The wonderous conumdrum of the AMC - how to make him tick?

[Christopher S]

Yes. It's me again. Back at it with another "I'm clearly out of my depth, please help" thread. 

Title pretty much says it all. Throughout FM20, as well as in FM21, I've struggled heavily with the AMC role. In previous versions (FM17 and earlier), it was less of a hassle for me. I've always had a soft spot for the technically brilliant player abusing space in 'the hole', spraying diagonal passes and slide rule passes left, right and center. Obviously, the game of football has changed and even luxurious attackers are now expected to contribute defensively - very few players get to be carried through the transitions in favor of their attacking output. 

So, here we are. I have a player that, attribute wise, should be a perfect candidate for the AMC position in a couple of different roles. My team is in the Championship, goal is solid mid-table performance with tendency to challenge for playoff.

I present to you, the Scottish Riquelme - Stuart McDougall: 

Simply put, from my understanding his attributes for the AMC position are excellent. Before we get into roles, there are a few things to consider. 

1) What kind of forward(s) will he have in front of him? 
2) What kind of formation are we planning to play?
3) What kind of playstyle will we employ? 

Everything needs to fit together to make it 'work'. So let's take stock: 

1) I have two strikers in my squad. Both are good for the level of the league. They are quick, good dribblers, underwhelming in the air and not particularly strong. Both are great off the ball, Simply put, both excel at moving into space behind the defence and in the channels. 
2) My squad has been built around the 433 DM system for the past 2 years. However, most of my central midfielders can play CM just as well as DM, or AMC as well as CM. I have options in all three stratas, and I have players that can relieve McDougall if he gets injured. 
We have double coverage on the full backs and the wings as well, with my left side especially being ineffectual in the ML strata. My immediate thoughts are a 4-2-3-1 variation, as that is what my current squad is inherently best set up for. 
3) While IRL I don't inherently favor heavy possession, my experience in modern day FM is that heavy possession based football is the most defensively solid. Not matter what I do tactically, or how good my defenders are, I can't seem to get my teams to defend their own box consistently. That being said, I suspect that camping in the opposition half will reduced the amount of space my AMC will be able to use and potential render him less effective. On top of that, considering my strikers both want space to move into, going full Pep is probably not the ideal either. Therefore, a middle ground seems more favored. Some keywords to latch onto: 
- Quick transitions through the AMC
- Pressing in areas that will allow us to play through the AMC when the ball is won
- Attacking the half spaces as our AMC should be able to thread the needle 
- If the counter doesn't work out, we need to set up in a way that allows space for our AMC to do what he does best. My striker will likely be moving a lot (AF being the most likely role here), and both my AMC and the wingers will have to use the space he opens up). 

Now, for some role considerations: 

While the quality of my full backs is good, I'm lacking a good attacking option on the right hand side. My left back, however, is solid going forward. This sets some presedence regarding the rest of my squad, as my left side will need more defensive cover than the right. Luckily, I have a couple of prime options for a defensively minded holding midfielder. With my left back looking to go forward aggressively, I must also figure out how to play my AML. The obvious starting point would be an attacking role for my LB and a supportive role for my AML, but I fear that'll leave us lacking penetration in the left side half space. My starting point will be a supporting role LB and an attacking AML, with look for overlaps. That'll narrow the mentality gap between the two, while hopefully retaining the AMLs willingness to run into the left side half spaces in transitions. 

On the other side of the pitch, a more defensively minded full back will allow my other central midfielder a bit more room to expand. That being said, he should still be avaliable to intercept sloppy passes when we lose the ball as well as be in position to recycle possession in a pinch. Our AMR would ideally be a out and out winger to provide width, but sadly, due to the lack of any real aerial threat I'll have to explore how to set up a hybrid of sorts. In other words, an inside forward that keeps width until an he spots an opening or gets the ball at his feet. We also have to keep in mind who he's gonna pass to when he cuts inside with the ball. My starting point for the AMR will likely be an Inside Forward on Attack with 'Stay Wider' set as the PI. 

This is where I am at so far: 

Now, the MCR role is an interesting one here and one I always struggle with. My instincts wants this to be a holding role as well, effectively making a 5-5 split between moving attackers and holding defenders. Thing is, my experience tells me that a lot of times having two properly holding midfielders is not all too hard to defend against. I suppose the standard go-to role here is the B2B midfielder, which I both like and am willing to try. I think both DLP and AP are out the window here, as my AMC is the focal point by design. If you have any suggestions for the MCR, feel free to shout them out.

Finally the AMC. 
If we base the role choice on which abilities FM21 values for each role, the prime option is the Engache (attributes highlighted below). 

However, I've never used an Engache. The role description does fit the goal to a tee, but I do worry that he will be too stationary and won't contribute much defensively. I do actually have 3 runners around him (the AML, AMR and ST), so maybe having a more stationary 'hook' (as described) isn't such a bad thing? Plus, with 16 Off The Ball, 16 Decisions, 17 Flair and 18 Vision, you'd think he would be able to shake a marker and find space reliably anyway. 

Another option would be the Advanced Playmaker on Support duty (attributes highlighted below). The attacking duty version was recently described in here as a counter attacking role, and while we do want to use quick transitions, the APa role has Dribble More hardcoded. McDougall is a decent dribbler, sure, but he's not that fast nor that good at dribbling either. His ability to pick out passes far outshines his ability to carry the ball and I'd much prefer he prioritized that - plus, I'm sure the APs role will have him make dribbles when appropriate anyway. 

The last option would be the Trequartista (attributes highlighted below). A luxurious role, almost entirely devoid of defensive fibre. Also the most demanding, attribute wise.

My immediate thoughts is that this type of role will not fit. We have 3 running players around the AMC, and I suspect that we need the AMC to keep mainly to the central part of the pitch to maintain any semblance of solidity moving forward. On top of that, defensively, I don't think he'll put in the work needed. 

My starting point will be the Engache for the AMC, and the B2B for the MCR, which leaves me with the following system. 

 

MENTALITY

This is something that eludes me a bit. While I feel I understand the basics (it's essentially a risk slider, in simple terms), as I've gathered it does change other instructions under hood as well. Some we can see - passing style, tempo, width and player mentality -, while others we can't. I've genereally found the mentality descriptions to be somewhat confusing, but for once, I've found a particular description to actually fit my goal: 

This is more or less exactly what I described further up, barring the expectation of losing the battle for possession. Considering our attacking strengths, we need space to move into. To get that, we need our opponent to move out of their own penalty box. I want to employ a strong mid block enables us to either hit a quick pass in behind or play through the AMC to release the inverted wingers. If the break doesn't pan out, our team can follow up and then start recycling possession. A few things to note, and please correct me if I'm wrong here: 

- This mentality generally asks the defensively minded players to play direct and/or at low risk. For us to get the ball to our AMC reliably, we need our players to not give away possession needlessly. If our central defenders hoof the ball every time they get it, we'll never really get to 'play' our AMC. 
- Some team instructions are probably needed to make sure key players won't take low% shots or go for gung-ho solo dribbles because they are afraid to try a pass and fail. Our priority is to abuse space, but that doesn't mean we are happy to give the ball away if the counter doesn't work. 
- Width. I wonder if playing a Cautious mentality will narrow the field enough to where our AMC is available when we regain possession in the mid block. On top of that, while width might not be super important when we counter, we do want to stretch the field a bit if we have to attack against a dug in defence after a counter fails. 

Taking all of this into account, here is what I have: 

The front 3 have 'Press More' ticked on top of the team wide 'More Urgent' to really stress the opposition in transitions, without having to enable Counterpressing. I am considering using the AMC to man mark opposition DMs if needed as well, as a replacement for higher pressing (as the EG role cannot have it increased). I increased the tempo as the standard tempo of Cautious does not resonate with our game plan to me. I ticked Play out of Defence because while we want to exploit space on the break, that is mainly when we win the ball further up. In the event of winning the ball in our own third, I don't want needless loss of possession simply due to players playing on low risk. 

IN SUMMATION

Testing starts now. I'd love to hear your thoughts and input on potential issues I'll face and how to solve them. I'd really like to get the AMC role to shine, both because I have the right player for it and because it's a role I really like personally. Cheers!

[Christopher S]

UPDATE NR 1

 

This is exactly what I wanted to see. We win the ball fairly narrowly, offload it to our AMC immediately who then looks up and picks out an inch perfect diagonal pass onto my AML. That part of our setup is working, and I've seen it happen often enough to where I'm satisfied with that part. 

However, something else has popped up that is somewhat worrying:
- The AMC and MCr constantly run into each other.

I think it's most likely due to the Engache having "Hold Position" hard coded, and as such, when the ball progresses upfield he isn't following suit as much as the rest, and ends up in the same space as the MCr. I tried with an APs, but the same thing happened more of then than not there too. The options I have now are forcing my MCr further back, trying APa or trying to train my AMC player to 'Get Further Forward'. I'm not sure which is the more apropriate option, though. Here's an example, where we are playing out from the back after kick off: 

Nr 6 here is the Engache. There is an ocean of space ahead of him, yet he's not moving into it. For the rest of the transition, hever never actually moves ahead of the ball, always staying parallell to the ball. This is the common theme, really - it seems as if the Engache role is hard coded to trail behind the ball, and not seek out space ahead of it. Maybe this is to ensure he can always receive a pass to recycle possession, but it creates a paradox - he's only really needed in those positions because he's not available further up. Him dropping deep during transitions to receive a pass and play into space is great, but I need him to follow up by moving up the pitch to be ready to receive the ball in pockets in the third half as well. 

I will be trying to swap him to an Advanced Playmaker for the next friendly, and trying both duties to see which yields the desired behaviour. If the APa gives me what I'm looking for, I suspect I'll have to monitor the duties of my AMR and AML as having all 4 front players on attack is potentially risky. 

[Lordluap]

I always find a good ol' AM(s) does a good job - easily customisable too.

[Christopher S]

5 minutes ago, Lordluap said:

I always find a good ol' AM(s) does a good job - easily customisable too.

I'm considering that, but I'm worried he'll not attract the ball the same way. Iirc, the AP/Treq/Eng roles are hard coded to have their teammates look for them. Not saying that is always the best approach, of course. Just worth pointing out. 

Edited January 20, 2021 by Christopher S

[NotSoSpecialOne]

Does the player have the Comes Deep To Get Ball PPM?

If no, it might be in part to do with his individual mentality. 

The Engache is a tricky role to get working but its great when it does.

[Christopher S]

30 minutes ago, NotSoSpecialOne said:

Does the player have the Comes Deep To Get Ball PPM?

If no, it might be in part to do with his individual mentality. 

The Engache is a tricky role to get working but its great when it does.

He does not, no. I suppose I can try to work the team mentality around a bit. Or maybe tick on 'Play Through the Middle', as the tends to up the mentality of central players.

[NotSoSpecialOne]

1 hour ago, Christopher S said:

He does not, no. I suppose I can try to work the team mentality around a bit. Or maybe tick on 'Play Through the Middle', as the tends to up the mentality of central players.

Just as an FYI, the focus play instructions no longer increase mentality. 

[Experienced Defender]

6 hours ago, NotSoSpecialOne said:

Just as an FYI, the focus play instructions no longer increase mentality. 

Yes. And even when it did increase individual mentalities (in previous versions of FM), that pertained only to the mentalities of CBs, DMs and defend-duty CMs (not AMC and striker). 

 

9 hours ago, Christopher S said:

Nr 6 here is the Engache. There is an ocean of space ahead of him, yet he's not moving into it. For the rest of the transition, hever never actually moves ahead of the ball, always staying parallell to the ball. This is the common theme, really - it seems as if the Engache role is hard coded to trail behind the ball, and not seek out space ahead of it

Well, enganche is a fairly static type of playmaker role. The role description states that clearly. 

Plus, it's in the nature of a playmaker (role) to always look to make himself available for a pass, which includes the tendency to drop deeper more than non-PM roles. 

11 hours ago, Christopher S said:

I'd love to hear your thoughts and input on potential issues I'll face and how to solve them

I am always skeptical of systems with all forwards - in this case the striker and wide forwards - played on attack duties, especially when they are also played in a similar type of roles, who are all encouraged to attack nearby areas of space (basically putting all the attacking eggs in one basket). Not to mention potential defensive risks of having both wide fwds on attack duties, particularly in an inherently vulnerable top-heavy system such as 4231. 

Your aggressive out-of-possession TIs coupled with less-than-optimal compactness + top-heavy formation with no DM make this risk even greater.

[Lordluap]

You have to remember - as ExDef has said above, the Enganche is meant to be a stationary role, so the movement (or lack thereof) that you see in your screenshots is correct.  The role in-game is basically designed to be Juan Roman Riquelme - the sedentary, classy - slow - playmaker who allows others to make 3rd man runs around him. The terminology of "Enganche" is a bit wrong and confusing in my opinion.  There are other accurate player-types for the in-game role - Pablo Aimar for example but then any number 10 in Argentina could be an "Enganche" - even Messi started his footballing career as such, and he isn't (wasn't) slow and static. For example, Marcelo Bielsa's go-to forward line was always "Un Enganche y tres Puntas" but his use of the number 10 isn't and has never really been an Enganche as per Football Manager parlance.

[NotSoSpecialOne]

Indeed, the most famous Enganche is Maradona and he was anything but static, so it is a bit weird terminology wise.

[Experienced Defender]

1 hour ago, NotSoSpecialOne said:

Indeed, the most famous Enganche is Maradona and he was anything but static, so it is a bit weird terminology wise.

Not sure that Maradona should be described as an enganche. For me, a prime example of enganche was Rikelme, rather than Maradona. Maradona was more of a trequartista IMHO.

Plus, we are here talking about a static role, not whether a player playing the role himself is static or not. You can play a very mobile and dynamic player in a static role, and vice versa. 

[Christopher S]

@Experienced Defender
 

Quote

Well, enganche is a fairly static type of playmaker role. The role description states that clearly. 

Plus, it's in the nature of a playmaker (role) to always look to make himself available for a pass, which includes the tendency to drop deeper more than non-PM roles. 

I am well aware, but I was expecting him to have his inherent position a bit further up the pitch - approx. 10 yards out from the penalty box. Coming deeper to receive a pass is perfectly fine, I want that, but I was hoping he would come deep, receive the ball, play into space and then move back up into that pocket.

Quote

I am always skeptical of systems with all forwards - in this case the striker and wide forwards - played on attack duties, especially when they are also played in a similar type of roles, who are all encouraged to attack nearby areas of space (basically putting all the attacking eggs in one basket). Not to mention potential defensive risks of having both wide fwds on attack duties, particularly in an inherently vulnerable top-heavy system such as 4231. 

Your aggressive out-of-possession TIs coupled with less-than-optimal compactness + top-heavy formation with no DM make this risk even greater.

I'm skeptical too. That being said, I just couldn't find a way to actually have players attacking the channels + in behind without doing it this way. My experience with supporting AML/AMR roles is that they rarely ever try to attack open space in channels unless your team is heavily dug into the oppos half in possession. Same with the striker; supporting roles in my experience do little to nothing in terms of trying to beat the offside trap or drag central defenders out of position. I'm not saying this is fact, just my (limited) experience. In general, the IF role attacks the half spaces off the ball way to rarely for my liking. Furthermore, it REALLY sucks that there is no way to have a AMR/L player without "Dribble More" unless you use a Wide Playmaker. I don't want my AMR/L to receive the ball, and cut inside on 50 yard solo runs (which they do CONSTANTLY). I want them to position wide, run in towards the channels and receive the ball. If they receive the ball wide, I want them to cut onto the full back and either beat him or put a pass in behind the defence. The latter never happens. 

As for the defensive risk, I generally solve that by having one of the wingers man mark the oppos most attacking full back, which seems to work fairly well. 

I want to specify that I don't actually know what I'm doing. The OP was just my thought process, and I did point out a couple of times that I'd like to hear what I'm doing wrong/suboptimally. I suppose you've just pointed that out, but just pointing it out doesn't really get me anywhere. I'm generally able to see that something isn't working, but for me the Match Engine isn't clear enough in it's feedback to instructions to where I am able to figure out why - or how to fix it. That's why I write these threads.

@Lordluap

Quote

For example, Marcelo Bielsa's go-to forward line was always "Un Enganche y tres Puntas" but his use of the number 10 isn't and has never really been an Enganche as per Football Manager parlance.

This is, ironically, the thought behind my setup. I wanted an attacking fulcrum that doesn't roam, and 3 attacking runners parallell/ahead of him (AMR, AML, ST). My experience with supporting AMR/L's is that they make very few attempts at attacking runs of the ball, and only attack with the ball at their feet unless I've moved the entire team into the last 3rd. 

Quote

You have to remember - as ExDef has said above, the Enganche is meant to be a stationary role, so the movement (or lack thereof) that you see in your screenshots is correct. 

As I answered ExDef above, him being stationary isn't the issue. I just expected him to be stationary from a more advanced position.

Edited January 21, 2021 by Christopher S

[NotSoSpecialOne]

1 hour ago, Experienced Defender said:

Not sure that Maradona should be described as an enganche. For me, a prime example of enganche was Rikelme, rather than Maradona. Maradona was more of a trequartista IMHO.

Plus, we are here talking about a static role, not whether a player playing the role himself is static or not. You can play a very mobile and dynamic player in a static role, and vice versa. 

I was just adding onto the point LordLuap was making about the confusing terminology as an Enganche is just the term for a no.10 rather than something more static. Obviously in the game the role is modeled after Riquelme and Maradona for example would be better reflected by a Trequartista instead. 

@Christopher SHave you given playing on a higher mentality a shot?  Or ticking on Get Further Forward for the Enganche? I've only ever used one on mentalities as low as Positive and have found that he doesn't come too deep. 

[Christopher S]

2 minutes ago, NotSoSpecialOne said:

I was just adding onto the point LordLuap was making about the confusing terminology as an Enganche is just the term for a no.10 rather than something more static. Obviously in the game the role is modeled after Riquelme and Maradona for example would be better reflected by a Trequartista instead. 

@Christopher SHave you given playing on a higher mentality a shot?  Or ticking on Get Further Forward for the Enganche? I've only ever used one on mentalities as low as Positive and have found that he doesn't come too deep. 

"Get Further Forward" is locked out for the Engache, unfortunately. I did try on Positive, and he did move slightly further up. However, that lead to a plethora of other issues which made me abandon it pretty quickly. 

[NotSoSpecialOne]

1 hour ago, Christopher S said:

"Get Further Forward" is locked out for the Engache, unfortunately. I did try on Positive, and he did move slightly further up. However, that lead to a plethora of other issues which made me abandon it pretty quickly. 

I

I'm able to select it just fine. 

[Christopher S]

What on earth. 

I could have sworn that was locked out. I've not got the game loaded right now, but I'll check when I can.

[Vizzini]

Why not drag the wide players into the ml and mr positions and play them as wma? They will get into space and you can customise them into doing whatever you want.

[Experienced Defender]

2 hours ago, Christopher S said:

I'm skeptical too. That being said, I just couldn't find a way to actually have players attacking the channels + in behind without doing it this way. My experience with supporting AML/AMR roles is that they rarely ever try to attack open space in channels unless your team is heavily dug into the oppos half in possession

Did you possibly wonder if that may have something do with your low team mentality (cautious)? Not claiming that's the only factor, just curious about your thought process. 

And btw, what's the exact reasoning behind choosing the cautious mentality? 

[Christopher S]

28 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

Did you possibly wonder if that may have something do with your low team mentality (cautious)? Not claiming that's the only factor, just curious about your thought process. 

And btw, what's the exact reasoning behind choosing the cautious mentality? 

Yes, I did. The other guy asked about that earlier, and I did try raising the team mentality. The Engache moved up a tiny bit, but raising the team mentality broke down other aspects of the system so I didn't explore it further. 

Reasoning for team mentality is in the OP, actually. 

Quote

This is something that eludes me a bit. While I feel I understand the basics (it's essentially a risk slider, in simple terms), as I've gathered it does change other instructions under hood as well. Some we can see - passing style, tempo, width and player mentality -, while others we can't. I've genereally found the mentality descriptions to be somewhat confusing, but for once, I've found a particular description to actually fit my goal: 

This is more or less exactly what I described further up, barring the expectation of losing the battle for possession. Considering our attacking strengths, we need space to move into. To get that, we need our opponent to move out of their own penalty box. I want to employ a strong mid block enables us to either hit a quick pass in behind or play through the AMC to release the inverted wingers. If the break doesn't pan out, our team can follow up and then start recycling possession. A few things to note, and please correct me if I'm wrong here: 

- This mentality generally asks the defensively minded players to play direct and/or at low risk. For us to get the ball to our AMC reliably, we need our players to not give away possession needlessly. If our central defenders hoof the ball every time they get it, we'll never really get to 'play' our AMC. 
- Some team instructions are probably needed to make sure key players won't take low% shots or go for gung-ho solo dribbles because they are afraid to try a pass and fail. Our priority is to abuse space, but that doesn't mean we are happy to give the ball away if the counter doesn't work. 
- Width. I wonder if playing a Cautious mentality will narrow the field enough to where our AMC is available when we regain possession in the mid block. On top of that, while width might not be super important when we counter, we do want to stretch the field a bit if we have to attack against a dug in defence after a counter fails. 

Granted, I'm fully open to all of this being non-sensical and wrong. When I was putting things together, though, it made sense. 

[Lordluap]

Could an AP(s) with Get Forward PI be the answer to your desire for the player to station 10yds from the 18yard box, drop deep for passes and then move forward again?

[Experienced Defender]

27 minutes ago, Christopher S said:

Reasoning for team mentality is in the OP, actually. 

Quote

This is something that eludes me a bit. While I feel I understand the basics (it's essentially a risk slider, in simple terms), as I've gathered it does change other instructions under hood as well. Some we can see - passing style, tempo, width and player mentality -, while others we can't. I've genereally found the mentality descriptions to be somewhat confusing, but for once, I've found a particular description to actually fit my goal: 

This is more or less exactly what I described further up, barring the expectation of losing the battle for possession. Considering our attacking strengths, we need space to move into. To get that, we need our opponent to move out of their own penalty box. I want to employ a strong mid block enables us to either hit a quick pass in behind or play through the AMC to release the inverted wingers. If the break doesn't pan out, our team can follow up and then start recycling possession. A few things to note, and please correct me if I'm wrong here: 

- This mentality generally asks the defensively minded players to play direct and/or at low risk. For us to get the ball to our AMC reliably, we need our players to not give away possession needlessly. If our central defenders hoof the ball every time they get it, we'll never really get to 'play' our AMC. 
- Some team instructions are probably needed to make sure key players won't take low% shots or go for gung-ho solo dribbles because they are afraid to try a pass and fail. Our priority is to abuse space, but that doesn't mean we are happy to give the ball away if the counter doesn't work. 
- Width. I wonder if playing a Cautious mentality will narrow the field enough to where our AMC is available when we regain possession in the mid block. On top of that, while width might not be super important when we counter, we do want to stretch the field a bit if we have to attack against a dug in defence after a counter fails. 

Expand  

Honestly, in-game descriptions of team mentalities can be - and largely are - misleading to some degree. For example, they lead many (if not even most) people to believe that the team mentality = style of play (e.g. defensive/cautious = defensive/counter-attacking football or positive/attacking = possession/attack-minded football). Unfortunately, that's not really how it works and things are more complex than that. 

Also, a low team mentality itself does not mean more defensive solidity at all. Good defensive solidity - regardless of your playing style - is primarily defined by your defensive compactness (DL/LOE distance) and balance in the setup of roles and duties. 

How you set up roles and duties is key to creating a successful and consistent tactic. The mentality and other instructions are of secondary importance compared to roles and duties, i.e. their overall balance and harmony.

Therefore, my first piece of advice is to sort roles and duties out first and only then think about the rest. And keep in mind that roles work through interaction with one another, never in isolation.

[Britrock]

AMC is a difficult one to setup. They need space to operate in, which is why I play my 4231 with 2 DMs instead of 2 MCs, but they can also be basically erased from a game just by the opposition playing a DM on top of them. I use mine more as another attacker as opposed to a playmaker for that reason, moving the playmaker back in to the DM strata.

I've had success with AMa behind an AFa, but I've also had a SSa behind a F9 which was great fun and led to a lot of runs from deep that weren't picked up by the defence at all

[Christopher S]

19 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

Honestly, in-game descriptions of team mentalities can be - and largely are - misleading to some degree. For example, they lead many (if not even most) people to believe that the team mentality = style of play (e.g. defensive/cautious = defensive/counter-attacking football or positive/attacking = possession/attack-minded football). Unfortunately, that's not really how it works and things are more complex than that. 

Also, a low team mentality itself does not mean more defensive solidity at all. Good defensive solidity - regardless of your playing style - is primarily defined by your defensive compactness (DL/LOE distance) and balance in the setup of roles and duties. 

How you set up roles and duties is key to creating a successful and consistent tactic. The mentality and other instructions are of secondary importance compared to roles and duties, i.e. their overall balance and harmony.

Therefore, my first piece of advice is to sort roles and duties out first and only then think about the rest. 

Curiously, I am aware of all this in theory. If you read back to the OP, I sorted pretty much everything except 1 or 2 TI's before even considering Team Mentality. All positions, roles and duties were assigned before I tinkered with mentality and/or team instructions. 

I chose to go standard/standard for DL/LOE for two reasons; 
1) Lowering the LOE always results in conceding an obscene amount of goals from long shots and crosses
2) I suspect that Higher DL will make it too easy to bypass our mid block with passes over the top. 

I realize that 1) is anecdotal and 2) is an assumption, but these were the reasons behind my thought process. I also spent a good amount of time looking at the individual mentalities in relation to one another. 

 

Quote

keep in mind that roles work through interaction with one another, never in isolation.

I'm sure they do, but my issue is that whatever interaction and/or ME feedback the game is giving me is too diffuse to see. As an example, if I put a left footed player on the right wing, in my experience he will do the exact same thing regardless of what role he has (outside of TQ and WPM). W, IW, IF and RMD - doesn't matter. He'll stay too narrow regardless of his PIs, and regardless of Team Width. He'll cut inside refusing to pass, and instead try to run with the ball for 40 yards across the field. I'm sure there is some things happening differently, but for me - I just can't see it. And that makes this really hard to figure out. 

[De Nile]

On 21/01/2021 at 11:55, Experienced Defender said:

Not sure that Maradona should be described as an enganche. For me, a prime example of enganche was Rikelme, rather than Maradona. Maradona was more of a trequartista IMHO.

Plus, we are here talking about a static role, not whether a player playing the role himself is static or not. You can play a very mobile and dynamic player in a static role, and vice versa. 

That is a very common misconception about the enganche. Maradona is an enganche but Riquelme is a more static version of the enganche. The difference between the enganche (mobile) and a trequartista is the enganche drops into midfield and pulls the strings from a deeper position. It's also more inclined to assist than score as the trequartista is more of a goal scoring between the two.

The problem with SI is that they created the static version of the enganche without saying that the original enganche itself is not static. That being said the closest to Maradona playstyle is AM(S) or AP(S).

Other examples of non static enganches are dejan savicevic, Zidane (at least when he was at RM), Magico Gonzalez.