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The Attacking Midfielder.


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Hi guys.

I have a couple questions concerning the attacking midfielder since it's one of the positions I would love to have in my tactic but never quite got the player in this position to be effective in any way.

Usually in todays tactics the AM has a lot of freedom to move around the pitch getting on the wings or making a run from deep if the striker drops down.

Essentially an AM tries to create an and overweight on the wings or tries to exploit space that other players create through roaming from position.

But my problem is I never get my AM to behave like this even with max "creative freedom", "roam from position" and "move into channels".

I tried to get him on the wings with "hug touchline" but that didn't work either.

I tried to get my striker to drop deep so my AM could run past him and get a lay off ball from the striker or a good pass into space from midfield or the wingers but that worked only once in a while and never really produced anything notable.

The major problem seams to be that roaming for the AM seams to only work in the way that he either drops deep or gets up higher on the pitch where he most of the time bumps into my striker.

Striker and AM seam to constantly stand in each others way and not profit from the space created by the other.

So my question would be how do utilize your AM successfully in order to work in a lone striker formation like the 4-2-3-1?

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So my question would be how do utilize your AM successfully in order to work in a lone striker formation like the 4-2-3-1?

Hi, I use an AMC in a 4-2-3-1 wide formation, the two wide midfielders are playing as inside forwards, with the lone striker on support duty.

Now at the moment i have my AMC on Trequartista attack role and depending on who i use there i have different styles of play.

I have an creative AMC who has lots of flair an good technique + he has good awereness, so he seeks the channels and moves into good positions to revceive the ball.

When I use my other AMC, who´s more of a striker esque, he plays more straightforward and more centrally. He Maybe plays 1-2 with my forward and gets in to the box more often than the creative one does.

I guess it all boils down to how you use your wide midfielders. I f they are cutting in that leaves the AMC space to run in to, but if they stay wide and you have instructed your AMC to run in to channels, there really no where to run on that flank.

One way to get your winger and AMC to play more together would be to instruct your winger/inside forward to not run with the ball often, that way he would be more inclined to pass the ball when the opponent comes to close him down.

It would make it easier to help you, if you told how you have set up your wide midfielders and your central midfielders.

One thing to keep in mind though is that players don´t make runs in the channels if the channels are already being occupied by a teammate, you have to create the space first.

Hope that helps, or at least got you thinking about the roles of the other players around the AMC and not just focus solely on the AMC not making runs.

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Another idea is the Ajax method of using your attacking midfielder. Use the AML/AMR as wide players with attack duty, preferably comfortable as wingers. Use your striker as an advanced striker - attack. These three players stretch the field which should open up lots of space. Also have a deep lying playmaker behind the AMC to force the opposition's midfield to open up even more. Then, use the AMC as an attacking midfielder - support. He should be getting a lot of space between the lines, and getting the ball there also means one of the CB's needs to get out of his position to get the ball, which gives room for the striker to run into.

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Hey guys.

Thanks for the tips the inside forward method really seams to work at least it makes the AM sometimes move onto the wings sometimes but only after the winger cuts inside which wasn't exactly my plan since I wanted to create an overweight on one wing so the opposition had to shift their defense to that side and free up the space for the other winger.

But it works reasonably well because the opposition defense be to good at handling roaming players at all.

Now the only thing that I need to get working is my CMs helping out the defense some more after the ball actually passes the midfield.

Strangly enough I tried the settings of my 4-5-1 where the CMs and the DM all helped out very nicely in defense but somehow they won't do it without an DMC behind them but overall it looks great so far.

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Hey guys.

Now the only thing that I need to get working is my CMs helping out the defense some more after the ball actually passes the midfield.

Strangly enough I tried the settings of my 4-5-1 where the CMs and the DM all helped out very nicely in defense but somehow they won't do it without an DMC behind them but overall it looks great so far.

I usually set my midfield as ball winning midfielder defend and Deep playing midfielder support that way they run forward rarely and stay in the midfield.

If you see the opponent is having too much space between your defence and midfield, you could consider pushing your d-line up via shouts and that way you narrow the gap.

I also see 4-2-3-1 as a high closing down tactic so the defensive work starts high upfield. Therefore I use the team setting ´close down more´ thus forcing the opposition to play longer ´cleared´ balls upfield wich my rather biggish backline have less trouble with, than facing an opponent with ball passed at his feet running towards them.

There´s many ways to play this formation though and this is how I usually set it up. Key players to this formation in my opinion is the 2 midfield holding players.

Thanks

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