Cleon

I used BPD's while using play our of defence, so they still attack and take advantage of positional play. Without these roles, you very rarely ever do any type of counter attack as play is slowed down far too much. But using BPD's, especially after the new changes on FM23 you can have best of both worlds. I wrote about it too and showed examples;

But it stops the counter attack from happening as they slow play down and play out of defence instead of taking advantage of positional advantage. You're instructing the players to pass it around in defence instead of attacking. You're correct it's not the same phase of play BUT it stops the chance of the other phase happening because you have told players to play with the ball deep in your own half instead. And considering most counter attacks happen from your own half....

You can but it is a bit counter productive in FM terms. Due to you playing out of defence, you allow the opposition to regain it's defensive shape and get players back into position, taking away any possible positional advantage you have.

I've started writing the next chapter today;

This entire thread is for FM23. Every setting I used is in the thread already.

All the details are in the post already, so you can make it yourself. This thread is for a discussion around the tactic, the principles of it etc and not a download. A download defeats the purpose and aim of the thread.

Thanks If it works for you sure. But personally speaking, I don't like to mirror roles on both sides. I much prefer variety and to attack sides in different ways. This is just my preference. But the benefits for how I play and approach games of not mirroring roles are; Keeping the opposing team on their toes: By using different attacking strategies, it can be more difficult for the opposing team to predict what your team will do next, making it harder for them to defend. Creating opportunities for different players: Different attacking strategies can create opportunities for different players on your team to shine. Exploiting weaknesses in the opposing team: By using different role/duty strategies, you can better exploit any weaknesses in the opposing team's defence Keeping the game unpredictable and exciting: By mixing up players role and duty strategies, it can make the game more unpredictable and exciting for both the players and the spectators. As players make runs at different times, use the ball different and create space different.

Read this thread. It shows you how to analyse your tactic, spot issues and fix them;

Likely different calculations compared to real life and probably doesn't count 60% of the pitch like real life. Some PPDA metrics have them below 6 for some teams in the Prem. But most places have the league average as 12.8 for this season with Leeds the lowest at 9.8. Also have to remember it's hard to replicate real life too, last year when defenders passed the ball around in their own final third constantly everyone moaned that it was bugged and overkill.

Probably change the entire shape as I think they’re wasted in a formation that uses a DM. They don’t position or behave like you’d expect them to without.

It depends. Just because a team might use 2 DM's and WB's it doesn't mean they'll be hard to break down or that each that uses these, utilise them the same way. It's not an always thing. But you could ask your AM's to man mark the oppositions DM's yeah.

Could you not just have dropped the striker back to AM? So you can use almost anyone in the role and go 5-2-2-1 instead?

Just for this game only. If I made a change it's only usually during that game. Most of the time it's fine and I don't change often but on occasions, especially against really good technical sides then I will adapt if they're hurting us like in the example above. As for the striker, no, what we do with the ball determines the striker not the player. It doesn't matter what striker I use the system is set up to score a similar amount of goals regardless of who plays the role.

For me the roles and duties have always been key. The rest of the things like PI's and TI's are all about refining/creating the style of play you want. But the roles and duties are key to getting the actions and movement you need. One injury made you make a total tactic shift? What was the thought process there? Seems a bit extreme. I originally used a support duty on the pressing forward with the low possession tactic. But because I wanted more attacking threat, ideally, I want 2 of the front 3 to be attacking. If the lone striker drops deep he's dropping into an area where the AP already operates and this can take away any space he has. You can do it that way if you want but it wouldn't be much different to how we play now. Still only 1 real attacking threat in the box all the time. That was one of the issues we were having, not enough attacking threat. It would just be like for like going the deep striker route. If you wanted to go that route then if it was me, I'd have both attacking midfielders on attack duty and attacking the box. So would change the AP to a AM attack likely as you wouldn't need a creator if the striker is dropping deep and being the link player. Thank you

In the first part, we spoke more about what to do before a match and studied the weakness and strengths of the opposition. While also talking about general metrics and suggesting what could or couldn’t be wrong with something. In this next part of the article, we study the actual football matches and use the data to refine our tactics and spot/fix potential issues before they happen. We also look at how we can use this data to evolve our systems and become even better. FM23: Match Analysis Match analysis can provide a more nuanced and qualitative understanding of a match that may not be captured by purely statistical data. For example, match analysis can help to identify patterns of play, tactical decisions made by managers and players, and the overall flow of the game. It can also help to identify key moments in the match that may have had a significant impact on the outcome, such as a red card or a penalty kick. Additionally, match analysis can provide insight into the physical and mental states of the players, which can be difficult to quantify with data alone. This can include factors such as fatigue, injuries, and psychological factors such as confidence and motivation. Overall, match analysis can offer a more complete picture of a football match, helping to understand not only what happened on the pitch, but also why it happened and how it impacted the outcome of the game. In Game First up I’m going to be looking at the matches just to see if I can spot any glaring issues before using the data to delve further. There are also three things from the first article I’ll be keeping an eye on here and those are; Not many final third passes attempted Low shot quality Defensive actions The first two are likely issues, we determined that in the first article. The third one is a non-issue but just want to double-check. FM23: Match Analysis - Final Third Creativity Since we’ve switched to the possession-based system, we have favoured possession above all else. The main aim was to keep the ball as long as we could while maintaining a large number of passes. We’ve achieved that here but when watching games, it feels like we are lacking that creative spark in the final third. For chances created we are all the way down to 13th in the table, which could be quite telling, especially based on the “feeling” I have when watching games. As we can see here, for the final third passes we seem to be quite high with being 3rd on the table. What is interesting here is we are high for final third passes yet low for chances created. This seems to suggest that we are prioritising passing the ball over being creative with it. This could be down to a number of factors. Perhaps it’s down to the players being unable to create chances and the players are poorer than I realise. It is possible, after all, I am attributeless. Let’s take a look; For open-play key passes per 90, our central midfielder on support duty is ranked 4th. Which is pretty good considering. Our advanced playmaker is ranked 15th for key passes per 90. Again this is decent for my side and where we are but still far behind a lot of other teams. A few of the teams have multiple players here, something I was hoping we would have. But this is likely part of the problem too that we are having. So far we seem reliant on specific players when I need other players on the side to help with the burden too. For chances created by individual players, the advanced playmaker has ranked really high again, being 3rd in the table. What we’ve learned up to now is we do have people creating but it mainly seems to be just two players. We need to perhaps look at spreading this load out more. But first, we need to look at how the others on the side hold up in the creative department. We also don’t have many shots per game either, we rank 18th in the entire league. But for the percentage of shots on target from the shots taken, we rank 5th with 39% We clearly have issues and are painting a vivid picture of what is at fault here based on the stats. Team Instructions Maybe our possession team instructions are too cautious now and not allowing us to take advantage of the opposition's defensive line being out of sync or any positional advantage we have. It is possible we tend to take extra passes rather than releasing the ball to the attackers. This is a reminder of the team instructions we are using; Much shorter passing Play out of defence Low crosses Dribble less Works ball into box Lower tempo Fairly narrow Out of all of these team instructions, I think it’s only likely that the issue is two or three of them. Possibly all three of them combined. But I think much shorter passing might be making players dwell on the ball more and not being direct enough in their passing, which means we can waste good opportunities in favour of the pass. Dribble less is an interesting one too as this could be one of the major factors at play here. We don’t allow players to dribble so maybe they can’t create the space we need or create chances themselves because again, we are telling them to pass the ball more than dribble with it. The last one I think could be and the likely real issue at cause here is; works ball into the box. Again we are asking players to reign back the shots and take extra touches and passes to retain the ball. Every team instruction I’ve mentioned so far is focused on encouraging more passes or touches over dribbling and taking shots. This suggests the gut feeling about us overplaying the ball is true. The next step now is to see if this is the case in the game and prove the gut feeling as a fact. Pass Maps The majority of my pass maps are like the above. They show that we play centrally and then out to the wings and then back centrally. There aren’t many penetrations or pass combinations in the final third centrally. This is a real problem as we have two attacking midfielders who should be able to dominate here and dictate the game in the final third. It seems that the central midfielders have all the influence and everything is going through them. That in itself isn’t a major issue but the fact the attacking midfielder and the advanced playmaker aren’t having the kind of influence I hoped, that’s a real issue. Not just because this is likely why we don’t create much as the team's creativity is far too deep to do anything noteworthy. But more because how we are playing isn’t really matching the football philosophy I wanted. Or maybe, it actually is but now I have something else in mind and need to evolve it. That’s probably a better way of looking at it here. At first, we wanted to retain possession at all costs because we didn’t have the players to compete with teams by allowing them the majority of the ball. Perhaps now, we need to take that next step and turn that possession into shots and goals rather than possession. Before that though, I need to gather some screenshots from a few games to confirm why we aren’t creating much and what we can do to fix it. Earlier on I mentioned the gut feeling we had about passing the ball around too much and taking extra touches. So here is an example of play I see happening 20+ times a game. I should note that I left it this long before investigating and fixing for the content and examples throughout this article. If you see something you are not happy with happening regularly, do not wait to investigate and potentially fix it. Try to sort the issue out before it becomes a major issue. In the above image, the advanced playmaker receives the ball and is pushed out towards the wing, as that is the only free space he has. He’s also being double marked so he can’t really do much else. But even without that, if you look at the forward options he doesn’t actually have any realistic options, even if he was facing forwards. The wingback is lagging behind play so in this scenario, he is only ever going to be a safe sideways/backward pass. Rather than playing a forward pass. Every single option to the wingback requires the wingback to run with the ball once he gets it, to create his own space and movement. If the advanced playmaker could have got the ball to the striker, then that would have been wasted as he’s actually offside. So again not an option. The central midfielder with a support duty is also marked so he isn’t an option either. Options-wise, the attacking midfielder is interesting as he has lots of space and is unmarked. But he isn’t actively involved in play because the advanced playmaker is going towards the wings. So if we refer back to the pass map above, you can now begin to see why we don’t really have forward passes deep in the opposition's half. Due to the ball being played out to the wings, then back inside and backwards. With us being deep here then this is clearly a role issue. Yes, we have team instructions that tell us to retain the ball but even if they were not selected, it doesn’t really change the player positioning. Using the right player roles and duties: Different player roles and duties can affect the way your team plays and the type of passes they will attempt. For example, using a "playmaker" role in midfield can encourage more creative passing, while a "support" duty for your fullbacks can encourage them to get forward and provide attacking options from deep areas. What we see here is this playing out. The players are just doing what they’ve been instructed to do. We aren’t actually focusing on getting the ball forward with any real intent. This has a knock-on effect on everything else in the tactic and the way we play. When we started out retaining the ball above all else was fine. As we are now getting better, we need to be more proactive with it. We might have just won the league but the context here is everything. We did it by being clinical with the chances we got which is fine. But then you remember we are passing the ball around more than other teams and struggle to create chances in general. Add this to the shot quality issue we mentioned in the last article too and we have real underlying issues. We’ve been lucky this season for sure and the strong defensive unit gave us a chance. But what happens when we become less clinical, less solid defensively and create even fewer chances? We’d likely struggle and playing this way with those underlying issues is a disaster waiting to happen. When it all goes in your favour it’s fine but when it goes against you, we’d be in real trouble. The contrast between things going for you or against you is the difference between winning the league and struggling near the bottom. I’m not exaggerating when I say that. In a different season with not as much luck, we could have easily been fighting relegation. This is why I always bang on about the context of the match, statistics and everything in general. All of our issues are linked and part of the same thing. You’ll have heard me mention before during my articles about the domino effect and how if a player is caught out of position then someone elsewhere on the side, has to cover and then that means someone has to cover for him and so on. This issue here is the same kind of principle. We are passing the ball sideways and backwards, we aren’t aggressive enough with our roles, and we aren’t creating much or taking many shots. It’s not a sustainable way of playing. This all stems from what we are doing with the ball and the sideway passes, especially when our creative players who have creative roles are in possession of the ball. Fixing The Issues There are a number of options we can explore here to improve us as a team and create more chances and score more goals. So what are the options? Risky approach: Working the ball into the box is a risky tactic, as it involves attempting to pass the ball through a congested and highly-defended area of the pitch. This can lead to turnovers and counter-attacks for the opposition, especially if your passes are not accurate or your movement is not well-coordinated. Can lead to over-dependence on crosses: If your team is overly reliant on working the ball into the box, it can lead to a reliance on crosses from wide areas. While crosses can be effective at creating chances, they are also relatively low-percentage plays and can be easily defended against by well-organized defences. If you don’t have players positioned correctly in the attacking phase then it can be quite tricky to retain the ball when you want to work the ball into the box. It can actually see an increase in bad-quality shots and crosses. If the players don’t have options then they’ll revert to these two things by default because what else can you do when you have no other options? I’m sure my side has been impacted by this and the stats seem to suggest so too, especially with the low-quality shots we have. I could remove works the ball into the box team instruction. We don’t actually create many chances as it is, this will encourage us to take more shots if the player thinks that is the best option. This is likely to impact other areas of the tactic too, especially the player roles. The advanced playmaker might be more open to attempting through-balls without this team instruction activated. The wingbacks might be happier to whip crosses into the box too or get to the byline and cut the ball back across the goal. I could also change the duty of one of the wingbacks and change it to attacking. That should make him a bit more advanced meaning the advanced playmaker can pass the ball to him in higher positions. Rather than what we see currently, sideways and backpasses. I feel it’s obvious but I’ll still mention it in case; if I do go this route then it’ll be the wingback on the right side of the pitch I change, as he is the one closest to the advanced playmaker. If I’m more proactive in the final third then I also need to have players in positions to make use of this. Currently, I use an attacking midfielder on support duty. I could change his duty to an attacking one or I could consider changing his role. If we change the role, it kind of picks itself too as there aren’t many role choices. The roles that can be used in the AM slots are; Attacking Midfielder Advanced Playmaker Trequartista Enganche Shadow Striker From these options, we can eliminate most of them. We already use an attacking midfielder that is the role we are talking about changing. The same can be said for the advanced playmaker, the other attacking midfielder we use in the tactic currently has this role. I don’t feel this setup would work that well with two of them. The enganche doesn’t feel like a good fit either and is more of a static playmaker, who will just sit and play the ball. I’m not sure this fits to sit alongside the advanced playmaker either. We need more of a runner and someone who can get high up the pitch and act as a second striker. We could consider a trequartista but he’d likely detract from the advanced playmaker's game because it can be quite a selfish role. What we want is to pick a role that compliments the advanced playmakers game not take away from it. The role needs to shine and because it’s a highly creative role, ideally he needs runners so he can create for them. That leaves the shadow striker, who is basically a second striker and will constantly be inside the box. This will add another dimension to our setup, a much more aggressive and direct approach. It comes down to a choice between the shadow striker role or changing the duty of the current role, the attacking midfielder to an attacking one. I’ve used the attacking midfielder role the entire of this save game so far and it’s done well. But now we are looking to move on from being a side that retains possession above all else and I’m looking to create an attacking identity. I think the shadow striker fits the new philosophy and will give us another direct goal threat. The role also compliments the attacking playmaker, which is a bonus. In the first article I also said that an advanced forward was an option to use but the reason I didn’t, was due to liking the pressing element of the pressing forward. But if we remove works ball into the box and use a shadow striker, perhaps the advanced forward will be better now. In theory, he’d occupy the defenders and keep them busy while the shadow striker is making surging runs into the box. It just seems a better fit cohesively and each player does something specific that enhances the other roles in the side. Defensive Actions And Pressing Opposition passes per defensive action is a statistic that tracks the number of passes made by the opposing team (the team on the attack) for every defensive action made by the team being tracked. A defensive action can include tackles, clearances, interceptions, blocks, and other plays made by the defence that disrupt the opposing team's possession. This statistic is a way to measure the effectiveness of a team's defence in terms of how well it is able to disrupt the opposing team's passing game. A lower number of opposition passes per defensive action is generally considered to be a positive sign, as it suggests that the team's defence is able to make more frequent and effective interventions to disrupt the opposing team's passes. On the other hand, a higher number of opposition passes per defensive action indicates that the defence is not as effective at disrupting the opposing team's possession and they are allowed to complete more passes. The opposition passes per defensive action metric can also be attributed to a team's press, which is a tactic that involves applying high defensive pressure on the opposing team in the early stages of their possession in an attempt to win the ball back quickly. Pressing can be an effective way to disrupt the opposing team's passing game and prevent them from building up their attack. When a team presses effectively, they can force the opposing team to make mistakes in their passing, rush their decisions, and limit the number of passes they can make before being dispossessed. The team that press can make the opposing team feel like they have no time or space to pass or build their attack, this is why the press can have a major impact on the opposition's passes per defensive action metric. A team that presses high and well can make their opposition make fewer passes, so the ratio of passes vs defensive actions will decrease. In other words, if a team that presses high and well manages to win the ball more frequently, this will decrease the amount of passes the other team is able to make. We rank the highest in the league for OPPPDA so this shows that our press is working. But again this is an area where I feel the data perhaps doesn’t tell the whole story and my gut is telling me something else. When watching games, at times, it looks like my players are charging around attempting to win the ball high up the pitch but is sometimes bypassed or unable to get to the player they are pressing. The data suggest we are fine though but I don’t think we are. Let’s have a look at the strengths and weaknesses of a high press; Strengths: Forces mistakes: By applying intense pressure on the opposition's players, a highly aggressive press can force them to make mistakes or play risky passes, which can lead to turnovers and scoring opportunities. Can win the ball back high up the pitch: A highly aggressive press can win the ball back in advanced areas, close to the opposition's goal, which can create good scoring chances. Can disrupt the opposition's build-up play: By pressing high up the pitch, a highly aggressive press can make it difficult for the opposition to build their attacks from the back and can force them to play more directly or play the ball long. Weaknesses: Can leave your team exposed to counter-attacks: If the press is not executed well or if the opposition is able to play through it, it can leave your team vulnerable to counter-attacks and expose your defence to dangerous situations. Can be tiring: A highly aggressive press requires a lot of physical and mental effort from your players and can be tiring over the course of a game. This can affect your team's performance in the latter stages of a match. Can be ineffective against well-organized defences: If the opposition is able to defend well and maintain their shape, a highly aggressive press may not be effective and can lead to gaps and openings in your own defence. I’ve mentioned it a few times but you should always trust your gut feeling. Or at the very least, look more in-depth at what is making you have this type of feeling. I wanted to include this example because I think it’s important and highlights why you need to pay attention to what is happening in game. Again, focusing on the actual context. In the above image the player closest to number 1, starts to close him down as we are using a very aggressive press. As soon as he moves to close him down, he passes the ball to number 2. When number 2 receives the ball then my player immediately goes to shut him off too. But a simple pass to number 3 and they have the ball deep in my own half. Not only that but they’ve bypassed my entire midfield and initially have a 1v1 down here on my right. Quite a number of factors can play into why this is happening though. Your press will work differently against all different types of shapes. Here, Santos is using a 4-2-3-1 formation and we are lining up in our usual 5-2-2-1 shape. Naturally, Santos has the advantage in wide areas and this is why our press is easy to play through as they’re using the width of the pitch. This is why at times I feel my players are running about like headless chickens. But the data overall show we have a really good press on face value. But when our press fails like in the above example, we are left vulnerable. So what can I do about it? One thing would be to pay more attention to what is happening during the game while it happens. If you see this happening in real-time, you can simply alter your press in general. As we use counter-press, I’d likely remove that and either leave it blank or ask the players to regroup. We’d still concede the same space but the two players who originally went to press the ball, would be in better positions centrally and able to pick up any runners. If we regroup then I’m sure Santos will find it very difficult to attempt to play through us centrally. This also means any crosses from wide we would be better placed to deal with and we reduce the risk of counterattacks against us because player positioning is just better. Other options would be to reduce the trigger press and try and engage the opposition in lower areas of the pitch instead. Again keeping our defensive shape allows us to stay compact. If I made this type of change I’d also move to a mid-block. I’d go mid-block as we have four central players with the two central midfielders and the two attacking midfielders. So we have the numbers to dominate the ball in a mid-block against the 4-2-3-1 formation. If we played in a lower block we’d likely allow the wide players to see more of the ball and we already know, I struggle for numbers outside already. So we’d end up with too much pressure in a low block and that’s why a mid-block would be way more suitable. As that should allow you to cut off the supply to the wide players too. There is still lots more to cover and we’ve only just scratched the surface so far in terms of data and analysis. But this seems like a good place to end this current article. Then in the next one, we can look at the changes made and see how they’ve impacted the shape and results. We can also have a lot more match analysis too as we discuss more issues. Hope you’ve enjoyed the article. If you want to chat with us more why not check us out on Discord? Join Discord

It would entirely depend, this isnt' just a minor change it's a totally different tactic so everyone would need different roles not just the front 3. The way it functions would differ, the way we progress the football up and the pitch etc.

In part two I discuss in detail about making changes to have a bit more umph in attack. There was nothing wrong and I was still winning. But I saw something in the data that suggested we could be better. Purely because I have confidence in my tactic and how I've set up. Every player is required to do something really specific with the role they have or I need them to be in particular positions. If I use OI's it alters your team settings and structure because the OI's are forcing these action more often than usual. I don't want that. I also don't particular care for what the opposition is doing in general. I focus on my own side and what we do well and don't do well. If I focus on the opposition all the time then I won't get to create a playstyle as I'll always be adapting to what they're doing/going to do. If my side does the things I've set up to do, well, then we'll win most games.

All the info is in the post already. I won’t be putting a download link if that’s what you’re asking. This is a topic trying to generate discussion about the principles of football.

No I never touch OI’s at all.

I’ve done a really comprehensive guide about this formation and shown different types of play styles too. Perhaps you might find some food for thought in it. Should be plenty of things in here that perhaps give you an edge for your own system or another way of thinking.

It's mainly pivots and wingers, the positioning they take up. If you use CM's and there is no DM behind they naturally drop deeper. But if you have a DM then they push a lot higher up compared to older versions of the game.

My players don't hoof the ball but BPD are much riskier on FM23 now with the changes. They opften do progressive passes that look to put us on the front foot or do a defence splitting pass. I wrote this elsewhere; Examples of Aggressive Passing from the Defenders I’m classing the halfback as a defender here because he is, with the way he defends and helps us transition the ball. Here the halfback is taking his time on the ball and waiting for players to get into position. I know this because I see him dwell on the ball and the commentary confirms it. Knudsen is scanning around to see what his options are and has a lot of them, 4 in fact. Actually, 5 should he decide to the bring ball further forward himself, which he does at times. On this occasion, however, he chooses the furthest option top right. Immediately this puts us on the front foot and has opened up a potential overload down the right side of the pitch. The mezzala can take his time to turn around and assess his options too, he doesn’t have to rush. When he turns around he can either lay it off to the inverted winger for a quick one-two. Or he can play in the fullback making a surging run down the right. We are using the full width of the pitch. From here we can either directly attack with the overloads down here or retain possession should the players decide now is not the best time to attack. Either way, we have multiple choices here. While we are building a possession-based system, we also still want to attack and win games. The possession we have has to be meaningful and not possession for the sake of it. We still want to win games and take the game to the opponents. This is another example but this time, this is much riskier. I want to highlight this pass particularly as it demonstrates exactly how aggressive the ball-playing defenders can be at times. It is almost reckless. He has lots of time on the ball to bring it out of defence if he chooses and he also has three (red circles) immediate passing options. All of them present a different level of difficulty to pull off. We also have the yellow circled player, which would be the reckless option and the least likely to pull off. Of course, that’s the option he chooses here. The ball-playing defender has been reworked on Football Manager 2023 and is much more aggressive with their passing and the positions they take up on the pitch. It’s not uncommon to see them attack deep inside the opposition half these days. I wanted to highlight this move so you are aware of the changes and just how risky the role can be. If you use ball-playing defenders and want to create a possession system, keep an eye on this as at times, it might go against what you are creating. Especially if they give possession away cheaply like in my example.

I think the "running into/using the same space" thing is a common misconception amongst FM'ers in general. It's like they don't understand combination play and how you need players to link up well with others and how players who initially might seem like they take up the same space, link up and play off each other instead. I've wrote a lot about this in my own stuff quite recently too. It's the best way of creating space and movement. When people watch real life football, they can see things like this happening too. A simple example of it would be a fullback and a winger, when the fullback overlaps the winger to retain width and the winger either passes him the ball and then follows and supports, or comes inside looking for the return pass. Those are two players running into the same space.

Ha. I don't mind posting if I know people are reading/enjoying it. It wasn't praise I was looking for it was more validation that someone was finding it useful and understanding what I wrote. If people don't post, I don't really know if people are reading it or finding it useful. I think that's what I was wanting to know. For anyone reading it, I welcome all questions and encourage them no matter how small or how silly you might think they are. No such thing as a silly question imo, so if you have them, fire away

It's a little spoiler but in all honesty the possession regain graph has been quite similar since we switched to the possession orientated system we now use. So that's from the 5th tier of Brazil to Brasileirão - Série A and the numbers are roughly the same give or take. It's more a system and role thing more so than the player imo. Getting better players will help but it's more the system and how it plays that will determine roughly what kind of numbers we see. I've just wrote a little passage for the next article about how we were pressing after we lost the ball and I didn't like what I saw, even though it's effective. So I've discussed the why and shown examples and then a solution to what I saw. Ideally you want to win the ball back in your strongest area of the pitch before they hit the weaker ones. So in the tactic discussed throughout there, that would be before the ball goes beyond the CM's. Ideally and in a perfect game we need to make use of the two AM's pressing and forming a block with the CM's that is hard to penetrate. If we don't win the ball before they bypass the CM's then I'm open for the counter attack. This is why I stressed that the CM's must sit and recycle possession in this system and not be adventurous and support attacking by moving higher up the pitch. If they move higher up the pitch it means a direct ball ends up in our final third with little pressure. Or that if any ball is cleared, they'd not be positioned to pick it up and keep the pressure on. Which is what usually happens. The defence will clear the ball and the CM's around the half way circle will pick it up and play in the attacking players or those who are still advanced. It allows us to continue the pressure and gives them no room to breathe. I think it's more down to player positioning like I mentioned above that determines this. It's one of the reasons why people who use a standard 4231 with 2 CM's for example, generally have issues when they have one of the CM's go forward. Because that leaves them exposed to what I mentioned above about a simple ball putting them on the back foot. And in the 4231 that would mean the other CM who didn't venture forward has the full responsibility now for defending/pressing and winning the ball back for the entire midfield. Which isn't realistic and possible. The analysis threw up something interesting in my tactic btw in part two of the article. So I have a decision to make about possible changes relating to the above too.