The central midfielder with the attacking duty is usually the natural part of my formations within the Football Manager saves. The FM22 edition is not an exception and this role has its place in my 2-3-3-2 formation (as I named it). I remember I always had one of the biggest expectations from this role but I’m not sure if any player filled them when I’m looking back on a couple of my last saves.

This post is some kind of summary of my own thoughts about this role mainly in terms of what I want from it, how I feel about this role and how I’m continuously trying to find my most ideal player for this role.

Preferable attributes for CM(A) highlighted by the game:

·         Long Shots, Tackling, Technique, Anticipation, Composure, Teamwork, Vision, Work Rate, Acceleration, Stamina.

Key attributes for CM(A) highlighted by the game:

·         First Touch, Passing, Decisions, Off The Ball.

My key attributes & the searching filter

I always liked the way how James talked about the player positions/roles/key attributes and it’s always great to follow or read when he talks about it. I can safely say that he was the one who influenced my thinking the most in terms of the fact that a certain player doesn’t have to have a specific role 100% natural to play. For example, using the natural winger as a wing-back and retraining him and many more.

This also applies to my thinking behind the CM(A) role. The fact I have one player with 100% ability to play as CM(A) doesn’t mean he will be the best possible choice for this role. My FM21 save with GAIS was a perfect example of this. I had Nuha Jatta for the entire duration of the save and he was natural in the CM(A) role and he was a best-rated role for 8 from 10 seasons I spent in Sweden. But was he the best? I don’t think so. It could be based on the formation overall but I think it was very similar even in previous editions.

If there would be an option to edit the key/preferable attributes for the roles, I would do it to reflect it straight in the game but this is something that I can see even when I just check a profile of a specific player. I’m sure many of you who play the game regularly have the same. One short look and you know the specific attributes for a specific role. I have them mainly within central defenders as I have them connected with the key attributes for set pieces. But also with other roles.

The combination of box-to-box and free role

Maybe my idea of the CM(A) role is a little bit different than yours but I usually have some different thoughts. The player in this role should not be a playmaker but it’s great when he knows how and where to pass the ball. In my eyes, this ‘XY’ player should be some kind of unstoppable-moving and free-minded player. Something between box-to-box midfielder and number 10 free role. Not the main engine of the team, not the main brain of the squad. Something between this. Maybe that’s the main reason why I always considered using the striker here (more below).

The off the ball movement and decisions are in line with the stamina to ensure he will be able to do all the stuff. Especially if the FM22 includes that factor of fatigue vs. impact to the decisions or quality of passing. I’m at the beginning of the save and I’m not in a position to be able to choose from the best possible players. That means I have to make compromises and I have to think about every player twice or three times.

MY secondary attributes for CM(A):

• First Touch, Technique, Teamwork, Work Rate, Vision.

MY key attributes for CM(A):

• Off The Ball, Decisions, Stamina, Anticipation, Composure, Passing.

That means the key attributes were added to the new search filter, all of them with the starting value of 13. The reason why 13 is very simple - I decreased the excellent attribute threshold to 13 in preferences to reflect the quality of the league I play in and players I have available.

The secondary attributes were added to the search filter as well but I don’t have them ticked/active at the beginning and I only tick them to just find out who has this and this. And also the starting value is set to 10.

In my current save with Warta Poznan, I was sure at the beginning that I will have to lower my demands because there will be no players interested in transfer/loan (or you can always hit the settings icon near the Transfer/Loan interested in and adjust how much/less interested players will be shown). But I didn’t have to adjust so much when I made the first try. I found three very decent players after decreasing the starting value just by one.

Bartosz Nowak went straight to the shortlist and all scouts went in…

My own options

I always like to check my own options in the first place before I will turn my head to the player search screen. It looks we are in a very similar position as with Nuha Jatta in FM21 as I mentioned earlier. My most natural CM(A) player is/was Mateusz Czyzycki. The 23 years old Polish midfielder looks solid in many areas but the overall result is that he is an average player and his key attributes for this role are not as good as I would like. But three goals and 1 assist in 7 friendly matches don’t sound too bad.

Mateusz was sent off in the 2nd league round and he got a ban for the next two matches. I let 20 years old Szymon Czyz plays in CM(A) role in these two matches despite his attributes are not too good. But something told me just to try it. And no, the fact their surnames has the same base was not the reason.

The fact I have the first transfer window closed gave me enough time to 1) try to develop/improve my current players a little bit during the first season and decide if I will stick with them or 2) search for better players.

In the end, I edited the search filter and added my own players to it. It resulted in the fact that I had to adjust the values down to 10 to meet my own criteria. I think that three from five players are defenders speaks for themselves.

But one of them was also a forward. I created a custom view within the tactics selection popup window (when you click on the name of the player within the tactics screen) so I can see the key attributes of all possible central midfielders here. *it’s only a small shame that I can’t see all players here instead of only central midfielders or players who are natural/partly natural in the CM role.

Forward? Why not

But instead of just moaning about something, I created the custom view for my squad and added all my key and my secondary attributes to this screen in combination with some more basic things including the overall stats of the season. I didn’t add forward to the headline by a coincidence. The FM22 version is the third or fourth version when I thought about playing some forward in the CM(A) role. The first idea was to use there some good finishers as this player offers big support around and in the penalty area so good composure will be useful same as for forwards.

The same as the composure is very important, the first attribute I look at is the Off the Ball movement. This attribute is crucial for most of the field players and I pay a big attention to it. Not only when I look on my strikers but also for this CM(A) role. I’m enjoying the combination of CM(A) and DLF(A) at the beginning of the save as the Deep Lying Forward (mostly Adam Zrelak) moves deeper to receive the ball and the CM(A) player is able to move up to the space to receive the ball and shoot.

This goal against Lech Poznan in the home derby match is absolutely perfect example and I can imagine this can work perfectly with the striker who would have even better combination of the Off The Ball and Composure attributes.

I highlighted some players on the screen below. Two of them are strikers. Adam Zrelak is my main Deep Lying Forward or Pressing Forward. Mateusz Kuzimski is a completely neutral forward who is not too good Advanced Forward but he is not too good as DLF too. Simply, that kind of player you don’t know what to do with. But his attributes for CM(A) role are not that bad if you compare it with others. I gave him twenty minutes in this role in the Ekstraklasa 4th round and he scored our second goal from a penalty kick in a win against Gornik Leczna.

The more I think about it, the more I’m sure I will try more and more players in this role to just test what works, what doesn’t work and what can be improved. I think it’s also important to mention that I’m using the CM(A) role in the middle of flat midfield trio and I’m not using any additional individual instructions for this role except the Get Further Forward (default for the role).

The funny thing is that when I decided to write about this topic and I made that custom view, one player appeared surprisingly. It’s the club captain - 37 years old Lukasz Tralka. I wanted to use him as a backup of our Half Back or one of the static CM(S) players with Hold Position instruction. But I think I will try him in this role if it will be needed. The only downside is the off the ball attribute below the value of 10.

If I would turn back to the search filter I shared above and untick the interest in transfer/loan, the best possible players within the game database will appear. And if I will increase the value of key attributes, the great players including forwards (Kane, Salah) will appear here.

Half Back & CM(A) combination

I’m also using the Half Back role within my tactics and despite I didn’t play for too long, I found the combination with the CM(A) is really nice. Mainly if 1) the HB is able to make the pass at the right time and 2) if the CM(A) player has a good off the ball attribute and he can take it as his advantage. For example like this goal in the friendly against Rennes.

Simple description - the Half Back always offers support to other midfielders and he is always available to receive the ball from other midfielders or strikers and distribute the ball further.

In this example, we won the second ball and CM(S) player passed it to the DLF(A) who didn’t have a different option than to pass it to the HB - Kopczynski made a great pass to Czyzycki and he scored.

Hopefully, more to come with these two roles. I think there is a potential to make it very successful with some useful players with good off the ball movement and decisions mainly.

When one swap changes everything…

I wanted to end this post originally after the previous part about the cooperation with the half back. But the game/save decided to write one more part. The reason is very simple. As the first season continued, I decided to swap two players in the flat midfield. I moved already mentioned Mateusz Czyzycki from CM(A) role to CM(S). He wasn’t bad in the CM(A) role but I think his Dictates Tempo trait slowed him down. And I moved Mateusz Sopocko to the CM(A).

I knew I won’t be able to sign some better player, at least during the first season, so I told myself it’s probably the last option before I will move the main striker Adam Zrelak here.

If you consider the highlighted key attributes in the picture above, you can say “he is not good enough” or “nothing special in comparison with Czyz or Czyzycki”. And you would be right. For example, his Decisions attribute is worse in comparison with the other two players. *You can easily compare it in the picture with the team selection I shared slightly above*

But.

I decided to make this change in the league match against Raków in the second part of November 2021. This match was just a test of how it will work. I was satisfied with his movement and I let him play here. He made one assist in the next match when we won 1:0 against Piast Gliwice and he scored Górnik so I decided to continue with it and test it even more.

The winter pre-season started in the middle of January. We played some quality matches, we tested the tactic more and more. And Sopocko scored 5 goals in 6 friendlies and he scored also one goal in each of the first three league matches against Zaglebie, Górnik Leczna and Stal Mielec at the beginning of the spring part of the season. If he would score goals just in friendlies, I would say, alright, it was maybe a coincidence. But when he continued scoring also in the league, I activated the automatic extension clause in his contract and will try to play him here more. At least until I will find a better player for CM(A) role.

The goal below is a fantastic example of the cooperation between the half back, CM(A) and DLF(A). The simple passes and the perfect movement. Perfect.

Btw. Mateusz Czyzycki left the club in winter and moved to Sparta Prague for just €200k because he wanted over €10k per month wage when I tried to extend his deal. Sopocko is better statisticaly and he earns only €2.4k p/m until 2024. Win win? Maybe…

Thanks for reading, take care.