Quote Originally Posted by vad View Post
I think, you are heavily overestimating the impact of whatever you do on the game. For instance, I have yet to see a game where upon my changing from hard defending to hard attacking (or anything in between) would have any visible effect on the movements of the players. I'm pretty sure that all those settings that we are allowed to specify, are no more than cosmetics for our entertainment.

Equally, everybody who played for a while knows that once in a while there will be a game where the players will just not perform at all. One would think that this is exactly what had to be reflected in their morale, by the very definition of the morale, but it's not the case.

Equally, if you look closely, there's no much relation even between the condition and the result. Again, I'm pretty sure that once in a while everybody has a case where you just did not have time to get to the team between two games on the same day, so the players all had 60-70% condition, but still beat an equal team.

Or, when the player who "broke the leg" and was "stretched from the field", if not replaced, keeps playing just fine, and even occasionally scores. In fact, if anything, you may even notice some boost for your team.

We sure like to tell ourselves that our movements and preparations and training and morale and formations and watching the game and bonus do matter, but I'm pretty sure that if someone ran statistics on big numbers of games, it would be revealed that in the end, they don't. Or maybe some negligible effect.
That's exactly what I think. Try to change "focus passing" from "down both flanks" to "through the middle" and you won't see any change. The player would still go down both flanks trying to cross the ball tenths times a match without getting a single header. Statistically in a football match you would see a lot more headers in attack than in a Top Eleven game. Occasionally, out of 10 games, I can get a cross right and score after that.
This season I tried to train more crossing and heading, without any perceivable difference.

Then you play association and I'm tired to tell this everytime. I go full morale and full condition, using counter formation on a much lower quality team, and still getting a defeat or a draw.
Full condition doesn't make any change, morale neither, quality...LOL, doesn't change ****. Counter formation? Try to mess up your formation, you would actually see the players in the position you put them, but after a second they would still go wherever they are expected to go covering all the field.

All this makes me think what you said, they are just cosmetics and the real result is calculated over something else we won't really ever know. Probably is a mix of ball possession, positioning and I don't know what.
If you watch every troll result you would notice that the shot efficiency is almost perfect on the winning team.