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Recently I have been thinking about which special abilities are useful and not useful.
We start with the breakdown on each of the special abilities and my own opinion of it.. Of course you are free to comment and voice your say on the matter.
Goalkeepers
Penalty stopper - Useless Any goalkeeper in my opinion can save penalties, it also depends on the player taking the penalty but we'll get back to that later. Having the extra bonus is probably only handy in penalty shoot outs but it only gives a slight edge over the opponent and in the end, penalty shoot outs are all down to luck regardless of goalkeeper used.
Counters: Penalty specialist
One-on-one stopper - Slightly useful. Given the volume of shots that are blasted wide or over the bar from 1 vs 1 positions, I don't see the point of this ability being entirely match saving because I have seen goalkeepers have an amazing game without one-on-one stopper abilities. My last 2 one-on-one stoppers were quite useless in those situations and probably made a save from 2 out of 10 times, the others missed or scored. Having said this, a one-on-one stopper may be useful in some situations against crap players and I have seen it happen a few times that they stopped a one-on-one scorer.
Counters: One-on-one scorer
Defenders
Aerial defender - Very useful - These defenders are very good in heading out corners, indirect free kicks and counter attacks in which the opponent attacks from the flanks. I also find that these sorts of players tend to score more from corner kicks with their improved heading stat. It is recommended that at least two defenders in your whole squad have this ability.
Counters: Corner specialist
Defensive walll - Useful/Very useful - These defenders are good for blocking long range shots and from direct free kicks, however this is all they are good at, tackling and heading is the same as a normal player. It's a more useful if you have a player with defensive and defensive midfield role along with this ability and playing them in the DM role allows them to mark attacking midfielders more and this becomes effective in countering a shadow striker.
Counters: Shadow striker
Midfield
Playmaker - Useless - These sorts of players are *supposed* to take on the kinds of roles such as David Silva or any playmaker in world football. But they simply do not as their assist ratios are rubbish. They are, however, a yellow card magnet as the only thing they are good at is passing and are prone to several yellow cards and the occasional red. If you are the kind of manager who likes to play flat formations then this may be useful with short passing, but usually the fact that they don't score that much makes this ability useless. I had 2 playmakers last season and all they did was get yellow cards. This season I have 2 more playmakers and I get the same thing, they get more yellow cards then they are scoring/assisting.
Counters: Nothing
Dribbler - Useless - These players are good at making runs through defenders with the ball but if you have a good, fast midfielder or attacking midfielder then you'll find that this is quite a useless ability as any decent player can rip through defences without a dribbler ability. I haven't actually owned one yet but I have watched matches with dribblers and they don't tend to do a great deal. It's not entirely useless but having one isn't that important.
Counters: Nothing
Shadow striker - Slightly useful/Useful - These players are good at shooting from long range and are mainly suited for attacking midfielders but if your players are good then they can score from long range without this ability as I have encountered numerous times. Nevertheless, against a rock solid defence, they are great at knocking in 30 metre shots.
Countered by: Defensive wall
Striker
One-on-one scorer - Average/Slightly useful - These players are good at scoring from one on one positions so you'd imagine that they will take on the shot themselves. But when they pass it to someone else and miss, you end up raging, then it's not so good of an ability. I'd say about 50% of the time any player (regardless of ability) will pass to someone else. When your player doesn't pass it, they do tend to score more from 1 vs 1 positions and although it doesn't happen as much as you'd expect, it isn't exactly a very useful ability but still quite handy to have one in your team.
Countered by: One-on-one stopper
Set pieces
Penalty taker -Useless - These players have improved accuracy for penalties, however any decent player can convert a penalty as a lot of it is down to luck. About 10/13 penalties were scored last season by my player who hasn't got a special ability which is still pretty decent. A penalty taker will probably score 11 or 12 of those. The ratio is not that much different.
Countered by: Penalty stopper
Free kick specialist - Useful - These players are brilliant at scoring from free kicks. Sometimes the goalkeeper will make a great save but that's nothing you can do about it, that's just the gave engine throwing in some drama. My player currently on free kicks doesn't even have this ability and scores quite a lot of goals from free kicks, so if you have a player with the ability and another player without one but with a much superior shooting stat, then it is better off choosing them. Having said that, you still need one of these in your team.
Corner specialist - Very useful - These players have a great crossing ability and I find that you'll score a great deal of corners with this. Even though the aerial defender counters this ability, your chances of getting past them is greater when using a corner specialist as opposed to a non corner specialist.
Countered by: Aerial defender
Thats it..So, thoughts?
In your squad, I'd say you need at least.
x1 one-on-one stopper
x2 aerial defenders
x1 defensive wall
x2 corner specialists
x2 free kick takers
x1 one-on-one scorer
Optional (not important)
x1 shadow striker
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Originally Posted by kullehh
Dribblers never dribble anyone and penalty kick takers usually miss more penalties than the non specialists.