’s real and computer generated goalkeepers – in each game the long ball to Crouch was employed on numerous occasions.

In the actual fixture Crouch played as the support striker, evidenced by the number of shots he managed – just one (a header at a set play). The same statistic from our Football Manager game demonstrates that the virtual Crouch adopted an identical role with two shots (one goal) coming from close range headers and a single effort from distance.

Although neither player performed that comfortably when passing the ball with a completion rate of around 55% in each case…

As with Robin Van Persie in our previous post, there are noticeable similarities in the performances of Peter Crouch and his Football Manager counterpart demonstrating that the A.I. Is capable of adapting and playing to a team’s strengths.

But how does the match engine cope when a representing a more creative player? We’ll end today’s post with a quick look at the passing maps of Juan Mata from Chelsea’s 2-1 win over Manchester City and that of his Football Manager equivalent.

In each game Mata started on the left wing in a characteristically Chelsea-like 4-3-3.

The most obvious difference between the two images above is the number of passes attempted – the real player completed 38 of 46 passes (82.6%) whilst the virtual Mata managed only 23 from 29 (79.3%). It is noteworthy that the lower number of passes is typical in Football Manager, but more on this in future posts!

The second noticeable difference is the way in which the real Juan Mata often came inside and played balls from the middle of the park, an approach scarcely taken by his virtual namesake. One explanation for this is that late in the game (and facing ten-men) the real Chelsea pushed their fullbacks forward on the overlap and encouraged Mata to take up a more pivotal role in the centre.

However, I believe it also highlights fundamental differences between the Inside Forward role of Football Manager and the modern false winger – a player who starts on the flank but is inclined to move toward the middle of the play in search of the ball.

That concludes the comparisons for this post, but keep following as there will be more to come over the next few weeks.

All of the data for the real Robin Van Persie has been gathered from FourFourTwo magazine’s excellent iPod application Statszone, the Football Manager data was gathered from the corresponding fixture played out in the match engine.

Arsene Wenger used a 4-2-3-1 formation at the DW Stadium with Van Persie the one up front, they won the game 4-0 with Robin Van Persie scoring once. Football Manager’s virtual Wenger employed a 4-3-3 formation but again Van Persie took up the role of lone striker, the game was won 2-0 with RVP netting both goals.

The passing map from each game demonstrates how similar the movement and contribution of the real and virtual Van Persies were. In each he operates quite high up the pitch, combines long and short passes to equal effect and occasionally drops deep – it’s also clear how both the real and virtual RVP utilised the full width of the pitch.

In the real life fixture against Wigan Van Persie completed 40 out of 48 attempted passes (83.3%), although the pass completion rate of our Football Manager version is similar (88.5%) he doesn’t see as much of the ball attempting only 26 passes. This is largely down to differences in formation and strategy, Arsenal achieved over 65% possession against Wigan on Saturday with a midfield that got forward and supported the striker, by comparison Virtual Arsenal managed a lower 58% and RVP was more isolated.

When it came to the chances each player created (4 for the real RVP, 2 for the Football Manager version) the maps do look different, with 3 of 4 chances created by the real Van Persie coming from corners. The virtual player made use of space in the wide positions to play teasing balls for the on rushing midfielders.

In each version of the match Van Persie managed four shots and the maps below illustrate again how the real and virtual players got into similar positions, albeit the virtual RVP was more likely to have a pop from distance.

So there are some striking similarities between the way Robin Van Persie performed against Wigan for real and the way in which his virtual counterpart set about the same fixture in the Football Manager match engine. I like to think (in a small way) this helps demonstrate the thought, effort and research the game’s developers have put into the production of Football Manager although it will be interesting to see if future experiments yield similar results.

More coming soon.

If you’d like to discuss this article and other FM related chat why not visit the forum site FM-VIEW

For this article I recorded all the important goalkeeping statistics over the course of one entire English Premier League season played out in the Football Manager match engine. That is 380 games worth of data analysis that could be useful in understanding how we can expect these players to perform.

Before I continue, here is how the table looked at the end of the season…

The goalkeeper alone will not win you a match, after all he is only one of eleven players – he needs a solid defence to shield him and prolific strikers scoring at the other end of the pitch – but when the understudy is winning more games than the first choice ‘keeper it could be a cause for concern.

The chart below shows both how many points were won per goalkeeper appearance and how many points were won per game when the player was rested, injured or dropped.

There are some clear anomalies – their respective clubs scored more points when David De Gea, Joe Hart, Pepe Reina, Ben Foster, Jussi Jaaskelainen, John Ruddy or Michel Vorm sat the game out – but all of these players took part in at least 36 out of 38 matches so the data isn’t really that reliable.

But the same cannot be said of Steve Harper (Newcastle), Shay Given (Aston Villa), Paddy Kenny (QPR), Wayne Hennessey (Wolves) and Thomas Sorensen (Stoke) who all missed at least one quarter of their team’s games yet saw their replacements score more points.

What is particularly interesting is the difference between the average points scored for Stoke team-mates Asmir Begovic and Thomas Sorensen. Begovic played in goal for 26 of Stoke’s matches, the team scoring an average of 1.73 points per game when he did – but when he was replaced by Sorensen for the other 12 games Stoke only managed 0.83 points per game. Had Begovic been selected for every game (and maintained his average) Stoke would have finished the season 11 points better off! Food for thought when considering squad rotation.

Given that the goalkeeper’s primary aim is to stop the opposition scoring, one of the most effective ways to measure a ‘keeper’s performance is by the number of saves that they make. The chart below illustrates the percentage of shots saved by each player.

It’s no surprise that the goalkeepers from the best performing teams feature highly but, as our next chart illustrates, Cech, De Gea, Szczesny and Hart all faced fewer shots on target largely due to the quality of the defence in front of them – who knows how the data would look if they were put under greater pressure?

More Impressive perhaps are the performances of Begovic (Stoke), Howard (Everton), Harper and Krul (both Newcastle) and Ben Foster (West Brom) all of whom had shots saved percentages above average but faced close to 5 shots on target per game.

Stopping a shot is one thing but should the ‘keeper parry the ball back into play he could put his goal under threat again almost immediately. Sunderland’s Craig Gordon performed best in this respect, holding on to 50% of his saves – worst was Man City’s Joe Hart who held only 30% of his saves and parried 32% (perhaps indicating a tendency to punch the ball).

Over 850 goals were scored whilst collecting this data, of which 191 were scored inside the six yard box, 531 came from inside the penalty area and 136 resulted from long range strikes. So which goalkeeper was it that conceded the most goals? And who was susceptible to shots from distance?

Jussi Jaaskelainen conceded the most goals (when you consider his team Bolton came last in the league this is no surprise), but Norwich’s John Ruddy struggled with long shots, 27% of the goals he conceded were struck from outside the penalty area – almost double the average! This goes to show that it really can pay off to study your opponent’s ‘keepers performances, shooting on sight when they are weak in this aspect.

With this final chart we’ll take a look at the mistakes each goalkeeper made over the course of the season. We are familiar with the sight of angry ‘keepers berating the defenders in front of them but on occasion the blame sits a bit closer to home. Of the twenty two players studied Ben Foster (West Brom) was the most error prone making 30 mistakes (that’s almost one every game!) and on two occasions he was directly responsible for gifting the opposition a goal.

Knowing how the opposition players are likely to perform before your team even set foot on the pitch can be the key to getting a positive result. Your analysis needn’t be detailed or complex, why not check out my article on analysing your squad for some hints and tips.

Building a team that is comfortable on the ball and retains possession effectively can be instrumental to achieving success in Football Manager, and there is no reason why this shouldn’t start with the man furthest back – your goalkeeper.

Some managers fear the short pass from their ‘keeper, worried that conceding possession so deep in their own half will present the opposition with a clear goal scoring opportunity. In truth, the way in which your goalkeeper distributes the ball could prove to be the difference between starting an attack or being pegged back in your own half.

After studying 50 English Premier League matches played out by the Football Manager match engine I noticed how often long goal kicks resulted in a turn around of possession. In fact less than a third of the long kicks taken reached their intended target, whilst the percentage of successful short kicks (or throw outs) by the goalkeeper was in the high nineties.

With this in mind I set about looking at the association between goalkeeper distribution and team possession.

When you plot a scatter graph for every game, comparing each team’s possession with the percentage of passes their respective ‘keeper successfully completed, you begin to see a relationship forming between these two factors. In all but one game the team who achieved 50% possession or more saw their goalkeeper successfully complete at least 50% of their passes.

When an average is taken for each team the trend continues. Of the ten Premier League teams to average at least 50% possession all but one also had a goalkeeper pass completion ratio of 60% or better. At the other end of the scale, seven of the ten teams to average below 50% possession had goalkeeper’s who completed less than 60% of their passes.

What is interesting about the three teams to achieve a low % of possession but a high goalkeeper pass rate (Wigan, Newcastle and Wolves) is that the ‘keepers all played more short passes than long kicks. This illustrates that either the outfield players are playing a high tempo game or they are not particularly capable of retaining possession!

These teams prove to be the exception, however, as the parallel between those who play fewer long passes and the successful completion of those passes is clear for all to see.

As is the correlation between fewer long passes and greater team possession.

And if you wanted any further proof of the relationship between team possession and goalkeeper distribution then check out the final chart below. It shows that the teams with lower possession averages faced opponents playing fewer long goalkeeper passes.

So, the secret to a bulging trophy cabinet is instructing your goalkeeper to throw the ball out or pass to a defender? Well not quite, but if you want to produce successful possession based football then you could do worse than start with your ‘keeper.

As I was researching and writing this article Michael Cox of zonalmarking.net posted his own findings regarding the correlation between goalkeeper distribution and team possession based on actual premier League games. The similarities between the two articles is entirely coincidental, but it is interesting to see how Football Manager is mirroring it’s real life counterparts.

Having already finished top of the league, the Galaxy will be playing in front of their own supporters and victory will see them end the season unbeaten at the Home Depot Center.

The Galaxy’s success has been built on a solid defence that has conceded only 28 league goals all season and a creative midfield with Beckham launching attacks from deep. It seems that the Englishman has finally secured the central midfield role he has coveted for much of his career.

Alongside Beckham is Brazilian Juninho another roaming playmaker and stopping these two players will be a critical part of Houston’s game plan. As will containing the intelligent movement of forwards Landon Donovan and Robbie Keane.

LA Galaxy finished the league season with four wins and two losses from their last six games, before beating a New York Red Bulls (3-1 on agg’) and Real Salt Lake (3-1) in the conference semi-final and final respectively. The last team to beat LA Galaxy was none other than Monday’s opponents Houston.

Meanwhile, the bookies have cast Houston Dynamo in the role of underdogs but they did beat the Galaxy 3-1 in the final MLS game before the play-offs.

They may not boast the star studded line up that LA Galaxy does, but the Houston players are a capable bunch with a fantastic do-or-die attitude. Going into the final they haven’t conceded in 264 minutes of football and haven’t lost in nine games.

Generally speaking, the team look to keep things tight before breaking on the counter-attack to good effect. Houston’s two holding midfielders, Adam Moffatt and Luiz Camargo, will need to perform at the top of their abilities if they hope to keep the Galaxy’s ball playing midfielders under wraps.

But the Texans will sorely miss the pin-point crosses, corners and free-kicks of left winger Brad Davis. Having topped the MLS assists chart this season, Davis suffered a torn thigh muscle in the Eastern Conference final against Sporting Kansas City.

At least Davis has been on hand to offer some kind words of support for his team-mates:

People expect L.A. to come out and walk all over us, but I don’t think it’s going to be like that at all. We’ve got a damn good chance.

The Boy Done Good’s prediction: with their star players and home advantage it’s hard to see any other outcome than an LA Galaxy victory. Houston will make a game of it but expect a reverse of October’s result, 3-1 to LA Galaxy.

Kick off is 02:00GMT on Monday 21st November 2011, the game is live on ESPN

Odds from BetFair: La Galaxy 4/6, Draw 5/2, Houston Dynamo 4/1

As the season unfolds Football Manager records a large amount of data for each player but this is barely reflected in the reports provided by your scouts and back-room staff. Over the course of the season I want to be able to access such data to better assess the performance of my team, tactics and individual player instructions. To achieve this I use different layouts on the squad screen, each representing one of three broad categories: Defence, Attack or Goalkeeping.

Each template employs a similar layout and all include the following standard column headings: Position Selected, Player Status Information, Name, Position, Appearances, Minutes Played, Form Over The Last 5 Games &amp Average Rating. The other data collected depends on the primary function of each template.

First up, let’s take a look at the Defence Data.

From left to right the highlighted columns read:

Headers Attempted Per 90 Minutes, Header Completion Ratio: Are my players winning the aerial battle? Who should I assign to man mark the opposition’s big target man? This data can help answer such questions.

Tackles Completed Per 90 Minutes, Tackle Completion Ratio, Interceptions: What I expect to see will depend a lot on the strategy I am employing, however, this information is instrumental in tightening up any slack in the back line or midfield.

Mistakes, Mistakes Leading To A Goal, Yellow Cards, Red Cards: mistakes cost goals and I can’t afford to carry anyone who may be a liability.

Then there is the squad’s Attack Data:

Passes Attempted Per 90 Minutes, Pass Completion Ratio: Misplaced passes put the team under pressure, whilst a defence splitting one can change a game. I use this data to identify where possession might be being lost and assess the impact of my creative players.

Crosses Attempted Per 90 Minutes, Cross Completion Ratio: If too few of our crosses are connecting then this could be down to the team or player instructions, I may even want to direct play down one particular flank.

Assists: surely no explanation needed, assists are the by-product of the team’s style of play.

Dribbles Made, Distance Covered Per 90 Minutes, Offsides: good player movement can be as important as a high pass rate, if a player is being caught offside too often this could indicate poor intelligence on the pitch or an ineffectual tactic.

Shots Attempted Per 90 Minutes, Shots On Target Ratio, Goals, Minutes Since Last Goal: Goals are the currency of football, I’d rather have a few shots on target resulting in goals than lots of speculative efforts flying high wide and handsome. Strikers live by form but it is rarely permanent, by keeping a close eye on the stats I’m able to spot any dip in form or make tactical adjustments quickly.

Finally, I use another template to monitor our Goalkeeping performances and distribution.

The column headings used are: Goals Conceded, Goals Conceded Per 90 Minutes, Minutes Since Last Conceded, Clean Sheets, Mistakes, Mistakes Leading To Goals, Passes Attempted Per 90 minutes, Pass Completion Ratio, Interceptions, Yellow Cards, Red Cards.

Not only do these templates help me stay on top of my own team’s performance but I also use them to evaluate my next opponents. By visiting the opposition’s squad screen and deploying the relevant template I can consider my tactical approach by spotting weaknesses and identifying the key players I want to nullify.

For example, in my next game Portsmouth have an important cup match coming up against fellow Championship side Derby County. Looking at Derby’s attacking stats I notice (amongst other things) that winger Bakary Sako represents a significant threat on the flanks. He has produced the team’s highest number of assistances – largely because he takes every opportunity to run at his opponents and boasts an impressive cross completion ratio.

Therefore, on match day I ask the fullback to defend a little deeper and replace my usual winger with a wide midfielder on an automatic duty – hoping that the two players can double up on Sako when we don’t have the ball. As a result Sako has his poorest game yet and is substituted at half time!

It’s just a shame that my own strikers were misfiring and, despite dominating the game, we drew 0-0… I think it may be time to take a look at those stats once again!