Analysing the 4-2-3-1: Why Your Playmaker Should Be Upfront.

[Flohrinho]

he is playing against Juventus, Rooney has played up front irl but like every one else was forced to play with back to goal, no good defender would let you turn, they certainly wouldn't give such space.

i'm reading people using Ozil too in that position, at least Rooney is strong, Ozil would be useless as he is much weaker.

this only happens because of weaknesses in the me.

You obviously totally fail to grasp the concept of a false 9.

If you play and intelligent playmaker type of up front it's key to let him drop deep move into space out wide or into an AM position this way creating an overweight where ever he pops up and creating space if a defender follows him. This way he rarely face the goal with his back or is isolated so I really don't see why you think this is such a ridiculous idea playing your playmaker up front?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2009/oct/27/the-question-false-nines-jonathan-wilson

This is btw a very good article about the concept of a false 9 or fake striker and which teams used it to great effect.

[Ville Valo]

If you really want a irl example, take a look sometime at van Persie and Messi, to just name two.

Messi is the ideal example, given that this system's based from the likes of David Villa and Iniesta's wide play.

[Mike_Cardinal]

I suppose that if a side is playing a DM or two, then the AM is going to have problems creating through the centre. Personally, I just give mine instructions to roam and move out wide, so that he can find space, and hope that with wingers who occasionally come inside and DMs who charge forwards needing to be picked up, enough space is made for him to create. Another, perhaps better, solution would be to stick the playmaker up front, but as I said before, I'm curious as to what purpose the AM should then fulfil in the team.

[Bluebeard]

I'm annoyed that I just sold Henrique/Ganso before I read this! He was doing nothing at MC/AMC despite great stats.

However, my 4-2-3-1 asymmetric doesn't have the playmaker up-front. I rotate three strikers who are respectively a hard-working, pacy deep-lying forward, a target man and a clinical poacher/advanced forward. My AMC tends to be another pacy, clinical type. The majority of my assists come from AML inside forward. I actually regard my MC as my playmaker though, as he (while not assisting much) is the 'metronome' of the side, mopping up second balls, collecting from the defence and constantly recycling and probing. Either way, anything wrong with this approach? Or does is just reflect their inherent attributes and intelligence (which is why I set the team up as I do)?

[mikewalker]

Isn't it pretty easy to slot loads with any international quality player up front if you're Manchester Utd? Genuine question, I've never tried playing as them.

Surely this Juame cat deserves a run up front (looking at his stats etc from another thread) maybe Ozil's just not a 'Man Utd' player and its time to move him on.

[Ville Valo]

Isn't it pretty easy to slot loads with any international quality player up front if you're Manchester Utd? Genuine question, I've never tried playing as them.

It's more about the style of football, rather than scoring loads of goals. I figure.

A playmaker of Ozil's quality would maximize the #9 coming in from the wing, by providing key passes, and dropping into space. Juame is more of a pure poacher, who will latch onto the shoulder of a defender. In the Torres mould.

btw SFraser, have you tried playing with an even 'purer' #9 than Aguero? I have had great success using Daniel Welbeck in a similar fashion to your footballing style. Perhaps, if Ozil's a success up top, Juame could be developed for this role?

[SFraser]

Bloody hell, never saw that coming.

Neither did I

But the list of potential transfers, my shortlist and scout recommendations were so poor that in my annual hunt to improve my squad I had to look within.

my idea was Goalscoring Number 8's, reckon Rooney will play that? Are you going to make any changes to your Midfield to compensate?

My idea was dribbly AMC's, the traditional 11 played in the hole behind Rooney but that hasn't panned out so well. The only reason I am thinking of Ozil upfront is because I am thinking of Rooney in the hole. Rooney solidifies my midfield in a way no other player does, and he also links up exceptionally well in that role. He doesn't have the absolute creativity of some other players but his Determination/Workrate/Teamwork/Creativity means he is an acceptionally good link-up man. Unfortunately his accuracy isn't good enough to get the most out of Jaume.

Playing Rooney in the hole will automatically change my midfield due to Rooney playing in the hole. You know my philosophy of attributes being king. It's an obvious philosophy, a basic philosophy, but one that is very often forgotten and one I have re-learned to a high degree. Dropping Rooney will change my midfield (hopefully for the better as I previously struggled with involvement for my AMC's) and so changing the FC to compensate is only logical.

I'm basicly just swapping Rooney and Ozil from their normal positions of FC and AMC to AMC and FC to see if it works. It's not really that profound and epic, it's more subtle than anything else, but it's an interesting idea.

I've added all the info to the 2nd post down SFraser for you

Appreciate that. Thanks Cleon.

I've been playing Eden Hazard and VDV upfront on my Spurs game because Defoe got injured for several months and I had no other back up. It was the best move I have done. The link up play between Bale from the AML, Lennon from the AMR and whoever I play as the AMC is awesome when one of them 2 is upfront. The speed of play and the precision at which we cut open defences is scary. I actually score a lot more this way than when Defoe plays.

Arsenal have Hazard in my game and he is an absolute nightmare to defend against. I hate that lad with a passion.

And the reasons why I hate playing against Hazard when he plays wide left for Arsenal pretty much sum up the point of this thread. His finishing isn't great, his movement is impressive but not world shattering, but his overall ability to really worry and disturb defenders and mess people up and then find a clever ball after all his trickery and skill is utterly brutal.

I don't worry about Hazard scoring goals when I play against him, I worry about Hazard chewing up my backline and then playing someone else in to score. Like Theo Walcott sneaking in at the back post as my defence gets sucked into the middle.

I would hate to face him through the middle. He knows how to tie defenders up in knots and then exploit those gaps. Playing against him when he is left wing is bad enough.

I signed this beast recently for the United Right Fullback position:

But Hazard tears him up. I like this right back as well. He might not get high ratings but when I watch him in my team he is excellent. Gives away a few fouls though.

yea cause in real life the defenders would let Rooney turn and face the goal like that, and give him the space and time to play though balls, what a ridiculous thread, and a silly tactical idea, Roma tried it with Totti and it really took Totti out of the game as he never had the options he would have playing behind the strikers. if you put a "play-maker" up front he will spend 89 minutes with his back to the goal.

Roma didn't play with strikers on the wings, I do.

The point isn't really about Juventus' defence, it's more about how quickly and how well Rooney exploited the space. The Juve defence didn't have three and a half hours to study these screenshots, this happened over the course of a few seconds in an entire match.

I didn't instruct Rooney to peel off Sissoko and stand ten yards infront of the Juventus centrebacks. I told Rooney to play with a lower Mentality and to Roam from Position. Juventus look like they are playing a high closing down Midfield as you would do in a diamond, with a Zonal Marking and deep back four. I didn't set that up. I didn't tell the clogged midfield to press like mad while the back four mops up.

And it certainly wasn't me that played a 20 workrate DM. I would rather keep that level of endeavour for my AMC, who I already described as having high workrate and the job of running from AMC to Striker position.

I don't think Juve's defence was poor, I just think Rooney's movement was better than it. We can look for flaws in the ME all day long but for this game to be realistic at any degree then sometimes a great off the ball mover is going to have to find space against good defences. If all defending was perfect FM wouldn't be football.

How would one go about this other than commenting on poor performances and poor training?

Mentor him with a better player. I'm mentoring the 26 year old Ozil with the 26 year old Aguero. It seems age doesn't matter. This might be a bug but then Darren Fletcher and Michael Carrick and Dimitar Berbatov all seem keen to learn to learn from their peers. Berbatov seems quite taken with Rooney in real life.

Quite an interesting update SFraser! If that's the tactical direction you're going in, with Ozil up front, Rooney behind and Aguero on the left, what happens to Jaume? Do you still have a plan for him? I'm guessing he'll fill in for Rooney on occasion?

That's an excellent question.

The interesting thing about Jaume is that he is the complete opposite of the idea of playing your playmaker upfront. Jaume is just about the purest goalscorer I have ever seen.

If we ignore Rooney as the awesome-jack-of-all-trades that is still by far my first choice CF untill he starts to radically decline, and look only at Jaume and Ozil, then infact I have two completely different attacks. One where my CF is a creative genius and needs lots of "strikers" running from deep and another where my CF is a goalscoring God and needs lots of supply from deep.

Having a plan for Jaume in the longterm and being able to effectively use Jaume in the short term are not always the same thing. I have a rough idea for how I need to develop my team over the longterm but I have a clear view of how to set my team up to effectively support Jaume today.

Apart from Jaume my team is quite flexible. Ozil can play LW and AMC as well as me training him for CF. Aguero can play LW and AMC and CF. And so on. I have options, I can tinker, I can test, I can play around. A season is not only just about getting the maximum out of your squad now, but also about getting the maximum out of your squad now while you test out ideas for tomorrow.

Next season should be quite exciting for me, I have a lot of different things I can play with.

I suppose that if a side is playing a DM or two, then the AM is going to have problems creating through the centre. Personally, I just give mine instructions to roam and move out wide, so that he can find space, and hope that with wingers who occasionally come inside and DMs who charge forwards needing to be picked up, enough space is made for him to create. Another, perhaps better, solution would be to stick the playmaker up front, but as I said before, I'm curious as to what purpose the AM should then fulfil in the team.

That's a rather open question. I only used Shelvey at AMC three times this season and two of those were in the Champions League Semi Final against Juventus that I won 6-3 on aggregate.

My back six (two CM's and back four) are pretty much set in stone but my front four are a matter of taste. Particularly my choice of AMC has a significant impact on how the match pans out, a defensive AMC gives me defensive strength, a creative AMC gives me creativity and an attacking AMC gives me direct threat.

When I play Ozil upfront the role of my AMC is very likely to be get into the box and score goals, while battling up and down the pitch. When someone else is upfront the role for AMC will change. And when I say role I really mean player.

[volharding]

Thank you SFraser for starting this. It really helps me alot. I have a question about mentoring though. I often get a response of a player that he does not want to be mentored by another player. What can I do about that ? How do you deal with that ? Do all your players want to be mentored ?

[ham_aka_stam]

I've lately been doing something similar with Rooney. Only in the second season, but I found that with no real creative force in United's MF, Rooney's work-rate physicality and general roundedness should make him a very good player attacking from deep and playing others in.

I play a lop-sided formation as follows:

Berbatov and Hernandez upfront as a fairly standard partnership of creative forward and goal-scorer. Berba can roam, and drift wide if required. Hernandez stretches the backline towards their own goal, not only making space for Berba, but also:

Rooney at AMLC (behind Berbatov) also roams, but has run from deep on often, a high mentality to make this happen as soon as there's a sniff, but often throughballs, so that he'll play Hernandez in if he's in a better position.

On the right wing (RM) is Nani, Ideally he'd be further forward at AMR, but this unbalances the team a little, and I rely on Nani to be floating around on the right wing. He also has throughballs and run from deep often, to try to convince him to get rid of the ball when someone else is in a better positon. I also tell him to hug the touchline. This counters his natural tendancy to cut inside a bit, meaning he plays as a neutral winger, making decisions based on the fb's positioning.

Carrick and Fletcher marshal the deeper areas of midfield. Carrick more likely to play cutting through balls if and when he sees them, but Fletch more likely to win the ball higher up the pitch and lay it off quickly.

O'Shea is my defensive RB, told to be economical with the ball, and not to get forward unless necessary. Foiled by Evra on the left who bombs forward when my left wing is vacated, take the ball round someone and either play a pass across the edge of the box to Berba or cross it in for the running Rooney or Hernandez.

It was born out of a similar issue that SFraser has now, Berba was struggling to get himself involved at AM, even though he had all the space in the world, and when he did he was dallying on the ball as the two standard forwards were each marked by a FB.

Equally, Rooney was blasting too many shots either over or straight at the keeper, often ignoring his team-mates because of his PPMs or getting dragged too wide with his willingness to attack.

By dropping Rooney back I delay his attacks into the box for times when there's a gap, either caused by the stretching of Chicharito or the dropping of Berba. I see lovely one-twos from them all, and flick-ons from Berba, who now has two on-rushing targets to pick from. It also means that when Nani or Evra get in the position to cross, there are three players, all positioned differently, to aim for - useful because none of them are particularly prolific in the air.

I also recently have Ganso, who's not been performing too well. I bought him to take Rooney's place when needed, but reading this I feel he may be better in Berba's role, albeit a more active one.

[Guest nik1313]

Ok, i ll give it a go.

While playing 4-2-3-1 and countering...

...In this case actually, its more like(as shown in the image/sorry for the quality:p) having your AMC and ST coming deep to get the ball and the winger from the opposite flank moving to the direction of the first pass A1

So the most important thing is your's AMC and ST "smart passing" in order to deliver the pass to the winger from the opposite flank who moves into space and then cut inside to receive a through ball

Seems like when countering against teams with strong DMC, flanks are useless, and your team's AMC and ST have to own playmaker abilities in order to break the wall that creates the oppoment's DMC. Sissoco's poor desicion/flair?/of the ball? in the OP gave rooney the space he needed to shoot from distance.

nice thread

[Mike_Cardinal]

The first screenshot shows a narrow three man midfield no more than 20 yards apart if even that, that is shaped in such a way to push attacks away from the middle and down the flanks. The 4-3-3 would simply have these three midfielders in a line while the 4-1-2-3 would be shaped to channel attacks in to the centre from the wide areas.

Just something I've been thinking about - how is a 4-2-3-1 or 4-2-1-3 any better as a defensive shape for dealing with sustained pressure than the 4-3-3? Surely a flat line would force the opponent wide in just the same way, and if you had your midfield 3 sitting deep in a holding midfield position, in a similar way to Mourinho's Porto playing a counter attacking 4-3-1-2 away from home in the Champions League, would it not, in fact, be a stronger shape? If you are going to suggest that the strength comes from the triangle shape, then is it not conceivable that the best answer to the holy grail that is to defend with a 2-1 shape and attack with a 1-2 shape is to use a fluid, adaptable flat line? With no runs from deep, low mentality but very high closing down, the central player can be both your sitting player as you push forward and your highest midfield player when defending, whilst your other two midfielders shuttle back and forwards, supporting your attacks but, assuming they have the stamina for it, forming your defensive shield when you lose the ball.

[mikewalker]

SFraser, how is the Ozil-as-striker experiment faring?

[messi2009]

so you guys are basically saying play ganso as a striker?????????

[Ville Valo]

Did this ever work out for you SFraser? I saw you used Ozil of the bench as a striker in one of your 'Meet the System' pkms.

[SFraser]

Did this ever work out for you SFraser? I saw you used Ozil of the bench as a striker in one of your 'Meet the System' pkms.

Not as well as I hoped with Ozil. He works well as a playmaker but his Composure and Finishing is very low for the goalscoring positions he gets into.

It's a good option to have upfront though for when I play dual Inside Forwards.

[R0ca]

Not as well as I hoped with Ozil. He works well as a playmaker but his Composure and Finishing is very low for the goalscoring positions he gets into.

It's a good option to have upfront though for when I play dual Inside Forwards.

I imagine he'd be a immense creative outlet in a defensive counter attacking team, i could see him working well in FM term's supplying the bullets for a lone forward who has space to play in.