Analog

Throw in's are goals that I don't really use when considering how my defense is set up for open play. Your defenders will be "unnaturally" pushed up, increasing the risk of a counter coming back to burn you. For that goal you were just unlucky, imo. On the long ball goal, if I'm looking at that I'm probably upset with my RB. When the ball is nearing their target man he's going the wrong direction for some reason, yet by the end of it his man has actually gotten past him... Look at the last three images of that sequence, and look where your RB is, and where #32 is. Something is going on there, whether it's positioning, concentration, anticipation. He seems slow to respond and react all around throughout that sequence. The other thing I notice though is in the very first image, you look like you might be playing a shape with 1 CM and 1 DM, well in any case your 1 CM there is up against 3 players. Look at the 2nd image and how now their three CM's are completely unmarked. If that player gets his head to the ball then they are going to be threatening. Look at the space #38 and #10 have for them when your CM and DM both move to help out with that header in the next image. That one long ball has pulled your defenders all over the place within a few seconds, but it looks like the actual finish probably came from their player doing well himself. At the start of the images it looks like you are letting their keeper play the ball long. You could try to close him down so that he doesn't get to freely attempt that kick. I would look at that in addition to why your RB did what he did, and if they have a trident style attack up top like that you might also consider using two DM's, and lastly if they play long balls like that you could look through your squad to have the best possible DM's or even fullbacks for dealing with those balls (heading, strength, positioning, concentration, etc.).

Because what was posted in the thread intrigued me and I wanted to see if I could get it to work. 4-4-2 has always been the best counter tactic for me, at least trying to set it up to play like I described. One striker defending deep, one looking to break, etc. The point of the support duties though is that if you use attack duties the midfield becomes disjointed when the attack duties close down more. The idea is to defend as a unit, then break as a unit. I tried to switch this up as you saw earlier, but Cleon was right it's too disjointed. So the only option I can see is to rely on defending very deep in order to try and drag their back line into your half, then you might have a chance at triggering the counter. I've failed with this one so far.

After 60 minutes and zero counters I abandoned the tactic and went back to my default. Can't get my head around this way of playing I guess. We get the ball back and sit there, no one makes a run. If I can't generate AI counters then what I want is: No matter how low the percentage - when we get the ball back we try to attack in a counter fashion, no matter the cost. Win the ball... take off running and get the ball to creative players. Score by running at them in numbers. This 4-1-4-1 works more like a possession tactic than a counter tactic, imo. From what I've seen over a number of matches now, the mentality has players too passive. I had 90% passing accuracy and 60% possession for the first 25 minutes of the match. Somehow you're getting this to work against Newcastle with players who are likely a notch below mine yet I can't get this to work with my team. I have decent players and came into the match with a very good defensive record and 2nd in the league. So I don't know, but I don't think relying on how the AI triggers counters is a very reliable way to approach the match, at least for me the actual events that have played out now over a number of games with this approach show that it's not reliable for me. Like I said, from what I have seen if you look back and see they have 3 players not coming across the half way line, then it's very unlikely you are going to get the AI generated counter, so I think maybe the frustration here is in the fact they are playing structured and have set up their back line to prevent this kind of style. Edit: Lol......... we won off of a counter (from a corner) FML.

Thanks for sticking with me. I'm currently playing the game on full highlights. I'm about 30m into the first half, and once again so far I haven't even had the slightest hint of a counter generated. PSG is playing 4-1-2-2-1 control/structured. Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but this really only works in specific situations. Their back four prevent AI generated counters, so I just end up feeling like it's foolish to even set my team up this way. I think we aren't underdogs enough going into the match, most likely? Here is a perfect example of what I am referring to with the clearances. https://giant.gfycat.com/IckyEmbarrassedFattaileddunnart.webm Here's how I'm playing, and why. You mentioned I have no one to get on the end of crosses, so why play wingers? Makes sense I guess, but the problem here is that I've had the majority of possession. Ironically, we conceded their goal to a counter attack. I go forward with wide midfielders and the team is narrow and we really don't threaten all that much. This is why I played wider before. This is also part of the challenge in this to me... the distinction between counter scenarios and the fact that you still have to account for having the ball. We end up retaining possession due to all of the support duties and rely on a very specific manner of threatening them offensively. Granted, we did have one decent spell with the ball, so it's not entirely passive. If you are seeing this so far in game, what changes would you make? counter - flexible - no instructions - match stats at this point in the game Edit: I'd originally had Lukic as BBM as an alternate option to either an AP or Mez, but he was closing down and I'm trying to focus more on the team playing as a unit like you said. So I switched both midfielders to CM(S) and had them get forward when in possession of the ball.

Try closing down their crossers so that they can't get the ball off without some pressure on them. Take a look at those crosses in the replays and see how often they had space and time to put the ball in. Next look and make sure you had adequate positioning in the box. In a 4-4-2 you can set your wide players to close down much more and tackle harder, you can also try pushing your line much higher. It seems like a risk, and on one hand it is somewhat, but on the other hand if you are pressuring them into lower percentage passes and crosses then very often it nullifies that risk.

I was setting that up in a similar fashion to my base tactic, albeit not thought out enough. Fair enough, yeah I did use clear to flanks during the game. I'm clearly doing a poor job of setting this up though because nothing works. I have a team that could probably beat Benfica on our day, but I'm trying this stuff out and we look like fools out there. That's fine though because I want to get better and be able to create different styles of tactics that work. Yeah I also thought about this. I seem to remember reading in the past that some users were having success playing counter on an attack mentality with a deep line since the tempo was higher. I actually started out with the DM as anchor and used an AP instead of the Mezzala but it was suggested that I use the playmaker in the DM slot instead. Well like I said, I don't have a problem drawing them into my own half, but we get absolutely pinned there and I see the most ridiculous goals. Since I initially started experimenting with this I've let in three own goals. Players get pushed deep and then eventually there's a lot going on in the box to where it's chaos and something random is bound to happen for an OG. But with that said, against Benfica they kept their back four just behind the half way line so it was nearly impossible. Ok, help me out here. I used those roles because earlier you'd mentioned you had attacking PPM's or PI's for some players. You said no one was running onto the ball because when I was playing AP and two WM's I didn't have aggressive enough roles. So my thinking was that players on attack duty are going to run forward more immediately when I win the ball back. I was thinking I'd have the two wide players breaking forward to help the DF, then the Mez maybe coming a little later. I wanted ideally 4 players attacking forward at pace if everything was perfectly set in motion. I guess my issue is not understanding the roles that work best in a pure counter system. So do I want attacking roles or support roles then through the midfield? Maybe you can help me understand how this will work better with my system. My Mez is a playmaker type, my LW is a pace player with great dribbling and movement, my RW is a fairly balanced, decent player really overall. My ST is another guy who is mostly pace. His decision making is not always great, but he does his job which is scoring goals. I'm short at the other CM role because my main player is out a couple of weeks. I only have either DM's, another AP (non-defensive) player, or a youth player to put in there... Ok, so pace up top and down the left side of the pitch. How do I set up my roles here to make the most of the LW and ST? Lol, well you obviously have a point... I guess I'm not thinking about intelligent counters and maybe that's my problem. Here's my dilemma though, how do I provide to the wide players and ST with anyone but the DLP if my midfielders are never anywhere near getting the ball? Clearances from inside my own box bypass those players and go straight out to the opposition. It's the most frustrating thing to see players off to the left or right wing who could get on the end of a header but it seems built in that defenders clear long instead of clearing in a more thought out tactful way. What I need help with is keeping my midfield positioned to get onto the end of clearances, and I don't know how to do that. Fair enough. All of that was pretty spot on in how I've been thinking. I think a big flaw I have is like you said trying to go from back to front too fast and also not going forward as a unit. Thanks!

Well, the style I'm trying to play just does not work whatsoever if the opposition fullbacks don't commit to attacks, so this game against Benfica is not going to be a good one to try and play this way. I've had to abandon this game as an experiment as I didn't generate a single counter attack. They send their front three forward and keep their back 4 in check. They stay too deep for this to work. Even if I have my players try longer passes, the 1-2 players that might be on the end of those are up against a mismatch of numbers. Not to sound overly pessimistic, but I actually am pretty convinced at this point that having a tactic like I'm trying to create is best reserved for very specific games when the opposition is trying to steamroll you. If they go forward with caution it just doesn't work to try and hit them on the break. Set pieces are the only place I really see that happening.

Yeah, wrote that wrong. The idea though is that the style is entirely based upon counter attacks, really. So getting an early cross in might be low percentage, but we don't get hit on the break either. Also the idea here is that I have good pace in my ST and LW so I'm trying to get them breaking and getting onto those early crosses. I'm playing wider to encourage more use of the wings. I want the DM to get the ball and spray it forward, that's the reason for the role. I want the use of the DF so that he is constantly causing problems for their defenders and giving them something to think about when they have the ball. Again, what I'm going for is not a tactic where we have the ball. It's entirely about hitting them on the break. If he's putting pressure on their passes forward then ideally there'd be more of a likelihood of an interception that could lead to a counter opportunity. @Robson 07 I want to sit back and defend, win the ball back, and ideally I want the MEZ and two wide players to break forward immediately. I want the other players to get them the ball quickly and let them work together during counter moves to try and score as the opponent is on the back foot, just generic counterattacking stuff really. When using defensive mentality I can see that the defenders play longer passes as I'd like, but I was aware of that. The problem is that I can't seem to get the attacking players to break to be on the end of those longer passes, and they all tend to go to the DF, who is not really good as a target man/DLF style player. I'll go ahead and play the Benfica match and not make so many changes as last time. I'll upload some stuff so you all can at least see what I mean about players being too static when we get the ball back. Edit: gonna take a look at @herne79 strikerless tactic again. I think he designed that tactic around a similar approach, iirc.

Bit frustrated as I'm still unable to get the 4-1-4-1 to *really* work in this style. I've tried different approaches to setting up for countering, but my (frustrated) estimation is that this is a style of play that is only effective in very specific situations. I am not generating counters, whether on counter or defensive mentality. I have even experimented playing on contain to trigger the ME counters more easily, but what I've found is that even when you tell your players to get stuck in, the tackling is too passive on defensive and contain. My midfielders follow their players into the penalty area and therefore I never have players to pick up the 2nd ball and start a counter. I can drop my DF to a defend duty, but he'll be in my half as the lone player to receive an out ball. I'm wondering if the formation is the issue? Maybe 4-1-4-1 is a better option to keep the AMC player ready to trigger the attacks? But to me that is far too one-dimensional and if that player is marked out of the game, etc. then it all falls apart. I'm still looking for suggestions. I have an EL game away to Benfica coming up and I'd like to get this to work, but at this point it feels like if I play defensively I actually have a stronger chance of losing, while if I play my pressing game I have at least a chance to win. For me it's more about understanding this style and getting it to work than just winning the game, so I'm willing to take a loss if the style actually works as I'd like. Here's the pre-match. One thing that I think is already problematic is their formation, Rashidi's "Portuguese 4-3-3". Two DM's can potentially make life difficult for us playing trying to play off the counter, but I want to reiterate that the main thing I'm struggling with is recovering the ball on clearances. I have even tried setting every midfielder to an attack duty, they still defend and track players too deep. I've tried highly structured hoping they would hold their midfield positions better, still no luck though. The pre-match says Benfica are slight favorites. Maybe one of the issues here that the teams are too evenly matched when I try to play this style? Thanks for any advice. My current setup:

I'm at the level of nerd/sad that I've actually been thinking about some of the discussion in this thread while at work today, also thinking about @Jebedaias's thread where he mentioned trying to defend against crosses. @Razor940 I actually just played a game that I thought I would share with you where I used low tempo and achieved good possession. I've also settled on a base tactic and then created a possession version of that tactic using the principles from Cleon's OP material and tried to make it work in my current system just on the fundamentals of the style alone. I wanted to see if there are things I can improve or maybe that I don't pick up on that other people notice. So here's some figures from the game. I played 4-3-3 (4-1-2-2-1) and Lille played a counter 4-4-2. I managed 62% possession which isn't crazy, but pretty good also. Razor mentioned playing fast to unlock defenses. Well I've been thinking about this really because the last time I made an adjustment to my tactic I simply lowered the tempo one notch to "lower", and suddenly my team is playing nicer football. It was such a noticeable shift that it gave me more ideas about a style of play. Players took a bit longer on the ball, but when they did pass it seemed like the ratio of dangerous to standard passes went up significantly. So after noticing that, I set all three of my midfielders on more risky passes, and set the DLP on more direct. So the style is keeping possession, but always looking for a dangerous ball out to the wings or played through into the box. So the thing I wanted to show here was the combination of 62% possession with 2 CCC (even though this stat in the game is still fairly off, imo), nearly 50% shots on target, 90% pass completion compared to 77%, and the fact that they had zero shots on target. Given that they are playing a counter 4-4-2, they clearly didn't succeed in getting shots off from inside the box resulting from crosses. So like I mentioned to Jeb what I do is actually really simple and just keep them from having time on the ball. Front three close down much more, tackle harder, mark tighter, and the mezzala just closes down more. Fullbacks close down more, mark tighter. The season is still really early, but here's my defensive record so far. While I'm very happy with the defensive record, I have to say it dramatically improved as a result of reading back through this thread. I decided to focus more on defense this season in that I'm looking to win games 1-0, but specifically when I go up by a goal I have been trying to then just keep the ball and be happy to kill the game off that way. Usually though we end up with more by the end when the other team has to go for it. Here are the league possession stats, and also my two tactics (base tactic and possession version). I'm happy with the style of play and overall happy with the possession stats, but they aren't remarkable. I think I just need to keep improving the players in each position and things are probably fine, but like I said it's a lot of stuff taken from this thread that makes up the defensive possession tactic.

Higher tempo is more demanding on players' decisions, and actually I disagree that playing faster = breaking the opposition. What you are describing means the right pass and the right run at the right time. When players have more time to survey the situation the likelihood of that happening can go up. If you are trying to break the opposition in a regular fashion, then you have to play some higher risk passes, which means turnover of possession. Do you think Pep at Fulham would have the same kind of success with their players playing the same style he plays with City? Obviously his philosophy works, but he has the right players to make it work as well. There are different ways to have high possession numbers, AND still be a goal threat.

When teams are set up to counter I usually play on the front foot. You know how they are going to approach it, so don't give them time on the ball to make those counter passes. My base tactic is control/flexible, but if I am worried about counters I might switch it to structured. Very structured has to be handled more carefully. Close them down more aggressively, just don't let them get a ball over the top. Structured means your defenders are not going to look to get involved nearly as much in the attacking phase, so they'll stay back to help out with this. I also like to play IWB(D) in general, because that player sits more narrow to prevent those kinds of attacks. Yeah, let your CM's and attacking players lead the pressing, let the DM shield more.

Push higher up and close them down sooner. Tackle them harder. Have your front players use PI's to close down much more, mark tighter, optionally tackle harder. Then play with a much higher line and team closes down much more. That's the extreme starting point, back off from there. That shouldn't actually be happening, imo. I have never had an issue with long shots from the AI in any FM game. It happens occasionally, but for both the user and the AI it's a very low percentage attempt. This again sounds like you are giving them too much time on the ball. What's your team shape? Closing down? D-line? Don't give them time to play would be my suggestion just from reading that much already.

Good to know. Definitely inspired to get a regista tactic happening in the next couple of seasons, especially if I can try to train up one from my academy. Also as luck would have it, this popped up in my feed yesterday. More fuel for the inspiration.

Bellerin is your wingback, not Nacho or Kolasinac. Against lower opposition you could probably get away with WB(S) for the left side, but WB(A) or even CWB(A) on the right side for sure. He's not a defensive minded fullback, yet you keep making him the more defensive of the two. You aren't understanding or using the squad as well as you could be, imo.