Clearing general in-game tactical concepts/mechanics + Specific help with application and adaptation

[Jervaj]

Hello there everyone!

 

I will start with a bit of context for reference and as disclaimer, as this is likely going to be a long post. Im for all pruposes a true newbie in most respects.  Im not really a football fan in the common sense. I stopped following fotball regularly years ago, and as gaming experience goes my last manager game dating 10+ years until I decided to jump back in with FM2021. So, suming up, Im sorry if I fail to see even the obvious. When I affirm something, its my belief so far from reading and in game experience, don't hesitate to correct me if Im wrong.

So, I picked up the game soon after the full release and given my lack of experience I really started from the basics. Picked one of the default styles and a formation among the recommended ones. mainly those that I thought I would like the most seeing. Left control of most stuff to the backroom staff, and over time as I started to get experience to get control of more things, and doing small tweaks at to tactics, training, etc until now that I have felt confident to take charge of almost everything and stopped usin almost at all the default tactics/training etc. I did try to fill in the gaps with videos and guides. I avoided plug and play tactics but still tried to learn from what people shared both in reard to more general guiding, and also the theory behind specific tactics they shared.

And so far I could say it is working fine for me. I do get slumps, but I have progressively made my team play more and more like I want it and Im even getting ncie results. However I still find myself often drawing blanks about what to do, and I find that this comes mainly from two things. One, not really understanding still how some game mechanics work/interact with each other when setting a tactic. And two, not knowing how to properly interpret the data Im given and react accordingly. And I wanted to come here to see if you can help me clearing out some of these doubts to allow me to understand better what Im doing/seeing and learn from it, and also to help with some specific examples of my current save to reinforce the understanding of the prior point and also achieve what I want in this case.

 

So, elaborating in the first point. I have with time  and by reading/waaching guides cleared mostly what instructions on themsleves mean, but what feel unclear is how the interact with each other. Specially the different kinds, TI, PI and OI (to some extent this applies to PPM too) So far what I have seen is that you have things like mentality which work shifting everything slightly. So at a TI level sliders setpoints become skewed towards one side or another, and at a PI level it combines with their role and duty to give a resulting mentality for the player that defines their attack/defend comittement and the overall risk/threat balance they decide to act upon. That seems clear correct me, if IM wrong.

Getting into TI-PI interactions. At first glance the interaction seems similar to mentality. Here TI seem to set the point of reference for the whole team, while PI seem to set how much the specific player deviates (if at all) from that team instruction. You see this in examples like, if you set pressing intensity to extremelly urgent you get some players (according to their role) fixed on less urgent, some can choose standard or less urgent, and others are locked into standard. If you lower it one notch, you can see those same players/roles have instead as options less urgent and standard; all less urgent, standard and more urgent; and only more urgent. So far the interaction there seems clear. In this regard I only have two doubts:

- Are the TI and PI levels equivalent? Example: Would less urgent pressing PI with extremely urgent pressing TI be the same than standard pressing PI with more urgent pressing PI?

- Why some roles lose the middle option instead of one extreme? This happens specially with passing, where you have shorter passing or more direct passing but not standard passing for some reason. Which option would stay closer to the TI in this case and why does standard even dissaper here? It seems to break the norm of the interaction.

Then we have the "toggle" instructions. Things like dribble more, tight mark, get stuck in. In this case there is no direct visible effect. Some roles have some options locked in or locked out, but they dont seem to care for the TI you have, you can either set them or not. In this case the question is simply:

- How do they interact at all? Do they stack? Do they negate each other? Do they override? Examples: If I have tight marking TI and then tight marking PI, does it mean the player marks (or tries to) even closer to his target? What if I have run at defence TI and drible less PI? Does it mean the player really tries not to dribble as if the TI wasnt there? Or does it just equal to having no TI nor PI for dribbling?

Last we have OI. Here the question its basically the same than the last point with toggle TI and PI. The only difference here is that instead of it been a combination for a given player, its for whatever player happens to interact with the targeted opposition player. So, whatever behaviour is set after combining TI and PI (which as seen before is still unclear for me) the question is then:

- Is it stacked, or overriden by OI? Example: Does asking to tackle X guy harder mean anything if my TI/PI were already set to get stuck in? Does setting normal or light in this case just softens it comapred to the standard or makes it equal for that playing to having a totally different TI/PI?

In this case I leave out targeting specific feet because those seem to dont itneract that much with the rest and be its own thing.

Last, to add just on top PPM. This I believe that mostly combine/stack with orders. They cause that behaviour even when TI/PI dont ask for that and w hen conflicting they make your order less effective, but still reduces how often will he do it somewhat. There is also some popups pre match when players seem to react pleased or unpleased (due to their tactical familiarity or attribute matchup with the role/tactic) to the tactic which depend on how if it matches or not the PPM. The doubts here are:

- Does tactical instructions matching or contradicting PPM have a direct performance impact? And by direct here, I mean something that affects directly the performance of the player hismelf or his morale, rather than the indirect effect which the resulting behaviour may have for better or worse in how your tactic plays out globally. To be honest I could extend this question to all the pre match reactions.

- How does it work exactly when PPM and TI/PI stack? Does the player do that even more often? Does he take it even further? Like if for example he has a cut inside from the wings and he is playing as IF which by default cuts inside, would he roam further center from his side or will PPM+TI/PI mean he just try to dribble in a bigger % of the time that with jsut TI/PI? Is it recommended to try to look for/train players with PPM that match the tactic or does it make them too inflexible and less likely to take the right decisions?

 

To finish. I want to comment about an outlier. A TI I simply dont understand too well and would like to clear up on itself. That is the one regarding creative freedom. I basically understand it from what is given that it either puts an emphasis on players taking their own decisions in specific situations over the tactic put in place vs them following the orders more tightly. The way this works out and when to use it seems a bit confusing after checking varying sources. I have seen mentions that been more expressed is better with "inteligent" (or overall better) players while been more disciplined is better with lower quality or less "inteligent" teams. This seems to check out with the in game info. The main doubt would be if this applies more at a relative level of your team vs the opposition or at a mroe absolute level of what the actual stats of your team are. However, on top of this, be disciplined seems to often be brought up when you want a defensive approach. I guess it could be to reduce the potential risk of a player breaking the defensive shape and leaving spaces for the opposition to exploit, but Im unsure how much this applies.

 

This ends the part that asks about the more general stuff that should help clarifying some concepts which would help in defining my tactics and overall understanding the conssequences and testing them out. Given its a long post I will rather continue in a second post tomorrow when I have the time, with the more specific doubts. Thank you all if you are still with me this far and for whatever help you may offer

Edited December 28, 2020 by Jervaj

[Jervaj]

About the specifics. I think Im gonna start by posting my current "default" tactic. As it should help illustrate better and give context to specific question from which I can maybe alter generalize for different tactical approaches. Is important to note that this tactic itself its already the result of an evolution where my first tactic saw several changes since I first started. Mainly to adress some issues I noticed, or in an attempt to exploit player's potential.

So, as you can see this is a very agressive tactic. My aim was to have quick transitions, minimize pointless passing and make sure that the ball goes forward and does it quickly, while looking to recover the ball as soon as possible once it is lost to restart the attack. I got to say that I managed to achieve that feel quite quickly and early on even if I had some issues.

As an important note, I did favoured aiming for a style I wanted than fitting the team I had. Which I aimed to do more progressively, specially given the limited budget the team has starting on the spanish 2nd divison. However the team already counted with a bunch of promising youth in the first team, and in the reserve team for later sessions, which could be grown to try to fit it better. The only notable transfer was Morato, mainly due to lack of depth and/or strong young prospects in the central defending position, and the two main CD's been amongst the older players of the team. Would be the one that most likely be reinforced again with more youth next session, specially with the decline of the older defenders. I know this is not ideal tactically, and may exacerbate some weaknesses of the tactic, but well, you know we play to have fun and I have the fit players into tactic PPM xD

 

When it comes to how formation itself became this one, the most changes came upfield. Most duties you see in attack used to be supporting versions. I first swapped PF, because I noticed in support he tried to hold the ball (has a fixed PI for it) and wait for others to join him up on the attack, harming the ability to get those fast transitions, and also tended to come too deep at times (specially exacerbated due to one of my strikers having a comes deep PPM) which made me lack forward references for through passes upfield (which my AM loves to do). Later on I toyed around with the IF, tested both duties and ended settling on attack. Here both setups seemed to work, but the attack seemed to have an edge for the quick transitions, counters, and having references in/near the box for through passes. It really finished giving my attacks the speed I wanted when the opposition defence wasn't already set up, while not hurting my possesion numbers much. Also meant more shooting from within the box coming from them, which was nice given my AM is not that good at it either from inside or outside the box. I still use support duties there in the "controller" version (as I like to call it) of this tactic which I use when I want to slow down matches. Seems to help keep possesion and play safer even if it takes away a bit of my attacking sting, which I like to use when Im leading by at least 2 goals in the second half to reduce intensity, or closer to the end if Im leading at all against a superior opposition or if I happen to be struggling more in that match.

 

The center midfield had the other big changes but these were pretty recent. The AM started as AP, the left CM one was a BBM from the start till very recently. The right more defensive minded one started as a BWM, transitioned to a DPL briefly to account for the young prospect on that position been actually pretty good creatively and wanting to exploit that. Thing is that he was also quite decent (compared to the overall squad) in long shots, so I wanted to avoid the DLP shoot less instruction and ended with the generic CM, adding PIs to kind of replicate some aspects of BWM and DLP (more on this later).

Passing by the AM, it started as AP instead due to the lack of good finishing skills but I wanted to avoid having playmakers close by interfering with each other when I changed up the CMs, and also wanted to take more advantage of his great off the ball, which I notice playmakers tend to benefit less because they seem to try to follow the ball more, staying closer and been an "easier" pass option. So he went to AM, briefly back to AP and back to AM when I made the last change (BBM to RPM).

The wingbacks in support, I thought of trying to change them up, seen how many people have at least one of the back wide players on attack, but Im honestly extremely happy with how they play  as is. They dont lead the attack, but when they are needed to provide width, they are there. Offering good passing options and helping a lot breaking down defences that are already set up or that play deep by default. All of this with a moderate risks that allows them to be there defensively when you need them more often than not.

Now, TI wise. I used to have "look for overlaps" and dropped it, realizing it slowed down my quick transitions, while without it I still got overlaps when needed. It was a clear improvement, or at least felt like it. I also added "get stuck in". It felt a bit risky but I happen to have a team with good tackling and related attributes relative to my league, and also that happens to be distributed across the field, not just for the defenders. I will admit I score high in the foul and yellow card rankings, but this seemed to increase my defensive effectiveness, specially when stopping counters/long balls over the top which are (as expected) my main weakness, while also allowing for more threatening recoveries upfield at the same time.

I also toyed around testing play out of defence paired with gk distribution options (mainly shorter CB/FB ones). I found this combination (Play out of defence + no GK specific instructions)  working great because it means that defenders try to hold possesion more instead of clearing which ends meaning my defence has less work in the long term. It also meant that when positions are already set (goal kick) the GK mostly distributes short and the play builds up from the back with the CM's coming deeper to assist the build up, helping maintaining possesion when there is no point in attempting a faster transition as the opposition is ready. However when the ball is recovered in a more dynamic situation the GK started quite a few very good counter attacking chances when there was an oportunity conencting with my IF and PF bombing forward. Even the defenders that recovered the ball did this at times.

I was having pretty good results overall, better than expected, but I started to struggle just after mid season. I had been noticing some issues, but then I played with 3 relgation grade teams in a row, and tied twice, fearing even defeat during those matches, and manager to win the last one but feeling much more threatened than I expected. This motivated me to shake up things a bit and try to adress some issues.

I started in the offensive side, I noticed that I had a bit too much congestion in and around the box, with players sometimes been too close and that these teams were defending deep against me which meant that there were so many bodies in the box. So I aimed to strech play a bit more and decongest a bit the zone. I removed "fairly narrow" TI that I had been carrying since the start from the preset tactic. I was convinced this was good for the defensive transition when coutnerpressing, but given the issues I was hoping this would give me more width and that the IF would cut inside anyway and still get involved around the box as planned. I also added "Hit early crosses" hoping to maybe hit those dfeneces before they have fallen that deep, and varying up the attack angles.

I also decided that I needed to change another staple and replace the BBM role to leave more space for the AM. I considered which role could be useful there to have the support I was expecting from the player in both attack and defence. I considered a BWM in support, but I was again fearing not to exploit the creative potential of the player + him been my best long shooter in the squad, and also youth coming up as potential rotation for that position not been that well suited as BWM as the original player is due to some lack of strength/bravery. I hesitated a lot and did some tests during a few games, shifting around the central triangle and ended in what you see now in the pick above. Its also when I started to use additional PI. RPM seemed to do the trick, been a roaming position like BBM but more focusing around following the play and the ball been most of the time an always availble outlet for an easy pass or a shooting threat at the edge of the box that the defence had now to pick up. Adding tackler harder and mark tighter PIs to take advantage of his defensive potential. My true holding midfield shifted to the more generic CM defence but simialarly, in an effort to keep his strong poitns in other roles I added tackle harder, and more direct passing so he could contribute linking up more even if he stays deeper. I also added dribble less replicating a BWM as that isnt really his strong suit. I considered taking more risks for the creativity, as I noticed he seemed to be quite safe with his passes even if he has the skill to be more adventourous, but the AMC and the new RPM seemed more fitting for that instruction and I didnt want to overdo it in so many close by players. The AMC went back to a more generic AM (again to avoid having playmakers too close to each other) but got take more risks PI to exploit his creativity, and dribble more + move into channels to exploit his good dribbling and off the ball skills while hopefully making him tie up/stretch the defence a bit more.

And it seemingly worked. Specially after a few matches with the changes thigns seemed to click and I was able to be more solvent again agaisnt varying defensive approaches. Its not like deep lines dont still give me some trouble, but the play felt indeed more stretched, my played had more space around the box, and either CM were offering always a nice nearvy safe pass outlet if there weren't any other good options. My crosses were now a good mix of deep and byline crosses which seemed to challenge the defence better, and also made more central positions contribute more on getting the ball in the box with longer and dangerous passes.

The last tweak to reach the final setup was on the defence. I noticed that in slower attacks from the opposition, when most if not all of my team its already on my half, I was having situations where someone on my back line broke rank to close down and press someone that was already been press, and this created spaces that could be exploited and sometimes were. I decided to add a press less PI to the whole line to minimize that behaviour and let the press in that situation fall more on the upper/mid block. I haven't had the time to test this out too much, but it seems to be working and I dont feel like Im losing on my pressing game when the D-line is higher up the pitch so far. I also havent noticed problems in the defensive transitions from the additional width, but I may not be seeing it. Though seems worthwhile the improvements in attack.

 

 

Now, the thing is, that while the results keep on coming Im still looking out for improvements. Understanding the more general matters that I raised in the first post will help when trying out some new things, but I feel like for other questions you really need a specific tactical context to give any answer at all. Be my guest if you want to ask questions about dubious aspects of the current tactic or raise concerns you see outright. The specific points I wanted to touch given the concerns I already have are the following:

1) Im still VERY agressive, while been somewhat wasteful in attack. Im not sure if its something I should worry about and should go out of my way to fix, or its just a natural and intended consequence of my tactic. I expect (and want) it to be agressive, but I wonder if Im doing something wrong. Its not like Im "terribly" wasteful but all the "good" teams of the league (at least position wise) have between a 2-5% better conversion rate, been on the clinical side of the spectrum while still keeping a good rate of agression (even if far from mine). Got to say that prior to changes I was around 10-20% below my xG and actual goals and since then I have caught up and even went a bit voer it. The thing is that most of these rival teams are way above their xG (as far as 60% above).

2) My main vulnerability has consistently been high ball over the center of my defence. It was somethign expected for this kind of tactic and given my older defenders sub par speed, specially after their decline. I hope to improve it next season as most if not all of the starting CD I had when I took over will finish been replaced with palyers that are already faster and have room to improve (Morato that I got this first season already falls in that category). I can't help but wonder if I should try something else though. I really don't want to lower the LoD without a very good argument because I feel it works so well while assisting buildup on slower attacks and at recovering balls quickly to restart my attacks. I was toying with the idea of removing the offside trap use though. I felt it made sense paired with such an agressive line and It does get the opposition in offside every now and then, helping to keep them compressed and away from the goal, but I wondered if it will make the DL a bit more cautious and better at dealing with this particular issue. I tried it a bit and it kind of worked? , but the sample size its miniscule to extract conclusions still of the tradeoff. Also, specially if I stopped using the offside I wondered if changing whoever is my fastest CD duty to cover could be another option. I had not considered it until now because both on def seemed the best if using the offside trap.

3) This is tied to one of the more general questions from the first post. But if I continue with my defensive line using the less urgent pressing PI, would I notice any difference if I lower the TI to just more urgent and keep the DL PI at standard, while cranking up the rest of the player's to the maximum pressing PI available? If there is any difference, what should I expect from such a change?

4) Im still not sure if the central "triangle" combination is solid enough. Im happy with it so far, but it has only been a few matches. Do you feel like it really achieve what I want while exploiting the strengths of the players there?

5) I feel like I really don't adapt to the opposition at all. At best I raise mentality if I need to score and Im running out of time, or change to a variant if Im leading in some cicumstances (but both of those are more about match situation), or against far superior teams from the first league maybe lower mentality to balanced/cautious. . In most cases I basically have my tactic and trust in it. When I see the opposition lineup I adjust OI accordingly but thats about it. I never think of psosible changes to the core of my tactic. This in theory its a good approach that some people seem to support, having the opposition adapt to you and not the other way around. But while Im reluctant to do drastic changes I feel like I could really use been a bit more flexible with subtle changes to adress specific situations/opposition. I do already have a secondary and tertiary tactic, but those are basically variations of this one to slow down the game or hold a lead, more on them on point 6).

I dont know if you have ideas of what kind of tweaks could be useful in some situations for the current tactic but so far the thing I have been wondering:

 5.1) Making my defence more compact, and improving the quality of my press by lowering a bit the LoE: I already do this in my variants (I lower the LoD too in them, but the LoE more), but I wondered if this could be useful for the main tactic, specially when facing bottom heavy formations against which I may lack the body count to be able to press efefctviely that high up the pitch.

5.2) Adjusting defending width TI based on opponent main attack avenue: I used to do this, because specially when the opposition attacked wide I felt like my WB were sitting too narrow and leaving too much space and time to think for the enemy wingers, so I set force them inside if I noticed this. After I stopped using fairly narrow TI (in possesion) I feel that this problem has diminished though, and setting a pressing OI seems to negate it well enough at the risk of leaving somewhat more space if the WB is the one that has to press instead of a IF or CM.

5.3) Changing roles mid match. Now this I have avoided a lot (outside using actual tactical variants), because it changes more how the tactic works so it feels more risky and it also tanks tactic familiarity for that player. I dont know if this is really ever neccesary, or maybe some milder adjustments to a specific PI/duty can do the job. The thing is that even if I could consider it I don't really what to look for and what alternatives could work within the framework.

5.4) I mentioned I set OI now in my second save, and I think I more or less already know when they are a better or worse idea depending on the matching players. However I still feel I do a bit blindly because of issues mentioned in the first post about TI and PI interactions with them but also because of a couple of other things.

        5.4.1) Does showing onto foot have any drawback aside of what may come from the oppositin player playing more towards the shown foot?

        5.4.2) I have seen a lot of mentions saying that one should try to avoid using many OI as it may disrupt your tactic. What I never gathered is how many is how many? And it is many of the same kind or many of any kind? If you ask the assitant he always seem to put in quite a lot. I have also noticed some respected tacticians in the community mention not using OI at all at least in some of their tactics to avoid said disruption.

 

6) As I mentioned already a couple of times, I use the other tactic slots for more "cautious/defensive" variants. I call them controller and lockdown, which may give you already an idea of their approach. Controller uses support IF and lowers a bit LoD and LoE (LoE more), shorter passing, medium tempo, medium pressing. Drops get stuck in and counterpress. Adds WBiB and be more discplined. And uses a balanced or (more often) cautious mentality. The basic idea is to raise the team compactness and reduce risks taken both in attack and defence to maintain possesion for longer in attack and reduce space in defence while not inviting too much pressure from the opponent and still keeping some attacking threat. I mainly use it to when Im leading by a couple of goals and want to slowdown the game to lower tactical intensity and reduce risks, or maybe in a tighter game if Im just a goal ahead but I feel that I can concede any moment due to the threat and  pressure presented by the opposition. Lastly lockdown swaps the AM with a DM (generic defence DM, as Im unsure of what role to use still), sets WB and PF on defence and goes very defensive/cautious overall regarding TI. Low pressing and minimum tempo. Hold shape and regroup. Keeps shorter passing and be more disciplined. Less dribbling. Much lower LoE and standard LoD. Mentality on defensive. Basically in this case the idea is to minimize risks and focus on defending in an organized manner while forfeiting attacking options. Used very sapringly, mostly at the very end of matches (85+) where I need to hold a 1 goal lead against an opposition Im fearing. Specially if my players are tired already compared to theirs.

The question here is, is this a good idea at all? In the sense that, these variants are meant to put an emphasis on defence (either by holding the ball and denying attack or by having a more structured and solid shape) over scoring, but given they deviate notably from my default tactic (specially lockdown) I wonder if may players may struggle with them and cause more harm than good due to attributes/familiarity not been that aligned with the new instructions.

 

7) To some extent this goes along with 5). basically I dont have a plan B on attack, and I dont know if this may be a problem. My variants, as seen in 6), are more about been safe when already leading. When I need to score I basically only raise mentality progressively the more I run out of time. If I can catch the enemy with my quick transitions (as it tends to happen with those deeps defences) I rely on the sheer number of attacks granted by my quick recoveries to hammer them into submission, or my press causing an error far up the pitch that my attackers can exploit. I dont know if this is good enough.

 

Thats about it, pretty long at the end. Thank you if you reached this point. Im hoping to be able to clarify some doubts and fill some gaps with this and also learn about tactics in general by using the current specific tactic as reference and starting up some discussion around the initial points risen. Feel free to chip in with other stuff though, if you also have any other recommendations about thins to look out for maybe in analyst reports or statistics which could lead to shaping my tactical decision making, or anything you consider worth while, even your own questions. It all helps and its welcomed!

 

Have a nice day everyone!

 

 

[Jervaj]

Im back. After almost half a season later of testing my might in the top league and I gotta say Im very satisfied but also surprised.

I have been using mainly the same tactics described in the earlier posts with the tweaks I mentioned I was testing (no offside, lowered LoE one notch). The main differences have only been a bigger use of the "controller" variation and using the default tactic on cautious more often too. Mainly due to wanting to be more cautious against some of the superior teams I face now. Im still not fully convinced about the offside thing, but the through balls over the top with their striker runing a good chunk of my half are no longer such a huge share of the good opportunities against. Im unsure if thats the main cause for that chnage though. Strikers seem to like to go get the ball deeper against me now.

 

Im performing quite well as mentioned. Even been near the top on the rankings at times, though it can be misleading as even then Im usually not more than 3 poitns away from the teams in the mid of the table. Its still great for a team that has just promoted, as I so far have no fear of entering the relegation battle, given the expectations were to struggle to keep myself on the league for the board, adn the player were quite pessimistic in that regard.

When it comes to performance, I clearly struggle more which was expected but the results are been very good. What I notice is a lower control of matches. Its not rare to have the lower possesion now, even when Im doing great in the match, and big teams are a struggle. I managed to win one game solidly agaisnt one of the top clubs and several ust won my thanks to a late penalty, but still the result feel deserved after seeing the flow of the match. The main exception was vs Barcelona, who, after a slow match start, in which I actually seemed more likely to get ahead, proceeded to score non stop and ended crushing me 5-0, despite no apparent changes in how they concucted the game. In fact 3-4 of the goals were a bit bizarre in that they were scored by someone kicking/heading a cross from up close without opposition despite there been enough defenders around for there been not much space. 2 specially were almost identic been a kick in the short post by their main striker, which worried me, but everytime there were enough defenders around to contest it. I assumed it been more related to a skill difference than to tactic given the context, but I might be wrong.

 

The interesting part is that in some respects my global statistics seem to have improved, even if Im not a dominant team anymore. Even those that seemed to be issues before. My defence is not as calm but still rather calm, and is now considered much more impenatrable. Similar in the attack, which used to worry me a lot. Far from the top agressiveness I used to hold, but still in the upper side in that department while been much much more clynical. Among the top 3 constantly in that department.

 

Given tactical tweaks have been minimun Im wondering why is this happening. My ideas are that some of the tweaks I amde during the previous season that seemed to be in the right direction are been confirmed to be such, but now the statistics arent muddied by a good chunk of the season been played differently. I also feel that maybe a good share may be related to the squad udpates, as there has been a few notable changes. I made good use of the expanded transfer budget, but also several players have come into the main team from the lower ranks. In the central defence, only Morato (the one I had signed myself last season) remains from the odler lineup. While on attack both PF are new (one signed, one from the B team) and 2 of the 4 IF I rotate are also new, both coming from the B team. Midfield (AMC and MC) has seen the least changes, with the only newcomer been a bargain I got and Im using as my backup RPM.

In theory the improvement wasnt drastic, specially on attack, but seems to be paying off and clicking with the tactic I guess? Im less surprised in defence due to the ageing declining CD players not fitting well the style as was mentioned before, due to their lack of pace, but still didnt expected such a lunge on those metrics. My main new striker still suffers even from poor finishing. Even worse than the rpevious though he is far better in the air, as long as he finds the space and doesnt have to contest the ball (lacks strength and specially bravery and it shows in matches). Any ideas of what may be happening?

 

One thing I noticed and that I have been trying to play with is IF behaviour when attacking and defending. I noticed by playing my secondary tactic (where they are on support) more now that their defensive contribution varied wildly at times. They always take aprt on the initial press, but ocne the opposite team got into my half sometimes they really tried to mark/press the opposing wing players, even almost to the byline but other they seemd to ignore them and leave it all for further back positions, even when they have plenty of time and where close enough to attempt contributing.  I assumed this behaviour may be ingrained with the attack duty as they focus on trying to stay open for when the team recovers the ball instead of activelly helping it get the ball in the first place.

I was wondering if there was a way of trying to mix up both a higher defensive contribution (even if not as extreme as described) while still behaving in attack similarly as they were doing in attack duty. I tried doing this by changing to support duty in the default tactic but adding manually the get further forward PI like attack duty has. The result has been a bit mxied. They seem to overall contribute defensively more, at least they track back more, but is still inconsistent how much theyd ecide to activelly engage. On attack they do end getting into the box supporting the PF as before, but they are more patient while doing it. Overall they seem less agressive tending to pass it more around back and forth with the CMs and WB in deeper positions instead of getting forward after releasing the ball or trying to carry it forward themselves directly. My analysts reports do shows in the overall positioning that my PF is indeed more isolated in most matches, even if the heat map hasnt changed that much. I also noticed that they seem to be ending more with the ball in the wide areas closer to the byline, when this happene dbut was rare before, as it was usually the wb who got in those positions. I dont know if this is just due to the tweak or the dfeences are pushing them there.

 

Any comments or inputs on this new poitns or odler ones is greatly appreciated. Thaks everyone for reading my ramblings and questions.