Dream League Soccer 2022 Guide: Tips, Tricks & Strategies to Build Your Dream Team and Win More Matches

There’s no denying that the Dream League Soccer franchise has been enjoying immense success through the years and its publisher, First Touch Games, is visibly committed to keep their momentum going. The latest entry in the franchise, Dream League Soccer 2022, brings necessary improvements compared to last year’s release.

There are visual, audio, feature, and realism changes all over in Dream League Soccer 2022. Even so, it is still pretty much the same beast of a game, packing the same kick and brand of challenge.

That basically means every concept applicable in Dream League Soccer 2021 very much applies still to the new entry. From the in-game controls, team management options, and facility improvements, if you’ve played any of the previous releases, you’d immediately feel at home. As such, for the sake of topic coverage, we are opening this Dream League Soccer 2022 guide with a rundown of what’s in ’22 that is not in ’21.

1. What Has Changed in Dream League Soccer 2022

Realism 1: Teams and Stats

The stats of the players and their respective base teams (should you play against the AI) have been updated in accordance to their recent career performances. This means that if they did not maintain their real-world stats for the past year to reflect their numbers before it, they essentially got nerfed; those who’ve exhibited improvements, meanwhile, were buffed accordingly. The most notable names kept their Legendary status (yellow) and some got demoted to Rare (blue); in the same way, some Rares were demoted to Commons (white).

Realism 2: Weather                                                                   

Generally, the graphic textures in Dream League Soccer 2022 see subtle, but very much welcomed enhancements of what’s in its predecessor and that includes the weather effects. When there’s intense sun, the shadows are more defined; when it rains, the focused camera view on replays and free kicks feature a much more evident presence of droplets and water streaks on the camera.

The “big” change in weather, meanwhile, is the reintroduction of snow. When it’s snowing, the field may be blanketed by a white film (making the ball essentially much difficult to spot in zoomed out views) and snowflakes can be seen in zoomed-in frames.

New Feature 1: Recruitment Center

There is now a recruitment center that you can upgrade to make scouting efforts a bit cheaper. Like the facilities for Commercial, Medical, Training, and Accommodation, upgrading it would require an incremental amount of gems (the premium resource of Dream League Soccer 2022) per level.

If you plan to spend big on the game, upgrading the Recruitment Center would be a brilliant choice because maxing it out will make your efforts to acquire popular players easier and much efficient. If your pockets are deep, you won’t have to wait for the Live Transfer’s RNG to give you the stars you’re after, the Recruitment Center got your back.

New Feature 2: Vanity Customization

You now have an ability to fine-tune the colors present in your kits. The edit kit feature lets you pick any color that you want through the use of a gradient selector. It is now also possible to assign individual colors to the elements (trims, number, sponsor logo) in ALL of your players’ and goalkeepers’ uniform variations. Go as multicolor as you want for uniqueness or go solid for boldness, the color combinations are basically endless.

And it doesn’t stop there, you can also customize the colors of a wide selection of preset logos to match your preferred identity. If you’re keen to tap into the institutionalized designs of football clubs, you have to pay a small premium to gain access to them. Vanity has a price, but if you’re a true fan of the sport, it will be a price you won’t mind to pay.

New Feature 3: Ultimate Tournament Challenge

Dream League Soccer 2022 introduces a fourth game mode in form of a focused tournament featuring a few pre-selected clubs. In this PVP mode, you need to select one club to play with and rack up wins to earn rewards. To get the gold medal and earn the max reward, you need nine wins; for the silver and bronze, you need to claim seven and five victories, respectively.

There is an entry cost of 250 coins, so you essentially need to bag 5 wins to ensure you’d break even. You will also get scouting and coaching tokens accordingly based on the medals. In your bid for the gold, you can absorb up to three loses before your participation ends.

The post-match bounties are literally the same amounts that you’d get in Dream League Live matches (perhaps because this feature is clustered with it). The Ultimate Tournament mode is a great opportunity to feel what it is like playing against high-rated players and playing as them. Treat it as a “shortcut” to play as the biggest stars of the game by only paying 250 coins, that in itself is an absolute win already.

Improvement 1: Dynamic AI Positioning

Based on the selected formation/tactic, players will now move accordingly and try to maintain the ideal distribution. They will also adjust their pace and positioning if you manually move a player off its original position to “invade” another’s somewhat akin to how players rotate in basketball, to allow for pitch coverage. The treatment is equal both in offense and defense.

Improvement 2: Layout

Apart from the graphic improvements and recoloring of the general UI, there are some layout changes in Dream League Soccer 2022 and the most notable of which is the pre-match line-up display. In the previous version, it is mainly a list of the starting 11; now, it also shows the tactic in effect for both teams.

Apart from all the changes mentioned above, you’d feel the game’s energy soon as you pop the app open, thanks to the new soundtrack. Now that you have an idea what’s in Dream League Soccer 2022 that is not in Dream League Soccer 2021, let’s jump unto the game guide proper.

2. Befriend the Basics

We’re sticking to what we said in our Dream League Soccer 2021 Beginner’s Guide that the game is not something a new player is expected to pick up in one day. The learning curve is steep, the skill requirement to achieve winning form is high, and the high amount of focus demanded in each match triple underscores the fact that it is not a casual game. Even so, there is nothing that patience, persistence, and practice can’t eventually conquer. In that account, we’re leading into our topmost tip.

2.1 Practice Plenty

The game’s natural difficulty mimics soccer’s actual trickiness to play. If you’ve played soccer in real-life and go back to the days you have just picked up a soccer ball, the challenge of learning to move it around using the same appendages you use for mobility – your legs and feet – would flashback.

While you don’t have to actively dribble in Dream League Soccer, the difficulty element is applied in maneuvering around with the ball, passing, and shooting. The good thing is, the game offers a training mode where you can polish your basics.

Passing isn’t really a mean monster because as long as there is a friendly player in the approximate zone you want to land the ball at, that player will position accordingly and receive the ball (sometimes even with his chest or head for strong passes). Shooting, meanwhile, is a different animal. It requires a tremendous amount of precision, timing, and positioning for an attempt to be considered decent.

Unlike other games with a goal (think of hockey, basketball, or heck, even casual soccer games), there is no reliable auto-aim here. When you shooting or passing you have to actively and carefully aim to the direction where you want to send the ball to.

Our first tip then is to spend as much time as necessary in the training mode to practice your shooting and passing. In it, you can gauge the ideal strength of kicks for each type of pass. Having a general idea of such will help make your ball distribution efficient and precise.

Passing is a crucial skill to master because anyone handling the ball can only “survive” a few tackle attempts, which is why it is best to distribute around buffering any pressure from your opponents. There is no opponent pressure in training mode so you can solely focus on familiarizing yourself with the passes and shots.

2.1.1 Passes and Shot Types and Their Purposes

Low Kick – B button

When passing, the B-button kick keeps the ball grounded and it is the most efficient option when covering short distances. In the free training mode when on the default sideline view, you’ll see visible lines through the pitch. A low pass works best when covering 2 to 3 “bars.”

Shots performed with the B-button kicks will hug the ground too, but full-powered ones will naturally have a slight upward trajectory (and will fly as high as 0-10% A-button kicks). Attacking with a low shot is best when delivering a follow up kick if you’re within the box and the opponent goalie is out of position or downed.

The speed of the ball will, of course, be determined by the power. A full-powered low shot is a safe and potent option in penalty kicks because there is absolutely zero chance that it will go over the net. Just try to avoid from deviating too wide to the sides.

Bonus: B-button kicks are great for micro passes when near the goal area to confuse the opponent’s goalkeeper. In defense, holding the B button will apply constant pressure to the ball handler while taps will act as “soft” tackle attempts that you must spam liberally when trying to intercept.

Loft kick – C button

The C-button kick will likely be your most-used pass/shoot button because it is simply the most versatile of all. Apart from it being the manual switch button in defense, it is also the most “forgiving” pass/shot type. Termed as the lofted pass/shot, it is your go-to passing button when an opponent is in tackling range already because they won’t be able to head or body block it. A tap lets you do a quick pass than can almost cover 2 bars and mastering how much power you need for increasing distances will be critical to your success.

When attacking the goal, the loft kick is the most ideal option because it has the least chance to be blocked or intercepted (due to its height) and you can control it better than a hard kick. You only need to be careful in putting too much force to avoid missing the goal.

It is also the best choice for free kicks done nearer the box than the centerfield because you can send the ball over the defender wall and make a cutting teammate touch it for a quick follow-up by the goal area. In penalty kicks, it is also the kick of choice; C-button kicks are coded to curve which is perfect for homing the corner goal.

Bonus: 0-10% power C-button kicks works nicely when you out-position or outnumber defenders in attempts to send the ball to your player closest to the goal. If you’re keen to put the extra work in defending, you can change the switching setting to manual to maximize it.

Hard kick – C button

Fitted with a self-explanatory name, the hard kick or A-button pass/shot is best for quick and long distance coverages. A quick tap to it can cover 3.5 bars and a full-powered version from just a bit past (about 2 whole bars from) your own penalty box can almost always send it to the other penalty box. It works best for close range goal attacks against an out of position goalie or whenever you see a teammate is wide open to receive a long pass for a rush attack opportunity.

Hard kicks are best when exploiting the small window of opportunity when you get a player near the goal, just make sure to deviate away from the goalkeeper but not too much to ensure the ball still homes within the posts. The innate power in them lets you send the ball flying at a decent speed in just a tap (equivalent to a 25% C.

Bonus: If you notice the opponent is actively tackling your players, the fastest way to send the ball across the pitch is through a well-aimed A-button kick. You only have to make sure of two things: 1) manually aim the pass for precision and 2) check the “minimap” whenever you plan for a long pass to make sure a friendly shirt is present to receive the package.

Once you have a good feel of these different types of passes and shots and you’re able to correctly invoke them at will, you’re on your way to build your game sense. So yes, the first element of game sense you can hone is kick type discernment. It’s honestly quite hard to give tips that may help one build it because it’s all instinctive and can only be cultivated through multiple matches and simply dedicating time to the game. Still, we’ll try our best to give hints throughout this guide.

2.1.2 Sharpen Situational Shots

Building a sound overall game sense may be elusive at first, but it’s possible to lure in it using what’s within our reach, practice. In training mode, you can also practice your Penalty Kicks, Free Kicks, and Corner Kicks. These three situations are literally doorways to scoring and being able to make the most of them will make you a potent opponent for everyone, even against other human players with a higher-rated lineup.

Corner Kicks

Experts in DLS seems to agree that Corner Kicks are OP and there a few reasons why:

First, the conduciveness to attempt a goal that it presents, just a touch or two after the inbounding kick and it’s a potential score. Our tip in this regard is to always do an A-button pass and put 30-50% power and it will ALWAYS lead to a clean reception.

Second, if you have a star player (Rare or Legendary) with a high Shooting rating like Neymar or Ronaldo or basically someone who has 91 (or higher) for the stat, you can fire off a skill shot after receiving the A-button pass. The player will receive it as a bicycle kick toward the goal.

Other strikers with a relatively high Shooting stat can also prompt a bicycle kick, but they have to be very adjacent to the goal to make it accurate, as most of the time they will overshoot. This is also perhaps the best chance in this guide to mention that skill shots (or double tapping on the right side of the screen without hitting any button) is the only form of auto-aim in Dream League Soccer.

Third, as the penalty area can get expectedly crowded, you can ease the pressure a bit by letting the receiver kick it back outside to the corner kicker and then re-angle your attack from him. Your proximity to the goal will be maintained and you get to reshape your offense, looking for a better-positioned receiver who can skill shot or deliver a clean goal kick.

Lastly, scoring from a corner kick is simply more satisfying than earning a point from free kicks or penalty kicks. This is mainly because your scoring potential is not spoon-fed. This may not be a “real” advantage, but you get it, the more work you put, the better satisfaction you feel when you gain something from it.

Free Kicks

A free kick, depending on the position, distance to the goal, and the number of opposing players building the wall, can be seen in different ways:

First, if the free kick happens at the general front angle of the goal, you can curve a goal kick directly. This, choice however, requires a high mastery of using the loft kick and your familiarity of the free kick taker (stats and dominant leg).

Second, if there is a gap in the wall, a full-powered low kick has a very high chance to get through it and once the ball gets past the defender wall, any teammate you have behind it can be the finisher.

Third, you can brew an attack by leading the ball toward an area stripped of defense. This applies if the opposing team used 4-5 players to build the wall. Exploit the uncovered ground and look for a teammate in that vicinity then mount a goal attack from him.

Lastly, if you have a player who positioned himself behind the defensive wall, aim for a loft kick meant to get the ball to him. The spot he’s at primes him to be a finisher, a diagonally deviated A-button tap or 20% power (or lower) C-button kick from him will often see a goalie in bad footing to decently defend the shot. Note that this requires a lot of power control; putting too less power would mean a “soft” kick that would lead the ball to land like a baby at the goalkeeper’s hands.

Penalty Kicks

While they don’t occur too often, being an ace in penalty kicks is as important if not much important than being well-versed in the two situations above. Your probability to score in penalty kicks is technically much higher, provided that you won’t miss-aim or overshoot, of course.

Regardless if you’re against a human player or an AI, the goalie you are up against must make a guess. If the goalie fails to predict your target section of the goal, you will score; it’s as simple as that. Imagine that the goal is divided into five rectangles, you simply have to choose any of the five and hope that it won’t coincide with your opponent’s choice. 

The best shot types here would be low and loft kicks. For a low, like mentioned earlier, it has to be with full power for maximum speed; for a loft, regardless which rectangle you aim for make sure to only put a maximum of 29% power; anything beyond that would be a crossbar hit or an overshoot.

The third-person, zoomed-in view in penalty kicks also allows you to be extra precise in aiming because of the perspective. Capitalize on it and make sure to train it to perfection so you’d be skilled enough to be comfortable with making shots that deviate as far as possible from the center.

2.2 Perspective Matters

If you think there is an extra sense of control when you’re taking free kicks and penalty kicks, you are not imagining things. This can be attributed to your perspective from the field of vision. Some may treat this as trivial, but we firmly believe that perspective is an important element in anyone’s DLS experience, which is why we devote a sub-section to touch on it.

A lot of players embrace the default sideline view. After all, as sports fans, that is the view we have been accustomed to when watching football and basically almost every team sport. In the original state of things, there is nothing wrong with playing using the classic, sideline view, but since precision passing and shooting are prerequisites for success in Dream League Soccer 2022, it will be best to use the camera view that gives the best perspective: goal to goal view.

While sideline view is a solid choice, the from the angular orientation makes it a bit difficult to judge when aiming from the other side of the pitch. If that was too technical, allow us to illustrate using the screenshot below, in it we marked in black the limited angle we can do for a low pass.

At the sideline, it is harder to aim when you have a limited angle while trying to avoid a defender. Had the perspective in this case be from behind the ball handler, it is much to doable to deviate the aim away from the defender and squeeze in a touchline-skimming reception.

Using goal to goal eliminates the geometric distortion the sideline view has and it gives you a better field of vision overall. When you’re running through the centerfield, you will have excellent vision of how spread the players are and you are able to accurately tell the gaps and spaces between each defender, this is something that’s hard to discern if you’d only judge using the minimap.

Regardless if the drive direction is upward or downwards, you are naturally much more able to see gaps and predict player movements accordingly. In the attack sequence shown in the screenshot above (yes, it’s a replay, but we did position the camera to mimic our POV), we see a couple of friendly shirts approaching the penalty together with the ball handler. Taking into account their apparent movements, we chained a pass to the nearer teammate and waited for another teammate to enter the central area of the goal.

When a teammate reached the desired spot, we quickly fired a loft pass then the receiver finished the attack with a hard kick to score. Being able to spot and exploit gaps is another important game sense element in DLS and its just wise to capitalize on how the goal to goal view will make it more feasible for you. For maximum visibility, also choose the 100% view for a wider field of vision.

2.3 Know Your Players

In football, the spot where you take a shot is a greater factor than the actual shooting skill of a player. This reality is reflected in DLS, a player with a shooting stat of 50 or below can still score, provided that he’s at the right place, at the right time, and preferably at the side favorable to his kicking leg.

Players with a dominant right leg can be more accurate when aiming for the goal at lower angles from the left side. Meanwhile, those with a dominant left leg will have more forgiving results when kicking from the right side. Their dominant leg also determines the direction of where their loft kicks will curve from. There are a few who can use both legs (B) and the curvature of their loft kicks depends on the side being targeted.

Dominant leg consideration is mainly important for strikers like Center Forwards (CF) and Wing Forwards (WF). If your formation or playstyle often brings a chance for your midfielders (AM, CM, LM, RM) to attempt goals, you might also want to check their main kicking legs when you position them accordingly based on your tactic.

If you wish to know more what play style fits for the different tactics, do check out our Dream League Soccer 2021 Best Formations and Tactics Guide. The available tactics and their respective functions remained the same for Dream League Soccer 2022.

Your level of familiarity with your players will also be instrumental to your success especially when you’re on free-to-play. It will take a month of playtime before you can organically and legally earn enough coins and gems to acquire players with godlike attributes, so you have to make do with who you have.

2.3.1 Stats Stuff

The players’ stats or attributes determine how potent they are their roles. They are color-coded according to how low or high they are and, for the sake of clarity, we will pertain to red numbers as low, orange as decent, yellow as good, green as great, and blue as excellent.

To effectively use the players yet available to you, it’ll be great to understand what the attributes stand for:

Speed (SPE) | Fitness – defines how quick a player moves across the pitch with or without the ball; as for goalkeepers, this also signals how fast can one stand back up to defend after falling to the ground from a missed catch.

Acceleration (ACC) | Fitness – pertains to how soon a player can reach his maximum movement speed.

Stamina (STA) | Fitness – defines the player’s playtime longevity. The overhead, reverse teardrop blip on the head of players serves as a preview of their current stamina. When full, it starts off as green which gradually depletes. Once half-empty, it will turn yellow and then slowly become orange. If you still have unused substitution chances, you will be offered to rest tired players to let fresh ones play.

Condition (CON) | Fitness –  pertains to essentially how resistant a player is to injury. Think of it as a player’s survival rate against soft and hard tackle attempts.

Strength (STR) | Fitness – refers to the player’s physicality, mainly their ability to arm-push for position, and withstand tackles.

Tackling (TAC) | Technical – defines how potent the defensive pressure a player can give and the effectiveness of his tackle attempts.

Distribution (PAS) | Technical – pertains to how reliable a player is when dealing with passes; that would be accuracy in passing and ability to position (AI-commanded) and receive in reception.

Shooting (SHO) | Technical – defines the reliability of a player’s kicks when aiming for the goal both for short and long distance shots.

Goalkeeper Handling (GKH) | Technical – pertains to a goalie’s ability to catch the ball with his hands.

Goalkeeper Reflexes (STA) | Technical – refers to the goalie’s AI value for how quick can he react against goal attempts.

You are free to jumble the slot assignment of your players, but it’s optimal to assign each of them in posts where their attributes can shine in.

The more aware you are of your player’s attributes, the more confident you can be in “flexing” their roles; by this, we mean, that midfielders can be assigned to striker slots as long as they have adequate SPE (above 70) and their SHO is not a red number. In the same way, if you’re keen to use multiple CFs more than what is prescribed by the tactic’s layout, you can assign CFs and WFs to midfielder slots especially if you are mounting an offense-heavy team.

If you’re new to the game and you play at a rather casual schedule, it may more than a month for you to get at least 10 Rares (and/or legendaries). Therefore, in that long interim for a grind, you have to capitalize on what you have. As such, we’re hooking in this sub-section some pointers on how to discern potential.

2.3.2 Attribute Assets and Liabilities

Naturally, the Legendaries have stellar numbers, they might have no low attribute at all and if they do, it that will still be higher than what Common players (with the same positon) has. In theory, given their high stats, they can be flexibly positioned, but it will, of course, be best to use them according to their design or strength.

The majority of the attributes Rare players have will be good and/or great making their impact definitive. Opposite to how you can stretch Legendaries, you can use Rares in roles that their weaker attributes will not make them a liability. In our example player, Silva has low tackling potential, but his SPE, STR, and PAS makes him a viable offensive midfielder.

Commons are not to be totally dismissed, not only because you don’t have a choice at the start, but because their best attributes can still make them a solid option. If you defend lazily and don’t plan your passing strategy, a team of pure Commons (even AIs) can still beat you. Their attributes do not encourage flexibility, but they can be repurposed in accordance to their stronger stats.

It is important to know how flexible your lineup can be because substitutions are often inevitable especially at the event of red cards, injuries, and fatigue. When thinking of assignments, note how the attribute ratings in Dream League Soccer mimic the purposes of each role in real-world football.

Strikers (the reds – CF and WF) rely on their ability to move through openings to make goal attempts, which is why the ones with a good SPE, ACC, and SHO usually excel. Midfielders (the yellows – DM, AM, CM, DM, LM, anf RM) reinforce attack sequences and often come in contact with the other team in a bid to preserve or disrupt possession; the stats the matter the most to them are SPE, STR, and PAS. The mission of defenders or backline (the greens – LB, RB, and CB) is to waylay charges to the goal, thus their priority stats should be TAC, STR, and SPE.

If a player gets a check for having (at least) decent numbers in their role’s three respective, key stats expressed above, it means they are an asset to your team. However, assets can be spoiled if they do have liabilities. We’re discussing below the implications of having inferior stats that will impede a rather solid player from shining.

Strikers are likely to see themselves competing for reception of long, rolling passes (usually from charged A-button passes). Long, rolling passes involves a race to the ball’s landing area, and in that run, the matter that can hold back their viability is a lack of STR. Even if a striker has the quickness to win a footrace against a defender, as long as the defender can anchor an arm on him, you cannot get the free ball. Having low strength is a definite liability for attack sequences where the other team can challenge you.

Midfielders are usually the ones that tire out quickly as they are the most common to run up and down the pitch the most. Contrary to the strikers and defenders which will only essentially fully relocate when a possession from either end “matures.” Due to their constant movement and high probability of ramming upon the other team, both and offense and defense, they need good STA so they can maintain their functionality through the default 90 minutes of regulation time.

Otherwise, they will not be able to receive passes effectively through gaps because a tired player won’t be enthusiastic enough to jump in reception and can easily get outpaced when dealing with tight spaces.

Defenders also need a good STR so they can muscle out the other team’s strikers. The effects of STR start upon applying pressure defense (holding the B button) even if the defender is yet behind the ball handler (meaning not within the frontal 90-degree angle where he can touch the ball). If an LB/RB/CB has low STR, his effectiveness to thwart attacks will be purely reliant to your manually directional control and TAPPING of the B button for soft tackles.

Being familiar with all the details in this subsection will be a part of your game sense because it will give you the ability to sense whether you hold an advantage or not. If you’re stat-handicapped (which often happens when competing against other human players with fat accounts) you need to put in extra work by controlling your defenders better, timing and aiming your passes right, and even positioning your men based on their dominant leg just to offset or minimize the disadvantage.

3. Match Proper Microeconomics

While there is not as much team management element in Dream League Soccer 2022, unlike in Top Eleven (hybrid) and Football Manager 2022 (pure management), the game is not short of matters to manage. In fact, its match-centric nature actually presents elements that a player is “forced” to manage.

In games where there is a team management dynamic, some decisions can be put off or ignored and you can could still go on pretty fine. That is not the case for Dream League Soccer 2022; the micro-decisions that you will do will greatly define the fate of a game or your team’s advancement in general. That may seem a bit vague, but worry not, as we’ll get unto it.

3.1 Energy Management

Grinding in Dream League Soccer 2022 means you will have to play dozens of consecutive matches per sitting to farm enough coins, enough coins to recruit players or afford multiple stadium upgrades. The limiting mechanism of the game are the players’ stamina or energy. They do get tired after games and simply using them again without doing anything will backfire on you hard.

If you field a player whose stamina is already at yellow/orange before the match start, expect him to underperform and fade by halftime. Underperform is actually an understatement especially if the stamina blip has been depleted. A player with red stamina will be barely functional, easy to tackle, slow to run, sloppy to shoot; basically just a warm body of garbage consuming a player slot.

1. Auto-sub: The first means then to manage your players’ stamina is to only field them as is and then wait for the game to offer a substitution. This sounds like a solution, but it is technically just partial. A team may only perform three substitutions within regulation time and about 5-6 players may reach orange stamina after one full game.

As such you will have to carry three pseudo-freeloaders for the match’s duration. The logical  method then is to change your lineup through the Team Management ang only leave up to three unrested athletes at a time.

2. “Physio-me” the Money: Another way to address stamina depletion is by using the Physio feature. You can hire a Physiologist for your entire team who shall give a one-time recovery boost. The effectiveness of recovery, of course relies on the cost.

Alternatively, you can individually get players physio assistance and the price for the intervention will depend on how much energy they are missing. Our suggestion is to use the latter more often than the former because it will be cheaper and you can focus the recovery aid for your more important players.

3. Team Recovery: After finishing a match, there is a high probability that you will see a certain Team Recovery button. When you see one, don’t skip on the opportunity because the 10% energy recovery you will get from it can set your orange stamina players ready for one more game.

It’s free, all you need to do is watch a short ad and you reap the benefit. This presents the potential of, basically, being able to play infinite, consecutive times which is helpful if you’re on free-to-play.

3.2 Defense Details

If the offense side of gameplay in Dream League Soccer 2022 is all about continuous control, conscious aiming, and a wide sense of situational awareness, the defense side is a bit opposite. Defending requires, a rather reactive control, relentless and constant pressure, and single-target focus.

When applying defense, you need to discern which of the three defensive options you have is most fitting. The tutorial phases will introduce you to the first (pressure) and second (hard tackle). Below are our pointers on where those two can work better.

Pressure: It is best done when the opponent is already entering the Penalty Box and the player you are in control of to chase the ball handler is about 1-2 steps behind. It presents the least chance to elicit a foul, hence, you need not fear giving the other team a penalty kick. If you successfully steal the ball by means of pressure, there will be no fouls and the ball will simply be transferred to the foot of your player (instead of rolling away ).

Hard Tackle: The tutorial phase will also inform you about this and fittingly, players are also informed of its potential detriment. This move is literally a slide tackle which can floor any opposing player if it connects. It is very visible, its impact can “stop” a player, and in more sense than one, a weapon that recoils on itself.

As it practically looks like an arcade fighting game sweep, it is VERY noticeable that even the commentators will speak of it once one is attempted by either team, this kind of signals that the referee also sees the same. If a referee “believes” that you initiated the move with malice, you’re at risk of being given a yellow or even a red card, especially if the player you attacked got knocked down.

In a somewhat relative manner, if you’re a solo defender and you manage to knock the ball away from the handler, do remember that you are on the ground too. It will take you at least a second to stand back up and approach the loose ball. If another opposing player is in the area, there is a huge possibility that you can’t get to the ball, therefore risking being booked with a card for nothing.

The optimum situation to go for a hard tackle is if you’re in a face-to-face collision course with the ball handler and if you got more teammates than opponents around. Fouls from hard tackles are much more common if they are fired from behind or from the side of the ball handler because they simply look like attempts made to trip and knock another player over. Needless to say, use it at your own risk.

Soft tackle: This is literally the middle ground of the previous two and you can do this by tapping the B button instead of holding it down. If you’re an FPS player, you can treat the pressure defense as a melee weapon, the hard tackle as a loud, primary firearm similar to a shotgun, and the soft tackle as a sidearm, a semi-automatic pistol, to be exact. You use it when the target (the ball) is visible and within shooting (kicking) range.

By that, we mean to spam taps only when you are very adjacent to the ball handler and within his frontal 180 degrees angle. If you soft tackle from behind, you risk a chance of awarding a free kick to the other team, with or without a yellow card. While a free kick may still be given if a soft tackle is done from the front or sides, at least there is an actual chance to knock the ball away and steal it. If we must spell it clearer, soft tackling from the back will not let you connect with the ball.

As what’s often true with pistols, you also need to double tap or shoot again after the target falls to score a confirmed kill (an interception). If you make contact with the ball by means of soft tackling, it will be knocked not too far away, double tap on your effort, chase down the ball. However, about one second before you “fetch” the ball, you can already charge a kick and nominate a direction. We advise doing so each time as the preplanning part will help your game sense improve.

Once you’ve become sharp on defense, you can stand a good chance even against powerhouse clubs (well, against the AI-controlled versions, at least). The key is to always seek opportunities cautiously to dispossess the ball from them and basically don’t allow to get near the penalty box. You know you’re able to put up a good defense if you at the post-game results that the meters for total shots, shots on target, and pass completion all exhibit a lopsided game in your favor.

4. Club Improvements

As soon as your offense and defense game become on point, you must set your eyes on gradually improving the facilities of your club. The benefits they bring will help you progress your Dream League Soccer career in terms of building a bigger, better, and more profitable franchise team.

Just to note, we wouldn’t expound on much as what you see in the game’s interface is somewhat self-explanatory. Instead, we’ll interpret their functions and rank them based on importance for your guidance.

1: Training Centre

Experts of Dream League Soccer believe that the facility people should prioritize upgrading is the Training Centre and they’re right because it’s the one that brings the most perks. These perks will never lose its value no matter which point of your Dream League Soccer career you are at. Form Boost tokens and Coaches are part of the regular loot from the Season Pass. But those two are just literally perks, what advanced player are after is to unlock all tactics.

2: Medical Centre / Recruitment Centre

We’ve already shared in the first section what Recruitment Centre is all about. It should take second priority if you’re running a new account and wish to secure Legendary and Rares by  using real currency. Meanwhile, if you already have a complete lineup of colored players, the Medical should be priority number two.

Maxing the Medical Centre will make individual and group physio trips super cheap essentially allowing you endless playtime with absolutely zero energy woes. The injury resistance it passively gives is a truly welcomed bonus too.

3: Stadium

Your career advancement relies on your stadium’s size, so upgrading it is obviously a must. What’s good with it is, it won’t take a share of your gem stash because Stadium upgrades requires coins. If you’re on Free-to-Play it will be way more feasible to max the stadium out than any other facilities, hence, it shall be your dead-obvious target. Don’t forget though that you may want to fortify your lineup first before increasing your Stadium’s capacity so your climb will make total sense.

4: Accommodation

Plain and simple, this is your barracks; upgrading it will increase your team’s headcount limit. If you wish to hoard Legendaries and Rares, you might want to pump it to 3 starts or max so you can bag, fit, and try players as much as you want based on your preferred playstyle or tactic.

5: Commercial

This is actually more of just an auxiliary piece rather than an income booster, but the vanity discounts from trademarked items and the extra post-match bounty sure does help. This should be your last priority.

As you can see, the five facilities upgradeable only thru gems give more benefits, whilst the stadium stands as a checkpoint for your readiness to scale up to face higher level of competition. It’s your decision which path to take, but either way, should you top up or stay as F2P, your Dream League Soccer experience would likely require and enjoy improving the facillities.

5. Team Development

Apart from recruiting high-rated players, using Coaches is the alternative way to improve your team’s overall stats permanently. You can obtain a Coach training from the Season Pass, the in-game store, and by releasing players you no longer need.

Depending which of the three “plans” you choose, the game will pick random players from your team and boosts the corresponding random stats. Due to such randomness and flat out being expensive, using Coaches Credits is actually considered an endgame move that should only be ideal when you are trying to send Legendaries to a rating of 95.

6. Farming Paths Recap

Regardless if you’re a paying player or F2P, gaining resources matters to us all. As such, we’re just running down a recap of key tips and facts that will help with it.

• If you’re planning to spend on the game for the first time, the most ideal thing to purchase is the season pass since you’re basically augmenting your earnings as you play games. Just make sure to time it well and maximize it.

• Quitting is actually considered a tactic in Dream League Live, you can check other video or article resources about it, and they would somehow confirm it. If you get matched with an overpowered player but you were assigned to be the Home team, don’t be surprised if they just forfeit; it’s apparently an advanced, time-efficient farming method for them.
  
  The priority of players who do that is to play and win Home matches. Apparently, playing as the Away team would be a waste of time for them. Just take the spoils and the points and the bounty that comes by end-season.

• Do your best to do Challenges. Even if you don’t get to accomplish the first 4 to gain the bonus diamond, that’s fine. Every bit of coin helps!

• Always try your best to finish as the Division Leader. Let’s face it, it will always be easier to win against AI competition so don’t treat Career matches as disposable games. If you get to win to top spot, you’re earning 40 diamonds. Ain’t that a sweet bonus for playing good?

Dream League Soccer 2022 is a game greatly commanded by RNG and an unforgiving learning curve which is why we hope that the tricks, tips, and strategies we gave in this guide would be instrumental to your success. The way to survive and thrive in skill-based games is by developing an impeccable game sense and we all starts with baby steps.

The climb is really supposed to be gradual and even steep, but just keep on playing and winning. Who knows? A month from now, you’d already have Messi, Mbape, and Ronaldo by your camp. It’s free to dream, it’s in the game’s name!

We hope you have picked something insightful and encouraging from this article. If you’ve been playing the Dream League Soccer franchise for years now and wish to share an important trick that we missed here, please feel free to share at the comment section below. After all, we’re stepping on the same pitch for glory and fame. See you next time, champs!