Meet EA guru who decides FIFA ratings - and why Thomas Muller remains one exception

FIFA 23 is finally out for general release which means it's the annual day Michael Muller-Mohring's ratings are debated around the world.

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'Triple M', as he is dubbed by the FIFA video game community, is the man behind Cristiano Ronaldo dropping down to eighth best!

The 55-year-old started with EA Germany in Cologne in 2004 but has held the position of Head of Data Collection and Licensing for 15 years.

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Muller-Mohring, a fan of German semi-professional side Fortuna Koeln, rarely plays FIFA itself after admitting he's not very good.

Yet he is responsible for determining players attributes in game alongside an army of producers and scouts across Europe.

"Each footballer is made up of 35 attributes. This then becomes the skill level that we rate on a 1-99 scale," he told Stadtgefluester, via the Sun.

"Closing strength, long shots, defending, heading, free kicks, etc."

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On the need for a global team helping him, he added: "This is because professionals in each country need to know the history of football, understand philosophy, and anticipate developments.

"But above all, they know all the players from the bottom up.

"We are talking about 18,000 footballers who are being watched - they have to meet the requirements of the database fairly."

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Muller-Mohring and the rest of his team have faced criticism from real players over the years unhappy with their ratings.

"We try to make it as objective as possible. But of course we know very well that players will complain," he told Bild in 2020.

"Only once have I met someone who said, 'I am satisfied with my values.' The important thing is: we don't want to hurt anyone. But if players come and want specific things changed, then we don't react - unless it's really grossly wrong."

Usually, a footballers complaint with the new FIFA ratings are to do with their pace - or more accurately, their perceived lack of it!

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The likes of Kyle Walker, Antonio Rudiger and even Virgil van Dijk on behalf of Joel Matip have voiced their displeasure at low speeds.

Yet during an interview with Mirror Gaming, Muller-Mohring admitted the hardest attribute to pin down is jumping.

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The reason being that if a certain player doesn't jump in-game then knowing if they secretly have a Ronaldo-leap in training is impossible.

Muller-Mohring was quizzed on whether he ever regrets his scores after watching a real-life game where a player shows a great turn of pace or scores an incredible goal from range that doesn't correlate with their shooting stats.

He said: "It literally happens all the time but you can't just go for single events.

"It might have just been a lucky shot if he hits a ball perfectly - even I can smash perfectly once in 200 years the ball into the top corner from 25 yards maybe if I'm lucky.

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"You always want to assess a player's performance over a certain amount of games to make a proper call.

"If there are moments where sports history is written like in a Champions League final someone scores from 50 yards or whatever.

"Ok, lots of people around the world have seen it so it's kind of the expectation that you adjust it (the stat) a little bit, but then if someone doesn't score from distance over a long period of time then we downgrade so it's constantly up and down."

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Muller-Mohring famously chose Thomas Muller as the hardest player to rate years ago and the Bayern Munich star still retains that title on FIFA 23.

He told the Mirror: "The one sentence I said about Muller will always bite me in the bottom. It wasn't really smart.

"I think I literally said "he's not good at anything" - "He's not super great in specific attributes", I should have said, sorry Thomas.

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"He's by far of all the players' I've seen the most difficult one and I think he always will be just because he doesn't excel in specific abilities.

"You would never say: "Greatest dribbler in the world Thomas Muller" or "Greatest finisher in the world Thomas Muller."

"It's just, how we say in Germany, he has a nose for a situation.

"Maybe if we do some sort of revamp of the attribute system in the future we could focus a bit more on playing intelligence of players and that would bring Mr Muller to the next level!"

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Better luck next year Thomas…