[Contex]

Second season, managing Tottenham, second prem title in a row clinched with 5 games to spare and scored 98 goals, with the team demolishing the opposition, especially in important matches. Had Barca in the QF's, and beat them handily, 4-0 over two legs, including keeping them to just 2 shots at the Nou Camp. I was starting to really think "this is now too easy" when it all started to go sour...

First, out of the FA cup to QPR - they had 3 shots, 2 goals. Then Everton came to WHL, and put 3 past us in the first half - two from corners, one from a counterattack where my DC did a John Terry and slipped. What made it worse is that the game ended 2-3, with my team falling just short of an epic comeback. The last 5 mathes of the season ended with just one win, one draw, and three losses.

CL final, against Arsenal was to be a dream derby. Morale of my squad was high again, mostly due to awards picked up, and it seemed all was ready to complete an epic season. Instead, more of the same. Lost 2-1, the winning goal came from OG, with my most reliable defender, Hummels, making the blunder. The scoreline still flattered me, because Arsenal should have scored more. The tactic I was using was the same one I beat them with two months before...

In the ME, it just looks like my players are sluggish. Their fitness and even morale are okay, but they're making silly errors and just getting pummeled. The IE seems to be using hard tackling and heavy closing down, and my players look like they have no battle in them.

This season is over, and by all accounts, a huge success - without spending too much, it's the second title, CL runners up, and for 90% of the year, some amazing football. In my ten years of playing CM/FM, I've never had a collapse like this - the style of play barely recognizable, and what seemed to work before just failing miserably when it matters most.

I use two tactics, neither of them really working. Team meeting and morale seemed to indicate "crisis solved" but instead, my team's form just totally nosedived. Funny thing is, the areas where I'm losing in are ridiculous - Huddlestone getting dominated in the air by Arshavin, Modric unable to see an open man, Ngog scoring from 30 yards....

Sorry for the long winded post, but an entire offseason to stew on getting spanked after dominating for an entire season is a bit hard to swallow. Has anyone had similar experiences? Is it the tactics, the squad, or just a case of overreaching and getting a cold shower of reality.

Form has always been a vicious mistress in FM - but in this vershion, she's got some serious teeth...

[JWP21]

I would suggest:

Basically, you've had an amazing 2 seasons, and vastly over-achieved with Spurs, I've no idea who you've signed (Hummels is a great player) and it's possible that your team in the second season are title contenders, but to win the league first season was a great managerial feat, but still a great over-achievement. In terms of form being a cruel mistress, from what you've said, you've had one bad run of form (5 games) at the end of the second season! That's not a cruel mistress! If anything, it's unrealistic that you've not had more bad runs. (Maybe you have, but there was no mention!)

Your bad run could be one of a few things.
Firstly, complacency. Your team has defended their title with 5 games to spare. That is a HUGE margin! When was the last time that happened in the Premiership in real life. Of course they will be confident, maybe too confident! Their morale may be a bit false, they are feeling 'superb' or 'very good' but the are also cocky and complacent. They make take risks they haven't done previously, or think that simply turning up will win them games. (Also, it won't necessarily matter how they respond in one or two individual team talks, this is more of a long term plan, where you may need to entirely change the way you interact with your squad.)
In addition to this, the other team (particularly Arsenal, will have a reason to be fired up against you, having lost in the league etc)

Secondly, teams 'working' you out. Not beyond the realms of possibility. Again, from what you've said, 2 years using the same tactic or set of tactics. Teams won't get steam-rollered by you every time, they will adapt the way they play to try and target your areas of weakness. This may be that big teams sit back more and are harder to break down, and that smaller teams will come and 'have a go' as they know they will get beat if they just sit back. Some tactical tweaks may be in order. Food for thought?

Thirdly, this is unlikely to be the sole reason, but it may be coupled with something else, and that is luck. There are things that happen in the game that are out of your control. Example being Hummel 'slipping', own goals and other individual errors.

[Contex]

Thanks for the detailed reply. It wasn't that it was 5 games per se, but more the nature of the losses suffered - teams positively pummeling me, and everything that can go wrong going wrong. Perhaps I overachieved and lucked out with the signings and inheriting a good squad, but my results were unrealistically good. The only new signings of note I had were Leandro Damiao (amazing 40 goals in 42 matches), mostly because I refused to pay Adebayeour's ridiculous wage demands and he's a bit of a c#nt, and Srna.

After watching the highlights, I noticed the opposition being awfully quick to close down and hard tackle Modric, and it resulted in him getting injured early in the CL final. In fact, Arsenal adopted a very Stoke-esque approach, by basically mowing down anything with a ball at it's feet, and my passing game was shot.

Another pretty silly error I had made was becoming lazy and complacent with my OI's. It's become a habit for me to "show onto weaker foot" for wingers, and close them down without thinking much, and it was pretty silly to do that to the very left-footed Arshavin and very either footed Sturrage. In my panic, I think I had high closing down on 5-6 arsenal players, and there it was - my team disjointed, harried, in a panic, and picked apart.

In the next season, I started experimenting more with measured closing down. Since I'm playing pretty attacking, or at least on Control Mentality most of the time, I find that most of my players close down quite heavily, so I put my team instructions on "stand off" quite often, and focus more on the dangermen, closing them down individually. So far, it's helped quite a lot, especially near the end when needing to turn up the heat.

Finally, the issue of bad luck or misfortune. Team A scored a cracker from a throw in or gets a deflected goal can and does happen in football (manager) and it's sometimes ridiculous to nitpick.

Anyway, it's going quite well again, until the next dip in form, though it seems this version is indeed fm back to its addictive best