Not very good at this game

[ReadingFan82]

Hello anyone that might read this, hope you are all doing well.

Basically what this post is asking how I would go about creating a tactic for myself and just not nabbing one of a forum or other fm website or something like that. I just don't really know where to start with it and was just wondering if anyone had any pointers on how I could get started. I kinda want to actually feel like its me playing this game and some random anonymous person from the internet who's tactic I have stolen so yeah.

I have saw some people saying leaving the instructions pretty bare could be a good idea so should I try that. Would that work with good players (my Everton save) and on my lesser save (Sunderland)?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Edited July 28, 2020 by ReadingFan82

[skyline72]

Do you have a rough idea how you want your team to play?

Possession?

Counter attacking?

Gegenpress?

[Hilly1979]

5 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Hello anyone that might read this, hope you are all doing well.

Basically what this post is asking how I would go about creating a tactic for myself and just not nabbing one of a forum or other fm website or something like that. I just don't really know where to start with it and was just wondering if anyone had any pointers on how I could get started. I kinda want to actually feel like its me playing this game and some random anonymous person from the internet who's tactic I have stolen so yeah.

I have saw some people saying leaving the instructions pretty bare could be a good idea so should I try that. Would that work with good players (my Everton save) and on my lesser save (Sunderland)?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

A lot of the advice you get here will say you need to think of a style you like and go about replicating it, to me that can be difficult to a newcomer and is trying to run before you can walk.

Have a look at the excellent pairs and combinations thread, it goes about showing how to set up a balanced tactic, if you can get a balanced tactic working you can then add various instructions to define a style of play but to begin with I would just go down the balanced route that suits the players you have.

[FMunderachiever]

7 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Hello anyone that might read this, hope you are all doing well.

Basically what this post is asking how I would go about creating a tactic for myself and just not nabbing one of a forum or other fm website or something like that. I just don't really know where to start with it and was just wondering if anyone had any pointers on how I could get started. I kinda want to actually feel like its me playing this game and some random anonymous person from the internet who's tactic I have stolen so yeah.

I have saw some people saying leaving the instructions pretty bare could be a good idea so should I try that. Would that work with good players (my Everton save) and on my lesser save (Sunderland)?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Not an easy thing to do.

I think as the two teams you mention, the football will be quite generic anyway, you cant really "pin" it down to a defined style where you could say Klopp's Dortmund and early Liverpool were definitely a gegenpress team, Barcelona under pep were THE tiki taka team, Chelsea under Conte had the low block back 3 etc.

I think you have scope for flexibility.

I think its really a case of looking at each role, and then becoming familiar with how they will interact with each other, which you can then use to produce a style that you want.

Most of the "stolen" tactics might work quite well in the game, but theyre not based on logic and wouldn't win an actual game of football. They just seek to overwhelm the opposition with overloads in the attacking third that the AI cant cope with.

It might be best if you create a tactic to start with, then post it and people can look at it and suggest where they would tweak it to make it more effective.

[GianniM]

First of all: make a choice between your Everton and your Sunderland save. You can take on the other in a few weeks but I think for now it'd be better to focus on one save and get deep into that to understand what you're doing. 

Take some pen and paper and write some things down. 

How many players do you have for each position? For example if you have no decent fullbacks you can probably ignore any back four formation. 
What are their main skills? Quick forwards? Then you might opt for a counter style of play where they can make runs behind the defense. Good technique and mentals? Then perhaps possession-oriented. 
Also don't 100% trust the green circle for role and positional suitability, but make your own evaluation based on the player's traits. 
Who do you expect to be your most important players? Create your tactic in such a way that they can shine. 
How do your players compare to the others in the league? If you have strikers with good aerial ability it may be a good idea to get crosses into the box, so you'll need wingers and more attacking fullbacks. 
Are your defenders quick with good positioning or are they slower with good aerial ability? This will define how high you can set your line of defense. 
Work rate and stamina will decide if you can press or not. 

So in short: Make an examination of your players strengths and weaknesses and build your tactic around that. Keep in mind that you need to have a well-balanced tactic: defense, support and attack are equally important. Then post a screenshot here for us to see and help you further. 

As said before, the pairs and combinations guide pinned at the top of this forum is a good guide to help you define your roles and duties, as well as other guides in the pinned threads. 

[ReadingFan82]

8 hours ago, skyline72 said:

Do you have a rough idea how you want your team to play?

Possession?

Counter attacking?

Gegenpress?

To be completely honest not really. I just kinda want a tactic that is gonna be effective but kinda not just overwhelming the AI and screwing the game really. I think I want it to be a fast attacking style like a gegenpress that presses high against the opposition to win the ball back quick. As long as it can be effective in game than I don't really mind, probably a gegenpress would be the best idea considering a lot of people think that it works well on this game.

Thanks for repyling

[ReadingFan82]

3 hours ago, Hilly1979 said:

A lot of the advice you get here will say you need to think of a style you like and go about replicating it, to me that can be difficult to a newcomer and is trying to run before you can walk.

Have a look at the excellent pairs and combinations thread, it goes about showing how to set up a balanced tactic, if you can get a balanced tactic working you can then add various instructions to define a style of play but to begin with I would just go down the balanced route that suits the players you have.

Yeah definitely, just having a mess around with a few of the instructions and seeing how they work and what they actually do so I can try and get my head around it. To be honest at the minute I'm kinda trying to replicate Klopp's style at Liverpool with high pressing, high tempo, high defensive lines etc. Currently playing a 433 with a DM with attacking full backs and inside forwards and that hoping that works. Only played a few friendlies so far so hard to judge but looks okay so far.

That thread sounds like it would be a massive help with understanding how the roles interact to one another. Any chance you could give me a link, having a bit of difficulty of finding the specific one you mean? Once I think I find that I'll have a bit of a better idea how to build on the tactic that I've started.

Thanks for replying

[GianniM]

 

[Justified]

Tbh I still do what I did when I played CM2. I still have pieces of paper with scribbles all over them that I do once I know what my playing staff is and eventually I try and put them into practice

Tbh the game has some good overall pre-sets where you can get ideas of what playing style you want to implement but I'd never recommend playing them "out of the box" as they're terribly unbalanced. Just use them for reference of playing styles.

Once you know what playing style you want you can start analysing what each instruction does and how it effects your tactic (pre-season is a great time to do this). 

[denen123]

1. Assess your team: to know which areas on the pitch you lack players, so you can either buy or if little funds, adapt( i.e, lack of wingers will indicate a narrower tactic is needed, till you've identified a style you want)

2. Acknowledge your squads quality: helps, to determine how you set up instructions & roles. Highline, gengenpress, counter-fluid...etc are all nice & soothing to hear, but can your players pull it off or pull it off in a better way than say, maybe Liverpool? If not, balance it out.

3. Read the pairs & combination thread, as suggested above. Watch bustTheNet videos on YouTube. 

4. Finally, start with bigger teams in poor leagues/even in EPl. You'll learn the mechanics easier without having to reload & loose interest. It can be deceptive, but knowledge of movements & play without having to fall into depression is important.

Welcome to the community🤝🏿

[ReadingFan82]

1 hour ago, FMunderachiever said:

Not an easy thing to do.

I think as the two teams you mention, the football will be quite generic anyway, you cant really "pin" it down to a defined style where you could say Klopp's Dortmund and early Liverpool were definitely a gegenpress team, Barcelona under pep were THE tiki taka team, Chelsea under Conte had the low block back 3 etc.

I think you have scope for flexibility.

I think its really a case of looking at each role, and then becoming familiar with how they will interact with each other, which you can then use to produce a style that you want.

Most of the "stolen" tactics might work quite well in the game, but theyre not based on logic and wouldn't win an actual game of football. They just seek to overwhelm the opposition with overloads in the attacking third that the AI cant cope with.

It might be best if you create a tactic to start with, then post it and people can look at it and suggest where they would tweak it to make it more effective.

Yeah I've kinda noticed that from a lot of tactics people have made. Its never really one specific type its usually a few mixed together, so a gegenpress with a bit of tiki taka etc and it seems to kinda work for a lot of people. I'll figure out how to post the tactic I've came up with and see what you guys think.

[ReadingFan82]

4 hours ago, Justified said:

Tbh I still do what I did when I played CM2. I still have pieces of paper with scribbles all over them that I do once I know what my playing staff is and eventually I try and put them into practice

Tbh the game has some good overall pre-sets where you can get ideas of what playing style you want to implement but I'd never recommend playing them "out of the box" as they're terribly unbalanced. Just use them for reference of playing styles.

Once you know what playing style you want you can start analysing what each instruction does and how it effects your tactic (pre-season is a great time to do this). 

I've not played that long, probably since about FM 15 I think was my first. Remember being Liverpool and having Lambert and Balotelli upfront together what a time. I've kinda been doing that while using other peoples tactics that I've found on forums and stuff like that and jotting down how each one works, what the blatant flaws with it are, how to try and fix/tweak them etc etc.

Yeah I've been playing around with some of the presets to try and see what works for me so far but its just taking time. To be honest its been so long that I haven't played this game without using a downloaded tactic that I've kinda forgot how to figure it out for myself but I'm sure I'll get there at some point.

[ReadingFan82]

5 hours ago, GianniM said:

 

Thank you very much for sending me this will definitely give this a look thank you very very much

[ReadingFan82]

Okay so this is what I've came up with so far on my Sunderland save. I'll try and explain my logic behind what I've came up with as best I can. Bare in mind for this that although Sunderland aren't in the grand scheme of football a really big team in the context of league 1 they are one of the best teams and are actually predicted to win the title outright, at least on this game they are, thus I've came up with a tactic that tries to play on the fact that they are likely to have better players than a lot of the teams that I will play in this league. The idea is the wingbacks overlap and put a lot of crosses into the box for the striker or the inside forward on the opposite side could get to and put the ball in the net. The idea with the DLP defend is so that there isn't a huge amount of space between the defense and midfield that the opposition could exploit and so we have a free midfielder who can just knock the ball off to the more attacking players on the wings or through the middle. I have a big enough squabe able to use this tactic consistently so that shouldn't really be a problem.

I've only used this or 1 game so far and that was a 2-0 win at home in the cup against Gillingham, from the league below, albeit with a very rotated/weakened team. I scored once from a free-kick, once from a corner and didn't seem to create a whole lot of chances but hopefully as the team becomes more used to the tactic it starts to work a bit smoother. 

I've also considered having the 2 centre backs as BPD's instead of standard central defenders, could that be a good idea? I've never really been too sure what the difference is between the 2 and was just wondering if it could work well for me in this sort of team/set up.

[FMunderachiever]

19 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Okay so this is what I've came up with so far on my Sunderland save. I'll try and explain my logic behind what I've came up with as best I can. Bare in mind for this that although Sunderland aren't in the grand scheme of football a really big team in the context of league 1 they are one of the best teams and are actually predicted to win the title outright, at least on this game they are, thus I've came up with a tactic that tries to play on the fact that they are likely to have better players than a lot of the teams that I will play in this league. The idea is the wingbacks overlap and put a lot of crosses into the box for the striker or the inside forward on the opposite side could get to and put the ball in the net. The idea with the DLP defend is so that there isn't a huge amount of space between the defense and midfield that the opposition could exploit and so we have a free midfielder who can just knock the ball off to the more attacking players on the wings or through the middle. I have a big enough squabe able to use this tactic consistently so that shouldn't really be a problem.

I've only used this or 1 game so far and that was a 2-0 win at home in the cup against Gillingham, from the league below, albeit with a very rotated/weakened team. I scored once from a free-kick, once from a corner and didn't seem to create a whole lot of chances but hopefully as the team becomes more used to the tactic it starts to work a bit smoother. 

I've also considered having the 2 centre backs as BPD's instead of standard central defenders, could that be a good idea? I've never really been too sure what the difference is between the 2 and was just wondering if it could work well for me in this sort of team/set up.

My thoughts are, this tactic is a bit EXTREME.

But thats not to say it couldn't work.

Complete wing back is a role many people associate with being the sole wide player, like a wing backs formation. With both of your wing backs set to CWB/A they are going to be barely defending and spending a lot of time high up the pitch. Combined with very aggressive out of possession instructions, i think some teams are going to have a lot of joy down the sides. Itll expose your centre backs.

I think one thing i notice too is, if youre a good team, youll need to look for ways to break opponents down who are awkward.

Playing 2 inside forwards, both on attack, i think youre crowding the middle of the pitch too much and stifling the room your AP has to operate in. also the fact that all your forward players are on attack, i think youre going to detach them from the midfield.

I think one of your wide left/right roles needs to retain some width to open up spaces. Penetration for me could be an issue because the three forward players will be pushed very high against opposition defences who will look to deny the space through the middle.

One other thing is, i would not be playing work ball into box and shorter passing with an extremely high tempo.

High tempo would essentially be whoever gets hold of the ball immediately looks for an attacking transition and goes back to front quickly. With the playmaker in there, i would assume you want to utilise his skills in unlocking defences, even though i dont know who he is.

Quicker is not always better. If youre intending to work the ball into the box, this suggests a patient approach where you are prioritising keeping the ball and passing your way through your opponents. Selecting this instruction will mean the wing backs will get high up the pitch but you are telling them NOT to cross the ball.

 

This doesnt meant to say however, your tactic will not work. Give it some games and note down if you see patterns emerging.

It may be that this tactic is SO aggressive, it takes opponents by surprise at first and you overachieve initially, but the opposition will gradually adjust to that, so be aware.

But it may be that its a good tactic, there are many variables. Watch some matches now, and then report back with some trends

[Darien]

I've found that CWB-at + IF-Su is enough to have many centers and overlapping, so overlap instruction is redundant.

Edited July 28, 2020 by Darien

[ReadingFan82]

Yeah I'm not quite sure this is going to be a goer for me. Played the second game against Bristol Rovers away, who are 16th, and lost 3-0. Created nothing all game. Really really bad. Nothing worked at all it seemed in that game. Conceded twice from a free kick, got a man sent off, everything was just awful. Should have beaten them easily, no way I should be losing to a team like that. Really poor stuff from me with that one there. Still early days but not too promising I must say...

[FMunderachiever]

10 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Yeah I'm not quite sure this is going to be a goer for me. Played the second game against Bristol Rovers away, who are 16th, and lost 3-0. Created nothing all game. Really really bad. Nothing worked at all it seemed in that game. Conceded twice from a free kick, got a man sent off, everything was just awful. Should have beaten them easily, no way I should be losing to a team like that. Really poor stuff from me with that one there. Still early days but not too promising I must say...

I think your main problem is going be retaining a degree of control over the game. Your instructions are trying to do everything frantically...players receiving the ball and then in their head youre asking them to look for a killer pass immediately.

Then the move breaks down, then you want them to hunt the ball relentlessly to get it back. The opposition is going sometimes be able to beat your press and play down the sides, OR play an over the top ball against your high line to a fast striker.

The red card......id speculate its a combination of your use of tight marking, the player is getting beaten, he has to recover, hes meant to close down, he makes tackles he shouldnt really make, he gives away fouls and then he is sent off. Like his tackles are last ditch because he has been beaten by the opponent.

This is what im speculating is the case. Its hard to give absolute answers like pick this player with this role, but the tactic could be problematic

[skyline72]

The tactic you last posted is too aggressive.

Attacking mentality with extremely high tempo?!

Maybe I shall rephrase my last questions about how you want your team to play, to which team do you enjoy watching with?

[GianniM]

1 hour ago, ReadingFan82 said:

they are likely to have better players than a lot of the teams that I will play in this league

You can actually compare your team to others in the league under the Team Report tab: 

[GianniM]

I second everything @FMunderachiever has said. 

You're telling basically everyone except your centre backs and the DLP to attack. Even the BBM although he has support duty will run forward, especially with an attacking team mentality. On top of that your team instructions are very attacking too. So everyone will be running forward like mad men without anyone being able to recycle a lost ball or available for a simple pass when there are no other options. 

So try to get some more balance in your team. 

And I don't think you need two central playmakers. 

Try to get some more variation in your attack too. The two IFs, the BBM and the AP will all move into the central space behind the PF. Try a few roles that will move in different directions to stretch the play more. 

[ReadingFan82]

Okay so there seems to be a pretty common theme with a lot of your criticisms of this one by me. I thought going so attacking with my team meant that I could possibly be able to overload the opposition down the but after looking at what you guys had said, and then giving it a try in a few games, it was pretty obvious that was not going to work as I had hoped it would. Even though a lot of you had said it wouldn't work I thought I'd give it a go anyway which I now know was a pretty bad idea, but hey-ho, hindsight's 20-20 isn't it? I've saw a lot of you say I needed more than the center halves and the DM to stay back, would another full back playing as an out and out defender possibly be enough to help that problem or do I need something a little more drastic compared to that? Could it work having one really attacking wing and focusing the play down there and having one that is less offensive? Or is it the midfield that needs to be made more defensive?

Given a few tweaks a go and will continue to do so. Lowering tempo a bit could help to try and get a bit of a control into the game for example, maybe going positive with a standard/positive mentality could possibly be an idea? To be honest still really getting my head around a lot of the instructions and what they actually do in a game as of yet, I'm a slow learner. Still struggling to get anything going going at the minute but fingers crossed.

I'm going to carry on looking through the guides and other peoples posts on this and other sites and try and get better at this game by knowing how it all works a bit better, but I'd still be really appreciative if any of you would be happy to link me some more reading.

As I said in my original post I'm a bit of a newbie to this so I'll probably before I start to begin to make something that looks like a coherent, potentially successful tactic so bare with me. Once again thanks for all the help

[ReadingFan82]

On 28/07/2020 at 19:32, skyline72 said:

The tactic you last posted is too aggressive.

Attacking mentality with extremely high tempo?!

Maybe I shall rephrase my last questions about how you want your team to play, to which team do you enjoy watching with?

To be honest its probably not much help but Liverpool? Obviously gonna be difficult to recreate that with pretty much any other team due to how good they are but you know what I mean. A team that is strong and stable at the back, gets the ball forward quick on the counter and creates a fair few chances from all over the pitch. To be honest I don't watch to much footy irl apart from my own team so I'm probably not the best person to ask haha

[GianniM]

9 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Could it work having one really attacking wing and focusing the play down there and having one that is less offensive?

Usually it's best to find balance - so a covering fullback on one side coupled with an attacking winger, and an attacking fullback on the other side coupled with a support duty teammate in front of him. It creates a more dynamic play and ensures better defensive stability at the same time. 

Also remember that it is an option to leave some TIs blank as well - it's not either a or b, you can choose not to use an instruction as well or just leave it to standard - then it will be dependent on your team mentality. 

9 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

I'd still be really appreciative if any of you would be happy to link me some more reading

Addicted to FM (google it) has some very good articles as well. 

Edited July 30, 2020 by GianniM

[Fatkidscantjump]

Hi, as someone kinda new to tactics myself, I think the tactic you posted demonstrate a common misconception about duties. It actually kinda looks like some of the tactics I created myself a week or so ago when I started learning about all this stuff.

Basically when you want someone to attack you set him up in a Attack duty. But eventually you want almost everyone on your team to be attacking at some point, so you end up with way too much attacking duties, which will split your team in half and leave disorganized and very vulnerable.

What was useful to me was thinking about duties like this : who will be a runner, and who will help the runners. For example, in your tactic, you might want an Inside Forward to run into spaces from the side, so he can receive a through ball. So that means he would be on an attacking duty. But then since he will be making a run forward and end up in the penalty area, you would want your striker to be on a Support duty. That means he will try to either create space for your Inside Forward by dropping a bit deeper and drawing defenders to him, and / or support the inside forward when he gets the ball by providing a passing option.

As other people said, it's usually better to have asymmetric threats so your play is less predictable by the opposition. But, regardless of that, two inside forwards in Attack duty could potentially work, but you would need a Striker acting as a F9 or a Deep Lying Forward(support). Otherwise you will have 3 players in the penalty area without anyone to help them for a while, since your midfield is set on a Support duty and will take a little while to get there.

One thing I found works well is having one Attack duty per line (attackers/winger - midfield - defense), and the rest of the team in a Support or Defend role. That way you have 3 separate threats that will attack space from different angles (for example, an Inside forward (attack), a Central midfielder(attack), and a Wingback(attack)).

But thats just one way to set up your attack, keep in mind all of this is influenced by your team mentality. So for example if you set your team mentality to Attacking your players with a Support duty will have a more attacking mentality, so you can make a tactic work with only one Attack duty overall, or even none.

Its all about achieving balance. I suggest you read the Roles and Combinations guide by llama3, this was super useful to me. And aslo ratemytactic.web.app can help you spot flaws in your tactic. And also more importantly don't be afraid to start new games and experiment a lot.

[FMunderachiever]

18 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Okay so there seems to be a pretty common theme with a lot of your criticisms of this one by me. I thought going so attacking with my team meant that I could possibly be able to overload the opposition down the but after looking at what you guys had said, and then giving it a try in a few games, it was pretty obvious that was not going to work as I had hoped it would. Even though a lot of you had said it wouldn't work I thought I'd give it a go anyway which I now know was a pretty bad idea, but hey-ho, hindsight's 20-20 isn't it? I've saw a lot of you say I needed more than the center halves and the DM to stay back, would another full back playing as an out and out defender possibly be enough to help that problem or do I need something a little more drastic compared to that? Could it work having one really attacking wing and focusing the play down there and having one that is less offensive? Or is it the midfield that needs to be made more defensive?

Given a few tweaks a go and will continue to do so. Lowering tempo a bit could help to try and get a bit of a control into the game for example, maybe going positive with a standard/positive mentality could possibly be an idea? To be honest still really getting my head around a lot of the instructions and what they actually do in a game as of yet, I'm a slow learner. Still struggling to get anything going going at the minute but fingers crossed.

I'm going to carry on looking through the guides and other peoples posts on this and other sites and try and get better at this game by knowing how it all works a bit better, but I'd still be really appreciative if any of you would be happy to link me some more reading.

As I said in my original post I'm a bit of a newbie to this so I'll probably before I start to begin to make something that looks like a coherent, potentially successful tactic so bare with me. Once again thanks for all the help

I think theres too much to suggest that can give you ABSOLUTES with the game, as tactics are a very fluid thing, different options can work, different instructions can work.

Just by listening to your observations about how youd like your team to play and that youd like to have them playing similar to Liverpool then a few things would stand out to me:

1) in terms of roles, an absolutely KEY role for Liverpool is the Firmino role. Hes a striker...but hes not the main goal threat. His role is to link play and come deep, to create room for Mane and Salah to exploit. I think this is a good example of finding penetration in attack.

2) Liverpool's style of play is not one that is suited to "playmakers" as such. When you think playmaker, you think of a player who is central to the creativity of the team. Youre thinking....Pirlo. Alonso. Ozil. David Silva to name a few. The play goes through them, they attract the ball. The same thing happens in the game, playmakers attract the ball. you probably dont need one. But you CAN design the player you want with instructions, by selecting "central midfielder" for example

3) Pay attention to player traits. If you have a wing back with a trait of "gets forward at every opportunity" then, if you set him to an attacking role, you may disrupt the balance of the team. Think about useful preferred moves for your players. Perhaps it would be good to have one full back who likes to hit early crosses for example. Liverpool certainly use a switch of play very often, so could you train these PPMs in your players? dragging your opponent over to one side of the pitch, switch of play, BINGO

4) You mention being useful on the counter attack. In order to do that, youre going to have to let the opposition come onto you, so you ideally need the line of engagement to be lower so the opposition come further up the field. So then it might be an idea to make the team more COMPACT by having less space between the defensive line, and line of engagement. Stay compact, nick the ball, play into the space left behind.

 

These are just some ideas to get you thinking about the game and instructions. You could be successful 5 different ways so its not a magic formula of do this and youll definitely be good, but hopefully it might help provoke thought about the instructions you use

[ReadingFan82]

Right I've been trying a few things and I genuinely have no idea what I'm doing wrong, can't get anything to work properly. I've tried reading through all the guides and stuff but I have no way of taking all of that stuff in and there's so much that just contradicts other things in it and just puts me in a spin completely.

So fed up of this game winds me so much. Nothing I do seems to work an keep losing to ridiculous teams, I lost to one that hadn't won in 15 games or something ridiculous like that at home and I felt there was noting I could have done to stop it whatsoever, like the game just decided I'd lose for no reason. Every team that's been on a bad run seems to magically end it against me for some reason no matter how bad they are in comparison to mine and no matter how many games they've lost on the spin. I put my CB's to CD's cause there bad on the ball and the amount of time they give the ball away still by getting tackled genuinely infuriates me, what am I even meant to do about this? All my players are just brain dead, what am I even meant to do when they do some of the ridiculous things they decide to do when they get on the ball. My team just does nothing I tell them too and just decides to always do the stupidest things possible at the given time to screw me over. So close to being done with this game, get absolutely nothing from it whatsoever but frustration. All it does is put me in a crap mood because of its pure bs and nonsense. I used to actually like this game but now it just does everything in its ability to p*ss me off royally and I'm not far off being done with it for good. Get no enjoyment out of it anymore. I just have no idea what to do on this bleeding thing

[FMunderachiever]

1 hour ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Right I've been trying a few things and I genuinely have no idea what I'm doing wrong, can't get anything to work properly. I've tried reading through all the guides and stuff but I have no way of taking all of that stuff in and there's so much that just contradicts other things in it and just puts me in a spin completely.

So fed up of this game winds me so much. Nothing I do seems to work an keep losing to ridiculous teams, I lost to one that hadn't won in 15 games or something ridiculous like that at home and I felt there was noting I could have done to stop it whatsoever, like the game just decided I'd lose for no reason. Every team that's been on a bad run seems to magically end it against me for some reason no matter how bad they are in comparison to mine and no matter how many games they've lost on the spin. I put my CB's to CD's cause there bad on the ball and the amount of time they give the ball away still by getting tackled genuinely infuriates me, what am I even meant to do about this? All my players are just brain dead, what am I even meant to do when they do some of the ridiculous things they decide to do when they get on the ball. My team just does nothing I tell them too and just decides to always do the stupidest things possible at the given time to screw me over. So close to being done with this game, get absolutely nothing from it whatsoever but frustration. All it does is put me in a crap mood because of its pure bs and nonsense. I used to actually like this game but now it just does everything in its ability to p*ss me off royally and I'm not far off being done with it for good. Get no enjoyment out of it anymore. I just have no idea what to do on this bleeding thing

Your results seem not too bad to me? 3rd in table, not so bad.

Im interested as to why you choose the roles and instructions that you do.

For example, we see an overall team mentality of balanced, but you are using higher tempo again and hit early crosses.

This indicates to me youre caught between wanting to control the game and be patient, and counter attacking.

If its the former you seek, then it wouldnt make a lot of sense to be using the higher tempo and the early crosses. When a wide player receives the ball, do you want their first thought to be "get the ball up to the target man" rather than assess their options? because if they play up to the front two (the target man will attract the ball), then theyll probably be outnumbered by the opponents back line UNLESS they play a high line themself (unlikely if youre the better team) and you can drop it in behind the back line.

If the latter is what you want, then youd need pace up front to latch onto the through balls, but it wouldnt make sense to have your line of engagement and defensive line higher. youd need to drop the lines lower to allow the space to play the direct passes.

So i think youre caught between two thoughts there.

I dont think the roles are too bad in the team, but you look quite one dimensional so penetration is again an issue i think. Why not have one of the forwards come deep, whilst a runner runs past him? there are different combinations of roles to achieve this. Youve also got 2 out and out wingers....could you add some variety into your play by having a wide man looking to come inside maybe to get to the back post to meet a cross or to encourge the full back to overlap and try and get some 2 v 1s going down that side?

Also, with regards to pressing and the counter press, i get that youre taking inspiration from Liverpool. Who wouldnt. But the way youre playing, youre playing a higher tempo again with early crosses. this means that youre playing a lot of low percentage passes. So youre going to lose possession from a lot of these passes.

But youre then telling your players to IMMEDIATELY try and win the ball back (with the counter press) and youre telling your players to use extremely urgent pressing, ie get in the opponents face constantly.

By having everyone running towards the person in possession so aggressively, youre probably creating gaps in your own team, that the opponent can knock the ball around you. If you push up with higher lines and press really hard, youre going to either hurry the opposition into a pass, which is quite likely to be one into the space youre leaving behind your defence = big danger, OR if you happen to play a good team that are composed and have good off the ball movement, they will find a way to pass their way around you.

Dont be so aggressive! it seems natural because i think in your mind, you want to "dominate" your opponent, but i think you are contributing to your own downfall in doing this. You dont necessarily need your entire team to press urgently, you can select certain players to do it for you. But you can also turn the pressing down and make your TEAM SHAPE more difficult to break down, by ensuring its harder to play through your formation.

I appreciate there is a lot to think about. I dont think youre THAT far off. 3rd place in April, seems decent to me

[ReadingFan82]

19 minutes ago, FMunderachiever said:

Your results seem not too bad to me? 3rd in table, not so bad.

Im interested as to why you choose the roles and instructions that you do.

For example, we see an overall team mentality of balanced, but you are using higher tempo again and hit early crosses.

This indicates to me youre caught between wanting to control the game and be patient, and counter attacking.

If its the former you seek, then it wouldnt make a lot of sense to be using the higher tempo and the early crosses. When a wide player receives the ball, do you want their first thought to be "get the ball up to the target man" rather than assess their options? because if they play up to the front two (the target man will attract the ball), then theyll probably be outnumbered by the opponents back line UNLESS they play a high line themself (unlikely if youre the better team) and you can drop it in behind the back line.

If the latter is what you want, then youd need pace up front to latch onto the through balls, but it wouldnt make sense to have your line of engagement and defensive line higher. youd need to drop the lines lower to allow the space to play the direct passes.

So i think youre caught between two thoughts there.

I dont think the roles are too bad in the team, but you look quite one dimensional so penetration is again an issue i think. Why not have one of the forwards come deep, whilst a runner runs past him? there are different combinations of roles to achieve this. Youve also got 2 out and out wingers....could you add some variety into your play by having a wide man looking to come inside maybe to get to the back post to meet a cross or to encourge the full back to overlap and try and get some 2 v 1s going down that side?

Also, with regards to pressing and the counter press, i get that youre taking inspiration from Liverpool. Who wouldnt. But the way youre playing, youre playing a higher tempo again with early crosses. this means that youre playing a lot of low percentage passes. So youre going to lose possession from a lot of these passes.

But youre then telling your players to IMMEDIATELY try and win the ball back (with the counter press) and youre telling your players to use extremely urgent pressing, ie get in the opponents face constantly.

By having everyone running towards the person in possession so aggressively, youre probably creating gaps in your own team, that the opponent can knock the ball around you. If you push up with higher lines and press really hard, youre going to either hurry the opposition into a pass, which is quite likely to be one into the space youre leaving behind your defence = big danger, OR if you happen to play a good team that are composed and have good off the ball movement, they will find a way to pass their way around you.

Dont be so aggressive! it seems natural because i think in your mind, you want to "dominate" your opponent, but i think you are contributing to your own downfall in doing this. You dont necessarily need your entire team to press urgently, you can select certain players to do it for you. But you can also turn the pressing down and make your TEAM SHAPE more difficult to break down, by ensuring its harder to play through your formation.

I appreciate there is a lot to think about. I dont think youre THAT far off. 3rd place in April, seems decent to me

Sorry mate but after looking over this I've only realized that this is a bit of an essay so sorry about that. Also sorry for putting such a ragey post up on the thread, considered taking it down and probably will do later on but to be honest Peterborough at home nearly had me my fist through the laptop. Thanks for such a helpful, measured response to my incoherent furious ramblings. Thank you again.

Yeah 3rd isn't terrible but my board wanted me to win the league and the media prediction was for me to come first as well so to be honest I thought anything far below that was underachieving massively. I've finished the season now, was 2nd going into the final day, knowing that just avoiding defeat would see me promoted, of course preceding to go 2-0 within 5 minutes to my Rotherham and then going onto loss the game 3-0, finishing 3rd. Ironically, the win for Rotherham pushed them to 6th, meaning I'd play them in the playoffs, which of course I then lost to them as well, 1-0 over the 2 legs, meaning I'm stuck in league one for another long, long season. I know it might sound weird, but it wasn't really the league position that was winding me up, but losing to stupid teams, not having a way to get back into a game, not having an idea how to see it a game for an easy win. There are so many games in that season that I look back on just so frustrated on how I didn't win knowing that just 1 more point would have put me up automatically. I don't really think my team coming 3rd is a very good representation of how they actually played for big chunks of the season.

To be honest I'm caught between a lot of things. Not really sure how I want my team to play in all honesty, which is a big problem. I just want them to be effective as possible, but I'm really struggling to find things that I think are going to/are working at any point in time. I tweak too much definitely but sometimes its quite hard to not tweak when my team don't seem to be playing well or they sometimes don't even seem to be following the instructions I tell them to do. Whether or not that's to do with me having too many or contradictory instructions is another thing but I'm just still getting to grips with this game. I think because my team was predicted to do so well and is better than a lot of the other teams in the league I kinda want to try and control the games I play but I could never seem to find a way to do it while actually creating chances that are good. My team seemed to be incapable of creating good chances for themselves but seemed to go only give the opposition near sitters. I'd win games having way more shots but I couldn't complain because there 2 shots on goal were actually good, well-worked opportunities, while my team with 65% possession and 20 shots on goal didn't really create a whole lot that was actually noteworthy. Could this be a problem with the playmakers/'s?

To be honest the early crosses was just trying to find a way to make use of Lafferty who I had up front who I thought could have worked well as a target man getting on the end of crosses but it didn't seem to work all too well. I was just trying to work with what I had available to me really. Yeah know your explaining it to me I kinda see all the problems with trying to use this sort of tactic. My problem was is that my 3 strikers where Lafferty, Grigg and Ross McCormack, meaning I essentially just kinda had 3 quite slow poachers who wouldn't really be able to do anything that involved too much technical ability and athleticism, essentially just being there to put in the chances, which would have been fine if I' figured out how to create some good ones. Not pacey or really good on the ball meaning that beating a line probably wouldn't be in their locker necessarily. Is the general idea something I should keep in mind in case i get up to the Championship at some point and would be against better teams with higher lines or just a complete no-go?

With the high lines I've just saw so many people use them almost as a default at this point that I just kinda thought they were a must without giving it any thought myself but it would seem they more of a hindrance to me more than anything. I do genuinely think a huge problem was the quality of my starting center backs, really slow, bad on the ball, always seemed to lose their man in almost every situation. I'm in the summer now and I'm going to have a pretty big revamp all over but I think at the back will be where most of my money is going to be spent. I think the problem is that my squad is really old, a lot of them on big money with no one interested, meaning I'm stuck with a gang of old players on quite a wage. Hopefully I'll find a way to shift a lot of them out. If I'm not able to get some more mobile center backs though I definitely will not be going above standard in most games though.

Yeah penetration was definitely an issue. Gonna play about with some asymmetrical kinda ideas during the off season and hopefully come up with something that's balanced and creates opportunities for my team to put away. Would it be okay to send you some of them when I've had a bit of a play around? Kinda want to do something with an inside forward and a winger for the wide attackers maybe with a more attacking full back on the inside forwards side maybe? Just gonna play around with it. Definitely know I want a 4 at the back, but just torn between what to do with the midfield and attack as of yet. Looking at a 4-2-3-1, 4-3-3 with a DM, 4-2-2-2 or a flat 4-4-2 like the previous one but not too sure which would give me a good balance. I do have the feeling though that the 4-2-2-2 would leave me not a whole lot in the midfield though. And yeah I've been trying to create overlaps but my full backs never seem to do it a whole lot, maybe because the winger is already kinda occupying the space that I want them to run into maybe?

That makes sense on the pressing as well. Maybe if I had a slower more measured tempo with quite a heavy press that could be a bit more successful for me? Getting countered was a huge issue for me defensively so your onto something there. I know having a lower tempo would stop giving the ball away so much, especially if I had work ball into box on as well as that. Would you say i should put it onto regroup or just leave it blank and hope my individual players make the right decision by themselves?

I think that's one of the things. I tried to double down almost, I was getting cut open too easy and I thought, for some reason, that going more offensive and aggressive could somehow help. I do find though that my team just seems to get broke down too easy, so much space in the hole between the defense and midfield and so much space out wide as well where I usually get ragged all over the place by their wide players. That's why at the min I think I'm leaning towards a 4-3-3 with a DM, or even just a flat midfield 3, just try and crowd it with bodies to try and plug all the gaps that previously I had been leaving, but just not quite sure the impact that could have on my attacking more offensive side of things and how I could transition well on the counter from that, maybe not having enough bodies to do so.

Just 2 more little things quickly. I had a problem with my center backs getting caught on the ball far too often and far too easily, despite not having them as ball players knowing they weren't technically good enough to be able to play that role. Is there anything I can do to try and counter these high pressing sides and stop my defenders giving the ball away so easily to the opposition? Also would having the work ball into box instruction prevent my wide players being able to cross the ball into the box?

I think that's the thing with me on this game. There's so many instructions that all link and all have so many problems that could come from them and I'm just struggling to weigh up the pluses and negatives from each one at the minute.

No I wasn't too far off at all really. Sure I can make a huge improvement on it next season though with a few better players and a better understanding for how I actually play this game. Hoping to win the league or at least go up automatically, I've been given a fair bit of money considering I'm Sunderland, I did get new owners thank god, so hopefully I can improve where I need to. 

[FMunderachiever]

12 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Sorry mate but after looking over this I've only realized that this is a bit of an essay so sorry about that. Also sorry for putting such a ragey post up on the thread, considered taking it down and probably will do later on but to be honest Peterborough at home nearly had me my fist through the laptop. Thanks for such a helpful, measured response to my incoherent furious ramblings. Thank you again.

Yeah 3rd isn't terrible but my board wanted me to win the league and the media prediction was for me to come first as well so to be honest I thought anything far below that was underachieving massively. I've finished the season now, was 2nd going into the final day, knowing that just avoiding defeat would see me promoted, of course preceding to go 2-0 within 5 minutes to my Rotherham and then going onto loss the game 3-0, finishing 3rd. Ironically, the win for Rotherham pushed them to 6th, meaning I'd play them in the playoffs, which of course I then lost to them as well, 1-0 over the 2 legs, meaning I'm stuck in league one for another long, long season. I know it might sound weird, but it wasn't really the league position that was winding me up, but losing to stupid teams, not having a way to get back into a game, not having an idea how to see it a game for an easy win. There are so many games in that season that I look back on just so frustrated on how I didn't win knowing that just 1 more point would have put me up automatically. I don't really think my team coming 3rd is a very good representation of how they actually played for big chunks of the season.

To be honest I'm caught between a lot of things. Not really sure how I want my team to play in all honesty, which is a big problem. I just want them to be effective as possible, but I'm really struggling to find things that I think are going to/are working at any point in time. I tweak too much definitely but sometimes its quite hard to not tweak when my team don't seem to be playing well or they sometimes don't even seem to be following the instructions I tell them to do. Whether or not that's to do with me having too many or contradictory instructions is another thing but I'm just still getting to grips with this game. I think because my team was predicted to do so well and is better than a lot of the other teams in the league I kinda want to try and control the games I play but I could never seem to find a way to do it while actually creating chances that are good. My team seemed to be incapable of creating good chances for themselves but seemed to go only give the opposition near sitters. I'd win games having way more shots but I couldn't complain because there 2 shots on goal were actually good, well-worked opportunities, while my team with 65% possession and 20 shots on goal didn't really create a whole lot that was actually noteworthy. Could this be a problem with the playmakers/'s?

To be honest the early crosses was just trying to find a way to make use of Lafferty who I had up front who I thought could have worked well as a target man getting on the end of crosses but it didn't seem to work all too well. I was just trying to work with what I had available to me really. Yeah know your explaining it to me I kinda see all the problems with trying to use this sort of tactic. My problem was is that my 3 strikers where Lafferty, Grigg and Ross McCormack, meaning I essentially just kinda had 3 quite slow poachers who wouldn't really be able to do anything that involved too much technical ability and athleticism, essentially just being there to put in the chances, which would have been fine if I' figured out how to create some good ones. Not pacey or really good on the ball meaning that beating a line probably wouldn't be in their locker necessarily. Is the general idea something I should keep in mind in case i get up to the Championship at some point and would be against better teams with higher lines or just a complete no-go?

With the high lines I've just saw so many people use them almost as a default at this point that I just kinda thought they were a must without giving it any thought myself but it would seem they more of a hindrance to me more than anything. I do genuinely think a huge problem was the quality of my starting center backs, really slow, bad on the ball, always seemed to lose their man in almost every situation. I'm in the summer now and I'm going to have a pretty big revamp all over but I think at the back will be where most of my money is going to be spent. I think the problem is that my squad is really old, a lot of them on big money with no one interested, meaning I'm stuck with a gang of old players on quite a wage. Hopefully I'll find a way to shift a lot of them out. If I'm not able to get some more mobile center backs though I definitely will not be going above standard in most games though.

Yeah penetration was definitely an issue. Gonna play about with some asymmetrical kinda ideas during the off season and hopefully come up with something that's balanced and creates opportunities for my team to put away. Would it be okay to send you some of them when I've had a bit of a play around? Kinda want to do something with an inside forward and a winger for the wide attackers maybe with a more attacking full back on the inside forwards side maybe? Just gonna play around with it. Definitely know I want a 4 at the back, but just torn between what to do with the midfield and attack as of yet. Looking at a 4-2-3-1, 4-3-3 with a DM, 4-2-2-2 or a flat 4-4-2 like the previous one but not too sure which would give me a good balance. I do have the feeling though that the 4-2-2-2 would leave me not a whole lot in the midfield though. And yeah I've been trying to create overlaps but my full backs never seem to do it a whole lot, maybe because the winger is already kinda occupying the space that I want them to run into maybe?

That makes sense on the pressing as well. Maybe if I had a slower more measured tempo with quite a heavy press that could be a bit more successful for me? Getting countered was a huge issue for me defensively so your onto something there. I know having a lower tempo would stop giving the ball away so much, especially if I had work ball into box on as well as that. Would you say i should put it onto regroup or just leave it blank and hope my individual players make the right decision by themselves?

I think that's one of the things. I tried to double down almost, I was getting cut open too easy and I thought, for some reason, that going more offensive and aggressive could somehow help. I do find though that my team just seems to get broke down too easy, so much space in the hole between the defense and midfield and so much space out wide as well where I usually get ragged all over the place by their wide players. That's why at the min I think I'm leaning towards a 4-3-3 with a DM, or even just a flat midfield 3, just try and crowd it with bodies to try and plug all the gaps that previously I had been leaving, but just not quite sure the impact that could have on my attacking more offensive side of things and how I could transition well on the counter from that, maybe not having enough bodies to do so.

Just 2 more little things quickly. I had a problem with my center backs getting caught on the ball far too often and far too easily, despite not having them as ball players knowing they weren't technically good enough to be able to play that role. Is there anything I can do to try and counter these high pressing sides and stop my defenders giving the ball away so easily to the opposition? Also would having the work ball into box instruction prevent my wide players being able to cross the ball into the box?

I think that's the thing with me on this game. There's so many instructions that all link and all have so many problems that could come from them and I'm just struggling to weigh up the pluses and negatives from each one at the minute.

No I wasn't too far off at all really. Sure I can make a huge improvement on it next season though with a few better players and a better understanding for how I actually play this game. Hoping to win the league or at least go up automatically, I've been given a fair bit of money considering I'm Sunderland, I did get new owners thank god, so hopefully I can improve where I need to. 

im not too familiar with Sunderland, so i might get them loaded and see how id set up with them, always interesting to compare ideas.

To take the points one by one id say:

1) Highlighting games where you have 60%+ possession and 20+ shots on goal but are not coming away with the result.... this is frustrating undoubtedly. What i would suspect youd be seeing is, your opponents who dont have as many opportunities or as much possession get BETTER chances on goal than you do, hence they take them. I wouldnt be surprised if this was happening, as with higher tempo there is a POSSIBILITY your players are rushing their decisions and not considering their options, so they are taking an aggressive option each time and that COULD be shooting. You may also have players who have player traits like "shoots from distance" which are affecting this. So its something to look out for.

 

2) I think the early crosses are something to use selectively. If youre really targeting an opponents weakness in terms of getting in behind them, and you have a distinct advantage in off the ball and acceleration compared to the defenders, then i think theres some merit. Late in the game too, if youre trying to overload the final third and go route one then early crosses might be an option too. As a starting strategy, im not sure though. I dont think that will help you as i think itll be more difficult to get players up in support of your forwards.

 

3) Lots of people use high lines of engagement and extreme levels of pressing because there is an arguable benefit in overwhelming the opposition by the intensity of the pressing. Gegenpress type tactics are often said to be overpowered in their effectiveness. Maybe that is true, and you could build a tactic around extreme pressing if set up in a balanced way. But there are also many ways to be successful, its not the only option you have.

 

4) Asymetric tactics are a good choice to use if looking to develop overloads in one part of the pitch. It might be difficult however to retain the defensive shape youre looking for by using a "lop sided" formation. I have used them though and its definitely a possibility.

 

5) In terms of style of play, you dont need to micromanage the performance too much. For example counter attacking....if you dont tick the counter attack box, it wont mean your players dont attempt counter attacks, it just means they are more selective about when they go for the counter attack. People tick work ball into box as if it will cure all their issues with long shots, not necessarily, player traits and the overall set up also plays a part. does a player have options around him? if not, he might well shoot as his ONLY option. By using less instructions, or even NO instructions initially, you can see the effect of each instruction on a game and if needs be you can change a performance by selectively adding an instruction here and there.

 

6) The collapse..... I would think the major issue there is down to your players "hidden" attributes. Some of your players may not handle pressure well. they might have low composure and decisions (you can see these), they might not enjoy big games either. you can see these things on their report cards but theres not a value attached to them, so theyre hidden. If you think back to last season, as manager could you sense CERTAIN players were more reliable than others when you really needed them? also, as manager, what did you do to make them feel more comfortable? did you try and tell them to enjoy themselves? did you cool things down in the media? or did  you increase the pressure on them with what you were saying and doing to them? watch out for that

 

7) Your defenders being caught in possession.....they almost certainly have low levels of composure, vision, technique and decisions. It takes them longer to choose options and their low level of technique doesnt allow them to pull passes of. It might be better just to switch one of them to "no nonsense centre back" so their style of play is very much safety first, play passes forward, dont lose the ball in a bad area, allow your strikers to hold the ball up to get others into play. You can run "play from defence" sessions in training though and this might help. You could also put your defenders on individual training routines to improve their passing if wanting to implement a play out from the back style.

 

Its very difficult to give absolute answers and say "do this" but there are usually reasons for whats happening, little tweaks can make a big difference.

 

I think ill get Sunderland on the go and have a look at their players

[CaptCanuck]

@ReadingFan82 - just how bad are your centre backs on the ball for the league? Could one of them still be a BPD? As FMu states, maybe they are simply not up to it? In which case that's transfer priority 1.

I remember in my first season with Brighton, I had Duffy as a CD to go with Dunk as BPD and there were too many highlights where he'd just hoof the ball and it would lead to an easy counter and scoring chance for the opposition. Balls played to Dunk largely turned out fine. Fortunately I could drop him for Webster and that was that, but I can sympathise with the rubbish CD play.

I see you're trying to bypass them all together with Distribute to Playmaker :-) I tried that for a bit one season and didn't see much good come from it. If your keeper is 1/2 decent, short kicks should see him knock it around reasonably safely to the FB/WBs and MF and maybe avoid putting your centre backs in harms way. That said, Scowen and Power should show for the centre backs. When you look at Match Analysis > Player Analysis do you see a lot of intercepted passes from them? Maybe those are the only real screw ups in the match and it looks worse than it is?

At least a poor season was still a playoff spot, so just need a small improvement and you're on your way to the Championship!

Edited July 31, 2020 by CaptCanuck

[Experienced Defender]

22 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

First off, your tactic is very vulnerable defensively, both due to instructions and roles/duties.

You play with extremely urgent pressing coupled with higher DL, which can make it easy for the opposition to play balls over the top of your defense. In fact, weaker teams will rarely have any other choice when you put them under so much pressure, while at the same time leaving yourself so vulnerable. Plus, the counter-press makes all this even riskier.

Then your vertical compactness is less than optimal, as you have both lines set to higher while playing in a formation without a DM.

And last but not least, you have players on both flanks who are not just played on attack duties but also in an attack-minded role (winger).

So these are things I would look to address first. I assume that you might be focused solely on your attacking issues and be disinterested in the defensive phase. But the problem is that these 2 phases of play are very much interrelated and affect each other significantly. How you defend has much of an impact on how you attack, and vice versa. 

[Experienced Defender]

And yes - tight marking makes no sense at all in a tactic like yours.

[ReadingFan82]

3 hours ago, CaptCanuck said:

@ReadingFan82 - just how bad are your centre backs on the ball for the league? Could one of them still be a BPD? As FMu states, maybe they are simply not up to it? In which case that's transfer priority 1.

I remember in my first season with Brighton, I had Duffy as a CD to go with Dunk as BPD and there were too many highlights where he'd just hoof the ball and it would lead to an easy counter and scoring chance for the opposition. Balls played to Dunk largely turned out fine. Fortunately I could drop him for Webster and that was that, but I can sympathise with the rubbish CD play.

I see you're trying to bypass them all together with Distribute to Playmaker :-) I tried that for a bit one season and didn't see much good come from it. If your keeper is 1/2 decent, short kicks should see him knock it around reasonably safely to the FB/WBs and MF and maybe avoid putting your centre backs in harms way. That said, Scowen and Power should show for the centre backs. When you look at Match Analysis > Player Analysis do you see a lot of intercepted passes from them? Maybe those are the only real screw ups in the match and it looks worse than it is?

At least a poor season was still a playoff spot, so just need a small improvement and you're on your way to the Championship!

Pretty bad from what I can gather from comparing them to other players in the same league. I have 5 and apart from one they are all naturally suited to just being a central defender so I tried to use them there and they still made bad mistakes on the ball so I definitely need to improve on them in general. A lot of them are quite old but they do have interest from opposition teams so I'm hoping they accept any offer that might in for them so I can reinvest in some better younger players who work better for how I want my team to play.

Yeah I just think a general problem for my squad was that so many of my players are just essentially the same type of player. All my strikers were very similar, all the center backs were very similar, meaning that it could be quite difficult to substantially change the way my team played so at the back I was just kinda stumped a lot of the time. Hopefully I can get 1 or 2 more cb's in during the summer who are a bit better in general.

Yeah I'd try to give it a game but I caught on pretty quickly that it wasn't gonna work too well for me, considered that it might have been because of not having a good enough play maker but if you've had the same problem it might just be a problem with that instruction in general. When I get the decent BPD/'s I want to have I'll just get it distributed to them and hopefully it all works well enough. I've got a new keeper coming in, Lumley from QPR, but he isn't exactly great on the ball. Might just try and keep it simple for him and let him knock it short and look for the easy ball instead of trying to have him be a bit more flashy than he really needs to be. No I haven't had much of a look at the match/player analysis but I definitely will keep an eye on it going forward and hopefully I'll figure out the problem if it seems there is one.

Yeah it seems a bit greedy being so unhappy with 3rd but in all reality I was so close to going up and all I have to do is get little improvements and I should be heading up by May

Thanks for all of the help mate

[ReadingFan82]

26 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

First off, your tactic is very vulnerable defensively, both due to instructions and roles/duties.

You play with extremely urgent pressing coupled with higher DL, which can make it easy for the opposition to play balls over the top of your defense. In fact, weaker teams will rarely have any other choice when you put them under so much pressure, while at the same time leaving yourself so vulnerable. Plus, the counter-press makes all this even riskier.

Then your vertical compactness is less than optimal, as you have both lines set to higher while playing in a formation without a DM.

And last but not least, you have players on both flanks who are not just played on attack duties but also in an attack-minded role (winger).

So these are things I would look to address first. I assume that you might be focused solely on your attacking issues and be disinterested in the defensive phase. But the problem is that these 2 phases of play are very much interrelated and affect each other significantly. How you defend has much of an impact on how you attack, and vice versa. 

To be honest when I made it I was trying to make it a bit more solid at the back but from using it and getting feedback on it proved to not be very sturdy at the back as  I had hoped. Is there any roles in particular you'd recommend me to swap around to make it a bit more stable at the back? Really found ti difficult to have a midfield that seems to work well defensively. in all honesty,

Yep I've noticed that myself. To be honest I was hoping having such a heavy press could kind of negate the risk from having such a high line but I'd say I was proven wrong when I actually tried it in game. I did have a lot of problems against weaker sides, particularly at home, so I'd kind of began to clock onto this issue and how easy it was to just bypass pretty much my entire team. From what a lot of you on here had said it was far too aggressive to use when being a team like Sunderland in my league against lower quality opposition, seems that I've played into opposition hands a lot of the time.

Sorry if I've not really understood but is the issue with the 2 wingers on attack is that they leave too much space wide on the midfield and leave too much space between themselves and the fullbacks or am I getting the issue with this wrong?

Yep I was definitely guilty of just trying to outscore teams at all costs hoping having decent enough players at this level would allow me to do this but obviously it didn't work too great for me so I'm definitely going to have some give it some thought before the next season. Only at the start of preseason now so have a lot of time to play about with it and hopefully get in a few better players to allow me to be able to plug gaps I might have in my squad

Thank you very much for responding mate

Edited July 31, 2020 by ReadingFan82

[ReadingFan82]

30 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

And yes - tight marking makes no sense at all in a tactic like yours.

On this one I've got a suspicion I don't actually understand this instruction very well. I just thought it meant that your players would try and stick to players a lot more often and not give them so much space but have a feeling this might not be right. 

If it is what are the issues with using this?

Thanks again for the help

[FMunderachiever]

3 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

On this one I've got a suspicion I don't actually understand this instruction very well. I just thought it meant that your players would try and stick to players a lot more often and not give them so much space but have a feeling this might not be right. 

If it is what are the issues with using this?

Thanks again for the help

They will try to do this, but youre probably just going to end up giving fouls away.

Also, playing the high line, if an opposition  player beats your player, theyre going to have lots of space to run into which is not ideal.

Tight marking is better with lower lines and narrower defensive widths.

Also, to pull this off, you would need players who have positioning, concentration, anticipation and of course, marking, to successfully defend in this way.

[Experienced Defender]

7 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Is there any roles in particular you'd recommend me to swap around to make it a bit more stable at the back? Really found ti difficult to have a midfield that seems to work well defensively. in all honesty

I can give you an example of a 442 setup that was very solid defensively for me, so it may give you some food for thought:

TMsu   PFat

WMat   CMde   BBM     Wsu

WBsu    CDde   CDde   FBsu

Of course, I don't say that you should use this exact setup. Just trying to help you understand how you can create a balanced setup of roles and duties that interact nicely with one another both in attack and defense. 

But as I said, roles and duties are just one part of the equation. Your instructions don't look solid either. 

5 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

On this one I've got a suspicion I don't actually understand this instruction very well. I just thought it meant that your players would try and stick to players a lot more often and not give them so much space but have a feeling this might not be right. 

If it is what are the issues with using this?

Tight marking does encourage players to stick to the opposition and try to prevent them from receiving the ball, but the problem is that it is a lot more suited for tactics that are compact and rather defensive-minded (and ideally using a bottom-heavy formation), which yours is not. Instead, your tactic is neither compact nor defensive-minded nor bottom-heavy in terms of formation. 

[ReadingFan82]

25 minutes ago, FMunderachiever said:

They will try to do this, but youre probably just going to end up giving fouls away.

Also, playing the high line, if an opposition  player beats your player, theyre going to have lots of space to run into which is not ideal.

Tight marking is better with lower lines and narrower defensive widths.

Also, to pull this off, you would need players who have positioning, concentration, anticipation and of course, marking, to successfully defend in this way.

Ah okay that's fair enough then. Now I kinda get it a little bit more thanks. Yeah I'm thinking about it it makes a lot more sense, still getting my head around a lot of these instructions and tactics and stuff but I'm slowly getting there thanks to you guys on this thread. I also don't think my defenders were good enough to be able to play this properly so I'm probably gonna give tight marking a skip for the time being.

[ReadingFan82]

24 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

I can give you an example of a 442 setup that was very solid defensively for me, so it may give you some food for thought:

TMsu   PFat

WMat   CMde   BBM     Wsu

WBsu    CDde   CDde   FBsu

Of course, I don't say that you should use this exact setup. Just trying to help you understand how you can create a balanced setup of roles and duties that interact nicely with one another both in attack and defense. 

But as I said, roles and duties are just one part of the equation. Your instructions don't look solid either. 

Tight marking does encourage players to stick to the opposition and try to prevent them from receiving the ball, but the problem is that it is a lot more suited for tactics that are compact and rather defensive-minded (and ideally using a bottom-heavy formation), which yours is not. Instead, your tactic is neither compact nor defensive-minded nor bottom-heavy in terms of formation. 

Thanks for sending me that, definitely gives me some food for though as you say

Yeah thank you. Just gives me a good example to build on and tinker with a little bit.

Yeah I really have to get my head around the instructions and how they all work and interact with each other. I'm sure I'll get them as some point though, hopefully.

Yeah that makes sense. Def not gonna work with a team in the way I'd set up so I'll bare that in mind for the future thank you.

[ReadingFan82]

Hello everyone, hope your all doing good.

This set up is what I've came up with at the start of pre-season, so still plenty of time to tweak and mess around with it, but this is kinda the starting off point. I've changed a lot of my squad around, lots of selling and buying, so to start off with I may have a  lot of problems because my team still needs some time yet before they start to gel properly with one another. Still looking for another left sided attacking player and have a few options to provide cover and competition for Maguire. I've only played 2 games in pre-season, both at home, a 1-0 win vs Darlington and a 6-1 win vs Gateshead. Darlington wasn't great, Gateshead was quite good if I say so myself. But it is still very early days against quite low quality opposition compared to my team so no need to get ahead of myself just yet.

This is kinda my thought process and the things I'm kinda thinking about with my set up at the min and where I could maybe change things a little bit. I'm trying to play a slow, build up type of possession play with my team in general just so you know. With the keeper I think its okay to have him on the goalkeeper role its because he suits that role best and I don't want him to be trying too many testing passes due to the fact that he has not great stats for passing etc. I know that a mezzela may be to aggressive for a tactic that tries to play like this but just giving it a go. Was kinda thinking about having an advanced play maker on attack next to the DLP but will that be too attacking as well as having too many play makers in one team as well? Kinda feel like a box to box could do the trick in there but not quite sure yet. With the full backs I'm trying to have one that is a bit more attacking ad one that sits back a bit more and is essentially just another body to be able to pass the ball to but maybe the CWB is too attacking? I kinda feel like if I want to play out of the back with a slow tempo based on having a lot of possession throughout the game I have to have 2 BPD's but am I right on the one or could I have a BPD and a CD? With the striker I think having him as DLF it could help bridge the gap between midfield and attack instead of having a huge gap between the 2 but not sure o that either. I've typically used my striker as an AF without really giving it any thought but could changing it to this help me a little bit more?

On the instruction side I've done everything that I think will get my team to play out from the back, playing the ball slowly forward with a more measured approach and I'm so far quite happy. Although it doesn't have it on the screenshot I have focus play down the left on. Is this a good idea considering I'll have a few more attacking players on that side or no? One thing is that my pressing is quite low considering when defending I want my players to focus in getting into a solid shape rather than chasing the ball around hoping to win it back quickly. Is having the pressing on just slightly urgent just right or is a bit of tweak needed?

Happy to take on any and all feedback, I know this is still some way off being close to perfect. Just a rough idea for how I want to set my team up for the next season.

[Experienced Defender]

59 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Was kinda thinking about having an advanced play maker on attack next to the DLP but will that be too attacking as well as having too many play makers in one team as well?

No need for 2 PMs so close too each other + AP on attack duty is a lot more suited for styles based on fast transitions (fast attack and counter-attack), as opposed to the slow possession football you want to play (regardless of whether that's a good idea or not). 

 

59 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

I know that a mezzela may be to aggressive for a tactic that tries to play like this but just giving it a go

Mezzala is not an issue, but I would rather put him in MCR and DLP in MCL (considering the rest of your setup). 

In addition, I am not sure you need a CWB as a role in this type of formation, simply because a CWB makes a lot more sense in narrow systems (where he is the only wide player on his flank). If you want a patient possession football, then WB on support would make most sense (possibly with the overlap left team instruction added). But not in tandem with a mezzala on that side.

HB is a fine role, but is usually used when you have both fullbacks in attack-minded roles (e.g. FB or WB on attack duty or WB/CWB on support). However, your RB is pretty conservative as a FB on support. So a standard DM on defend duty would be a better choice for your (current) setup IMHO.

Playing both CBs in the BPD role is not really possession-friendly (even if both players are good enough for such a role).

In terms of instructions, I would definitely avoid the Get stuck in coupled with a high D-line. Counter and Regroup also don't make sense in a style of football you say you wanna play, although for a different reason from the Get stuck in.

Btw, I am curious as to why you opted for the Dribble less TI? I don't see any particular point of that instruction in a tactic like yours. 

[ReadingFan82]

19 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

No need for 2 PMs so close too each other + AP on attack duty is a lot more suited for styles based on fast transitions (fast attack and counter-attack), as opposed to the slow possession football you want to play (regardless of whether that's a good idea or not). 

 

Mezzala is not an issue, but I would rather put him in MCR and DLP in MCL (considering the rest of your setup). 

In addition, I am not sure you need a CWB as a role in this type of formation, simply because a CWB makes a lot more sense in narrow systems (where he is the only wide player on his flank). If you want a patient possession football, then WB on support would make most sense (possibly with the overlap left team instruction added). But not in tandem with a mezzala on that side.

HB is a fine role, but is usually used when you have both fullbacks in attack-minded roles (e.g. FB or WB on attack duty or WB/CWB on support). However, your RB is pretty conservative as a FB on support. So a standard DM on defend duty would be a better choice for your (current) setup IMHO.

Playing both CBs in the BPD role is not really possession-friendly (even if both players are good enough for such a role).

In terms of instructions, I would definitely avoid the Get stuck in coupled with a high D-line. Counter and Regroup also don't make sense in a style of football you say you wanna play, although for a different reason from the Get stuck in.

Btw, I am curious as to why you opted for the Dribble less TI? I don't see any particular point of that instruction in a tactic like yours. 

Thanks for responding on mate.

Yeah that makes a fair bit of sense about having them on attack duty. Did think myself it would be a bit better suited to a more fast, high pressing high tempo sort of set up.

Ah okay is that so he fills the space on the win thats left having the winger more attacking and the full back being a bit more defensive? Was thinking that a little bit but was just kinda waiting to see what some other people who had a bit of a better idea than I did thought about it.

I did kinda think that a CWB might be a little bit too offensive in this set up, especially with a player already being further forward than him. I'll definitely give things a go with a WB on support and swapping the Mezzala around in my next few games in preseason. 

Ah okay I'll give a standard DM  a go in the next few games as well. Would having them on the defend role or the support role be more effective for how I want my team to play?

Is there any reason why 2 BPD's will not work great for that role? I just assumed that they would suit the role and set up a little better than standard CD's would but maybe I don't get really get what the roles do.

I don't have a high line but a high line of engagement I'm not sure if you maybe got them a little bit confused when having a quick look over them. Is that what you meant to say?  Also what are the specific issues with counter and regroup? I thought regrouping would quite well in terms of making a defensive shape that tries to close space for the opposition as opposed to trying to chase them down but would not having either of them on work a bit better? Also on countering when you have the ball I kinda get that one a bit more, is that one I should just leave neutral as well or?

I put dribble less on cause I thought it would help them pass the ball around a bit more and hold onto the ball a bit better, worrying that if they run at players they could give the ball away a bit more but I don't know.

Thanks again for the help

[FMunderachiever]

2 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Hello everyone, hope your all doing good.

This set up is what I've came up with at the start of pre-season, so still plenty of time to tweak and mess around with it, but this is kinda the starting off point. I've changed a lot of my squad around, lots of selling and buying, so to start off with I may have a  lot of problems because my team still needs some time yet before they start to gel properly with one another. Still looking for another left sided attacking player and have a few options to provide cover and competition for Maguire. I've only played 2 games in pre-season, both at home, a 1-0 win vs Darlington and a 6-1 win vs Gateshead. Darlington wasn't great, Gateshead was quite good if I say so myself. But it is still very early days against quite low quality opposition compared to my team so no need to get ahead of myself just yet.

This is kinda my thought process and the things I'm kinda thinking about with my set up at the min and where I could maybe change things a little bit. I'm trying to play a slow, build up type of possession play with my team in general just so you know. With the keeper I think its okay to have him on the goalkeeper role its because he suits that role best and I don't want him to be trying too many testing passes due to the fact that he has not great stats for passing etc. I know that a mezzela may be to aggressive for a tactic that tries to play like this but just giving it a go. Was kinda thinking about having an advanced play maker on attack next to the DLP but will that be too attacking as well as having too many play makers in one team as well? Kinda feel like a box to box could do the trick in there but not quite sure yet. With the full backs I'm trying to have one that is a bit more attacking ad one that sits back a bit more and is essentially just another body to be able to pass the ball to but maybe the CWB is too attacking? I kinda feel like if I want to play out of the back with a slow tempo based on having a lot of possession throughout the game I have to have 2 BPD's but am I right on the one or could I have a BPD and a CD? With the striker I think having him as DLF it could help bridge the gap between midfield and attack instead of having a huge gap between the 2 but not sure o that either. I've typically used my striker as an AF without really giving it any thought but could changing it to this help me a little bit more?

On the instruction side I've done everything that I think will get my team to play out from the back, playing the ball slowly forward with a more measured approach and I'm so far quite happy. Although it doesn't have it on the screenshot I have focus play down the left on. Is this a good idea considering I'll have a few more attacking players on that side or no? One thing is that my pressing is quite low considering when defending I want my players to focus in getting into a solid shape rather than chasing the ball around hoping to win it back quickly. Is having the pressing on just slightly urgent just right or is a bit of tweak needed?

Happy to take on any and all feedback, I know this is still some way off being close to perfect. Just a rough idea for how I want to set my team up for the next season.

Just saw your new tactic and i think youre heading in the right direction.

A few things i see with the tactic you may or may not want to consider:

1) Youre using a half back. When you win possession he will drop in and become almost like a third centreback which gives the security for your wingbacks to be more attacking. Youd probably be better off with a defensive midfield role considering my second point....

2) You have a higher line of engagement but a standard defensive line, so there will be slightly more space BETWEEN your lines. The good thing is you have a DM player in there now so the effect of that will be less, but getting stuck in wont be a help, its good for when youre playing compact. I would also say this impacts my third point of....

3) Using the regroup option. I dont think its necessary for you to do this, because youre playing with the higher line of engagement. id just leave those boxes unticked.

4) I like the choice of roles throughout the team. One thing id watch out for is ensuring that your winger on attack doesnt get isolated. Currently youve got a DLP there who will mostly sit in the middle of the pitch and not offer too much help to the winger. I think for a good midfield balance if you are coming up against deeper defenses, id be tempted to use the DLP in the DM role where he might find a little more time and space to orchestrate the play, and then id perhaps use a carrilero as your right central midfielder to offer support defensively and to the winger.

Its possible you could even flip the mezzala and DLP around, so the inside forward has room to come inside into central areas.

I like the use of the deep lying forward to, to help link play between midfield and the forward line.

 

All in all, heading in the right direction i think.

[ReadingFan82]

14 minutes ago, FMunderachiever said:

Just saw your new tactic and i think youre heading in the right direction.

A few things i see with the tactic you may or may not want to consider:

1) Youre using a half back. When you win possession he will drop in and become almost like a third centreback which gives the security for your wingbacks to be more attacking. Youd probably be better off with a defensive midfield role considering my second point....

2) You have a higher line of engagement but a standard defensive line, so there will be slightly more space BETWEEN your lines. The good thing is you have a DM player in there now so the effect of that will be less, but getting stuck in wont be a help, its good for when youre playing compact. I would also say this impacts my third point of....

3) Using the regroup option. I dont think its necessary for you to do this, because youre playing with the higher line of engagement. id just leave those boxes unticked.

4) I like the choice of roles throughout the team. One thing id watch out for is ensuring that your winger on attack doesnt get isolated. Currently youve got a DLP there who will mostly sit in the middle of the pitch and not offer too much help to the winger. I think for a good midfield balance if you are coming up against deeper defenses, id be tempted to use the DLP in the DM role where he might find a little more time and space to orchestrate the play, and then id perhaps use a carrilero as your right central midfielder to offer support defensively and to the winger.

Its possible you could even flip the mezzala and DLP around, so the inside forward has room to come inside into central areas.

I like the use of the deep lying forward to, to help link play between midfield and the forward line.

 

All in all, heading in the right direction i think.

Thank you very much, I think I'm very slowly getting a grip of this.

1) Yeah your the second person to say that to me about having the half back so I've changed it up.

2) Yep I've took off get stuck in, again your not the first person to point that one out for me. I wouldn't be playing with the gap between the lines without someone there who could be able to sit in that space the way my DM can.

3) Yeah I've switched that off for now and I'll see how it goes. It had seemed to work quite well in my first few games but I'll see how things go without it for a while. If you say it should work than I'm sure it will.

4) Yep once again your the second person to say to swap the Mez and the DLP so I've done that as well and its worked quite well in the past 2 preseason games I'm played so far so yeah thanks for that.

Yeah the DLF has worked quite well so far, all of the front 3 seem to work quite well together, all seem to get in on the play a lot of the time and have spread the goals and assists quite well so far so yeah its working quite well.

Someone said that I may have had a problem playing with the 2 BPD's when trying to play in this set up as well. What are your thoughts on this one?

One last thing . I added the focus down the left instruction before I posted this screenshot and its worked okay but was just wondering what you thought about this one?

Thanks again for the help mate

[scratchmonkey]

11 minutes ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Someone said that I may have had a problem playing with the 2 BPD's when trying to play in this set up as well. What are your thoughts on this one?

Just to chime in here, I think the name of Ball Playing Defender can be a little misleading, it conjures up images of a more 'cerebral' defender, certainly the type of player that you would have in the Dutch Total Football system or one of Guardioloa's sides. The problem here is that the main thrust of what the role does is hard-code the Take More Risks Player Instruction. And unless your defender actually has good passing attributes (Passing, Vision, Decision, Technique, First Touch) you stand a very good chance of having your defender attempting highly ambitious 40-yard crossfield passes that get picked off by an intercepting player and suddenly your defense is caught backpedaling. Or, in a less worst-case scenario, just consistently turning the ball over from trying lower-percentage passes, which is really the opposite you want from a team attempting patient build-up play.

Rather than using BPDs, I think you would get more joy from your approach by using regular CBs, then using Lower Tempo (which you already have as a Team Instruction) or Shorter Passes (which you can have as a Team Instruction, or set it individually on the CBs) to make sure that they're helping keep possession ticking over (which will also involve making sure that other players are offering them easy outlets).

[ReadingFan82]

48 minutes ago, scratchmonkey said:

Just to chime in here, I think the name of Ball Playing Defender can be a little misleading, it conjures up images of a more 'cerebral' defender, certainly the type of player that you would have in the Dutch Total Football system or one of Guardioloa's sides. The problem here is that the main thrust of what the role does is hard-code the Take More Risks Player Instruction. And unless your defender actually has good passing attributes (Passing, Vision, Decision, Technique, First Touch) you stand a very good chance of having your defender attempting highly ambitious 40-yard crossfield passes that get picked off by an intercepting player and suddenly your defense is caught backpedaling. Or, in a less worst-case scenario, just consistently turning the ball over from trying lower-percentage passes, which is really the opposite you want from a team attempting patient build-up play.

Rather than using BPDs, I think you would get more joy from your approach by using regular CBs, then using Lower Tempo (which you already have as a Team Instruction) or Shorter Passes (which you can have as a Team Instruction, or set it individually on the CBs) to make sure that they're helping keep possession ticking over (which will also involve making sure that other players are offering them easy outlets).

Ah okay I think I get it a bit better now thanks very much for this. I'm happy to keep using them as BPD's for now, haven't really noticed them screwing up too much and they're good enough to play the role for the level I'm at but its definitely something I'll keep in mind so thank you so much. I'll just keep an eye on it and see how it goes. Thanks for explaining the roles to me, I seemed to get a little bit mixed up on what they actually did so thanks for that

[Experienced Defender]

12 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Ah okay I'll give a standard DM  a go in the next few games as well. Would having them on the defend role or the support role be more effective for how I want my team to play?

DM on defend is what I personally would opt for. But if you are willing to accept greater defensive risk, you can play him on support duty. I really don't know how good your players (not just him) are, so cannot say what level of risk they would be able to handle successfully. 

 

12 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Is there any reason why 2 BPD's will not work great for that role?

Nothing wrong with a BDP as a role (provided you have the right player), but you yourself said that you wanted to play slow possession football (building patiently from the back and that stuff). If you really want that, then you don't need a CB role that tends to play risky and/or long(ish) passes skipping your midfield. Okay, you may use one BPD (to break the "monotony" on occasion), but playing both CBs in BPD role does not really go hand in hand with your intended style of play. 

 

12 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

I don't have a high line but a high line of engagement I'm not sure if you maybe got them a little bit confused when having a quick look over them

Sorry, my bad. I misread it. I thought it was higher DL & standard LOE (which btw would have been an optimal combination for compactness). But yours is actually the opposite. But anyway, I would avoid the Get stuck in in either combination. What personally works best in my experience is higher D-line and standard LOE coupled with a split block (with normal tackling and normal pressing). Alternatively, you can go with both DL and LOE set to higher, but then don't use a split block. You have to experiment a bit to see which particular combo suits your players optimally. 

 

12 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Also what are the specific issues with counter and regroup?

Neither instruction suits your intended style of play. No instruction (or role) is either right or wrong per se. The problem occurs when you fail to consider them within the context of your overall tactical style. A tactic needs to be consistent.

 

12 hours ago, ReadingFan82 said:

I put dribble less on cause I thought it would help them pass the ball around a bit more and hold onto the ball a bit better, worrying that if they run at players they could give the ball away a bit more but I don't know

In order for the "Dribble less" to be really effective, I fear you'll need a bit different setup of roles and duties. But there is no need for overcomplication, so I would simply leave that instruction unselected. After all, if you don't want certain players to dribble, you can use the relevant player instruction specifically on them. 

[ReadingFan82]

3 hours ago, Experienced Defender said:

DM on defend is what I personally would opt for. But if you are willing to accept greater defensive risk, you can play him on support duty. I really don't know how good your players (not just him) are, so cannot say what level of risk they would be able to handle successfully. 

 

Nothing wrong with a BDP as a role (provided you have the right player), but you yourself said that you wanted to play slow possession football (building patiently from the back and that stuff). If you really want that, then you don't need a CB role that tends to play risky and/or long(ish) passes skipping your midfield. Okay, you may use one BPD (to break the "monotony" on occasion), but playing both CBs in BPD role does not really go hand in hand with your intended style of play. 

 

Sorry, my bad. I misread it. I thought it was higher DL & standard LOE (which btw would have been an optimal combination for compactness). But yours is actually the opposite. But anyway, I would avoid the Get stuck in in either combination. What personally works best in my experience is higher D-line and standard LOE coupled with a split block (with normal tackling and normal pressing). Alternatively, you can go with both DL and LOE set to higher, but then don't use a split block. You have to experiment a bit to see which particular combo suits your players optimally. 

 

Neither instruction suits your intended style of play. No instruction (or role) is either right or wrong per se. The problem occurs when you fail to consider them within the context of your overall tactical style. A tactic needs to be consistent.

 

In order for the "Dribble less" to be really effective, I fear you'll need a bit different setup of roles and duties. But there is no need for overcomplication, so I would simply leave that instruction unselected. After all, if you don't want certain players to dribble, you can use the relevant player instruction specifically on them. 

I'm happy to have him on defend duty, think the players in front of him are good enough going forward to allow him to be not so supportive. If I notice the midfield could need a bit more help from him I can always just put him onto support anyway so its no big deal.

Yeah I must say I didn't really understand the difference between the 2 roles but now I get them a little bit more thanks to someone explaining them to me. Probably going to give the partnership of a BPD and CD together to try and get some balance for my team. Should I have the BPD on the side of the WB and IF or with the FB and W, or does it not really matter that much?

Yeah I've took get stuck in now, had a few people tell me having it on might not be the best idea for the way I want to play so yeah. Gonna have to give it a bit of a tweak and just see how it goes going forward in the future for me yeah.

I've took regroup of because your not the first to say it wouldn't suit how I play and I'll see how having counter off goes for me, not worked terribly so far in preseason but I'll give it a go without for a few games.

One last thing I put for my team to focus play down the left but didn't have that in the screenshot that I posted on this. Should I take this off or is it good to stay?

I've also took dribble less of now and Ill just see how think go without it for now.

Thanks again for all of the help 

[Experienced Defender]

1 hour ago, ReadingFan82 said:

Should I have the BPD on the side of the WB and IF or with the FB and W, or does it not really matter that much?

I personally prefer to play the BPD on the opposite side to my playmaker (if I use a PM), so in the case of your tactic - that would be the left side (CDL position). However, there is no strict rule, so you should not be too obsessed with the BPD's side. More important is to make sure the player has what it takes for that kind of role (passing, first touch, composure, decisions, vision, technique ...). 

 

1 hour ago, ReadingFan82 said:

One last thing I put for my team to focus play down the left but didn't have that in the screenshot that I posted on this. Should I take this off or is it good to stay?

I don't see any need for such an instruction, especially as your tactic is not about wing-play or anything like that.