Asunto: Read before standing for election

1. Why have you chosen to stand for election in Australia, and if you haven't been active int he forums in the past, why not?

Firstly, I find it an enjoyable experience to manage the Australian National Team. I get to test myself against other managers from other countries on a regular basis and learn a lot from every game.

Secondly, I have a few things I would like to have a chance at rectifying as explained in my press release. The ranking points isn't as strong as it was 1 season ago. I would like the chance to be able to get out of that problem during the qualification matches and qualify for another attempt at the world cup.

Finally, I stand as a person who will listen to and is open for comments on virtually any aspect of the national team. I have always been with the belief that you can't have a good national team if you don't have the user involvement in discussion and to be able to take on suggestions from the users themselves.

2. Australia has always suffered from having only a small number of managers actually following the australian team. How would you create more interest among the australian community?

People seem to be asking about competitions. Yeah these can be effective and I have used them in the past but there are various other methods as well. Some other methods which could be used involve writing up weekly pre and post match reports of the game, getting a discussion from the users on what went right, what didn't, in the main forum. Then there is the ability to be able to communicate to others about training regimes for particular players and to discuss any other potential issues like how to set a tactic etc. Sure some of these get asked by other users in the forums, but if you can help someone understand the game then I would think that has a higher chance of having that user stay and hang around, which then as they get more aware of what's going on around them, they can then turn to the NT side of things. These are just some of the things that can be done. Other things include as others have already mentioned a guide as to where players are situated, and possibly allowing users the chance to have a small role such as scouting for players in foreign countries etc.

3. Provide a matchlink where you were/are happy with your choice of tactic (club or NT). Why were/are you happy with it?

A few come to mind. From the NT it's hard to go past the win against Norway in the world cup qualifiers last season. After losing the opening leg against them, a new approach was needed and it was vital with Ireland pushing hard for our spot, that we needed to walk away with something against Norway. To walk away from that with a 2 - 0 win against a stronger national team showed that something went right.

The other NT match that I was rather happy with was the 2 - 1 win over Finland in an U21 match. The reason I was happy with that was that I knew the structure that they had been playing and tried to counter that as best as possible. The plan worked, although we did have to come from behind with 2 late goals to Storey to steal the win, but considering how strong Finland have been and how they've beaten us by a large amount early in our history, it was extremely rewarding to walk away with that victory.

4. We have an issue in Australia where we have lop-sided strength. We have a strong batch of wingers but no real capability to strike through the centre. It leaves us playing quite predictable formations. How would you try to deal with this issue to help us get a bit more balance in the skills of our NT squad?


Well, we do have the capability to strike through the centre, although it isn't nearly as strong as our wingers. One problem tends to lie in trainers not training defending to midfielders to try to maximise the other skills. Also junior pulls play a part as well, with a lucky distribution it is possible to result in a better midfielder.

Now about how I would try to deal with this. I think the best approach is to work out where and what people currently train, and then talk to them individually about what the player needs and the best way to train them. The other important thing to note is that I somehow get across that single skilled players are not as strong as a rounded player and that single skilled players will not get selected. By getting that message across and to advise of how to train our midfielders, particularly young ones in the future we should expect to see a more balanced looking midfield.

At the same time though, it's not just our midfielders that results in playing wingers. A combination of striker misplacements from tactical structures and also the quality of the striker also play a role. Our strikers of the past have lacked the critical punch of some of the other teams. They haven't been high enough across all skills and that causes issues in that they struggle to break the line, so as a result a winger was effective to get in behind the defense line.

So, also trying to get the striker trainers to train up properly is important and I would definitely try to improve striker positioning to get the effect we require.
(editado)

1. Why have you chosen to stand for election in Australia, and if you haven't been active int he forums in the past, why not?

Do I need to answer a question aimed at a foreign manager? If I do, then I'm sick and tired of being stuck in II.01. I'm gonna look for success in other avenues, mainly Australia, multis and Battrick.

2. Australia has always suffered from having only a small number of managers actually following the australian team. How would you create more interest among the australian community?

Interest = Principal x Rate x Time.

I'll award terjeH the assistant manager's seat. The interest will skyrocket that way. Can't go wrong with that approach.

3. Provide a matchlink where you were/are happy with your choice of tactic (club or NT). Why were/are you happy with it?

Like Dave above, I cbf providing a link, but it's the match we lost at the WC when I was manager. France 1 - 0 Australia.

To say we were robbed of the win is a gross understatement. We played so much better than a team that was so much better than us that an entire nation actually believed we were going to do it. That nation being France of course, surrenderists that they are.

4. We have an issue in Australia where we have lop-sided strength. We have a strong batch of wingers but no real capability to strike through the centre. It leaves us playing quite predictable formations. How would you try to deal with this issue to help us get a bit more balance in the skills of our NT squad?

Simplest question ever. All I have to do is bully FG7 into training some defending for his midfielders. Mwahaha.
(editado)

Don't need to bully. It is happening already ;)

1. Why have you chosen to stand for election in Australia, and if you haven't been active in the forums in the past, why not?

I come from Italy, where the forum life is too active to leave time to actively partecipate in some other forum. so, I choose Australia after some weeks of silent reading of forums all over the world. My staff and I like this community very much.

2. Australia has always suffered from having only a small number of managers actually following the australian team. How would you create more interest among the australian community?

I want to create a discussion thread on the NT, where I can speak about NT with Australian users and plan together the future.
Great attention on the young players, with 1 scout for each role (gk, def, mid, att) and for each age (so... "att over 21", "att19-20", "att 17-18", "att16" etc...). of course, each of you can be selected for these roles.

3. Provide a matchlink where you were/are happy with your choice of tactic (club or NT). Why were/are you happy with it?

my best match was versus a team with a bad tactic (of course!) they were stronger but.... there I also planned a superimposition of two forwards (that took my team in goal)

4. We have an issue in Australia where we have lop-sided strength. We have a strong batch of wingers but no real capability to strike through the centre. It leaves us playing quite predictable formations. How would you try to deal with this issue to help us get a bit more balance in the skills of our NT squad?

All Australian users will be helped by my staff in improving their training plan. my MID scout is one of the best trainers in Italy. I think that we'll solve this problem in a pair of seasons.

The question from vivski was:

Do you think the changes to the match engine will change the formations you use? And what impact do you think they will have on the Australian NT?

The engine modifications I don't really believe have been "significant" to directly impose changes into tactical styles but that's not to say they won't have any impact because ofcourse there will be some effect. I think the major two which have been talked about in other forums and make this an improved version is the ability for wingers to decide to pass earlier rather than always run to the corner before whipping in a cross which often failed to hit the target, and the defenders actually retreating to assist the keeper on rebounds which previously didn't happen.

They appeared to be the main two, but there some other minor adjustments.

What this then means if anything is that it falls back towards our favour as we are strongest in our midfield, but particularly our wingers. This doesn't mean a winger will be always used, but it certainly assists our chances. So as I've stated I don't expect the engine modifications alone to change much from our style, although I expect a lot of other teams to think the changes are so significant that they'll play wingers and that's something that will need to be looked at when designing and developing tactics.

The only potential change, might be planning for early passes back into the centre as I've noticed that a bit, so effectively placing players becomes more important across all squares in the tactic editor, as it opens up a few more potentially surprising solutions to finding a way forward.

Others might disagree but the engine modifications improved the game, but the process of designing tactics still fall to the players we have on the day, the likely structure of the opponent and the strategy in place for that particular day. These improvements weren't as quick to change tactics from when they made lower ranged wingers less accurate in generating crossing goals when every side knew goals came from them as a major source.
(editado)

Wow that was avery close elction, except without the excitement of a close election :S

What? I only got one vote? That's a disgrace ;)

Congrats Cometer, make us proud! :)

"One for Martin, two for Martin"


The question is... was it you who voted for you or someone else? [xD]

I voted for myself to test the "if you have a vote you get on the shortlist of candidates" ;)

Most happy that I didn't get the job :p