Player Review
95 - TOTS
Due to the fact that I have an untradable totw neymar, I have waited long for the ligue 1 totssf squad to be released. My first interest was Renato Sanches, and then Aouar. However, due to a limited budget, I started the week by trying Verratti first. And this card has absolutely schocked me.
I play 4321/41212-narrow in game. My 3 midfielder before was De-Jong TOTY (Shadow), Gullit 93 (engine), Allan 91(Anchor). Verratti (Shadow) comes in together with totssf Van De Beek (Engine) to replace De Jong and Allan. HIs driblling stats out perform all other players in the midfield. Or maybe not the stats only, it's his model and the stats together, that makes him great in dribbling. He turns quickly as if there is no such thing called momentum. With Shadow, he accelerates like a ferrari. Of course, you just don't use him to dribble half the pitch to hit the bottleneck of top sprint speed. Defensive wise, I am used to playing Kante like small but agile&quick players to challenge the ball holder. Verratti is also very very good at this. Strength is a Con, you don't knock an opponent off the ball by simply rushing into him. However, with a little bit left stick movement, combined with good jockey/sprint timing, verratti is a wall in my midfield. Moreover, his strength in attacking is not a problem at all. With such good balance stat, he doesn't get bullied easily by opponent players.
Considering his performance, I am not going for Renato Sanches now, I feel this card is a real bargain in the market. And as a organizing CDM, he probably is my first choice. Other organizing CDM I have used are:
- De Jong TOTY: with engine, dribbling is probably as good as verratti. But he lacks the lightening acceleration to tackle the ball. That's why I put shadow on him, and dribbling in the case is not as good as Verratti
- Allan FB Premium: I tried engine / anchor. he is a good card, but not as agile as Verratti, and the extra strength deosn't feel a huge difference compared to Verratti, maybe because they are both small
- Gullit 93: This card is god of course. But he is not that agile, and I turn not to use him to dribble much. Defensive wise he is different too, usually you don't rush that much with this card. Different type.
- Vieira 91: I used this card back in Feb. The reason I switched to Gullit, was because sometimes you don't pass well with this card. And of course you can't rely on his dribbling much.
- Van de Beek: 3 star skill is a con. I first tried Anchor and he is terrible at dribbling. After using an engine, this card is good but not perfect at almost all dimension, except that he is only 3star skilled. I will accept a replacement for him (considering atal). Verratti has more presence than this card
- Trent Arnold TOTY: I used this card for almost 1000 games after TOTY, most of the games at CM, with sniper. It's a meta card before May. After other TOTSSF cards being released, you can start to feel his speed, defence (neither stats nor model is perfect) and dribbling (3star skill is always a con) are starting to feel not that good
To summarize, I believe this is a card you must have, if you can get the Chemistry working. This card is so cheap, which in turn saves you another million coins for upgrading other positions.
- dribbling: agile, and with a great acceleration
- passing: full stats, can pass great through ball
- defending: gives me the Kante feeling
- sprint speed: if he has to cover the wing, sometimes, lack of top speed is an issue, you need to drop back towards center more so that you are not outpaced by opponent wingers
- shooting: lack of shoot power is a big issue now in the game. I put him always stay back.
- Strength? I don't feel this being an issue. others might. Anyway, the Strength stat doesn't look great