Leeds FM26 Club Overview

Welcome to the first step in the Leeds FM26 team guide, the club objectives. This is where we review the board and supporter expectations in order to understand the club culture or identity. This normally includes playstyle and recruitment objectives which will help define your reign at the club.

Starting with the board objectives, we can see the board have given you free reign, so we will need the supporter objectives to guide us.

So the supporters objectives are readily available. They are focussed more the playstyle of the team wanting attacking football, entertaining football and high-tempo pressing football.

When cross referencing the various play styles with the objectives, 3 come back, Control Possession, Tiki Taka and Gegenpress. Any of these styles will help you in this club’s identity.

The supporters also want you to focus on youth development and use the facilities to create tomorrow’s heroes. This means that you need to arrange the club towards developing youth and that you should recruit the best staff. Get a top notch head of youth development, scouts that uncover potential, coaches that are good at working with youngsters.

Want to try this with a different team? Check out the Brighton version here.

Leeds FM26 Squad Guide

The next chapter of this Leeds FM26 team guide involves breaking down the squad. Using the assistant’s star ratings, we pinpoint our most important players right now, as well as the youngsters who could develop into future stars.

We then match those players to their best roles and positions, allowing us to build the formations that fit the squad and provide the overall shape of the team.

Key Players

When looking at this group of key players, I think it fair to say that Leeds have recruited well. 4 out of the 6 are new signings and bring real quality to the team. You can also see that the focus is on defensive positions like DM, DC and GK. There hasn’t been a large focus on the attacking line, which is something newly promoted clubs should be focussing on.

Even though there is only 6 players, you can see that they are setting up in a 433, 424 or potentially 451. Okafor is an AML according to the assistant, but he could easily play as a fast forward.

Best Youth Prospects

Now this is the area where Leeds United got their reputation from in the noughties, the youth players. As you can see there are a couple of really talented players in Matteo Joseph and Wilfried Gnonto. Matteo in particular will be amazing next year, especially with the lack of out and out forwards.

There is only one player that is capable of playing AMC, so I am inclined to move away from a formation with an AMC. The 433 on the other hand suits the combative midfield we could put together and push the ball out to the wings in possession.

Formation Verdict: 451 or 433.

Leeds FM26 Wonderkids & Young Talents

So we won’t have seen him in the Leeds FM26 team guide as he is in the youth team, Harry Gray is the wonderkid at Leeds United. He is also the brother of another wonderkid, Archie Gray, it must be something in the DNA.

Either way, he maybe too young to push now, so let him have time at another club in the first team as this is the fastest development phase and when he comes back you need to make the decision to promote or not.

Leeds United FM26 Tactics & Best Formation

We’ve reached the part of the Leeds United FM26 team guide where we pull the entire plan together. By blending tactical data, formation options, and the key players identified earlier, you now have a complete strategy for your first season. Leeds should hit the ground running with this setup in FM26.

We have to take into account we are a relegation candidate when designing our FM26 tactic. We also have a number of key players that play in positions in the defence. The problem we are going to have is goals and goals is what win you games.

To conquer the above, we are going to play Gegenpress to lean into our great defensive abilities and formation shape according to squad depth. With the 433 into 4141 transition, there are very few players who will be caught out of position and it is solid. It’s great for a team that wants to keep it’s shape.

The main areas for the attack are the wings. Our centre midfield is focussed on defending, especially in a 5 man midfield in Gegenpress formation. The wings is where the ball will be pushed along, the wingers pushing into AML/AMR

This shape works even better if you use the FM26 433 transition model.

Transfer Recommendations for Leeds United in FM26

Positions to Strengthen

I think the most obvious area for improvement according to our Leeds United FM26 team guide is that they need a striker. This isn’t unusual as most of the bottom half of the table are looking for the next striker to score numerous goals.

Other than that I think Leeds have done a good job in their recruitment and there is plenty of potential in the team.

Potential Signings

As we are getting into the habit of building player profiles, this is what I have put together:

• Position: ST
• Age: 20-23
• Attributes: Acceleration, Anticipation, Work Rate, Aggression, Stamina (Gegenpress core)

Recommended players according to the profile:

• Manfred Ugalde (Spartak Moscow)
• Jay Stansfield (Birmingham)
• Franculino (Midtjylland)
• Troy Parrott (AZ)

Leeds United FM26 Save Challenges

Well I think it is pretty obvious, the FM26 save game starts with keeping Leeds United up surely? Once you keep the team up, you can start to force your tactical style on the club more, buy and sell players.

While the recruitment has been good for this level, to push the team higher you are going to have to be smart. There are a number of routes you can take with your recruitment in order to build for the future.

Conclusion

Leeds United have an amazing history, from the years of dominating the league, to going bust in the early noughties. It’s been a real tale of two halves, and now they are back and ready to take on the EPL. It’s not going to be easier after seeing the number of promoted teams get relegated, but they are trying.

I used the Leeds United FM26 team guide to manage them until Christmas and we did fairly well. We aren’t involved in a relegation scrap and sitting around midtable. It’s solid if unspectacular start in all honesty and I will post the results of the season in another blog.

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