LLM - Mazzarri's Napoli 3-4-3

I'm sure this has been done before, but I'm trying to replicate Mazzarri's tactics at Napoli. I have barely watched Napoli bar reading about them and some Marek Hamsik videos, so I'm sure some of the Italian experts here will tear me to shreds, but I've replicated the style I believe they played in. Also, as a spin to this, I'm playing lower leagues - Hungarian Division II as part of Gundo's Challenge. I'd struggled to come up with my own 'system', so I felt I should try and imitate someone else's and settled upon this one as it has a three-man defence and has exciting counter-attacking.

I'll show the shape in a second, but this was the reasoning behind my decisions. First and foremost I wanted clever players. I would focus highly on decision making, concentration, composure, creativity over physical attributes. This is supposedly brave in LLM as the default is an expectation of 'route one' and power play. Secondly we would play counter attacking football, letting their players crawl over and prod and press my backline before hitting them on a rapid counter attack - this meant I set to a counter mentality. I did not want to 'counter like Real Madrid', as I would never have the physical and mental attributes to do this effectively with the players I was after.

I would have a strong, quick and clever defensive three - this hasn't by any stretch of the imagination been achieved yet, but I set them with the cover on either side and a stopper in the middle. I believe this will eventually change the other way round, but I tended to want two holding a line as cover. I may be misplaced in this belief.

I need quick, powerful attacking wingbacks. I need two more defensive minded central midfielders with some creativity here - specifically in the article I read a Regista was mentioned, so I decided to play one - this leads to my slightly jaunty shape. The Hamsik role is fundamentally a Trequartista, so this was fundamental. I am unsure how to implement the Lavezzi role of playing as a wide striker roaming, so I simply went for a DLF and said roam around a bit, and I did similar with an AF.

The aim through the shape is to get lots of passing triangles and break up opposition midfields. Therefore the philosophy is set to very rigid so that the play definitely flows through the playmakers and through the wings.

Here is my Treq with Trequartista attributes highlighted. They don't neccessarily look great, but with the high creativity and decision making , alongside a good passing attribute and decent physicals, I thought he'd do the job.

Regista:

Again not neccessarily gifted, but good tackling, passing and decision making are crucial here, along with positioning. His physical stats also let him dominate the midfield area.

I was predicted to finish second bottom and my results so far have me third with only a few games left. The tactic is defensively solid but with enough flair to make it an exciting game to watch.

In a formation with 3 CBs, the 2 outer defenders push out quite wide, therefore having your central CB as a stopper could potentially leave a hole in the middle of your defence with him pressing the opposition more.

I prefer to have all 3 on defend duty so they keep in shape.

thanks for the advice. i'll try it out and see whether i notice anything different.

Sorry for the late bump...but I am looking at a 3-4-3 formation. How did you go with this? I'm thinking about the same type of philosophy in terms of style but looking at a more flat formation to include 3 strikers as I have taken over a club with 6 forwards and not a lot of flexibility in the squad or the financial state of the club.

yeah I stuck with this for a while until I dominated the Hungarian league, but it became better as a force things when you're late in the game tactic with my main tactic being a 3-4-1-2 tactic, but I guess that is just how tactics evolve