New Star Manager - Hints and Tips

Managing a football team, albeit a virtual one, can be a bit daunting. So here are a few hints and tips that will see you well on your way to becoming a great manager. This guide covers tips and suggestions on the basics, so if you are just starting out on your career you should find something useful here.

First Things First

The first few matches serve as a tutorial, so when you have full control you need to build a scout office as you can’t buy any players until you have a scout and you can’t hire a scout until your scout office has been built. When you have a scout you can then have a good look at your squad with a view to bringing new players in and letting others go. You will have to wait until the next season starts for the transfer window to open.

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If you go to your squad screen and click on INFO and then SQUAD DATA, you get all the information you need on your current players. Select SKILLS from the drop down menu and sort by potential. This helps you to see which players are worth keeping and which you need to sell. The most important position to strengthen early on is your Goalkeeper. Look at the squads of the best teams in your league and see if you need a better keeper.

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Then look at the rest of your squad and identify your best players and work out what the best formation is for your current players and work around that. Try to have at least 2 players for each position on the pitch. Don’t get too hung up on having a really strong starting 11 as the key is having a decent squad.

As soon as you can afford it, you should upgrade the pitch because the first upgrade improves passing accuracy. Subsequent upgrades reduce energy loss and the chance of picking up injuries. Don’t get carried away with upgrading the stadium too early, it’s not like “Field of Dreams”! In this game, if you build it, they won’t automatically come. Fans will be drawn to your stadium when the quality of your squad rises. Wait until you get a message prompting you to upgrade.

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Formation

Generally speaking, you should try to play in a formation that suits your best players, so for example if your best player is a left sided forward player, you should consider playing 3-4-3 or 4-3-3. If you have a few decent central defenders in your squad, consider playing 5-3-2. This formation is very flexible because you can play either defenders or midfielders in the wide positions.

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Players that can play in multiple positions are the most valuable and having players that can play on the left, right or in the centre are worth keeping, even if their rating is a bit lower than other players. Keep this in mind when selecting substitutes. Also note that the ASSISTANT PICK button is not a magic button: don’t become too reliant on it as sometimes there are better options.

Tactics

Don’t be afraid to swap formation and tactics. Before a match starts you can view the squad of the opposition and this will show you their formation. You can use this to your advantage, for instance if the opposition is playing 4-4-2, changing to 4-3-3 might give you the edge in the centre of midfield.

The same is also true during a match. Pay close attention to how much space your players have and the match commentary. The assistant coach will tell you if your team is struggling in a particular area.

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If you are worried about energy consumption, lower your team’s work rate or use a team talk card at half time or even before a match. Team talk cards are very valuable, so use them wisely.

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Always use your subs. There are good reasons for using your subs, for example, you can rest your best players to make sure they have enough energy for the next game or give your rookie youth players game time.

And lastly, you can always change your style of play if things aren’t working. Switch it up! Going direct, counter attacking or increasing your team’s work rate are good ways of potentially changing the course of a match.

Controls

Take your time. When the match engine loads up a chance, make sure you look around to see what your options are, zoom the camera right out and spin it around so you can see the whole pitch. Can you see a potential gap to send one of your players into or do you have a player unmarked?

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Recognising the transition between kicking and dribbling is very important. Notice the colour of the arrow and how there is a slight delay between it reaching maximum (dark red) and then transitioning into dribbling.

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You can pull out of a pass or shot by pressing the CANCEL button on the screen where you click the ball: this can help if you are in full flow and need a moment to think about your next move.

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Don’t be afraid to change the camera angle and zoom when lining up a shot. Remember that you can add curl to the ball by hitting it at the side: this effect is more pronounced the more skilful your players are.

Practice getting your tackles right, don’t go sliding in from behind as you will always be penalized. Anticipate where the ball will go and send your players into the space. Remember that when tackling, you are not pulling backwards but pushing forwards, so watch the colour of the arrow and when it turns red you are within sliding tackling range: that’s when to make the tackle.

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Headers can be tricky to control. If you get a header in the area, try just clicking on the screen where you want the header to go: if you click on a corner of the goal, it’ll usually fly into the net and look good on the replays. When heading to another player remember that hitting the ball at the top will cause the ball to be headed down and hitting the ball at the bottom will cause the ball to loop up.

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Not everything has to be done at full power, sometimes a deft chip over a defender for your attacker to run onto is more effective than trying to leather an ambitious pass right across the field.

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Finally, make wise use of the RETRY button. You only get one retry a match, so when you use it, make sure you approach the chance slightly differently. There’s nothing more annoying than wasting your retry making the same mistake you did the first time.

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Transfers

Young players cost more than older players, but older players run out of energy quicker. Don’t be fixated on the rating of a player, look at the potential of a player. For example, a high end silver player will be cheaper than a low end gold player but if the silver player has potential, they might be a better investment.

It’s also worth remembering that if a player has already reached their potential, they won’t get upset when you don’t use training cards on them. Early in you career you can pick up some great older players that can help you get out of the lower leagues, but as you progress you will realise that you need to invest in youth and potential.

Have a good look at your squad and identify exactly what type of players you need. When searching for potential recruits, you can easily find more versatile players by using the L C R buttons. For example, a L C midfielder can play on the left and centre of midfield in a 4-4-2 formation and also on the left in a 5-3-2 formation. Conversely a striker who can only play on the left limits your tactics and formations.

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When hunting for your next purchase, don't forget to use the position filter. You can also sort by name, club, age, rating, potential and price.

Always find 2 or 3 players for a position you want within the price range you are willing to pay and use the ADD TO SHORTLIST button. This way if you fail negotiations with one player, you can move straight on to another. Remember that you can agree terms with a player at any point in the negotiation, even before making the first higher/lower choice.

If you fail a negotiation with a player you really want, come back after another match and try again. Lastly, if you are buying a few players and you have the BUX, try changing the length of the contract on some of the players so their contracts don't all run out at the same time.

Money Management

Just like in real life football management, don’t try to live beyond your means. It’s all well and good splashing out money on a superstar, but can you afford to re-sign him when his contract runs out? Never get into a situation where a player’s contract runs out and the transfer window is closed because if you can’t afford his contract, you won’t be able to sell him and will end up having to let him go for nothing!

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On the squad data screen, you can sort players by how long they have left on their contract and by their value. The more valuable a player is, the more expensive their contract will be. Save your contract cards for your best players.

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Contract cards are a random reward for hitting board targets and for getting press conference questions right. These rewards are extremely valuable, so make sure you know the answers to the most common questions like your best and worst results, the names of your staff and who in your team has contributed the most assists and scored the most goals.

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Always make sure that youth players from the academy get a few appearances., Even if you know you are going to sell them, their value goes up with every appearance, so it’s worth giving them a run out in a match where the result is already secured.

A Word From Our Sponsors

It’s important to upgrade your club shop in order to unlock shirt sleeve and stadium hoardings sponsors as both will bring your club extra revenue.

It can be tricky choosing which sponsor to pick. Do you need the cash upfront or is the win and goal bonus better? Does your team score lots of goals? If so, the goal bonus could be important.

Fan approval is also significant: if the fans don’t like the sponsors you choose, it can affect shirt sales and attendances, especially if all your sponsors have low fan approval.

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How do you keep your sponsors happy once you’ve signed with them? Generally speaking, sponsors are happy if you keep winning and if you have successful press conferences. When it comes to dilemmas, make sure you carefully read what the outcomes are for each choice.

Life After Promotion

Have a look at your competition. Click on the teams in the league table and gauge if your squad is going to be able to compete straight away or if you will need to be patient. If you’ve just been promoted, don’t think that you will be automatically promoted again at the end of the season. Sometimes you have to be prepared for a tough season while you strengthen your squad and not getting relegated becomes the goal. This might also mean that you have to play more defensively, especially away from home.

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Have a good look at your squad and particularly their potential. If their potential is too low for the league you are in, then you need to look at replacing them as soon as you can. And remember that you only have a few matches at the beginning of a season to get new players in before the transfer window closes.

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Scouting

You can’t buy any players unless you have a scout, so that’s the most important reason for hiring one, but as an added bonus some targets the board set can only be succeeded if you have a scout, so having one on your staff also opens up potential for extra rewards from the board.

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Scouts become particularly useful when the transfer window is shut and you can’t buy new players because they can find free agents for you that you can sign straight away. Free agents are also usually quite a bit cheaper than players bought during the transfer window which is another bonus.

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It’s important to upgrade your scout office so you can see player skills and traits. There can be pitfalls to buying a player without seeing all their attributes: it’s not a good feeling buying a player to then realise they have the “Red Mist” trait!

In Conclusion

As you go along, you will unlock many different achievements. These can be viewed in the manager profile screen.

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Don't forget to claim these as this helps your manger level to increase and when you level up, you get a reward.

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Finally, the last thing to say is that the importance of patience can’t be overstated: don’t expect to be able to win everything straight away. After a couple of seasons things will start to fall into place and you’ll know exactly what you need to do and have a plan for improving your squad and facilities.
Then maybe just maybe, you’ll end up with a team to take on the very best! :)

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[Spring Cl🌞uds™]

Hello there,
Contracts of players was my nightmare in my 2nd season, so I should play my 3rd season in weaker league again. (Overall of my players was 100% less than my opponents)

I love the game but I play it for fun.

[bliep]

Does someone know what to do if a rival team doesn’t want to sell their player or if a player isn’t interested in joining your club or is there even something you can do about it??

[chrisbamb]

A great guide!

Only other thing I will add to this, is to also make sure to invest in the Youth Facility, as this brings in some great, cheap young players for free.

Also when you receive offers from other clubs for a player, check out the transfer market. Quite often, you can purchase a player with the same rating/potential cheaper than the offer you have received. This is a great way of making money. As an example, I had a Striker with a 61 rating and got offered £1.1million for him. I purchased a 62 rated striker for £695,00 after haggling. Thus gaining me a better player and a whopping £505,000 profit.