Running on rails
Posted by: not-Greg in European Cup (ECC), Real Madrid, defending, league table, tags: defending, European Cup (ECC), league table, penalties, Real MadridIn Master League you often end up playing the same teams back-to-back in the League and in European groups. It’s one of the many consequences of the Master League world being so small. Master League is in urgent need of an overhaul. I think we need more than just four leagues with two divisions in each. We need about twenty leagues with four divisions each, in my opinion. It needs to be as close to the real world as possible. Yes, I’ll say it, it needs to be as close to FIFA’s Manager Mode setup as possible. I’d like to be able to play a Pro Evo career in that kind of wider footballing world.
Real Madrid are in my European Championships group. They’re also one of my main rivals in the league. They’re not a great team in my ML and never have been, but they’re still no pushovers. They can still give me a good game.
In our league encounter they took the lead, a little luckily. I equalised soon afterward (which is always nice), albeit rather luckily with a Schwarz header that first went down into the ground then looped up and over the keeper into the net. 1-1 it stayed from then on. I’d just accepted that it was going to end 1-1 when I had a chance with Schwarz. He was in the box and I was just about to pull the trigger when the CPU defender viciously scythed him down from behind. Not even Pro Evo could deny me such a clear-cut penalty, but the CPU defender got away with a yellow card. For me, that would have been red.
Andy Cole was my penalty kicker. I felt beforehand that I’d miss the penalty whoever took it, so I decided I might as well leave Andy Cole to carry the can. Penalties in PES have always been totally random. They have no actual skill element that I have ever been able to detect. If anybody out there believes otherwise—or, preferably, knows otherwise—then I’d love to hear from them. I did no more than flick the analogue stick toward the right of the net, and tap shoot. Andy Cole ran up and blasted the ball two yards over the crossbar, and the match ended 1-1.
Then Real Madrid beat me in the first game of our European Championship group. The match started pretty tamely, but I had Del Piero sent off for a nothing foul in midfield. The CPU player was miles from my goal with my entire defence in the way. My tackle with Del Piero was a slightly mistimed one from the side, the kind of tackle that’s a yellow card at most. But on this occasion it was a straight red card.
Despite the setback I took the lead. That often happens when I play with 10 men (and sometimes with less than 10 men). I play superbly and wonder how I can ever be beaten. But on this occasion, it was not to be. I admit to letting my concentration slip and allowing a soft equaliser to go in before half time. Then, in the second half, Real got their winner. I couldn’t come back, and thus I lost the opening group game. I hate doing that.
In the league I finally came up against Deportivo la Coruna. I’ve had a great start to the league season, and so have they. I beat them 3-2 with two good goals from Henry—his first for me—one of them a true poacher’s goal after a very strange short back-pass from a CPU defender to the goalkeeper.
For my second game in Europe I brought all my concentration to bear. Another defeat was unthinkable. I’m going for a Treble this season.
Benfica, another old ‘friend’ of mine from this ML career, were next. I scored early and hung on until the end to win 1-0. I had to really dig in and withstand some ridiculous pressure and manipulation of the game. I absolutely hate in PES2008 how your players are often forced to run on rails with the ball at their feet and carry the ball over the line for throw-ins and corners to the CPU. Before anyone mentions super-cancel, it doesn’t arrest the progress of my players’ running on rails. It’s a definite feature of the programming this year, just one of the myriad ways in which the AI is granted an advantage in times of trouble.
Never mind. It hadn’t cost me this time and I’d got the win I wanted. It makes the group table look a little healthier, although I hope that first-game defeat doesn’t come back to haunt me further down the line.
Entries (RSS)
Greg
Penalties on PES are shocking, I always shoot down the middle, GOAL.
Take the penalties on FIFA, I use the finesse the shot and can curl the ball anywhere I direct the ball. I played a couple of friendlies with Everton and Man City against Celtic, hint. 2 of the games went to penalties, I applied my curl shot towards my top right and Artur Boruc saved both, in a way I was glad.
In PES it’s either hit or miss, no skill involved, IMO.
The Master League is indeed due a major overhaul, with more teams and leagues required. As you know, the full English set-up is in FIFA, along with 2nd divisions in Spain, Germany and Italy. They could replicate this which would bring a deeper ML.
Please change the currency to £s, Euros and Dollars. No more points.
I find it quite boring to be drawn in a European Championship group with one and sometimes even two teams from my regular league. It would be nicer to play teams from other leagues for a change.
And how about a FIFA World Club Championship inside the ML?
Not to mention the fact that not all the top teams in FIFA’s ranking are in the game. My beloved São Paulo FC, three times champion of the Copa Libertadores and of the Toyota (now FIFA WCC) World Club Cup is sorely missing from the game since we won the World title in 2005.
There should be at least a couple of teams from Brazil and Argentina in every version of the game. It’s a joke that there’s the like of Heracles Almelo and Goteborg, but there’s no São Paulo, no Santos.
About penalties, I always press down on the d-pad when I have a pen, and I’m not winning the game. Sometimes the keeper will not move, and defend the shot, but most of the time he’ll let it through.
Besides the “running on rails” issue, I’d also like to see an improvement in the own goal problem. A lot of times I shoot on goal, and the ball is either deflected in by a defender or the keeper fumbles or something like that in a situation that in real life would be a sure mark for the striker, but the freaking CPU awards an own goal. Damn. Kim Cyun Hi would have at leat a couple dozen more goals if not for that.;)
Down-the-middle is my preferred type of penalty on PES as well, but in circumstances like the one in this match (1-1, tight game, several minutes to go) I just felt that planting it down the middle would be asking for trouble. I felt that Cole would simply blast it over if I went down the middle.
I tried to put it to one side, and Cole blasted it over anyway.
I suppose I could have pulled the analogue stick back and aimed down the middle along the ground. Cole would have struggled to blast it over the bar. But I think the keeper would have saved it with his legs, or just stood still and saved it. When you can’t win you can’t win…
Heraldo, have you had a mammoth penalty shootout on FIFA08 yet? I had a 24-23 shootout ages ago in an International tournament.
Adriano - pinball-style own-goals are one of the numerous banes of my PES2008 life right now. I don’t ever recall them being so common, or so maddening, as they are in this instalment.
Oh, I know what you mean. And don’t even get me started on the damn rebound goals from the CPU. I seldom score from rebounds. Usually when the CPU doesn’t want me to score, it will just make my players miss the target, but the CPU will score goals from rebounds at will. Infuriating. I’m a third through my alternate ML season, and after 10 matches I’ve conceded only 2 goals, both from rebounds. Grrr.