Player Roles are special titles that can be earned by members of your squad that affect both mental and physical attributes as well as increasing club funding in some cases. A solid, dependable team of players who connect properly will always win out against a team of flashy egos.
You'll drop more points in the long term by being unbalanced, so when you invest into the team you need to improve each area gradually by buying players who suit your style rather than those who have the highest stats. This is just as true for any other position too. Overloading the frontline with super strikers and neglecting the backline is whimsical nonsense in PES 2017 because you may have the goalscoring power, but if your defensive line can't handle a simple set piece or through ball without panic then it counts for naught. Check their individual stats to make sure they will fit your vision, and more importantly, check how likely they are to want a transfer in the first place.
It's here that a little research pays off. A solid, experienced centre back, a hungry young talent in midfield and a seasoned keeper who is being neglected by his current club are key players to get in through loans. By taking in young talent not getting game time at their parent club, or old hands that are being phased out, you can greatly improve your squad for the season. If they turn out to be awful then you can ship them out and look for better backup.Īs mentioned earlier, money isn't exactly flowing out of your pockets at the start so in order to improve the squad you have the Youth setup to call upon, and just as vitally, the loan system. More importantly, by using more of your squad you not only find out where it needs work, but also give yourself a stronger bench to call upon. You may discover you had a better player for a position that you never played because the first teamer had better stats (see Yankov over Coutinho in the default lineup). The best way to experiment for any length of time early on is to rotate the squad heavily for friendlies, cup matches and dead rubber matches. It's easy to get stuck using the same set of players for every game as you naturally fear dropping points if you don't, but you will need to call on the fringe players at some point, be it to allow a rest for an overworked midfielder, or to cover suspensions or a bad injury.