Man Marking

can anyone confirm if man-marking is a known bug? I've been tweaking a Chile/ Bielsa tactic for weeks now and I realise the inverted wing-backs is just broken but when I set-up every player to man-mark but leave 1 man spare, lone forward marks both centre-halfs, it just leads to some ridiculous animations in the ME. My players literally run in the opposite direction of their designated man, where up to 9 of my players converge at the semi-circle whilst my 1 spare defender is left facing up to 8 totally unmarked opponents. Weirdly the tactic is still a winning one, lots of 7-4's, 6-5's etc and the odd 12-3 but it's just weird to see so many players run away from their designated man and perform a huddle whilst their opponents camp in and around my penalty box.

The problem that you're encountering is that man-marking is a strict instruction, the player will always attempt to mark their assigned player wherever they are on the pitch & if you're assigning 8 or 9 man-marking instructions it will rip apart any shape that your team had, this only gets worse when the opposition change their formation or have players swap position.

What I think you're looking for is for most players to mark a man taking up a specific position, ie left back always marks player in right wing position, MCR always marks player in MCL position, this is achievable by setting the use tight marking team instruction as should see players closely marking the player who is in their area of responsibility.

I kind of get what you're saying and yes I want my right winger to mark their left back, my left back to mark their right sided player etc, etc. which is how Bielsa regularly has his teams set-up but your answer offers no explanation of why my players run away from all the opposition players and then stand around the half-way line waiting for the ball to go dead or my gk or 1 spare player to make an intervention. It's comical to watch, that's my point.

Specific man-marking shouldn't be treated as a "normal" man-marking instruction, which is what you're doing. If it's as comical as you say though, a bug report (tactical setup etc) and PKM would be appreciated.

Could you explain in more detail what, 'specific man-marking shouldn't be treated as a normal man-marking instruction' means? I'm just trying to copy Bielsa where every outfield player, except the spare man, man marks their opposing opponent. With the exception of the lone striker nominally shuffling between the centre-halfs. The mark tighter PI refers to defensive situations but the intention is to pressurise the pass in the opponents half, reduce space and passing lanes and most importantly to ensure the spare player. I'll do the bug report and PKM if I can figure out how to do so, if only for the comedy value ☺

Specific man marking - Your player will attempt to follow their assigned player wherever that player is on the pitch even if the assigned players is moved to play in another position.

Normal marking - Your player is not asked to mark a specific opponent, with no instruction to mark as specific player they will attempt to pick up closest player to them on the pitch when that player enters their area of their pitch.

Personally I think you're taking commentary on Bielsa's style too literally, he does not have his players stick to their opponents like glue for 90 minutes which is what I think is what you want to see.

For more detailed help it is worth heading over to the tactics forum to seek advice, do take the item to read the posting guidelines & the sticky threads before you post & when you do post give as much detail as possible about what exactly you're looking to achieve & how you currently go about that.

http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/405098-Reporting-a-Match-Engine-issue

The defender will stick to his man, no matter what. It could be useful if you want to keep an important playmaker quiet, for instance. Man-marking the entire team is just risky and you'll get pulled out of position completely.

I'm assuming you've also set Close Down Much Less?

Specific man marking - Your player will attempt to follow their assigned player wherever that player is on the pitch even if the assigned players is moved to play in another position.

The defender will stick to his man, no matter what.

That's exactly what I would expect of the instruction, but the point the OP is making is that his players aren't doing that.

Personally I don't think you know anything about Bielsa's tactics as sticking tightly all over the pitch( man-marking), the spare man in defence and quick vertical passing are his trademarks. Maybe type, 'Bielsa man marking' into Google and read a few responses before insinuating I don't know what I'm talking about. Maybe you should follow your own advice and head over to the Tactics Forum. I never asked or require any tactical help, I simply asked if players running away from their designated opponent and standing grouped together at the halfway line whilst the opposition continued to play was a known bug!

I'll just follow Hunters advice, thanks anyway.

That's exactly what I would expect of the instruction, but the point the OP is making is that his players aren't doing that.

Which is why I said he should report it. It's not the best tactical decision (IMO) to do what he is doing, but if his players are "randomly" running away from the player they're supposed to be marking, that isn't right.

http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/405098-Reporting-a-Match-Engine-issue

The defender will stick to his man, no matter what. It could be useful if you want to keep an important playmaker quiet, for instance. Man-marking the entire team is just risky and you'll get pulled out of position completely.

I'm assuming you've also set Close Down Much Less?

Yes, close down much less PI and TI just for insurance.

Note that I expect to see great counter attacking opportunities for my opponents but, once again, I don't expect to see my players run away from their man and stand around at the centre spot until the opposing attack is finished.

I'll just post the PKM.

Personally I don't think you know anything about Bielsa's tactics as sticking tightly all over the pitch( man-marking), the spare man in defence and quick vertical passing are his trademarks. Maybe type, 'Bielsa man marking' into Google and read a few responses before insinuating I don't know what I'm talking about. Maybe you should follow your own advice and head over to the Tactics Forum. I never asked or require any tactical help, I simply asked if players running away from their designated opponent and standing grouped together at the halfway line whilst the opposition continued to play was a known bug!

I'll just follow Hunters advice, thanks anyway.

Yes, close down much less PI and TI just for insurance.

Note that I expect to see great counter attacking opportunities for my opponents but, once again, I don't expect to see my players run away from their man and stand around at the centre spot until the opposing attack is finished.

I'll just post the PKM.

Your PI/TI instructions will be a primary factor, you're telling players to man mark players but to also drop off them as much as possible, this is likely causing a conflict in the match AI with the end result being the unintended behaviour that you're seeing.

If someone can explain how I post a screenshot I'll post a couple of images that should show the behaviour I'm trying to explain. I agree entirely it's some sort of conflict in the AI, I find it comical but it still really shouldn't happen.

Video is better than screenshots for ME weirdness as it will show how the players ended up in their strange position whereas a screenshot just shows the end result, uploaded a passage of play to YouTube using the in-game highlights uploader & then just post the link.

If someone can explain how I post a screenshot I'll post a couple of images that should show the behaviour I'm trying to explain. I agree entirely it's some sort of conflict in the AI, I find it comical but it still really shouldn't happen.

I agree with your reasoning about closing down settings.

It's (the man-marking) potentially a nightmare at set pieces too. I've experienced it on set-pieces where I've told my fullbacks to specific man-mark the opposition wingers. The wingers were stationed in the box to defend a corner while my two fullbacks were the only two players defending for me. As soon as the opposition cleared the ball, my fullbacks raced to the opposition box to (rightly) mark the wingers, leaving the lone attacker completely unmarked.

Posting images is simple(ish). Upload it to an image hosting site (photobucket etc) and post the link here. As Barside said though, videos (or gifs) are better.

I'd post a vid but I'd need to create a YouTube account.

As hopefully you can see there is a 5 second gap between the images.

14 red has just taken a corner which the goalie has collected then played a long ball to the Norwich forward. Hopefully you can see that all the players are man marking apart from 14 who is getting back into position, and 21 the spare man.

the second image shows 8 Norwich players in my half and 2 Liverpool defenders opposing them whilst 8 Liverpool players gather around the half-way spot. Most noticably including the Liverpool centre half.

Clearly there is some bugged behaviour that you should report in the match engine bugs forum.

As a start to finding a possible workaround have you tried removing the specific man-marking instructions & just adding the 'use tighter marking' TI & 'mark tighter' PI? That will hopefully removed the bugged aspect & even if it doesn't create exactly what you want it is a base point to work from,

I have tried exactly as you suggest, I've tried everything I can think of. Unfortunatly those TI/PI's are only applicable in defensive situations and the intention is to force the GK and defenders to turn over the ball high up the pitch. I could go back to my Barcelona 6 second group press but as I originally said the intention was to replicate Bielsa's marking style. I spend alot of time trying to recreate tactics, Klopp, Guardiola, Sacchi, etc, etc. You never get any of them perfect, or perfect for long but this 1 with the man marking problem and the poor realisation with inverted wing backs has brought this one to an end. Hey ho, time for a new Mourinho tactic I suppose. The Bielsa tactic even with its problems was 1 of my favourites, very entertaining.

I imagine that you'll need to ask players in the attacking positions to close down more/much more & maybe even tackle harder to encourage them to engage the defenders higher up the pitch. To cut of passing supply going for a Structured team shape, with Stick to position TI would logically help retain your core shape to stop players being drawn too far out of position as that's generally what opens up those annoying though ball passing lanes.

Edit: Should add that Bielsa's style can very much live or die based on the players he has, the main stick that is used to criticise him is that although he thinks up some pretty clever ideas they tend to lack any real balance or structure & that his methods can only ever create short terms success, I can see how trying to perfectly replicate his way of thinking in FM will be almost impossible. The guy defies logic & if you don't have the right type of players you might be doomed to failure from the start.