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Has anyone managed to make a (winning) tactic that doesn't use crosses?


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Yes all the time.

For example I wrote about this where my assists are from an even mix of crosses, through balls and short passes:

But we have no idea how you are trying to play so posting your tactical system would be a big help if you want advice.

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You don't need to have a tall and strong frontman for successful headers. General movement (I guess Acceleration, Off the Ball, Anticipation and maybe Decisions) can play almost as much of a role. Especially if said player has space to run into and disrupting teammates. 

As for your big question, Herne already made a good point: A well-balanced team with creative freedom will find multiple ways to attack out of which crosses are just one out of many. 

If you want less wild crosses and more open play, two things help: Options and opportunities. Even (or especially) if you have 10 player oriented towards the center, they will look to pivot to the flank as it has plenty of open space. But on the flank they are alone whereas the teammates are parking in the box. Cue the crosses. With a deeper winger behind or a static midfielder, the chances are higher they try to recycle the ball for a new attempt. 

Which is another reason I love 'hybrid' roles so much and have gone away from pure narrowness with double IF and IWB and instead go for overlapping IWB and/or Wingers PPMd to cut inside (cut inside, channel, one-two, late into area) — pure narrow formations will often have players starting wide but then they see the packed centre as best opportunity and ignore the instruction to be yet another space-filler.

Overlapping IWB will go wide but in doing so incentivise the outer players to not immediately cross and once outside most likely they still have these players for a short pass and the PIs to try running in. Narrow wingers cut in late from the side and can shoot, pass or attempt in-swinging crosses from there (which especially helps these more moving players up front). 

As for classical through balls in particular, I have found three option that helped me a lot: 

1) A playmaker instructed to hold position (e.g. Enganche) together with at least one attacking player running into the box hard (I had CFa as switch and RMD as distractor and target for a second play). The CFa worked especially well because he can both come deep (to make room for the RMD or send either winger) and stay at the line and wait for the deadly pass. This works so well because this player almost always is close to the box and has the eyes to play these sorts of balls. More roaming players too often are too deep or too wide to cpnstantly attempt these passes. 

2) Two Advanced Forwards next to each other in a deep formations. They constantly send each other. But such formations are most likely either borderline exploit-y or highly specialised on counter (or just one-trick ponies that are pretty boring!). 

3) Lots of movement at the top with players attempting one-twos. For example: My narrow winger, a hybrid striker role (CF, F9...) and optionally the Engance sometimes create the beautiful movement of the CF dropping deep while the Winger cuts inside and passes to the Enganche who in turn passes into the box where both CF, Ws and the other winger move in as potential recipient. 

 

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key is to transition quickly enough from defense to offense before the opponents defense is set. Once the defense is set you cant expect much central play as the area is packed and players will move out wide to cross.

If you feel your players are not taking the best option you may consider lowering tempo and/or mentality.

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4 hours ago, Muja said:


podUIVy.gif

(as the gif says, the games calls these kind of passes "through passes" but they're NOT.  At least, I'd call these "passes over the defense", or "long passes")

Through balls (passes) can be both short and long (as well as medium). So this is a through pass, but obviously not of the type that you prefer. Every pass that is played into the space in front of its recipient is a through pass, and a through pass that is played into space behind the opposition back-line is a killer ball. 

 

4 hours ago, Muja said:

has anybody been able to make a tactic that succesfully uses this strategy instead of the crossing game?

I personally don't care what type of assists my goals/chances come from as long as they do. But if I were to try to create a tactic that minimizes crossing and encourages the shorter through (killer) passes you insist on, this is a setup I would give a try:

F9

APsu                                  IFsu

CAR      MEZat

HB/ACM

IWBat      CD     CD      IWBsu

GKde

Positive mentality, much shorter passing, play out of defense, fairly narrow width, work ball into box, pass into space

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Thank you, everyone, for your input!

I've tried various things in the meanwhile.
 

On 02/09/2019 at 18:16, Piperita said:

A playmaker instructed to hold position (e.g. Enganche) together with at least one attacking player running into the box hard

@Piperita your suggestion to use an AMC with the "hold position" instructions really made things better. A little. Problem is, I'm not using the 4231 wide formation, as I don't have the players for that.
 

On 02/09/2019 at 16:51, herne79 said:

But we have no idea how you are trying to play so posting your tactical system would be a big help if you want advice.

@herne79 you're right, I didn't post my tactic because I was actually looking for some examples of this strategy done right (and mine wasn't :lol:).

Anyway, I've attached my current tactic here.
It's a 442 diamond. I've read somewhere this is the hardest formation to setup in FM2019, but I don't really have any other choice with this roster.
I've put both my WB on defend, so they can give support to the midfield but they won't run down the flanks. 
My two tops, a forward and a poacher, will give the chance to try some direct passes to them, if the opponents leave any space behind their defense, as they both will attack that space. With an attacking mentality, this works quite well.

As you can imagine, I'm having lots of possession with this tactic. But it's pretty much sterile, especially when the opponents are parking the bus. We'll close them in their half of the pitch, but we rarely find the chance for a defense splitting through ball.

Any suggestion? How could I change this tactic?
Or is it completely off, and I should recosinder everything from scratch..?

Thanks again, guys!


 

lecce 442 D possession.png

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2 hours ago, Muja said:

lecce 442 D possession.png

 

2 hours ago, Muja said:

It's a 442 diamond. I've read somewhere this is the hardest formation to setup in FM2019, but I don't really have any other choice with this roster.

I don't think it's hard to set up (much less the hardest), but the thing is - narrow systems (whether with 3 or 4 at the back) inherently tend to generate a greater number of crosses because the fullbacks/wing-backs - as the sole wide players - will naturally be tempted to cross more than they otherwise would. So in a narrow diamond 442 you can hardly eliminate crosses altogether, but it is possible to reduce them to a reasonable degree. You are trying to do that by playing them on defend duty, which is one way to achieve what you want, but to the detriment of you team's performance overall. Because when you opt for a narrow system, you opt for it precisely because you want/expect the FBs/WBs to be key players. 

 

2 hours ago, Muja said:

Any suggestion? How could I change this tactic?

In relation to what you want to achieve - less crosses and more killer through balls from just outside the area (shorter ones), I would build a tactic on the same principles as the 4123 I proposed in my previous reply. So if this was the 4123: 

On 02/09/2019 at 22:26, Experienced Defender said:

F9

APsu                                  IFsu

CAR      MEZat

HB/ACM

IWBat      CD     CD      IWBsu

GKde

Then the diamond would look like this:

F9       AF/PO

ENG

MEZat      CAR

HB/ACM

FBsu      CDde    CDde      WBsu

GKde

Because in a narrow system IWB as a role is ineffective in the sense that it will behave as a standard FB/WB. But here you have player instructions you can use for both fullbacks: sit narrower, cross less often, take fewer risks.

And I have to give credit to @Piperita for the very good idea to play with the Enganche in AMC :thup:

As for team instructions - same as in the 4123. Therefore:

On 02/09/2019 at 22:26, Experienced Defender said:

Positive mentality, much shorter passing, play out of defense, fairly narrow width, work ball into box, pass into space

 

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Your on a low risk mentality with lots of risk reducing instructions.

Then looking at roles+duties, you've basically got 5 players sitting deep and playing safe (so extra safe considering mentality + instructions) and 5 attackers, 4 making runs and 1 playmaker.  Your team is split in two.   Its a narrow formation to start with, made narrower by the mentality and then made even narrower by instructions, just because you want to play through middle doesnt mean you dont need width, that creates space inside.

Finally, if you want short interplay around the box, I'd argue that few of the passes are "through balls" and more are to feet. It also requires less focus on forward runs.  Having both forwards on attack will make them both sit on shoulder with little space to run into.  In your GIF of what you want you even show them dropping before making run, thats not really what attack duty forwards do.

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Why not try a counter attacking based mentality. Think Pirlo in front of a super defensive or supportive back 4, and behind a dynamic and creative midfield / attack. I got this to work, with no-nonsense full backs. But try to get composed central defenders.

On the issues of AMCs, a lot of great AMCs perform better in deeper positions eg mc, either get the right ppm or train the deeper position.

Also, have you tried wide playmakers (MRL positions)

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