Bust the Net - Football Manager Tactics

[LEEMOD]

Thanks for replying Rashidi

[kalou-less]

Right we all know copying is the greatest form of flattery so as such i ripped off the 41221 formation. All the roles are the same but i think my team instructions mirror Athletico and i made a stab at PIs

We all know 41221 is vulnerable on the wings , so my idea was to play high def line and narrow to minimise the space and it worked to a certain degree. Getting to champions league 2 out of 3 seasons with Newcastle. In my humble opinion i think i need to get better at OIs to have any real success.

So should be i be looking to target runners (def on att, mids on att etc..) ? Should i close down wings so that they go through my centre?

I do follow my assistants advise most of the time, adding hard tackling on players with low bravery or the odd tight marking if they are an IF or AMC.

I think i saw (might have been hungover, sleep deprived , shattered) but there might have been a post by rashidi on targeting their weakest players or something like that but i cant find it anywhere.

I also keep going over the west brom vs liverpool match OIs in this thread for inspiration but it keeps eluding me.

Dont suppose there is a chance of further updates focusing on OIs a bit more :o (frustration is getting to me )

[Rashidi]

Right we all know copying is the greatest form of flattery so as such i ripped off the 41221 formation. All the roles are the same but i think my team instructions mirror Athletico and i made a stab at PIs

We all know 41221 is vulnerable on the wings , so my idea was to play high def line and narrow to minimise the space and it worked to a certain degree. Getting to champions league 2 out of 3 seasons with Newcastle. In my humble opinion i think i need to get better at OIs to have any real success.

So should be i be looking to target runners (def on att, mids on att etc..) ? Should i close down wings so that they go through my centre?

I do follow my assistants advise most of the time, adding hard tackling on players with low bravery or the odd tight marking if they are an IF or AMC.

I think i saw (might have been hungover, sleep deprived , shattered) but there might have been a post by rashidi on targeting their weakest players or something like that but i cant find it anywhere.

I also keep going over the west brom vs liverpool match OIs in this thread for inspiration but it keeps eluding me.

Dont suppose there is a chance of further updates focusing on OIs a bit more :o (frustration is getting to me )

Sorry took me a bit to get back to this, a tonne of things happening at work, and no time to play in my free time...;-(

If you are using a 41221 and you know the limitations, then you should be paying careful attention to the one i put up. Mine has a huge weakness - the left flank. While that flank is notoriously strong, frequently producing me a lot of goals its also the weakest part of the pitch. Since I have two players who could potentially be in the opponents half most of the time, I am depending on the midfielder and and the DM to cover the left flank, while the fullback gets back.

This means that either : you play with players who suitably fit for that role, the midfielder needs to be a workhorse. So even if you set players on hard tackling using OIs especially on the left flank, you have to be wary of the risk of doing so. When one knows that a certain flank has a lot more risks, they can either elect NOT to hard tackle, close down the opposite ams on that flank, cos one mistimed tackle could leave that flank vulnerable.

OIs are not even something you can set up as a rule for every game, you use them sometimes or sometimes never. Whats more important is recognizing the threats. Currently I am playing a similar system but I play with 3 attackers leaving my fullback as the last line of defense. In some matches he plays as a complete wingback on attack, in others he's a fullback on support. IN some games I play the system on counter, in others i go attacking. I adapt to what I am faced it, and thats the reality. You can use almost any system for every game, sometimes you just have to adapt to what you are faced.

Example I just finished a match against Liverpool. Match started, Liverpool had a 41221, with FB(S) and IF(S) on the left flank, and MC(S).

I had gone into the match with a FB(S), with my 3 attackers (playing a 433), but it was set up as a counter attacking system. Lookiing at liverpools system I knew that the only way they could meaningfully score was if they could get to control the middle of the pitch and camp in my half.. true enough inside a minute we were a goal down.

I changed to an attacking configuration, CWB(A) Attacking mentality, close down more, we took over midfield, scored two goals and were leading at halftime. Start of second half, Liverpool change their system and go with an attacking fullback and a support IF on one flank and a support fullback and attacking winger on the other, time for me to hop back to counter, and change to fb(S) on both flanks. We score another and win the game.

Only one OI was used...hard tackling on coutinho. Sometimes the best thing to do is to look at how another team is playing and adapt to the threats by making tweaks that handle these. Almost any system can do this...

I think when I have time, that could be the focus on my next post on this thread

[Rashidi]

FM - GETTING REAL

Everyone on the forum, can toss you an attribute list or an ideal configuration, but there is NO COOKIE CUTTER BUILD in this game. There is no one tactic to rule them all, there is only one sure fire way to win this game and win almost every game, and that is to understand whats happening and adapt to it. Thats the simple truth. I just played a match against Sampdoria, top of Serie A, and a team in my Champs group who have also won their first game. We are away in a match that we aren't favorites for, you would think they would make us favorites after winning it 4 in a row!

So I check their formation for the last match in serie A and its kinda irrelevant cos they are using a few auto roles. For our match its a bit more crystal clear

They are playing a 442 with quite a few support roles, and that suggests one thing to me, they aren't going to be flying in my face attacking me all the time, but if I give this side too much respect and time on the ball they will hurt me, so the best thing I can do is NOT play their game. So I will do the opposite. High tempo ,attacking , close down more, but I make some changes to the starting system as well. CWB goes to FB on support, cos their defensive coverage will now be slightly deeper since I am going to be so offensive. And I am also using quite a few TIs that include

Close down more, work ball into box ( so i don't cross so much), play out of defense, stay on feet, narrow, exploit middle, high tempo, gk distribute, and offside trap and oh, one OI on their playmaker.

Its an offensive set up after like 30 minutes...I know things are going to plan. Here some thoughts are running through my head, should I slow down tempo?....i decide against it.

And then bang we score, its precisely how we want the goal to come, the strikes are pressuring high up the pitch, one of the strikers is closing down their fullbacks who has the ball deep in their own half, he passes the ball to their playmaker who is hard tackled and the ball then drops to OUR playmaker who drills a pass back to one of our strikers who does a no look square pass to another striker to score, we are a goal up. Nice to see, but I IMMEDIATELY switch to Opposition Tactics, I don't even wait for the slow mo.

Sampdoria have now changed their strategy, the RIGHT fullback is now on attack, that means with forwards already on attack, they will be going for overlaps. My LEFT FULLBACK is changed to a LFD to compensate, and I contemplate making a change and then the AI makes one more change and this time I make a major switch to strategy.

Sampdoria is now trying to get back into the game in a big way, a goal down, and I need to make sure we don't give in..so we make some major changes,

We go counter and change our TIs as well, removing close down more, and going for direct passing, and pass into space. We score again and win the match

I only used ONE OI, but I adapted to the changes in the game. And the skin I am using is Scorpio to illustrate this.

[kalou-less]

Sorry took me a bit to get back to this, a tonne of things happening at work, and no time to play in my free time...;-(

I think when I have time, that could be the focus on my next post on this thread

We've all been there, joys of being an adult i suppose. No one expects you to be here 24/7 but if you could setup a hotline that would be great

Thank you for helping , it seems im my own worst enemy. After a decent run of game i go to autopilot mode and get lazy. Plenty of food for thought in the last post

[LEEMOD]

I still play FM14 - how come now on FM15 you get to see the oppositions player roles? Isn't that a little unrealistic? Or was this from a scout report?

You're work is amazing yet baffling sometimes, I wish I could understand it better.

One of my issues is knowing when to adapt and what to look for, I tried to do this myself but I prefer now to focus on training/ squad management / transfer dealings.

Keep up the amazing work!

[LEEMOD]

Also, I was going to ask, for the shape above, could you please show a list of team instructions and player instructions if you don't mind?

Thank you

[Rashidi]

Also, I was going to ask, for the shape above, could you please show a list of team instructions and player instructions if you don't mind?

Thank you

I use the Scorpio skin, and it shows the player roles, the team instructions that I used are listed in the post titled _ Getting Real

[macca72]

Rashidi, genius thread as always.

I'm working on a counter / defensive 4132 and 442 / 4411 and think I'm getting close on the basics. What I'm interested in is how you (generally) understand how to exploit the opposition formations and what you change to enact it.

[Rashidi]

*taken from my blog* excuse any pagination problems..i just didn't have time to edit it

@macca 72, thanks mate, I am trying to show how I adapt against various systems in these posts, which is the focus now of the thread.

Can you take one tactic and win every single match all season long? Unlikely. What you can do is take one single tactic and adapt to the conditions of the game and try to win every single match, the chances of going on a massive winning run? A lot more likely. In my case I usually have a win ratio of 75% in all competitions.

Last season for the first time in a long time, we fell behind a rampant Chelsea, they only lost 1 match, drew 2 and won the rest. It was such a blistering pace we fell apart because I played like an experimental manager, willing to try different kinds of systems all season long. We did get revenge on Chelsea in the Champions League final, but it was a narrow win. I am hell bent on exacting my revenge on Chelsea. They beat us to the title by a whopping 10 points eradicating our points record, its time to dish it out...they are our next opponent.

A post on the forums made me think. Someone asked me for my Team Instructions and a list of OI's. Now I know I've said these are important, but these in isolation do not make your tactic better, and neither does a magical combination of PPMs. Yes you need a system but without a strategy to USE the system its half as good. What one needs is a plan to handle what the AI throws at you. You need to know what to expect and then you change to adapt. Now I will admit its really hard to spot from the 2D screen, but there is a way to make it easier. I don't consider this a cheat of sorts but I do reckon that the information is already visible on the 2D screen, you just need to spot how the dot behaves in FULL MATCH mode. The problem is very few people have the patience. The reality is that in modern football you could probably spot who the playmaker was or which fullback was more attacking if you were watching the whole game from the stands. So in all fairness I think this approach is quite helpful. What you need is skin that shows you the opponents ROLES, like Scorpio.

Time to run through another game and go through each step, I won't be doing this very often because its intensely time consuming, and personal commitments are straining me at the seams, but here's what I can offer for now. This post alone took me almost 3 hrs to do. The game was played in like less than 10 minutes.

I typically start each match like this, but we are going to be against Chelsea, and I can't field my top 2 strikers, fatigued after Europe, which is a bummer.

Chelsea are set out interestingly, the plan will be simple: isolate their defensive group from their attackers. Since they are playing a support styled play, they need to be in my half to be a threat, so if I switch to an attacking mode then i can press the game and deny them the space and time to threaten me. So I elect to minimise OIs, by just doing this.

My TI's are set up for me to press higher up the pitch, the idea is to deny them any space to build anything of import. Its a simple plan. I choose work into box, because I want to minimise crosses. We will play a high tempo match, but again, I will be wary of fatigue.

12 minutes in and I am a happy bunny, everything is working as planned, their defense is under pressure, Chelsea have hardly left their half and we've already blown one gilt-edged opportunity. I check on their formation and there aren't any major changes. We wait, something should happen.

30 minutes in we score, Chelsea have only managed one shot on goal thus far. I spend a few seconds admiring our goal which as expected begins from a loss of possession and a quick thrusting move through the middle to score. I immediately turn to look at the oppositions tactical screen, it should change, but it doesn't...we keep this going till the end of the half. I go into half time thinking they will change their tactic, so I set my match to full match mode, to buy me time. Right at the start of kick off, I spot Chelsea's change.

They've gone mental with a 424, against a 4312 it can be a problem with the way I am set up. I immediately make what I deem to be key OI changes. The goal now is to completely isolate their two defenders and the 2 central midfielders. By closing them down and hard tackling them, I can remove their influence on the game. The defense needs to punt the ball up, so I know we need to change things around ourself in terms of our shape.

I go counter and my two fullbacks are put on support. The goal now is to contain, so no more high pressing from everyone, only the strikers do the high pressing, and with the OI changes we are set to play a different kind of game.

A rapid counter attack from us following a failed Chelsea attack produces our second goal. not too long after the restart. It slowly becomes a match we dominate.

They manage to score one goal, but with 6 clear cut chances, I know we should have scored more while winning it 4-1. The counter attacking strategy worked when they hopped to an attacking 424.

The boxed players are the ones I was aiming at. Reducing their influence on the game was my priority. And nothing absolutely nothing, beats getting one over on Mourinho.

So there you go, in a nutshell with a lot of screenies, showing you how one should adapt to changes in a game. If you can learn how to see what the AI is trying to do then it makes it really easy. And once again the skin I use is called Scorpio.

Oh and I have time for one more addition...into the next match, an away Champions League tie to Wolfsburg. Fewer screenies now. They are set up as a 442 with an overlapping fullback on the right flank. I expect him to overlap because the midfielder is on a support duty. So I instruct my fullback to go play as a fullback on support. The whole 442 is set up with quite a few support roles and this tells me that in order for it to do well against me, it needs time to build up play. They are at home as well, so I do expect this team to play a lot better than Chelsea did. We stick to an attacking framework apart from that one small change to the fullback who's set to cover for the opposing fullbacks overlapping runs. My shouts are simply the attacking ones I used earlier against Chelsea.

2 minutes in I am forced to bring on a 19 year old player for his ECL debut, replacing my key player Nathan, who's stretchered off, but I am not upset cos M. Perkovic has a blinder. I do drop tempo after like 3 goals, only because i know my players are gonna be dead tired.

Once again the only thing I do is adapt my system to the one the opposing team is using. I change mentalities and make some minimal OI sets, that only focus on wrong footing their strikers and we are off...for a 4-0 away win. Same thing, they are playing to control, i deny them that by going attacking and pressing high. You can often tell how a team is playing by either the way the dots are laid out on a screen with advanced dots having (A) set on them or by using a skin that tells you their roles. In this case they had so many support roles and with only the two front men on attack and one fullback, I knew that by going attacking it would cause them problems.

More to come I hope...works crazy at the moment...I barely had time to get this in, and this is a copied and pasted post from a scheduled blog post lol. I hope I get some decent game time in so I can give more examples. This beats a livestream I could do any day.

[Rashidi]

Its actually quite easy to play with one tactic the whole season through, so far in my last 3 matches, I made some OI settings, but they were so few, the last game had none, the one before had like 2 in the whole game.

So using this rather simple way of playing, which involves using one tactic and then making some minor changes based on what i face..the side has had a pretty good start claiming 28 points out of a possible 30 in the first 10 matches in the league.

So after the Wolfsburg match which we took 5-0, we travelled to QPR, now this was a team that for the first time had a rather unique way of playing.

They set up with this system. Now please take a long hard look at what a TARGETMAN set up looks like. And this was a dangerous one. It had pacey strikers plus pacey wingers and a deep lying playmaker. I didn't even notice the target man, until we conceded two goals inside the opening 20 minutes.

My plan had been simple all I had done was to compensate for their attacking fullback by getting mine to be on support. Seeing they were on support I set my whole team to attacking. Ok so they ripped us twice and I took a look at my defenders. I took the poor marker off, and brought on a better one. I did think of dropping back down to counter, but I stuck to my guns. We stayed on attacking and won the game 3-2.

By keeping pressure on the dlp I hurried him into making passes, and by keeping the TM tight marked, I was able to reduce the threat. It wasn't hard to do. We've kept doing the same thing in every match, the whole goal is to make things as simple as possible without making fundamental design changes to the tactic.

[Rashidi]

Time for another quick example.

Once again let me reiterate, I am taking one tactic and playing it like a system. The whole idea is to maintain using that one tactic for every game but only adjust it via small tweaks that do not affect the fluidity of the system, so that we maintain team cohesion. Doing this requires that one knows their system and how it plays. My tactic plays narrow and I like to move the ball around quickly, and even if I am faced with a side playing wide I will still stick to what I am doing, knowing fully well that adjustments to roles will still be done to compensate for my lack of width.

Today's game a trip to St Marys to face Southampton. We are playing our 4312, and its Fluid as a control tactic, but as always whether I choose to go control or not really depends on what Southampton puts out. This is what the match day lineup looks like. Southampton appear to be sitting between a standard or controlled 4123

The forward line has me thinking that they could be a problem if they get behind my attacking Complete Wingbacks. So I need to make some changes, the system they are playing doesn't play with a target man and suggests the way they will score will come from being camped. So I won't be letting that happen.

I make some changes to our system, the CWBs roles are changed, and we adopt the basic shouts I use for the start of every attacking mentality setup. The goal, pressure the opposition into goal concessions.

Within 5 minutes we are up, my immediate reaction as always is to look at their system to see how they have changed

After going down by a goal, Saints immediately begin pushing up their left flank, ordinarily I would have just compensated by changing the roles of my right fullback, but decided to do it for both. Knowing that they sought a way back, we changed to a counter attacking strategy, removed the pressing cos thats not needed anymore, and took off the offside trap.

They concede another goal and decide to change the role of the lone wolf upfront to a poacher. Electing to stay on the safe side, and hoping this guy isn't fast, I set tight marking and wrong footing to the chap.

By now we are comfortable, Southampton strategy doesn't look too adventurous, I could go for more goals by going attacking but don't see the need, we do end up scoring our best goal later to make it 3 goals. As you can see its so easy to play the game in this way. You can set the other two tactic slots on the tactical creator for other shapes.

[Bruce Drundrige]

There's no Target Man in the QPR team picture?

And how are you seeing the roles of the opposition, is that an FMC feature??

[Bruce Drundrige]

Well that certainly helps doesn't it

[Apostrophe]

Having the same issue/question as Edinton, how do you show the roles? I have Scorpio as well but it's not showing at the moment.

[LEEMOD]

I use the Scorpio skin, and it shows the player roles, the team instructions that I used are listed in the post titled _ Getting Real

Thank you

[Rashidi]

There's no Target Man in the QPR team picture?And how are you seeing the roles of the opposition, is that an FMC feature??

When I looked at the QPR team they had pace. A central midfielder was set to play deep as a DLP and the only two real outlets where the strikers with one pushed so high up that he would be standing on my line. It will end up playing like a TM.

[Southern Buddie]

This a great thread!! Very insightful.

A question I do have is, do you use any player instructions as a base in your current 4312?

[Rashidi]

This a great thread!! Very insightful.A question I do have is, do you use any player instructions as a base in your current 4312?

Yes. I tell my Backs to play less risky passes and my front three to close down much more

[LEEMOD]

I wish I had the nous to watch the game in full and spot things like this.

Rashidi - for us people who are less patient is there another way of playing, a more simple way? For example, what can we gleam from the match stats alone?

Your work is excellent but even if i watched a game in full I wouldn't really know what to be looking out for.

[Rashidi]

Nearly every game I play is on key and commentary. The only time I may go full is when I spot a change that the AI has made to the formation. Going on full is just so I can buy time to make the changes. Other than that, I dunno how more simplified I can play, Those examples I used just a few posts up about QPR and Southampton those were all the changes I made. The fastest I could go would be to go with the skin that allows the Assman to sim the games.

[LEEMOD]

Nearly every game I play is on key and commentary. The only time I may go full is when I spot a change that the AI has made to the formation. Going on full is just so I can buy time to make the changes. Other than that, I dunno how more simplified I can play, Those examples I used just a few posts up about QPR and Southampton those were all the changes I made. The fastest I could go would be to go with the skin that allows the Assman to sim the games.

When you watch in full though I don't know what to look for.

Are there anything in match stats you would take note of?

Thanks

[Mr.Delph]

Hi Rashidi, I've been following all your threads on here and blog just never posted. What I was wondering was do you have counter/control/attacking set as your 3 formations so that the fluidity is not low when you change from attacking to counter etc. Also with TI's, as obviously if you have one tactic with short passing and change to direct passing in game with a TI then the bar is lowered.

[Rashidi]

Hi Rashidi, I've been following all your threads on here and blog just never posted. What I was wondering was do you have counter/control/atYutacking set as your 3 formations so that the fluidity is not low when you change from attacking to counter etc. Also with TI's, as obviously if you have one tactic with short passing and change to direct passing in game with a TI then the bar is lowered.

You can see from the screenshots listed above when I change mentalities, the fluidity bar of the tactic hardly changes. There is a slight drop but its not massive, not when you are making minor changes like mine. I will take screenshots of the bar itself soon.

[Rashidi]

This is gonna be a quick post, its meant as a response to a question posed on the forums. Essentially I was asked whether its better to have 3 tactics with different mentalities/PIs or to do just what I do- change on the fly.

Let me use my next game as an example. We're travelling to White Hart lane to face Spurs. On default my tactic is Control. The fluidity bar is 100% by the time August comes so I really don;'t have much of an issue.

On match day this is what the tactic screen looks like. Spurs coming in with what looks like a controlled 4231. But, when the match is about to begin, it changes.

On one flank there is an attacking fullback and on another flank we have an attacking winger. This implies that we will face strong pressure down the flanks. We make some changes the screenshots below show the before and after effects of making the changes.

The system is still FLUID, and as far as I am concerned thats enough, I am not displacing the system too much by making a huge amount of changes.

It was a successful change, and even when Spurs decided to go all out attacking with a 4231 and in spite of my passing changes done to TI we were still able to maintain fluidity for our system. Winning the match 1-0.

We have been playing like this all season long, it hasn't been too long, but still, I am happy with our results.

Its a simple system, know your tactic, understand how the AI is going to attack you, then prepare the flanks and mitigate against their style as best as you can.

Followed the same approach in our next game, vs Sampdoria in the ECL, they lined up with a 4141, and had one attacking fullback and nearly the whole team on support. It was clearly a defensive system, so we went into the match with an attacking mentality, all I did different was tell the FB on the side of the attacking fullback to switch to a FB(S) instead of his default CWB(A). We smashed the Italians 3-0 with 30 shots on goal giving up 5 SOG on our end.

It is slightly harder to look at an opposition system and establish whether they are attacking or defensive. Actually I keep things really simple. I look at a system, and decide if its going to be attacking or defensive simply by the number of attacking roles and the shape of the tactic. In Sampdorias case, it was a 4141 which to me is immediately a defensive formation, then i looked at the number of attacking roles, and found only 2, the DLF and the FB, and based on that I guessed that they would be south of control. Its not hard its a simple system which has seen us win 23 games in our last 24 in all competitions.

[herne79]

Sorry but I have an issue with this post.

You are showing us how just a simple change to your base tactic can produce good (and consistent) results by looking at how the opposition line up and making your small adjustments, which is fine .

However, you are using a 3rd party skin to tell you what roles and duties the opposition use which most of us don't have - and basing your decisions on that.

Wouldn't it be of much greater benefit to explain how you can make decisions to make small adjustments without relying on such a skin? Perhaps you have elsewhere in this thread, and I apologise if you have, but I think that if you are demonstrating how we can make simple changes it should be made clear you are using more than just the default game.

[Rashidi]

Sorry but I have an issue with this post.

You are showing us how just a simple change to your base tactic can produce good (and consistent) results by looking at how the opposition line up and making your small adjustments, which is fine .

However, you are using a 3rd party skin to tell you what roles and duties the opposition use which most of us don't have - and basing your decisions on that.

Wouldn't it be of much greater benefit to explain how you can make decisions to make small adjustments without relying on such a skin? Perhaps you have elsewhere in this thread, and I apologise if you have, but I think that if you are demonstrating how we can make simple changes it should be made clear you are using more than just the default game.

Apology accepted. Its listed in the post and on my blog and in a lot of my previous posts. I won't be going through it again, cos its time consuming, you will need to look at the tactical screen again, identify which position a dot is in...there are 5 possible positions as I have indicated in my Strikers Grid Post, when i illustrated that a forward on different roles will have different positioning. Then once you have identified whether its an attack, support or defend position you will need to look at the 2d game. In the game you will need to determine by the dots movement whether its attacking or or support. Thats really easy to spot. and we have been doing that since 1998. People want a simplistic answer and I have provided them with one, but I am not about to go into detailed posts showing the 2d screen and explaining everything again, thats way too time consuming and I don't have the time for it.

What people need to take from this is that one needs to adapt to the conditions of the game, and this includes everything from the current match score, the conditions both physical and mental, the weather etc. Its a long list of things that one needs to do. Even if i wasn't using the skin, i would have been doing the same thing, pause, identify, go to full match, then observe, modify, hit highlights assess, reevaulate if changes are needed.

[herne79]

All good then

[Southern Buddie]

Rashidi, within your 4312 system, what is the job of each striker? How do you differentiate between what players to use in each role? What kind of attributes are you looking for?

[Rashidi]

Rashidi, within your 4312 system, what is the job of each striker? How do you differentiate between what players to use in each role? What kind of attributes are you looking for?

Good question. I am on the road atm so I will update with more details when I can.I have 3 main roles with an expected style of play.

I expect the AM in the middle to provide a lot of opportunities, he needs to have the strength and ability to play the ball close to his feet and find players in front of him. He also arrives late in the box and must be able to finish off chances that will drop to him since the two in front of him do a lot of movement off the ball.

The DLF on the left will score a lot and create a lot from playing so close to the AM. The F9 on the right is expected to drift wide to support the CWB and be a short option for when we work ball into the box. Since all three players are expected to work as 1 unit teamwork and work rate are important. Teamwork because I will need them to occasionally abandon their roles to support either CWB for the AM supporting the MCs.

As far as attributes go for the whole group teamwork work rate anticipation first touch and composure, finishing OTB and acceleration, decisions, vision as well. Vision is esp important for the DLF and AM. I will clean this up when I am not on my phone

[Option]

rashidi1 why dont you stream your matches? Or any saves you are playing. Talking about the game, your thoughts when setting up formation. By streaming, you will have an active live chat to.

I rarely read much, but this time you actually got me to read everything here. Im amazed.

[djohnson11]

How can you see when to react on key? Ive tried playing this way but i find the opposition will often use subtle role changes rather than formation changes that you can see with the formation widget.

[Option]

Honestly all this is contextual, my shouts depends on the match and what happens. If I find that I am defending more and I need to create more chances, but my possession seems decent, then I will just pass into space, work ball, play from defense and high tempo

If I am defending and not having much luck with possession, I will retain possession, work ball , short passing, play from defense and high tempo

If I am attacking and can't seem to find a way through and have a lot of possession, direct passing, pass into space, work ball, play from defense and high tempo

If I am attacking and have low possession, retain, short passing, work ball, play from defense, high tempo

As you can see this all varies from situation to situation.

Retain Possession + short passing, makes you pass even shorter, high tempo, makes it more likely players will do more movement off the ball, and this could and sometimes lead to fast one touch passing, amongst players who aren't holding up and looking for ttb.

Direct passing and pass into space, allows you to play ball behind lines and against sides who are attacking you. Its especially helpful if you are in your own half for most of the time. Not good to use if you are already struggling for possession.

Is not work ball into box and pass into space counter effective when both are applied?

[Rashidi]

How can you see when to react on key? Ive tried playing this way but i find the opposition will often use subtle role changes rather than formation changes that you can see with the formation widget.

1. Experience

2. You watch the game and stick up their formation as a widget, then all you do is hit the pause button when their formation shows some changes. These are clear and evident such as a dot moving up slightly from its default indicating a change in duty.

3. I don't make a 100 changes in a game, I usually make 2. When a game starts I adjust based on how I understand their roles will play out. We can't see mentality so I make assumptions, based on how many attacking roles I see and previous experience. For example, in my games Chelsea almost always plays defensively when they travel to the Hawthorns and at home they tend to be more controlled, they only go attacking when they are a goal down.

4. So I wait for incidents, like a red card, going a goal up...when these happen I immediately wait for a backlash, and thats when I tell my CWBs to go fullback on support.

And I have thought of doing live streams, but I tend to play these games on either my laptop at home while watching the news or on my iMac while I am multitasking doing work. I can't isolate myself when my wife is pregnant and do a live stream. I have put some of my saves up on youtube, i may record one game and stick it up, but people are just going to see me making changes quickly and moving on...god my game is going to slow down so much while I do a stream I may lose any semblance of a normal life.

@ Option...work ball into box, reduces crosses and long shots and pass into space increases through balls, depending on the situation you are faced with they may not be counter intuitive. For example I could be up against a 424 attacking, I would do both these shouts,because my team are shorties, I am not dependant on crosses but they have the pace and the ppms to exploit spaces so I would use both these shouts together.

Shouts are contextual, they should never be used as a golden rule.

*edit* sigh ...haven't had much time to play lately, works a 'mare and theres a lot to do on the weekends.

[Rashidi]

With a baby due anytime soon, my updates are going to be few and far between, at least for the next 2 weeks. So I will be responding to queries and doing my best to answer them. A recent post on the forums got my attention. Someone asked me what attributes I looked for in my strike force for my 4312 formation. Interestingly enough I got started on it, wrote a fair bit about what to look for in players and then I played a game and realised the answer isn't as simple.

When selecting players to fit into your system its clear that certain attributes are more important than others, if you look at my 4312 system you will see 3 clear strikers upfront. Designed as a unit teamwork is vital for them as they create chances for each other. In isolation the unit is useless. Whats the point of discussing their attributes when its the rest of the players that work the ball up for them, and this is my point: When determining what attributes are important, its vital that you establish a style of play and its this style of play that defines the attributes that you need and the players you will depend on.

We were playing a game and I didn't have the luxury of picking my best midfielders; we almost lost the game, winning at the death. My side depends a great deal on the 3 central midfielders and my two fullbacks or complete wingbacks. Without the ball winning grit in the middle, the pace and guile down the flanks, the balls will never get to the feet of my strike force. The key is not identifying the best traits for your strike force, but the best traits for your team!

In our case, first touch, concentration, bravery and passing are critical attributes. Teamwork and workrate are also important, in fact its these 5 attributes that form the central core of who we are. This means that my 3 MCs and my two fullbacks along with my strike force are the ones I focus on. They all need to have good doses of these attributes. If they all have great teamwork I am smiling, but there will be times when teamwork is a rare commodity so I decide by looking at key battle areas. If I go into a game thats going to be tough, then even my AMC needs good teamwork, tackling bravery. If its a game that isn't as bad, then I will drop bravery and tackling for him only.

The way my 4312 is set up, the demands on my AMC are clear: He also needs to win the ball high up the pitch against good sides. When we play on an attacking mentality, I expect them to work hard in the opponents half. So when I go into these kind of games I start isolating my attributes:

Tough Game

AMC - Bravery, Off the ball, Passing, Decisions, Teamwork, Finishing, First Touch, Composure, Dribbling, tackling

Easy Game

AMC - Off the ball, passing, decision, teamwork, finishing, first touch, composure,dribbling

My DLF has typically been someone who has bagged the second highest number of assists in the team and will usually finish the season with at least 20 goals or close to that. He is expected to be a team player with intelligence

DLF - Passing, finishing, composure, first touch, passing, teamwork, balance, workrate, teamwork, bravery, off the ball

My F9 usually ends up supporting the fullback, and he also tends to get into positions that take him out wide

F9- Finishing, Passing, Crossing, Off the ball, Crossing, First Touch, Composure, workrate, teamwork

So those are the numbers I like to look for, and here are some of my players. Discussing them in isolation is going to be dangerous, these guys are only good because of the rest of my players. So here's the dude who sometimes plays as the AMC in games where we are expected to get as good as we give

TOUGH GAME AMC

He hasn't done too badly.

He had started out as one of my 3 MCs in the early part of his career, last season we moved him in as the "tough" AMC, and he did ok.

My first choice AMC is usually this player who has the attributes I value for goals and assists.

My DLF role is all about chances and goals. In fact if it hadn't been down to my aggressive rotation policy he should have bagged in access of 30 goals by now.

F9 is almost the same except I look for crossers of the ball as well

Yeah but these players are useless without these 3 kingpins in the middle:

My playmaker

And my two ball winning midfielders

At the end of the day, if I don't have those 3 guys in midfield and my two wingbacks I can to a large extent expect to struggle. So the important thing isn't the attributes of your strike force, but how you fit all these pieces together

Once you figure out the jigsaw puzzle that is your team, and have fit all the pieces together, then how well your team does is going to be a function of the quality of players you have, how well designed your system is and finally how well you handle match events. Handling match events is easy, if they are attacking you, go counter, and don't over commit. If they are defensive and looking to build up in your half, deny them the midfield and go attacking. Its that easy. I got to admit this is the easiest match engine since 2000. I had predicted that the advent of the tactical creator would dumb down the game, but I didn't expect it to go this easy.

[Rashidi]

For the last few weeks most of my posts have been about adapting to changes by the AI. For the longest time, we had to depend on staring at the 2D screen and assessing the roles based on their behaviour with and without the ball. Understandably this is tough for the majority of new players. And while it can still work. I will now explain how you can do this in the game the old fashioned way and by using custom panels.

OLD MAN WAY

Back in the days when I frequently returned to my cave during the days of sliders and notches, we had to rely on positioning. When looking at a dot the easiest ones to identify were always the dots that seemed to stand further out than normal. The best time to do this is at kickoff. You want to immediately look at the fullbacks. If the fullbacks are in line with the DCs or slightly forward but behind the DMs then its usually a safe bet that they are on support, if they were standing further afield when you have the ball, they are on attacking personality. Now you should apply the same rule to midfielders.

If you see a midfielder drop between the 2DCs he's playing as a halfback, if he's dropped just in front chances are he's either a BWM on defend, a DLP, so thats easily one support or defense role. The goal here is to identify the number of support and defense roles in the team, this should give you a clear idea of whether its an attacking mentality or a support one. I can't really break this down to all 6 postures..( i think there are 6), but you should be looking for either support or attack. Forget defense. The more support roles you see the more the AI is going to play and try and control the middle of the park and slowly push at you. Its times like this that i advocate attacking the AI.

I would then begin looking at players making runs or holding up the ball to make long passes. These I would categorize as the creative/dangerous players, and it would be this area of the pitch I would either lock down or press. By locking down I mean taking one of my attacking roles off and sticking a support one in. These usually only happen on the flanks, and really the only one I lock down is my fullback.

Looking further afield, you want to start paying attention to strikers who drift deep, these will be support players, those who are just sticking to the shoulders of your last man, are usually but not always players with an (A) duty.

To really identify them, you need to slow the game down during the parts where the AI has the ball in its own half, in the middle. The middle phase is where transitions occur and the players whom the ball go through are usually the important ones, and these are the ones I will pay attention to in terms of ratings/stats eg. passes

So thats basically the old way. its a lot of work, but it makes it really easy to play the game once you can suss out how the AI is coming at you.

Since FM14 things have gotten a lot easier. We now have custom panels that have been created on the Skinning forum that have been adopted by some of the skin authors and included in their skins. A lot of work has been down by Sparrow, and his thread covers in detail how you can get these in. You have several options. These aren't available in the default SI skin, but there is a way to get them in, and its not very hard. These apply only to skins that you can download or the base SI skin which has to be downloaded as well.

YOUNG BUCK WAY

Option 1:

Go through each skin and find one that has a tactics panel that shows you opposing views. There are at least 2 I know off, but there have been some peopple who have indicated that these sometimes get lost in updates. When a patch goes out, I reckon these get wiped, so maybe a fresh install of the skin? I dunno.

Option 2:

Personally I just go to this thread on the skinning forum. Sparrow covers it in detail and its pretty easy, download the 3 panels and create a panels folder in the skins folder and drop the downloaded files into the panels folder. it should show up for skins that you downloaded from the skinning forums or from susie. I tested this method on andromeda,vitrex. and it works. I seem to have problems with skins that are downloaded through Steam Workshop cos these are already in .fmf format. It seems that for some the tac panel has already been included, these apply to alavanja and for some of the others the tac panel won't show up. So you should really try this yoursellf. I can't get this to work for Steklo, though it should be a simple matter of identifying the and replacing the tactics panel with Sparrows.

*EDIT Went back in to test it again on different skins..this method of replacing the files only worked with: Alvanja, Andromeda, and Scorpio Steam.

.

if you have any questions on these please raise it in the skinning forum, cos I won't be answering it here, since this is a tactics forum and I am no skins expert.

[ajh1977]

Really enjoy reading your threads rashidi, as much as it pains me to see WBA doin well, there's always something in there I can use for the Wolves.

[Rashidi]

Whoa my first stickied thread ;-) thanks to whoever did this. I didn't think it was good enough to warrant it, but thanks nonetheless

[Taipan]

Much too modest rashidi. If this is your first sticky, it is well well well overdue. Great thread and one I have enjoyed reading very much

[Cleon]

It should have been done a long time ago tbh

[Rashidi]

Ok lets continue with my "Adapting" series. Lately I have been focused on making minimal changes to a game, relying on observing how the AI has set up and then adapting to these changes. In today's example, West Bromwich Albion are facing Manchester United in the FA Cup.

WBA are currently top of the table and are on a 30 game winning run stretching from last season. Going into this match, we have elected to rest 2 of our prolific players with a view of keeping them fresh for our champions league clash away to Shaktar.

United have gone into this game with a 4141, we haven't really made many changes and the screenshot above is the same tactic they used at the start. We are using the same 4312Samba system I use, with the same shouts I've always used. If you are wondering what these are just refer back to my older posts. Nothing has changed.

The reason why I am sticking this screenie is to make a point, even though my 4312 has been set to narrow and there aren't really any wide men to speak of apart from my fullbacks, you can see that they wingbacks do take up wide positions. and its positions i like to see. I keep it narrow because almost every ball thats a 50-50 has at least a few players to recover. We are still playing our attacking mentality set up; there is no real reason to sit back and try and hit them on the counter, we want to dominate possession in midfield and deny them the chance to build any kind of momentum.

In fact for some reason the AI makes one odd change, it decides to change their DLF to a TQ after going 2 goals down, the only slight change I made was to counter the attacking fullback on the right flank by asking my wingback to go FB(S). Even then, that wasn't really necessary.

We managed to dominate the completely, in fact at this point I was only focused on checking on how two players were doing, my cameo AM and my fullback on the right. I was very pleased with the performance of the cameo AM, Goddard. He managed to score a brace and his goal scoring positions were perfect.

My wingback had an amazing game as well, by working his socks off playing down the line when required. Overall it was the perfect performance. I stayed on attacking from beginning to end.

Total number of tactical changes made: 1, excluding substitutions

Next Match Shaktar

Heading into this game we are the defending 5-times champions of the European Champions League. We are expected to win this game, but as is the case in FM, anything can happen so we won't be taking anything for granted.

This is what the match day screen looks like before I submit my team. Note that my tactic is defaulted on Control and the familiarity of the tactic is fluid, and our shouts are the same as they have always been.

The Miners are setting up shop to defend, if anything else they are looking to get the ball up quickly to their lone striker. They do have a playmaker in the middle, but I won't bother looking at the attributes of the players to see if they are a threat on the counter. We will observe how they play before making any changes to the system.

I will pay attention to several things during the game, and these will tell me if a change is needed. We need to see how quickly the flanks get up to support the lone striker. If this becomes a problem I may tell my backs to switch roles to FB.

We do the usual team talk and I change my mentality to attacking, remember if your familiarity is fluid and you learnt it on control, then changing this to either attacking or counter will have a slight drop in familiarity, but you should still be fluid. Maybe not maxed, but still :-) You see how long this takes...damn now I need a break.!@!

10 seconds in and I am only looking at their flanks to see how they push up, 5 mins in and I lose my main man in midfield, this is not going well. So reducing tempo is an option to take, we wait. Our attacking mentality and our narrowness ensures we are better positioned for 50-50 balls. We win the ball in their half and my wingback surges into the box to score. We go up a goal and the Miners abandon their defensive posture. We respond by changing the roles on our wingbacks

They have definitely gone more offensive, I don't know how much, but we will be observing how their strikers stand, whether they are on the shoulders of our last line, and if needed we will drop to counter. For now we observe its 5 mins in., 2 mins later we score another as we remain camped in their half. Time to reduce tempo. They have 3 players on attacking duty, and I am tempted to go counter, but unless i see surges from their flanks, this remains an option.

We are definitely losing the possession battle, so we drop to counter and I remove the close down more shout. This doesn't work, we have ceded control of midfield to Shaktar its time to return to attacking and see if we can win the battle in midfield, maybe the possession numbers will improve. Their attacks are coming from deep crosses from the flanks. Its time to give their flanks more to worry about. This is getting annoying we lose another player to injury and the half hasn't ended yet. Good news we are now firmly in control.

Second half and Shaktar have now totally changed formations. It looks like a control 442 with overlapping fullbacks. We don't make any changes, but we can not afford another player going down.

I am worried that a long ball from the back will find their strikers and it does for them to get a goal back. We score a third goal from a set piece and then a fourth from some fine play inside their half. Sticking to an attacking mentality worked, there was some pressure from the strikers but by forcing play in their half, I relied on them missing their long ball strategy. Its a good win, not as great as the ones before, but good nonetheless. My only concern now is that two key players were stretchered off. Ones out for 3 weeks!, damn.

[Southern Buddie]

In regards to the team instructions you use for your 4312, are any of them formation based or are they purely to create a style of football? For instance, would you use the same instructions in a different formation if trying to play the same style of football?

[Rashidi]

The Tis I used for my 4312 were to create a specific style of football based on how I wanted them to play. The Tempo TI gets turned off/on depending on the game. I don't consider any TI sacrosanct to any formation. It could be argued that some Tis are better with certain tactics, but its also possible to play a game without Tis too. I just use Tis as a simple way of telling my team to change the way they play during a game.

[Sussex Hammer]

Fascinating thread Rashidi. Dunno how you guys do it reacting to the oppositions every move. I have pretty much given up and downloaded your RY4132MAMBA tactic for away games at Spurs and Chelsea. But with me in charge Chelsea had 54 shots and Spurs had 31. As I say no idea how you guys do it!

[Rashidi]

Fascinating thread Rashidi. Dunno how you guys do it reacting to the oppositions every move. I have pretty much given up and downloaded your RY4132MAMBA tactic for away games at Spurs and Chelsea. But with me in charge Chelsea had 54 shots and Spurs had 31. As I say no idea how you guys do it!

Its usually more than just downloading a tactic, all of them usually act as templates for people, they key lies in understanding your own sides abilities. If I remove my 3 central players and stick in 3 average players it can be quite painful. I remember when using my 4132 how important it was for me to observe how my DM was doing. Against sides like Chelsea I would make sure he would not sit too deep, so the ppm (likes to drop deep or always stays back were never on them). Chelsea's 4231 seeks to control midfield, so the battle has to be won there without compromising your flanks. Eventually over time I realised how important my MC was in the system and it slowly morphed into a 4312 system, where the continual pressure in midfield became consistent.In fact, it started looking like some weird 442 diamond. Pity Brendan Rodgers hasn't seen the light yet.

[Sussex Hammer]

Its usually more than just downloading a tactic, all of them usually act as templates for people, they key lies in understanding your own sides abilities. If I remove my 3 central players and stick in 3 average players it can be quite painful. I remember when using my 4132 how important it was for me to observe how my DM was doing. Against sides like Chelsea I would make sure he would not sit too deep, so the ppm (likes to drop deep or always stays back were never on them). Chelsea's 4231 seeks to control midfield, so the battle has to be won there without compromising your flanks. Eventually over time I realised how important my MC was in the system and it slowly morphed into a 4312 system, where the continual pressure in midfield became consistent.In fact, it started looking like some weird 442 diamond. Pity Brendan Rodgers hasn't seen the light yet.

What you say about the DM and CM in a 4132 is very interesting as that is where my 4132 seemed to fail. Had both strikers banging them in but if it didn't click the system just didn't gel at all. Looking at my midfield I rotated Noble, Downing, Romero, Song and Kouyate/Poyet. Not bad but hardly world beaters and both Poyet and Romero very young and the DM and CM A just didn't click at all often enough.

Interestingly I have tinkered with your Samba formation and am at present using that with my own front three roles, (there is a question for you in the Stupid Tactics Questions Thread, I hope you don't mind). It has got Valencia and Sakho firing again and getting more out of Downing as a TQ than I ever did at CM. The really fascinating thing is that even without a DM is plays quite compact in that area as both Noble and Romero have the PPM "come deep" and yet with a TQ in my case there is also a link further forward. Against Swansea I was having trouble with their AM Shelvey and so I man marked him with Noble and went from being 2-1 down to draw 2-2 so this thread has got me looking about what the opposition are doing a bit more.

How to stop the Hazard's, Mata's and Balotellis of this game are a different matter!!!

[RTHerringbone]

This thread prompted me to give a 4-3-1-2 a go on my new save with Arsenal Cheers rashidi1

I'd had a very successful first season switching between a 4-2-3-1 and 4-1-2-2-1, because those are the systems I perceive Arsenal to use. In season two, we've made more use of the tough tackling brutes I signed in season one to shore up the soft centre at Arsenal by reverting to a 4-3-1-2. My interpretation of the system is fairly different to rashidi1's and I'm not overly happy with my attacking element yet (which is very different!), but the dynamic defensive covering you can get in a system like this is quite excellent to watch. My MC line is BWM (S) - CM (D) - BBM (S). When our attacking full backs advance, the intelligent shuttling across of the outer MCs when attacks break down is superb. The central CM drops to form a narrow diamond on occasions and it's a welcome change from the tactics I employed in my first season.

[Rashidi]

This thread prompted me to give a 4-3-1-2 a go on my new save with Arsenal Cheers rashidi1

I'd had a very successful first season switching between a 4-2-3-1 and 4-1-2-2-1, because those are the systems I perceive Arsenal to use. In season two, we've made more use of the tough tackling brutes I signed in season one to shore up the soft centre at Arsenal by reverting to a 4-3-1-2. My interpretation of the system is fairly different to rashidi1's and I'm not overly happy with my attacking element yet (which is very different!), but the dynamic defensive covering you can get in a system like this is quite excellent to watch. My MC line is BWM (S) - CM (D) - BBM (S). When our attacking full backs advance, the intelligent shuttling across of the outer MCs when attacks break down is superb. The central CM drops to form a narrow diamond on occasions and it's a welcome change from the tactics I employed in my first season.

I am not surprised that you came up with a different combination in fact, when I first started messing with it, I came up with a few. Its all down to personal preference, and you absolutely right the dynamic defensive covering is excellent. In fact I think its even better than the a formation that plays with a dedicated DM which really isn't needed. When I played with systems featuring a DM, I realised that whilst I could get his ratings up, his performances were never pivotal to our success, which led me to the conclusion that that slot was redundant. Pushing into an MC position with a DLP or BWM seemed a better option. And I am glad I did, it all started with me swapping from 4132 to 4312 for those games where teams refused to come out of their half.

The one thing thats got me baffled at times is how wide it can actually play with the right backs. This is probably the first time in a long time that I have stuck with one system. Other systems work as I have shown in this thread, but for me personally the fact that I can attack with 3 strikers is just too good a system to pass up

[Southern Buddie]

Rashidi, if memory serves me right, the 4411 formation used to be a big favourite of yours a couple of FM's ago. Is this still a system you rate highly?

How would you go about setting one up now?

[Rashidi]

Rashidi, if memory serves me right, the 4411 formation used to be a big favourite of yours a couple of FM's ago. Is this still a system you rate highly?

How would you go about setting one up now?

Wow you have a good memory, thats from FM12. The basis for that system was simple, defend like a 442 but play like a 4231. It was a poor mans 4231. If memory serves me right I had set that up so that I would see 2 holding midfielders. Now there are some changes in FM15, most notably how well the wingbacks play. So i would do things slightly differently now. It would probably look like this but played at a normal tempo. I can't see how I could play this on a high tempo since the support players take some time to get up. My shouts would be simple as well, no overlap shout used since the system itself encourages overlapping. Shouts i would use on attacking would include Offside trap, stay on feet and close down more. I would learn this on control and switch over to counter if I needed dropping the close down more shout in the process.

Upfront I would be concerned with the lack of ccc, created. I have used this before but it requires a really strong intelligent DLF to hold up the ball for the rest. The WM are used because they can cut inside as opposed to the rest of the wide men. A 2 man holding midfield is preferred since I want it to play solid in the middle. This system has the luxury of seeing one of those MCs given a support role..because of the solid defensive shape.

This is what I would start with if I were playing a 4411, I'd tweak it slightly, but this would be the overall base,. I would also use this to go an make a system akin to Tony Pullis one but would change the passing patterns...maybe by getting the Koke position to go attacking with a FB(S) behind him but the passing system would be direct overall with a strong player playing upfront.