CARRERA

I guess you refer to the "Work ball into Box" team instruction. Tempo is something entirely different compared to WBIB. Tempo is about how quick your players make a decision for the next move (whatever that may be), while WBIB just asks them to play for a good opening before trying to finish instead of rushing it. Its important to understand, that there is nothing like short, direct, high or low (or any other instruction). Try to look at it as shortER or highER compared to your base layer of instructions, which automatically comes with your team mentality. Let me try to showcase this by a game of numbers (never refer to it, the numbers are completely made up). Think about passing risk on a scale from 1------------------20 The Team Mentality you set comes with a passing risk of 10 1---------10---------20 Player roles may of course also affect the passing risk, but for the sake of simplicity we'll leave them out Now you add more direct passing via team instructions, which increases your teams passing risk to 15. 1--------------15----20 Adding Play out of defense will ask your defensive players to take less risks with their passing Passing risk of the team --- 1--------------15----20 Passing risk of your defensive players --- 1----5--------------20 Whithout having more direct passing, the passing risk of your defensive players may be at 1 with Play out of Defense, for example. 1------------------20

No, they apply in all areas of the pitch. Instructions don’t override each other, they do always combine into a do more or less of something compared to the base modifier which is your team mentality and other (team) instructions.

Using more support duties will make your team move as a unit and play more compact. By more I mean 6 - 8.

Are you sure, that selected roles and duties match each other? Usually TF should be the same no matter of which screen your looking at.

Usually, if your central striker is dropping off, you want the wide players to attack the box. So the first thing I would change is making the Winger an attack duty. You also want all 5 channels occupied / attacked by your team. As the DLF is dropping off and moving into channels, you need someone to attack the central area of the pitch. Therefore I would change the Mezzala Role into a CM. Properbly as well with an attack duty, at least against weaker oppositions. Remove play down the right. Personally, I only use that instruction situational, if I can spot a weakness in the oppositions formation.

I don’t think that’s the case. Your pass completition is beyond 90% in all areas of the pitch. If you feel like you loose the ball while dribbling, then remove run at Defence

I wouldn't recommend chasing numbers for the sake of it. Always make your choices purposeful. Why do you actually think it will be beneficial for your team to pass more frequently? If you really just want the numbers make one or more of the following adjustments. Be aware though, that your teams effectiveness might suffer heavily. defend in a high block trigger your press more often and defend more aggressively remove counter / add hold shape work ball into box waste time more often lower your tempo ...

I would ask my team to invite crosses or leave it unticked and I would neither have them step up or drop off - leaving it unticket

„Stop crosses“ and „invite crosses“ is somewhat related to the old defensive width instruction, but only in your defensive third. It instructs your players to either move into the wide areas to limit the oppositions crossing opportunities (at the cost of opening up the center). Or to focus on shutting down the center (at the cost of leaving wide areas rather open). — usually you want to play to your teams strength. In your system with just one wide player I would properbly „invite crosses“ and shut down the center. This should be no problem if you have physically strong defenders. „Step up“ and „drop down“ is about how your players behave if a ball is played behind their defensive line. Do you either want them to „step up“ and force an offside situation, or do you want them to „drop off“ and try to protect the space? — if you have intelligent defenders with good positioning and antizipation, you can try to „step up“. If they are pacy or you simply want to take less risks, then ask them to „drop off“

Is your teams tactical familiarity maxed out? And what is your teams standard passing directness? Anyway, it’s always hard to discuss a specific case. There could be thousand reasons, why the player did actually make that pass and not the other.

To make that pass happen you need to play out of the back more directly I think. It’s a quite a risky and vertical passing option. A typical build up pattern for quick transitions.

Can you be a bit more specific what exactly you mean by playing out the back? There is a difference between actually playing out the back instead of clearing the ball and using the „play out of defense“ team instruction. Playing out the back requires a relative high mentality (at least balanced, better go with positive or higher), so your defenders are willing to take risks (clearances are the low risk option). Superiority in your defensive third. So a 3rd defender or a DM is quite helpful. A teams passing directness that fits your needs, depending on how you are looking to build up. Additionally you can ask your GK to roll it out / play short. What you don’t want to do against teams that use a high press, is applying „play out of defense“ team instruction. It’s used to invite the opposition to apply pressure and therefore leaving space in midfield. This is achieved by patiently playing around the back to lure out a striker / midfielder. It works well against defensive / passive teams, but becomes super risky against aggressive teams with almost no benefits for your team.

I’m not 100% into the presets, but playing narrow can be very attractive, especially if there are players who still create width. You will see a lot of combination play of your team.

The left side looks good to me. On the right flank however, your team heavily lacks width and penetration. I would suggest change the IWB into a WB on attack. That change will help your team to initiate attacks trough different areas of the pitch. The team also lacks penetration in central areas, therefore I would switch the role of the AP into an AMa. I’m also not quite sure about the RPM, as you may want to keep players behind the ball to give your setup a more stable pivot and depth. I would prefer a DLP, but if it works - it works. Those changes should give you a good starting point from where you can move on. Instruction wise definitely remove the underlaps, as they will ask your wide players to hold onto the ball to wait for other players to make runs, but you want your wide player(s) to be the main goal thread don’t you. Using a more narrow attacking width will help your IF participate more inside the box instead of cutting back from wide areas. Oh and for sure work on your tactical familiarity. It’s important for your players to carry out their tasks effectively

Against three central defenders, you usually want to pin back the two outter defenders and free up the central one to make him give up his position or leave him more or less in a useless position for his team. You can achieve this by assigning attack duties to your wide players and let your striker drop off with a support duty.

I almost never change mentality. It’s the fundamental baseline of the tactic and changes almost every aspect of how the team plays. Usually I just make changes to certain team instructions during the match.

Well I think 3D representation heavily affects immersion. Hitting the woodwork or any other unrealistic representation in the match engine can simply kill immersion.

Help your players to better understand how you want them to play by increasing tactical familiarity. Right now they are not capable of executing all tasks sufficiently. Gegenpress is a very aggressive playstyle both in and out of possession. So naturally a higher mentality (positive or attacking) is more suitable. @Johnny Ace already gave you some ideas on how different roles & duties could positively affect your game.

No, Team Fluidity is just a Label that helps you to understand how you did set up your team. The more support duties you use, the more fluid your team will play, as more players will actively be involved in all phases of play. The more attack/defend duties you use, the more structured your team will play, because responsibilities are more clearly divided between your players. It can be said, that both fluid and structured play styles have their benefits, e.g. a more fluid approach will be beneficial if you want your squad to move as a compact unit. If you are looking to create and use more space, then maybe a strucured approach might be yours. The Number of Attack / Defend duties will determine if your team shifts its balance more into he attacking or defensive direction. Depends on the Game Version you are playing. If its FM23, then 2x DM. FM22 and lower is 2x CM DL should be +1 at least for proper gegenpress.

Without know, this sounds like you are playing with an increased attacking width. Did you try to play more narrow and have fullbacks create the width? IW/IF should be acting more in the channels

The strength of the halfback is to drop back between the central defenders to help in buildup and allow the fullbacks to move high up the pitch. The 4231 with its double pivot is also made to allow the fullbacks to move more aggressively. However, you only have two c/dm midfielders to support the play centrally. Therefore I don’t think an HB is the best choice in a 4231. It doesn’t really give you any benefits compared to your natural formation.

Use Wingers. IW/IF and mezzala occupy the same space naturally. You need someone to stay wide with and without the ball. Increasing the width slider or asking the IW to stay wider won’t cure your problem without suffering elsewhere.

I mean, of course certain roles have certain instructions hardcoded, so in that sense it’s controlled by instructions. But what I wanted to say is, that it’s more important to use roles that create width naturally like wingers or wingbacks do, instead of using the width slider for the same reason.

Maybe I can add something more general to this ongoing discussion. It’s always helpful to remember, that instructions do always increase or decrease the tendency of certain behaviors. It’s never set to only do or don’t do something. So when talking about width, tempo, passing or whatever always keep in mind where you are coming from (Team Mentality / Roles & Duties). There was a lot going around about passing directness and tempo and how to combine or use them. Tempo is simply about how quickly decisions are made, while a higher tempo leads to more quickly but inaccurate decisions, a lower tempo leads to slower but more accurate decisions. It has absolutely nothing to do with where to move the ball or how it gets there. However, the intention of the game (football) is most likely, especially on higher mentalities, to move the ball forward. That’s why it may feel like, that tempo affects a more progressive build up, but it doesn’t. It’s just a side effect, that may come with it. But it’s important to understand how certain mechanics work. Passing directness on the other hand is not particular about the range of a pass, it’s more about the risk of a pass. Shorter passing (instruction) actually asks your players to look for safe passing options to maintain possession which obviously leads to more short (range), sideways and backward passes. The main focus is on keeping the ball and not so much on taking risks and creating chances. More direct passes on the other hand do primarily focus on taking risks and crating opportunities more quickly, at the cost of controlling the game. Those passes can have a longer range as this is obviously more risky, but they also can be quite short in terms of range. The intention is to play forward quickly and creating chances. One more thing about space and how to create it sufficiently. It’s important to differentiate between width and depth. Both require the dispersal of your players, but in a different way. To create and utilize width, it is not important to actually use the team / player instruction, it’s more important to have players who do actually utilize the space in wide areas. And other players to utilize the channels and central areas. That will allow a team to utilize the whole width of the pitch and being unpredictable by being spread out. Width is important to stretch the opposition horizontally and open up space between the defensive players. Depth is important to stretch the opposition vertically and create space between the lines. Depth can be created by having players ahead of the ball who are making runs behind the defensive line (usually attack duties), but depth can also be created by having players behind the ball who are protecting the space and offer safe passing options (usually defend duties). The space that’s created vertically between the lines can be best utilized by player who can link with the players who create depth. Utilizing width and depth well, will offer your team a broad variety of vertical / diagonal and safe passing options.

No, there is nothing wrong with using a FB on a defend duty. You could either use him as an additional defend duty to generally have a higher player count in rest defence. You could also use him to allow a bit more freedom for players in the DM strata, eg. DLP / RGA on support or maybe even and VOL on an attack duty. Just make sure, there is always someone who is working the wing.