FM22 - This is how I counter attack

[Gah Rii]

Hi. I don't post here ever because I usually don't feel like I have things worth sharing that aren't already perfected by the community. However recently I got really interested in trying to create a counter attacking system that didn't just rely on very high defensive/engagement line with very attacking mentality like every single plug & play tactic in existence. 

My dream football style is Jose Mourinho teams, Diego Simeone, Claudio Ranieri, Antonio Conte, all of these managers have their own distinct brand of how to play pragmatic counter attacking football and achieve success with it.

I've spent a LOT (many many many) hours trying to create a style of football that I love with FM22. 

Here's what I wanted to achieve with this tactic:

◉ using 3 centre-backs and more specifically using the wide centre-back

◉ using 2 strikers to try and replicate the little/large style that used to be very popular

◉ defend in a mid-block

◉ ensuring that we build from the back to draw the opposition up the pitch

◉ create a style that works at both small teams and big ones, so that it can eventually win trophies without wholesale changes to the entire system

◉ concede the least amount of goals I possibly can

 

Here's the formation and roles I settled on after much testing by playing through seasons to see what worked:

 

I'll give my thoughts behind each role and their importance to my system before proceeding further.

 

Sweeper keeper - defend: on defend duty a sweeper keeper will move just outside his box to clear up through balls if needed, which is perfect since I defend with a high-line.I recommend getting the best shot stopper you possibly can here.

Wide centre-back - support: extremely important. I've tried both the attack and defence variants and neither offer what I'm looking for. The WCB - D seems to hit a lot of aimless balls due to their role attached PI "cross from deep" which didn't suit me at all. Wheres the WCB - S purely has "stay wider", and while it doesn't have "hold position" what happens in game is that if one ventures forwards, the other holds his possession and the anchor man drops into the empty part of the pitch so I still end up with 3 centre-backs essentially, while allowing overloads due to the WCB - S moving up the pitch.

Central defender - cover: I found that he'll cover any balls over the top with relative ease which was a problem in the initial stages of testing this tactic

Wingback - attack: extremely important. this is where all the attacking threat comes from, I want them creating problems on both flanks the moment I win possession to create space for other players in the middle

Anchorman - defend: I wanted a role that would guarantee the player stays deep in attacking phases and makes sure my defence isn't exposed, and this works perfectly. Ball winning midfield seems to leave his position too often and if he fails in winning the ball back then I end up with the opposition striker/AMC having a free run at my centrebacks.

Box-to-box - support: simple role, I just wanted a work-horse in midfield that would move between both boxes influencing play

Central midfielder - attack: important. A lot of the attacking threat comes from this player because of the DLF in front of him that's opening space. Without the CM's penetration counter attacks are not threatening.

Deep lying forward - support: extremely important. For this role I use a target-man kind of player. My favourite in FM22 being Christian Benteke (surprisingly), someone that's capable of dropping deep and holding the ball while the CM-A underlaps him and creates panic in the opposition back-line

Advanced forward - attack: this player needed pace + good finishing to ensure my counter-attacks paid off

 

After some thought I decided to make a home and away version of this tactic because I've found through my years of playing football manager that having a home/away helps considerably. This is the home version;

Similar concept to the one for away, I just move the anchor man to the CM - D, and the CM - A to the attacking midfield. Maybe not ideal, but I'll specialise the players a bit more in the future, for now I just wanted diversity.

Next I'll cover the actual tactical style I ended up using:

 

Starting at the top;

Positive mentality is the best mentality to use in the game, in my opinion. It offers a good base-line to build any tactic off and makes each of the roles in the game just aggressive enough without over-committing and leaving gaps.

Play out of defence because I want the opposition to push up to win the ball off me while we're passing it around the back and then open them up with 1-2 passes and shoot. 

Roll it out/distribute to centre-backs kind of overlaps with play out of defence but without that I still found the keeper hoofing the ball at the opposition keeper randomly, which wasn't the style of football I wanted.

Counter should be obvious since that's what my entire style is meant to be  

Regroup is very situational. For example I'm currently managing Norwich in the Premier league to test out the final style I came up with. If I'm against Man UFC, Liverpool, Man city, Leeds then I'll do Regroup. If I'm against Burnley, Crystal Palace, Watford or the like then I'll switch to counter-press. It depends on what I believe I can get from a game.

Higher defensive line because I wanted to defend in a mid-block. This allows me keep the opposition far enough away from my goal when I win the ball back while still allowing them far enough out from their own that there'll be space behind.

More often closing down. Anything less and I gave too much space and got dribbled past, anything more and one missed tackle resulted in them being through on goal

Use tighter marking perhaps one of the most important instructions in this style. I originally used just higher defensive line and more often and conceded so many stupid goals I thought my entire tactic was awful. Once I added this my players became much more aggressive when the opposition entered our zone of control and harried them off the ball.

Some things that didn't work for me;

pass into space just resulted in aimless balls to nowhere really often, so I left it up to the players to decide when to do it.

lower line of engagement/standard defensive line just gave the opposition WAY too much room to do what they wanted outside my box, which is a death sentence against teams like Manchester City. 

Get stuck in seems to serve no purpose except to get yellow/red cards, although that might be related to me signing players with high aggression. Also if they miss the tackle then it's a problem because the player just walks past them essentially.

Offside trap I'm still not sure about. It makes sense to constrict space even more in the area I'm trying to close them down in, but I feel like the opposition break the offside trap very easily, so I'll avoid it for now.

So; onto the actual testing and development of the tactic in game.

I wanted to test this with a team that wasn't suited to it at all and was much weaker than the teams around them in a very strong league. This led me to Norwich City in the Premier league.

The style that got Norwich to the Premier League from the Championship in the first place was attacking and possession orientated, while my style was going to be the complete opposite. Perfect.

I've gotten 21 games through the season so far and I must say I'm very satisfied by the results. We're sitting in 5th with 41 points, and conceding very little goals in games against much stronger opposition, while still being a threat. Not bad considering the average level of most of the players Norwich have in FM22.

 

My favourite result of the season so far being this

where we absolutely dominated spurs despite having a whopping 33% possession!

 

In this you can see I didn't make any wholesale changes to the original norwich team, just signing some players that I believed were needed. Namely a goalkeeper in Dominik Livakovic, a central midfielder in Jaime Seoane and of course the wonderful Christian Benteke to fill the deep lying forward role. I of course made other signings, some of which can be seen on the bench, but in general they're rotation options and not starters.

Overall I'm extremely pleased that this style worked out so well. Whether or not it's capable of winning trophies like I originally hoped I can't tell yet, but I'll find out as I proceed further into the season.

 

This is not meant to be some kind of definitive guide on counter attacking (if you'd like one then give this a read, I got many tips from it;)

but rather something to give people inspiration and maybe some ideas of what's possible with this match engine. This tactic and my thoughts can absolutely be improved upon and anyone out there is welcome to do so, it's just what works for me.

 

Just some further info before I leave; I don't use any opposition instructions or player instructions, everything's left to default. I don't change anything in game except substitutions or to swap between formations if I feel one isn't working better, I don't change team instructions/mentality or anything.

 

If there's anything more people would like to know/stuff I'm missing then feel free to ask and I'll update as I can.

 

Happy counter attacking 

Edited December 21, 2021 by Gah Rii

[glengarry224]

Great post! 

[nully29]

That formation used to be called a Chariot. Two strikers are like two horses, wingbacks like wheels and DM like a rider.

[engamohd]

Brilliant post, I am interested in seeing how you will cope during the mid-end of the season.

[Gah Rii]

Well the season is finished, and I've massively exceeded my own expectations. We finished 3rd!

 

 

It was an exceptionally weak season from the other top teams in the league which allowed us to get such a high position in the first place, namely looking at Chelsea, Tottenham and Man UFC (I don't know if I'm allowed to use their real name so I won't ), Manchester City also finishing under the 80 point mark, with very low goals scored across the board. We'll see how things go when all of the teams around me inevitably strengthen.

I absolutely achieved what I wanted with this tactic in terms of pragmatism and having a strong defence, conceding only 31 goals in 38 games with a defence that definitely isn't as strong as those around me, while still being capable of winning games and getting points where needed.

I added some much needed reinforcements in January which I believe allowed me to move further up the table than I would have originally been able to, namely signing Luis Romo and Ruben Loftus-Cheek.

 

The ugliest game on that schedule being the 4-5 loss to Chelsea, purely due to the amount of goals involved in the game going completely against my philosophy, but overall achieving multiple 1-0 games which is what I think the real life users of this style would appreciate.

This is another result that I'm very proud of. 3 shots on target, 44% possession and we manage to beat Manchester City 2-0 away from home. As you can see from the team-sheet there's no world class names on my team, purely ones that made sense to my tactical idea, which shows the importance of signing players that suit your philosophy.

Christian Benteke as my DLF - S having one of his best seasons in his entire career with 22 goals in 33 starts.

 

With Milot Rashica and Adam Idah sharing the burden of being my AF, Adam Idah sometimes slotting into the DLF - S when needed, and getting 38 goals between them.

 

My wingbacks both proving to be the creative force needed with 12 and 15 assists between them.

 

 

Whether or not this is the long-term strategy that I wanted, I have no idea. This could be an extremely lucky season that will fall to pieces with the added pressure of European football and a reputation increase which will change how the opposition handles me, or maybe I've found something that works perfectly with the players I bought. One season isn't enough to tell, in my opinion, so I'll proceed to do more testing myself over the course of FM22's lifespan and see what happens.

 

There can definitely be improvements made to it, namely the home tactic which didn't perform anywhere near the level of the away version. That could be related to the fact that I don't really have an AMC - A that suited the role perfectly which is why I bought Ruben Loftus-cheek, so I'll see what happens with it next season.

Worryingly my goalkeeper's XG - prevented is 11.82 which means things could have been much worse without him, but I think that's possibly due to allowing the opposition to shoot from range in meaningless low XG shots that slowly add up while never being threatening.

 

I don't know what the rules are in regards to posting outside links, but I'll leave a link to imgur where I'll post all the stats that I found relevant so as not to spam this thread overly much. If that's against the rules feel free to remove it https://imgur.com/a/wKZdo2O

 

If anyone has any questions then ask, or wants to use any of the information/tactic provided here feel free, I don't mind.

 

I hope this proves helpful to anyone wishing to try and make a counter attacking style because it can definitely be successful, it just relies completely on the type of player you're using. This is not the finished article, and your mileage may vary when using it, but I definitely believe it can be successful, especially in leagues at a lower level than the premier league where the competition isn't as strong.

 

Overall I'm extremely happy with how my idea played out, and I can't wait to play more.

 

Thanks for reading all of this if you're still with me, and hopefully this tactic works out well for you too. Bye 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 21, 2021 by Gah Rii
pictures appearing in wrong place

[cragswfc]

download link?

[carloshcorbalan]

I don't see a link to tactics ...
Therefore.
Are there individual instructions to the players .. ???

[crazybrain13]

15 minutes ago, cragswfc said:

download link?

We're not in the download tactics part of the forum, and even if we were he's literally given you all the information you need to make the tactics in minutes!

 

OP - I like this tactic a lot. We see a lot of OP gegen-press style tactics so it's good to see something a bit more pragmatic. 

[Bigpapa42]

2 hours ago, carloshcorbalan said:

I don't see a link to tactics ...
Therefore.
Are there individual instructions to the players .. ???

He literally addresses this specifically. 

Edit - love the thread and the detail. Thanks for taking the time share with us, Gah. Gonna try these ideas. 

Edited December 21, 2021 by Bigpapa42

[Sharkn20]

Nice to see something different to the classic 4231 GGP with all wonderkids team!

Well done and keep us posted!!

[glengarry224]

That's impressive!  Only 31 allowed in the EPL and four of those allowed in one game = 27 allowed in the other 37 games.  One goal allowed in your last eight matches!

I wondered if as they learned your style, teams would start to counter-attack wider against you but it looks like your defense got stronger and stronger.  I'm guessing that your WCBs were great at closing down the flanks (?)

What's your plan for next season?  Will you use the extra money to buy depth? or upgrade your starters?  or bring in some youth prospects?  or facilities?  I always feel the dilemna when I first get European football with a smaller club.  I can play reserves and tank the cup matches so that I can concentrate on the league games, but each cup match won brings a lot of money.

[Gah Rii]

3 hours ago, cragswfc said:

download link?

 

3 hours ago, carloshcorbalan said:

I don't see a link to tactics ...
Therefore.
Are there individual instructions to the players .. ???

Hi, there's no download link as I don't feel one is needed. All of the roles and instructions are specified within the post. I don't use any individual instructions on any roles. It's all left default.

[Gah Rii]

14 minutes ago, glengarry224 said:

That's impressive!  Only 31 allowed in the EPL and four of those allowed in one game = 27 allowed in the other 37 games.  One goal allowed in your last eight matches!

I wondered if as they learned your style, teams would start to counter-attack wider against you but it looks like your defense got stronger and stronger.  I'm guessing that your WCBs were great at closing down the flanks (?)

What's your plan for next season?  Will you use the extra money to buy depth? or upgrade your starters?  or bring in some youth prospects?  or facilities?  I always feel the dilemna when I first get European football with a smaller club.  I can play reserves and tank the cup matches so that I can concentrate on the league games, but each cup match won brings a lot of money.

The anchorman is key to not conceding goals.

 

The WCB on support specifically can be more aggressive when the opposition enters their zone of control, which would be a problem if there wasn't a covering CB behind both of them with the anchorman also there to cover positions where needed. What I see quite often when I watch this tactic in real time is that the WCB will have a higher start position than any other defensive role I've tried (apart from WCB-A but that role isn't suited for any style I'd play, needs too much specializing around it to work), so if there isn't someone covering behind them then you'll get absolutely destroyed by through balls. With the Anchorman + CB-C my team can play extremely aggressive as a unit closing down, specifically on the flanks as you said. The wingback isn't 1v1 or 1v2 anymore, because the WCB can move out to help and the anchorman will slide over into his position. My fear is that better teams will eventually exploit this with a wide switch of the ball, but we'll see 

 

As for plans for next season; Delia Smith retired the moment we achieved champions league football and we got bought by a tycoon, which was funny. We are now owned by Vincent Kesler for better or worse has yet to be decided. He instantly declared he wants 1/4 finals in the champions league, final of the FA cup, final of the league cup, and finishing in the top 4. So, maybe I don't keep my job too long this season 

He promised significant investment, so that's going to be helpful in one way but harmful in another. As ridiculous as it sounds there really isn't that many options I realistically see can upgrade on Benteke outside of Calvert-Lewin and maybe Lorenzo Lucca. Everton are asking for €328 million for Calvert-Lewin and Lorenzo Lucca won't get a work permit xD . So for now we're relying on a 31 year old Benteke to do an important role.

 

That's what always becomes a problem for me in these kinds of saves. I want to keep the idea of the team alive while also making the team improved enough to challenge for the league title, but I don't want to compromise on what I was originally trying to do. 

 

Ideal scenario is I find youth players that long-term can improve over the current players I have while still keeping the original philosophy alive, and maybe improve some areas that need it urgently now (LCB, BBM, AMC being the main ones), all while making sure we don't regress in the league as a priority. I need to keep champions league football if I want to test how far this tactical style can actually go. If I drop out of the top 4 places then something's not right and needs to be fixed.

 

FA cup/league cup will get my attention if I manage to get deeper into them without too much focus, and the champions league depends on how bad of a group I get. I assume I'll get an awful one due to seeding.

 

I'll keep this updated if something interesting happens, and any changes I make to my strategy in the future. I'll definitely be doing more with the home version of the tactic because I'm not at all happy with it. 

 

Thanks for reading it all, and I'm glad you enjoyed. 

[glengarry224]

Cool save.  Yes, it gets tempting to upgrade a position to a player who does not fit your prior philosophy.  Look forward to updates.

[carloshcorbalan]

Gah Rii       

[cragswfc]

7 hours ago, Gah Rii said:

 

Hi, there's no download link as I don't feel one is needed. All of the roles and instructions are specified within the post. I don't use any individual instructions on any roles. It's all left default.

i thought it was download section. you use am as home tactic? dm away

[poma]

This is great! The tactic/setup got me a lot of wins 

[cragswfc]

 

For the dlf  Silvère Ganvoula M'boussy is a must if not millions to spend and miles better than

Christian Benteke

15 hours ago, Gah Rii said:

 

Hi, there's no download link as I don't feel one is needed. All of the roles and instructions are specified within the post. I don't use any individual instructions on any roles. It's all left default.

i thought it was download section. you use am as home tactic? dm away

Edited December 22, 2021 by cragswfc

[Gah Rii]

8 hours ago, cragswfc said:

i thought it was download section. you use am as home tactic? dm away

I use the DM tactic for away, and the AM as home. I've recently been trying the attacking midfielder on attack as a shadow striker instead. I'll see how it turns out over the course of a season before deciding if it's better.

[Bigpapa42]

So this tactic bangs. And might have just broken the ME. 

First season with Norwich. Match day 5. Done okay so far - away draws at Chelsea and Arsenal, with wins over  Brighton and West Ham. Facing City. Just hoping we don't get smashed. And somehow... we win. Big. BIG big. 8-0 big. 

Made a couple signings to the squad, but nothing too significant. Gianluca Scamacca was a deadline day panic buy when Fiorentina came in for Pukki and he wanted to go. Wasn't impressive in his first match and I started to worry I'd gotten rid of someone who could have been key for us. 

Been messing with this tactic in South America. Was looking at a save in Italy or Germany, but couldn't decide so figured I'd do a shorter save in England. Decide just to full on emulate Gah Rii and try Norwich for the first time. 

[janrzm]

Love the post @Gah Rii Interested if the OP is still perusing this approach and what tweaks he has made since the ME changes?

[MrMourinho]

Fantastic post! I'm managing my beloved Chelsea and I am tired of using a 4-3-3 formation. A back three fits the current Chelsea squad and it's fun to have a formation that resembles Tuchel's idea. I will start a new save with this tactic as a core idea and see if I can get a solid defense that is a threat on the counter and at the same time is dominating at Stamford Bridge. 

I am really curious if the opening poster has continued with his project and if there are any updates on your save?

[Skywalk3r83]

Nice read. Missed it when it came out in December😄👏🏻

[phenomx3]

Truly lovely post. Thanks for sharing. Would be interested to hear more of how you got on in the following season.

[Raymond85]

@Gah Rii i am a big fan of your approach. Have you figured out some tweaks for when your team grows and teams start playing more defensive against you, leaving less space on counter?

[gennamitico]

@Gah Riiwow, happy to find this post!!! do you think this approach and these same team instructions could be use with other formations? example 4231 or 433 or 424

[Gah Rii]

On 07/10/2022 at 16:03, Raymond85 said:

@Gah Rii i am a big fan of your approach. Have you figured out some tweaks for when your team grows and teams start playing more defensive against you, leaving less space on counter?

 

I'm currently in 2041 in a save and managing Chelsea. Throughout the entire save I've been using variations of my original tactic. 

 

This is the one I've landed on for Chelsea that pretty much guarantees results for a top team if you build the team properly. It's not that different than what I was originally using, but the small tweaks I made definitely made a difference for me. 

 

I've won everything there is to win at Chelsea. When I joined them in 2031 they were a mid-table team with multiple 33+ year old players so I was able to rebuild them as I liked which helped.

[Gah Rii]

On 09/10/2022 at 21:05, gennamitico said:

@Gah Riiwow, happy to find this post!!! do you think this approach and these same team instructions could be use with other formations? example 4231 or 433 or 424

Yes, absolutely.

 

433 specifically works really well for it I've found because you can keep the same midfield 3 which gives a lot of solidity in the middle. 

 

4231's problem for me is that I don't like CAM as a role in FM when it's behind a lone striker, I don't like their interplay. If it's a CAM behind two strikers it works much better for me.

 

What I've been trying recently with my Chelsea team is this: 

 

 

The IF ends up being the main goalscorer for me with this so far. I tried multiple roles for the CAM and so far AP-A works with the lone striker, but I'd need to test it with other teams first to be sure whether I truly like it or not because my Chelsea team is really stacked with talent so it's a bad example of what does/doesn't work since the league isn't as balanced as it should be in the year 2041.

 

442 is a good formation for this style of football too, it becomes really hard to break down.

[gennamitico]

15 ore fa, Gah Rii ha scritto:

Yes, absolutely.

 

433 specifically works really well for it I've found because you can keep the same midfield 3 which gives a lot of solidity in the middle. 

 

4231's problem for me is that I don't like CAM as a role in FM when it's behind a lone striker, I don't like their interplay. If it's a CAM behind two strikers it works much better for me.

 

What I've been trying recently with my Chelsea team is this: 

 

 

The IF ends up being the main goalscorer for me with this so far. I tried multiple roles for the CAM and so far AP-A works with the lone striker, but I'd need to test it with other teams first to be sure whether I truly like it or not because my Chelsea team is really stacked with talent so it's a bad example of what does/doesn't work since the league isn't as balanced as it should be in the year 2041.

 

442 is a good formation for this style of football too, it becomes really hard to break down.

thank you very much!! i'm trying to implement this style within a 523 in a torino save!! i'll let you know if it works!! thank you again

[poma]

On 15/10/2022 at 19:35, Gah Rii said:

 

I'm currently in 2041 in a save and managing Chelsea. Throughout the entire save I've been using variations of my original tactic. 

 

This is the one I've landed on for Chelsea that pretty much guarantees results for a top team if you build the team properly. It's not that different than what I was originally using, but the small tweaks I made definitely made a difference for me. 

Any Pi's ?

[Raymond85]

Il 15/10/2022 in 19:35 , Gah Rii ha scritto:

 

I'm currently in 2041 in a save and managing Chelsea. Throughout the entire save I've been using variations of my original tactic. 

 

This is the one I've landed on for Chelsea that pretty much guarantees results for a top team if you build the team properly. It's not that different than what I was originally using, but the small tweaks I made definitely made a difference for me. 

 

I've won everything there is to win at Chelsea. When I joined them in 2031 they were a mid-table team with multiple 33+ year old players so I was able to rebuild them as I liked which helped.

That looks quite sensible, thanks for the update.

i have to say that this style is the one that gave me the most enjoyable football in FM22.

i’ve played around a lot with the deeper striker: starting with Udinese i used Deulofeu as a trequartista, also i have had some players work out as complete forward support.

when opposition doesn’t threat much on the counter i might switch my anchorman with a DLP defend, but only situational.

i love how simple yet effective this style is. Also situationally i change sone team instructions if i am behind, or soaking up pressure, and it’s amazing how well the team responds to what you see in game.

i will try something similar in FM23 i think, but maybe more vertical

[Bigpapa42]

I used this approach for the entirely of FM22. Tremendous work, Gah Rii. 

Curious if anyone has adopted it yet for FM23? I toyed around with it, added PIs for Mark Tigher, and ran a test sim with Atalanta. Finished 8th - not amazing lol

[Novem9]

Ouch, for the past few years I have been saying that the 532 with a dm is outdated. It looks like I was wrong. Although two WCBs are too radical for me. But if it works? Congrats on a great post