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How to build an LS team – a fast guide

Written by Mr_Hahn

On January 13th 2009 the tactic of Long Shots (LS) was introduced. Until now, little is known about this strategy. There has been found an empirical formula to calculate your LS tactic level, which seems to work quite well, and there's even a tool which lets you calculate your tactic level. Meanwhile, in some countries an LS team won the national cup or even the national championship. However, a lot of managers are still skeptical about LS and therefore, the tactic is hardly used. In this article – which is a mix of the translation of the Dutch article by mokkel (506102) and my own view on LS – I will try to give you a practical overview of how to build your own decent LS team within five seasons with only a few millions of euros. Because when used properly, the LS tactic is in my opinion the strongest tactic in the game.

The principles of LS
First I would like to emphasize that LS is not a tactic that is used now and then. You can only be successful with LS if you are willing to fully customize your team. In my opinion the main goal of an LS team is to prevent the opponent from scoring, so that you don’t have to score much yourself. To do so, it is important to maximize your midfield rating and your defense. In that order, since the more ball possession you have, the less chances your opponent will get. The LS tactic is like duct tape: if it doesn't work with duct tape, use more duct tape. So, if you don't have enough ball possession, train PM and use more midfield power. You will train LS players with both PM and Def, because monoskill players aren’t good enough to let you promote to the highest divisions. You’ll need defenders with a lot of Playmaking and midfielders with quite some Defending. Attack ratings can be fully ignored [see note 1]. Hence, the best formations to play LS with are 4-5-1 (two WTMs, one DFW) and 5-5-0 (two WTMs), depending on the midfield rating of your opponent. (Of course 3-5-2 (two WTMs, two DFWs) is another option if your opponent has got weak attack ratings.) Also, you will need a defensive minded coach. Clearly, you will need to score goals yourself. Here comes the LS tactic in play, but also FKs and special events will give you the opportunity to score, so you’ll have to maximize those options as well [see note 2].

To buy or not to buy?
Buying 26yo players and train them a few more seasons won’t give you much satisfaction, since you can only play LS at a high level for a couple of seasons. A second reason for not picking this option is that you don’t have much to choose from. Decent LS players are rare on the transfer list, especially with the right specialty. So in my view the best way to be successful with the LS tactic is to train your own LS Dream Team.

To build such a squad requires a tight schedule. You’ll need to train several skills of your players, such as Playmaking, Defending, Scoring, and/or Set Pieces. In the following paragraph I will give you a brief roadmap of how to train your beloved LS players, starting with only a small amount of money. This is just one way to get things done, it’s definitely not the only way. I will use the following abbreviations: PM = Playmaking, Def = Defending, SC = Scoring, and SP = Set Pieces.

Fast guide
- Buy six 17yo players (four Head, two Quick), as young as you can get them. It’s no big problem when they differ half a season in age, though. The Head players will be your future IMs, Quick players will be your WTMs. The skills of your purchases will have to be PM 6+, SC 6+, Def 5+ (ignore SP). Each player will probably cost you a few hundred thousands of euros, so you will have to start with a cash amount of 2M euros. The reason that you start with 17yo players and not with already half trained 22yo players is simple: these 22yo players don’t exist on the transfer list (and if they do, they are way too expensive).

- Train Scoring until your players reach SC 8. If you bought them with SC 8 already, you can skip this step.

- Buy four more 17yo players (three Head, one Quick) [see note 3], again as young as possible. These Head players will be your future defenders, the Quick player will be your DFW. The skills of your purchases have to be PM 5+, SC 6+, Def 6+ (ignore SP).

- Train Shooting and SP alternately for about one to one and a half season on all of your ten players. Ignore the bad results of your first team – you will relegate a few times. The six trainees you bought first should have SC 9+ and around SP 10+ afterwards, whereas your future defenders and DFW should have SC 8+ and SP 10+, which will be enough for now. Your LS tactic level will be high enough to score some LS goals in the future. From now on, train SP during the two off season weeks.

- Train PM. Your future IMs, WTMs and/or DFW should get 100% PM training [see note 4] and they will have around PM 11 after one and a half season. Your future defenders will get 50% PM training and they will have about PM 9 when they just turned 20yo.

- Train Def for about one and a half season, until your ten trainees reach about Def 9-10 at 21-22 years.

- Train PM again until your IMs, WTMs and DFW reach PM 12-13. By this time your IMs, WTMs and DFW will have PM 12-13, Def 9-10, SC 9+ (except maybe for your DFW) and SP 12+, and your defenders will have PM 9, Def 9-10, SC 8+ and SP 12+.

- Now it is time to buy a freakingly strong goalkeeper [see note 5]. The skills depend on how much money you can effort and how strong you want your LS team to be. (I guess you'll have also an old team left, before you start building your LS team. If you sell those players, you'll have some millions to buy a goalkeeper, I hope. If not, make sure to gain some money before starting your LS plan.) My advice: if you want a better goalkeeper, then invest in his Def skill rather than in his GK skill. (For example: don’t go for a GK 17, Def 4 when there’s also a GK 15, Def 10 on the market.)

What’s next?
After about five seasons, you are ready to rumble. Your players will have enough PM and Def to set up a decent midfield and some nice defense ratings and you will score some LS goals. However, you’re not done yet. All important skills can be trained even further. I suggest that you first train SP for a while, since your goalkeeper needs a big amount of SP too. Make sure he gets the 25% bonus. Next, you can train Shooting, PM, and Def. This all depends on what level you are playing by this time and what division you are aiming for. You can improve your players for several seasons, even after they turn 30yo.

In the meantime, always keep an eye on the transfer list. If some interesting LS player shows up, you can add him to your team or even, if he’s good and young enough, switch him with another trainee. Make sure you have enough substitutes. In the abovementioned fast guide I’ve written about buying ten players and one goalkeeper. You’ll need more LS players to strengthen your team, for example as a buffer for injuries, suspensions and form drops. A team consisting of 15-16 decent LS players should do the job, so you’ll have to buy four or five more LS players. It’s okay if they don’t have both a high PM and Def skill, but a nice specialty and enough SC and SP is a must.

When your team gets older and older, you’ll have to think about a new plan. If you want to keep playing at a high level, you’ll need to substitute older players by younger ones, one by one. If you want to start all over again, just sell your oldies and start building your LS Dream Team 2.

Notes
Note 1: When choosing for an LS team, it’s nearly impossible to play with two or three decent attack ratings too, since you will have a defensive minded coach and you don’t have the time to train the Passing skill of your players. To be less predictable you can field one strong wing attack (OWB, OW, FTW), if those players also have some Scoring and Set Pieces on them. Of course a lot of managers will play AO against an LS team, so you may want to scare them off now and then with a stacked wing, but that’s your call.

Note 2: The main reason why it’s quite impossible to build a decent LS team consisting of youth players is that you don’t have enough youth players with nice specialties, let alone players that also differ only one season in age.

Note 3: You may consider exchanging one Head player with one more Quick player (defender), to stop Quick SEs of your opponent. Personally I’ve bought two Powerful defenders instead of two Head players as well, just in case I face an opponent who outruns my midfield, so I can play Pressing. But I must admit I don’t know if this will be worth it, yet. Anyhow, make sure that you always play with at least five Headers, since this event occurs most often.

Note 4: As said before, the Quick players will become your WTMs and DFW. As regards the IMs, let the Head players with the highest SC skill be your IMs. IMs and wingers get more LS chances than defenders and strikers, so you want your IMs and wingers be your best shooters.

Note 5: The reason that you don’t buy your goalkeeper sooner is that you don’t want your goalkeeper to be much older than the rest of your team. Also, it is a waste of salary costs if you buy your goalkeeper when you are still relegating. When your players have enough PM and Def, then it’s time to pick up your goalkeeper from the transfer list and win some matches.

Some last words
I hope you enjoined reading this article and maybe it will be useful for your team some day. I get a lot of questions about how to build a strong LS team and with this article I hope to have answered these questions. For more information about and experiences on the LS tactic, please feel free to join the Long Shots Federation (93046).

Finally, I would like to thank all federation members, especially mokkel, for their thoughts concerning this article and the LS tactic in general. I am most certain that one day a member of the Long Shots Federation will win the Hattrick Masters.

Editors note: did you enjoy reading this article? There's something you would like to say about it? Feel free to have your say here, on Global forum: (16118059.1)