Tactic using Enganche

[thehig2]

I'm 5 years into a journeyman save, first job was at IFK Helsenfors in the Finnish Premier League. Got them Relegated then won promotion and stabilised them in the premier league for a few seasons.

Very limited team so my tactic with them was to sit deep, defend narrow but aggressive and counter with long balls to fast forward players. With play for set pieces enabled this often lead to counters attacks resulting in corners, free kicks etc. The style worked and I probably got the best I could out of that team.

Due to my last season finishing 2nd with IFK I got a job offer from FC Krasondar, a massive offer as the Russian League is bigger than Finland, my wages more than tripled and I had 30 million to spend on players. Its currently mid season break and the club are 9th in the league, the board are wanting a top half finish, which means finishing 8th or better. 

I dont really have a tactical style, I try to play to the main strengths of my team, or play avoids the teams weakness being exposed.

Krasnadars main strength is an Aussie 31 year old player called Tom Rogic. Looking at his profile I really want to try out a tactic built around the Enganche, his stats are pretty good for it with outstanding vision, first touch, composure & Anticipation, and very good technique, passing & decisions.

I was thinking of playing at 4-2-3-1 wide, with my two centre midfielders holding position(maybe a centre mid defend and ball winning mid defend) full backs or wing backs to get forward, and my wide players being Raumdeuters, as they look for space and my enganche should be able to find them.

Anyone had any experience to speak about using Enganche role ? 

Any pointers would be great I'll post a screen shot of my tactic once I've finished it and tested it for a handful of games.

[thehig2]

First I had two Raumdeuters, but didn't create many chances they were getting caught offside a lot, so I tried lowering the line of Engagement which has kind of worked, scored a few goals since. 

Thinking two Raumdeuters is overkill so changed my right winger to an inverted winger. 

My goal is for Rogic (my Enganche) to have options ahead of him to thread killer balls. 

So far I've played 4 friendly's, and the Russian Cup QF. 

Drew 3 of the friendly's 0-0, and won one 3-1. Won the cup game 2-1 against Rostov (a similar ability team to me) but both my goals were set plays.

 

On the plus side I'm fairly solid at the back, I'm obviously not getting my attack right yet, my Enganche just isn't involved in the game enough. 

[noikeee]

I'd be amazed if you manage to get a Enganche involved enough in FM20 as the game is not very friendly to this type of player, but maybe someone out there is bright enough to make it work - good luck.

[thehig2]

17 minutes ago, noikeee said:

I'd be amazed if you manage to get a Enganche involved enough in FM20 as the game is not very friendly to this type of player, but maybe someone out there is bright enough to make it work - good luck.

so far my tactic is getting decent results in spite of the Enganche, hes been the worst performing player on my team more often than not, the game passes him by.

Got all the rest of the season to make it work, as I'm safe in 7th with the board only expecting top half

[craigd84]

low risk game and short passing would help get the enganche involved. 

No other playmaking roles either.

[thehig2]

26 minutes ago, craigd84 said:

low risk game and short passing would help get the enganche involved. 

No other playmaking roles either.

dont have any other playmakers, reluctent to go short passing for now as I've gotten great results so far, however the enganche as been useless.

I'll try shorter passing if there are a few dead rubbers at end of the season.

[Experienced Defender]

6 hours ago, thehig2 said:

Enganche is a pretty static PM role, so he needs a lot more support around him than your setup is offering. And the ENG role is clearly far more suited to patient possession-based styles, which your tactic obviously is not.

[thehig2]

3 minutes ago, Experienced Defender said:

Enganche is a pretty static PM role, so he needs a lot more support around him than your setup is offering. And the ENG role is clearly far more suited to patient possession-based styles, which your tactic obviously is not.

I thought a direct style might suit and Enganche, as I want him to play killer balls, not recycle possession with low risk passes.

What I noticed was happening was my centre midfielders or centre backs would by pass the enganche and go over the top to one of the front 3. When the opposition doesnt have a DM the enganche seemed to occupy a defender allowing a striker in, creating goal scoring chances in directly. 

This also could have been just a case of the CPU going overboard with pressing.

I never ended up slowing my play down and playing more possession based to suite the role because I got involved in a race for European places and couldn't afford to alter a tactic that was working.

[Experienced Defender]

4 minutes ago, thehig2 said:

I thought a direct style might suit and Enganche, as I want him to play killer balls, not recycle possession with low risk passes

In that case, AP on attack or TQ are a better choice than enganche for an AMC position playmaker. But then the lone striker's role should be simpler and preferably on attack duty (PF on attack, poacher or AF). However, this also means the RMD is not a good idea.

Edited December 15, 2019 by Experienced Defender

[thehig2]

1 hour ago, Experienced Defender said:

In that case, AP on attack or TQ are a better choice than enganche for an AMC position playmaker. But then the lone striker's role should be simpler and preferably on attack duty (PF on attack, poacher or AF). However, this also means the RMD is not a good idea.

The attacking player maker doesn't have the mobility to play any other role, thought the Raumdeuter would make runs and find space so the enganche could find him with his great vision and passing.

Sold him now anyway another season has passed now and his physicals have dropped even more now hes not a viable option.

Was fun trying something different, trying to build a tactic that was supposed to get the best out of an enganche ended up failing but I came accross a tactic from it that suits the team and won me the Russian Cup and helped me climb the league.

Ive moved on and play an attacking midfielder in that role now

[nick1408]

I've been following this thread and had a bit of a revelation today.

 

My thought process went as follows:

1. Enganche is a really static role that needs movement all around. If this is the case two players in front is a better option than just one
2. The role was pretty much how Riquelme operated. He didn't like to get out of first gear when running but could pull the strings by finding the correct space to be in. Because of the movement around him and the space to play a pass he rarely missed a player
3. It isn't so much about the AMC role but more about the roles around him

In the 4-2-3-1 posted above I just see not enough players in front of the AMC to make an enganche dangerous and not enough movement around him to do the same. An enganche doesn't drop deep, doesn't make runs, doesn't really do anything special other than be a really good playmaker (my opinion so very much could be wrong). With all the above being my beliefs on the role I felt a narrow tactic like a 4-4-2 diamond or a 4-3-1-2 would be the most suitable system to employ. I then googled tactics Riquelme played in and while there wasn't a lot of info (more like, not a lot of info I could be bothered reading) I did find that he was used in a 4-3-1-2 at Villarreal and that someone had actually set a tactic up to replicate it. 

 

I am currently playing as Western United in the A-League so I thought I had the perfect player to play the role in Alessandro Diamanti. Knowing that trying to press heavily will be let down by one player I figured that by having the 'movers' in midfield doing the hard pressing and to leave the forward three to be in the right space would be best. This means no counter press (as the AMC won't do it anyway). Counter attack is fine. Tighter marking, hard pressing and anything else that asks the whole team to do something defensive as a team is a bit pointless so I asked the two MC's to tackle hard and press hard in an effort to still win the ball back but not rely on the AMC to do much defensively. As the AMC won't be offering anything in defence I see it as pointless asking the strikers to do anything defensively as if they did it can create holes where the AMC is doing not a lot. This rules out a pressing forward for me (I don't want him to be pressing opposition and moving away from the tactical shape).

 

As I want lots of movement I have wingbacks offering width (pointless having IWB's when I have so many players centrally already). I have also gone for a Halfback so when the WB's go forward it still leaves three at the back.

As for team instructions I want to create space for the enganche to play in so have asked the team to play extremely wide. I asked for early crosses to try and get the ball to him. Shorter passing due to conversation earlier in this tread (a really poor reason to go for it). Regroupe due to what I said before, counter to try and catch the opposition out of position and lower line of engagement due to my really slow defenders.

 

Half time stats ended like this:

 

I switched Jertec with Pasquali at half time due to his poor rating. I should have dragged him but ended up subbing him at 74 minutes. Armanakas (his replacement) scored the first goal as the mezzala and the F9 scored the second. What I did notice was that Perth Glory set one of their DM's to man-mark Diamanti after half time. This lead to two immediate consequences 1. Diamanti finished with only a 6.7 rating but 2. it also opened up their two DM formation to be exploited by the right-sided players (F9, Mezzala).

 

End match stats:

 

Bit weird to see red after a really good win but I have a feeling my poor analyst's may be to blame. anyway...

 

See the enganche's average position is more or less in line with the CM's. This is due to his lack of movement and the movement of the CM's forward (CM-A and MEZ-S).

 

So, this is only one game but it did give me enough to think moving forward this is a tactic (and role) worth persisting with. I had been playing @yellowforever  4-1-3-2 tactic so this is a natural evolution for my team. I still feel it's important to have the right roles around an enganche as well as the right shape. He will suffer more than a lot of other roles by being crowded so pick the formation carefully.

 

 

[Johnny Ace]

1 hour ago, nick1408 said:

In the 4-2-3-1 posted above I just see not enough players in front of the AMC to make an enganche dangerous and not enough movement around him to do the same. An enganche doesn't drop deep, doesn't make runs, doesn't really do anything special other than be a really good playmaker (my opinion so very much could be wrong). With all the above being my beliefs on the role I felt a narrow tactic like a 4-4-2 diamond or a 4-3-1-2 would be the most suitable system to employ.

I totally agree, the Enganche needs options in front of him & runners from deep to make up for his lack of movement, there's a piece about it on The Byline

   https://www.footballmanager.com/the-byline/perfect-number-10-wednesday-wisdom

I really like the idea of that tactic, the CF roaming, the F9 dropping deep.  the CM A making surging runs into the box & the DLP covering. I don't think the Focus through the middle is needed  

[thehig2]

@nick1408Great post, I would have done something similar but as my tactic was winning games I didn't want to experiment just to get the best out Rogic.

Might start a side save and have a go

[thehig2]

Had another go for a game, used my normal play maker made him an Enganche, he has good enough stats despite being mobile enough to play a normal playmaker role.

Whole point of playing about with this tactic now is so I have a tactic if I'm in this situation again were your best creative player isn't very mobile. 

I was playing a team I was expected to beat, but the difference in class between the teams wasnt massive it was still expected to be a competitive game.

This time much better result for getting the Enganche involved, he played a lot of through balls and directly created a handful of chances and was involved in the majority of moves going forward, the opposition had trouble picking him up. 

Instructing the keeper to distribute to play maker helped, a long throw would normally make it to my Enganche in space, he then turns and has options ahead of him. With pass into space enabled along with lower line of engagement it makes it easier for the Enganche to play a successful killer ball. Will leave it for now but tempted to go a little more direct with slight quicker tempo to match how I like to play.

Ended up with a 7.5 rating, if not for poor finishing would have scored more.

[鹅爵爷]

Dude, it's just my own opinion, Mr. Rogic's attributes and traits look better as a MC(A) or a DLF(S).

He has superb finishing, composure, dribble, long shot, pass, vision, off the ball, position, teamwork, good balance/strength/jumping reach, poor agility/pace.

Poor agility means that he needs a century to turn around, like Demichelis. Under highter tempo, he is unable to play like a young man, pass and turn around quickly.

As MC(A), he may face the goal, dribble forward then pass or long shoot.

As DLF(S), with back to goal, he may hold, pass, finish,  and even defend as good as Firmino.

 

[thehig2]

2 minutes ago, 鹅爵爷 said:

Dude, it's just my own opinion, Mr. Rogic's attributes and traits look better as a MC(A) or a DLF(S).

He has superb finishing, composure, dribble, long shot, pass, vision, off the ball, position, teamwork, good balance/strength/jumping reach, poor agility/pace.

Poor agility means that he needs a century to turn around, like Demichelis. Under highter tempo, he is unable to play like a young man, pass and turn around quickly.

As MC(A), he may face the goal, dribble forward then pass or long shoot.

As DLF(S), with back to goal, he may hold, pass, finish,  and even defend as good as Firmino.

 

Takes away from the point of my thread, I was enjoying trying to make the Enganche role work, as in Football Manager so far its been a hard role to get players to perform well in.

Not interested in playing him elsewere for two reasons, 1 - I wanted to experiment with the Enganche role, and 2 - He no plays for West Brom.

Read the later post in the thread, I'm still playing about to get something out of Enganche role with a different player.

[Britrock]

Argentina is the natural home of the enganche and isn't 3-4-1-2 the favoured formation there? It gives you two players in front, two behind and two out wide of the enganche, thus plenty of passing options and runners around the fairly static role. Might be worth giving that a shot if you want to see the role flourish

[thehig2]

4 minutes ago, Britrock said:

Argentina is the natural home of the enganche and isn't 3-4-1-2 the favoured formation there? It gives you two players in front, two behind and two out wide of the enganche, thus plenty of passing options and runners around the fairly static role. Might be worth giving that a shot if you want to see the role flourish

trying that is on my to do list, dont have the right players for it right now though.

[Tiger666]

On 16/12/2019 at 09:52, Johnny Ace said:

I totally agree, the Enganche needs options in front of him & runners from deep to make up for his lack of movement, there's a piece about it on The Byline

   https://www.footballmanager.com/the-byline/perfect-number-10-wednesday-wisdom

I really like the idea of that tactic, the CF roaming, the F9 dropping deep.  the CM A making surging runs into the box & the DLP covering. I don't think the Focus through the middle is needed  

A little piece about it here too

https://www.thehighertempopress.com/2017/03/choose-best-player-role-number-10/