engamohd

Brilliant results against Man U and Kiev!

That's not fair lol Good luck!

Thats a very nice save! Glad you are having success with the low block. When it wokrs, it provides some wonderful football. Following your story now.

I am away from my laptop now, so I will type it down: Balanced Mentality GK-D FB-S CD-D CD-D FB-S IW*-A CM-S CM-S IW*-A CF-S TM-S Player Instructions MCL: Hold Position, Take More Risks STCL: Mark DM*, Move into channels Team Instructions Higher Tempo, Narrow Attacking Width*, Standard Passing*, No Time Wasting* Regroup*, Counter*, Distribute to Flanks Narrow Defensive Width, Lower LOE*, Standard DL*, Tighter Marking, Stuck In * - situational instructions

I was concerned by having a double supporting mids that could see us caught out of possession or being susceptible to long shots. However, I found out that having a flat four midfield actually helps you block these kinds of shots. It will boil down to your defensive transitions and the midfield pair. Most of the time I am on Regroup or not choosing either of them. Counter Press is VERY dangerous in this situations, and I only use it against potato teams or when I am chasing a goal. The central pair should have proper PPMs (such as making sure the holding CM does not have the "Gets forward whenever possible" PPM), along with suitable PIs/Roles. As a rule of a thumb, I NEVER use a roaming CM in a midfield two, to help with the solidity. === I have adapted @cocoadavid's style to my own, basically cutting out the OIs allowing the players to be mildly aggressive against the backline, accentuated by the low LOE. The main reason behind this is that I don't want to give the opposition's CBs all the time in the world, and sometimes pressing them is imperative. Secondly, the narrow defensive width helps us block middle passing lanes naturally, without the need for any OIs. The absolute beauty of this approach is the double CM pair. They could make or break your day. I don't want to hijack cocoa's thread, but I'd like to highlight the two rules I follow for them: 1. NEVER use a CM with a Roam from Position PI 2. Make sure you have 1 CM with Hold Position PI, one with Take More Risks PI and someone that surges forward in support. My fav so far has been: CM-S (Hold Position, Take More Risks) + CM-S (No PIs) I used this for a full second half of a season (using a very similar setup already during the first half) with Feyenrood, to great results.

This is a BRILLIANT thread, great work! I am a big fan of the 4-4-2, and use it almost exclusively. I have written a lot about here and on my blog about quick transitions and direct football using 4-4-2 (and 4-4-1-1), but I was frustrated using 2 attacking strikers. They remain so high up and never offer the kind of compactness that I like, no matter the DL and LOE settings. It never occurred to me to use two support strikers! I actually feel a bit dumb of not thinking about it, especially that our styles and systems are almost identical Thanks to you, I will tweak and test my tactic further, and see if it improves the compactness of the 4-4-2 or not, and surely will keep you updated. Cheers!

Thank you! I don't use PIs in the second formation, the IW and WP naturally cut inside, so I didn't find the need to any further PIs.

I like this! I feel mentality is a bit out dated from the times of the old sliders system. I can imagine that the Team Mentality and Team Fluidity are part of the Match Engine which is being developed incrementally over the years, and is hard to drop, but in my opinion, I believe the time to evolve and liberate from it has come. I believe the only real use at the moment for the mentality is risk taking, everything else can be set by the TIs and PIs. If there is a way to decouple mentality effects from the rest of the tactic, this would be a great step forward. I think this could be achieved by scrapping the mentality completely and replacing it with the following: 1. Improving Passing Risks and Off the Ball Runs Risk TIs and PIs. This would give us the ability to make the team take more risks on and off the ball without the need for any nebulous mentality concepts. I am aware that "More Direct Passing", "Take More Risks", "Pass into Space" and "Get Further Forward" instructions does increase risk taking, but it is coupled with Mentality. Any one of these instructions is interpreted in an Attacking mentality differently than Defensive mentality. Allowing these instructions to function independently within a dedicated spectrum (such as the passing slider or the pressing slider) will give us much more ability to create specific playing styles without using mentality. 2. Allow all tactics to begin in an absolute clean slate, no default settings based on mentality. Everything is set at the standard middle defaults. Our TIs and PIs will be then interpreted absolutely, not relatively. This would be a more realistic interpretation, and is MUCH easier to anticipate the effects of my instructions. A 2 notch up direct passing instruction should mean the same to any team, not be construed differently in the context of Mentality. These changes will make implementing style like a deep quick transitioning side (similar to Jose's Real Madrid) more intuitive. However, I am aware this is very difficult to achieve and probably is not going to be considered seriously. Therefore, a more conservative improvement would be as follows: 1. Limit the effects of mentality to on and off the ball risks only. Things like width, compactness, defensive line, pressing, tempo etc. should NOT be changed by mentality. I may want to play a high risk football and defend in a deep block, doing so by going on an Attacking mentality would have lots of unwanted effects, while Defensive will not see us be sufficiently forward thinking. Removing the rest of the mentality effects (other than risk taking) will allow us to adjust everything from the TC and will make the player anticipate any changes he makes more accurately. Why should I play two attacking duties strikers on a defensive mentality to compensate for lack of risk taking, while I go with a support and attack duties on a more attacking mentality, if I want to achieve the same play from both strikers? I believe everything in the TC (TIs, PIs, Roles and Duties) should be absolute and not relative to mentality. 2. Update the description of mentality to EXACTLY describe what mentality is affecting. 3. Update the PIs and TIs related to risk taking so that it indicates the level of risk taking. At the moment, we do not know the frequency of forward runs, or is the player playing risky or not. 4. Place some distinction between Direct Passing, Tempo, Pass into Space and Take More Risks PI. All these instructions affect passing in someway, but it is not intuitively clear what each of them do. I happy to elaborate further and would really love to see the ME take a giant leap forward.

Cheers, thank you so much! Glad you are enjoying them

That's great, glad you are enjoying your save! Normally, the AI will be a lot more cautious against you, and the system will be exposed by time. When this happens, I'd go with something similar to the system in the second reply above, giving your team more attacking options, while still retaining the direct style. Good luck!

Thank you, I am glad you like this! For my WMs, I were looking for creativity and pace. I want them to act like Wide Playmakers, so I look for similar stats. Cheers!

I'd initially use a PF-A and a WB-S at left back. I'd also move the DL one notch higher with Offside trap, to get your strong team closer to goal.

It does make sense, and it is the sort of roles that I'd naturally do, but the main idea of the first one is to be direct and sort of route one football. Sadly, I realized this model isn't sustainable on the long term, and is completely reliant on the TM. In the final version, I use zero PIs, since the natural movement of the wingers cutting inside and narrower is enough for me, and is compensated by the wide WBs. They do combine with the forwards beautifully, providing lots of different weapons in our attacking arsenal. Henry isn't my first choice, I usually go with Almada as the IW and Zaniolo as the WP. I look for flair and creativity for both these role rather than pace, since our pace up top is more than enough. I initially had some concerns about them, but as you can in the attacking shape, they do not get into each other's way. However, they actually do a very good job, with the DLP controlling the ball from deep, doing Pirlo-esque passes, while the WP roams freely creating overloads in different areas. Also the presence of two playmakers allow the play not get rushed, which is what I want. No I don't. I find the more urgent pressing along with the compact shape quite sufficient. Against weaker teams I expect to dominate, I use the Counter Press TI to force the mistakes as you say.

A fine goal against Real Madrid, demonstrating our verticality: EDIT: Another MASSIVE counter attacking goal against Real Madrid: EDIT: A third goal against Real Madrid, in a real long ball style, Allardyce would be proud of:

I just written the part 2. I look for technical and creative players for these roles, since they become our main creators in the team.