How to get more assists for my Attacking Playmaker, and how to make him specifically assist my Poacher?

[Titanium Steel]

Just got the free Football Manager 2024, and already unbeaten on Ligue 1 so far and just beaten Real Madrid. The issue is that my AP who has very good stats (17 Pass, 19 Vision, and 17 Decisions) can't get assists. (He gets plenty in his international team which I manage)

I also have a Poacher who is currently top scorer, but most of the goals are from the IFs' crosses which he heads in easily with his height.

How do I take full advantage of the AP's stats and make him hace de Bruyne or Messi level assists?

[Titanium Steel]

I'm also open to changing my tactics to optimize my team's tactics, I'm still new to the game so I'd appreciate any advice, thanks!

[Titanium Steel]

One last thing, the thing I'm trying to achieve with this tactic is to have my poacher who isn't really good at dribbling to wait in front to score while the IFs either keeps the opposition full backs occupied or become passing options so they themselves can cross to the poacher or score themselves. Ultimately, the AP is supposed to be the guy to pass to one of these three and wait for them to score from that pass and get him an assist, but in games the AP rarely makes assists nor passes to the poacher which was the whole aim.

[Adonalsium]

Well... maybe try playing much lower tempo, less attack roles on the wings, more support roles overall. Switch DLP to another DM. Maybe then your AP will get more involved as the main creator.

[Dr Naysay]

A playmaker needs space, how you are setting up is limiting some of that space but I'll wager because you're doing so well teams are defending narrow, deep and packing the deep midfield which will rob of space to work in. When using a playmaker I like to see where the space is. When facing a 442 the AP has space in that AM spot, against a lot of other formations the space would be out wide so I'll train him as a winger and play him out there but a key is to surround him with complimentary roles that help to create overloads and free up players for the AP to pass to. You can also achieve this by keeping him in the AM slot and using roles and instructions that help create overloads on either flank

Changing some of your other roles to help him would be important here because you're also not providing him with a lot of players to play off here. The first thing I would do is to analyze what he's doing by both stats and watching and freeze framing your other players when he makes passes or turns the ball over. You want to see what options he has around him.

Another thing to do is to make up your own XG chain of all your goals. Being the primary assister is all well and good but if he is heavily involved in the build up play and pinging balls to the wide players to cross in to the box that would be good enough for me too.

 

[Titanium Steel]

3 hours ago, Dr Naysay said:

A playmaker needs space, how you are setting up is limiting some of that space but I'll wager because you're doing so well teams are defending narrow, deep and packing the deep midfield which will rob of space to work in. When using a playmaker I like to see where the space is. When facing a 442 the AP has space in that AM spot, against a lot of other formations the space would be out wide so I'll train him as a winger and play him out there but a key is to surround him with complimentary roles that help to create overloads and free up players for the AP to pass to. You can also achieve this by keeping him in the AM slot and using roles and instructions that help create overloads on either flank

Changing some of your other roles to help him would be important here because you're also not providing him with a lot of players to play off here. The first thing I would do is to analyze what he's doing by both stats and watching and freeze framing your other players when he makes passes or turns the ball over. You want to see what options he has around him.

Another thing to do is to make up your own XG chain of all your goals. Being the primary assister is all well and good but if he is heavily involved in the build up play and pinging balls to the wide players to cross in to the box that would be good enough for me too.

 

 

3 hours ago, Adonalsium said:

Well... maybe try playing much lower tempo, less attack roles on the wings, more support roles overall. Switch DLP to another DM. Maybe then your AP will get more involved as the main creator.

Thanks for the advices, I applied them all and plus some of my own...

First, I placed an Roaming Playmaker next to him so he can always be a passing option and contribute a few assists himself. I put the Inside Forwards on Support too, and finally I moved my playmaker down to a CM so he can be closer to his fellow midfielders and make a triangle of passing options. The instructions was also changed. I decided to make things simple by not setting too many instructions to allow my players to have some freedom, but I did lower down the tempo to give the AP and RPM some time to create passes.

I also set him to roam around so he can find space which seemed to work really well. He seemed to roam around where space was, and almost every time I saw the ball played to him, there was either no opposition players around him or just one.

I tested it out, and the results was very good. It was just one match, but it was against AS Monaco which was the strongest opponent I had in Ligue 1. It ended in 6-1, with a perfect hattrick by the Advanced Forward. The AP had himself a hattrick of assists, two for the AF and one for the left IF. The RPM himself also had a good day, with an assist to his name. The AP made 11 key passes while the RPM made 9 key passes. The AP would've gotten Player of the Match (9.7 rating) if it wasn't for the AF. (9.9 rating)

I'll come back later after a few more matches, but just from this one match this tactic is clearly working extremely well and harnesses the full potential of both of my best players.

[Dr Naysay]

So I set up a tactic similar to yours with some changes to roles in La Liga and we played Betis(We are Zaragoza) they played a 4231 with two deep midfielders and it was palpable watching the game how their two DM's were robbing the space from our AP(Lopez). He however was instrumental in the first goal which harks back to my last point in my previous point.

I was a bit annoyed to be honest that he missed Aguados run(whose a DM role I changed) because Aguado got beyond his marker and was clean through if Lopez had passed through that seam but he passed out to the Fullback Nieto who was in acres of free space and Nieto put a cross in to the striker that scored. Adding the roam from position PI allowed Lopez to drop in to pockets of space through that first 70 minutes.

As time was ticking away Betis did something that played right in to our hands which was changing to a flat 442. This suddenly gave Lopez acres of space to work in. 

Within two minutes of that change from Betis Lopez received the ball sucked in the Betis centre-back and played in our poacher to seal the game.

This is why I think making your own XG chain is important to understand what your AP is doing.

 

 

[Titanium Steel]

8 minutes ago, Dr Naysay said:

So I set up a tactic similar to yours with some changes to roles in La Liga and we played Betis(We are Zaragoza) they played a 4231 with two deep midfielders and it was palpable watching the game how their two DM's were robbing the space from our AP(Lopez). He however was instrumental in the first goal which harks back to my last point in my previous point.

I was a bit annoyed to be honest that he missed Aguados run(whose a DM role I changed) because Aguado got beyond his marker and was clean through if Lopez had passed through that seam but he passed out to the Fullback Nieto who was in acres of free space and Nieto put a cross in to the striker that scored. Adding the roam from position PI allowed Lopez to drop in to pockets of space through that first 70 minutes.

As time was ticking away Betis did something that played right in to our hands which was changing to a flat 442. This suddenly gave Lopez acres of space to work in. 

Within two minutes of that change from Betis Lopez received the ball sucked in the Betis centre-back and played in our poacher to seal the game.

This is why I think making your own XG chain is important to understand what your AP is doing.

 

 

Really shows how space is so important for playmakers.

Sorry if this a bit of a noob question, but how do you see that xG chain and also get that map view instead of a view of the game?

[Dr Naysay]

56 minutes ago, Titanium Steel said:

Really shows how space is so important for playmakers.

Sorry if this a bit of a noob question, but how do you see that xG chain and also get that map view instead of a view of the game?

In the game analysis section after the game has finished, click on the cross or pass that led to the goal and hit the "show linked event"

So I played Betis again in the same fixture but moved the playmaker out wide and then instructed the team to create an overload that side in order to give him some help, the AM is now an Attacking Midfielder duty. This shows that there is no need to change formation, but changing the positioning of the playmaker can be crucial

This is exactly what you want to see if the opposition is trying to block the middle, yoyr AP in plenty of space, even if it's out wide.

This was the first goal but you can see if you put a playmaker with attributes like yours in to space and with a overload he can do some pretty great things.

Anyway, sorry to harp on about this.

 

[Titanium Steel]

54 minutes ago, Dr Naysay said:

Anyway, sorry to harp on about this.

 

Don't worry, you're 100% not harping on, I appreciate and take into account every piece of advice I see, so you're helping me a lot by giving me some of your own data. I'm still new to this game so I don't really know the tactics fully, yet.

 

56 minutes ago, Dr Naysay said:

In the game analysis section after the game has finished, click on the cross or pass that led to the goal and hit the "show linked event"

So I played Betis again in the same fixture but moved the playmaker out wide and then instructed the team to create an overload that side in order to give him some help, the AM is now an Attacking Midfielder duty. This shows that there is no need to change formation, but changing the positioning of the playmaker can be crucial

This is exactly what you want to see if the opposition is trying to block the middle, yoyr AP in plenty of space, even if it's out wide.

This was the first goal but you can see if you put a playmaker with attributes like yours in to space and with a overload he can do some pretty great things.

 

 

Nice thing to know if the opponent has a strong plug on the middle. My AP is two-footed, so he wouldn't have any issues with going wide on either side. But I do wonder how you would "overload" a specific side? Is it turning on "Focus Play Down The Right" and "Overlap Right" in the TI?

 

[Jr35]

11 saat önce, Titanium Steel said:

But I do wonder how you would "overload" a specific side?

that is exactly what im thinking about after watching the Mustermann's attacking width video on YouTube. at the and of the video he made 2 examples, one is overloading the flank and the other is isolating a player for one-on-one at the flank. then i tought i should try to do that both at the same time and i created a tactic* like this.

 

i had a short opportunity to test this tactic, and I saw that it worked fairly well, but it still needs some tweaks imo.

so i'm here to listen your advice for overloading on one flank while isolating the other.

 

*i tell my GK to distribute to CD for retain possession with short simple passes. WB(d)'s mentality is increased to balanced by focus play down the right instruction**

PI's; hold up ball to IW, sit narrower to WB(d) & stay wider to BPD. also my LW is off-footed 

**i think that despite his defensive role, his tendencies are make him more aggressive on attack

 

 

Edit: i changed F9 to PF(s) and removed the pass into space

Edited September 22 by Jr35

[Titanium Steel]

Thanks everyone for your help! Now my AP is getting more assists (from 3 assists before to 15 assists after I changed the tactics) and additionally his RPM buddy is assisting him to make assists and making a few good passes himself! On the way to win Ligue 1 unbeaten and agg. 9-2 thrashing of Real Madrid after finding them deep in an injury crisis. The tactics seemed to fail against Monaco who beat me on penalty shootout but to be fair all of their goals were penalties.

I really wanted a creative creator of my own in my tactics as a love letter to the classic No. 10, which had many players I admired like Zidane, Pele, and Maradona. It's a shame it was less effective when played the traditional way, but just a bit of adapting it to today's tactics managed to revive the position to its glory days.

[Dr Naysay]

I am glad the changes you made helped him assist more. Unfortunately those number 10(like Riquelme) days are mostly gone.

In FM so many teams are using one or two man DM formations that a creative number ten rarely has the the time/space to thrive so you end up having to use a role that essentially acts like a number two striker to get something out of them.

I personally don't use playmakers anywhere on the pitch now because they act as a magnet for the ball, I prefer to use generic roles and let my most creative player have some some more freedom on the pitch.

[Titanium Steel]

Final update, just to share some experiences and ideas with everyone...

I've modified and perfected the tactics, until it looks like this. I decided to completely move away from an AP and start using a Mezzala on both sides of the midfield since I discovered my RPM was also very good at creating chances, so I basically had two creative masterminds in my squad. In the middle is a BWM, whom I set to Defend duty so that he can pass it to one of the MEZs right after getting the ball.

I changed my AF to a CF because he was much more dangerous that way, sacrificing scoring one goal for himself to help his IWs score two.

The tactic didn't really give as much of a gigantic boost as last time, but it did improve the amount of key passes I was seeing. I was able to beat Inter Milan to go through to the semi finals of the UCL.

[dazza11]

Be interested to see your team instructions as I ran with almost identical set up but found oppositions 10 got way too much room. Best way I found to negate it was to play a libero and a midblock to condense the space but every now and again defensively I’d get taken apart and reverted to a more standard 433 with a dm