Columnarius
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Posts posted by Columnarius
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If your opponent is playing conservative on defense, sitting back, not pressing aggressively, and generally parking the bus, then I find the best way to get penetrating passes is to play with an attacking mentality on very slow tempo with shorter passing and with your wingers / forward having a get forward often PI (either via their role or via you specifically setting that PI).
By slowing down, the player on the ball will hold it longer, waiting to see if a team mate makes a run. Since they have time on the ball, they can wait, spot the run and try to make that penetrating pass.
If your opponents is playing very deep, it simply may mean they are denying you space behind them and you won't be able to easily penetrate behind them. In that situation, you are more likely to score via a cross or a long shot from the top of the box.
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If on the other hand, your opponent is playing aggressive defense, with a high defensive line and aggressive pressing, then you likely want to play with a faster tempo and standard or more direct passing (and likely dribble less) with at least a few players making forward runs often. This tries to get your team moving the ball quickly around and beyond the pressing defense.
I'm not talking about counter attack situations, which are totally different.
I hope that helps!
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I think a great point highlighted in this thread is that some instructions relate to the "Transition to Defend" phase while others relate to the "Defending" phase. "Transition to Defend" is the moment when your team loses the ball and your team is adjusting its mindset from Attack to Defend. "Defending" is considered after that transition moment has passed and both teams have adjusted to their new situation.
How instructions relate to these different phases is somewhat made clear in how team tactics are divided among three sections.
It is interesting there isn't a division between "Transition to Attack" and "Transition to Defend" tactical sections.
Coming back to the original point about clarifying the Counter Pressing Transition to Defend phase TI vs. pressing-related Defending phase TIs/PIs, I've often wondered for how long the transition TI stays in effect. For example, how long does the team try to apply the counter pressing TI after they lose the ball before players switch over to the Defending phase TIs.
For example, if I had counter pressing enabled, but a much lower line of engagement and less urgent pressing TIs / PIs, my assumption is that upon losing the ball, my team would initially try to press aggressively but at some point, they'd stop and instead retreat to the LoE where they applied pressing only when an opponent with the ball got very close.
How long exactly that period is I don't quite know.
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A team that regroups as their transition instruction won't immediately press when they lose the ball. If the team plans to play with a high LOE and aggressive pressing, than it would be a bit strange to not counter press unless you are worried about not covering zones properly before you start pressing.
I think it would be quite normal to regroup if one had a lower LoE and lower defensive line even if you planned to aggressively press once your opponent crossed that lower line.
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I can get 61% average possession over a season playing a "4-3-3" Man City recreation (with Man City) using a base formation of 2-3-2-2-1 and while I get lower than 61% against defensive teams who are good at keeping the ball in their own defensive third, the combination of formation, roles, duties and tactical instructions has squeezed those possession stats down.
This linked thread below mirrors just about everything we've talked about above and in the linked thread although its hyper aggressive in pressing and tackling. Here's all details including the stats:
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Also, have the CF man mark their DM. This starts the CM further back and when he presses, he keeps the DM in his cover shadow.
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25 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:
- The same logically goes for the "Stay on feet" (a.k.a. easy tackling) team instruction
In theory, if your goal was to force the opponent to clear the ball long through pressure (rather than tackle and win he ball), than "Stay on Feet" might be logical but I have to agree that I haven't actually found it to be helpful in any situation other than when trying to avoid fouls.
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6 hours ago, zyfon5 said:
There were plenty of discussions about this on this forum before
In addition to what's discussed in the linked thread, I've also found that using opposition instructions to force CDL/Rs and DML/Rs onto their inside foot (So right foot for L sided players) while forcing FBL/Rs onto their outside foot (So right foot for right sided player) helps to trap them in uncomfortable positions and increase the cover shadows to reduce passing options.
Using your CMs to mark tightly can also help.
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18 hours ago, Nix0n said:
Can you share tactic ? Updated version
I think you can build it with all the info I provided but here you go.
Man City 4-1-2-2-1 Positive v2.fmf
Man City 4-1-2-2-1 Very Defensive v2.fmf
Don't forget to add the opposition instructions, which are not stored in a saved tactic.
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Here's a full season:
Average Possession % climbed to 61%, which was spot on to the 61.2% real-life average.
Average # Passes / Game also climbed to 639.8 (The math on that is 22126 / .91 / 38). This is still below the 674 / game but quite a bit closer.
Average Passing Accuracy % increased to 91%, which is above the real-world average of 89%. Let's look more closely at this in terms of passing accuracy by player.
Ederson's 91% was well above his real-word average of 86%.
Stones (CDR) was spot on at 94% while Laporte (CDL) was lower at 91% than their real-word average of 92.1%.
Walker and Cancelo (the IWBRs) were higher at 91% / 92% than their real-life averages of 88.9% / 89.4%.
Mendy and Zinchenko (the WBLs) were lower at 87% / 88% than their real-world averages of 88.3% / 91.5%. This may reflect that I didn't alter the mentality for Zinchenko, who I think usually plays with less aggressive personal instructions than Mendy in real life.
Fernandinho and Rodri (the DMs) were higher at 95% / 94% than their real-world average of 89.8% / 92.2%.
David Silva and Foden (the MEZs) were higher at 89% / 91% than their real-world averages of 87.3% / 88.7%.
De Bruyne (the RPM) was significantly higher at 90% than the real-world average of 81.7%. This suggests the tactic did not encourage him to be adventurous enough. This is confirmed when we look at his Assists / Game, which are .41 compared to his incredible real-world average of 1.65. This is an area that requires some tweaks in the tactic!
Sterling (the RMDL) was significantly higher at 88% than than their real-world average of 81.8%. This either suggests the tactic did not encourage him to be adventurous enough or reveals a disconnect between the game's ratings where Sterling has a passing of 13 compared to reality.
By contrast, Bernardo Silva (RMDR) was lower at 86% than their real-world average of 89.3%.
Finally, Aguero (the PFS) 94% than their real-world average of 80.7%. This suggests the tactic did not encourage him to be adventurous enough.
Average Shots / Game increased to 17.3, which got a lot closer but still fell short of the real-world average of 18.6.
Average Goals / Game increased to 2.13, which got a lot closer but still fell short of the real-world average of 2.37.
If we consider these last three points together along side the details of the player passing percentages, we can hypothesize that increasing the aggressive passing a bit more of De Bruyne, Sterling and Aguero (while figuring out how to account for Bernardo Silva's more conservative passing) may get us the rest of the way however we will have to consider that against the desire to maintain the overall Possession %.
Even with the role and duty changes, we only reduced Average Dribbles / Game from 20 down to 18. Let's look closer at the dribbles by player.
We had a more substantial reduction for the RMDL/Rs than the PFS but these remain high. I think the last think to try here is to append Dribble Less PIs to a number of roles and see if that further reduces beyond what the Dribble Less TI is already doing.
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I've revised the tactic and gone through another season and I think It is pretty close!
As a reminder, I outlined various real-world stats for Man City and the average position per player as the basis for what I wanted to emulate starting here:
As I highlighted above, I really wanted to further improve the Average Possession % and Average Number of Passes / Game, which was significantly below City's real-world average. To do this, I improved both the offensive approach and the defensive approach.
Offensively, my focus was on looking at ways to reduce the chance of me losing the ball, which most happened either by failing to dribble past a defender or being too aggressive in the attacking third.
Defensively (meaning not a transition to defense moment), my focus was on both further compressing the space around the opponent's ball carrier while cutting off obvious passing outlets to induce a clearance. A key takeaway from re-reading some of the excellent linked media was that City focus more on forcing the defender to clear the ball than on actually tackling and winning the ball off of the opponent's ball carrier. Man City have one of the fewest number of tackles but the highest tackle success %, which I found interesting.
To get an idea about this, I recommend reading the Pressing section of https://spielverlagerung.com/2018/01/02/how-peps-citizens-have-taken-over-england/ and watching the following:
What I take away is that successfully replicating Man City's pressing relies on the following:
- The way supporting players positions themselves to deny passing options, mark opponents tightly and compress both the horizontal and vertical space to restrict off the ball movement options
- The angles players take when they press to keep opposing players in their cover shadow
- The direction they press players towards (back inside or towards the side lines) in order to reduce passing options
- The decision making of when to Press (this one is challenging to replicate so instead we make the players decide to press very frequently)
- The decision making of whether to Tackle when Pressing (this one also challenging to replicate and so instead we tackle aggressively)
With these points in mind, I set about resetting my approach to their defense to reduce my opponents' Passing Accuracy and Possession %, particularly in their defensive third by trying to find ways to get them to clear the ball. If we win the ball, great, but that isn't the actual purpose.
Formation, Position, Roles and Duties
Changes from my previous iteration, which you can see details on in the last few posts, include:
- CF-A becomes a PF-S
- IFL-A becomes an RMD
- IWR-A becomes an RMD
These changes reduce Avg. # of Dribbles / Game while still maintaining the off the ball movement patterns City exhibit in this particular instance of their variants. These changes also raise the Average # of Passes / Game, the Average Possession % towards the target numbers. Finally, we get some beautiful forward runs onto through balls from the AML/Rs deep in the opponent's third and that classic cross or cut back from the end line that City use so effectively.
The down side is that we do not see the ideal width from the AML/R as frequently as I'd like but the RMD role will roam outside sometimes and the average positions remain acceptably realistic given the other benefits these roles and duties provide. I hypothesize we can further affect this with Personal Player Traits.
It is critical to use roles that do not have dribble often in order to achieve the desired Average Number of Passes / Game and get closer to the desired number of Average Dribbles / Game. We simply cannot use the Winger Roles or the F9 and do that from my experience so far.
- DM-D becomes a DM-S
The more aggressive personal mentality translates into just a bit more threat and support play from the DM. In particular, the DM will switch play from one side to the other not just in their own defensive third but in the attacking third, which City often need to do to create space against a defensive-minded opponent. I think it also adds a bit more compactness to the defensive positioning of the vertical lines, reducing space for the opponent to make forward passes into.
- WBL-S and IWBR-D move fro the FB to the WB strata.
This is not an offensive-oriented change but more of a defensive one. By moving up to this higher strata, these players can more effectively tightly mark opponents' AML/Rs when the opponent has the ball deep in their own third, which increases the chance that the opponent will decide these players are not available and will instead clear the ball. I believe this significantly improves Average Possession %. Second, Man City is more likely to contest long balls to the wings due to closing down triggering further up the field.
- SK-S becomes a SK-A
This increase in the GK's mentality results in them playing further out of the box to sweep more balls over the top, which improves our Average Possession %. I did not notice a major reduction in the GK's Passing Accuracy for Ederson.
All other positions remain the same to what I posted previously so please take a look at those posts for more explanations on why I chose those roles and duties.
Mentality and Team Instructions
If you review my previous testing, you will see that I was:
- Considerably low in Average Passes / Game
- Slightly low on Average Possession % / Game
- Considerable high on Average Dribbles / Game
- Slightly low on Average Shots / Game
These team tactics improve the areas that were most off and while Mentality remains Positive, there are a number of TI changes.
In Possession Team Instructions
We adjust and use Fairly Narrow Attacking Width, Shorter Passing, Standard Tempo and add the Dribble Less team instruction. This combination increased Average Passes / Game and Average Possession % much closer to our targets while reducing Average Dribbles / Game. It also slightly improved Average Passing % / Game.
In order to not turn into a team that keeps the ball but never scores, we add the Pass into Space instruction. As @Rashidi has mentioned on many occasions, this TI is situational and not great against highly defensive teams defending deep but defaulting this to on often works with this variation of the tactic and is key to increasing Average Goals / Game above 2.
We keep Play out of Defense and Work Ball Into Box to preserve the replication of the attacking play and ball movement in both our defensive and attacking thirds.
Transition Team Instructions
For transitions, we add Distribute to FullBacks and Distribute to Centre-Backs as this slightly improves Passing Accuracy for our GK although honestly you could leave this off and not notice much of a difference in my view.
We keep Counter-Press but leave the defaults on for when possession has been won to reduce the chance over over aggressively counter attacking while still doing so in obvious moments.
Out of Possession Team Instructions
We adjust the Line of Engagement to Much Higher in order to start our press earlier. We adjust our Defensive Width to Narrow to reduce passing options in the middle, particularly when we've forced the ball to one side of the field. We add Extremely Urgent Pressing and Prevent Short GK Distribution to reduce time on the ball.
We also add Use Tight Marking as this is key to Pep's strategy of forcing a long clearance.
Lastly, although I wanted to actually use Stay on Feet in order to increase the chance that I can harass the ball carrier until they clear it, I felt I had to go with Get Stuck In, to effectively cause my opponent the clear the ball frequently, which seems to rely on the defensive player attempting to tackle as opposed to pressing but not tackling.
We keep a Higher Defensive Line and use of the Offside Trap to compress the vertical space. So in summary, we are HIGHLY AGGRESSIVE on Defense. What makes this setup work is what we do with Opposition Instructions and Man Marking Personal Instructions, which denies passing options and increases the number of clearances.
Personal Instructions
We make numerous PI changes, both offensive and defensive.
PF-S
- Pass it Shorter - This improves our ball retention in the final third, affecting our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
- Mark Specific Position: DM - This is all about setting up the PF to better keep a DM in their Cover Shadow. With the use of the own body, a player can position himself between the ball carrier and an open man, covering the latter in his fictive shadow. Therefore, the defender can prevent a pass while pressuring. By marking a DM, it reduces the chance that the DM will be open to receive a pass when the PF presses a GK, CD, or FBL/R. No need to adjust if the opponent is not playing with a DM.
RMD L/R
- Mark Tighter - These reduce the chance that the FB L/R or WB L/R or CD L/R is considered open, which in-turn increases the chance of a clearance. Combined with opposition instructions, this also improves the chance that these players are in the Cover Shadow of the RMD L/R.x
MEZ-A
- Pass it Shorter, Shoot Less Often - These improve our ball retention in the final third, affecting our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
RPM-S
- Shoot Less Often - This improves our ball retention in the final third, affecting our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
- Move Into Channels - This creates the desired movement and average positioning and facilitates the 2v1s and 3v2s on the wings in addition to creating nice angles for crosses and through balls.
WBL-S
- Pass it Shorter, Shoot Less Often - This improves our ball retention both in terms of how we move the ball out of our own half and how we are patient with the ball in our opponents defensive third. This improved our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
- Close Down More, Tackle Harder - These improve our ability to fight for long passes down the wings and denies our opponent's wide players from easily progressing up the field. It also helps balance out our narrow defending in our own defensive third and reduces the time our opponent has to cross the ball into our box.
- Mark Specific Position: AMR - Per the comment in the Position, Role and Duty Section, man marking of the AMR makes an incredible difference, both in terms of marking out the opponent so that opposing players are less likely to pass to this player as well as increasing the likelihood that the WBL will challenge for long balls out wide by starting closer to the AMR. No need to adjust if the opponent is not playing with an AMR.
IWBR-D
- Pass it Shorter, Shoot Less Often - Same reasoning as above with the WBL-S.
- Close Down More, Tackle Harder - Same reasoning as above with the WBL-S.
- Mark Specific Position: AML - Same reasoning as above with the WBL-S.
DM-S
- Pass it Shorter, Shoot Less Often - These improve our ball retention, affecting our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
- Close Down - This helps shut down counter attacks given the DM is further up the field due to their Support duty.
CDL-ST
- Pass it Shorter - This improves our ball retention in our own defensive third and the middle of the field, affecting our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
- Stay Wider - This helps the team achieve its 3-Man Defense when in attack by getting out wider to more closely mirror the IWB-D while the CDR-D stays central.
CDR-D
- Pass it Shorter - This improves our ball retention in our own defensive third and the middle of the field, affecting our Average Passing Accuracy / Game and Average Possession %.
SK-A
- Tackle Harder - This helps defend counter attacks by increasing the chance that the GK is going to come out of the box aggressively to defend 1v1.
Opposition Instructions
Opposition Instructions, specifically closing down defenders onto specific feet, is key to pressing when in the defensive phase of the game and both forces ball carriers into uncomfortable situations where they are more likely to clear the ball and improves cover shadow positioning.
By closing down the CDL/R on their inside foot, a pressing player forces them back inside where we often have a PF or a CM lurking. Also, by positioning themselves to the opponent CDL/R's outside, which improves the chance that the opponent FB/WB on that side is in the pressing player's cover shadow. This concept also applies to DMs when the opponent plays with two of them.
By closing down the FB/WBs on their inside foot, it forces them to face wide and makes use of the side line to help us reduce passing options and encourage the ball carrier to clear the ball long.
This, together with the TIs and PIs has made a big difference in reducing the opponent's Average Possession %, particular in their own defensive third and increased clearances.
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The Ultra Defensive Version, used to shut up shop by remaining highly aggressive on defense but patiently moving the ball around on offense, was also updated. It now looks like this:
All PIs are the same as the primary tactic.
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I just wrapped up a full season. Let's compare to reality.
104 points broke the 2018-2019 title winning side's record for most points and wins in a season. 80 goals meant I had 2.1 goals / game, which was a bit below the 2.37 they averaged so far this season. 20 goals allowed meant I had .52 goals allowed / game, which is substantially lower than the 1.1 average. So it looks like I can be a bit more aggressive in order to get closer on this.
I came in at 15.9 shots / game, which was a bit under the 18.6 they've averaged this season and matches up with the lower goals / game number.
Average Possession of 56% is lower than the 61.2% I was targeting. I attribute this to the amazing degree to which teams can keep the ball in their own third when playing defensively in this year's version of the game. I've made progress but still can't fully crack "Setting Traps" for these teams that force them to clear the ball sooner.
Average Passing Completion Ratio was spot on.
If my math is right, I averaged 573 passes per game. So even with my shut up shop tactic, I wasn't able to get that close to the 674.6 number. Maybe I need to increase the tempo?
20 Dribbles per Game far eclipsed the 13.1 average in real times. Reducing dribbles and increasing passes would help get closer to the desired balance.
The AML/AMR players are clearly where all the extra dribbling is happening and are way over the ~1.7 dribbles / game they average in real life and so this looks like something to adjust. the CF is also roughly double Aguero's actual 1.1 dribble / game.
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So it feels pretty close! I guess I need to go back and look at a few adjustments and give it another shot?
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In-Match Adjustments
When playing a defensive team that is hard to break down, I:
- Set mentality to Attacking
- Setting Passing Directness to Shorter
- Set Tempo to Extremely Low
- Change the WB-S to an WB-A
- Change the DM-D to a DM-S
- Change the IWB-D to an IWB-S
When playing a team that presses aggressively (they could be playing anywhere from a Cautious to a Very Attacking Mentality, I:
- Set Tempo to Slightly Higher
- Set Dribbling to Dribble Less
Watching the match, I'm looking to see that my players stop clearing the ball and instead try to move it to the next player fast enough.
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I'd really love to hear suggestions on how to improve these further to get closer to the stats. I also think there are more "adjustments" based on in-game situations that we can standardize. I see many "I sometime change X" comments but I don't feel like we have a well known standard list to employ.
But in addition to that, things to still work on for me include:
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Common variations of the 4-1-2-2-1, such as:
- The DM drops back to become the third man of the 3 man defense and the FBR pushes up more aggressive alongside the FBL
- Both FBs play narrow and both AML|Rs play wide (Sane as the AML and Sterling as the AMR)
- City's less aggressive variation used in tough away games
- Alternative formations that City have played over the past couple of years, which include 4-2-3-1, 4-4-1-1, 3-1-4-2, 4-1-3-2 and 3-4-2-1
- City's common set pieces (please link to articles or videos if anything comes to mind)
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Common variations of the 4-1-2-2-1, such as:
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On 01/06/2020 at 10:49, h3nrique_SEP said:
Nice topic, i'm also a big fan of Pep and his style of play, can you share the tactic for download please?
Hopefully, I've covered everything needed to create them in the above posts but here you go!
Man City 4-1-2-2-1 Positive.fmf
Man City 4-1-2-2-1 Very Defensive.fmf
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30 minutes ago, Rashidi said:
Closing up shop doesn't need to mean you have to go defensive to be honest. If your side is really good, you could just stay on balanced or positive and slow down your tempo. Thats provided your team can keep the ball and move it around. Narrow will help you keep the ball, but you could also do different things.
For example, sometimes I like to lower my tempo, but maintain width in attack with direct passing. Again, thats because my team is good at passing and off the ball movement. Our passes are going to have the effect of moving defences around creating more chances caused by them chasing our players, you have 2 fullbacks on defend duty. I do think that City typically play with an IW/IF combo, this does allow them to stretch the field quite a lot with their side.
@Rashidi Thanks for jumping in. While trying to achieve what you are describing in past FM versions, I often felt like I could do it with balanced or positive. This year, it seems like the players play a bit more aggressive for what I want, which is to just keep the ball and only score if there's an obvious opportunity. Also, in past versions, it seemed like Ultra Defensive caused teams to get rid of the ball pretty quickly while this year they seem able to patiently move the ball around for extremely long stretches even under some degree of pressure.
I'll go back and take another look at whether I can actually hold the ball better on balanced as that was what I originally tried to do.
Regarding the point about the IW/IF, I think you are getting at the idea that they often have one of the two players in the AML|R strata out wide and the other more narrow in the channel. I agree and I've got that in the main tactic but not in the shut up shop tactic. I'll go back and revise that.
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Separately, one thing I'd love to hear your opinion on is how we might get closer to the average number of passes City achieve. If you were to tinker with your recreation tactics to achieve it, what might you try? Maybe something for a new Liquid v3/v4 2020 video?
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16 hours ago, coach vahid said:
Just one thing, i cant see the closing up shot formation. Problem with the picture.
Thanks for letting me know, Should be fixed now!
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13 hours ago, Crazy_Ivan said:
Well done bud what is your average possession in the league?
12 hours ago, Robson 07 said:I don't know if they all play out the way you've described them but makes sense.
They don't all work out like that for sure! Some look like this:
But some still look like this:
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So that's what I've been able to figure out so far but I'm not sure its the best and most accurate way to reflect what City do. Keeping in mind the quantitative stats, how else might you approach it?
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Some games don't go as smoothly.
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With the above, I can get the following kinds of results:
I would say that it still remains challenging to consistently balance things in order to get both the desired # of total passes, passing accuracy, possession %, total shots and goals / game but this feels close. This game had 20 dribbles vs. the avg. 13.1.
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Closing Up Shop Formation
If you watch City Play, you noticed that when they are winning, somewhere around the 60-70th minute, they get a little slower and a little less aggressive and start to ping the ball around endlessly. I think this is actually a pretty critical aspect of achieving their passing accuracy and possession percentages. To approach replicating this, I adapted the starting tactic to a City-version of shut up shop as follows:
The positioning and roles are intended to spread the field and make it easier to move the ball around until time expires.
Mentality and Team Instructions are as follows:
PIs are the same as the Standard Tactic as the motivations remain relevant.
CF, IF, IW, Mez
- Close Down More
- Tackle Harder
RPM
- Move into Channels
DM, WB, CDL, CDR, IWB
- Take Fewer Risks
With this tactic, you can add 100-150 additional passes, safeguard your lead and get a lot closer to the stats mentioned above.
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As I mentioned, this thread contains so many different contributions to understanding City's tactics that it is hard include everyone but I'd like to point out a few sources that I think have had a big influence on my thinking as it relates to attempting re-creation in FM.
@Rashidi created an example of Man City's play in the following tactical breakdown for FM19 that several others on this thread have referenced and I have personally found incredible useful:
Likewise, this outstanding tactical analysis of City emphasizes a number of key points to consider (I'm not as sold on the FM re-creation part of this video as I am about the analysis part).
There is a great write up with embedded video examples here:
https://www.footyanalytics.net/post/manchester-city-playing-philosophy-game-model-positional-play
This is another excellent writeup on tactical analysis and has a highly useful analysis of the defensive side:
https://spielverlagerung.com/2018/01/02/how-peps-citizens-have-taken-over-england/
Finally, this video focuses in on the nuance of how City Press when in defense:
The 9 pages (as of the writing of this post) in this thread add to these three information sources but this is a good refresher for anyone who skipped ahead to this page.
I'd like to point out, as others have in this thread, that it may be impossible to replicate Man City but I'm hoping we can collaborate on getting as close as we can and I think we can get close with a combination of a couple of different tactics. The first is how we start the game and the second is how we finish the last 25-30 minutes, assuming we are winning.
Note: When playing away against an equal or better opponent, I basically think we have to look closely at how Pep adjusts. For example, away to Real Madrid on 2/26/20, we see some significant differences in tactics and statistics. Likewise if you look at away to Liverpool on 10/19. This post won't cover these scenarios but maybe we can work together on tactics for these challenging away game situations.
Starting Formation
The starting formation is intended to mirror both many of the team's statistics and the average player positions. If one was to use it for an entire match, it could easily win you the game and we can pretty much nail the shots per game, goals per game, goals allowed, and shot / assist locations. Where it would frequently fall short is in terms of total passes and possession % compared to the numbers above.
Building on the formation in the above post, here's what I've come up with in terms of mentality and team instructions:
Personal Instructions I've found to make a meaningful difference compared to the defaults include:
CF, IF, W, Mez
- Close Down More
- Tackle Harder
RPM
- Move into Channels
DM, WB, CDL, CDR, IWB
- Take Fewer Risks
Below are some comments on my observations relating to my tactical instructions.
Mentality
I've tried endless combinations of team tactics, including changes in mentality and as far as I can tell, I can achieve similar results with Very Attacking, Attacking, Positive, or Balanced, which is kind of confusing to be honest! But Positive seems to be the post consistent against most opponents when the game is 0-0.
In Possession Team Instructions
I've tried attacking widths and the default of Fairly Wide seems to be the most consistent from my testing. Width is a strange setting. It doesn't actually limit the absolute width of your players in that a Winger or WB with Get Wider will still move close to the sideline when the ball moves to their side of the field. Instead, it affects how close players will move to one another relative to where the ball is. Given we want 2v1 / 3v2 overloads on the wings, the tactic doesn't benefit from a Wide or Extremely Wide setting, which I think is probably more appropriate for a direct / long wing play tactic (think Ferguson and Man Utd circa 2005).
I leave Pass into Space unticked. As @Rashidi says in his excellent videos, this setting is situational. I agree and I experience more success without it on average so I don't enable it.
I've tried focusing play through the middle vs. the left / right, utilizing overlaps / underlaps, and dribbling more / less with more or less creative freedom none of these seemed to make a material improvement in outcomes so i've left them all blank.
Here are some real-world stats to compare agains in terms of overall passing accuracy of Man City's defenders:
- Stones - 94%
- Otamendi - 92.4%
- Laporte - 92.1%
- Zinchenko - 91.5%
- Cancelo - 89.4%
- Walker - 88.9%
- Rodri - 92.2%
- Fernandinho - 89.8%
Play Out of Defense definitely seems to help get closer to these desired passing accuracy stats.
Interestingly, I find that the Standard passing directness doesn't hurt my defenders as far as their passing accuracy and it it actually gives them license to pass a longer if they need to when under pressure, resulting in an overall Increase in passing accuracy compared to Shorter passing, which works fine but slightly lowers overall passing accuracy due to the times a player can't find a shorter passing option and clears the ball rather than making an intentional long pass. In theory, you want to go shorter passing when you are facing a defense that puts a lot of bodies behind the ball so you are not passing long to an isolated player but I don't see setting the passing directness to Pass Shorter resulting in any noticeable benefit.
Regarding Tempo, Slightly Lower seems to be ideal but I want point out that there are a few different stats that are in tension here. When tempo is lower, passing accuracy goes up assuming the opponent is not pressing aggressively. That said, when facing teams that press aggressively, I've sometimes needed to increase it to avoid having the player on the ball pressured too the point that they clear the ball in a panic or even worse, lose it to an opponent's tackle. Teams can employ aggressive pressing regardless of their overall mentality, so it is something to watch out for even if the opponent is playing Cautious as opposed to Attacking.
A lower passing tempo means the player on the ball holds it a bit longer, allowing more off the ball runs by team mates, which City thrives on. But if we are too slow, then the defense can adjust, resulting in fewer goal scoring chances and we don't hit our 18.6 shots or 27 goals / game target. Finally, lower tempo does not appears to result in fewer passes per game even though the team is moving the ball a bit less quickly. This thread has seen a lot of debate as to whether City use a Higher or Slightly Lower tempo and after watching games closely and testing the different on stats, I think Slightly Lower is the way to go most of the time.
City averages 13.1 dribbles / game. I think it is important to be wary of too much dribbling at the expense of total passes as it is easy to rack up 20+ dribbles (and a lot of failed dribbles) in a game while seeing far lower total passing numbers. I know real world and FM stats are calculated different but here's the average number of dribbles per game for City's Players
- Sterling - 3.7
- Mahrez - 2.9
- De Bruyne - 2.5
- Cancelo - 2.4
- Bernardo Silva - 2
- Aguero - 1.8
- Jesus - 1.7
- Silva - 1.3
- Walker - 1.1
- Foden - 1.1
- Rodri - 1
So just to emphasize the point, Sterling only has 3.7x dribbles game compared to Rodri and averages less than 4 dribbles per game. This makes me think our tactic should try to limit dribbling for these players in their respective positions to similar numbers.
I also haven't seen that increased dribbling TI or PIs improve the team's chance of achieving the real-life statistics (although it does result in more goals) and generally speaking, I feel that it is easy to dribble too much and lose the ball, killing any chance at achieving the 62% possession and 674 passes / game city averages.
That said, I haven't found that the "Dribble Less" TI results in a material improvement in overall pass vs. dribble statistics relative to the target either, which is why I haven't ticked it.
In Transition Team Instructions
I tick Counter-Press as I think this helps the team achieve its desired shots on goal and goals / game targets. I do not tick Counter because Man City are so aggressive and are often the favored team and I realized the Counter TI wasn't really helping. As far as I understand, ticking this increases the percentage of times the team will try to counter attack after winning back the ball. As a refresher, when a team counters, they ignore team and personal instructions and go into. special Counter set of instructions that involve a lot of dribbling with the ball, extreme forward runs and use of through balls. Not ticking this still results in some counter attacks but only when there are fewer defenders back and more favorable opportunities for the counter attacking team. The end result that I believe I see from my testing is that by not ticking it, I keep the ball more and score just as many goals. if I was a less favored team and my opponents were more aggressive, I think it could help but that isn't City.
For similar reasons to @Rashidi's point of view, I do not tick the distribute to position options in order to allow Ederson to make his own choice based on what the defense gives you. Most of the time, this is a pass to the CDs but if an opponent is pressing, then it can be to the FB L|R or even the AM L|R stratas instead. I pretty much never see passes to the CF despite some amazing highlights of Ederson assisting Aguero in real life.
Out of Possession Team Instructions
After much experimentation and consultation with others on this forum, I've realized that one can be too aggressive with their out of possession pressing and positioning, resulting in your opponent keeping the ball in their own third for long stretches of the game. Although this doesn't really hurt our chances of winning, it does not help us achieve the 61.2% average possession, the 674 average passes, or the opponent's 300 average passes.
By dropping off a bit through use of the Higher Line of Engagement and Higher Defensive Line settings while using the default Slightly More Urgent Pressing setting and not ticking Prevent GK Distribution, it actually reduces the opponent's possession in their own third by luring them further up field where there is less support. This means the opponent gives the ball away sooner and my possession and total passing numbers go up.
I do not tick either Stay on Feet or Get Stuck In as neither helps due to the different in tackling aggression between my forward and back players that I describe below.
This is an area where I still can't replicate real life entirely where a weaker Premier League side might only pass 250 times in a game against City but this combination of TIs (and PIs) is the closest I can come up with as it relates to limiting the opponent's possession and passing.
I leave Defense Width on Standard as my testing suggests this is the best combination of denying passing lanes out wide while limiting space through the middle. Narrow is similar but allows more overall possession down the flanks. Wide doesn't really seem to work at all.
Personal Instructions
There are basically two sets of PIs.
The first focuses on helping us achieve our desired passing accuracy, overall possession percentages and build up play style. I tick Take Fewer Risks on the WBL, CDL, CDR, IWBR and the DM in order to encourage them to keep their passing simple and to stay patient as they look for opportunities to get the ball to our two CMs to initiate the attack in the final third.
I have not found I need to set Shorter Passing for similar reasons to what I outlined above as far as TIs.
Interestingly, I have not found I need to set Dribble Less on the WBL or IWBR and that this actually hurts our possession and passing accuracy.
The second focuses on helping us achieve our desired possession percentages and opponent's total passes / passing accuracy as it relates to our pressing. I believe this is often referred to as a Split Block, in that a block (group) of attacking players press aggressively while the defenders hang back. To achieve this, I tick Close Down More and Tackle Harder for the CM-L (Mez-A), AML (IF-Su), AMR (W-A) and CF.
I have not found I need to tick Mark Tighter
The final PI is for the RPM. I tick Move into Channels in order to encourage De Bruyne to get further wider and create the desired 2v1 / 3v2 situations down the wings, while also spreading out the defenders to allow runs that split them by the AM L|R / CML / CF.
I have not found I need to ticket More Direct Passing as this seems to lead to an increase in overly ambitious balls without any meaningful return on goals despite the reduction in passing accuracy and possession %.
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One thing I'd like to experiment with a bit more is what effect, if any, hold up ball has for the AML|R players in terms of preventing them from mindlessly dribbling into defenders and in terms of creating more 1-2 passes.
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First off, thank you to @HUNT3R, @el_tgv, @zyfon5, @Experienced Defender, @sporadicsmiles@Robson 07, @robot_skeleton, @KyleHyde, @Crazy_Ivan and @TheGoodRebel for the engagement and feedback.
After consideration of the discussion and testing of numerous tactical instruction combinations, here's the best I've been able to come up with.
PIs are as follows:
CF, IF, W, Mez
- Close Down More
- Tackle Harder
RPM
- Move into Channels
DM, WB, CDL, CDR, IWB
- Take Fewer Risks
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There are numerous things here related to the larger tactic but if we hone in on the topic of preventing weaker teams from possessing the ball in their own third, I think the keys to the improved results are:
- We are not pressing so aggressively. This lures the opponent into playing the ball a bit further up the field before we press, which complicates their passing options.
- We are not playing so wide, putting our players in the AML|R strategy in better positions to deny passing lines out wide to the FB L|R.
- One of our two CMs (the CML) more aggressively presses when the ball gets past the CF, allowing the CF to block off the easy back pass.
- We are not counter attacking quite as frequently (because Counter is no longer ticked in Transition Team Instructions), meaning we have more players near our opponent when we lose the ball in the opponent's third who can press and cover.
- We are a bit less aggressive with our mentality by switching from Attacking to Positive, resulting in more players closer together when we move into the final third, meaning we have more players near our opponent when we lose the ball in the opponent's third who can press and cover.
With the setup above, I often see lower overall possession for my opponent but more specifically, lower possession in their own third. It tends to look like this:
There's still some things to work out in terms of overall replication of Man City but I'm happier with the improved tactics leading to reduced possession of weaker opponents in their own third.
Let's take the broader Man City conversation over to here:
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9 minutes ago, TheGoodRebel said:
City play with inverted wing backs quite a lot too don't forget. The beauty of this being they join the central midfield area. So you could potentially utilise these and keep your width so that you've got your players out wide but also extra bodies in the central areas to press the opposition and give you greater ball retention.
IRL Kyle Walker is City's 5th best player this season in terms of passes completed (1,418 compared to 1,470 from De Bruyne).
@TheGoodRebel Thanks for pointing out that is often where the player ends up vs. where they start the attack phase.
I agree that if the AM L|R end up more narrow than the opposing FB when transitioning from attack to defend, they can cut off the passing lane more easily than if they end up wider.
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9 minutes ago, KyleHyde said:
Notice how the gegenpressing 433 preset has IFs and a narrower team width. It's not just to force play in the middle but so the attacking trio is near CBs and DMs once they lose the ball and thus start the gegenpressing. If oppositon has less space to play in the middle they will be forced to play wide and have their options reduced. You must then be able to deal with that!
I see your point and I can imagine how AML|Rs playing in the channels between CDs and FBs would help them more quickly position to take away those outside passing lanes.
How to balance that with the well known Man City desire for at least one, if not both AML|R to get very wide when in possession? Would you say that playing with a more Narrow Attacking Width, combined with an AML|R role that instructs, or at least permits, the individual player to get wide allows more of a balance where the AML|R on the side that the ball is on may be wide but the player on the far side stays in the channel between the CD and FB?
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All things Pressing
in Tactics, Training & Strategies Discussion
Posted · Edited by Columnarius
Yes - potentially.
Here is Athletico Madrid, playing a low Line of Engagement, Narrow Defensive Width, a Low Defensive Line, and somewhat urgent closing down (but very conservative tackling).
Even though they regroup when they lose the ball, they don't give up passes over the top because the team regroups deep enough to dissuade their opponent from playing a long ball quickly.
Because of the low Line of Engagement, they force teams to try to move the ball up the field slowly. The only reason this is successful is because of how they cut off passing lanes. If you sat back but left passing lanes wide open, then a technically talented and patient team that was playing with shorter passing would pick you apart. But if you can compress the space, deny passing lanes, and aggressively close down within the small block of space you are defending (vertically and horizontally), than as you say, you make yourself hard to break down and play through.
So that said, if you setup a tactic with regroup, consider where you want that LoE to kick in and just how aggressive you want closing down on your players (especially your first line of defense that your attackers represent). The more aggressive the pressing instructions (either due to the TIs or PIs), the sooner the pressing will trigger AFTER they've regrouped relative to the LoE.