CARRERA

This kind of thing was the same for FM23. I assume, that those settings are underlying a range and barely don’t make it to the next threshold to display anything else. Tactical familiarity properbly is linked to those thresholds, that’s why it doesn’t change. I think it’s working as intended, eventhough it’s quite confusing, but I raised a bug report for it last year and it’s already lasting now for several patches and iterations of the game. who knows tho 🤷‍♂️

Teams will increase their pressure if they are behind and desperately need to score. One problem could be, that your defensive players can’t handle the pressure while playing out from the back. Try to remove that instruction if you feel the opposition is pushing up their lines and is pressing more aggressively. You could also try to entirely shut down your lines for the last 10-15 minutes by making duties more defensive and reducing defensive risks. Also figure out which shouts will keep your players focused and motivated.

There is almost no support from deeper areas, as both midfielders are on support and both wide defenders are on defend. Your team is most likely heavily outnumbered in attack. Also every single instruction in possession is about taking low risks and slowing down the play. e.g. you ask your whole team to dribble less, but all of your attacking players are natural dribbling roles. Why is that? You also ask your team to play very disciplined in the final third, for what reason? Those are just two examples. What im trying to say is, that you need to allow your players taking some risk at one point to actually break down a defensive block. Especially in the final third.

Mentality is one of the most influential instructions for your team, as it changes many aspects of how your team plays. Making big changes to the mentally during a match or even during the season can have a very bad impact as you loose a lot of familiarity. Only make changes if really necessary or if there is enough time to develop new familiarity. I would recommend making individual changes to certain instructions and your formation / roles / duties.

I think they mentioned it in one of the blog posts for FM23 when these instructions were introduced, if I remember correctly.

They apply for different parts of the pitch. Stop / invite crosses applys in your defensive third while pressing traps apply in the middle and final third. So any combination can basicly work.

@wazza your team will always have a basic set of instructions determined by the mentality you picked. Team Instructions are only used to further refine what you already got. That’s why you can play without ticking anything or just a few without a problem. Ticking many is no problem tho, as long as they match each other and fit your vision of football.

Yes, it helps the player to better understand the role & duty by maximizing tactical familiarity and lets them individually train the assigned attributes to become an overall better player in the role.

All the Info written there is part of this official Video: TLDR; they updated squad planner and have the national team selection mode revamped. There are also some new game modes which alters the behavior of real life transfers.

Until your players are matchfit. You can go for 2 weeks fitness training and then go for 2-3 friendlies before Supercup

Lovely, take my money SI

Because you don’t individually train your players in their assigned role/duty.

Great first feature blog. Reads well, let's see how it plays :-)

I would at least question if a much higher defensive line is beneficial for sitting back. Generally, I think there are way too many instructions. I would probably start out with just the very defensive mentality, time wasting, regrouping and a goalkeeper thats slowing down the build up. You could also consider the defensive balance of your team by making adjustments to the shape, like pulling back the wide midfielders or making the central midfield into a 2x DM setup, to really shut down the center. Adding 1 or 2 defend duties will also help to achieve what you are looking for. There is no reason for a fullback to attack the flank if you are looking for ball circulations in your own half.

In short, yes. But be aware that such a style can lead to enormous amounts of pressure if the opposition isn’t willing to let the game go. So if you feel like there is one highlight after another for the opposition better switch back to a more intense approach by yourself.

How does it play out? I would actually question regrouping with a high block and working the ball into box with a quick and direct build up style.

Direct passing is about the urgency on how quickly you want to progress the ball towards the goal. Usually your team will have only a few touches before creating an opportunity or loosing possession. It's considered a high risk passing style as the ball is played through or behind the lines. Its effective for quick transition styles and penetrating space in the opposition half. The height of your striker doesn't really matter, both a tall and a small striker can benefit from direct play. Good passers will play direct passes more accurately, but even "bad" passers will hit the direct ball now and then. Also remember, that instructions in football manager are never "do or don't" instructions, they are tendencies.

@TEGER what are you actually struggling with? I get you are not winning, but why, what’s happening on the pitch? What I see for now is a setup of duties which are very direct, attacking players attack and defensive players defend / support. Your instructions however don’t reflect a direct playing style. It’s not only about passing, but also about build-up and transitions. If you are looking for a different attacking approach try to attack from different angles. Switch around duties on one of your flanks for example, so that one of your fullbacks can aggressively look for overlapping runs. Also make sure to max out tactical familiarity and have at least one player utilizing every channel. Looking at the first tactic for example, your IF is moving into the left channel -> who is creating width? Your FB will do so insufficiently. The mezzala is moving into the right channel and you striker is also moving into either the left or right channel -> who is attacking the center of the box? Probably change the striker into a role that’s not moving into channels, or make the mezzala a CM on an attack duty.

Very good post by @SpecialOne Miko. Duties play a big part in determining whether your team is more attacking or defensive. It’s a quick method to shift around the balance of your team without affecting your whole tactical approach.

I‘m interested in how everyone is assigning their scouts. Do you have multiple scouts got after one nation or specific target, or do you rather take a much broader approach, where just one scout is assigned to a certain task? I would also be interested in knowing why.. Personally I vary between certain assignments, but at least to my home country I usually send more then one scout.

For me what works best is having 1 Tactic as a base setup which I then alter during the match in terms of instructions, duties and formation. I never go for extreme adjustments though, due to familiarity reasons. I assume you are talking about tactical familiarity? Tactical familiarity doesn't make players better or worse, it just makes them play more accurate to what is instructed to their role and the team in general. So if you want your team or a player to play a certain way, then better max out tactical familiarity. see 2) Yes, star ratings a related to your team. 3* is an average player on your team and is good enough to be in the starting 11. Its very hard to have a 4 or 5 star player in every position, maybe if the other players in your squad are rather below average. If you open up the "Coach Report" you can see his skill / potential compared to the leagues in your country. You can't make a player fully familiar in more than one role. You can only make him familiar in playing different positions on the pitch. However, shifting role familiarity to another doe only take a few matches. It makes sense if you think about it. Hard to say actually, at least in terms of FM I think strikers and Goalkeepers have the highest impact.

Maybe I can put a different perspective on it. Isn't the ultimate goal of every team to score? The question is just how, right? Players in FM will always take certain opportunities like a real player would do. So setting up a team to just not take the opportunities the match engine offers, will lead to bad results or at least a low amount of goals. Its very hard if the Match Engine favors certain moves, and you try to play against it. Assigning duties to your setup doesn't necessarily result in more direct play or chaos. What it does create is movement, depth and space. You also have to consider, that more support duties will lead to more creative freedom, while having more duties will make your players act more rigid and therefore focus more on the actual instructions you gave them.

I think there are way too many support duties. They will move closely together and allow narrow combinations, which is good if you have the space for it, but as you are trying to compress the space heavily with your defensive settings and build up rather slowly your own, there won't be much space to execute this. That's why the xG is very low. What you want your players to do (and you stated that yourself already in the opening post), is make the opposition move. Therefore, you need your players to spread out and hold their assigned position. (No, don't add that Player Instruction :D)

Did you max out tactical familiarity? I can't confirm that my players primarily play vertical on these settings. Also have a look at your "in transition" settings. If counter is activated, your players will look for quick win opportunites and general movement / passing will be more progressive after winning back the ball. Another thing I found helpful is to play more positional. You can achieve that by assigning more duties to achieve a more rigid shape.

Usually passing directness and tempo will dictate your build up style. I guess you tried that already.. However, you also have to consider, that your players will take promising opportunities anyway, no matter what you’ve set up. Passes over the top onto a striker is part of the FM 23 DNA. You can’t cancel them out completely.