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Something we see more and more in modern day football is teams having different formations depending on whether they are attacking or defending. Many teams playing with a 4-3-3 in attack defends with a 4-man midfield. The teams playing with a 3-man defense often revert to a 5-man defense when defending. I can see how this can be exploited for example playing 3-4-3 in attack and 5-5-0 in defense, but I think this could be interesting nonetheless. An alternative to full formations could be a PI that tells the player to go from a winger/wide midfielder to a full back in defense. I think this would be really interesting and would reflect better how teams are set up nowadays. What do you guys think.

442 UNIVERSAL!! NEW UPDATED TACTIC 442 Burg & V3.32 WOLFSBURG TEST!!! BUNDESLIGA CHAMPIONS 1ST SEASON!!! 14PTS DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 2ND PLACE!!! (PROJECTED TO FINISHED 8TH) HOME: 442 Burg.fmf AWAY: 442 Burg Away.fmf MY TEAM ALSO DOMINATED OTHERS GETTING 40+ SHOTS!!! TEAM COHESION IMPORTANT!!! (FOR ANY TACTIC BELOW TOO): STICK TO TRAINING SCHEDULES BELOW TO ACHIEVE THAT HOME V3.32 v3 19.32.fmf AWAY V3.32 v3.32 away.fmf BRIGHTON TEST!!! FINISHED 2ND AND WON FA CUP (PROJECTED TO FINISH 17TH) HAVING FAST CBS ARE IMPORTANT!!! RESULTS BEFORE SIGNING PHIL JONES RESULTS AFTER SIGNING PHIL JONES 442 FOR TOP TEAMS!!! CHELSEA TEST!!! WON TREBLE FIRST SEASON!!! 102 POINTS WINGERS ARE IMPORTANT!!!! 442 top home.fmf 442 top away.fmf 442 top top away.fmf (NOT IMPORTANT, SIMILAR TO AWAY, JUST AN ALTERNATIVE)  credit to Knapp, TFF & Mr U Rosler PREVIOUS VERSION Home v3!! Away v3!! v3 19.3.fmf v3 19.3 AWAY.fmf BOURNEMOUTH TEST! 1ST SEASON 95PTS 120GLS (PROJECTED TO FINISH 14TH) ALSO WON THE CARLING CUP 2ND SEASON WON THE TREBLE!!! WON CL!!!! TRAINING UPDATED!!! TRAINING IS VERY IMPORTANT!!!! (special thanks to Mr U Rosler) what you knew before was all rubbish!! pre set schedules are not good. Playing loads of friendlies are NOT good despite what you heard/read! having a long pre-season is also a BIG myth!!! - Only do 4 weeks pre season with only 4 friendlies! i recommend you to have your friendlies only on saturday! YOUTH WILL DEVELOP MASSIVELY ALSO IF YOU GIVE THEM GAME TIME ALSO! - for 4 weeks in pre season use "Pre Season" schedule Pre-Season.fmf - when you have one game in a week: EARLY SEASON TO GET GOOD COHESION: 1 match week.fmf TACTICAL: 1 match tactical.fmf ATTACK: 1 match attack.fmf DEFENCE: 1 match defence.fmf - when you have two games in a week: EARLY SEASON TO GET GOOD COHESION: 2 match week.fmf TACTICAL: 2 match tactical.fmf ATTACK: 2 match attack.fmf DEFENCE: 2 match defence.fmf - During international break use: EARLY SEASON TO GET GOOD COHESION: 0 match week.fmf OTHER: no match defence.fmf INDIVIDUAL TRAINING/YOUTH TRAINING: HINTS AND TIPS Which tactic to use and when?My Guidelines for Bournemouth test: Home against poor opp - Home tactic Home against mid table - Home tactic Home against top 4 - Away tactic Away against poor opp - Home tactic Away against mid table - Home tactic (if you are on form) Away tactic (if you are off form or if opp are in excellent form) away against top 7 - Away tactic NEW! FILTER ADDED! 442 Universal.fmf - ML take left corner, MR take right corner - DL take left throw-in, DR take right throw-in - try not to make more than 2/3 signings - players develop with match time!! so stick with schedule! - FOR TOUGH AWAY GAMES, I PLAYED MY LB AT LM! this helps be more solid so wise to train some your full backs as wingers! FMT USERS!!!!!!!! screenshots of individual instructions GK: LB: RB: CBs: WGs: B2B: DLP S(home) D(away): STs: SET PIECES: Att Throw Left:Att Throw Right: Att Corner Left: Att Corner Right:

HI I was just wondering... you set player instruction to like every player to play to there strengths.. I've never really bothered. But for those of you that do. Do you set instructions for EVERY player or just certain ones ? & as for the opsing team do you set certain extrusion your self or leave it to a good assistant manager ? Thanks guys!

I'm unable to ask Assman to quick pick my poland team. I changed the Assman but it didn't work. In responsibilities Assman is set to auto pick and that is unchangeable.

Hi All Why can I not find ANY youtube videos about the use of 4-3-1-2 in FM2019? Is this formation impossible to succeed with in FM2019? I can't find any evidence of other people using this formation successfully in FM2019 anywhere. Would be great to use it as a way to get both Aubameyanga nd Lacazette in the same team as well as Ozil for Arsenal...

Here you will find bargains, Wonderkids, tactics, tips and more. Best teams to manage 2019

A possibility to take off an injured player is nice. However, there are some flaws: to take off injured player user need to find mouse cursor and click a pop-up button in less than 4 seconds (that's a pop-up message time limit for some reason) and it's not possible to take the player off later if you missed that pop-up; there is no prompt to change tactics immediately after taking a player off, it can be irritating if you taking off a striker but also can be critical if it's center-back. What I propose: if a user clicked a "Take Off" pop-up button, open tactics screen immediately so tactic can be adjusted; introduce the possibility to take off injured/exhausted players from tactics screen at any time. It'll greatly improve manager's QOL.

Sorry if I am doing something wrong. This is my first time here and since I just got of the toilet taking a huge **** I just got an idea I'd like to share. It might already be there but I have not seen it so far so yeah... As the title says, it's an advanced opposition instruction. You can already put in opposition instruction and player instruction but what if you could put in opposition instruction for player instruction? For example: you are playing as Barcelona, and facing Liverpool in an important Champions League match. A Barca fan favourite has signalized Salah as their main threat and you start to put in instructions. But there is no opposition instruction you can put in on the player? Like you want Jordi Alba to mark Salah all the time because he has some pace and will be able to stop him. Like add opposition instruction for your players. Players can be instructed to mark a specific player, maybe close down a lot, mark all the time, get stuck in in tackles etc. Chase that player for all the game when the player is not joining in on any other face of the attack for example. It could be more useful to have specific players take on specific players. Like you can put your strongest centreback to follow and stop anything coming from CR7, so you can have a better chance of winning without CR7 being there, and your player emptying his pocket finding Ronaldo furious there as he could not get anywhere near the box to attack. If you have any suggestions based on this idea then feel free to comment :)

Hello guys, i'm searchin' for a good tactic for "Die Fohlen". I've invested many time too find a good tactic, but i cannot find even a acceptable tactic for them: What's my problem?: Me and the directors want to play a possession oriented system. Before matches my team is very often the favorite (even against Bayer 04 or Schalke). So far so good. But when i'm playing my sytems i've created don't work. Every time i get counter-goals or goals after crosses. Also I've the feeling that my possession don't bring much chances. You can find my current sytem below, i decided to try the vertical tiki taka, because i hadn't success with Gegenpress, possession control or a custom style. I can imagine that my opposition instructions are too bad, too. (The average rating is that high, because a high win in the dfb-pokal) Please help me. I'm very desperate. I've invested more then 20hrs with analysis etc but i don't find the right system.

Hello First, i got very unusual fixture on 2022 adding pictures. Second, after moving players on tactical board player list mixing up. Hope can understand what i mean.

I want to recreate these three tactics from the 07/08 season, but I struggle with tactical knowledge so I need some help. Tactical analysis Cheers! P.S. If someone has created all three of the tactics, a link is appreciated

Not interested in your formation or the style of tactic, you can add in post if you want, but due to so many problems in the beta topic regarding injuries/goals/crossing/set pieces etc, none of which I experienced bar the odd blip, I'm wondering what people are going for. My first game I tried the prebuilds with a few tweaks but couldn't seem to get it clicking how I wanted, now on my second save have built my own and I am much happier with how it seems to be performing. EDIT: if you are someone who has had specific issues in game could you say what issues you have and how you voted, for my curiosity please. Poll closes midnight 2/11/19.

Hello guys, so I have been using a tactic by Eusebio which I downloaded fmscout website. The attack has been quite reliable but defense keeps me quite disappointed as I have to struggle in matches even where I scored 4-5 goals or even suffer defeat Here is my tactic: And here are the instructions : Please suggest the changes so that my defense can also become reliable. Thanks !

SICARIO BRAZIL SAMBA 4222 (Beta) Sicario Brazil Samba 4222 is a recreation of Tele Santana’s 1982 Brazil squad which played beautiful fun and free football style known as Samba. Please note that the below tactic file is still in beta stage will re-upload a more stable version and screenshots after few test runs. DOWNLOAD TACTIC FILE brazil samba.fmf

Hey guys I have tried a lot of tactics with my Stoke team and nothing have worked for me so far. Can anyone tell/give my a good tactic for my Stoke team, I play with 3-5 others every Monday and have stayed clear of relegation, we are in 2020(i think) and started the game from day one. This i my Team GK: J. Butland, P. Rajkovic, A. Nübel DR: N. Clyne, B. San Emeterio DC: ST. Juste, C. Chambers, T. Matos, H. Delcroix DL: L. Pellegrini DMC, CM, Cam: J. M. Seri, M. Pasalic, N. Mendy, D. Amartey, K. Palmer, M. Braitewaite LW/RW: C. Under ST: Paulinho, W. Geubbels, L. Martinez, F. Arp Can you help?

I was wondering what is the best midfield role for a 433? I am playing Roaming Mid - Deep Lying (D) - Roaming Mid in a 3 midfield system. Instructions are central passing + work into box @ control mentality # Forwards are 2 IF & 1 CF - all support

My Formation (Manchester United) ---------------------AF (A)------------------- ---IF (S) --------------------------- IF (S)--- -------------RPM (S) --- DLP (D)--------- --------------------RGA (S)------------------ FB (A) --- CD (D) --- CD (D) --- FB (A) Can someone advise what is the potential risk I am facing with this system? I am using Season1 Manchester United squad. Facing issue to get goals...like 0

Hello there. I have recently got back into Football manager being playing since FM14. Started a save with BCFC as I support them IRL (we just survived relegation today KRO), and well I am starting to get very frustrated with the results. I am 3rd currently, coming of a 1-0 defeat to Fulham. I have attached some screenshots giving some context to the situation. I guess you could say I have been overachieving looking at the squad depth, I have had a lot of injuries to key players (Grounds, Maghoma). Formation: When I am at home against a team that isn't in the playoffs/playing well, I tend to opt for a 4-4-2. When away, I always tend to play with the 4-4-1-1 (shown in the attachment). I have made subtle changes to player roles/instructions in recent games to see if I can change my luck. For example, originally I had the left centre midfielder playing as a BWM, I have now changed to a centre mid on the defend duty. Looking at the below tactic, you can see a couple of players out of position, this is down to the injuries I mentioned earlier which have been a massive hit on the formations I play. Team Instructions: Again I have made subtle changes to the team instructions once again. Brought in the clear the ball to flanks. The idea behind this is to use the pace of the wingers to get forward quickly to then allow more crosses into the target man. I am indeed playing narrower. Trying to ensure that it is harder for us to be broken down in the middle along with sticking to positions because we don't have the best creative players meaning we lack creativity in the final third. Team Report: Team report is useful here aswell, shows me that we have conceded a lot from crosses due to the high amount of assists from these areas. Furthermore we have one of the worst passing stats in the league. To be third in the league is good, but I feel us slipping off now with some poor results to Wolves and Middlesborough where we should've done better. If anyone could give me some advice it would be greatly appreciated. I haven't messed around with FM18 too much but it feels the same as the previous versions in terms of form being linked a lot to morale and the tactics you deploy. I don't see any glaringly obvious things that should be changed and ideally don't want to change tactics either. We have high determination overall in the squad along with teamwork, maybe I should try a higher pressing game where we look to go more direct with our play? Thanks in advance !!!

I’ve read that the games descriptions of mentality and team shape are poorly written. For example that Counter is actually a better mentality for control than control. Is there a thread on here that translates things from the tactical screen, and offers shared observations about instructions, individual instructions, roles etc? I’m quite hungry to expand my playing styles in different careers, as well as learn how to make tactical changes based on the ME and not using real life logic and staring at misunderstood instruction definitions. Also ive seen people make comments such as “the recommended attributes for a position are guidelines only, if you employ a trequarista with strength, stamina and pace you have a completely different animal” Id love to find a thread dedicated to translating and brainstorming player roles also, as I feel there is more to the game than the misleading face value in game descriptions. I have favourite player roles but would like to understand them all.

I keep reading on here that counter mentality doesn’t mean counter and control doesn’t mean control, and that fluid and structured isn’t what some people think it is. and that the existing descriptions for instructions don’t make total sense to what they actually do. Can anyone discuss or point to something to read up on better interperetations of the settings so I can revise my FM understanding. I feel as though approaching the game with real life football logic can sometimes not work how you expect it to so there might be an advantage to learning what each setting really does.

This season, I’ve been really taken with Real Betis and their attempts to play attacking football that utilises the technical abilities of their players. Setien is a maverick, a man who has stated his sole purpose is to produce produce entertaining football and score goals, even at the expense of getting results. A man who has said he is left cold by modern football, he is a purist, a man who idolises Johann Cruyff and Luis Aragones. His Betis side, at times have played football at least comparable to anything produced by Guardiola’s City and Sarri’s Napoli. Here’s a video from Tifo, attempting to explain the principles behind the thinking of their manager Quique Setien. It is important to note that Betis have moved away from that 4-1-2-2-1 formation now, and are playing a 3-5-1-1 or 3-4-2-1, which is what i’m aiming to create with Inter Milan in my first season. The move to the back 3 has massively improved Betis’s defensive performance, and enabled them to push on and challenge for a European place. Tactics is available for subscription from Steam Workshop here. Please see opposition instructions below for the tactic. Blog post for this tactic available at https://footballmanager2017dotblog.wordpress.com/2018/04/09/quique-setiens-3-5-1-1-possession-based-tactic-title-italian-cup-in-first-season/ Inter are a good team to try this with, because in Perisic, Valero, Brozovic, Skriniar, and Icardi they have some players who have good technique. Rafinha is also there on loan for the first season, and they have a lot of talented young players. Their current U20 team is arguably the best in Europe right now. All in all, a great team to start FM18 with. The Formation Betis play either a 3-4-2-1 or a 3-5-1-1 which I will use for this tactic, given the player’s I’ve got at Inter in the first season. To recreate this tactic in FM, I’ve used a DLF-Su to essentially recreate the Boudebouz position. This is because at Inter, you’ve got Icardi, Pinamonti, and I signed Martinez as they have in real life, none of which are adept at playing in the AM role. But obviously if you had the players to do it, then the AM-A can work quite well. Occasionally, i’ll drop the DLF-Su into an AM-A if i’m playing Franco Vazquez there, and he feeds the AF-A quite nicely. To play as Betis do, as you can see I’ve signed ball playing centre-backs with good first touch, composure, decisions, and passing. Given the high line it helps if the BPD-Co has good pace, and you don’t really want any CB’s who are slow. I have a better keeper, Rulli, although Handanovic is a world class stopper. I’ve also signed two new wing-backs, with good dribbling, crossing, first touch, composure, passing, and off the ball. You want your AF-A to have good pace, finishing and heading, and your DLF-Su to have good passing and vision as well as dribbling and off the ball. Central midfielders should all have the standard attributes for ball playing teams, e.g. passing, first touch, decisions, composure, technique, off the ball. I’m pretty happy with this team now, have some other unavailable players (Frenkie de Jong, and Carlos Soler in CM). Team Instructions Mentality I would say control is the best tactic to recreate Setien. Perhaps you might deem his tactics “attacking” in orientation, but we all know that Attacking is a VERY attacking orientation in FM. You can set up an attacking version of the same tactic, just for games in which you are losing, but attacking basically causes too many forward passes and the tempo to be far too quick, you’re going a bit too direct with it. Remember Setein cites Aragones as his major influence. BUT you do want to use pass into pass here, Setein I would say is a little more direct than the traditional tiki-taka ball retention styles of Spain in the early 2010s. I mean you could use attacking, slowing the the tempo and restricting width ticking off “pass into space”, you might get the same effect. Attacking also has the effect of intensifying the press and raising the defensive line. And yes, there are many ways to create the same style. This is just one. If you toggle between control and attack, you will see many things happen to the other instructions, it’s good to understand the linkages. Team Shape Having a fluid team shape does two things crucial to Setien’s style. Firstly, it raises the creative freedom of the players, and secondly, it ensures that Defenders and particularly full backs make attacking contributions, whilst attackers will contribute to the defensive phases also. Tempo Having a normal tempo was the best way I found to recreate the appropriate passing speeds. Setien does not rush things, but he is far from slow possession for possession-sakes passing we see at teams like Swansea. Having normal tempo allows a team full of good decision makers to make decisions about the speed of the game and make passes which are appropriate to the situation, as per Setien. If you create an attacking version of this tactic, the tempo will automatically rise. Width The wing-backs are an important feature of Setien’s betis in this 3 at the back system, therefore it’s important I think to get a balanced approach here. Possession based control tactics can function better playing with less width, especially with 3 CM’s and 2 strikers, but I think if you have two good wing-backs you gain fidelity to Setien by using balanced. If you’ve got an AF-A with good heading, you’ll score a few from crosses also, and get some nice triangles with the CBs, CM’s and WB’s. Defensive Line & Offside Trap Highest line you can have with control is slightly higher. If you use attacking you can go one higher. I wouldn’t say Betis use as high a line as Sarri, so perhaps slightly higher is OK, i’d like to go one notch higher though still. Again, offside trap should be ticked, although I wouldn’t say Setien is as obsessive as say, Saachi in his use of the offside trap. Would be nice to have different measures of offside trap, e.g. Aggressive, moderate, weak offside trap. Closing Down & Prevent GK distribution. Again, Betis do a lot of closing down and the attackers contribute to this. See the opposition instructions will help achieve the desired effect of closing down in the opposition defensive areas and attacking wide areas. If you use attacking, you can go one notch more aggressive in your press. Note, you need to have players with high team work and work rate to execute pressing properly, if you don’t have these players it won’t work properly. Even 12’s are not good enough, hence I sold Icardi, Perisic, and Candreva second season. Use your pre-match sessions also to focus upon the pressing. GK distribution will help press the opposition back line, and you will recover a ball once or twice a game doing so, obviously tires your strikers out doing this, and you’ll need to keep an eye on their fitness. Get Stuck In I wouldn’t say this is a feature of Betis’s play, I just like to have it ticked. You could undo it if you wanted to, and you wouldn’t lose fidelity. Build Up play To get the Setien build up style, you’ll first need to ensure that the GK is playing the ball out to the central CB. This can be done in player instructions as follows. The use of sweeper keeper in FM is interesting, because you can’t have a sweeper keeper who plays no risky passes, so arguable a Goalkeeper will give you better fidelity in the playing sense. Although there are times that you can get caught out when your CB’s are high, and the GK is too withdrawn. But if you use a Sweeper keeper, you will find him playing too many long passes, like Ederson does for Man City. It’s a trade off I guess. The other features of build up are obviously, play out from the back, with shorter passing and retain possession ticked. I’ve ticked pass into space, just so that we get the verticality we see with Setien’s style. I’ve ticked more expressive as Setien does like his teams to entertain, and has even said he prioritises entertainment over results, we want to maximise flair for sure. Attacking In terms of our attacks, obviously we want to work the ball into the box. I’m not sure if overlap does anything when you are not playing wingers, but it might help the wing-backs overlap the wide CM’s possibly, so I’ve left it ticked. Again, we want to see fluid and creative movements from our players, so I’ve ticked roam from positions. Opposition Instructions Purpose of these instructions is to recreate the tight closing down on opposition defenders and deeper midfielders, and the pressing of wide players. Players are also either to be shown inside, or pushed onto their weaker feet. All players are to be greeted with aggressive tackling. Training I would argue that general training on Team Cohesion at High Intensity should be done until you get to Very Good Match cohesion. At this point, you can then switch to a mix of attacking, tactical and ball control training, which will develop the attributes needed to play this tactic. Player training will be by their roles, and firstly focus upon compsure for defenders, off the ball for midfielders and strikers, at whatever intensity level you can get them to train before they start moaning. ALSO GET GOOD COACHES IN ON THE FIRST DAY YOU ARRIVE THERE. Five star coaches are easy to find, just go into staff search and select filter, and click on attributes, and select motivation, determination and level of discipline at 15, and click match 2 from 3. Then you need a coach that has a sum of 60 across four attributes; (i) for the thing you want him to coach, e.g. attacking, (ii) motivation, (iii) determination, and (iv) level of discipline. So you could have 20 for attacking coaching, 20 for motivation, and 19 for determination, and 1 for discipline, he’d be a 4 star coach. Also always ask your board for extra coaches, so you can get the workload down ASAP. Check this every month or so, to keep getting more. I’ve got like 15 now at Inter in two years, we started on nine. Also once you’ve won a fair few games, say, around Xmas, ask them to improve the training facilities. If you’re like me, and focus upon young talent, the training facilities have to be very strong, or you won’t improve the players quick enough to justify selecting them over established players. Use tutoring also, select older players over 25, with outstanding mental attributes, and try to tutor every youngster at the club at least once. Determination is one attribute that get’s passed on well in training, so use highly determined players to develop less determined youngsters PPM’s All CB’s Brings ball out from the back Tries long range passes (if good passing stats) Switches ball to the other flank Runs forward with ball often (if good dribbling) Both WB’s Gets forward whenever possible Plays one-Twos Runs with ball down their flank (if good dribbling) or Knocks ball past opponent (if good pace but poor dribbling) DLP-D Comes deep to get ball Stays back at all times Dictates tempo Plays simple short passes DLP-S Comes deep to get ball Dictates tempo Plays one-twos Tries long range passes & switches ball to other flank & tries killer passes (if good passing /. vision) or shoots from distance (if good long shots) CM-A Arrives late in opposition area Plays one-twos Tries Killer Balls DLF-Su Drops deep to get ball Dictates tempo Runs with ball often Tries Killer Balls Plays one-twos AF-A Beats the offside trap Plays one-twos Tries first time shots

Hey guys,I'm looking for a Feyenoord tactic with a special note:I'm looking to recreate a tactic like this:Hipster Guide 2016-17: Feyenoord's tactics, key players and emerging talents • Outside of the BootHere you see that when Feyenoord is in possession they are a 4-3-3, but in defense they are a 4-4-2 basically. My question is how to recreate this in football manager 2018. I attached my tactics that i have at the moment. Any help would be appreciated!Thanks in advance,Dennis

Vitória has won 2 league titles in 2 seasons in Benfica. In this thread I will take a look at Rui Vitória's stint in benfica. He took the job after Jorge Jesus left for city rivals Sporting. In the past season, he was won 2 league titles, 1 cup, and 1 supercup. This season things started on a weak note, after a summer of selling some of the best players and a questionable board policy of not investing in the squad. At the beginning, Vitória opted to keep the base of the 4-4-2 that JJ developed, and that led Benfica to 3 league titles in 6 seasons. However this season, RV has changed to a more balanced 4-3-3 that does not depend so much on the midfielders' quality, and spreads the workload of the game more equally among the team. http://outsideoftheboot.com/2017/09/05/jorge-jesus-v-rui-vitoria/ https://www.lateralesquerdo.com/2017/01/18/o-benfica-de-rui-vitoria-uma-equipa-digna-de-sacchi/ http://euvistodevermelhoebranco.blogs.sapo.pt/o-4-4-2-de-rui-vitoria-2501 https://community.sigames.com/topic/373361-arrigo-sacchis-4-4-2-very-fluid/ RV's 4-3-3 can be described as a tactic that focuses on putting intense pressure to win the ball, movement and roaming with the ball to create space, and overlaps on the flanks and in the middle. The following is the base XI with the main substitutes: To replicate this style of play in FM we need to establish some main points: IRL, the tactic still relies heavily on individual quality to produce the best results; RV has often chose to adopt a different, more cautious, strategy against bigger teams; if missing some key players, the team changes some of its principles (e.g. Jonas, Pizzi, Fejsa). With this said, let's try to transpose these ideas into the game: Team shape: Very fluid - the team is allowed a considerable amount of creative freedom, and plays with little space between sectors. Mentality: Standard - a very fluid shape gives your entire team the same, or very similar mentalities. That explains why very fluid makes your team compact, and attack and defend as a unit. Very Fluid shape with Standard mentality offers synergy due to it's balance. The entire team attacks and defends as a unit. I had initially thought about a more balanced approach of Fluid/Control, but RV bases a lot of his strategy on Sacchi's principles, so this combination seems more logical. Team instructions: play wider, much higher defensive line, use offside trap, close down more, prevent short gk distribution, play from defense. This creates a base for the Sacchi/Vitória hybrid, which used the same principles but does not take them to such an extreme level, especially regarding pressing. Regarding player roles: GK: Sweeper keeper (defend) - if Ederson was still here, possibly a support/attack duty could be selected, but Varela is not the best sweeper so there's the need to keep his demands limited. RB: Wing back (support) - Almeida has always been more versed in his defensive duties than attacking, although he still tries to contribute as much as possible in attack, despite his limitations in crossing and dribbling. CBs: Central defender (defend) - the Dias/Jardel partnership is by far the best to put to use Benfica's very high defensive line. They are both pacy players who can control the space behind them. LB: Wing back (attack) - Grimaldo, unlike Almeida, is an attack-minded player and some of his best skills are his runs forward, finishing with great crosses, through balls, and combinations with the winger and the striker. DM: Defensive midfielder (defend) - Fejsa is absolutely key to guarantee balance and he is responsible for closing gaps in the midfield and in defense. MCR: Central midfielder (attack) - Pizzi is a player who likes to score and assist, he always looks to make runs to the box to occupy the space Jonas opens. MCL: Advanced playmaker (support) - the nickname 'Krovimodric' is perhaps a bit too much, but he really is the brain that makes the entire team click. AMR: Winger (attack) - Salvio is a classic pacy winger who likes (sometimes too much) to go 1v1 and to a cross in the byline. AML: Winger (support) - Cervi is a more refined player than Salvio, so he tries to mix a tad more of one-twos and through balls than always looking for the cross or the shot on goal. ST: False nine (support) - Jonas is a king in the portuguese league. With his technique and movement he tears apart entire defenses, always being in the right positions and opening spaces for his teammates. Some of the substitutes are given different roles to best suit their attributes. The most common cases are: Samaris: Ball winning midfielder (defend) - can play DM and CM João Carvalho: Advanced playmaker (attack) Zivkovic: Advanced playmaker (attack), Inside forward (support) - can play CM and AM Rafa: Inside forward (support) Jiménez: Defensive forward (support)

Lately I've been reading a lot about Magic Magyars Golden Team and started fantasizing about recreating their formation with a strong team such as Barcelona. I'm just afraid that playing with one centerback and halfback will leave me too exposed in back even with 2 fullbacks that always stay back. My idea of choosing Barcelona would be just to experiment if I can outscore my opponents with my two wingers, two inside forwards and Messi as central false9 or trequartista, Magyar style. Any thoughts on how to faithfully recreate this system? Is WW formation viable in the game?

Hey guys, in case you are a more experienced player of the game and you're doing fairly well with FM unlike me for the most recent years, please post your suggestions below if you have any to make this work. So the type of playing style I like a lot especially for mid- to low-level underdog teams is to play more devensive when expecting to not control the game, then shifting to immediate counter when retaining possession. I do like players to close down more and press a lot (as much as possible) but I do not know if this goes together with the idea of being an underdog-team. What type of player roles and overall set of settings would you recommend for such a tactic? What is the best formation to play like this? 4-4-2, 4-3-3, 4-5-1? If you'd like to go after an example, you can pick a team like Swansea or Nottingham.