Player roles under different formations/strategies

[theratulz]

Hi there,

Is there any resource that thoroughly details different player roles based on formations or strategies? I'm looking for a complete resource or various partial resources to see how players in different positions operate under different player roles in different formations/strategies.

Example:

• A striker with "False 9" role does (movements, defensive duties etc.) X, Y, Z if he's playing in a 4-4-2 formation
• A winger with "defensive winger" role does (movements, defensive duties etc.) X, Y, Z if he's playing in a 4-1-4-1 formation in a team that's playing attacking, direct, high pressing football
• A defender with "limited defender" role does (movements, defensive duties etc.) X, Y, Z if he's playing in a 4-3-3 formation in a team that's playing control, short passing, creative football

Also, I would like to learn more about how a player operates in conjunction with other players in the team with different roles.

Example:

• A central midfielder (with ball winning midfielder role with defense duties, who's the middle person in a three man midfield) does (movements, defensive duties etc.) X, Y, Z in a 4-3-3 narrow formation with short passing when the other two midfielders have an "Advanced Playmaker" role
• A striker with "Target Man" role does (movements, defensive duties etc.) X, Y, Z in a 4-1-2-2-1 wide formation with direct passing when the wingers have an "Inside Forward" role

I'm aware of pairs and combinations & the Football Manager's guide to Football management (Also, if someone can give me a review of this book, the 6 reviews on Amazon not helping much) - but before diving deeper into them, I want to make sure these are covered in details and if there are other better/updated resources.

Thanks

[summatsupeer]

No one doesn't exist because it doesn't work like that.  A role doesn't change because of the formation.  

All that will change is the players risk taking due to mentality, but the balance of what they try remains the same as there instructions define that.

What a player sees as a risk will depend what is happening around him but there's way too many variables including the players attributes.

Keep it simple, you'll have to watch what's happening, just using a different player will change how a role plays.

[theratulz]

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No one doesn't exist because it doesn't work like that.  A role doesn't change because of the formation.  

So you're saying that a striker will not change his positions/movements based on how high/deep the team plays in? A midfielder won't be positioned differently based on a narrow or wide formation? The movements won't be different depending on another player's movement? How should I dictate a player saying if X has the ball, make a run at this direction etc.? How will I be able to achieve that?

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What a player sees as a risk will depend what is happening around him but there's way too many variables including the players attributes.

What are the variables? What possible situations can I anticipate? Even if there are a lot of moving parts, I'm trying to create an organized thought around it.

Quote

Keep it simple, you'll have to watch what's happening, just using a different player will change how a role plays.

So I'm basically looking at it the other way around? The way to anticipate what a player will do is based on his attributes.

I'm trying to create a framework for assisting myself through the matches. Do you think there's a resource that'll help me create it like this:

• A player will do X, Y, Z in an attacking mentality if he has A, B, C, D, E attributes + if the opposition is/isn't doing J, K, L to him. 

Thanks again for your response. Really looking forward to your thoughts.

[Atarin]

I can see what you're asking and why and I understand the thinking behind it (I've been there myself) but unfortunately there's no simple and quick answer to your questions.  If there were then the game would be as simple as checking the spread sheet, plugging in the right players and watching the results come rolling in.

Its almost impossible to give an answer to the question "in this situation, this Role will play like this..." for every Role and every possible permutation of player playing that role and in any particular tactical system in any particular tactical situation. As an example Ibrahimovic playing as a CF(s) is not going to play the role in the same way as Lewandowski, for reasons such as their diverse attribute distribution, their PPMs.etc

Its best to know the basics of football theory, failing that learn what each role does in a vacuum (i.e - nothing other than the bare role taken into account) and what balance looks like in a team selection. An example would be that in the attacking positions roles can broadly be split into space creators and space exploiters. A DLF is primarily a space creator . An AF is primarily a space exploiter. We don't need to know more than that to know that to create balance in our forward line. The permutations within that are countless.

[summatsupeer]

1 hour ago, theratulz said:

So you're saying that a striker will not change his positions/movements based on how high/deep the team plays in? A midfielder won't be positioned differently based on a narrow or wide formation? The movements won't be different depending on another player's movement? How should I dictate a player saying if X has the ball, make a run at this direction etc.? How will I be able to achieve that?

What are the variables? What possible situations can I anticipate? Even if there are a lot of moving parts, I'm trying to create an organized thought around it.

So I'm basically looking at it the other way around? The way to anticipate what a player will do is based on his attributes.

I'm trying to create a framework for assisting myself through the matches. Do you think there's a resource that'll help me create it like this:

• A player will do X, Y, Z in an attacking mentality if he has A, B, C, D, E attributes + if the opposition is/isn't doing J, K, L to him. 

Thanks again for your response. Really looking forward to your thoughts.

A role is just a set of instructions which the players attributes interpret to decide what they try to do.  If you have a CM-A, it doesn't matter if you have a DLF-S or DLF-A, the CM-A will try and do the same things which is to get forward often and try other things sometimes (rather than rarely).  They might try and play through balls to the DLF-A more than the DLF-S, but that's because the DLF-S isn't in position to receive a through ball as often whilst the DLF-A is giving that option more often due to his duty and instructions.  There's no way to list what the CM-A will decide to do, you just have to use some common sense and look at the combinations.  You can't micro-manage the movement in the way you describe.  

You can't really anticipate where or when a CM-A will make a forward run, you just know he's going to try them often whilst sometimes dribbling or trying through balls.  A players Work Rate, Off The Ball, Decision and others will decide when/where he runs but it will likely be central.  His PPM's will affect which options he picks, a player with Gets Forward will likely try more than a player who doesn't when given the same role+duty.

There won't be anything like that, everything is chance based.  Even if a player had all 20s, he won't be perfect, they still a chance he won't pick the best option, position in the best place, pass perfectly etc.  You'd need to know the engines formulas which won't be public, even then it would be chanced based and way to many parameters to be usable.

 

[theratulz]

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Its almost impossible to give an answer to the question "in this situation, this Role will play like this..." for every Role and every possible permutation of player playing that role and in any particular tactical system in any particular tactical situation. As an example Ibrahimovic playing as a CF(s) is not going to play the role in the same way as Lewandowski, for reasons such as their diverse attribute distribution, their PPMs.etc

3

In this case, how to learn perfectly how a player operates? For example, I'm in an unknown 3rd division team and I don't know any of the players. By watching the full matches, how do I understand that x has a specific playing style and would be suited for such role in my formation. I know I'm trying to look at it very objectively, which football isn't. But how do I recognize a pattern, understand the situations?

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Its best to know the basics of football theory, failing that learn what each role does in a vacuum (i.e - nothing other than the bare role taken into account) and what balance looks like in a team selection.

Any suggestion for guides/resources I can find these theories? Any suggestion on how to effectively learn them? I'm looking into the Mentality Ladder and a few posts from Cleon. Any other you would recommend?

Thanks to summatsupeer for your thoughts. Will have to look at this much less objectively as I had anticipated.