Is it possible to have an organised defence in this game?

[pocketspace]

Wide players are pulling the fullbacks out of position regardless of the opposition stats then cross and no one gets to deal with the cross so there can be 4-5 of my players in the box and a player from the opposite side and he still scores.

If this trick doesn't work, then the opposition wingers/fullbacks cross from deep as the fullbacks are not rushing to close them down and still no one gets to clear the ball as it is pushed back in the net by a world class League Two striker with 8 Off the Ball movement and such. 

 

Oh before you ask me about my tactic

FB-S, CB, CB, WB-S

WM-A, DLP-D, CM-S, WM-S

F9, CF-A

 

Counter-Flexible

TI: Close Down More, Push Higher Up, Work ball into the box, Play out of defence.

[herne79]

If you need help you need to ask specific questions.  All you have done so far is make some anecdotal reference to crossing followed up by a sarcastic hand clap.  And opposition wide players are supposed to be able to pull your fullbacks out of position, that's what wide players do.

How often have you seen these issues?  How many goals do you concede by these means?  What does your season stats for type of goals conceded tell you?  How many games have you played?  Who are you playing as?  What have you done already to change things?

Please try to provide as much info as possible and ask specific questions.  We can't see what you can so you need to be descriptive.

[summatsupeer]

I think people focus so much on the tactic they overlook the players they're using, expecting the tactic to cover their flaws.

Just because players are in a position to defend, doesn't mean they can do it well, it still comes down to there attributes & form.

[permanentquandary]

Post the attributes of your defenders and what the average is for your league.

I have had some recent success with 4-5-1. I realise you might not want to switch formation and I personally find it irritating when someone says change the formation and I'm sat there trying to make THIS formation work, but it's something to think about for next season.

With my 4-5-1 I kept 8 clean sheets in 12 games and didn't lose a game, and I conceded twice in one game only once.

I am finding the wall in midfield is really hard for them to break down and it works great.

But yeah lets see your players.

[Cougar2010]

Yes is the answer.

This season so far my team has conceded 26 goals in 28 games which is the lowest in the division and has kept 11 clean sheets.

Just having a tactic isn't enough I'm afraid you need to recognise when its not suitable and have other options as well as reacting to what is happening on the pitch.

[Keyzer Soze]

Yes, Of course yes.

In fact, in FM16 it's almost easier to keep a clean sheet then to score goals  

In my current save, i've played 103 games and only conceed 48 goals. Pretty good stats i think.

And i play with attacking wingbacks.

It all comes down to a balanced tactic, and trying to have the best players for the roles/duties you choose.

[Ji-Sung Park]

Love me a good rant now and then. 

The 442 needs vertical compactness to be successful IMO. I would start with a very basic setup first; i.e. both fullbacks on FB(s). Central midfielders as CM(s) and CM(d). Then watch the games in full to get an idea of how compact you are and where the goals are coming from and then adjust accordingly. You might want to go 'Fluid' immediately to narrow the gaps between the banks and go one notch lower on d-line.

Also, my limited experience with using a B2B in a 2-man central midfield has not been good.

[noikeee]

I did find in FM16's final patch(es) it was impossible, or at least incredibly hard, to build a defensively sound team with a deep block. You'd get undone by crosses and by opposing fullbacks as you have found.

However it's not impossible to have a strong defence if you don't use a deep block. This means playing much higher up the pitch in terms of mentality/pressing, I would also recommend a 5-man midfield instead of a 4-man midfield. What happens with a 4-man midfield is your wingers will get pulled inside by the extra midfielder the opposition has (and release free the opposition fullback). All of this stops the immense number of conceded crossed goals (you may start conceding other kinds of goals though, as in direct balls behind your defence).

I did notice you've got close down more and push higher up, but this is on the Counter mentality so I'd say it's still too deep. I'd also say these shouts are usually a bad idea for such conservative mentalities as what'll happen is you'll sit deep BUT get pulled all over the place. This causes havoc.

[pocketspace]

3 hours ago, Ji-Sung Park said:

Love me a good rant now and then. 

The 442 needs vertical compactness to be successful IMO. I would start with a very basic setup first; i.e. both fullbacks on FB(s). Central midfielders as CM(s) and CM(d). Then watch the games in full to get an idea of how compact you are and where the goals are coming from and then adjust accordingly. You might want to go 'Fluid' immediately to narrow the gaps between the banks and go one notch lower on d-line.

Also, my limited experience with using a B2B in a 2-man central midfield has not been good.

Why would I do that? I want to emulate a certain system so just doing random changes to it to make it more stable is not a good idea.

[pocketspace]

18 hours ago, herne79 said:

If you need help you need to ask specific questions.  All you have done so far is make some anecdotal reference to crossing followed up by a sarcastic hand clap.  And opposition wide players are supposed to be able to pull your fullbacks out of position, that's what wide players do.

How often have you seen these issues?  How many goals do you concede by these means?  What does your season stats for type of goals conceded tell you?  How many games have you played?  Who are you playing as?  What have you done already to change things?

Please try to provide as much info as possible and ask specific questions.  We can't see what you can so you need to be descriptive.

No I meant that the fullbacks are too aggressive and they rush in to tackle and they are often unsuccessful.

Almost every goal comes from a cross. Byline cross, deep cross, doesn't matter how many defenders I have in the box, they're just useless. I've already said this.

I am playing as Bournemouth.

[Cougar2010]

2 minutes ago, pocketspace said:

Why would I do that? I want to emulate a certain system so just doing random changes to it to make it more stable is not a good idea.

What if the system you want is put at a disadvantage by the shape/tactics of the opposition?

Do you make changes to improve your teams chances of winning or continue to hit a barn door with a shovel?

[pocketspace]

6 minutes ago, Cougar2010 said:

What if the system you want is put at a disadvantage by the shape/tactics of the opposition?

Do you make changes to improve your teams chances of winning or continue to hit a barn door with a shovel?

Yes sure, it could be that the system is exploited by the AI, so in that case it means that AI is better than most of the Premier League managers which in this case I should rather go and become a real life manager because it's easier...

 

I am not sure what type of changes I can do in this situation when the crosses come from byline or just deep at random during matches, there's no visible pattern, you just can't predict how it's gonna play. In terms of player roles, I felt that those choices emulate the system I am trying to recreate in the best way so there's a small change that I could edit them further (not like I haven't tried different player roles and watched how they moved but still had sort of problems).

If you make a move to gain defensive solidity, you will then lack attacking support/width/mobility etc (in my case obviously) and your team will struggle to score goals. So basically from a hole to another bigger, more frustrating hole. So a player role change (say from B2B to CM-S) will mean that you have to give someone else the job or roaming and finding space etc so that way you go further away from the system you want to create.

[Keyzer Soze]

17 minutes ago, pocketspace said:

No I meant that the fullbacks are too aggressive and they rush in to tackle and they are often unsuccessful.

Almost every goal comes from a cross. Byline cross, deep cross, doesn't matter how many defenders I have in the box, they're just useless. I've already said this.

I am playing as Bournemouth.

But, if you choose TI's like "close down more" and " Push Higher Up", of course your FB will be more agressive in defense.

If they tackle with sucess or not, it will come down to their quality. Perhaps you just have bad Fullbacks.

If you want them to play more conservative, why not low the close down setting for them, and perhaps use the TI to "stay on feet"?

[pocketspace]

2 minutes ago, Keyzer Soze said:

But, if you choose TI's like "close down more" and " Push Higher Up", of course your FB will be more agressive in defense.

If they tackle or not, it will come down to their quality.

If you want them to play more conservative, why not low the close down setting for them, and perhaps use the TI to "stay on feet"?

I am not trying to play conservative. I used Counter for the narrow shape in defence. This "Close Down More will make your players more aggressive" line is already out of context, the mentality is set to Counter, it's not like we are Attacking and also Closing Down More. If anything, the custom Closing Down in this case is something close to what Control begins as the base amount so I wouldn't say that's so aggressive.

[Keyzer Soze]

I'm not saying it's too agressive.

I'm just pointing the obvious that you are saying to your team to close down more, and then you are surprise that the fullbacks rush into tackle.

What do you think the closing down more instruction will do?

They will close down the opponent more, and so they will leave position more, and if they are bad, they will open more space, 

[Cougar2010]

5 minutes ago, pocketspace said:

I am not trying to play conservative. I used Counter for the narrow shape in defence. This "Close Down More will make your players more aggressive" line is already out of context, the mentality is set to Counter, it's not like we are Attacking and also Closing Down More. If anything, the custom Closing Down in this case is something close to what Control begins as the base amount so I wouldn't say that's so aggressive.

If you don't want to play conservative then why select counter?

Choosing it for the narrow shape causes you two issues:

A) Your team mentality should be an overall starting point for your tactic.  You have selected it for one reason but then are having to deal with all the other factors it affects.

B) A knockon effect of narrowing your defence is that you are giving the opposition more space out wide.  The opposition are going to use this space because there is limited room centrally so it shouldn't be a surprise that you are seeing a lot of goals from wide areas.

 

I don't have an issue with using close down more alongside counter mentality but it will result in your players not keeping their defensive shape as well when they do go to close down the player on the ball.

 

The bottom line is that you are Bournemouth so you are a team that is expected to finish in the bottom half of the table.  Teams think they are better than you and will come to attack which puts your defence under pressure.  Man for man your players probably aren't as good as many of the opposition teams so you shouldn't be looking to put your players into man to man situations.  Looking at your formation you are using 442 which is a fairly common formation but given the quality of your players this will often put you at a disadvantage against many oppositions, especially those that also use 442.

You then also have an issue with shielding your defence, you are asking a lot of your DLP to both run the game when you have the ball & shield the DCs/pick up opposition midfield runners when you don't.  He needs to be a star within your team and I see it as the key position in your formation. 

Ultimately I think the formation/roles/duties you stuck up in the OP is a good one for a top team who are expected to challenge for the title and will often face more defensive opposition but I think it will struggle more for a team like Bournemouth.

[pocketspace]

4 hours ago, Cougar2010 said:

If you don't want to play conservative then why select counter?

Choosing it for the narrow shape causes you two issues:

A) Your team mentality should be an overall starting point for your tactic.  You have selected it for one reason but then are having to deal with all the other factors it affects.

B) A knockon effect of narrowing your defence is that you are giving the opposition more space out wide.  The opposition are going to use this space because there is limited room centrally so it shouldn't be a surprise that you are seeing a lot of goals from wide areas.

 

I don't have an issue with using close down more alongside counter mentality but it will result in your players not keeping their defensive shape as well when they do go to close down the player on the ball.

 

The bottom line is that you are Bournemouth so you are a team that is expected to finish in the bottom half of the table.  Teams think they are better than you and will come to attack which puts your defence under pressure.  Man for man your players probably aren't as good as many of the opposition teams so you shouldn't be looking to put your players into man to man situations.  Looking at your formation you are using 442 which is a fairly common formation but given the quality of your players this will often put you at a disadvantage against many oppositions, especially those that also use 442.

You then also have an issue with shielding your defence, you are asking a lot of your DLP to both run the game when you have the ball & shield the DCs/pick up opposition midfield runners when you don't.  He needs to be a star within your team and I see it as the key position in your formation. 

Ultimately I think the formation/roles/duties you stuck up in the OP is a good one for a top team who are expected to challenge for the title and will often face more defensive opposition but I think it will struggle more for a team like Bournemouth.

A. Other factors - Attacking width (countered with a TI), tempo (acceptable), risks (acceptable, good for possession game), sitting deep (countered with a TI) were dealt with. What else?

B. Lol. If I play narrow they have space wide and they exploit it. If I play wider like Control, they exploit it aswell.  No matter what you do in this game, the AI is going to exploit it.

 

I think these "you're Bournemouth, teams gonna attack you" lines are pretty much over-used now. See, if I was some of the better team you talked about and went to Bournemouth, I'd want to attack yes and guess what would happen in this scenario, the AI Bournemouth would sit just as deep as I intended and then they launched some counter-attacks and beat me by one or two goals. If I am a small team I look to play more cautious and defensive and sit deeper, why would I venture forward for lol...

 

It's starting to get me incredibly frustrated and disappointed by the game because it seems to be working to some crop of people who had the luck to participate at the creation of the game and those who put a lot of effort in it etc meanwhile the regular football followers just want a football simulator to have fun in their free time, not actually read books about some masterminds tactics. Hilarious.

[herne79]

You may be getting frustrated, but starting a thread with sarcasm, then telling people who are trying to help you that they're wrong, and ending it with nonsense such as the AI exploits us no matter what we do, is a great way of a) discouraging people from helping you and b) getting the thread locked.

You may think "teams are gonna attack you" is over-used, but that doesn't change the factual correctness of it.

Further, your own beliefs in the game are incorrect, and thus you are dismissing advice given by some knowledgeable people.  You say your attacking width is countered with a TI - yet out of the 4 TIs you mention in the OP, none of them affect width.  You also talk about using Counter for the narrow shape in defence, however all mentalities are narrow in defence - the width TI (and the width impacted by the chosen mentality) is your in possession width.

You've had some good advice here which you clearly haven't tried to implement.  If you want people to continue to help it might be an idea to listen to them.

[looping]

Pocketspace,

I've been in your situation for a long time and recently broke even. I completely understand you: all the answers you received are Microsoft answers: completely true and completely useless for you.

Guys: I'm not criticizing your advise, what I'm saying is that your answers are far away from what an average user can understand. It sounds like repeating mantras which may be true but really don't help.

If you think I can help  all I need is my posts not to be deleted.

[Dr. Hook]

23 minutes ago, looping said:

Pocketspace,

I've been in your situation for a long time and recently broke even. I completely understand you: all the answers you received are Microsoft answers: completely true and completely useless for you.

Guys: I'm not criticizing your advise, what I'm saying is that your answers are far away from what an average user can understand. It sounds like repeating mantras which may be true but really don't help.

If you think I can help  all I need is my posts not to be deleted.

Oh stop it, please. For example, he said his fullbacks were getting caught out of position by getting too aggressive and missing their man with the tackle, and therefore giving up crossing chances. He was advised not to have higher closing down selected and he argued back that it shouldn't be a problem.  Nothing Microsoft about it- it is just true. If you or he cannot understand something that basic, then there is no point in either of you posting in here because no one can help. Before this descends into another sillyfest, I am closing the thread.

Pocketspace, if you actually want help and are willing to accept it, then feel free to create a new thread. If you just want to rant, don't bother- this is not the place for it. Looping, if you want to try to help, then actually offer some help, don't just complain that the advice is not helpful- that will get your posts deleted.