[Defensive football, is it even playable in FM20?]

2 hours ago, Bluebird123 said:

Here you go, from an old save file I had. I took over a poor Napoli side in 2028, two years of building them I won a title playing without counter pressing or high press. 

 

25 goals conceded is a little too high for my liking (four of those goals were scored by Juve in a single one off game so not representative of the tactic as a whole), but with better players I think I could get it between 15-20. The tactic worked very simply, we'd win the ball back in our half/in midfield, and break quickly due to the positive mentality and certain PPMs my DLP had (switch ball to the other flank feels like a cheat sometimes). With that PPM, the winger would usually find himself behind the opposition fullback and he'd cross to the TM (ignore the F9, that was a weird experiment) or the onrushing CM-A who has the gets into opposition area PPM. With the defensive settings we would see games out quite comfortably. Our first season in the CL since the in game starting season and we qualified from a group looking like this, again, all of those goals were scored by Real over both times they beat me, no tactic is perfect eh. United couldn't score against us. We knocked out Bayern then Chelsea beat us in the quarters, not too bad for a tactic that has average players and doesn't counter press. 

 

 

 

I didn't continue this save after this point, perhaps I should and continue with the same principles and try to win another title or CL just to show you it's entirely possible to be successful without playing a high press. This tactic was achieved by reading Rashidi's posts and watching some of his streams/YT vids and getting to grips with mentality and how it's essentially a risk scale. If you set your DL to the lowest it can with minimal pressing on top of being on the defensive mentality, then no wonder you get slaughtered by bigger teams. No top level manager plays that type of football. 

Awesome result. Could you post detailed stats? Do your players have specific PIs? What percentage of goals do you score from crosses?

[4-4-1-1 A very flexible tactic and the long term development.]

Great writing.

Could you please sum up all role models' PPMs and their important attributes for IWa, Wa, BPD, ST and so on?

 

[[FM20][FM21][FM22][FM23] Calcio]

1 hour ago, WilsonJuve said:

Thats as he is right now. You canSee from the stats at the bottom he just had a decent Euro 2024 too so hopefully the form will carry over into the new season.

Could you share your tactics and adjustments to opponents?

[Everything TOTAL Football (From Cruyff's 343 to Guardiola's Overloads) - UPDATED Feb 28, 2023]

52 minutes ago, andrewsgn said:

Here's an example of the overload I mentioned a few posts above. By overloading the left we are able to create a goal with a few simple passes back to the right.

Hourihane (DLP-D) plays a ball out to my left back, Taylor (WB-S). Norwich is playing a 4-2-3-1 and are narrow and compact with all but their striker behind the ball.

 

Taylor cuts the ball back to Lansbury (MEZ-S). El Ghazi (IF-A) is just inside of Lansbury. Both of Norwich's DM's have shifted over.

 

 

El Ghazi stops his run and Lansbury plays a simple ball to him. Because the DM's have shifted we have a 3v2 with Grealish (CM-A) unmarked right at the edge of the box.

 

El Ghazi plays the ball to Grealish who taps it over to Bolasie (W-S) who has a clear shot and scores the goal. 

 

As I mentioned I kind of stumbled into this but it's proving very effective. Granted, Aston Villa are one of the stronger Championship teams, but we've scored 38 goals so far in 15 matches. My AMR's (Bolasie and Adomah as W-S) have combined for 11 goals. My striker, Abraham, has 11 goals and 5 assists. Grealish leads the team with 7 assists as CM(A).  

What Mentality/TI/PI do you use? Is it possible that it affected on CM(A)/IF(A) to create chances and W(S)/PF(S) to score goals?

[The Italian Job! Italian league thread is here!]

17 hours ago, blue heron said:

Second season syndrome

Onwards to my second season with Fiorentina. Great to see @zlatanera also playing with La Viola. Exciting to see how s/he approaches things.

In the summer we had - of course - an overhaul at the club. A lot of loanees returning to parent clubs and interest from major (richer) clubs for my star players. In the end, Milenkovic moved to ManUtd for 73M euros and Veretout to Huddersfield of all places for 33-39M depending on some clauses. I had accepted a huge bid for Chiesa also, but he rejected Tottenham and opted to stay with me! This funded my buying spree to find enough players to fill all the gaps and have enough depth to deal with playing in the Champions League. I only found one Bosman signing worthy: Moreno came from Liverpool. Other key signings where Kouamé as AML, Hugo Mallo as RB, Felipe Luiz from Lazio as CB to replace Milenkovic and Gagliardini to play DLP. 

 

We kept playing a 4-3-3, though we tried some different approaches the first few matches of the season. In the UCL we got a very though group with PSG, Arsenal and Leverkusen. I was happy to finish 3rd in that group to be honest. In the Serie A we played well, but not spectacularly. But none of the other teams was very good either. Especially Juventus had a torrid first half of the season. We kept on doing what we where good at, which is not conceding any goals. In the end, we only let in 13 goals for the entire season, finishing on 85 points. Which was incredibly enough to win us the league!

With us finishing 3rd in the UCL, we got into the Europa League, where we had some easy matches against Anderlecht, Mainz, Dynamo Kiev and Galatasary to set up a final against Tottenham. We played to our strength and with one goals from my signing of the season, Kouamé, we did lift my first European silverware. In the Italian Cup, we also got to the final and beat Inter Milan in extra time to make it three cups in my second season in charge. 

Now, on the the third season. I'm feeling like I'll be loosing some more players. Everyone wants to renew his contract and get 3-5 times the wages they're currently on and there's no way for Fiorentina to pay that. So it'll be looking at players on the transfer list and high potential youngsters my scouts keep recommending.

 

How did you manage to concede so few goals? Will you share your tactic?

[Tactical frameworks and squad building - an in depth guide to how I approach FM.]

@sporadicsmiles, could you uncover your approach how to grow youth and transfer/loan policy in relation to it?

[The Italian Job! Italian league thread is here!]

On 10/04/2019 at 10:45, MrZollo said:

I'll certainly take that in my first season on FM19. Ultimatley, we could have finished in the top 4, in April and May we had some terrible results such as 0-0 with Chievo, Cagliari and Sampdoria as well as 1-1's with Sassuolo, Spal to the positives and know we can reach the Champions League places if we improve a small amount.

My shot analysis against Chievo, not quite sure how we didn't score!

In my off season I have plenty of work to do, I think keeping hold of Simeone and Chiesa will be where I start. Simeone's contract still has a €24m release clause for Champions League clubs, best try and get rid of that. Liverpool are sniffing around Chiesa. I also need to replace Muriel who heads back to Sevilla after his loan, there's also 3/4 other loan players returning to their parent clubs while I have 42 players returning back to Florence. There's alot of work sorting that lot out.

  

One last thing to note, we welcome two signings in January. Erik Majetschak agreed a bosman deal but I was  offered the chance to sign him in January for €150k which I thought was a nice touch. I snapped their hand off and got him to the club ASAP to train him how I want to. Anthony Anglieri also joined the club. He made the €800k switch from Palermo. Both of them had a big say in our U20s team winning the league and then beating Juventus and AC Milan in the semi and final. Our U18s also won the league and beat Inter in the semi finals but fell short of taking the trophy home when Juventus beat them on penalties in the final. The future looks bright for sure.

Could you post your tactic with TIs and PIs?

[FM19: Arsenal - Au Revoir Monsieur Wenger, Hola Señor Emery]

On 09/01/2019 at 01:52, Johann said:

First Season

Transfers

IN - Tierney ($33.5M), Pavón ($13.25) and on January signed with Pulisic ($17M).

OUT - Jenkinson in July. January I sold Xhaka, Monreal, Lacazette, Koscienly and Martínez, got $80M for all.

Key Players - Özil, Aubameyang, Mustafi and Bellerín.

Europe League - Champions

Carabao Cup - Lost at Third Round

FA Cup - Champions

Premier League - Champions

 

Second Season

Transfers

IN - Skriniar ($67M), Arp ($20M) and Havertz ($110M) are the players to the main squad.

OUT - A lot of players, Elneny, Sokratis, Welbeck and others, with them I got $94M.

Key Players - Mustafi, Bellerín, Pulisic and Aubameyang. Auba also broke the record from Thierry Henry.

Uefa Super Cup - Champions

Community Shield - Champions

Carabao Cup - Champions

FA Cup - Lost the final game to Liverpool.

Champions League - After the group stage with Napoli, Celtic and PSV, beat Bayern Munchen (6x2), Liverpool (4x1) and PSG (4x3). The final game I lost against Juventus (4x2)

Premier League - Champions

 

Third Season

Transfers

IN - Jadon Sancho ($83M) and Lascelles ($26M).

OUT - Pavón ($114M) and Kolasinac ($25.5M)

Key Players - Pulisic, Özil, Mustafi and Aubameyang.

Community Shield - Lost do Liverpool

Carabao Cup - Lost at the Third Round

FA Cup - Lost at the Third Round

Champions League - The group was Internazionale, Barcelona and Schalke. Passed and draw against Celtic (3x1), Bayern (6x1), RBL Leipzig (4x1) to meet Manchester City in the final game, which I won 1x0.

Premier League - Third Place

Could you share your tactics?

[The Italian Job! Italian league thread is here!]

22 hours ago, jonathan44 said:

End of Season

 

Respectable 9th place finish, but as you can see I was miles off 8th/the euro places, didn't play very well against the top opposition (Inter, Napoli, Juventus and Roma all did the double over me) which ultimately let me down.

Didn't do many more transfers, Dalot and Wilson's loans have been extended for next season but with little to nothing in the bank I'm very limited. Mbemba and Vavro haven't played fantastically well or tightened up my defense, but with a tough goalkeeper situation (1st choice Posavec went out on loan to fund Cataldi's transfer) and then a subsequent 3 month injury to Brignoli left me with a 1.5star 20 year old in goal so I'm hoping another season will help gel them together.

No new budget from the club and they won't offer me a contract that doesn't give me a 1k per week paycut despite a very healthy overall balance of £39 million.

Do you adjust your tactic to the opponent? Considering you use two wingers on attack, how varied the types of goals you score? Is it one dimensional: dribble, cross, shot?

Your both wingbacks have attack duties, complemented by attacking mentality. How vulnerable are you and where do opponent goals come from?

[The Italian Job! Italian league thread is here!]

10 hours ago, jonathan44 said:

Started the second season with Palermo, not had a bad start P5 W3 L2 in the opening games and my team seems to play well, even in the losses. With a tiny wage budget that barely covered the wage increases for promotion, i was looking around the squad for players to cut. Out went Murawski (£2.2 mill) and and a number on loan, but with little over 2 million to spend I didn't believe I could attract many players. I got Harry Wilson on loan as my major signing, the transfer money for Schmid was from last years budget. Then comes the weird bit:

 

In the summer Norbert Balogh came back from a loan and I was really impressed with his stats so I gave him a new contract with a £25 million release clause. His value rockets to 10 mill and Roma  and Lyon become interested. My idea was to convert him to play as a more mobile target man to complement Puscas (he's a giant at 6'5), but within 2 weeks of pre-season one bid of 14 mill had him unsettled and pissed off as I rejected it as it was mostly after 50 appearances. Two days before the end of the transfer window Lyon and Roma both make bids, my board let me negotiate the Lyon bid who eventually just activate his release clause... The other from Roma is accepted at £18 mil, 10 upfront and the rest in installments etc. Thankfully he chose Lyon and said farewell. In the final days of the transfer window I managed to sign Sergi Samper (£1.8 mill) and Mbemba for (4 mill); and finalise loan deals for Loftus Cheek and Marc Navarro to boost my limited squad.

So yea, thanks Balogh, you never played a game for us but you saved me from using 99% of the serie B squad. Despite the high transfer fee, I only have 3 million left in the budget. Didn't have time to get in a striker Cheick Diabate rejected me after a successful trial, so Kevin Cannavo is now my second striker. I can't get a pressing forward to work in this formation, but he's playing ok as a target man so who cares.

 

 

What does your tactic look like?