Mastering the low block, an offensive approach?

[Vinay17]

In all these years playing FM24 I realize that I have been spending all my time trying to achieve an invincible tactic, and not trying to learn about and most important if, enjoying the game. Thats why this time I want to show my way to see football, how I enjoy and how I feel it, but first let me introduce myself.

I´m from Uruguay, small country but with a old tradition about football, where lot of good players grow up everyday. Neighboors of Brazil and Argentina, its a must to compete at their level, since that we dont have the same resources of them, we need to work smarter and harder as well. I find myself and I can speak for most Uruguayans, that we have an offensive way to look football, despite of being listed as a very hard working and sacrificed side, I think we are very offensive. 

Nowadays we find a lot of cultures, styles of playing, philosophys that makes football so special, that you can find a way (in a whole of ways that exists) to success. Success is a big word, comes after lot of trial and error. But the objective for every club is the same: SUCCESS and how that comes? By overachieving. 
- How do we overachieve? Winning games. No team has overachieved just by tying games.
- How do we win? Scoring goals. If you dont score, you cant win, as simply as that.
- How do we score goals? Putting the ball inside the net
- Which is the best way to achieve that? Generating and attacking space.

There are ways to generate and attacking space, you can generate space with the ball (by drawing players out of position) or without the ball (by inviting more pressure to open spaces behind opposition players) each one has the same goal: attack the space generated. For me both ways are good, but In my personal preference I prefer to concede possesion of the ball, as long as, when we recover the ball we penetrate the space left quickly to put ourselves in the best goalscoring chance. When I think about this plan, I always remeber Ranieri´s Leicester that won the Premier League 15 /16.

Despite popular opinion, I found Ranieri an offensive type of manager, statistics tell us that they were 3rd on goals scored (68) that year, we are talking about almost 2 goals per game, 1.7 to be exact. So how can a mid to low-block score that amount of goals?

That opens a space for my Key Principles for this style:

• COMPACTNESS

As the definition says "the quality of being closely packed together". A compact team concedes less, it may be true. Remember that when you dictate under what rules and in what space the game is played, it is not defending, it is hunting. If we stay compact the opposition only has few ways to score, how we restrict space and keep solidity determine how succesful our compact block is. 

• SPEED

The speed, is what make us dangerous, is what make a counter dangerous, we need pace, we need quick decision making, we need to be as clinical as possible, we need to unsettle the opposition before they get in shape. It reminds me like how F1 pits act. In order to get that going I prefer more direct style with a higher tempo, also we have a ton of space forehead, if we have pacy wingers and strikers pass into space is a must. If the ball is loose by a bad pass we dont worry, next play is the important. MINDSET.

      

• EFECTIVENESS

In this principle depend how the season is going to be or not, to achieve we reliant on certain attributes, I think that Anticipation, Decision, Passing and Pace are the foremost important to execute the plan.

• Pace: why pace before acceleration? as we defend on our half, we have a lot of space to run into. Its more important on midfielders and strikers, but if we high up defensive line to get more compactness, is also for defenders. 
• Anticipation:  the best way to defend is to have good anticipation, a player who lacks strength or range to jump, even tackling or marking can cover up deficiencies by having a high anticipation rating. As @crusadertsar explained in his thread is the most important attribute for defending and its almost in every role that you play.
• Passing: "this attribute reflect the player´s ability to successfully find a team-mate with the ball", if we have players with good passing ability, the odds are to our favour to get goods transitions, combined with good dribbling abilities by my wingers or strikers, most of the counters will reach to the point that the mind games come in.
• Decisions: I put this one before of composure just because I find that decision-making is what make a footballer intelligent on the pitch, a player with low composure maybe dont choose the best option but will be a clever one if he has a high rating on decisions for sure. The players on the pitch (with ball or w/o) choose wrong the 99% of the time.

 

I will use a 4-4-2 because I find that it meets several requirements for the style of play I am proposing. First, two lines of four that provide sufficient cover on the flanks. Second, two forwards who give me the possibility of playing a more direct game and faster transitions without having to involve the players on the flanks. Third, play on the wing that can end with crosses or stretching the play for second line finishers.

For my chosen club, Werder Bremen, it suits perfectly. Also I never play on the bundesliga.    

 

In the next days I will be updating on this, with my whole squad and how I configure the system explained above (roles, duties), also I will tell you which players I´m going to build the system around and why I chose them.

 

 

 

 

[Dr Naysay]

This forum needs a thread like this right now.

[ceefax the cat]

Mourinho's Madrid spring to mind

[CapitalismReimagined]

What do you see as weaknesses of the tactic? 

[Bahnzo]

Interested to see how you do with this. I use a 442 with a mid block with the D pushed up to provide that compact defensive idea. I also am trying to use low pressing to see if I can move away from that high-press meta and also retain my defensive shape better with a combination of PI's and OI's. It's had some mixed results so far. 

I also consider Work Rate as one of those most important attributes as I've noticed defenders without it tend to be those that leave me frustrated when they switch off and let someone run by them. 

This is my 442 at the moment. 2nd in the Bundesliga, but 10pts behind the mighty Bayern. I don't play on the counter like you are, but maybe that'll change. 

[jc577]

Looks great, following with interest!

[Vinay17]

hace 6 horas, ceefax the cat dijo:

Mourinho's Madrid spring to mind

Another team that used to exploit the space really quickly, Xabi Alonso was great at choosing the first pass after the recover. Also I think that they used to play on a 4-2-3-1DM (formation that encourages the direct play)

hace 5 horas, CapitalismReimagined dijo:

What do you see as weaknesses of the tactic? 

When we talk about tactics, we talk about spaces. That´s why Pep is so obsessed about rest defense, to protect some spaces we have to give away others, here we encourage the opposition to attack the flanks allowing them space free to run into. This is one of the weakness that I see, another one can be all the pressure that you invite. To counter this type of weaknesses we need people to handle this situation, people that feels comfortable dealing with crosses, fullbacks that can really defend and not that typicall type of wingback that just bomb forward, and then people that can actually win the ball.

I think that if you can handle this weaknesses, you have the space in front to exploit as a reward. So in resume, the weaknesses are the pressure that you invite, giving up the flanks and giving up the possesion. The good thing about this is that you can make your strength or your game plan from your weakness, you kill two birds with one stone, since you cover your weakness and at the same time attack in this way.

hace 1 hora, Bahnzo dijo:

Interested to see how you do with this. I use a 442 with a mid block with the D pushed up to provide that compact defensive idea. I also am trying to use low pressing to see if I can move away from that high-press meta and also retain my defensive shape better with a combination of PI's and OI's. It's had some mixed results so far. 

I also consider Work Rate as one of those most important attributes as I've noticed defenders without it tend to be those that leave me frustrated when they switch off and let someone run by them. 

This is my 442 at the moment. 2nd in the Bundesliga, but 10pts behind the mighty Bayern. I don't play on the counter like you are, but maybe that'll change. 

This is a nice set up, like some partnerships that you have like the AF-DLF(s) combo there. Your set up is more possession-oriented anyways.
If you want a player to engage more you need to look for players with high agression, I see Work rate more related to Teamwork. but if you have a squad with high Agression, Work Rate, Anticipation and Tackling you can defend triggering more press.
As I play a low-block I prefer player with low agression so we dont get pulled out of position, but high marking, concentration and anticipation makes more ratio of interception that tackles won ratio.

Edited February 6 by Vinay17

[Socerer 01]

4-4-2… trapping outside with a low block and then counter at high tempo with passes into space being direct?
 

Reminds me a lot of Simeone’s first Atleti side.  

[Bahnzo]

27 minutes ago, Vinay17 said:

This is a nice set up, like some partnerships that you have like the AF-DLF(s) combo there. Your set up is more possession-oriented anyways.

It's definitely more possession oriented than what you are going for, but I've noticed it also works very well if I play on the counter. Having that two striker partnership really shines when the DLF takes the pass and hits a thru ball to the AF. So that makes me curious to see how well your low block and counter version does. Might be good if I adopt that for the mega teams like Bayern or when I faced ManU in the Champions League. But my board forbids me playing like that all season.

[Chiravilla]

As a big fan of counterattack, I'm waiting for it!

[ceefax the cat]

 

On 06/02/2024 at 08:53, ceefax the cat said:

Mourinho's Madrid spring to mind

I had some success in FM22 or 23 with a tactic a bit like that. Very little closing down but a relatively high line of engagement seemed to be the way. I wanted the team to prioritise dropping back into a solid shape, but not to let the opponents into our half unmolested, so to have a little bit of closing down starting in their half was useful. High mentality, passing and tempo, narrow width.

[Englishhammer]

10 minutes ago, ceefax the cat said:

unmolested

Sounds like you’re playing a team comprising of Jimmy Saville, Gary Glitter and co. 

[Cloud9]

1 hour ago, ceefax the cat said:

 

I had some success in FM22 or 23 with a tactic a bit like that. Very little closing down but a relatively high line of engagement seemed to be the way. I wanted the team to prioritise dropping back into a solid shape, but not to let the opponents into our half unmolested, so to have a little bit of closing down starting in their half was useful. High mentality, passing and tempo, narrow width.

Are you aware that you're talking to yourself here lol. 

[crusadertsar]

2 hours ago, Cloud9 said:

Are you aware that you're talking to yourself here lol. 

No I'm pretty sure he was replying to the other ceefax the cat, not the first one surely 

[mikcheck]

@Vinay17 any updates?

[Vinay17]

hace 2 horas, mikcheck dijo:

@Vinay17 any updates?

Not yet sorry, at the moment I’m on vacations so I hadn’t play, but I’m looking forward to, don’t worry this thread will have updates.

Edited February 15 by Vinay17

[caco4003]

do you tend to use an agressive trigger press when using a low block?

[Cloud9]

2 hours ago, caco4003 said:

do you tend to use an agressive trigger press when using a low block?

I go for a low trigger press in a low compact block (no counter press as well). 

This prioritizes defensive shape and makes sure that when you do go to win the ball back, it's a higher % chance. I prefer an aggressive trigger when playing higher up the pitch, where an unsuccessful press is less punishing. Aggressive triggers on higher lines can actually make you more resolute, as pressuring the opposition protects the high defensive line.

This is somewhat stylistic, you could look to build an aggressive defensive press if you had the right players to do it. I might consider experimenting with a midblock if that's the goal. 

Edited February 15 by Cloud9

[lied90]

On 15/02/2024 at 16:00, Vinay17 said:

Not yet sorry, at the moment I’m on vacations so I hadn’t play, but I’m looking forward to, don’t worry this thread will have updates.

I'm guessing it didn't work out?

[caco4003]

En 29/3/2024 a las 4:17, lied90 dijo:

I'm guessing it didn't work out?

if you want a counter attacking low block tactic check this thread 

 

[lied90]

59 minutes ago, caco4003 said:

if you want a counter attacking low block tactic check this thread 

 

It's a very good and well written post.

It's also a far cry from the 442 tactic Leicester used in their winning season.

[mikcheck]

Em 15/02/2024 em 15:00, Vinay17 disse:

Not yet sorry, at the moment I’m on vacations so I hadn’t play, but I’m looking forward to, don’t worry this thread will have updates.

Guess not