Solo Striker - Help Me Make Mine Not Awful

[Slippy_]

I’m really struggling with tactics. Due to personnel I have to play a 1 striker system. This should not be a problem as my striker is a good striker at my league level and young enough to improve. However I’m struggling to get anything out of him after almost a whole season.

I’ve tried a 4-3-3 with both an AMC and a DM, different AMC roles to support him and even tried him to run him as a support role (DLF and F9) with a SS behind him. The only thing I havent tried is playing him as a  TM because he isnt a great header nor powerful enough imo.

My issue is that he just doesn’t get involved in play at all. No assists, no key passes, no goals and not a lot of shots. Basically my AML and AMR are doing all the heavy lifting with the AMC chipping in. The AML/AMRs are IW on attack. Unfortunately they aren’t consistent enough to score enough goals and currently it feels like I’m playing every match with 10 men.

I feel like I’ve tried everything. In 22 appearances I have 6 goals and 2 assists (3 of those goals came in one game against a lower club in a cup game). So it’s essentially 3 goals in 21 appearances. He regularly has games with 0 shots and 0 key passes (I’d be happy with one or the other).

Has anyone got any tips? I could try switching my IWs to support but if I do that I worry that I’ll have no goal scoring potential during the match.

 

Tactic One:

 

Tactic 2:

[Experienced Defender]

You are trying to play defensive football with a very gung-ho setup of roles and duties (which applies to both tactics). So your tactic(s) is/are contradictory in itself. 

Before any further discussion, I am curious to learn what's the exact reason for playing a defensive style - lack of quality or simply for the sake of it?

[Slippy_]

9 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

You are trying to play defensive football with a very gung-ho setup of roles and duties (which applies to both tactics). So your tactic(s) is/are contradictory in itself. 

Before any further discussion, I am curious to learn what's the exact reason for playing a defensive style - lack of quality or simply for the sake of it?

Mostly lack of quality. The team I inherited are newly promoted to the top division and we are currently mid table. We started the season well with the 4-2-3-1 (the right IW scored 75% of our goals) playing that tactic but have started leaking a lot of goals, hence the switch to 4-3-3. My thinking on the 4-2-3-1 is as is as follows:

Balanced -> dont see the need to change it. My players arent really fast enough to play total counter attacking football (ala cautious)

Transistion -> I want to channel play through the DLP to try and play balls to higher up the pitch and I dont trust playing out the back. Counter and re-group to ensure we attack when we get the ball and try and stay strong when we lose it.

Out of Possession -> Lower line of defence because I conceded a lot of long balls over the top. More urgent pressing to win the ball back to counter.

I wouldnt have said its THAT gung-ho, more I see it as having a stable back 4 with the DLP holding in the middle with BBM moving up and down as required. The attacking 4 are focused on the final 3rd.

 

EDIT: To clarify I am not too worried about the quality of players. As a mid table side we clearly have done enough to stay up but I figure that as my striker is pretty much not on the pitch doing anything I must be doing something wrong tactically. When my right IW has stopped having the season of his life we have plummted due to lack of goals and leaking goals (in the last 5 matches we have conceded at least 2 goals a match and scored 2 goals in that time).

Edited March 24, 2021 by Slippy_

[Johnny Ace]

Ignoring the TI's you're not making your AF the main goal scoring threat with your roles 

Cautious most definitely doesn't = Counter attack either  

[Slippy_]

1 minute ago, Johnny Ace said:

Ignoring the TI's you're not making your AF the main goal scoring threat with your roles 

Cautious most definitely doesn't = Counter attack either  

Hmm. My understanding was that IW should offer enough support even on an attack for an AF. In the past I’ve run standard wingers on attack with a flat 4  which have given me plenty of support. 
 

I see what you are saying with cautious but for me I see cautious as the most counter attacking mentality (when you drive up directness and tempo anyway) when that’s your main outlet of attack. 

[Johnny Ace]

1 minute ago, Slippy_ said:

Hmm. My understanding was that IW should offer enough support even on an attack for an AF. In the past I’ve run standard wingers on attack with a flat 4  which have given me plenty of support. 
 

I see what you are saying with cautious but for me I see cautious as the most counter attacking mentality (when you drive up directness and tempo anyway) when that’s your main outlet of attack. 

Dual IWs can work just, I wouldn't have them both on attack, in your 4-3-3 you could try the left hand one on Support or even both. An AF can struggle in that system too as he has the potential to get cut off from the rest of the team 

In the 4-2-3-1 he's the only player out of the top 4 on support, you could easily have both wide players on Support  

Dual wingers on attack in a flat 4 will support better than if they're in the AML/R strata  

Can't say I've dabbled on Cautious too much except for in possession systems but with the higher mentalities I'll use the Counter & they trigger a lot & less on the lower ones. Even I if I use Cautious I'll raise the lines as I find it's a good way to get penned into your own third   

[Slippy_]

16 minutes ago, Johnny Ace said:

Dual IWs can work just, I wouldn't have them both on attack, in your 4-3-3 you could try the left hand one on Support or even both. An AF can struggle in that system too as he has the potential to get cut off from the rest of the team 

In the 4-2-3-1 he's the only player out of the top 4 on support, you could easily have both wide players on Support  

Dual wingers on attack in a flat 4 will support better than if they're in the AML/R strata  

Can't say I've dabbled on Cautious too much except for in possession systems but with the higher mentalities I'll use the Counter & they trigger a lot & less on the lower ones. Even I if I use Cautious I'll raise the lines as I find it's a good way to get penned into your own third   

Yeah I think you are right - probably need more support duties. I guess I’m just worried that as my IW’s are pretty much the only ones contributing to attacking moves that if I take them off attack we will have nothing going forwards. 
 

ive used cautious with a 4-4-1-1 for a counter attack system and it blew the opposition away. We scored an unbelievable amount of goals from long balls on the counter. This used a standard defensive line but a lower line of engagement with the idea that would bring the opposition out of their half to give us space to run in behind. 

[Johnny Ace]

Excellent!! Don't let me put you off, it's just what I've found playing the game

Can you post up a screenie of your striker? If he's fast he should excel in a counter system 

[Experienced Defender]

53 minutes ago, Slippy_ said:

Mostly lack of quality

Well, that can be tricky. Because in order to play defensive football successfully, you need both your defenders and midfielders to be good defense-wise (i.e. in terms of their defense-related attributes). Otherwise, defensive football can easily prove costly even if a tactic itself is sensibly designed (which yours is not at the moment IMHO). 

 

58 minutes ago, Slippy_ said:

The team I inherited are newly promoted to the top division and we are currently mid table

That's a great achievement. Even though your current tactics don't look solid (in my view), I am not sure if making changes would be a good idea when results are that good. Because in FM - just as in real football - one needs to be realistic. 

 

1 hour ago, Slippy_ said:

We started the season well with the 4-2-3-1 (the right IW scored 75% of our goals) playing that tactic but have started leaking a lot of goals

Leaking a lot of goals confirms my thesis about your tactic(s) being contradictory (playing defensive football with a shaky/gung-ho setup of roles and duties). 

 

1 hour ago, Slippy_ said:

Balanced -> dont see the need to change it. My players arent really fast enough to play total counter attacking football (ala cautious)

The cautious mentality has nothing to do with counter-attacking football. When I said you are playing defensive football, I was referring to the low line of engagement (which you use in both tactics), not a team mentality. Because the team mentality does not define your style of football. Moreover, counter-attacking football actually works better on a (bit) higher mentality, because it encourages (proportionally) faster attacking transitions. 

1 hour ago, Slippy_ said:

Balanced -> dont see the need to change it. My players arent really fast enough to play total counter attacking football (ala cautious)

Transistion -> I want to channel play through the DLP to try and play balls to higher up the pitch and I dont trust playing out the back. Counter and re-group to ensure we attack when we get the ball and try and stay strong when we lose it.

Out of Possession -> Lower line of defence because I conceded a lot of long balls over the top. More urgent pressing to win the ball back to counter.

I wouldnt have said its THAT gung-ho, more I see it as having a stable back 4 with the DLP holding in the middle with BBM moving up and down as required. The attacking 4 are focused on the final 3rd

It's not your instructions (including the mentality) that are gung-ho. Your setup of roles an duties is gung-ho - precisely and mostly because all 3 forwards are on attack duties. That's the inconsistency/contradiction in your tactic(s) I was talking about. 

And the setup of roles and duties is the most important element of any tactic. That's what primarily defines your style of play and how balanced your tactic is. Instructions - as well as the mentality - are of secondary importance compared to roles and duties (something I keep repeating all the time in numerous topics here). 

[Slippy_]

Here you are! 
I’m in the Danish Super Liga so he’s not going to be Prem or perhaps even Championship qualify, but his stats indicate he should be okay at this level. He’s not slow but he’s hardly a speedster in my eyes. 

[Slippy_]

Thanks @Experienced Defender! 
I can appreciate we are doing well for what we are, I could clearly see that there was an issue with my tactic as my striker wasn’t involved at all. I wanted to try and rectify that. 
 

I started the season with a standard defensive line but had to drop it after we conceded a lot of over the top balls which resulted in goals. 
 

I think partly my issue is that in FM (both this and past editions) I’ve primarily played a 4-4-2 and 4-4-1-1, meaning I’ve never really used advanced wide players. I can clearly see now that I need to try and use more support options in the attack. My original thinking is that having the central midfield of support/defend would be enough to proctect the back 4 and let the advanced players do their thing with little defensive/supporting responsibility due to being IW, which should still cross the ball and make assisting moves unlike say IFs. 
 

I think I’ll try running one IW on support and possibly the AMC as a support to give the striker a chance as an AF on attack. 

[Experienced Defender]

Just now, Slippy_ said:

I started the season with a standard defensive line but had to drop it after we conceded a lot of over the top balls which resulted in goals

That's not necessarily a consequence of the defensive line setting itself. FM is a complex game, so different factors can contribute to tactical issues (not just ones that may look obvious on the surface). Never look tactical elements in isolation, because they all work through interaction with one another. I would rather argue it had more to do with the lack of balance and consistency in your overall tactic - the setup of roles and duties in particular - than the defensive line alone. 

 

7 minutes ago, Slippy_ said:

I think partly my issue is that in FM (both this and past editions) I’ve primarily played a 4-4-2 and 4-4-1-1, meaning I’ve never really used advanced wide players. I can clearly see now that I need to try and use more support options in the attack. My original thinking is that having the central midfield of support/defend would be enough to proctect the back 4 and let the advanced players do their thing with little defensive/supporting responsibility due to being IW, which should still cross the ball and make assisting moves unlike say IFs. 
 

I think I’ll try running one IW on support and possibly the AMC as a support to give the striker a chance as an AF on attack

I need to see what the tactic as a whole will look like once you make all those tweaks. Precisely because - as I already stressed - nothing works in isolation. Making changes/tweaks on a random basic is not a good idea. 

[Slippy_]

21 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

That's not necessarily a consequence of the defensive line setting itself. FM is a complex game, so different factors can contribute to tactical issues (not just ones that may look obvious on the surface). Never look tactical elements in isolation, because they all work through interaction with one another. I would rather argue it had more to do with the lack of balance and consistency in your overall tactic - the setup of roles and duties in particular - than the defensive line alone. 

 

I need to see what the tactic as a whole will look like once you make all those tweaks. Precisely because - as I already stressed - nothing works in isolation. Making changes/tweaks on a random basic is not a good idea. 

I saw an issue, realised my central defenders aren’t the fastest so I made a change to correct that. That helped shore up the defence a bit and now we concede other types of goals. 
 

i agree that making random changes isn’t a good thing but making changes based on information and ideas isnt random. Number one rule of any test isn’t to change everything, it’s to change one variable and see how that works. By changing my duties on one or two of players is something I would like to try because it looks like it’s been identified that I’m running too much attack duties in the final 3rd. 

[Experienced Defender]

1 hour ago, Slippy_ said:

Number one rule of any test isn’t to change everything, it’s to change one variable and see how that works

Absolutely - going step by step is always better than changing too many things at once