After getting burned out on PES 2021, I fired up PES 2019 again today. A few matches in, the differences between the two games stood out immediately. Here’s how PES 2019 feels compared to PES 2021:

Gameplay is simply more fun.

Players feel more responsive, and without the constant ball‑shielding animations, everything moves more freely. I even like the dribbling controls better in PES 2019.

Defense is night‑and‑day better.

Without the heavy shielding, good defenders actually get to show their quality. They poke the ball away, intercept passes, and react naturally. The game also helps by switching you to the nearest defender when the opponent plays a long ball—and it does this while keeping your momentum intact.

Below is something that you would normally see in PES 2019, but not in PES 2021. As the opposing player receives the ball on the wing, my RB (in this case I think that's Nacho) closes in and manages to poke the ball away.

In PES 2019, most defenders with high enough defensive attributes, can poke the ball away from the offensive player as can be seen above. In PES 2021, this only happens if you've got a very good angle on the ball, otherwise the ball-shielding animation will kick-in and your defender will either have to shoulder-charge the opposing player to win the ball, or you'll end up having to fight against the ball-shielding animation. It may be a bit more realistic, but not as fun in a video game, and can downright be frustrating most of the time.

Also in PES 2021, auto‑switching is unreliable unless you force it manually, and even then it often picks the wrong player. Worse, it kills your momentum, which makes defending feel like a chore. PES 2019’s defensive flow is just more enjoyable.

Offense feels smoother and more predictable.

With my usual pass‑assist settings, PES 2019 sends the ball exactly where I intend most of the time. Dribbling is also more responsive and fun without the excessive shielding.

In PES 2021, even with the same settings, pass assist feels inconsistent. I’ve had so many misplaced passes that it gets frustrating.

Visuals: PES 2021 wins easily.

Even without Xbox Series X enhancements, PES 2021 is the best‑looking football game I’ve played. Player models, lighting, and animations are all a clear step up. That said, I still prefer the simpler, cleaner Master League menus in PES 2019.

Sound: slight edge to PES 2019.

Both games are similar overall, but I like PES 2019’s soundtrack more.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019 #ProEvolutionSoccer2021

Let's start off with this beautiful free kick goal from Arcas. I surprised myself here with the amount of curve he was able to put on that ball. Wonderful goal.

This second one is the best goal that I've ever scored in the game. Gameiro does a beautiful run behind the defenders. You can see that he's running almost perpendicular to the defenders. Then Casteldine chips him a beautiful lob pass. And then when he gets to the ball, he uses his head to knock it down so he can take a good shot on goal. Up to this date, I've never seen another player do the same thing (in the game) with his head, to get a shot at goal. This was just a special goal.

This third one is another beautiful free kick goal from Arcas. The ball slithers in between the heads of two defenders, then ends up in the back of the net.

This fourth one is a wonderful counter-attack. The goal was scored by Petrucci, who is the backup AMF in my Master League team.

This last goal is a great example of when to use the 1-2 pass in the game. When the defender is marking your player closely, that's when you use it. If you time it just right, even a slow player like Goios can get behind the defense for a shot at goal.

Tags: #GameClips #ProEvolutionSoccer2019

After a few moments of terror, frantically trying to clear the ball out of the box, I get a second or two to breathe. Then it's straight into a counter attack. My excitement building as I start to see passing lanes forming before my eyes. It culminates into a shot at goal, at which point I get off my seat and silently scream (because the kids are sleeping), GOOOAAAALLLLL!

This game clip also highlights a variation of the 1-2 pass that can lead to a break in the defense. When my RMF David Concha gets the ball on the wing, I start a 1-2 pass with my AMF Casteldine. But instead of passing the ball back to Concha, to complete the 1-2 pass, I send it over to one of my strikers up front, Jarvis. He then sends a through ball down the wing to Concha who was still continuing his run. This then opens up the whole field for the final through ball pass into the box, where Goios beats the defender to the ball and scores.

One of the cool things in this clip is noticing Goios' reaction when the through ball was sent to Concha on the wing. He immediately sprinted forward and managed to stay ahead of the defender to get a shot at goal.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019

Had an amazing game against FC Barcelona.

Due to the way they were defending, I couldn't keep the ball in the center of the field. Once I pass the ball to my AMF, he would have just a few seconds before he is dispossessed. It's just not enough time to build up an attack. So, I tried a different way of attacking. I went from sending short passes into the center of the field, to lobbing through balls over their defenders.

I noticed that Goios times his runs perfectly. But even after a perfectly timed pass, Goios is just not fast enough to get to the ball before the defender clears it away. This happened 2-3 times before I realized, it is not going to work with Goios. That's because Goios only has a Speed rating of 70.

So, at the 55 minute mark, I decided to take Goios out and brought in K. Gameiro — one of my more promising strikers. The important thing to note here is that Gameiro has a Speed rating of 90. That makes him the fastest player on my team.

Now with Gameiro in the game, I tried the same passes I was using between Goios and Castledine, which were 1-2 lob passes over the defenders. The first time I tried it with Gameiro, I knew it was going to result in a goal later on. Gamerio was fast enough to get some separation between him and the defenders on the initial run. He's also fast enough that he could get to the ball with an opportunity to take a shot at goal. This meant that the defenders were now focusing on him, which opened up spaces behind for my other players to fill in.

After a couple more tries, I eventually scored a goal to put my team up 1-0. Then another goal came via the same tactic, to put us up 2-0 against Barcelona. On both of those goals, Gameiro made the pass that led to the goal. The decision to bring him in early in the second half paid off.

This is also an indicator that Goios — whose stats are now slowly dropping because of his age — might no longer be good enough to play against elite level teams. You can see in the screenshot above that his overall rating is only 70. My newest signing Gameiro is at 78.

This post is Day 63 of my #100DaysToOffload challenge. Visit https://100daystooffload.com to get more info, or to get involved.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019 #100DaysToOffload

Currently in the offseason, prior to the start of the 2022-2023 Master League season. I tried renewing F. Aguilar's (CB) contract. His contract was set to expire on 2023. After renewing his contract for 4 years, his contract expiration date is now 2027. So, renewing a contract means the year length is added to the current expiration date.

Need to figure out what to do with the offer to Canning and Mihailov.

• Canning probably should be replaced with a better player at LB. That's what I'm keeping him for in the first place; a backup LB.
• Mihailov has a Stamina stat of 58, which is pretty low. If I'm replacing him, it has to be for some other player that has better Stamina. To get him to not run out of stamina before the end of games, I have to set him to not defend at all. This can be a liability when you're behind and you need everyone to press the opposing team.
• K. Gameiro, a Striker on my Youth Team, is the one I'm looking to sign. However, I predict it will be really expensive to try and keep him in the lineup in the future.

It is now the start of the 2022-2023 Master League season. I won my first game against Real Madrid in the International Champions Cup. We were tied at the 95th minute mark. I won a corner kick and called everyone to join in. Scored the tiebreaker in that set piece and Real Madrid did not have time to get another goal.

Next game against Club Brugge ended in a draw.

Last game for the International Champions Cup was against Manchester City. I won that game, which meant that I won the International Champions Cup. Prior to the start of that game, I signed K. Gameiro as a backup Striker. That turned out to be a good idea, because Arcas, the superstar on my team, was injured in the win against Manchester City.

K. Gameiro made his debut for my team in the French Super Cup game against Paris Saint Germain. I scored the first goal with B. Goios, but eventually fell behind 2-1 after Neymar scored two goals in succession. We equalized with a great free kick from Castledine. Then towards the end of the game, Hamouma and Gameiro hooked up to score the decisive goal. We won the French Super Cup against a really good PSG team.

To end my post, I'll share a new thing I finally learned in the game. To have your defenders join the attack during set pieces, you can choose which players do so by going to Gameplan –> Player Settings –> Players to Join Attack.

I can't believe I've played PES 2019 for a year before I finally figured that out. 🤦‍♂️

This post is Day 48 of my #100DaysToOffload challenge. Visit https://100daystooffload.com to get more info, or to get involved.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019 #100DaysToOffload

I'm actually not sure how I triggered this kind of goal celebration. It is rare that any of my players would jump up to the stands and celebrate with the fans.

This post is Day 39 of my #100DaysToOffload challenge. Visit https://100daystooffload.com to get more info, or to get involved.

Tags: #GameScreenshots #ProEvolutionSoccer2019 #100DaysToOffload

Arcas is one of the players you get when playing Master League with the original lineup. He's the most expensive player in the lineup. So, you might be tempted to ship him off to try and save money in your salary budget. I think that would be a mistake. If you hang on to him, he will bloom into your team's very own superstar. Later on, he'll have the chance to become a “Legend” at your team.

This post is Day 29 of my #100DaysToOffload challenge. Visit https://100daystooffload.com to get more info, or to get involved.

Tags: #GameScreenshots #ProEvolutionSoccer2019 #100DaysToOffload

In my previous PES2019 Game Log entry, I talked about contract renewals. In this one, I'll share some tips for managing your Master League lineup and keeping your salary budget in check.

Prioritize Contract Renewals on Transfer Windows

What I've started doing during Transfer Windows is before even looking to make a new signing, I try and get contract renewals for my players whose contract's are expiring within a year or two. Some players who are already old, or have already peaked, or have a lot of love for the team will be looking to extend their contracts for longer than 2 years. This is almost always a good deal as it will save you a lot of money in the long run. I was able to secure 4-5 year contract renewals from role players using this approach. This frees me up from not having to worry about them in the future, which means I can then focus on keeping or getting star players. Most star players in my experience will only extend their contracts for up to 2 years using this approach. So for those players, you will just have to wait until they ask for contract renewals themselves when their contracts are about to expire.

Try to keep a good mix of old and new players in the team

New players, especially rising star youth players, will want bigger and bigger annual salaries on each renewal. This is because their stats and ratings are improving every year, so they will want to be paid more. If all you have in your lineup are young rising star players, you're doomed. You will not be able to keep all of them signed to your team as your salary budget will not be enough for all of them. So, to counter this, you want to mix in a bunch of veteran players who have modest requirements for their salaries. Players who are old, or players whose stats are on the way down are good candidates for this. These players will more than likely be willing to sign for longer years on their contracts and for less money. If anything, it is better to have more veteran players in your lineup, than to have more youth players in your lineup.

In my first Master League season, I replaced every player in my lineup with youth players. After a few years, it was time for my then superstar, Arcas, to renew his contract. Along with Arcas, I also had to renew contracts for my goalkeeper and other pretty good players. I had a salary budget of around 10 million. Arcas wanted 18 million. And the other players all wanted more for their annual salary. It was clear that it wasn't going to work and I didn't want to lose my players. I ended up restarting my Master League season, this time with a focus on trying to manage my player's contracts better.

Some examples of mixing young and old players:

• Arcas as I have mentioned is the superstar in my team. Since I run a 4-4-2 diamond formation, that means I have two strikers up front. Arcas is one of them. To keep my salary budget in check, I have avoided signing a superstar striker to pair with Arcas. So, Arcas continues to play with an aging Goios who has very modest annual salary demands. As long as I am still able to win with the two of them upfront, I'll maintain that partnership until I need to make a change.
• 3 of my 4 defenders can be considered young and rising star type of players. Their annual salary demands are getting bigger and bigger on each renewal, which is why I'm trying my best to hang on to my aging center-back who doesn't want that much money. Ideally, I want 2 of the 4 defenders to be veteran players with modest salary requirements.
• I have the same setup in midfield, with 3 of them being young and still developing and wanting more salary on each renewal. Again, ideally I want at most 2 young and developing players paired with 2 veteran players.
• Since most of the starters in my lineup are young and still developing, I know they will demand more salary on each contract renewal. To try and keep my salary budget in check, most of my reserve players are aging and have modest salary demands. My backup center-back for instance, Sasaki, was one of my first signings when I started my Master League season. I am hanging on to him even as his stats degrade because he is still effective in the field when he plays. My backup midfielder is a player at his peak, but signed for a lot more years than I expected, that was a good deal. My backup left-back is a new signing, but his stats are on the way down and so he didn't ask for a high annual salary.

Closing Remarks

To sum it up, the best way to manage your Master League lineup and keep your salary budget in check is to focus on retaining good players in your lineup. This means you want to always be thinking about contract renewals first. Only think about signing new players if you're letting go of another player. The tips I shared, prioritizing contract renewals, mixing old and new players, are all based on the idea that you are prioritizing the retention of good players in your lineup. Focus on that and your salary budget will always be enough.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019

I think a good rule of thumb to follow, is to expect a player to demand around 30% of their market value as their annual salary. So, a player that has a market value of 30 million, would want an annual salary of around 9 million. This means that going forward I need to periodically check my player's market value, to make sure I have enough in my salary budget to renew the contracts of players that I want to keep. This also means that I can't continue going on spending sprees during Transfer Windows. Oh well.

How Contract Renewals Work in PES 2019

So for awhile there I didn't really understand how contract renewals work in PES 2019. To clarify, I'm talking about contract renewals in Master League mode. How much money did I need in my salary budget to successfully renew a player's contract? What does a contract length of 2 years mean? What are Release Fees? I'll try to answer some of those questions below.

Player Salaries and the Salary Budget

The photo above shows the contract renewal screen, where I'm trying to extend Arcas' contract by 2 more years. You can see that I have a salary budget of $3,149,700 and the current in-game date is 10/28/2020. Arcas' current salary is $845,000 and his contract expires on 08/31/2021. For his contract renewal, his proposed annual salary is $3,085,900 for an extra 2 years with the club. You'll note that his asking salary of $3,085,900 is awfully close to my salary budget of $3,149,700. However, it turns out I need less than $3,085,900 to make it work.

The photo above shows the contract renewal confirmation/summary screen. You can see that my salary budget was decreased by $2,240,900 only, which still leaves me with $908,800. I would have expected it to be decreased by $3,085,900, which is Arcas' proposed annual salary, so what happened? Where did this $2,240,900 amount come from?

It comes from this formula: Proposed Annual Salary - Current Player Salary = Amount Decreased from Salary Budget

So, it was $3,085,900 – $845,000 = $2,240,900.

Contract Expiration Dates

Now as far as the new contract expiration date goes, I originally thought that if I renewed a contract today, the new contract was going to replace the existing contract. This is only true if you renew a contract without extending the contract length. In that scenario, you pretty much just gave them a raise but didn't extend their contract. Needless to say, that's a very bad deal. Instead, you should be considering contract renewals for at least 2 years or more to get more bang for your buck.

Anyway, going back to our example above, I thought that since the current in-game date was 10/28/2020, the new contract expiration date for Arcas would be 8/31/2022. I was thinking, 2020 + 2 years equals 2022, which, for a 3 million annual salary, doesn't seem like a good deal. Thankfully, it turns out that a contract renewal will stack on top of the existing contract. So, the new contract expiration date for Arcas is actually 8/31/2024. Now that's much better.

Another thing to note with contract renewals is that player salaries are already factored in for the duration of their contract. Sticking with the example from above, after the contract renewal Arcas now has a salary of $3,085,900 and his contract will last until 8/31/2024. What this means is that you don't have to pay Arcas any money for the duration of his contract. Everything is already “in the books” as the game would say.

Release Fees

Lastly, release fees. Release Fees are something that Konami added to the game to make it easier for players to be able to sign star players from other teams. The idea is, if you can pay the Release Fee for a player, the team who the player plays for cannot stop you from entering into a contract negotiation with that player. This doesn't guarantee that you can sign the player, it just gives you the opportunity to try and sign the player without getting blocked by the team who owns the player. The thing to note here, is that it goes both ways. If you have a player with a Release Fee in their contract, an opposing team can bypass you and negotiate directly with your player to try and sign them.

Now as far as contract renewals goes, some players will not accept a contract renewal without a Release Fee. In my experience, I found that going for the maximum Release Fee is the best option since it satisfies the player's requirement of a Release Fee and makes it as hard as possible for opposing teams to get into a negotiation with your player.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019

07/06/2019 – Saturday

Physical Contact seems to be a very important attribute in Pro Evolution Soccer 2019. For defenders, it allows them to get in front of attackers just before they make a shot. The Center Back K. Manolas exemplifies this attribute a lot.

One of the biggest threats in PES 2019 is the low cross. Typically what would happen is, a low cross comes in and the opposing team's striker will seal off my defenders to allow themselves an easy volley in front of goal. I see this happen a lot when playing against elite level teams. When I finally got K. Manolas on my team, I noticed that he was a lot better at defending against the low cross. He would get in front of strikers to clear the ball away.

07/10/2019 – Wednesday

What a disaster in my Master League campaign. I decided to play my reserve players for the PEU Cup game and I lost 4-2 to a team that wasn't even one of the top teams in my league! I lost because I decided to save my starters for the game against Chelsea. To add insult to injury, I actually got two of my players injured in the game.

One thing I am noticing is that my Left Back, Miguel Lopes, frequently gets beaten in aerial battles. He has good speed and decent defensive stats, but he is a liability in the air.

My Center Back, Congre, has good speed and skills. He has the Interception and Acrobatic Clearance skills, but sometimes I feel that he reacts slower compared to my other Center Back, Kabak. Kabak has at least 80 in both Defensive Prowess and Ball Winning attributes, but has less speed than Congre. – I have since learned that Defensive Prowess determines how quickly a defender will react to a loose ball, or an attacker with the ball, or an attacker running into space that makes them a threat. So it's a toss up really, between a defender who is quick as far as speed goes, but reacts slower in defense, or a defender who is slow but reacts quickly in defense. Ideally, you want a defender who reacts quickly and is fast on his feet.

• On my next game, I'll try starting Kabak again and see if he pairs better with Manolas. – This never happened because I restarted my Master League campaign.

When playing against elite level teams, I seem to have trouble with the Attacking Midfielder position. Basically, my AMF cannot hang on to the ball long enough to facilitate the offense. I think next time I'll try playing a 4-4-2 formation with Lerma and Bero playing as Center Midfielders. – Wasn't much of an improvement. I could defend better, but my offense suffered without an AMF to feed the ball to my strikers.

07/16/2019 – Tuesday

Last night I restarted my Master League campaign. The main reason for doing so was to manage my player's contracts better this time around. I want to see if I can manage to keep Arcas, who will bloom into a superstar, in this play-through. – Arcas is one of the default players in the original Master League lineup. If you groom him well enough, he will develop into a superstar player. Of course this also means that he will demand a much higher salary than anyone else in the team.

I also decided to try an official team this time around. I am playing the Paris FC team, which is a Ligue 2 team in France. – Part of the reason for switching to an official team in my Master League campaign is to get official kits for the teams and the league. Pro Evolution Soccer has always trailed FIFA as far as licensing goes, but they were able to license a number of teams and leagues for their 2019 game.

I'm also experimenting with decreasing the game time in PES 2019, to see if it would lower the amount of goals per game, to make it more like a real world result. – I went from 15 minutes to 10 minutes and it drastically improved the game. I no longer had games where I would score 7 goals in just one match. The number of goals were much more realistic and the game had a much better flow overall.

07/30/2019 – Tuesday

I switched back to a 4-4-2 diamond formation in PES 2019 and it is just so much easier to score goals. – Most French teams run something like a 4-3-3 or 3-4-3 formation. When I started playing with the Paris FC team, I started with a 4-3-3 formation which was their default formation. I never got comfortable with it, which is why I ended up switching back to the 4-4-2 diamond formation mid-season and that was a good improvement.

I've noticed a disadvantage when I have all my defenders (LB, RB, CB) marking specific players on the opposing team: the defender will always chase after his mark, even if his mark is not even posing a threat to score a goal. This in turn opens up spaces for other opposing players to run into. Defenders marking other players will not leave their mark even if an opposing player runs into a space that makes him a significant threat to score. – Some time after, I stopped marking other players in defense and it has significantly improved my overall defense. I no longer conceded stupid goals, like one where my CB decided to stick to the opposing striker running to the wing, while the opposing AMF was dribbling straight in front of goal.

Another thing I noticed is that when I mark opposing Wingers with my Fullbacks, they will almost always run out of stamina before the end of the game. Chasing after the Ronaldos and Neymars from elite teams makes this even worse. Not to mention, non elite Fullbacks will simply get beaten on the wing when faced against an elite Winger. So this is another reason to stop using Man Marking in the game. When I stopped doing it, I noticed that even my slower Fullbacks had a better chance at defending against faster Wingers.

I actually haven't played PES 2019 for a good amount of time now. Writing down these entries makes me want to play it again. I will just have to add it into my rotation of Civilization 6, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and Division 2. This is one of the things where I've found weekly planning to be of good use.

Tags: #GameLog #ProEvolutionSoccer2019