How to find tactical analysis of teams in real life

[TheFalseNine]

I want to replicate real life tactics but am struggling to find articles on the internet. For example I’m trying to find how West Ham play under Moyes this season and haven’t really found anything. Does anyone know any links or websites that are useful in finding out how teams play? 

[Lasson]

It's not a whole lot, but I'm sure others can find much more information somewhere on the internet. I've taken this from WhoScored.com.

[pedrosantos]

32 minutes ago, Lasson said:

It's not a whole lot, but I'm sure others can find much more information somewhere on the internet. I've taken this from WhoScored.com.

Can you point the right direction to find that information ?

I can find similar but about players, not the team.

Forget it, I have found it

Edited September 7, 2023 by pedrosantos

[herne79]

Bear in mind West Ham don’t always play on the counter (against Luton we dominated possession for example).

Edited September 7, 2023 by herne79

[Carambau]

20 minutes ago, herne79 said:

Bear in mind West Ham don’t always play on the counter (against Luton we dominated possession for example).

its listed under "strengths", not "style of play" 

[herne79]

2 hours ago, Carambau said:

its listed under "strengths", not "style of play" 

I’m helping to answer the OP’s question, not what whoscored categorise things as 👍.

[Carambau]

1 minute ago, herne79 said:

I’m helping to answer the OP’s question, not what whoscored categorise things as 👍.

Oops, sorry for the misunderstanding... sometimes I should read more carefully!! 

[TheFalseNine]

5 hours ago, herne79 said:

Bear in mind West Ham don’t always play on the counter (against Luton we dominated possession for example).

Thank you! I did have a site that showed lots of information. Daljit mentioned it in one of his streams but that’s long gone. 

[w_x]

https://spielverlagerung.com/ used to have a load of analysis but it's not been updated for ages. One of the writers, Rene Maric, went on to work for Dortmund and Leeds, as well as a few other clubs. Might be useful for historic stuff.

A guy called Michael Cox used to run a website called Zonal Marking, he works for The Athletic now. Which brings me onto The Athletic, they have some tactics writers (Ahmed Whalid for example) who do analysis of current teams. Tifo IRL on Youtube is affiliated with The Athletic (owned by?) and they do videos including tactical anaylsis

[Rashidi]

This is a pretty good site for European games https://betweentheposts.net/the-inverted-parabox/

[AndrikoDS]

On 07/09/2023 at 08:40, TheFalseNine said:

I want to replicate real life tactics but am struggling to find articles on the internet. For example I’m trying to find how West Ham play under Moyes this season and haven’t really found anything. Does anyone know any links or websites that are useful in finding out how teams play? 

I fear that the only way to really do this is to just watch football and analyse it yourself - I've been looking for years for an analysis of George Graham's Arsenal (other than 'boring') in a way that I could translate to FM, but it's surprisingly hard to find this sort of info outside the very biggest managers/tactical styles.

[Cloud9]

On 07/09/2023 at 00:40, TheFalseNine said:

I want to replicate real life tactics but am struggling to find articles on the internet. For example I’m trying to find how West Ham play under Moyes this season and haven’t really found anything. Does anyone know any links or websites that are useful in finding out how teams play? 

FBref is a good free source for seeing how individual players perform. The Athletic is a paid resource but you can access it via a trial, they post some really nice/indepth analytical breakdowns of highlighted games/teams/players.

Checking news hubs for the specific team you're interested in is a good starting point as well. They have more information about the players and play style, and can give you a feel of the culture around the club itself. For example: if Interested in Athletico Madrid visit Into the Calderon. 

Edited October 12, 2023 by Cloud9

[Cloud9]

On 07/09/2023 at 07:41, w_x said:

https://spielverlagerung.com/ used to have a load of analysis but it's not been updated for ages. One of the writers, Rene Maric, went on to work for Dortmund and Leeds, as well as a few other clubs. Might be useful for historic stuff.

A guy called Michael Cox used to run a website called Zonal Marking, he works for The Athletic now. Which brings me onto The Athletic, they have some tactics writers (Ahmed Whalid for example) who do analysis of current teams. Tifo IRL on Youtube is affiliated with The Athletic (owned by?) and they do videos including tactical anaylsis

Athletic is great, but I wouldn't recommend Tifo analytics anymore unfortunately.

The poaching of Tom Worville by RBLeipzig and Alex Stewart moving on to a separate analytics company has left them a much poorer resource. Checking out those two individuals twitters for any linked data I would recommend though. 

[Cloud9]

On 07/09/2023 at 01:47, herne79 said:

Bear in mind West Ham don’t always play on the counter (against Luton we dominated possession for example).

A little off topic, but curious what your thoughts are on Moyes as a West Ham fan and his approach to football.

A UECL trophy last year but also a scraped relegation fight on top of primarily direct football with a record of 4 points out of an available 72 away against the big 6 (as of last year) but a great start to this season. Got some real exciting players, Paqueta especially but also with the arrival of Kudos, you presumably could take the hand break off and look to control games. Recent seasons have seen talented player like Haller forced out under Moyes, only to flourish elsewhere. The exit of Scamacca, a technically talented Italian international, seem eerily reminiscent to Haller's departure from the club. 

Are you keen to see where Moyes can take the club, avoiding an Iraola like drop in revolution, or hopeful that West Ham can take a more progressive approach on the back of European success + the financial boon of London Stadium?

[Rashidi]

And not forgetting totalfootballanalysis.com, they do fantastic work. And a lot of the gfx are in the posts of a large number of content creators here, including me. I usually check their video channel out first if I want to verify some assumptions I have made. Their website is subscription based. 
understat.com for xg
fbref.com for data
sofascore.com for heatmaps
For articles betweentheposts is actually now no 1 for me, then its totalfootballanalysis, and then the athletic. There is one very underrated video content creator The purist football on youtube. He is also very good.  

[herne79]

1 hour ago, Cloud9 said:

A little off topic, but curious what your thoughts are on Moyes as a West Ham fan and his approach to football.

A UECL trophy last year but also a scraped relegation fight on top of primarily direct football with a record of 4 points out of an available 72 away against the big 6 (as of last year) but a great start to this season. Got some real exciting players, Paqueta especially but also with the arrival of Kudos, you presumably could take the hand break off and look to control games. Recent seasons have seen talented player like Haller forced out under Moyes, only to flourish elsewhere. The exit of Scamacca, a technically talented Italian international, seem eerily reminiscent to Haller's departure from the club. 

Are you keen to see where Moyes can take the club, avoiding an Iraola like drop in revolution, or hopeful that West Ham can take a more progressive approach on the back of European success + the financial boon of London Stadium?

Personally I’m kind of amazed, he seems to have rediscovered his Everton form.  I think if we hadn’t won the europa last season he’d have been out.  While we may not be playing in the “West Ham way” (whatever that is as SAF once quipped) we’re getting the results.  We seem to have 2 main strategies - pure highly disciplined, pressure soak, hit on the counter with pace and flair against equal or better sides; or control the game, apply constant pressure with intensity against weaker teams.  There’s nothing revolutionary about it, Moyes just seems to have found the key to unlock it.  Honestly that video does a really good job of analysing.  I think Ward-Prowse has been central to this and an inspired buy (I’ve been buying him for my West Ham saves since FM16, about time they took notice lol).

Interesting you mention Haller and Scamacca, both strikers.  We’re short in that area and Antonio isn’t getting any younger.  On paper they’d seem to fit the bill of what Moyes looks for - big, powerful, able to hold up the ball - but they clearly didn’t fit.  I get the feeling Scamacca may have been homesick, no idea what went wrong with Haller.  Will be interesting to see who we bring in next.  Osimhen?  

As for your final point, the club clearly has ambitions of a European nature (as do the fans) but we’re also pretty pragmatic and don’t get carried away.  There’s an old joke - “what do Christmas decorations and West Ham have in common?  They both come down after Christmas” - so personally I’d like a progressive approach rather than instant win followed by more relegation battles.  However, it’s been 7 years since we moved into the London Stadium with the last 3 all seeing European competition so that progression seems to be with us now.

I’d just like to see it sustained.  We’re not a top 4 side but I see no reason why we can’t continue pushing for a European spot.

[Gilberto Silva]

Check out the Mastermind Site. Plenty of in-depth tactical analysis of various sides.

[Cloud9]

On 12/10/2023 at 00:51, herne79 said:

Personally I’m kind of amazed, he seems to have rediscovered his Everton form.  I think if we hadn’t won the europa last season he’d have been out.  While we may not be playing in the “West Ham way” (whatever that is as SAF once quipped) we’re getting the results.  We seem to have 2 main strategies - pure highly disciplined, pressure soak, hit on the counter with pace and flair against equal or better sides; or control the game, apply constant pressure with intensity against weaker teams.  There’s nothing revolutionary about it, Moyes just seems to have found the key to unlock it.  Honestly that video does a really good job of analysing.  I think Ward-Prowse has been central to this and an inspired buy (I’ve been buying him for my West Ham saves since FM16, about time they took notice lol).

Interesting you mention Haller and Scamacca, both strikers.  We’re short in that area and Antonio isn’t getting any younger.  On paper they’d seem to fit the bill of what Moyes looks for - big, powerful, able to hold up the ball - but they clearly didn’t fit.  I get the feeling Scamacca may have been homesick, no idea what went wrong with Haller.  Will be interesting to see who we bring in next.  Osimhen?  

As for your final point, the club clearly has ambitions of a European nature (as do the fans) but we’re also pretty pragmatic and don’t get carried away.  There’s an old joke - “what do Christmas decorations and West Ham have in common?  They both come down after Christmas” - so personally I’d like a progressive approach rather than instant win followed by more relegation battles.  However, it’s been 7 years since we moved into the London Stadium with the last 3 all seeing European competition so that progression seems to be with us now.

I’d just like to see it sustained.  We’re not a top 4 side but I see no reason why we can’t continue pushing for a European spot.

On the striker, maybe Osimhen's fellow countryman, Terem Moffi at Nice, could be a nice next step. On paper he's a similar profile to Osimhen, although I think he's significantly weaker (although still a good aerial presence) with his back to goal/in the air. Like Osimhen, he's rapid and has superb movement off the ball, but he also provides a ton of defensive pressing up front. I think his role at Nice has focused a little more on end product rather than the pressing. He's in that age range West Ham seem to look for and would probably cost 1/3-1/2 an Osimhen w/French Footballs financial difficulties.  

Fig 1. at Lorient, Fig 2. at Nice.

What would you count as a successful season this year for West Ham? Top half in the league and challenging for Europa League? Or just good football? There's some strong project managers on the market at the moment, I particularly liked what Lopetegui did at Sevilla & Wolves, and the Hammers could presumably take an approach like Villa have under Emery after selling Grealish. 

[herne79]

5 hours ago, Cloud9 said:

What would you count as a successful season this year for West Ham? Top half in the league and challenging for Europa League? Or just good football?

Personally I think we should be challenging for a European spot, not just top half.  That may be a too ambitious given we finished 14th last season and sold our best player over the summer, but I like the players we brought in and so far at least seem to be right for how Moyes wants to play.  The Board clearly have ambitions in that direction anyway.  Sure I’d like good football as well, but at the end of the day it’s results that count.

It’s still early days (wasn’t it Bill Shankly who used to say he never looks at the league table until November?) and we’ve made a promising start, but as a fan I know not to count the chickens too soon.

[Cloud9]

6 hours ago, herne79 said:

Personally I think we should be challenging for a European spot, not just top half.  That may be a too ambitious given we finished 14th last season and sold our best player over the summer, but I like the players we brought in and so far at least seem to be right for how Moyes wants to play.  The Board clearly have ambitions in that direction anyway.  Sure I’d like good football as well, but at the end of the day it’s results that count.

It’s still early days (wasn’t it Bill Shankly who used to say he never looks at the league table until November?) and we’ve made a promising start, but as a fan I know not to count the chickens too soon.

I'd agree on that, exciting season ahead for the hammers  

[Fraser]

I think if you look at match reports on WhoScored then you get heatmaps, average position etc - which might be useful.