Defending the Wide Areas With 4-2-3-1?

[Elwood]

I remembering reading somewhere that 4-2-3-1 is one of the best shapes defensively, but what I'm finding is that a player playing in the AMR/L position is extremely slack tracking back without some tweaks to marking or the use of OI.

Hence when the opposing full-back pushes forward my nearest defensive-midfielder will have to pull wide to cover (my own full-back is busy covering the opposing winger) leaving only one in the middle and very prone to overloading.

Is there any way to solve this? I don't want to put my winger on specific marking nor on a lower mentality/FWR as he's not very hardworking and it takes some of his offensive edge off neither do I want to play him in a deeper position like MR/L as he doesn't have a positional rating there.

[silten]

It is naturally the DMs job to cover the attacking fullback and so he will pull wide to cover the exposed flank. It's then the job of the AMC to help cover the centre in the event of a loss of possession while the fullback retreats. If your AMC is too attack minded, then you will be left with just the one DM in the centre and as you say, prone to overloading through the centre. If your AMC is set to an attacking role, consider a switch to support. If he's already in a support role, you may need an AMC with better defensive attributes such as positioning, teamwork and workrate.

[Flohrinho]

Well it's one of the major problems of every formation that doesn't have 7+ players beyond the AM positions in FM. Zonal marking in reality would see all the AMs drop into defensive positions to help out the defenders but not in FM where AMs are considered to be attackers mainly and not part of the defense. So in essence you would have to play a 4-1-4-1 or 4-4-1-1 to get the desired contribution of your wingers in defense.

[furiousuk]

This thread is perhaps the one you read.

As the formation is probably best employed as a zonal marking system due it's strong defensive shape it relies on a few criteria. The MC's have to be principally defensive players, this does not mean they can't venture forward from time to time, simply that their first concern is defensive shape. So, they can pass the ball forward by all means but they shouldn't make frequent runs forward. The reason being that the MC's have to help out covering the flanks as the 'wingers' won't do so with any regularity (nor would you want them too, if you do want this then consider the 4411). The scenario you describe is exactly the way this formation defends. One MC pushes out to help cover the flanks once the opposition move the ball in line with them whilst the other MC then pushes across. The AMC restricts passing lines so the opposition have to be extremely good to get around to the less defended side quickly or extremely good at playing through a crowded space. If you're using man-marking then your players will be more likely to leave their zone which will mean that passing lines may open whereas this formation aims to restrict passing lines - it's defensive strength is that it pushes the opposition into 'dead-ends' where there are no passes, once in that situation then you can press the ball-carrier and win the ball. The winger who doesn't track back too aggressively then cuts off the passing line back down the pitch.

It's possible to get the winger to track back (although difficult to do this with any reliability) but, in most circumstances, it goes against what the formation is designed for.

This is all explained (and better too I might add) in the opening post of the above link (look for part 2).

Edit: Beaten to it whilst posting! Must learn to type faster!