Controls

Take your time. When the match engine loads up a chance, make sure you look around to see what your options are, zoom the camera right out and spin it around so you can see the whole pitch. Can you see a potential gap to send one of your players into or do you have a player unmarked?Recognising the transition between kicking and dribbling is very important. Notice the colour of the arrow and how there is a slight delay between it reaching maximum (dark red) and then transitioning into dribbling.You can pull out of a pass or shot by pressing the CANCEL button on the screen where you click the ball: this can help if you are in full flow and need a moment to think about your next move.Don’t be afraid to change the camera angle and zoom when lining up a shot. Remember that you can add curl to the ball by hitting it at the side: this effect is more pronounced the more skilful your players are.Practice getting your tackles right, don’t go sliding in from behind as you will always be penalized. Anticipate where the ball will go and send your players into the space. Remember that when tackling, you are not pulling backwards but pushing forwards, so watch the colour of the arrow and when it turns red you are within sliding tackling range: that’s when to make the tackle.Headers can be tricky to control. If you get a header in the area, try just clicking on the screen where you want the header to go: if you click on a corner of the goal, it’ll usually fly into the net and look good on the replays. When heading to another player remember that hitting the ball at the top will cause the ball to be headed down and hitting the ball at the bottom will cause the ball to loop up.Not everything has to be done at full power, sometimes a deft chip over a defender for your attacker to run onto is more effective than trying to leather an ambitious pass right across the field.Finally, make wise use of the RETRY button. You only get one retry a match, so when you use it, make sure you approach the chance slightly differently. There’s nothing more annoying than wasting your retry making the same mistake you did the first time.