Before I start let me apologise for the length of this post, and the rather rapid conclusion. I could write much more on this particular topic, but even with the rapid conclusion this is still one of the longer posts you are likely to read on these forums.
That said I hope it is of use and interest to those reading it.
Backroom StaffBackroom Staff have received quite an overhaul for this edition of FM, not only in what they offer to a human player but also in the ease of use and ease of understanding for the human player. Still, if you do not understand what they are useful for, what they offer you in the first place then this additional ease of use and ease of understanding is still pretty useless.
Backroom staff and staff in general are a support system for the human manager. They have a wide range of abilities that can enhance the working of a club and enhance the performance of a team or even the performance of the manager. They are also relatively complex individual characters with their own personalities, and although nowhere near as complex as players, they still work away in the background of a club interacting with players and ideally enhancing or atleast modifying, the day to day function of a club.
The list of potential enhancements staff members can provide for a club are vast, ranging from the simple improvement of training, morale, scouting knowledge and injury recovery right up to the complex enhancements of additional tactical suggestions, man management suggestions and techniques, enhancing squad relationships and player to club relationships, right up as far as being able to actively compensate for key deficiencies in the human managers ability which themselves can range from tactics to motivation to transfers to even counter-balancing deficiencies in the human managers personality.
The right team of people working inside the club as staff members can have a huge impact on the overall efficiency and function of the club in many numerous ways. Ways perhaps many people do not realise, and do not take advantage of. Getting the wrong staff can have an equally powerful impact on your club, but in a completely negative way. The right and wrong staff for the right and wrong roles might not be as easy to spot and know as you might think, especially when taking into account the very nature, style and ability of the manager. You may consider yourself a kind, amiable, friendly chap but if the players think you are an ogre and you have a dry, unapproachable tactician for an Assistant that controls Youth Team and Reserve Team matches, and a team of brutal slave drivers taking training then it will not take long for your club to spiral into dressing room turmoil. In contrast to this approach you could employ the cheeriest, happiest group of smiling faces to see around your training ground and club facilities, but if they don't help you get the results you need you will be looking for a new job in short order.
It is important to understand what it means for your staff to be a support network, a team working for the improvement of the club. It is one of the toughest management challenges to understand what exists and what is missing from the infrastructure of your club, to understand what you need but also what you can get. For every manager in every club there is a different set of strengths and deficiencies in the infrastructure of your club, and also different sets of limitations. Manage these issues effectively and every other management challenge you face becomes all the easier to deal with.
Staff ProfileBefore being able to discuss what the backroom staff can do for a club, what myriad roles and functions they can perform for the club, players and manager, it is important to first find out and understand what staff members can do and how they work as individual characters. Only when we build up an understanding of a staff members profile can we really understand what he will bring to a club, to a role.
Here we have Valter Di Salvo, an ex-Manchester United and Real Madrid Fitness Coach, ex-Real Madrid First Team Coach, now come full circle and continuing the ascent of his career as Assistant Manager at Manchester United. This man is one of the hottest properties in staff in the world today and his career record says precisely that. Infact if it were not for his relatively poor Tactical ability (and his rather weird Hidden Tactical Preferences) then he would surely be one of the top Managers in the game. Luckily for me he has never been approached by a side to become their manager and he does have rather poor tactical attributes while this is his first job as an Assistant Manager, meaning I got him easilly and should be able to keep him for a while.
So what does his profile tell us about his abilities?
I will have to place a disclaimer here and state that although the exact breakdown of attributes that contribute to 5 star coach ratings have been discovered and posted, I do not know them off hand and do not know where to find the post at short notice. If someone knows where it is for me and would like to post it that would be great. There is also the second point that some of what I am about to say is unproven assumption and is purely how I view and understand the function of certain attributes.
Valter Di Salvo is a 46 year old Italian Assistant Manager with a World Class Reputation. This means that he has a long career ahead of him as a staff member, but unfortunately is widely known, highly recognised and likely to be intensively sought after in coming years. His high reputation means he is only likely to accept large contract offers from the top teams in the world.
AttributesHis Coaching Panel tells us that he is an excellent Physical Coach should I require him to fill that role. He will able to radically increase the rate at which Physical Attributes in the Physical Training Categories gain CA through Training, meaning better results in a shorter time or with less of a Category Workload Intensity. His Attacking, Defending, Goalkeeping and Technical are quite poor so he would not do so well training Categories that involve these attributes.
His Man Management, Mental, Tactical and Working with Youngsters are areas of interest. As I understand these attributes they either do not apply directly to training improvement "speed" or they have secondary functions ontop of training improvement "speed".
Man Management determines how this Staff Member gets on with players and people around him, but also how well is able to Manage their happiness/Morale or offer advice on how to manage their happiness/Morale. He is nigh on perfect when it comes to dealing with players, when it comes to forging strong relationships, when it comes to keeping them happy and being friendly as they interact with him, when it comes to spotting issues that might make players unhappy, and when it comes to taking actions or offering advice on how to deal with player situations that reduce their happiness. It also means he is able take a firm line with players over certain issues and produce the best results, such as Contracts, Media Interaction. This is a massive attribute in terms of Managing Individual players.
Mental is another key attribute as I understand it. As I understand it, it may well correspond to the ability to train Mental attributes, but as I understand it it also serves the function of defining how well a member of staff understands the Personalities of players, or the hidden Mental Attributes of players. Because this Staff Members Mental is at 20, he is a perfect judge of a players personality and their hidden mental statistics. Combined to his Man Management score of 20, this Staff Member will not misjudge a players personality and decide upon the perfect Man Management technique based on an imperfect judgement leading to inferior or downright bad end results, he will apply perfect Man Management Techniques to perfect player Mental Judgement for perfect results.
You can no doubt see a trend forming, a trend of potency and powerful implication for the function of my entire club and my own personal management techniques and ability.
Next up is Tactical. While Tactical does have an impact on training Categories that have Tactical elements, there is crystal clear evidence that it also defines the ability of a coach to offer Tactical advice and understand Tactical trends. Infact it is the coach with the highest Tactical attribute that offers Tactical Backroom advice. Clearly this attribute is not "Tactical Knowledge" in the sense of having access to a vast repertoire of Tactical "tricks" but is instead Tactical Intelligence, the ability to spot tactical problems and tactical issues and tactical trends and details and offer up accurate tactical advice based on these issues. Clearly this guy is rather poor at this aspect of the game.
Next is Working With Youngsters, the longtime bane of human managers when it comes to figuring out what coaching attributes mean. I simply do not know for a fact what it does, so I will offer a simple possible option that I play by, and that is that Working With Youngsters is a modifier of final "success" applied to all situations when dealing with players under 18. So when judging the personalities of youth and applying man management techniques and training youth players, this coaches final "success" rate is reduced by just over 1/4 or 25%
In other words Valter Di Salvo is just under 75% of perfect at Man Managing Youth and training their physical attributes. He is just under 75% of mediocre at training their shooting, and just under 75% of terrible at training young goalkeepers. That is my assumption and untill someone comes up with a better interpretation, I am sticking to it.
Next up is his Mental Panel. These tend to describe a staff members ability at choosing the right option for X understood scenario. Whether this is the right teamtalk, the right quantity of "stars" when comparing ability, or the right "Shout" for X match condition.
Adaptability is all about speed and ease of adapting to new clubs or roles. The higher this attribute is the less likely that there will be any problems for a staff member moving to a new club or a new role, and indeed the speed at which he adapts. Valter Di Salvo's high Adaptability has meant he has quickly settled in a completely new role at a new club with minimal fuss, but has also come to have a perfect knowledge of the players at my club in only 7 months.
Determination defines the will to succeed. In a staff member it has one clear function and several other possible functions. The clear function is the speed at which a staff member gains CA (yes staff members do have CA and PA and do improve and decline with Age, and this has massive repercussions for backroom staff as you will see later in this post), while the possible functions is to define the quantity and quality of staff member events. High Determination Staff Members may provide more advice, better advice, better training. Infact I think that Determination is a key attribute in achieving 5 star coach ratings for training which supports this assumption for the function of Determination.
Judging Player Ability/Potential. These attributes have the crystal clear function of reporting levels of CA and PA. In my opinion however it is very likely that they combine with the Mental attribute of Staff Members to produce an accuracy/ability level when it comes to reporting key "Hidden Attributes" of players. High JPA combined to high Mental will produce an overall ability level for reporting key player Hidden Mental traits such as Injury Proneness, Professionalism, Consistency, Important Matches etc. If you simply want a "Star Comparison" then simply look for JPA or JPP. If you want an accurate report on Hidden Mental Traits then look for JPP/JPA combined to the Staff Members Mental Attribute, and possibly Determination. That is just my opinion again, but from what I understand of the complexity of other areas of the game I would be surprised if this was not true.
Level Of Discipline. Level of Discipline is one of those "obvious" attributes that doesn't show up ingame in any obvious "cause and effect" pattern, so the exact function is entireally speculative without rigorous testing. That said the entire function of the game throws up some reasonably obvious functions for the attribute. The first "obvious" function would be define how much a Staff Member especially an AI manager takes a "hardline" approach when it comes to Disciplining players for actions that can be Disciplined. In an AI manager it seems completely logical to assume that it determines the level of discipline they apply to misdeamenours. For coaches however it is my opinion that this attribute functions to define the quality of training, i.e. factors into the end result of Training output calculations, with increasing end result coming at the expense of player morale, and eventually player-coach relationships. As you will see later it is my opinion that this functions in a similar way to Motivation in terms of quality of end result, but carries the opposite consequence for players.
Motivating. The straight up function of this attribute is to define how well the AI chooses Teamtalk options in response to match events, match pressure and player personality. A perfect score in Motivating will ensure the Staff Member chooses the perfect Teamtalk option for his "perception" of a context. However as said before, the Mental attribute will define a coaches ability to accurately know a players personality which is vital to select the "right" teamtalk, and it is more than possible that Tactical or Tactical Knowledge or some other set of attributes functions to define the Staff Members comprehension of a match context. In other words there is absolutely no point being able to choose the right Teamtalk for your players in X context if you have absolutely no understanding of your players personalities or absolutely no understanding of X context.
In my opinion, there is a second function to this Attribute that I assume is similar to Level of Discipline. The secondary function is to define the quality of the outcome of a certain process that players and staff are involved in, Training or Physiotherapy etc. yet instead of producing a superior outcome at the cost of player Morale and player-coach relationship, a high score for Motivation produces a superior outcome with a benefit to Morale and relationships. In other words a high Level of Discipline produces a superior outcome at the expense of Morale and relationships as the coach forces his players to succeed, while a high Motivation produces a superior outcome at zero expense of Morale and Relationships as the coach encourages the players to succeed through positive techniques.
However Level Of Discipline would seem to be key to the development of Staff Members themselves, while Motivating is not. There is also the issue that Level Of Discipline would seem to be key in the Star Rating of Coaches while Motivation is not. This could mean that Level of Discipline improves results at the expense of Morale/Relationships, while Motivating achieves no superior end result but improves Morale/Relationships. This would also hold for Staff CA development.
Pay close attention to Level of Discipline and Motivating. Irrespective of which way these attributes work, they both do work in clear ways of impacting Morale/Relationships while Level of Discipline is certainly involved in superior end results from Training/Physiotherapy etc.
Physiotherapy. While the current concensus is no clear judgment of improved injury recovery, yet a concensus on superior judgment of injury timespan, I find it completely impossible to accept that Physiotherapy does not have an impact on injury recovery. No testing to my knowledge has been done, or atleast produced on this website, so you may think what you will. For me however my understanding of the complexity of this game means I find it incomprehensible to imagine Physiotherapy does not impact Injury Recovery.
Tactical Knowledge. As I understand Tactical Knowledge it is not so much a skill at tactics as it is a knowledge of when to apply Tactical "ploys". In other words Tactical Knowledge would define the quality of Tactical Choices made by a Staff Member during the course of a match, according to the basic AI programming. With the TC in function for the AI in FM10, I find it likely that Tactical Knowledge represents either the quantity of TC options available to the AI, or represents the likelyhood of the AI employing a "coded ideal" tactical change to a particular match situation.
Tactics, Contract, Staff Roles and Knowledge PanelThese are for the most part self evident apart from a few key details.
In the Tactics Panel we have a basic explanation of his preferred tactical style, but we also have his "Coaching Style" which is Fitness. It seems to me that "Coaching Style" simply states what area of training he is best at, and tells the AI how to use him when choosing Coaches for Training Categories.
Staff Roles are a combination of Ability and Role Experience. Much like player Positions. As players play more regularly in certain positions so their Position Experience increases. As a staff spend more time in certain roles so their Role Experience increases. Crucially for this Staff Member his Tactics and Tactical Knowledge is very low, so irrespective of his experience in a role, he will never become perfect in the Assistant or Manager roles. This does not mean he is not absolutely amazing and better than anyone else on the planet for the job as MY assistant, it means simply he will never be the perfect assistant according to the games point of view. It is another one of those features more useful for the AI than the player, although it is still shown to the player and can still give general information to the player, assuming they want it.
The knowledge panel describes this Staff Members knowledge of players from specific countries. It means two things, the first that his knowledge will be "given" to the club and will make up the clubs knowledge, therefore your knowledge, of certain players from certain countries. Secondly it means this staff member will be able to provide superior knowledge on players from these specific countries untill such time as a better scout achieves a similar level of knowledge.
Personal ProfilePerhaps the greatest Backroom Staff improvement, including the much revamped and extended system of advice, is the simple bar graph display of key staff abilities. Neither direct advice in any quantity, nor the subtle background effects of staff on your club, is in any way usable by any manager without a means to judge the accuracy, meaning and effect.
While FM10 gives us vastly expanded sources of knowledge and advice and information, most crucially it gives us a vastly expanded means of both judging the degree of accuracy, and judging the exact impact and function, of Staff attributes and abilities.
Dealing with the general Overview on this screen first, it contains nothing I have not spoken about that is relevant other than Staff Personality and Media Handling Style. Staff Personality is much like player personality in that it defines how they develop, how they react to certain circumstances, and how the react to other characters. The Staff personality does the same. It defines how Staff Members develop, it defines how they deal with certain situations and it defines how well they relate to and get on with other specific player personalities.
Media Handling Style is another by-product of Staff Personality. Certain key attributes in the Staff Personality will be used to define a style of media interaction and the choice of reponse. As you can see my "Professional" Assistant Manager is Media-Friendly and Reserved when speaking to the media. He keeps them happy and keeps everyone happy, while giving very little away. Ambitious personalities might be more likely to be Outspoken or Short-Tempered, meaning that they say the wrong things from a club perspective.
The key feature in this screenshot is the Backroom Advice profile. In this screenshot I have hovered my mouse pointer over the "Man Management" table and received a tooltip explaining what it means in human terms. You can do the exact same with every other entry to receive a description of what it means.
This Backroom Advice Profile is not just a new way of explaining how new stuff works, it is a new of explaining how old stuff works. If you take this Staff Members "Recruitment" ability level then it is explaining that his suggestions are generally as good as you could expect to get when it comes to signing players, even if his JPA is only 16 and his JPP is "only" 18. This ability chart graph is taking into account all the relevant attributes as the game sees them and is telling me that in this game, this particular staff member is top quality when it comes to suggesting new players. Assistant Managers suggesting players has existed for atleast one version of FM, but now you can actually judge how good these suggestions are compared to the rest of the AI. They still might be terrible suggestions from a quality human managers perspective, but according to how the AI chooses players they are top notch.
According to how SI both value and define the relevant attributes for particular game issues, Valter Di Salvo suffers only from a lack of Tactical ability but is otherwise just about the greatest member of staff in the game. Barring Tactical ability, my Assistant Manager is just about better than all other AI managers, combined. Ofcourse Tactical ability is vital for a manager, but it is not vital in an Assistant especially if you happen to have a Tactical Genius floating about the coaching department.
The Backroom Advice panel is essentially a set of bar charts describing a coaches ability at key elements of staff ability, using the combined attributes that SI take into account when calculating outcomes during the game. If you hover your mouse over each section you will see a tooltip containing an enhanced description of what these entries mean.
This is a great way of instantly judging a staff members ability, and also in judging the accuracy of the advice he gives. These values do not solely correspond to Backroom Advice quality, they are the products of attributes that apply across the board in a coach/staff members function. Someone with high levels for Man Management will not only give good Man Management advice, but will be an individual others find easy to get on with and easy to work under.
Staff RolesIf half the battle is understanding your forces and the enemies forces, the other half is using your forces against the enemies forces. Worth pointing out here is that in the context of Backroom Staff, the enemy is yourself.
The entire crux of Backroom staff is understanding what roles they can fill in your club, above and beyond the standard roles you can hire them for. And understanding what you yourself are strong at and weak at, and constructing a team to bolster your weaknesses while enhancing your strengths. The Backroom staff is your support team, it is a group of people moulded around your own management style and ability, with the sole purpose of expanding the management capability and overall performance and efficiency of the club.
SI don't allow you to design new stadiums, plan new training grounds, set ticket prices, build new stands etc. They do not allow you any direct control over the physical infrastructure of your club. Instead they give you the ability to construct a vast management infrastructure of immense depth, from the most shallow of initial appearances.
Contractual RolesThe contractual roles are pretty basic and pretty obvious. I do not think it is worth going into much depth here because there is very little. Suffice to say that staff members have preferred roles, and highly specific roles such as youth or first team or fitness or goalkeeping coach generally require less wages while providing a lot less flexibility in their use.
Non-Contractual RolesThis is where a managers understanding of the game pays dividends. This is where a manager that is capable of appreciating ability and necessity and gameplay function can trully excel. There are a multitude of options and I in no way claim to know all possible permutations. Suffice to say that there are as many possible options as there are abilities and mechanics in the game.
Roles, Functions and SystemsThis section is getting a bit messy, because I really want to talk about what staff members and staff roles can be used for, rather than attempting to describe the obvious, while not wanting to miss anything out.
From here on in I will describe roles and how they can be used, and will no doubt leave out many possible roles and uses that I am simply unaware of.
Assistant ManagerThe Assistant Manager is your right hand man and head of the backroom team. He can fulfill almost any possible role and do anything any coach is capable of, while also having the greatest number and variety of specific inputs. He will advise on match tactics, player ability and potential, teamtalk options, contracts, signings, overall team ability, team weaknesses, teamtalk feedback. He can take press conferences and will offer his opinion on the advice given by other staff members.
The absolute crux of the Assistant Manager is as the foil to the Manager. He can be used in a variety of "smaller roles" such as coach, scout, Backroom advice filter etc. but his absolutely fundamental purpose is to support the manager in key management tasks. Only the assistant can give teamtalks, only the assistant can comment on tactics, only the assistant can advise on signings that improve the first team and sit with the manager during contract negotiations. Only the assistant can take press conferences etc.
It is absolutely vital to find an assistant manager that directly compliments your own management ability. If you are tactically weak then get a great tactician assistant, if you are motivationally weak then find a great motivator, if you don't know what to say to the media then find someone who does, if you cannot judge players effectively then get someone who can. If above else though you cannot handle your squad and individual player happiness effectively, if you are a dragon or an overly soft touch, then find someone that is the anti-thesis of you around the dressing room.
You and your assistant manager are a team. If you do not work closely with him then you are giving up a massive aspect of successful management. If you do not find someone that you trust to do the key jobs you ask of him, then you have gained nothing.
Club PsychologistSure you cannot contract anyone into this role, but you can sure as hell use them in this role. Such a staff member is ideally your Assistant Manager as he has the greatest area of comment and advice and can be given the greatest level of interaction with your players.
This individual exists to do two things and requires a few things to achieve his role successfully. His role is to interact with players, understand players, manage player happiness and offer sound advice on their mindset and the best ways to handle them. Such an individual should be regularly involved in all training regimes in order to regularly interact with all players, should have excellent Man Management and Motivation and Mental Skills, and if at all possible should be your Assistant Manager in order to offer key advice when it is most needed, i.e. during the match.
Such a staff member is never overtly a "psychologist". They do not sit in a room and wait for players to come to them. What they do is involve themselves regularly with everyone at the club, and come to you first and with the best advice. It does not matter if they are the worst coach, worst everything else. All that matters is that they are constantly involved with players and raising their morale, and are as good as possible at understanding Player problems, mentality and offering quality advice.
Club TacticianAgain, cannot be directly contracted but most certainly can be utilised. Again, best suited to the Assistant Manager role if possible.
Such a staff member has the sole purpose of offering the best Tactical advice available to you. If it is during a match then all the better. If not, then so be it. This individual does not need to be involved in the day-to-day activities of players, he needs only to be as good as possible for your club at understanding tactics and offering tactical advice to you. If he is your assistant then it is all the more useful if he is a good judge of players and can offer good advice on who to sign for the gaps and problems he spots.
Simple as that.
Reserve Team ManagerAgain a role that does not exist on paper. None the less it can be a highly important role, and it can be a huge benefit to you if you get it right and use it properly.
The average reserve team contains a smattering of OAPs, First Team crocks, First Team under-performers, up-and-coming stars, a few lads on the transfer list, and some people that have annoyed you.
This is the pool of less-than-ideal that are still at your club and must be managed appropriately. You might have high hopes for them, or you might need to bring some pain-in-the-neck back into the first team and demand a performance from him.
The reserve team manager has the job of managing a bunch of misfits so that they either do not cause much trouble, do not get upset, do not enter a team of emo-junk prior to their big day, and do not get their spirits crushed.
The reserve team manager is all about attempting to get results, but most importantly maintaining or improving morale. He is a cross between the club Tactician and the Club psychologist, although nowhere near as good as either at individual roles. This is the guy you have high hopes for and want him to develop quickly through experience managing the Reserve Team, while also trying his best to get this bunch of misfits in the right mood for playing at your club.
Tactical ability is highly useful, Man Management and Motivating is a necessity.
Youth Team ManagerThe guy tasked with managing the games of the Cristiano Ronaldo of the future, with all the petulance and arrogance and childishness that comes with it. A guy tasked with taking a bunch of children in personality with limited skill in a set of competitions offering minimal developmental opportunities.
Forget being nice to these lads, they are too immature to understand. All that matters is results, which boosts ability growth, while you hope Gary Neville can kick some sense into his protege just before he knee-slides towards the Liverpool U-19 bench, kissing the United badge.
It is nigh-on impossible to team-talk youngsters towards the all important result necessary for CA improvement, so you can only hope that the youth team managers tactical ability can do it instead.
Man Management can be useful for forming early relationships. Anything less than perfect Motivation is nigh on useless so ignore it. Tactical ability is an absolute must.
If these guys don't win, they don't develop.
First Team CoachSo you wont work with youngsters?
In that case while my grinding, ruthless, hardcore Shooting/Set Piece/Tactics coach is putting the first team player through his paces, you can be standing there offering shouts of encouragement and words of inspiration while reducing his workload.
The First Team Coach is like a mini club psychologist. He doesn't do much coaching even though he is involved in every training regime, his job is to boost the morale my individual category slave drivers are reducing.
Youth Team CoachAs above but with maximum Working With Youngsters, if possible.
Reduce workloads, improve morale.
Category CoachesWelcome to hell.
Maximum possible single category star rating, maximum possible determination and level of discipline. Man Management and Motivating a bonus.
You do have some real friendly guys walking around Carrington watching the training and offering words, shouts and claps of encouragement don't you?
Head Scout
Alright Dave? Hows the familly? Fancy heading over to Nottingham this Wednesday and giving me your opinion on their young reserve winger I have heard good things about? By the way, there are a couple of young Brazilian defenders I want you to watch around August, 3 weeks holiday for you and the familly. A game each would be spot on. After that we might able to squeeze in a dirty weekend for you and the missus in the South of France, aye aye.
Quite simply the best, most reliable scout you can get. Spare no expense in finding one guy with the best possible JPP, JPA, Determination, Reputation, Mental, and anything else you might think is even remotely connected to a good scout report.
This guy is your main man when it comes to getting that report. Sign him, give him whatever cash is necessary to keep him, and rely only on him.
General ScoutAlright son, heard good things about you. How about you head on over to (country of birth) and tell us what you see for the next season.
These guys should have high Determination and Level of Discipline as that seems to signify the highest rate of CA gain for Scouts. Send them to wherever they are familiar, get them to scout regions you require general knowledge of. Use them as the workhorses of your scouting network and get them to do the donkey work.
Whatever they send back that you like, send Dave to investigate properly.
Head PhysioGet on that bench and get fixed. We have a league to win and I have a report to send to mister Fraser ten minutes ago.
Determination, Level of Discipline, Physiotherapy. End of story.
General PhysioHello mister Anderton, how are we today? Ah it looks like I might have to send the manager a sicknote for this week.
Man Management, Motivating, Physiotherapy.
I am sorry I could not go into more detail. There is an epic amount of potential for someone like myself to write about, but this post is becoming long even for my standards.
I hope it was of use to people, and I hope it opens some eyes as to the underlying and hidden potential that exists in this game.
