Tips to manage teams expected to be relegated from lowest division

Hi! I have been playing fm quite a lot and have been very sucessful with medium teams in medium leagues. Now I thought a nice challenge would be to start from the bottom and eventually work my way up. So I started at the lowest division in England (cant remember the name... The teams name was Hungerford if I remember correctly..) thats not important though...
My problem is that for about 10 games or so everything is gping well... I win quite many games and is located around mid table... But then it always collapses completely... Could be 10 games without scoring a goal... According to the health number the players are "fine" (I know there are hidden parameters to fatique and so on) but I try to rotate the players, give them rest days from training and so on...

But my question is... What are your tips for handling these really low end teams? I have tried using a 3-5-2 tactic but I guess that might be a bit too hard for such a bad team... Tried another save with 4-4-2 long balls... That worked for something like 10 games then like 15 straight losses...

What are your suggestions to avoid these complete wrecks after a few games?

Any ideas are appreciated=)

/Niklas
Ps. Sorry for the bad formatting, trying to compose the message on my phone...

Some quick thoughts....

At that level don't put overly physical demands on your players press wise. Also ask them to do their roles, defenders defend... and so on. You won't get marauding overlapping full backs working at that level consistently for example.

To fail twice, so to speak, with different formations implies something is fundamentally at fault with your basic set ups. But as you say you have had success elsewhere so perhaps you are being too ambitious in your requests on the players.

Thanks for the tips! Im trying to kewp it as basic as possible, what really confuses me is that I am very succesfull for like 1/4 of the season and then it fails completely... That is really what confuses me

How is the teams morale? Are you overly critical of them in defeat?

No most of the time Im very positive after a defeat. But of course after 10straight defeats morale is a bit low

hey man one tip i should mention is not to go after technically or mentally good players instead go for players who are physically good.
another is to check released players from top clubs who may be ready for first team they are free and mostly will be not ask lots of wages.
ask your board for a senior affiliate to loan players from

If morale is low then drastically changing a tactic won't help much. At times like this the game should be called Morale Manager 2020.

Getting the morale up is your number one priority. Forget everything else. Players with low morale will make basic mistakes, you will give away more pens and simple decisions will be incorrect.

Call a team meeting for starters, now these can be very hit and miss but you have to start somewhere. Go for the 'I know things have been going wrong lately' angle. Never get aggressive with a low morale team, you have to calmly or assertively praise them. Tell them they are unlucky in defeat and praise them for everything else.

The pattern for the team talk should be - Calm, inspire, praise. You'll see there you have one option to inspire, at half time. This is when you can get angry if really needed. The calm and praise are where you build that morale back up.

yeah to improve morale here's a cheat. when interacticing with player praise player conduct his morale always increases

Hi! Interesting you say drastically changing the tactics, cause the season I got the best result was actually when I completely rebuild the tactics after around 17 games. That was after 10 good games and then the usual crash... Then after about 5 straight losses I rebuilt the tactics completely from a 4-4-2 long ball to a 3-5-2 possesion tactic... Then I cot lile 5 good games until I crashed again... That was enough to save me from relegation...

But I mean it cannot be the idea that you conpletely need to rebuild the tactics every 7th game?

And morale wise... Thats pretty much what I try to do. I try to be overly positive and careful with critisism. But when the crash comes nothing helps... The team talk boosts it up. Everybody is green and happy... Then we loose 0-4 against a team below us in the league the next game...

I'd argue then there is something fundamentally wrong with your tactic(s). Can you post them up here or pm them to me if you would rather keep private.

That would be highly appreciated. I have kept them very very simple, just a 4-4-2 eith long balls and havent changed the roles...
I will save the tactic and send it to you as a pm latest tomorrow... Not sure if I will be able to get to the conputer today!

Thanks =)

No problem Nuggit82, happy to help. I suspect you are consistently too attacking in your set up & you are being picked off by certain opposition. It's a common theme.

I hope i can be of some help here.

I have never managed a lower league club but i did take Jamacia (a very low status national team) to the World Cup Final ....take a moment, and yes its true......i took Jamacia to the world cup final where France would beat me 2-0.

This happened on my FM2016 save and below was my secret to success.

1. Do not play with a lot of tactics and big changes .....KISS...keep it very simple so the stupid players can understand their role and position. No overlaps, no complex roles just simple defend, attack, run, shoot and tackle.

2. Play a formation that best suits the players you have available.
....For example i had a lot of midfielders when i was the Jamacian Manager so if one of my strikers was injuried i would use what i had and make the 2nd formation 4-5-1 ...i did not play a midfielder in a striker position so i could keep my primary formation all the time.

3. your set-piece takers are very very important....always check these and have the best possible selection for yout freekicks, penalties, corners.
...i feel people forget about the importance of these...you can get alot of goals from this.

4. It will not be pretty but it will be affective......Jamaica 3 - 0 England .....a score i will never forget, because we only had 5 shots on goal for the whole game!!!!
.....yes, it was a very nervous game

Your moments of game play will be limited but you can be affective when you have the ball.
Play to your physical strengths and let your creative players be expressive. Give them freedom and let them attack.

5. Understand that some of your players are not good enough but they can do a job for some time or some of the game \ season.
.....i had some terrible players for Jamacia but they did surprise me at times and they did a job for the team as well.

6. Because they are limited, do not be too hard / critical when they lose or play bad. This is so important when they lose to a better team. Always take positives away from a lost game when you are the underdogs.

I hope the above helped.

Thanks for that, I will try yet another save with this team and try to use all the knowledge you guys have fed me...

Thank you all, Im extremely thankful for all your tips