Tips for hattrick.org managers

MixaM talking, and other members of the community

Freekick focuses on matches, tactics and transfers. I didn't like the way Hattrick (HT) had so much focus on things that had nothing to do with what happened on the field. In Freekick (FK), there is no "ideal" tactic that will work every week - you need to look at and maximize your strengths and exploit your opponent's weaknesses to win.

Transfers are a bit different - you see the average bid, not the highest bid, so I would recommend studying transfers in FK to try and determine what you should/shouldn't pay for certain players. Try bidding 1.5 the average price to start. You can search for Recently Sold players by doing a transfer search to understand values of players, and can even look at bid histories.

Perhaps the most important thing about FK is realising that players need to be strong in multiple skills to be useful, especially midfielders. For example, a striker with Scoring 90, Offensive Positioning 20 and Ball Control 20 will be almost useless in FK, because they will never be in an Offensive Position to actually shoot in comparison to the defenders Defensive Positioning. Study the FK manual and read the table for the skills needed for each position, it will be very good to know.

The way potential skills work in FK is a bit different than HT. Look for young players with high potentials in complementary skills - they could be future stars. Also, note that players can be trained above their potentials, but at a much slower rate. For starters, look for good (50-59) 15-16 year olds in the main skills.

In FK you CAN win games against better teams by choosing the right tactics. The game does not simply depend (in HT, the midfield has a much greater influence) on your midfield. You don't always win a game by just having good passers. Your midfielders need to be good at doing everything in the middle of the pitch.

Every newbie should (from the start of their career) always take the time to read the match report. Assume that information in match reports are relevant in FK instead of the opposite for HT. In FK, you always know WHY you've won or lost a match. You just have to read the match report. In HT, there is at least one game per season after which I had no idea why I won/lost from reading the match report.

Unlike in HT, spending a lot of money on youth is not a necessity. It is one way to play the game, but not the only one. You can be very successful manager by spending your money improving your team from the transfer list as well. This is a huge difference between HT and FK. If you are a new manager, you should consider waiting a while before investing big amounts of money in the Little League.

If you do choose to train youths and pour money into them, don't sell every good draft you get! It's not a good way of getting money, it probably won't cover what you put into the youth squad every week, and you are letting go of good future players. Economy is not the focus of the game, money only represents what players you could get for it.

Of course, if you have a great player that just doesn't fit in to your team, like if you only ever play passing and draft a Forward with great AE (Aerial) but can't use him, then by all means sell him. But do not make selling Little League drafts your strategy to make money. If you want money and don't need young players, just stop investing. It's far easier and far more cost-efficient.

As a former HT manager, you should remember that:

- Constitution is important for all positions. Players need about 40 to finish a match without getting tired, 31 for youth players.
- All players get trained. They do not need to play in a match that week. The position that they played does not affect training.
- You do not need to hire a Coach
- Senior players train faster then youngsters, not the other way around
- You can train two skills at a time, and not necessarily the same thing for the entire team.
- No home and away games and no home team advantage. Attendance money is split between the two clubs playing.
- No weather forecasts
- Different rating system for players
- No random goalscorers. Forwards will score frequently.
- Player aging: (1.6 yrs/season) and the fact they do not all age at the same time. Players have unique birth dates.
- Players in FK have a stamina/constitution (CO) level
- Players low in constitution should (generally) not be used
- HT tactics or strategies will not work in FK
- Substitutions and tactics are changeable whenever you want in FK
- One-skilled (or mono-skilled) players are totally useless in FK
- Understand that every (outfield) player uses every skill he has at some point
- Midfielders do some of the defending and should be your must well-rounded players
- Don't trust your Assistant Coach to set the team's tactics or select players. Learn what to do and do it yourself (even if you set it badly, you learn from it)
- Experimentation is the key to knowledge. Schedule friendlies and learn from them.
- Friendlies have no effect on your players. They start the game as if they had full stamina, and after the game they return to whatever level of stamina they had. No injuries in friendlies. Don't use friendlies thinking you will get experience or extra training for youngsters (wrong), just use them to experiment with tactics and to have some fun.

-In FK, transfers are different, you see only the average bid. Expect to pay about double, but that is a guess.
-In FK, not all of your players have the potential to become a superstar. Look at the talent and current ratings for each player.
-In FK, there is no "best" tactical scheme. In HT, most teams play a 352 formation; all other teams use different schemes because they want to "train" defense, attack...you have flexibility in FK and are not locked in because of the training.
-In FK, Little League investment depends of all other clubs in the world, which is represented by the Key Value. In HT, it is static and limited.
-In FK, every skill is important for outfielders and goalkeepers. Some more than others...

The FK interface takes awhile to come to grips with, but once you get the hang of it it is nice to use.

To join a new forum:
Settings > Forum > Choose a forum to join:
(If you do not see your country listed, join the forum named "Mixed")

It is hard to get a grip on this game when you are a newbie, but please realise that it is worth it! Freekick has the superior match engine and the biggest plus: It resembles real football a lot more than Hattrick. We here at Freekick call it T.O.G. or that other game...

How to Train Passing

written by aussie

This post is for the people who can't understand that passing (PA) is less important for midfielders than offensive positioning (OP) and ball control (BC).

Of course, yes, a midfielder needs to be able to pass. To do this, he needs to get free (with his OP) or win the reception (with his BC). If a midfielder can't do one of those two things, then his PA becomes worthless.

Therefore, OP and BC are trained before PA, because without them there is no point training PA, because he will not get a chance to use it.

Therefore, because OP and BC are trained before PA (and in preference to it), OP and BC are more important than PA.

Even though PA contributes to the zone, BC and OP also contribute to the zone. Therefore there is no advantage to train PA for that reason. PA also contributes to the zone where the player is passing to, but again to do this he must win the reception and have enough OP or BC to do so.

Therefore PA is a luxury skill, and can only be trained to a high level (superb or higher) once all other offensive and defensive skills are maximised. Turn the "MF Skills" option On (located on the left of the screen) and slowly train passing so that it is not capping (noted with the asterisk *) the other skills. The point is that you need the minimum PA while training other skills.

PA has lots of uses at the high levels of football. Do not forget that to dominate the midfield zone (and earn more opportunities), the passing rating of all of your midfielders are added and compared to the other team. However, there is no point training passing to a high number unless you have already trained OP/BC because you won't get to use it. Therefore OP and BC are more important than PA because the match engine checks for the player's OP and BC first before PA.

Tactics to Create More Opportunities

written by Markov

Question: How does a team create Opportunities?

Have as much PA (Passing) as possible in the midfield. Playing with 5 midfielders will obviously give your team a bonus. If you have one or two flank backs/wingbacks with higher PA than any of your midfielders, you can set your team tactic to Flexible and get a bonus from those players at the back instead of your midfielders.

If one or more of your midfielders have higher BC than PA, you can set your team tactic to Creative. This way, BC is used instead of PA for calculating the number of opportunities (only if BC is higher than PA, that is). Furthermore, wingbacks (important: I am talking about RWB LWB, not to be confused with flankbacks LB RB) may create their "own" opportunities if they have high enough (decent/40 and higher) CO. Their opportunity will be breaking free with a dribble or receiving a pass in midfield. They will not start an opportunity by passing. For this reason, some managers prefer high BC at the expense of low PA on their flankbacks/wingbacks.

Forwards/strikers very low PA, often will lose the ball if they receive it in midfield. If your attackers are very bad at receiving the ball in midfield and your opponent's midfielders have very nice defensive skills, consider setting your team tactic to Long Ball. The forwards/strikers will not drop back to midfield, instead they will stay up and wait to receive the ball in the penalty box. You may not get as many attacks, but at least two of them won't be totally lost by having a forward not knowing what he is doing with the ball in midfield.

catacombrocks talking

If you have enough defensive skills on your midfielders and wingbacks, another trick is to set your team tactic to Opportunistic (counter-attacks) efficiently. If Flexible and Creative won't give you extra attacks, and Long Ball doesn't seem useful, and you think you can stop opponent in midfield, playing with 2 wingers and Opportunistic will dramatically increase your counter-attack chances. As you may expect, some of your opponents failed attacks become your opportunities. Also, a keeper with high Control, or defenders with some passing will help increase counter-attacks if your opponent passes your midfield, and if you win a clear defensive margin.

Midfield domination

The PA skill of the 4 highest PA midfielders from every team is compared. The team with the highest average PA for his midfielders will achieve Midfield Domination. By getting the Midfield Domination, that team will get up to 4 extra opportunities.

Notes:

- Only midfielders will get the ball in midfield from these extra opportunities.

- Every 5 points more in average will give a team one extra opportunity. Fractions of this will mean chances to get the opportunities.

- The midfield domination is calculated every minute, being based on the real PA skill of the midfielders, and is affected by stamina loss.

- If one team uses only 3 midfielders, then the midfielder with the lowest amount of PA will get his PA multiplied by 2 for calculating the midfield domination.

- When using the Flexible tactic, and with a 4-4-2 formation, you can sneak in a LB/RB/LWB/RWB who has extremely high passing but is more of a defensive midfielder. You can field your four midfielders with sup, sup, sup, good passing and then put on a sup passing flankback and have the good passing midfielder contribute with some other very high skill such as exc offensive positioning, exc ball control or tackling.

Building a Squad

written by Butlee

Building a Squad

2.1 Introduction
2.2 Finding your base level
2.3 New players A Maintain
2.4 New players B Step Up
2.5 Topping Out
2.6 Consider your Competition (Jagger)

2.1 Introduction
Building a squad is basically about how and why you add players to your squad. It is about finding your weaknesses and strengths and just aiming so that you have all the tools available to you when creating a strategy.

This is really my area of expertise. I spend a lot of time looking at my players, ensuring that I have adequate coverage for all my positions, formations, tactics and strategies and even a few for my theories. All that for short term and long term as well. The idea behind this chapter is how to build your squad up from scratch, to be an elite squad. Keep in mind that building the squad is only half the battle, the other important factor is strategy and winning games!

2.2 Finding your base level
Before you can begin to build you need a foundation, that's pretty simple. Finding that foundation is a bit harder. I think the trick here is to be really pessimistic about your side, and totally undervalue your squad for now. What am I talking about? Well in this stage you basically have to come away with a the ability to say (for example) The worst possible striker I would use right now is dec SC, good OP and weak BC. You need to be able to do that for all positions, and you need to be able to look at a player at a glance, and decide if he's worth another look to be around the level of your squad.

This stage is basically a decision making stage. You look at all your prospects in a certain position and then pick a mid-range guy from there and take that as your base level. It's not an exact guide, but the trick is to pick a level that you never want to be worse then, that is why you need to pick a realistic base level.

Let's do this with an example:

You have to pick a level you're happy to play with. So say you pick a defender in your squad that is dec in CO and good TA and good DP. You decide that that is your base level and from now on you don't settle for anything less. If you've only got one of these, there's nothing saying you can't buy an older guy, like 30 plus years, to support the one you already have.

All in all, this 2.2 Section probably doesn't make sense, but it's usefulness will become apparent in the other sections.

2.3 New Players A - Maintain
To put it differently, the Maintain stage could be called "The Art of Not Getting Worse". Once you have a base level, it is important that you at least stay at that level.

So let's look at the type of player you're thinking of to maintain your level:

This player will be used to maintain the step you are on. He's mostly to replace guys who can no longer maintain your step (due to age and skill deterioration). This player doesn't want to be too young, as by the time he is ready to maintain, he may actually be a step back.

In the defenders example, you would want a 'maintain' option to cover for any guys over 30 years old. So you probably want to buy a guy 25+ years with dec TA dec DP and dec CO, with potential to go to good TA and good DP. That way, in one season from now, when the 30 yr old's skills drop below good/good, you have a 26-27yr old to maintain the good/good level you want.

But if you bought a 22yr old as a "maintain" player, by the time he is 27 it's been 2-3 seasons, and over that time you want to move forward, so you don't really want to be relying on dec/good/good defenders now.

2.4 New Players B - Step up
Step up in my opinion is the best and smartest way to get a better squad. The overall idea is that you look at your squad at any given time, and when all positions are maintained, then you pick where you wish to step up, and start looking for players accordingly.

Let's have a look at what you'd look for in a player set to "step up" :

The idea is to buy a younger player that you can train, that will be better then your current players. These guys can vary in ages, but your general idea is that the younger the player, the better he needs to be potentially, as you will assume your team is getting better.

So once you have a good/good CB, and a maintain CB to replace your old guy(s), you pick a step. Do you want to try and get some AE on your CB's? In which case, maybe your next step is getting dec/dec/good/good AE>DP. Or, maybe you're finding attackers get free too much, or there's a lot of OP in your division? You could make this step dec CO, good TA and exc DP. Or are you promoting fast? You may want to go higher.

Say you take a bit of a large step up, and you want your backline to be dec AE, dec CO, good TA, exc DP. So now you do a bit of rough math and figure out what current skills a guy needs to be able to reach that. I'd say 1 denomination per season for 2 different skills (roughly, I think it's a pretty conservative estimate also!). So two seasons is 3.2 player years, so maybe I'm going to look for a 22-24yr old with weak AE, dec CO, dec TA and good DP. That gives me heaps of time to train him up if he has the potentials I need.

Further to this stepping up process, you don't just plan to cover 1 era. Your next step after dec/dec/good/exc might be dec/good/exc/exc - you decide that you need to make some tackles better, and you feel you can gain an advantage from more CO then your opponent. So now you do some numbers again. Maybe I can find a 17yr old with weak TA, weak DP, but already dec CO and weak AE? Mostly now though, we're looking for potentials that are good/good TA/DP that will rise to exc/exc and the potential to have the CO needed.

Just keep in mind that there's nothing wrong with a maintain style player. And there's definitely nothing wrong with simply maintaining your current level long term in a certain position or area of the field. Don't step up too fast either. Remember, the idea is never to have to step back, so if you push too hard stepping up, you're basically ignoring the principles of the idea : to avoid stepping back ever!

2.5 Topping Out
I just wanted to put a few little comments here too. It is possible to top out in 2 ways. The first is financially. If you can't afford to buy the step up players then you've topped out for your level of playing. Generally there's only 1 think I can offer here: be patient. You've bought the players that will eventually give you the strongest possible team with that "budget", so eventually that's going to start paying off… focus on those +25 years maintaining players without breaking the bank.

The other part to topping out is simply availability. This really is only a factor when you hit the "high rollers" market. For example, my modest side runs CB's that look like exc/dec/bril/bril or dec/exc/bril/bril, and that's my maintain level. I can hover with different levels of CO, or go sup/awe in TA/DP, but I can't really step up from where I'm at because the step up players just aren't available for purchase…….well they do say every man has his price, but in my case it brings me back to the financial "top out" position : the maintain players I can afford, the extra step (ie, up to world class players) is out of my financial reach at this time.

So availability and finances/budget are the two ways to top out in terms of building your squad.

2.6 Consider your Competition

You should also look at your competition for the week (opposition) and other teams in the league. Pick a mid-level and top opponent within your division. Look at the skill levels of their goalkeepers, defenders, midfield and forwards. You could also look at the Achievers (Stats) section of the league. This will give you a base level objective of reasonable skills needed to compete within the division.

Personally, I would recommend building a team beginning with goalkeeping, then defensive backs, then midfield, then offense. Goalkeepers are expensive but the most important position on the team, in my opinion. Good defending backs and defending midfielders will make a newbie team competitive quicker and at less expense than the glamour forwards.

Guide to Special Abilities

written by Butlee

Ambidextrous - Always active, Off foot penalty is 5 or 10% to PA of players playing on the opposite side to their preferred foot. No zone effect. Except for flank backs since they are the only ones who contribute to a zone with PA.

Anticipator - Triggers when a pass is made to that player. Seems to offer 10-15 pts of OP. No zone effect as far as I know. It can be triggered also when the player is the active defender and he will get a bonus to his DP.

Artistic - Triggers when the player does an action. The theory is that it raises flair, which in turn effects attendance. No zone effect.

Aviator - Triggers when receiving high passes. No zone effect as far as I know. Do not know numbers.

Fair Player - Always in effect. Potential chance to "foul less" (or not at all?) and avoid yellow and red cards.

Handsome - Always in effect. Theory is that the more minutes on the field, the more this ability raises your flair. Theory is that it will stack. Perhaps higher attendance?

Long Shot - DOES NOT MAKE YOUR LONGSHOTS BETTER. Allows your player to get free to achieve a longshot (the player must be set to longshot on long choice). I hesistantly say it is a triggered ability. No zone effects.

Master of Set Pieces - This one I know a bit better. Triggered ability. Is +15 PA to a corner kick taker. Potentially used for set pieces next season. No zone influence. Half of the potential bonus is added to the PA skill of the player when deciding who takes the corner (ie, if my LM has 50 PA, and my CM has 55 PA, 7.5 is added to my LM's PA, so my LM will be chosen to take the corner. This does not garauntee that the SA will trigger (at 65PA total) or not (at 50PA).

Playmaker - Triggered ability. Bonus to PA while passing. As far as I know no zone effect. I hazard a guess that this is +10 or +15 to PA or to a pass when triggered.

Quick - Triggered ability. Seems to be an OP/DP boost whenever their is a lose ball or an opportunity start. No zone effect. Unsure of the bonus amount.

Reliable - Always active. I believe this to be just like an Experience boost. Make players perform nearer their actual skills - chance of over and underperforming is reduced.

Steadfast - Always active. + 15 to CO. No other zone effect (though the higher CO *may* effect the zone if it pushes CO above 50.... this is not confirmed).

Stopper - Triggered ability (seems to trigger often). When a challenge is made it is a boost to TA. No zone effect as far as I know. I do not know the numbers for it.

Sure Feet/Hands - Triggered effect. Boost to BC or CT. No zone effect. Not sure of the bonus, but it doesn't seem that large. I would guess +5 or +10.

Tough - Potentially used to prevent injuries.

=================

Explanation of the Special Abilities taken straight from the Freekick manual:

Ambidextrous

A player who is Ambidextrous is equally good at both feet. This means that he can play at any side without penalty and that he contributes more with Passing and Ball Control when playing in a centre position.

Anticipator

This ability is a complement to the Positioning skills. The player has an innate ability to often judge what team mates and opponents intend to do. Both outfielders and goalkeepers can have this ability.

Artistic

An Artistic player does fun things, and sometimes spectacular (meaning they are actually good for something). There are no drawbacks with having an artistic player in your team, but the advantage is more that he is entertaining than that he is better than other players. Both outfielders and goalkeepers can have this ability.

Aviator

This ability is a complement to the Aerial skill for outfielders or when goalkeepers intercept high balls. The player might be freakishly tall or have a great timing in his jumps.

Fair Player

This player never draws a foul since he plays fair.

Handsome

Women adore him, why a squad with handsome players get more attendance.

Long Shot

A player with this ability rarely misses goal when firing long shots and also is more skilled at finding opportunities to unleash them.

Master of Set Pieces

A player with an uncanning ability to execute set pieces. This player quite often surpasses himself when taking free kicks, corners and penalties. If a goalkeeper has this ability it means that he often overperform during these situations.

Playmaker

This ability is a complement to the Passing skill. This might be because the player has an eye for when and who to pass, or because the accuracy of his passes is better.

Quick

A quick player might run past opponents when dribbling, creating opportunities for his team. He is also more likely to be first to get to rebounds. Both outfielders and goalkeepers can have this ability.

Reliable

A reliable player acts above his experience, why he is less likely to underperform or make foolish mistakes. Both outfielders and goalkeepers can have this ability.

Steadfast

This is a complement to the Constitution skill. It is always in effect, but only affects the part of the skill that deals with losing stamina during matches.

Stopper

This ability is a complement to the Tackling skill. It can both apply to tackles and blocks.

Sure Feet/Hands

This ability is a complement to the Ball Control skill for outfielders when it comes to receptions and controlling the ball after dribbles. It complements the Control skill for keepers.

Tough

This player never gets injured. Although this ability does not add to the prowess of the player in any way, it will help him to be able to play all matches. Both outfielders and goalkeepers can have this ability.

How to Train for Profit - Freekick Economy

lac29 talking to SolidSniper

1) Should I have 11 first team senior players and have every other player at the club just there to train-for-profit and money? Should I rotate players to give them some game time and experience? Does simply being on a team for a long time (with or without playing games) give me a financial advantage when I sell a player?

Answer: You can train your players individually, and it's your choice whether you want to set up a system of buying and selling players to make money. If players are on your team, yes, they train daily if they have played a match or not. If you train well, the players will become worth more, but meanwhile you are paying their wage and a training fee. The best time to sell them is during day or evening for European time.

2) Train-for-profit seems like age doesn't matter as long as they aren't at the point where skills drop rapidly. Does a 17 y.o. train as fast as a 25 y.o.? Also is 27 the age where skill drops?

Answer: A youngster (U21) trains at 3/4 speed of a senior (older than 21). He also increases his potentials by about 12 points per player year. When a player turns 21, he will not have any more potential raises. 27 is the age when skills start to drop, but certain skills start dropping at different age. CO starts dropping at 27 for instance, but GP only at 30, etc. Training-for-profit requires different ways of management if you are dealing with a 16 year old than if you are dealing with a 25 year old.

3) I haven't had much luck buying players from the transfer market. What advice can you give to me in terms of what type of players to buy with my 20,000 budget for train-for-profit players? Do I aim for players in their 30 weak level range to train/raise them to 40 decent level range? Should I go for older or younger players?

Answer: I wouldn't advise you to try to buy players to train-for-profit. As mentioned before, the currents/potentials system makes it very hard for newer managers to estimate the value of players. My advice would be to define the weak points of your team and then buy players to cover those areas up, preferably with cheap, old, experienced players. Then you can start thinking about profit and future plans.

Butlee talking

As a general guide, I suppose 15 yrs, 21yrs and 24-26 yrs are the best ages to sell. With 15 years olds, people pay for the potential abilities of the player, at 21 yrs, managers will pick him up as a useful senior player (especially if the purchasing team is from a weaker division), and 24-26 year olds means a manager will pay top dollar for a senior starter, who they can use for 2-5 seasons, and they still have a couple of seasons before their skills drop.

I'm not the best person on the transfer list, but here is what I would do with 20,000:

Two types of players:

Type 1: 15 year olds with a 2-3 of potential skills at good or decent. Try and find a combination of PA/BC and CO, or SC/OP/BC or CO/DP/TA where they have good potential in all skills, or 45+ potential in all three. Also, try to avoid buying players with below 20 poor current skills in any position.

In a couple of seasons you'll have the option to sell guys who are dec/dec/dec at age 19 for some cash, or you can keep them until they are 21 and they'd be good/good/dec or something, and some teams might pick them up because they have a few complimentary skills. The most important thing is to pick out the right combination of skills with the suggestions above.

Type 2: 21 year olds with 1-2 potentials of excellent and some of the others decent. Current skills should be around decent on the excellent-skilled potentials and 30+ on the decent potential skills. You can find these especially at the start of a new season or the end of a season when teams sell off players who are no longer eligible youth players. With players like this, you can get the 1 skill up to excellent and have 2-4 skills supporting that decent skill. At aged 23-25, that is not a bad player.

Try avoid spending over 1,000 for a player. You can snap up some guys for $1 if you look hard. It's really tricky to find bargains and it's hard to win bids in low auctions. But it does get easier to find the right players. Also, I think it's more profitable to have the right players (and having less selection of players) then it is to snap up 30 or 40 $1 players who don't amount to much and constantly lose their skills because of their age.

Ollea talking

Buying old, cheap players is an excellent way to get fast results and you won't lose much in the long run either if you buy them cheap. For good long term results, I would recommend creating a decent team of old experienced cheap players (don't spent more than a few thousands per player maximum) first so you can learn about the game and the match engine. When you get that knowledge, you should begin spending more to get good players for the future. If you spend money too ambitiously from the start, without getting the player material to experiment in tactics and formations, you will probably not get very good transfer market bargains.

Centre Midfielder Strategy OM, DM, CM

woodman663 talking

Offensively, the OM gets very little assistance from the DM and therefore has real trouble getting through midfield. Defensively, the DM has too little assistance from the OM to really cut off the passes into the box. The double CM formation leaves you vulnerable to flank attacks, because there is extra assistance that doesn't compare to what the OM contributes to the PB.

I don't like the OM-CM formation much unless you're totally dominant at the back but, lacking in the front. I think you're better off playing a DM (diamond formation) while you have an OM in play, but of course it depends on your team, the opponent, and the occasion.

awesomeau talking

OMs annoy me. Actually, DMs do to an extent too.

My main reason for using either of these positions, is not entirely for the extra assistance in the PB, but to limit the amount of times the OM appears defensively in midfield, or the DM appears offensively. Otherwise, I may as well use them as CMs.

However, I too often find my OM appearing in defensive actions, and not appearing enough offensively and vise-versa for my DM.

It's a risky position to play, because by playing the OM as a CM, I risk him taking part in even more defensive actions... and he doesn't fit in anywhere else.

Butlee talking

The thing people have to remember when looking for CM's is that the "more" skills you try and get, the lower each skill will be.

As a premier club, it's quite easy for me to obtain a guy with 2 awe skills (say PA and BC) to play in midfield at OM. It's not even that hard to obtain a guy to play DM with sup PA and sup/sup DP/TA (though that's a flanking back imo).

What is hard, is to get a guy with OP,BC,PA,TA,DP at exc, and still have some dec CO about him. So most days I will settle for a guy that has 3 exc skills and 3 good skills (in OP,BC,PA,CO,TA,DP) and that's quite a high quality player for me. Then the rest of his skills are just trade-offs. Maybe I'll take sup BC and only have dec OP, and the rest the same, for example.

The thing to remember is that it's the same for everyone, depending on your division. If you're getting a guy with two sup skills (BC and PA for example) and that's going to be a great OM for you, then your DM/FB might only be exc/exc/exc PA/TA/DP. Then a well-rounded midfielder is likely to have a couple of exc skills, and then mostly dec or good skills otherwise.

Your ideal CM is actually a weak-looking player, but he's strong because he can do a bit of everything and is well-rounded. Just realise that you're not going to get flashy skills across every position, but you can get good enough skills to do the job, sometimes multiple jobs.

The Story of Manager A and Manager B

nicosantos76 talking about 2 managers who are both not investing in Little League:

Winning Youth leagues doesn't help improve your finances at all. But winning matches with your seniors (especially advancing in the International Cup) does give you a lot of money. Each day we have more and more users wondering what's the point of buying a u-21 (Youth) player. Let's pretend we have 2 managers and both managers are great at buying and selling players, and that neither of them invest a cent into their Little League.

Manager A buys only awesome-experienced players with great skills at a relatively low price. He doesn't spend a cent on u-21 players and makes no investment into his Little League. This doesn't hurt him at all since he's not expecting to draft anything and his economy won't be hurt at all by not paying for training and being relagated to the 4th amateur division by losing every game 14-0. Manager A has a full budget for buying ready-to-play players and can afford to pay them high salaries as he will have no more than 30 or 40 players and he will buy/sell an extra player only if needed (because of injuries or a given rival team). As Manager A is great at buying and selling he doesn't earn (or lose) a dime for his trades, despite the old player's tendency to lose skills and reduce in value by getting older. He bought them cheap, so he can deal with selling them cheap. He just needs to remember to avoid keeping a player for too long.

Manager B buys mainly youth players and they will, eventually, become his senior players, so he goes for high potentials and interesting current skills. He also buys some senior players, but as he enjoys training and improving players he tries to find players aged 28-30. As Manager B invests money in buying youth players he has a limited budget to buy senior players. He's going for a long term strategy of developing his own players. He has 30 or 40 senior players, and another 30 or 40 U-21 players.

Now let's make a comparison: Manager A has a better senior team than Manager B because his finances were invested there. He advances 3 more rounds in the I.C. (International Cup) than Manager B, making an extra 100k in the season in I.C. tickets sold; he also gets good sponsor bonuses because he wins more matches (and by a bigger goal difference=clear win). Let's say this gives him an extra 100k a season. And last but not least, he has a better team ranking and an easier draw for next season's I.C. making it easier to advance even further in the I.C. next season. He also will have a better Flair rating because it will be easier for him to play offensively as he has better players than most of his opponents. Flair is quite important in FK, so his income for tickets sold are 20% higher than Manager B's, and thus earning an extra 100k. Conclusion: This makes Manager A earn 300k more a season than Manager B, of course the numbers are fair from being exact, in fact it is more likely he's earning more than that compared to Manager B.

While Manager A has no u-21 players and is now reaching 7th amateur division of the Youth league, Manager B succeeded to be second in the highest Youth league of the country. Manager B took 20,000 advantage of this as he sold some more tickets. So now Manager A has dropped to a 280,000 difference of money in his favor. Manager B sells each season some of his recently-promoted senior players in order not to overpopulate his senior team and be able to deal with a 60 to 80 player's squad salaries. These players that he sells, you may be tempted to think, earn him a lot of money: Plain wrong. The managers who want to win a senior league buy experienced players, and those who care about their u-21 team buy players with high current skills when they're still u-21. So if you sell a player when he's no longer u-21, his value is lower than if you had sold him in his last (playable) u-21 season. As he's not ready for the senior team and he can't play any longer in u-21 squad, potential buying managers of the player are very conservative about how much they will spend in a long term investment like that.

So let's say he earns 80k by buying u-21 players and selling them when they're recently promoted to senior players (80k is the final result after taking from the profit all the money spent in salaries and training of these u-21 players). This extra 80k Manager B earns is then compared to when Manager A keeps a player for his senior team and sells him when he's older than 29. Manager B really loses more money, but as in this example, since he's great at buying cheap u-21 players he just loses 80k by selling his now 29 years old player in high form.

So I think it's a smarter choice to be Manager A. I was reluctant at first but now I'm convinced because:

- Experience is very important (maybe too much) in FK and older players are more experienced and they don't have enough negatives, like getting injured more often or having serious problems to keep his CO high enough to be able to play a full match.

- Winning or losing u-21 leagues doesn't make the slightest difference to your economy while winning senior matches makes all the difference in the world.

- Training a player, developing his skills gives you much less money than the one you lose by not winning more senior matches. The bonuses for winning senior matches are too high and the incentives for developing a player are too short. Having u-21 players means paying $200 for over 50 player's training, salaries are quite high because they're too related to the value you buy them and high potentials. U-21 players don't come cheap.

To summarize, something must be done because nowadays u-21 teams and leagues are something we care about for the joy of it, but the price we're paying for this joy is too high and those who keep their money away from u-21 players are making a difference in the game. I'm very aware now of the benefits of being Manager A, but I still would like to be Manager B and care about my u-21 squad without being so much penalized for that. Am I asking too much? Thanks for your time.

response from ddraig

a) Little League is the worst investment these days, the only reason I really invest is to try to get some good players for my (patriotic) home nation. Most of the players I do draft are players that might be able to play in the U21s, but not my senior team. I have more control over what I get on the transfer market. I do draft the odd player from LL that I don't think I could buy on the transfer market, but these are very few and far between.

b) Buying youth players is the best investment. This is where I'm at odds with the original point I think. You can buy 15 yr olds reasonably cheap, but buying 16, 17, and 18yr olds can be better value because people often ignore them. I've picked up lots of bargains in this way, and sold them for profit or had them develop into my team. Some don't work out, but if you buy sensibly then you're generally in for a profit or a fantastic-value senior player.

c) Buying older players can be good. I generally only buy older players to cover gaps in my squad, but they're ready to go and don't need too much investment generally. However, as they get older they're less valued, which means resale is lower, and their wage is generally higher even if their original transfer value was lower. It's also much more difficult to get hold of a really good senior squad player (by this I mean National Team/International Cup class), and if they are around even old ones cost a lot. These players lead to the 4k+ wages that also have a direct impact on the teams in your league, by pushing up everyones wage bill.

I think again it's personal choice, and I'm sure if I looked at it in more detail I'd be surprised by what I saw. However, the main goal is to compete and win, and there are a lot of good teams which use various player strategies. I'm sure you could argue that each one has their benefits, and looking at 2 different teams they'd be better at one strategy or the other because they know how to value players better using that strategy.

Youth Money Economy Freekick Strategy

jgphoenix talking:

The most successful teams in the Freekick economy and in terms of talent level all seem to practice the same technique. After saving some money and establishing their team, they started purchasing superb talented youths at the age of 15-16. These youths sold from anywhere between $1 and $5000, had good potential, lower current skills. They trained these youths up and sold most of them between age 19-20 to get maximum value. From there, they worked their way up, buying talent with some currents and great pots for between $5000 and $10000. Once again, they trained these players up and sold them between 19 and 20 years of age while keeping a few for seniors.

From there they spring-boarded pretty much into the NT (national team) category where they would just buy up youngsters (no matter the cost) who had absolutely ridiculous potential. They'd train them up and again sell them at 19-20 to get money for funding or when they're youth national team stars. The thing to know (and I don't know whether the transfer list works like this anymore) is that those wonder kids will sell for between $50,000 and $150,000 between 15-16, but once they're trained up into national stars they'll sell for well over $300,000, usually upwards of $500,000. This is how the most talented clubs and richest clubs made their money.

I was a successful youth coach but got way too attached to my kids and never did the selling part *laugh* or I would've been rich too... Then again, I never went into the bidding wars for the definite future NT players. I was more a fan of buying great talent for under $50,000 a player. I hated the thought of putting so much money into a player that could get all his raises in CO. But, mathematically if you risk it, long term it pays out for you every time. I guess the important thing to do is stay within your budget, establish your teams, and make sure to sell off most of your youth talent over a year before they turn adult 21. Best of luck in creating a phenomenal youth team!

19-20 year old's tend to have more value than 21-23 year old's simply because they can be used as Youth league players for an additional year and still have room to mature, whereas 21-23 year old's either are done with the youth league or can remain for only the end of the season. Typically a team can't use them right away and need to spend time training them. So they won't sell for as much. If you intend to make any amount of money on a player try selling them before they hit 27. After that, the market goes down tremendously. Even at 26 years old, the market seems to bottom out a bit. Train your player up in key stats and sell them, the earlier the better. I wouldn't really sell a 21 year old you can train up if you want to make a big profit. Either sell him before 21 or sell him after 24 or 25.

That strategy may not be the most optimal for you. It wasn't for me, but then again, I was never a financial guru in this game... my strength was as a tactician. Some of the other veterans might have different ideas also- the best thing about Freekick is there is no one right way, although some ways are better than others!

Strategy for Buying Old Players

written by Guldmann

To get you going and improve your team in the first couple of weeks, I recommend buying old players, as you can get those very cheap. Look for players who are 30-32 years or older as the price take a steep dive around there. Keep your eye on CO (constitution, the player's stamina) and look for weak, but he will need decent to finish a match without getting tired.

Key for using the Transfer List and this guide:

30-39 weak
40-49 dec
50-59 good
60-69 exc
70-79 sup
80-89 bri
90-100 awe

Central defenders (CB)
Try looking for at least: 60 Tackling, 60 Defensive positioning. If you can get 70+ it is good, but 60+ together with some experience will do just fine to start with. Some AE is nice, but usually not necessary in the lowest divisions.

Backs (LB, RB, LWB, RWB)
50 tackling, 60 defensive positioning, 40 constitution, 50 passing (and if you want them to not lose the ball) 40 ball control and 30 offensive positioning.

Centre midfielders (CM, OM, DM)
Pretty much the same as the above will give you a good well-rounded midfielder. You will need more passing though, so go for 60+ at least. 40+ Ball control and 30 Tackling.

Side midfielders (LM, RM, LW, RW)
These need more offensive positioning, so set the requirement at 50+. Other than that, they are the same as central midfielders (and backs). Positioning is more important on the flanks/sides of the pitch, so you can have lower Ball Control when buying side midfielders.

Attackers (FW, ST)
There are several kinds of attackers.

Offensive positioning attacker: Go for 70+ offensive positioning and 50+ Scoring and 40 Ball Control.

Ball control attacker: Go for 70+ Ball control and 50+ scoring and 50 Offensive Positioning.

Well-rounded attacker: Go for 60+ Ball control, 60+ offensive positioning and 60+ scoring.

Aerial attacker: Go for 60+ aerial, 50+ scoring and 50+ offensive positioning and 60 ball control.

Goalkeepers (GK)

70+ Reflexes, 60+ goalkeeper positioning, 40+ interceptions, 50+ control, 30+ organisation. The first two (RE, GP) are easily the most important, then CT, IN, OR.

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Keep in mind that these examples are the minimum, current numbers for players at least 30 years old. I would go for 32 years of age though. Don't pay more than 1,000 a player (except Goalkeepers) and actually, try to keep it lower than that.

Bonuses and Penalties

written by Jonny_RIP

I will try to summarise the bonuses / penalties a little. Note that only positioning bonuses are included in the denomination.

Bonuses/penalties to saving attempt (for GK)
(values are not confirmed just estimated by me)

- On the right spot 15-25 points bonus to saving attempt
- Ready 5-15 points bonus to saving attempt
- Hesitant 5 points penalty - 5 points bonus to saving attempt
- Fooled 15-5 points penalty to saving attempt
- Totally in the wrong position 25-15 points penalty to saving attempt

Keeper positioning bonuses / penalties

- Bonus to keeper's positioning if the challenging defender has better DP than attacker's OP (higher the difference, more bonus to keeper's GP)

- Bonus to keeper's positioning if the attacker puts the ball down after a high pass (~15 points - estimation)

- Penalty to keeper's positioning if the attacker wins the duel with the defender (higher the difference between reception and tackle, higher penalty to keeper's GP / if the defender is close the penalty will be very high)

- Penalty if the keeper misses an interception (~15 points estimation)

Scoring attempt bonuses / penalties

- Totally free bonus when the keeper cannot close the player down. If the keeper doesn't try to close the angles of the attacker then the bonus is higher (~ +25 points estimation). The bonus is not applied to headers and volleys.

- Long shot scoring attempt penalty if the BC skill is way lower than PA and SC

Positioning bonuses

- 15 points bonus to DP when defender faces a high pass in the penalty box

- 1 point bonus to defender's TA(AE) for every DP point over 2 x attacker's OP (in the PB or center midfield).

- 1 point bonus to defender's TA(AE) for every DP point over 1.5 x attacker's OP (on the flank midfield)

- OP bonus for the player who executes a one touch pass, based on the value of the pass of the player who makes the final pass (higher the pass value, higher OP bonus)

Skill bonuses

- bonus to the effect of the pass for the player who executes short passes, based on his SC skill (if PA > SC then the bonus is equal to the SC skill, if SC > PA then the bonus is (PA+SC)/2 )

- Special Abilities: Playmaker / Sure feet-Hands bonuses - if a player has one of those abilities they can use (estimation) 25% more of their PA / BC when calculating MF skills

Attackers - Building your Offense

Cafa talking to suzukii regarding Attackers:

Diversify your offense. So you can make use of different holes in opponents' defenses. You need an OP attacker, a BC attacker, and an AE attacker.

Just decide what's the best player order for each of your attackers in each match, regarding the defense & goalie you're playing against. That's the key.

You check both defenders. If they lack AE (aerial), naturally, it's good to field AE offense.

If they lack DP, you field OP offense.

If they lack TA, you field BC offense.

DP (defensive positioning) = OP (offensive positioning)

TA (tackling) = BC (ball control)

The value of the pass affects the positioning duel.

Look at it this way. A defender has excellent DP. Attacker has good OP. But if he receives an awesome pass, he might lose the defender.

TA/BC duel happens only if the defender won the positioning challenge and is "there" with the attacker. Assistance affects this duel.

Markov talking

The perfect striker balances the probability of beating the defence with the probability of beating the keeper perfectly. So SC should be high enough, but not too high at the cost of other skills. And this is of course highly dependent on what goalkeeper and defender you are facing.

I personally prefer attackers with SC just below the other skills of BC and OP, but not much.

High SC strikers are important at the top level because you face "wall" keepers all the time (high RE, GP) so even an exc/awe/awe (SC/BC/OP) might struggle to score. You will find this at national team level especially. Personally I find that a high SC/BC combo makes for a great forward/striker, with good+ OP.

The trick in this game is to keep winning with as cheap players as possible. Then you advance constantly, as you always have money for reinforcements.

Buying Youth Players

PepsiGiggs talking to suzukii regarding Youth Players:

Lets look at two players both 15 years old:

Player 1
SC 10 60
OP 20 80
BC 30 50
PA XX XX
AE 25 50
CO 20 40
TA XX XX
DP XX XX

Player 2
SC 40 50
OP 40 70
BC 30 50
PA XX XX
AE 25 50
CO 30 40
TA XX XX
DP XX XX

Player 1 has great skill potentials for being an attacker, but only 105 (currents) in total in the relevant skills.

Player 2's potential is a bit worse but has 165 in "currents" skills.

Player 2 will almost certainly become a very good player, and with some luck a star player. Player 1 has very bad currents and will most likely never reach his "star" potential.

Ask yourself these questions before buying a youth player:

1. Will he play for my youth team?
2. If I can't use him myself, can I train him for one season and somehow make a profit?
   
3. What season will he be ready for my youth team compared to my current youth players?
4. What will he look like in his last year (between age 19-21) of youth team eligibility?
   
5. What will he look like as a senior player?
6. Will he reach his potential skills (can I train him good) before age 27, the age when skills start to deteriorate?

Tips for Day One

awesomeau talking

Get to know the game. Challenge managers to friendlies, as many as possible, and have a look at teams around your league to get an idea for the game. Don't make any big decisions yet, you may regret them later.

If you want to build up a team from a young age - great. In fact, now is the perfect time to do it. As you're in the Amateur leagues, you won't need great players to achieve some success. In fact I would recommend buying some 'oldies but goldies' even if you are going for the training-up-youths idea.

Why? All you need is 3 good players, a CB, a strong FW (high in OP or AE works best) and a GK. As a result you'll win more, get more sponsorship money and have a better economical situation with which to bring in those younger players. Furthermore, make the rest of your team relatively young... but with some nice potentials. They will grow for you, and you will use them regularly... and they will thus get some great experience. I bought a few 20-ish old players when I first started, and because they kept raising in skills as I trained them and went up the divisions, they kept being in my first team for a long time. This gives you a great base of players to build upon.

Cafa talking

If you invest in little league so early, you'll have financial problems, you won't have a competitive team, and it will take you at least 5-6 seasons before your first draft secures a place in the senior team. Players age 1.6 years per season, and a season lasts 14 weeks, meaning, it will take you a year and a half before your 15 year old player becomes an important senior first team player.

You need a team which will keep winning, so you get the sponsor money and increased attendance due to popularity and flair.

For this you need quick success. Old experienced players (age 30+) are severely undervalued in FK economy and they can be bought very cheap, even though they're the best players due to experience, which reduces the random factor. Most managers just don't like them as they dream of developing a top class player. Just buy a developed player. "Buy young and cheap, sell when old and expensive" doesn't work here. It's upside-down.

If I restarted playing the game, I'd buy fifteen players aged 30+, replacing the ones who get really too old, and I'd save the sponsors / attendance money as much as I can, to be able to buy even better old players when I advance to the higher league.

That's the way you'll have success quickly, and later your team will be strong / rich enough to support a big little league investment without influencing your senior team strength.

And, you have to learn much about tactics. Use normal 4-4-2 for a start, and learn which players go to which positions. Players are tactics. So 4-4-2 can be many different things, depending on the players you field.

Avoid the usual newbie mistake. Midfielders have to have some defensive skills. You won't get far with 4 offensive guys. Don't copy real-life soccer, learn the rules of THIS game. Weak defending and weak tackling might work, at the minimum.

braeken talking

One big difference with T.O.G (Hattrick) for me is that you always have to look far ahead. You can not sit back for a season and do nothing. Players age quickly and you need to make a plan. Therefore I would recommend to focus on the youth and that includes older youth players. Look where your weak spots are plan for that.

Now you could also buy older players to cover your weak spots. Keep in mind that they lose skills quite quickly (and of course value).

Freekick is totally based on players and not on the average of all the players skills as in T.O.G. Technically you could have 1 great CB but if the other CB is very weak, you do have a weak spot in the back since the strong CB might be able to stop a striker in 8 of the 10 chances but in the other 2 chances the weak CB might be one who needs to stop the striker. I think it's better to have a well balanced team in each area of the field. Don't spend all your money on 1 player.

Now which area is more important? Good question. This season the goalie is definitely very important but they are going to be toned down next season. But I think a goalie is definitely important. The reason is that he is normally often mentioned in a game report.

Now which is more important: attack of defense? I think they are equal. And the midfield is important when it comes to starting chances or the prevent the other team from starting a chance. It's not as T.O.G, where midfield is the most important. I think each area is pretty much equally important. A strong offense is useless when you can't create chances for instance.

It also depends on tactics. I play long ball which means that my midfield is less important than when you would play passing since the ball will often flying over the midfield players. But then again, midfield players can prevent chances for the opponent.

General rules for a new team

SolidSniper talking:

There are alot of things to do with a new team.

First, you need to determine who is worth keeping and who is not. There are several guidelines to follow:

1) Look at your older players (over 26 years old)

You have to ask yourself with each player: will he be able to play in my team this & next season and will he be an asset? If you're doubting, then you can go out to the transfer market and try to find similar players to buy. If you can find better or the same players for a very low price (500$)

2) Look at your young senior players (21-26 years old)

A player rises (trains) about 16 points per player year. Try to judge each player separately to see whether he will be good enough at the age of 25 to be playing in your team...will he have enough skills? If you are in doubt you can look at the transfer market to compare but if you are not sure, keep them, you can sell/kick them later on.

3) Look at your youth players (less than 21 years old)

It might be that you only sell/kick 1 player in total, or it might be that you find 5 or more that are not good enough.

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Secondly, you'll want reinforcements for the team.

1) You need to set up a team that is able to compete in your league.

Try to make a lineup (Tactics), and see which positions you don't have a good player for and also which positions that you have many options. You may sell players that are too similar to other players that you have, but don't forget about injuries or substitute situations for players with low CO. In the end, you may want squad depth.

2) Search for some ready-to-play oldies, who can fit into your team right away and who (preferably) have some experience. You should be able to get good 30+ year olds with experience for less than $1000 a piece. Don't buy players for more than $1000 the first few weeks, unless you are 100% sure that they can player for more than 1 season. Expect skill drops, and do not expect a profit from selling these type of players later on.

3) After that, it is time to start working on the future. Buy some players between 21-26 years old who have good potential skills but need training. You will save money this way.

jogm talking:

Let me warn you about some pitfalls that can hamper your long term development:

1) Continuity is key; evaluate your squad and players futures

For example, do NOT sell your talented 22 year olds at the start of next season simply because their currents haven't matured yet. That would create a 'gap' in your team continuity from your Little League drafts. Recognize what your team needs and fill those positions so that you can use your stars at their best positions.

2) The good thing about little league is that it is not necessarily an all-or-nothing type of thing. VERY nice youth have been pulled from mediocre LL sytsems. This has to do with the fact that a major part of the luck is the combination of skills, which is not effected much by LL-level. A plan to start with low LL investments so that you have money for new players is a sound one. I'd advise to start with the standard investments, and as your finances allow it, slowly build up to double the investment. Going for awesome LL is fine, but not without cost: You may end up having to sell your star players in their prime to avoid bankruptcy. However, teams without a LL system have been very successful and as you have noticed you can often find very decent youth players for bargain prices. Buying superb youth or better is extremely expensive because then you bid against top-level clubs.

3) Don't be to eager to simply (or only) buy bargains. You can find decent old players and youth players for scraps, but for a little more money (and with some patience) you can find excellent 15 year olds that will be true gold for your youth or senior squad for many years to come. I am talking about spending 8,000 on a good/excellent player instead of 80 on a weak/decent one.

Avoid These Five Common Newbie Mistakes

written by the Freekick community

1. Buying the wrong type of Midfielder

Don't make the mistake of buying a midfielder with awesome BC and not looking at his PA, which is only good, so his BC is then adjusted (MF Skills capped, read about adjusting skills to midfield in the FK Manual) to superb or so. Midfielders need to have OP, PA, BC, TA, DP and CO. Find a midfielder with high PA and work from there on finding decent for everything else, and higher if you can afford it. Remember when shopping for players that in the midfield zone, BC and TA contribute more than OP and DP.

2. Playing a "defender" at LB or RB

It seems like the right thing to do. After all, they are two of the four defenders. But in Freekick, the LB and RB MUST have PA. The players that are listed under the "Defender" tab are CBs. Some of them have good PA, but you'll usually find the best LB and RB players under the "Midfielder/Defensive Midfielder" tab. They sometimes are listed as DM or RWB/LWB as their preferred position. Look at the matches where the LB and RB have TA and DP both excellent or better, but their PA was poor, so they didn't get to use almost any of those great skills. Their defensive assistance was lousy because of this. CB (centre) defenders are easy to find: DP, TA and maybe some AE and just ignore their offensive skills. Do not forget CO is more important for these players than if they were a CB.

3. Buying the wrong type of old players

A big mistake in the beginning is buying some old players because of their experience. "Hey, yes, he may be 36 years old, but he has good SC and excellent experience - great player!" Wrong. Newbie managers also buy good players, but with low CO, meaning they can barely play 45 minutes before tiring.

4. Buying the wrong type of Forward

A big mistake is to buy a FW with only good OP and dec BC, because they have sup SC.

It is hard for that type of forward to score using any of his SC when he is losing the positioning (OP vs DP) and tackling (BC vs TA) duels. Remember in FK that forwards need to receive the ball or break free before they use their scoring skill.

5. Buying a youth player who will never reach his potential

A player with great potential skills but low current skills should be avoided. So remember this: Try to look for weak in the skills you need when investing and buying youth transfers. Otherwise, an unskilled (but potentially good) 15 year old would never contribute to your youth team and would require years of training before he "possibly" would be ready for the senior team. He would not have gained any experience either. Players start to deteriorate in skill at 27 so make sure he can reach or be near his potential skills by then.

Detailed Player Skills and Positions

written by Butlee

General Knowledge
1.1 Player Skills
1.2 Goalkeeper Skills
1.3 Positions

1.1 Player Skills

The first lesson someone should always have on FreeKick. This is essentially what separates FreeKick from any other game in the free online football manager genre. FreeKick takes the actual skills and puts them in one-on-one situations against other players. This make each skill vital. And it is important to know about each skill, what it does, and when it is used in these one-on-one situations.

The key thing to remember is that many skills can be useful for many positions. You have to know how and when to use them:

Scoring (SC) Used for putting the ball in the net, scoring goals. If there is a shot, its power is in part generated by SC. That includes normal shots (which are basically 100% SC), longshots (PA and SC), freekicks/set pieces (PA and SC) and also headers (AE and SC) . The exception is penalty kicks. Please don't mistake your scoring ability as the ability to get a shot off. SC is only about the finish, the final kick towards the net, nothing more, nothing less.

Offensive Positioning (OP) Whenever there is a chance for your player to receive the ball, OP is used. If there is a pass for him to get to, he needs to use his OP to get away from the defender. If a player dribbles into the penalty box, he also uses his OP to find space, though how well he can dribble effects this. Also, if there is a loose ball from a challenge, or a keeper letting out a rebound, your player will use OP to get to the ball first.

Ball Control (BC) Ball control does two things: Receive passes and perform dribbles. So whenever a player has used his OP to get to the ball, he uses his BC to control it. Whenever a player dribbles he is using his BC. When there is a high ball coming to him, BC works with AE to receive. Another use for BC isn't as common or important, but BC is sometimes used for helping determine who the best set piece taker is. If a player can get one-on-one with the keeper, how well he controls the ball helps him dramatically.

Passing (PA) Passing in FreeKick has two uses. The first is obvious: passing! When the ball is passed, a player uses his passing skills. The other use for passing is probably best defined as "The ability of the player to play in midfield". While that is an important note to make, it is not necessary to go into right now. Just keep it in mind.

Aerial (AE) Any of the "on the ball" actions (meaning, not the positioning actions) that are in the air use a combination of their primary skill and AE. For example, a pass in the air will be received by a player who uses his BC and AE in combination. There are different rules for how each skill (SC, BC, PA, TA) works with AE, but these we'll go into later. For now, the best general rule is to remember that anything in the air needs a bit of AE, and having huge AE without any supporting skills isn't that useful either.

Constitution (CO) I think many users would agree that CO is really just a great tool for ensuring the longevity of a player. Having higher CO allows the player to keep his stamina up during matches, and also to avoid injuries. This makes high CO players the more likely ones to last past their 20's. Currently, you need 32 for a youth player and 40 for a senior to complete a 90 minute match without getting tired. Youth always get a +8 bonus to CO.

Tackling (TA) I see tackling as a direct counter to ball control. Basically, think of any situation where BC is used and there will be a defender mentioned, trying to use his TA to stop him. There is not much more to say. A defender will use his positioning to get near the player, and if he is near enough he will use his TA to tackle, to challenge in the air (TA combined with AE), or to block the pass/shot/dribble, or even to prevent them. This is another rule about where and when players can use their preferred choices, so we'll go into that later.

Defensive Positioning (DP) Where TA counters BC directly, DP counters OP directly. If you imagine whenever your attacker may need to use his OP to get the ball, there will be a defender trying to use his DP to get there. From rebounds and loose balls, the defending team uses it's DP to get to the ball first, but other then that, DP is used to get close enough to attackers to make the challenge. You can get right on top of the player virtually, and the challenge will be easier, or you can be close but not quite there and then you have to rely on a block which is a bit riskier. Or if your DP isn't good enough you can end up nowhere near the attacker, leaving him free to do what he likes.

These are the outfield skills in a nutshell. If you think about them, and what I was saying about how they all effect every position, can you start to see how it works? A forward can use his SC, OP, BC to score, but also his TA and DP to block defenders trying to clear the ball. Or a midfielder can basically use every skill and be as offensive or defensive as you like, keeping in mind if he is completely one or the other there will be a weakness for the opponent to exploit.

1.2 Goalkeeper Skills

Reflexes (RE) The Freekick manual is very strict not to say which skills are most important for certain positions, but the one exception to this rule is Reflexes. Reflexes are the primary skill for a goalkeeper, so get the highest that you can. If in doubt, use the highest RE value, or train the RE skill. In terms of actual gameplay, reflexes is the last and main skill for making a save. If the keeper is sharp enough to get a hand to everything, then your opponent can't score!

Goalkeeper Positioning (GP) Reflexes might be the main skill for a keeper, but no matter how fast he is, he can't make a save 100% of the time if he can't get his body in the right position to save the ball. When a shot is fired in, the keeper's positioning is judged and after that he tries his best with his reflexes to get the ball but this might not be enough. On the flipside, if your goalkeeper gets into the right position then the save is easier, it is easier not to give the ball away for a rebound, and there is less chance the ball will be parried away for a corner or something more sinister.

Interceptions (IN) There are two main actions for a goalkeeper's IN skill as I see it. The first is dealing with high passes into the penalty box. Upon seeing his high pass, the keeper uses his IN to decide if he should come out, and then how well he comes out if he does. So the consequences of bad IN are making a bad decision to come out to the wrong ball, or just generally not reaching the ball which can have disastrous effect! The second use for IN is covering one-on-one situations where an attacker gets free from the defence to shoot. The keeper may use his IN to cut down the angles it is like with the high passes things, bad IN leads to bad decisions and bad execution, neither being great news since he is your last line of defence.

Control (CT) Not to be overlooked, CT is sort of like a handling or catching skill for a keeper. IN, GP and RE are essentially how well he will get to the ball, but CT is used to ensure he hangs onto it! There is nothing worse then doing everything right, making an awesome save, then dropping the ball at the strikers feet! Low control leads to rebounds, which are often 50/50 in the Penalty box and the worse the control skill the worse these rebounds can be. Low CT can mean saves are only pushed out for corners, or worse, bad CT can mean the ball goes straight through the keeper and into the goal. Don't get too carried away with CT, RE is still the primary skill, but keep in mind that you need some CT skills to stop those bad situations happening.

Organisation (OR) The theoretical side to OR is that your keeper can organise his defence (penalty box), which can save him a lot of effort in the long run. OR actually contributes to a fifth of the overall defensive workload by your players in the penalty box. So I see OR as something of a bonus to your defence if you have it. The other major use for OR is for defending freekicks. The keeper's OR skill helps set the wall and his own positioning, lessening the importance of GP a bit. It is quite a complicated skill actually, and we'll need to go into it more later. As always, just keep in mind that you can't totally ignore OR.

1.3 Positions

Once you know what player skills do, then you can start to think about moving them around the pitch. There is no absolute guide to what works where, which is why FreeKick offers a lot of tactical variety. Currently there are some restrictions to what formations and positions you can play players in, but that doesn't prevent a lot of the strategy elements available through positions.

Here I wish to go through all the possible positions, and try offer some styles of build in that position. It might get a bit complicated, and if that is the case you can come back to this later. Oh, and keep in mind these aren't rules, or even guidelines really. They are just tips.

Central Back (CB)
Does the bulk of the work at the back. Won't be running up out of the penalty box much. Won't be supporting the attack. But will be stopping attackers when they come into the PB. If he's the best AE defender he'll go for it, and if he's got nice DP he'll likely be the most there to cover the passes.

Balanced CB - There's not many positions so easy to choose for. With a CB, sometimes the best option is to get TA and DP as close to one another, and pick the highest combination you can get. And you'll find that that will either be enough to stop your opponent, or it won't. Happens all the time. If it doesn't you need to employ other tricks. The balanced CB often has dec-good CO, and sometimes dec AE too. But he's still just a TA/DP junkie.

You might need AE in a CB. If your opponent prefers high passes, then your best AE-CB will challenge him. It is not important that all CB's have AE. Some CB's on your team should have it and for others it is not necessary. Consider using the tactic "Aerial angles" for a CB that has low Aerial and he will try his best.

Example: AE/TA/DP = 40/55/60 is the minimum.

Flanking Back (FB, LB, RB)
Left and right side of the central defender. I guess a good tip here is if you don't know what you're doing, get a guy with at least dec PA and then as much TA/DP as you can find. If (somehow) he has more then exc/exc TA/DP (or good/sup or bril/dec etc…) then he'll need more PA. The story goes that flanking backs need PA to allow them to use their defensive skills when they're in midfield. Theoretically, without PA, the player obviously hasn't been trained in "midfield", so he can't use his full defence skills. Look for high CO also.

TA FB - Probably not as common, but I am assured it is the best way to go. The FB supports the PB in two ways: firstly he's got a job to do in stopping the ball getting into the box, and then he's used to support the zone there and the CB going for the challenge. TA is a good choice, as it's believed to support more than DP, and TA is also a valuable tool for swamping midfielders, as BC is a more "primary like" skill for the midfielders he'll be up against.

PA FB - There is an offensive element to the FB. He uses his PA to help the attacking flow in midfield. So this is a good way to make your side slightly more attacking, by taking a few points less in TA and DP and putting a bit of PA and BC on your FB. Do not forget CO.


Wing Back (WB)
This position was specifically created to allow attacking flank backs. They won't help out defensively as much, though they'll still be forced to defend their flank, but they'll support the midfielders more then a standard flanking back. Generally for WB's, keep in mind they want CO. They get some large incentives to use large CO so it's worthwhile. Think of these as very defensive midfielders.

Question: What is the difference between a RB and RWB?

Answer: The RWB will contribute more to the MF (midfield) zone in terms of defense and attack. The RB will contribute, but no as much (I believe its half as much), and instead contribute more to the PB (defending penalty box) zone. Also, a wingback may start opportunities based on his constitution above decent (40). I feel that's as simple an explanation as you need for now.

Balanced WB - Probably the most common style of wingback. Generally he just pretty strong CO (exc or more) and comparable defence to any possible FB's (maybe a bit less), and he has just enough PA, BC and OP to make him worthwhile supporting his midfielders offensively.

Mono-defense-skilled WB - The more skills you require on a player the more variations there are, but I'd say the other major type of Wingback is one that is a lot more offensive in PA, BC and OP, while trading off for one of his defensive skills, TA or DP. So your typical player here is likely to have a high CO, high TA build, or a High CO & DP build, and have just enough of the other defensive skill, but something quite nice in PA, BC and OP.

Defensive Midfielder (DM)
The most common midfielder used to break down attacks in midfield. This guy supports midfield and the penalty box defensively so he can be valuable when you are up against a heavy attacking side, or defending a lead.

PA DM - A lot of DM's are just FB's with huge PA. While BC and OP are useful if you have them, the main purpose of the DM is to defend midfield, so TA and DP are a priority, and the high PA makes him useful for passing the ball around.

Mono-DM - Similar to the WB mono version, this DM is often played to shut down a particular player. If your opponent scares you with a huge BC player in midfield, you will play a high TA DM to stop him, for example. Same goes for OP and DP to combat that.

Central Midfielder (CM)
Central midfielders are the hardest positions to fit with players. If you have a central midfield who is too defensive, he's likely a great DM. If you have a CM that is great offensively, he's likely a Winger or Offensive midfielder.

PA CM - The trick to a CM is his secondaries, needing OP, BC, TA, DP all as high as possible. In this build, the CM has considerably high passing skills, and tries to get an acceptable level of the other 4 skills he needs.

Balanced CM - It's viable to not have heaps of PA on a midfielder. So long as the PA is comparable to all his other skills, you can get away with a CM that has 5 or 6 skills at the same level.

Flank Midfielder (FM)
This position is exactly the same as a CM. The trick to remember though, is that most opportunities will go down the centre, so it's wise to remember to keep your best CM players at CM, and your weaker CM players at FM. Though, not having as many plays down the flanks does open up a bit of freedom: these guys don't always need to be as balanced, as they'll be exploited less often, but could make a difference once or twice that changes the game.

Winger (RW, LW)
Introduced into FreeKick to allow the attacking version of the Flank midfielder. They still have the same offensive and defensive duties on the field, but the major difference is that the flank midfielder helps support your midfield more, whereas the winger supports your front line more.

OP Winger - If your winger is looking to beat more balanced FM's (Flank Midfielder) (and FB's), it's likely he'll be able to find himself some space if he can position himself well. Once you get free, the main bonus is that you can use your preferred passing/crossing/dribbling choices.

BC Winger - You'll find that this option came about mostly because teams used to try defend to stop the OP Winger. So, as soon as you find a FM (Flank Midfielder) or FB with lower TA, then the BC winger can plow right through him, beating the challenge and then doing what he needs to do.

CO Winger - This is a bit of an "old school" impression of the winger because the position used to be more stamina-intensive then most, meaning sides needed more CO on their wingers to play a full game. The CO winger is still a valuable asset though, as CO always is. It keeps your skills up because it avoids a lot of fatigue (stamina loss) during matches and helps you avoid injuries.

Offensive Midfielder (OM)
The midfielder in this position is chosen to attack the penalty box. He-s likely to be involved offensively a lot, and he supports your front players in your attacking penalty box, the same way the DM supports the CB-s in your defensive penalty box.

BC OM - The most common style of OM, and it is also a sort of "old school" impression. It's perfectly viable and it takes a very specialised sort of CM or DM to stop him. The player has huge BC, and a bit of PA and OP and often some SC as well. The golden rule is that if you can't take the ball off him, he's likely to get the ball into the box easily.

No TA/DP OM - There's not much else in terms of variations in OM's. You can go higher PA or OP or even SC, but another common player you will find at OM is the MF with OP,BC,PA but no TA and DP. These two skills are still important for the OM because he is still a midfielder, but often teams find it easier to defend with guys behind the OM, and leave the OM free to terrorise with his offensive skills only.

AE OM - The trick with an OM is to have a guy that your opponent can't stop. High passes in midfield is a very cunning trick that most normal CMs and DMs won't be able to stop. If you combine high AE with a bit of BC he’ll be hard to challenge, and a bit of PA to allow him to head on or volley on to other front men, he becomes a valuable style of player.

Forward - Striker (FW, ST)

Ball Control Forward
(SC/OP/BC)
He needs very good skills in at least two of these: SC/OP/BC

Example: This would be a forward for the lower (amateur) divisions.
65/55/60 in SC/OP/BC are the minimum requirements.

Offensive Positioning Forward
(SC/OP/BC)
The OP-FW needs exc or sup (or even more) for assistance to the other FW.

Example: SC/OP/BC = 50/70/45 is the minimum. He can score often, but more importantly he provides assistance to help his teammate, the Ball Control-style FW to score.

Aerial Forward
(SC/OP/BC/AE)
He is very different from the previous two. He is something special in all matches. You can see an option on the Tactics page . There is "demand high passes" option for him. If you want high passes in the penalty box, you need this guy. You could also use the "seek corner" option and see him score from a set piece. Don't expect to use this player every week.

Example: SC/OP/BC/AE = 50/50/40/60 is the minimum.Why do you need BC for an AE-FW? Because BC is important for making a reception and battling in the air against tall players.

(My guess on the calculation:)
Reception: BC+AE/2
Heading: AE+SC/2 if AE>SC

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Butlee talking about Forwards

In general, OP is the better and more important skill for a FW than BC. OP helps him get free, might get him more bonuses with the keeper and sometimes means you don't need to use much BC if you get away from a defender.

Besides all that, OP also offers more contribution to the PB zone when you're attacking, so from an assistance point of view having OP higher then BC offers a bit more.

But it's never that simple really. It's a good guide to say OP is stronger, but BC can be used to beat TA better if you can't get away from the defender. BC also helps get around the keeper in one-on-one situations. BC can help put the keeper out of position if the forward receives really well, especially in aerial AE situations.

If you haven't got a full handle on how it works just yet, OP is usually a better option. A guy with both OP and BC is stronger than one with extremely good OP and extremely bad BC.