Adapt, Improvise, Panic - A Tactical Nightmare

[wynter]

Thanks, @Deisler26 

This is going to be a weird ass save. After trying to get some new tactics working and while not altogether being frustrated but slightly unsatisfied I've decided to explore fully optimising my tactics and also trying out some new aspects of strategy. I'm going to run a save where every game I set up with a new tactic. It's a bid to freshen up my FM experience, fully test out some roles I've personally never employed and maybe, just maybe, learn something along the way.

My club of choice since this was just going to be a fun experiment is my favorite football team. 

Also a strong squad with deep numbers, perfect for rotation and tactical flexibility. Issues out wide controlled our transfer window and adding overall quality in the form of Dani Ceballos.

By adjusting tactics, I'm going to alternate between roles and formations, some games may see the same formation, but the player roles will have been changed in a bid to see how those roles have impacted the system. I don't want to become to stagnant though as that removes the initial idea behind the save. So I will be changing up the formations quite regularly testing 3/4/5 man backlines and various bodies in offence and defence as well.

This'll be a match by match career, showing off each tactic I play with and personal thoughts to why I set it up, and whether I could see any positives or negatives through the duration of the match. A slow, but detailed exploration of how to set up systems, keep a fluidity in style (I'm endeavouring to play every game under Control/Attacking) but also a save which will maintain strong results and avoid the sack. 

 

[Jimbokav1971]

This sounds really interesting, but it also sounds that you will have to be quite in-depth in your posting in order to do it justice? 

[wynter]

For Purposes of Flexibility Tactics 1/2/3 have each been given 3 man, 4 man and 5 man backlines. Idea being so long as the backline remains somewhat similar shuffles to the Midfield and Offence shouldn't blunt tactical familiarity too much.

First Tactic I've created is a 3-3-4

I've been wanting to experiment how a system with a lack of wide coverage can operate. With that in mind, it's also a test of how setting the team to both play and defend wider can impact a lack of fullbacks. The questions I was thinking of in its creation were: Will the centrebacks push wide enough to act as LFB's or will the Carrilero be able to work as a shuttler, closing down the wide attacks? With the attacking focus the primary goal is to dominate with our Front 4, and score as many goals as possible, using Belotti and Zaza's talent to pile on the goals.

Our first game of the Season was AC Milan, perhaps not the best team to test this out against but we went through with it anyways.

8th Minute

Highlights show the core of the experiment. When we're attacking it's a 4 on 4, my vision was Falque, Ceballos and Saint-Maximin would all have enough flair to generate an opportunity to sneak through their backline to any one of our attacked. Engineering consistent solid chances. In this instance, Meite moves it to Falque who shakes his marker immediately and lashed it over the bar, just wide.

20th Minute

We push forward and get immediately countered down left.

The onrushing Right Mid highlights a massive problem for me, because as a goalkeeper irl, in this I'd rather have 2 shutting down Piatek and the 3rd being ready for the onrushing winger. Instead the whole team gets dragged across and while they shut down the opportunity, it's not a promising sign if a winger is always going to be free on the counter.

41st Minute - The Own Goal

Nothing really too upsetting here, out Right Centre Back ran out to close down, simple case of a good shot or just **** lack that it bounced off Sirigu. I'd consider this an outlier than anything.

53rd Minute

We counter, on the right we have a flood of options and we pass to Belotti with acres of space. He cracks the post though and we're denied an easy goal.

93rd Minute

Our Carrilero and CB are doing what I wanted, both head out wide to see off Castillejo, however that leaves the other flank open and a quick switch sees them score as Castil heads inside as they move down the right.

Ultimately

Loss, deep into Stoppage time after an own goal was conceded. That being said, the flanks weren't a massive problem all game long with only the last of the highlights and the counter in the 20th being times where Milan were dominating down wide.

We were stronger through the middle but only marginally.

Overall Thoughts

We edged Milan Statistically. Shots and Shots on Target both better. We engineered some solid chances and had a disallowed goal off a corner when Saint-Max was offside. The flanks weren't as big an issue as expected and I've been left with some things to consider.

Ideas

- A Carrilero on the Left > a BBM, added defensive coverage. The initial Installation of a BBM was so I had a 5th option getting forward, acting as a playmaker further up the pitch given DLP's are more stationary. Carrilero on the Left and an AP or an RP to create two holding mids and a more creative playmaker is a potential idea.

- Reducing Offensive Instructions - Sometimes simple is better, slowing the Tempo and perhaps removing Run at Defence and Pass Into Space. Through allowing creative freedom, removing the instructions should further enable my playmakers to create rather than follow a set system of approach could result in more varied and innovative offensive patterns.

Increased Pressing - Press from further up the pitch, putting immediate pressure on the backline. We're already vulnerable on the counter, but perhaps we should accept this weakness and strive to make sure they never get out of their half. It's an idea but could make counters even more lethal if a team manages to break past our frontline.

I think the system did aspects I wanted it to do. My CBs actually did defend against their wingers, or would go out to shut them down. It's vulnerable to rapid movement though as seen through the last goal. Our attacking was good in creating shots, but never really close ones judging by the lack of highlights. Hence thinking changes to our attacking instructions could see better results. I think there's definitely something here and I'm going to revisit it later down the line.

[wynter]

Tactic/Match 2

Rationale

I wanted to create a fully roaming team. The BBM and Regista operate as our effective Centre Midfield due to the Regista's desire to press forward. The 3 Man Backline adds defensive security to make up for the lack of an active ball-winner. However, with Trequartista, CWB's and Raumdeuter all aspects of our side have more licence to roam than usual, even the CBs with Stopper Duty are more likely to press further up field to break up attacks. In fact in our starting ten, the only players that don't have Roam from Position as an innate instruction in their roles are the CBs and Belotti/Zaza. The rest of the side has an already built in mandate to roam to their hearts content not as an instruction instilled by myself but a byproduct of the various roles I've assigned them.

Udinese Match

Defensively it sets up nicely. Even Falque (14) as a Raumdeuter in this highlight is tracking back to defend. I put this to the further encouragement for players to roam, combined with his natural high work-rate leads to him putting in a shift both ways. The 5 Man Backline is actually highly structured and leaves Udinese little room to engineer opportunities.

There's not much the goals point to, fumble by the Keeper is poached by Zaza and the other is a goal from a free-kick. 

Playing out from the back though, shows a very stable midfield. Izzo as the Libero pushes forward and Ceballos/Meite/Lukic are all in positions where they're able to interact with each other.

This play progresses forward

Which leads to something I'm curious about. Aguilar is entirely free out right, even when the ball moves to Ceballos no-one actively ever goes near him to the point where he sits on the edge of the box with space. The question then became with Ceballos being a right-slanted Trequartista, does the Left Back gravitate towards him, or is Aguilar ignored since he's a very high pushing right back?

The answer is the fact he's a right back. His high-pushing nature gave him freedom to roam because Udinese only set up full-backs/WBs

Nuytinck keeps Ceballos in check, while Aguilar isn't ever recognised by Sissoko as a threat until he is given the ball in the 18 yard/regular crossing scenarios. Which highlights the potential for a skilled Wing-back and a Target Man potentially being a devastating combo in this system. Early crosses pumped into the box could be a very reliable way to extract chances. I dislike this style so I never opt for it, but I was noticing it could be something to explore.

Ansaldi and Aguilar also showed their potential by generating this exact chance from both wings 4 times over the course of the match. The complete freedom they were gifted by the opposition something higher quality wingbacks could have dominated this match with.

Only thing stopping a larger scoreline was good keeping/poor finishing.

Overall Thoughts/Ideas

Move the Playmakers to Balance out the side

We were very effective attacking from the left, yet we rarely did. I'm attributing this to Regista and Treq being slanted to the Right side of midfield even with roaming factored. Perhaps moving Ceballos to the middle of the pitch could have helped bring Falque/Ansaldi into the match? Or turning the Left Stopped into a BPD could have also contributed to further play through the left hand side. I moved Ceballos to AMC(R) thinking it'd provide added Room for Falque to cut in. Perhaps it wasn't necessary.

A BWM may be Needed

We barely out possessed Udinese, yet we had what was essentially a 4 man system with much better midfielders. Against better sides we're likely to be dominated for possession and with Juve on the horizon I may need a midfield grafter to give us some steel. Sacrificing a little fluidity for results.

[wynter]

Following the Udinese Match I decided to improvise the ideas I had and shifted a BWM into Midfield amongst other switches.

So the BWM becomes the midfield destroyer, while the RPM comes from deep to accompany him as the main Playmaker. Meanwhile I decided to keep the Trequartista where he is, to function as the 2nd playmaker up top/add creativity to our frontline. 

And what Better Team to Practice Against than Juventus?

 The first goal shows the utility of Ceballos being slightly slanted, drawing defenders away from Belotti allowing him to make an incisive finish. However it also shows Meite and Ceballos can overlap given Cebal coming from behind his RP which gives me an insight about a future decision to make: to either embrace that overlap or instead revise their roles to prevent such a thing from happening.

Juve's reply shows the beginning of a problem which presents over the course of the match. 

Players running towards the back post aren't marked in this formation.

Here it leads to a goal, and in another highlight could have been our undoing.

The 2nd Juve goal was quality, but also one I wasn't pleased with.

TOO MUCH SPACE OUTSIDE THE BOX. Our TI's Demand a high line and urgent pressing yet he had time to load up a shot from the 18 yard line and bury it. Meite does go out to close him but is too slow in the approach. Not sure what can be done about this though on a tactical level, other than sheer bad luck.

On my perfectionist bent I'm going to be very critical, especially about this pass from the back.

As Libero Nkoulou is encouraged to launch balls/make a play when he sees it. However in this instance he bypasses our entire midfield in a Holy Mary pass which wasn't hitting either Belotti or Falque or going to be a great counter since it was veering to the corner flag. I'd be looking at his TI's to see if I can reduce his direct passing/encouraging him to make better use of shorter options.

Ceballos again shows the allure of a slightly slanted player in that he has a ready made channel for players to pass into. We don't get a goal, but this play highlights how effective he and the Trequartista role can be, finding the space which we encourage by not surrounding him with players and drawing attention before using his passing ability to generate chances. As my first time really using the Treq I find it something worth exploration in the future.

Final Score

2-2

For now this ends the roaming midfield experiment. A lack of wide options means players are getting frustrated with a lack of gametime and I'm looking to balance the squads happiness to still maintain results > just pure tactical exploration.

We'll move back to it eventually.