We've reached the halfway point in the season & I'm quite disappointed with the way my team results. Though my team has played well, the results are less than desirable. Five teams in my department have played better than mine has (based on avg performance) & 4 teams have a better Q than mine. Here are the midway standings:

Pos   Team Manager Actions Last 5 MP W D L GF GA GD Pts 1   tpromeo tpromeo   WLWDW 15 11 3 1 32 4 +28 36 2   Gladiators Maestro101 6 WWLWW 15 11 2 2 25 9 +16 35 3   brunswick blue devils acanary   WWDWD 15 9 5 1 18 4 +14 32 4   Irish Warriors Fast10   LWWWD 15 9 4 2 24 7 +17 31 5   Kings Eagles moneymike   LDDDW 15 7 6 2 16 4 +12 27 6 LyThong FC Ly Thong   WLWLW 15 6 5 4 17 13 +4 23 7 Real Madison skellygreen LWDDD 15 5 7 3 18 12 +6 22 8 Emerycat FC emerycat   DLLWD 15 5 5 5 14 11 +3 20 9 FC Hood FC Hood 19 DWDDL 15 5 5 5 11 14 -3 20 10   sambas Reds evil 3 WLDDD 15 4 6 5 14 10 +4 18 11   Berrykush FC AuroraKush   LDDLD 15 4 5 6 8 11 -3 17 12   FC Allegheny RotoWizard   WWDLL 15 4 2 9 9 17 -8 14 13 muttballs mottmachine 9 DLWWW 15 3 4 8 10 20 -10 13 14 LABUAN UNITED Abg kelol   DWDLL 15 3 2 10 7 23 -16 11 15   India United bunty 15 LLLDL 15 2 3 10 12 22 -10 9 16   CA-bot 170363 Bot-manager   LLLLL 15 0 0 15 1 55 -54 0

With 22 points & 10 points out of playoff qualification, I'm going to need a swing of luck to reach that critical mark. I just sold my backup keeper, Karl Calhoun to finance future camps or potentially to pick up a youngster next season. I was glad to get rid of him at the price I did because his performance history has been abysmal & gains terribly slow. He's too  slow & can't pass to save his life. Too many times he would turn the ball over after making a save before one of my players would even touch the ball. That just can't happen. 

My last three matches (as you can see above) have resulted in draws & I'm now up against an injured LABUAN UNITED team that I should easily beat. It's a road match but there is no excuse for anything but a victory. Round 17 is against Irish Warriors which will be a tough match & am important one for me. I lost in Round 2 @ Irish Warriors & am hoping for the W at home this time around. IW is banged up with several players currently sitting with very low fitness. His keeper is at 86 & IW hasn't been online in at least 7 days. I'm hoping this bodes well for me but so far, it hasn't. 

I've been fooling around with a 3-5-2 mixed formation in friendlies with some success, but haven't committed to moving towards it. In league matches I've experimented with hard tackles against some of the better teams. I used hard tackles against tpromeo & not only scored the first goal of the season against tpromeo, but also pulled down the only victory against the department leader. However, against a much worse brunswick team, hard tackles didn't seem to make a bit of difference as my team was generally  too slow to get to the ball in that match. 

I'll try to get back on in a few hours & post results from Round 16 against LABUAN UNITED. In the meantime, any thoughts on the formation you might use with my team?

Real Madison