It's all in the head

Many years ago Michael Duff was the first player I tried to buy in the then Championship Manager. The young Cheltenham (as was) right back was the model of consistency and could play at every league on the way up to the top flight. Given that his attributes were not earth shattering, I always wondered why players like Duff (now at Burnley) always performed 'above' their level. I think one of the reasons must of been high attribute scores for his character. Character attributes normally come to light when your want away striker wants to leave and stamps his foot, or a loyal old pro decides to fight for his first team place rather than leave the club.

I've called this branch of attributes psychology. These attributes are normally hidden in a game but we all know Craig Bellamy doesn't get 20 out of 20 for sportsmanship, Pascal Chimbonda doesn't quite get 20 out of 20 for loyalty and Adriano may struggle with double digits for professionalism.

I've conducted some analysis from a saved game of FM08 to identify which players have the best scores for Psychology in my quest to determine whether this element represents the hidden variable that make journeyman pros play above the level their other attributes would suggest they could achieve (like Michael Duff). The score is calculated by adding Ambition, Loyalty, Pressure, Professionalism, Sportsmanship, Temperament, Consistency and Important Matches. Under normal circumstances the last two are grouped under the mental attributes. And please bear in mind that nobody is saying 20 out of 20 for ambition is necessarily always a good thing.

So caveats out the way, here are my top 10:

1. Gianluigi Buffon, the legendary Juventus keeper, - 146 / 160
2. Eugenio Corini, veteran Torino MC - 145
3. Oleg Husyev, Dinamo Kiev DR - 144 - this guy is very popular in FML
4. Bernd Schneider, former German international - 144
5. Andrea Barzagli(right), former Palermo DC - 143 - one of the best DCs in FML
6. Cristain Zaccardo, moved with Barzagli to VfL Wolfsburg DR, - 142
7. Miroslav Klose, top German international - good targetman - 142
8. Truls Zachariassen, Norwegian keeper - the weird one on the list - 141
9. Michael Ballack, lives round the corner from me, MC - 141
10. Iliasu Shilla, Ghanian DC plays in Russia - 140


Just bubbling under are Xavi, Raul, Zapater, Brighi, FM favourite Per Ciljan Skjelbred, Speed, Zambrotta, Henrik Larsson and Michael Cia (a good FML prospect). 11 of the top 25 are Italians, demonstrating perhaps a higher psychological ability amongst those denizens of Serie A. I was hoping the top ten might flag up a few more surprise inclusions, but the former Palermo pair are perhaps the ones I would recommend for your FML team. Both possess plenty of time to progress, have great innate ability - and now we know they have a superb psychological approach to the game. Put them on your shortlist because they cost too much for your initial squad.