Experienced FM'ers _ Your help is needed!

[josh381991]

Hi All,

 

Really hoping some of you can help solve my misery !!!

 

I am playing as leicester city and started off with some really good matches for my first 10 games or so and after this is kind off all went to pot and now entering my 2nd season i seem to be struggling to get that right team balance.

 

I am Playing the following formation - No individual player instructions

 

GK - Zeiler 

FB (A) Fuchs

CB Jones

BPD Vallejo

FB (A) Coleman

DM (D) Amarty

CM (S) James

AP (A) Hamsik

IF (A) Mahrez

IF (A) Lingard

DF (S) Cordoba

 

My plan was to have the 2 IF's rushing upwards an inwards to create a front 3 with the FB's becoming wingers in attacking movements with my AP controlling the play and pulling the strings.

In defensive moves i want the DM to create a back 3 with the FB's sitting slightly higher to break wing attacks.

 

Currently i have instructions set as follows - Structured & Fluid

Tempo - Normal

Fairly Narrow Play

Normal Defensive Line

Use offside trap

Stay on Feet

Play out of defence

Retain possesion

Look for overlap

run at defence

 

I seem to have a lack of possession and conceded a lot of goals from close play.

 

Is anyone able to tell me where i am going wrong or give me any pointers to improve.

 

Thanks in advance and sorry if this should be in the Tactics forum but i got no responses there

 

 

 

 

[rinso]

I'm by no means a tactical genius, or anything like... but.. does seem to me there's an awful lot of players with attacking mentality. If I'm reading it right, there's 5? So basically half of your outfield players are on attack duty. 

I play an asymmetric 4231 formation, with a dm and mc, but never have more than 3 players on attack duty... 

edit: my overall team structure is attacking, counter pressing, very fluid, and higher tempo

[herne79]

I'll move this back to the tactics forum (probably the reason you didn't get a response before was that you only included a tactic for download rather than posting it as you have done here).

In the mean time, apart from your two central defenders, who is defending?  And you have zero midfield defensive cover from both your role/duty selection and the players you have put in midfield.  Overall there's no real balance to your team.

[josh381991]

Sorry Herne79 I think I was rushing previously.

 

im stuck at the best way to balance my team, if I change my fb's will I loose there sprints forward ? 

 

Would it it be an idea to change my cm ? 

 

Thanks

[herne79]

Sorry, had a brain fart yesterday.  Thought you were playing a 4231, my mistake.

Your DM will be offering the defensive cover, it's your flanks that are very attacking and you may also have an issue with a lack of a runner from midfield along with potentially little variety in attack.  However, if it's defensive issues you are having I'd start by looking at your fullbacks and DM to make sure they are taking up the positions that you want.

[westy8chimp]

13 hours ago, josh381991 said:

My plan was to have the 2 IF's rushing upwards an inwards to create a front 3 with the FB's becoming wingers in attacking movements

they wont 'rush' forward.. you are on standard, normal tempo, retain possession & looking for overlap... all of which will detract from the IF involvement

13 hours ago, josh381991 said:

IF (A) Mahrez

IF (A) Lingard

with FBs behind them also on attack it's a bit much. IFs on support with the marauding FBs can work well. The overlap would be natural and the shout not really needed as that will just slow the attacks down at times when FBs haven't gone forward with the ball.

[josh381991]

Thanks for all of your replys, I have done a bit on tinkering and seem to be doing okay with the below but still conceding a high amount.

 

GK(D) - Zeiler

R FB (A) Coleman ( Cross From Deep + Cross Aim Centre )

CB (D) Vallejo

CB (D) Jones

L FB (A) Fuchs ( Cross From Deep + Cross Aim Centre )

DM BWM (D) Amartey

CM AP (A) Hamsik ( Roam From Position )

CM BBM (S) King

R IF (A) Mahrez ( Sit Narrower )

L IF (S) Lingard

ST DF (D) Cordoba ( Shoot More Often )

 

Team Tactics - Standard - Fluid

Higher Tempo

Slightly Higher defensive line

Play out of defence

Retain Possession

Run at Defence

 

Any improvements guys ?

 

 

[Jorsin]

It would partly depend on what types of goals you are conceding - e.g. if you are finding a lot of balls played through the middle / over the top and your CBs getting beaten for pace, you may want to drop your d-line to normal. 

A couple of things that may help:

1) Your FB both cross from deep, so there is less need for them to advance far enough to overlap. It may be worth changing to a support role - either FB or WB. I find I still get plenty of assists with WB(s) but has less chance of being caught out of position.

2) Your BWM is going to hunt down the ball and will offer less protection for your CBs (which will already be stretched because of your attacking FBs). This may (and someone please shout out if I'm wrong) be amplified by the fact that both of your CMs will be roaming (BBM being hard-coded). This leaves you open to the possibility of having both out of position when you lose possession and your BWM being dragged to the side and allowing runners a straight shot at your defence. Personally, I would use a simple DM(d) as they close down a little less. He is more likely to sit in front of your defence and you can then use your CMs for more attacking purposes. Alternatively, have one of the CMs keep position a little more - possibly a DLP(s).

 

However, it really depends on what types of goals you are most vulnerable to - that way you know what your main weakness is. 

[josh381991]

Hi Jorsin and thanks for your reply,

 

In my last 4 games i have conceded 6 goals but scored 9.

 

1 was a straight cross across the goal mouth and tapped in ahead of my defender

2 Where headers from set plays

1 started with a play down the wing where my defender did not close down resulting in a cleared cross to a opposition player who played the ball thru the defence , hit the crossbar and the rebound put in the net

1 goal over 3 defenders who headed it back and there forward locked onto it no one else reacted and scored.

1 goal bad header back to the keeper who spilled it and then a forward hit the rebound into the net.

 

I can't see a pattern just a lot ! looking at the heat maps of the games i have possession in the area between the centre circle and opposition penalty box across the width of this area in high red where as the opposition have possession in the same area in my half but not as heavy.

 

As suggested i have changed my DM to a DM and set my defensive line to standard to see how this goes.

 

[Ji-Sung Park]

Remember that your two IFs will still get plenty of chances to score even if they are on supporting duty. My experience with having those two on attack is that they will make a lot of rushed plays of they don't have options.

Your DM, who is set as a BWM, will close down a lot and as such will be drawn out of position a ton, leaving your two CDs exposed.

[josh381991]

Thanks for your input Ji-Sung Park ( United Legend ! ) 

 

The screenshot below shows the tactics currently which are still conceding many goals ( uploads Available if wanted ) I have changed the FB(A) to FB (S) to see if this helps the wing attacks so only a few games will tell !

 

 

 

[herne79]

Changing fullbacks from an attack duty to a support duty won't necessarily help you concede fewer goals, as you are finding out.

By way of an example I currently use a 442 narrow diamond with 2 attack duty fullbacks and concede a very low amount of goals.

Things to consider:

Do your players have the right attributes for the roles you want them to perform?

Is your midfield sufficiently controlling the game, especially in the defensive phase?  Are your midfielders taking up the right positions?

Are you getting caught in possession in dangerous positions?