[Tactical Challenges #5 (6?): White Board]

Been predominately occupied with a return to my attempts to help replicate Marco Giampaolo's 4-3-1-2 recently. However, I did have some time recently to try out the Libero with the deeper lying 3-2-3-2 variant of the formation to see how the presence of players in the DM strata would affect matters. Can definitely say that you have to be more thoughtful about your duties and roles if you decide upon having a midfield pair in the DM strata as it's a lot easier to nullify your Libero, far more likely to negatively impact your Libero's ability to influence games if he's being crowded out in the same areas of the pitch by the deep lying midfield duo in front of him. Either the midfield duo in front of the Libero need to split very wide to give him room to operate, be given roles and duties that push them up the pitch and vacate the space of the DM strata for the Libero, or a employ a combination of the two movement strategies.

Having a narrow central band of three deep lying midfielders during build up, perhaps understandably, in most cases takes away from the Libero's ability to make his mark on games. Really does not seem to help the Libero's ability to get beyond that deeper lying position and into more advanced positions either, though I guess that is still an improvement on the "doesn't go past the halfway line" that some people seem to experience. Certainly possible to work an aggressive Libero into the deeper lying 3-2-3-2 variant of the challenge's formation choices, but definitely got to give the player movement and positioning a lot more thought compared to using the more aggressive option of the '3-2-5 Wide' if you want the Libero to exert an influence on games. Having that midfield duo pushed up to the Midfield strata makes a world of difference in terms of ease of setting up something that will work, you can literally play two Central Midfielders on Defend and often still have the Libero be decently involved in play (Does work best if they are asked to 'Play Wider' too).

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

@camoulton21 Having great with Player Preferred Moves at the moment and seeing how they interact with different roles. Pressing Forwards seem fairly unconstrained in FM match engine by hard-coding, so you can create a nice compact formation with a Pressing Foward (Defend) duo and yet still have them move high up onto the shoulder of the last defender when they have a PPM that encourages them to play on the shoulder of the last defender to attempt to beat any offside trap. Which was an interesting observation and discovery to me, since it seems to let me almost typecast the forwards by what I want them to do defensively first and then let PPMs encourage them to play how I need them to offensively in ways that just a plain (no PPMs) Pressing Forward (Defend) often cannot do. Does mean that the forwards are going to cover a bunch of ground transitioning to and from their offensive and defensive positions, but I certainly can't knock the extra defensive compactness that it allows us achieve.

Shame that the PPMs so far have not had the same effect on making a Fullback (Defend) more willing to make third man runs down the wing though, via 'Gets Forward Often' and similar traits. I appreciate the tactical challenge, so I keep tinkering away at it when I have free time to see how far I can push the formation\tactic in terms of effectiveness in FM20. Hard to stop trying when you start seeing cheeky little dinked balls over the top of those stubborn low block defenses, which could have lead to a beautiful goal to show off if it didn't get ruled out due to an unfortunate and annoying offside flag. (Seriously Dzeko, please stay the right side of the offside line mate. It killed me to see a wonderful goal like that get ruled out)

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

You know, I wish there was a half-way step between Fullback (Defend) and Fullback (Support). The former often gives better security when building up from the back against high pressing teams due to the deeper positioning of the FB (D), perfectly recreating the "four link" talked about in some of the tactical articles, but it lacks the penetration (fowards runs) and width that the FB (S) provides. Wingback (Defend) doesn't really fill that role because whilst it can pair penetration and width with a more defensive mindset it still occupies a higher position on the pitch when playing out from the back than FB (D), so reduced security from the lack of forming that "four link". So trying to recreate how Giampaolo wants his fullbacks to play is definitely a mission in tactical compromises in the end.

Anyhow, after playing a sizeable chunk of games I'm definitely leaning towards wanting to have my players to either already have or be able to learn the 'Plays One-Twos' player trait. Entirely subjective opinion, but it looks like it helps facilitate the sorts of interplay we're looking for through the middle and half-space zones. With how congested the middle can be due to narrow defenses, three-man midfields, and other factors it definitely pays to maximise how well the forwards and midfielders can create lovely bits of interplay between each other. It's a lot of playing the fullbacks into space down the vacant wings and hoping something comes of the crossing opportunities, when up against stubborn low blocks, otherwise. Having the 'Moves Into Channels' PPM on my forwards is also growing on me at the moment with the two roles I'm leaning towards favouring up top, since some roles can't have the 'Move Into Channels' and 'Play Wider' PIs active at the same time.

Might seem like an odd choice up against stubborn low blocks but I'm partial to a Pressing Forward (Defend) or PF (S) currently due to how they'll peel off the defenders and interact with the AMC, MCL and MCR when everyone has 'Plays One-Twos' in their bag of tricks. I actually kind of prefer it if teams want to come out and give us some room in behind their defence, it typically greatly improves our chances of generating those killer central through balls that everyone craves seeing happen in FM20. An effective low block is the literal epitome of us dominating possession and hoping we manage to bag a goal from a cross, set-piece or some miraculous interplay through the middle third of the pitch.

Width is an interesting dilemma that is still puzzling me at times, and honestly I'm (paradoxically?) definitely favouring playing on Very Narrow or Narrow in a lot of games so far since it helps improve our interplay through the middle whilst not really impacting the utilisation or effectiveness of our fullbacks. All the space is out on the wings anyway so narrowing team width doesn't really greatly impact the fullback's use of it, the 'Play Wider' PI keeps them nice and wide if they tuck in too much without it activated. Striking that perfect balance between the midfield roles and overall team's width (team instructions) is still like a dance to me, since any role with 'Play Wider' is typically going to position itself wider than a role without it regardless of the team's width setting.

This has been an interesting long-term tactical challenge. Boy, if it doesn't make me constantly doubt and re-assess my tactics at times though compared to other formations I've used in the past in FM20. If there's one formation that makes me feel like I need to queue up three different variations of the same theme it is this formation.

[Tactical Challenges #5 (6?): White Board]

4 minutes ago, herne79 said:

One thing I do want to look out for is the increased risk.  We're already dealing with a somewhat risky formation, so having an advancing Libero as well might be a step too far on occassion.  Again this comes back to balancing risk vs reward (the point of this challenge) therefore I want to keep an eye on this aspect.

That balancing of the risk-reward ratio is something that is always on my mind, especially with trying to mitigate for potential player errors that could lead to turnovers in dangerous areas. So far though, Soria seems to have a good sense of when to be conservative and when to involve himself in influencing the play. For example, here you'll notice we are up against a 4-1-2-1-2 (4-4-2 Narrow Diamond) congesting the middle of the park and attempting to shut down our ability to play through the middle of the park. First, the presence of the opposition AMC made Soria a bit more conservative in his positioning to guard against threat of the opposition AMC during transitions. Secondly, playing a midfield diamond vastly simplifies marking assignments for our opposition, directly countering our own ability to make a diamond in midfield through our AMC, widened MCR and MCL, and Libero.

So a more subdued performance, however, that didn't stop Soria from still producing a key highlight by choosing the right moment to present for the ball, receive the pass and drive into the space available, all before threading it out wide to our AMR and picking up an assist thanks to Bruno Zebie (AMR) smashing the ball home into the bottom far corner. Which I must say is quite the finish for someone who supposedly has a 5 for Finishing ability...

[Tactical Challenges #5 (6?): White Board]

To kick off a discussion about how to possibly go about getting more from your Libero, here's my base tactic so far. The midfield duo are asked to 'Get Wider' to open up the space in between them, as you may notice in my earlier gif, so that the Libero has space to move into (or beyond) my midfield line. That allows him space to move into with the ball at his feet, or present himself as a passing option in midfield during ball circulation, or attack into said space either during transitions or when an opportunity to offer a third-man run exists. Which given Soria only plays on a Positive mentality for me at Libero due to my Team Mentality and other tactical considerations, it does make me wonder how he'd go with an even more aggressive risk-taking mentality.

And here's Soria profile, who due to the lack of any fullbacks, was deemed a good fit to convert into my Libero at this level due to his attributes and positional familiarity at centreback. As you can see though, he has no Player Preferred Moves to try and entice him further forwards like 'Gets Forward Whenever Possible'. So on paper at least, Soria could be made to be even more likely to get forwards with or without the ball at his feet. One other consideration to take note of is that formations like the 4-4-2 can be particularly vulnerable to how our midfield works, our AMC either has to be left free or marked by one of the opposition midfield two, which leaves the other opposition central midfielder with a lot of ground to cover to combat the deeper lying midfield 2 or 3 (depending on where Soria is at the time).

[Tactical Challenges #5 (6?): White Board]

Personally, so far I have experimented with a Defensive mentality, support duties at AML\R, and then applying 'Look for the Underlap' to further decrease the player mentality even further. Seems to work pretty well in general for getting the AML\R to track back and be wary of runs from opposition players in the FB, WB or ML\R slots, still need to test against formations that use AML\R though.

Certainly not faultless when facing formations that have two wide players, because sometimes the AML\R will pass the more advanced opposition wide player onto our wide centreback to go press the second opposition wide player. Surprisingly, decently functional so far though despite being a Canadian Premier League team, which as you might guess means seeing AML\R's with a Work Rate of 13 or higher is kinda rare.

Going with the first, deeper lying, interpretation of the 3-2-3-2 offered by Herne (called 3-2-3-2 DM in the game) should allow for better defensive solidity, in theory at least. Currently, I figure the best way to protect my flanks is to utilise the top heavy advantage of the more advanced 3-2-3-2 (3-2-5 in the game) to play a high pressing game that forces the opposition into hurried clearances and inaccurate long balls, rather than letting them have time to measure an accurate pass out to the flanks. Anyone trying to play out of their half with 4 at the back is getting greeted by their whole backline being marked or harried, whilst the AMC makes it hard for a midfielder to drop back and casually collect the ball.

[Tactical Challenges #5 (6?): White Board]

1 minute ago, herne79 said:

Soria is the player who made the final through ball?

Aye, that was Soria alright. Gleefully made the run up the middle to offer himself as a passing option for my AML (David Doe) that was driving through midfield and then played the final ball right down the middle for Tomi Ameobi (STCR) to finish in the box. 

[Tactical Challenges #5 (6?): White Board]

Real tempting to try out the top heavy 3-2-5 Wide formation for a challenge, so off we go to FC Edmonton in the Canadian Premier League to do some experimentation. Going to make full use of a long pre-season period to experiment with mentality, team instructions, player roles and duties, man-marking assignments and so on. Bearing in mind that it is only pre-season currently, still pretty chuffed that Ramon Soria produced this bit of play as my Libero in a pre-season friendly match against a 4-4-2. Given the number of teams that love to play a 4-4-2 in the Canadian Premier League, having Soria step up into and past the midfield line could be rather fruitful if we can get him to replicate this often in competitive games.

Be interesting to see how we fare once I lock in my finalised version of the tactic, definitely got some adjustments to make, and we achieve peak tactical familiarity. Will be keeping a keen eye on how 29 year-old Spaniard Ramon Soria performs as my Libero over a season.

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

Still chipping away at this every so often, been trying out some different ideas to see how they translate into the match engine and against different tactics. Unfortunately lost this game against a 4-1-4-1 formation 2-1 due to an inspired Kingsley Coman performance at ML as an Inverted Winger on Attack duty, he scored both goals. However, I did salvage something valuable from the experience when we produced some saucy interplay to score this beaut' of a team goal. Cut them open through the right half-space, with our STCR delivering a delicious through ball for the AMC to apply the finishing touch to. Had a couple of other promising highlights of interplay down the right half-space that sprung a player in behind the opposition defense, alas those moves didn't result in a goal though.

So feeling like I might be on to something fruitful with the latest combination of team mentality, team instructions, and player roles and duties I have been experimenting with. Time to see how it does over the full course of a season, rather than just a run of a few games.

[Dealing with those pesky defensive possession heavy sides]

It's moments like these where the ability to train three different tactics, presuming you care about maximising tactical familiarity at all, comes in handy for certain formations. Sometimes you just need to get real aggressive with the standard 4-1-2-3 and shift the middle three up a strata so it is a 4-1(cm)-2(AMCL\R)-3. It's all about being able to get really tight to the opposition's players and quickly pressure them for the ball back if we turn it over in the final third due to a goal attempt or the ball going loose.

If we're camping in the opposition's final third, I'm usually fine with the risk of going extra aggressive because typically all that ends up coming out is hurried clearances that we regularly mop up easily to progress back into the danger zone. Alternatively, just go full Marcelo Bielsa and man-mark everyone across the pitch for better or worse...

So, uh, yeah, backing off ain't exactly my middle name as you can clearly see, at least not when I'm going for a high pressing tactic, it's in for a penny in for a pound with me.

[CM vs DM]

Positioning is indeed probably the most significant factor when comparing either the exact same, or two similar, roles between the DM and MF strata; a DM\D typically sits a bit deeper for me than CM\D when you are camped around the opposition third probing for an opening. So can be a combination of either the player sitting a bit deeper in the attacking or defensive phases, having to cover more ground to take up the same attacking positions when playing in the DM strata due to deeper starting position, how much ground they might have to cover to get touch tight or pressure an opposition midfielder, and other similar considerations.

 

Another would be how Team Instructions can have different impacts on facets like Player Mentality depending on Role, Duty and whether the player is in the DM or MF strata. The 'Play Through The Middle' team instruction will typically only affect players in the MF strata if they are on a Defend duty, however, in the DM strata it will typically affect any Role and Duty combination (a Segundo Volante on Attack in a team on Positive or above already has a Very Attacking player mentality though). So that can lead to subtle differences since a DM\S can end up with a higher Player Mentality category than a CM\S with 'Play Through The Middle' active, since the DM\S will be playing with a more positive\risky\adventurous mentality than the CM\S would.

[Gian Piero Gasperini at Atalanta Case Study]

1 hour ago, crusadertsar said:

I just looked in my own save and on balanced team mentality, my wingbacks (on support duty) mentality went down to cautious. So I don't really understand this. Maybe someone else can check it out.

Look for the Underlap (LftU) definitely typically increases the mentality of players in the "Fullback" and "Wingback" tactical formation positions for the majority of role and duty combinations, and I cannot replicate (nor remember off the top of my head) so far any weird combinations that can cause it to do the reverse. Anything from the Midfield strata and onward will often see LftU drop mentality down a categorisation though, so that is something to be mindful of if you push your wingbacks forward in the tactical formation up to the Wide (left\right) Midfield tactical formation position. Since you explicitly said your wingbacks are on Support duty we can rule out Attack duty being an offender, since LftU typically causes no noticeable mentality change within the UI for Attack duties.

So, yeah, I don't know, you got me stumped for the moment as to what precise thing you have done to achieve that outcome.

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

And I'm still learning new things with each and every game, haha. Especially after my latest managerial step in FM20, examined below.

Decided to up the stakes and try this out with the Spanish National Team to see how a vastly more talented group of players would handle things compared to my group of more limited CanPL players. Firstly, let's just say that it really drives home how important ingraining maximum tactical familiarity into the squad is for the 4-3-1-2, it was like going back to square one watching my Spain squad try to get to grips with the formation until the tactical familiarity built up over time with games. For all the vast upgrades in attributes that Spain's top players have it does not mean much at times without that tactical familiarity. The football is far better to watch, and more effective, when the players are highly drilled in all the different components (tempo, width, etc) even with a dream of a squad at your disposal. Really drives home having multiple 4-3-1-2 tactics setup for when you need to adjust anything which will lower tactical familiarity; like tempo changes, width changes, etc. Even Spain can be prone to playing wasteful long passes to no one, needlessly hoofing the ball when better options are available, players not being on the same wave length for switches of play, and other such things when the tactical familiarity is middling.

Admittedly, having Sweden's rather defensively solid 4-4-2 as my first opponent in Euro 2020 qualifiers did not help matters. They've always been challenging to play against even when using formations with more width like the wide 4-3-3, and our games typically result in hard fought low scoring encounters. Sweden are no hacks and have far better tricks up their sleeve than just relying solely on a compact low block and letting us dominate play. A Cautious 4-4-2 with a Pressing Foward on Support often results in the PF (S) marking your DLP (D) during your build up, which can cause some obvious issues when Sweden decides to apply some pressure on the ball carrier if one of your main options for circulation of the ball is now much less of an easy, safe out-ball. Definitely not a match up where leaving things as they are will result in victory more times than a draw or defeat, having replayed those games a few times over just to see how consistent the result would be.

Playing in the big leagues can be a blessing and a curse with how much more prevalent PPMs become, Saul and Koke take shooting from long range whenever they can to an annoying extreme with 'Tries Long Range Shots'. On the flip side, having a more talented and technically secure squad does mean I was able to make adjustment to the passing style (up to 'Shorter') safe in the knowledge that I could trust the players to make good decisions about when to circulate the ball with quick, short passing and when to utilise longer passes to get from back to front or from side to side quickly. Additionally, if you find yourself needing to create some situational width on one or both flanks switching one or both strikers to the role of Poacher allows them the freedom to sometimes drift out to the flank and make themselves available for a pass down the line. Actually the only role I have found with quite that amount of freedom of lateral movement across the pitch, not even a Complete Foward will roam quite that widely across the pitch to exploit space and make themselves available for a pass. Poachers being poachers though, you will have to account for the fact that they'll contribute less defensively due to their propensity to want to sit up with the opposition centrebacks but that does mean you have the potential to spring some lethal counter-attacks.

On the plus side, at least my Spain squad have the smashing of the minnows down fairly well so far after belting the likes of Malta in qualifying. Thought I was going to have to throw everything out and start again from scratch to bring success to Spain using a 4-3-1-2 after the headache the Swedes were giving me. And yet I'm not quite satisfied with this group of Spanish players since despite all their vast improvements in every element of the game they have over my CanPL squads, I have yet to see them hit the heights of incisive one-touch passing that my Pacific FC squad managed during passages of certain games.

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

Tried to boil it down to the bare essentials since TIs vary depending on the Mentality chosen, the opposition formation, and other factors. For example, I rarely have 'Focus Play Through The Middle' and 'Overlap Left\Right' active if using the Defensive mentality. The primary reason? I often use those two TIs to nudge the Deep Lying Playmaker and the Fullbacks' individual mentality up a category. Also, important to note that FPTTM only affects a DLP in the midfield strata if they are on Defend duty.

Often I'll begin games with a positive mindset and look to enforce my game on the opposition, ergo a positive mentality, therefore FPTTM and OL\R are enabled due to affecting player mentality. Similar consideration with choice of width too, a Defensive mentality already plays Fairly Narrow whereas a Positive mentality plays Fairly Wide by default. While the 4-3-1-2 is fairly narrow formation, playing with Mezalla or Carrilero roles will already widen the midfield due to 'Sit Wider'. Therefore, width TI is used as a tool to adjust the horizontal compactness of the midfield diamond's positioning in response to opposition defensive structure. Typically start out Very Narrow or Fairly Narrow and adjust from there when in Positive mentality because, ala Giampaolo, midfield diamonds make for easy connections through the lines and the more compact the diamond the easier and safer the connections are for quick, fluid ball circulation.

Emphasising Much Shorter Passing is pretty self-explanatory for a Canadian Premier League team when you see how wasteful we can be with long passes at times, they'll still hit them when on but don't waste possession quite as often. It also plays a part in tempering our choice of playing at the highest tempo, the motto is to circulate the ball at speed against settled defenses and then go from back to front in a flash once the opportunity opens up. Play Out Of Defence is a situational thing, typically we face low blocks and can play around any forwards pressure but sometimes I disable it if we're getting pressed in a way we struggle to play around. Though, nice little trick for everyone, Distribute To Playmaker can be handy to enable against certain formations when POOD is active, most often the two-man pairings. If our backline and DLP is pressured often no one picks up the AP (A) coming deeper and so the goalkeeper just lobs it over the pressure right into our wide open AP (A).

Offside Trap is pretty self-explanatory I should imagine, and wins us back the ball plenty of times. Defensive line is going to depend on your squad and choice of mentality, typically not having supremely athletic (quick) defenders I err towards sitting deeper to begin with. Due to lacking someone in the Defensive Midfield strata I always drop our line of engagement by at least one notch for greater vertical compactness. Also, easier for me to mark zonally and deny passing lanes through the middle than to try pressing up the field; so the strikers sitting deeper to deny a route into central midfield is usually helpful.

Defensive Width I like to have narrower where possible to help congest the play where ever the ball might be located, and it often helps congest the box for me against crosses from out wide given the CanPL defenders aren't always the best markers. Depending on the opposition formation Opposition Instructions might be employed to encourage players to apply pressure to the opposition wingers and fullbacks as soon as physically possible. One advantage of players often having weak, or no, ability with their non-dominant kicking leg is being able to force players onto their weaker foot and force play inside into our congestion using OIs.

Then there is the more situational TIs like Counter, Play for Set-Pieces, Shoot on Sight, Run at Defence and Pass into Space that see some context sensitive employment during games if I feel we need it. Shoot on Sight I sometimes like to employ for a while against those compact, narrow low blocks to either get the AI to tactically react to us getting shots on goal or encourage the lads to not be afraid to have a shot when we create and exploit pockets of space in-between or behind the lines, because you know the opposition are going to scramble to close it down tight.

That touches on what I would consider the basics, but doesn't even begin to get into how I've begun to change up the player roles during games in response to the opposition. Sometimes I'll drop one or both Mezalla (S) for Box-to-Box Midfielders due to 'Play Wider' making the diamond too wide in such a way that the opposition's defensive structure closes off the Mezalla as an option for the DLP, even on Very Narrow width. Similarly, might drop one or both Mezzala down to Carrilero and\or BBM if our DLP (D) needs help circulating the ball or creating the play since it removes the inclination for the sides of the midfield diamond to be aggressive in their positioning due to 'Get Further Fowards'.

Sometimes dominating the opposition in the final third calls for more careful and deliberate thought about when to take up advanced positions. While other times the DLP is able to dictate the play from deep alone and the diamond's sides are free to be unrestrained in taking up dangerous advanced positions. Leaving things the same and brute forcing it can work too, but I would rather not overly burden our deepest lying midfielder when the turnovers can be mitigated.

I find there to be plenty of nuances to consider if you want to maximise the formation's potential within each game. Set and forget can work out, but you might cop some additional draws or loses in games as a result of just trying to brute force it. Tried doing that against the 4-3-3 Narrow for a while and more often got punished for it than things going my way despite often dominating long periods of those games.

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

Potentially promising times ahead for my attempt at the Giampaolo 4-3-1-2 as I get closer to settling on the right balance of instructions, roles and duties finally; as our team cohesion and tactical familiarities also near their peaks. With the inconsistencies I run into sometimes though I am definitely going to play a bunch more games before calling anything finalised. I only just found the right balance to still provide width via the fullbacks whilst counteracting my nemesis the narrow 4-3-3; I was worried I'd have to sacrifice myself to playing a 4-1-2-1-2 against it to guard us against being ravaged by the three strikers during transitions. Each different formation brings its own tactical subtleties to get to grips with as a 4-3-1-2, meaning I often can't just "set and forget" roles and duties for games.

The promising thing is that the lads last game started to see and play some rare through-balls down the channel between the fullback and centreback for the strikers to latch onto, when left disengaged by the opposition low block to pick a pass. Even better yet, they created some lovely opportunities centrally where we broke down the narrow, low block with quick movement and silky one-touch passing. Our AP (A) with PIs to 'Get Further Forwards' alternates between being involved in circulating the ball as we probe for openings and becoming a third striker between two up top. Our strikers when they can't get involved in play are very much still helping the team out by pinning back the opposition centrebacks and then typically subtly dragging them wider to create space for the AP (A)'s movement, opposition centrebacks are left with the option to either react to the danger of the AP (A) or let a striker wiggle free.

Pretty settled on a dual attack of Complete Foward (S) for now due to the way they work in tandem, the danger they can still cause going forwards in transitions, and more importantly their useful decoy effect against the low block for the AP (A) and others. As counter as it runs to the usual advice, using exactly the same player role and duty as a strike partnership isn't always a bad thing when it comes to broad roles like CF (S) due to how each different player interprets the role in their own individual way via their attributes and PPMs. I have one player who will interpret it in a more Targetman ("big man") fashion, another who is all action across the pitch, and others who lean more towards putting a Poacher-esque ("little man") spin on the CF (S) role. CF (S) duo using PIs to Get Wider and Move Into Channels at the moment.

Got to give the team some credit, sometimes the players can be one footed to the point of frustration when dealing with the Canadian Premier League but they have the potential to play some slick passing moves when they sync up. And I didn't even get the chance to try giving members of the squad the "Plays One-Twos" PPM yet, so watch this space? Most CanPL players are clean slates in terms of PPMs, so still a lot of potential for optimisation via that route.

[Training Schedule by FM Korea]

As an aside, regarding the structuring of the pre-season training program sessions shown in the screenshots in the opening post. What with this being a video game I'm going to presume that structuring an Endurance session before a Resistance session doesn't actually have any negative impacts on athlete development. Because in a real-world context the current literature and research would very much suggest that those two session types be sequenced the other way around for optimal benefit in regards to strength gains.

[Training Schedule by FM Korea]

On 30/03/2020 at 15:25, Cadoni said:

Same here.

Whatever I put, then starting to complain for something else.

If they develop and have max tactical familiarity; ignore it.

You can say that again. Almost seems like the players just want to complain for the sake of complaining at times. The Assistant Manager can be just as bad at times too, complaining about individual training focuses that he reckons aren't going to do anything yet lo and behold guess who has achieved statistically significant improvement in their focused attributes a month later.

[I know what I want, but not how to get there]

Decided to try my own hand at this after reading the thread, always enjoy a challenge. Still experimenting with different options before settling on possible best combinations, and probably making life a tad bit harder for myself by being in the Canadian Premier League. Frustratingly inconsistent sometimes depending on the opposition formation I am up against, so not sure it will ever be close to "set and forget" and instead I so far have three different versions set up to ensure very high tactical familiarity should we need to adjust our offensive diamond's width and such. When it does click for us in games good luck getting the ball off us with the speed we can pass the ball around the midfield diamond formed by an AP (A), MEZ (S), DLP (D) and MEZ (S). The AI loves a good narrow, low block on the edge of their box though, which is understandable yet frustrating since working around and through pressure is what we thrive on when it flows.

Working the ball wider and creating space for a cross from the Mezzalas in the halfspaces has proved to be one avenue to goal for us so far. Tried out WB (S) and FB (S) and so far have settled with FB (S) since the fullbacks were offering sufficient width while being just that little bit more conservatively positioned during the transitions from our defensive third into the midfield and opposition third. They can get forwards quite well once midfield control is established, but if additional generation of width is needed the Get Further Forward PI works a treat at getting FB (S) to get involved further forwards more often. Outside of set-pieces and counter-attacks, challenging to get the two up top involved in the goalscoring action outside of those crosses into the box due to the aforementioned narrow, low block the AI loves to settle into. Unless the AI tries to apply pressure to us, so far I am having to resort to using the two forwards as occasional lay-off men and decoys for our true goalscoring threat, working our Advanced Playmaker and Mezzalas into pockets of space where they are facing towards goal and able to get some rather spectacular shot offs.

The defensive side of the equation is far more settled currently, most of my experimentation and tinkering has to do with maximizing our offensive potency. Not much use being decently solid at the back if we can't create and convert chances at all, can't expect the defense to keep a clean sheet for 28+ games in a row. I have seen the allure of recreating Giampaolo's 4-3-1-2 in FM though, when it clicks I love it but making it click for us consistently is the challenging part. Tempted to see if PPMs like Plays One-Twos could possibly help further enhance our ability to break the lines and create pockets of space to exploit.