How to win head-to-head matches in EA Sports FC

EA Sports FC Mobile offers two main experiences: playing matches and building your team. Team-building equals success, and going head-to-head with the best players around the world is the best way to test your team and adapt your strategy.

This guide will walk you through the best tips when it comes to head-on clashes in FC Mobile. Controlling players on the pitch is the easy part; it's everything surrounding those matches that might make you scratch your head. With these tips, you'll be soaring up the leaderboard ladder in no time, and you'll cement your spot among the game's best players.

This one sounds obvious, we know, but hear us out. You may get a top-notch player while playing through a league or tournament, and then forget to go back after the competition ends and upgrade your team. It happens to the best of us, and we just want to make sure that you're playing with the best team possible.

Luckily, the game makes it easy to have the most optimized team possible – based on the players you've collected – with the Auto Build function in the Team menu. Use this to populate your squad with the best 11 players in your portfolio, and then get back on the pitch and prove that you're the best!

Once you have the auto-built, fully optimized soccer team of your dreams, it's time to pick a formation. To the non-soccer fan, this might seem arbitrary, but making sure your players are lined up in a way that maximizes their potential is a major key in winning. Without a good formation, some of your best players might just be sitting ducks on the pitch.

If you notice that your team is particularly efficient with the ball in their possession, choose a formation with an emphasis on offense, such as the 4-3-3 Attack or 3-5-2 options. Defense-minded teams should look into the 4-3-3 Defend or 4-5-1 Flat formations, while a more balanced approach might favor the 5-2-2-1 or 5-4-1 sets.

Autoplay can be very enticing, especially if you want to take care of chores while progressing in the game, but use it wisely. Don't lean on the auto-play function as a means to get wins in head-to-head.

While you might rack up some wins early on, eventually you're going to get stomped by someone who is manning the controls and knows what they're doing. Make sure you measure your opponent carefully before deciding if auto-play is a good idea. If they're good, and you're not ready, you’ll have no chance.

Unranked matches are available for a reason. You can experiment and get a feel for things before moving on to the matches where wins and losses start to count. Don't think you have to plunge into the ranked waters straight away; take your time and figure things out.

When you think you're ready, and you've built a good enough team, play a ranked match or two and see how things go. If you win big, then great, you're ready to take on ranked players and climb your way up to the top ranks. If things go poorly, well, now you know you weren't quite ready to dive into the deep end yet. Reassess your strategy, rearrange your team, and then head back out there.