(FM 2017) Bringing Northern Ireland Football to a higher level

[Mypos]

Hey Guys. Im playing FM2017  with Armagh in Northern Ireland. The goal is to bring the level of Football in Northern Ireland up. So im now in season 25 with Armagh and i play CL regularly and the league is improving every year. Im trying to use as much players from Northern Ireland as i can. I also use as much coaches from Nothern Ireland. What i see now is that a lot of the players from my youth are a bit better then the other NI players so the level is slowly risen with other clubs too because a lot of my youth products who are not good enough for my team end up with other NI teams.

Now i got offered the job of coaching the National Team and i accepted because i read somewhere that if you achieve good results with national teams you can also get a boost in better youth players in a country. Now i would like to ask you guys for some advice. I have awesome attackers for NI level, reasonable midfield and decent fullbacks but awful central defenders. They are like 12 tackling positioning marking heading and not really tall. What kind of tactics would you guys use to get good results with the national team? 

I am a tactical noob by the way. This year was the first year i tried to build my own tactics and it worked a bit but it was more luck then knowledge. 

[Experienced Defender]

Let's hope that people who are still playing FM17 will see your topic and chip in with some helpful advice 

[Mypos]

11 hours ago, Experienced Defender said:

Let's hope that people who are still playing FM17 will see your topic and chip in with some helpful advice 

But i think its also appyable to FM2020 right? I just need some advice on tactics.

[Impacto]

Tactics in previous FMs work very differently in FM 20. I play FM 18 and on that game I can tell you a top CB makes a difference. But since you don't have much choice with the National team, I suggest to just build a tactic that plays to your strenghts. If you have fast players, drop deep and use the pace. If you have more technical players, push the line of defence high and try to control games. In both ways you will concede goals because of the weak defence, it's just the way it is.

That being said, if I had a poor defence, I would try to give it extra protection without sacrificing too much attacking power. I find that a Half Back really helps defenders and posession at the same time. DLP on defend is great in the DM strata, it's a bit more risky than the HB, but can still work with the right player. Make sure that you have one more midfielder either as a Ball winning midfielder or a Box to Box. Both help the defence well, the latter though will support greatly attacks too. 

You can also try 3 at the back. The extra man really helps, but to be effective on the offence you need top attacking players to compensate the one man less going forward. In real world football teams use the CBs to create overloads by pushing them very high, but in FM that is not really possible. 

Good luck! 

[Experienced Defender]

4 hours ago, Mypos said:

But i think its also appyable to FM2020 right?

Honestly, FM20 is comparable only to FM19. But with earlier versions - nowhere near as much.