[Which midfielder to use for wingback cover?]

carrilero 100%, it is basically the Jordan Henderson shuttler role

[FM20 Tactics : NBL 4-1-5 Attacking Football]

have you changed it at all?

[FM20 Tactics : NBL 4-1-5 Attacking Football]

any updates on this tactic?

[Manchester City Pep Guardiola Analysis and Tactical Recreation]

More!

[Manchester City Pep Guardiola Analysis and Tactical Recreation]

12 hours ago, extudassex2 said:

First of all I want to say thank you so much for this great thread! Lots of information, detail and food for thought.

 

Just wanted to share my two cents.. some context, I'm finishing my 2nd season playing with Porto, so expecting to win the League but far from a contender in Champions League. Also, it's a very youth orientated save so lots of homegrown kids playing. I was playing a strikerless 4-1DM-2W-3AMC but with some similar principles: 2-3-5 shape on attack, exploring the half-spaces, maximum width, short passing but wasn't as possession-biased as a Pep's team. After getting knocked out of CL by PSG and with 7 leagues to play I decided to give a shoot and try to somewhat recreate this style given since the start I focused on developing my players on the mental side (anticipation, composure, decisions, teamwork, vision).

So this is my setup right now:

 

 

No far off from yours, but some notes. 

• Really like the IWs (stay wider and get further forward) as they are keeping the width until very late in the move;
• CMa was a recent change as I felt the Mez (a) was a bit too wide. Maybe both play a bit too deep in the 1st build up phase but I'm worried that play 2 AMs cause a lot of distance between the 2-3 and the 5.
• IWBs because I think on attack they take the space of CM and SS (I'm even considering making at least one defend duty to try attract opposition midfielders and open even more spaces for the CM to explore)
• Regarding TI, I went with extremely wide to really stretch opposition, despite potentially conflicting with much shorter passing but with so many players in the half spaces they aren't too far apart.
• Now the bit that I think takes this to another level: underlap. It really helps regards CM/AM exploring that FB-CB space. 

Just a couple of examples from my last game. 2-3-5 perfectly defined, maybe #50 should be even wider but I'm ok with that. See #6 making the run into that half-space and #72 actually plays a perfect through ball to him.

#34 with a ton of space ahead of him, makes the run and our DLP plays it. This also shows my preference for the support duty on the IWB as he gives more room to our CM operate and draws the the attention of opponent #23. This result in a really nice goal after a quick 1-2 between #34 and #30 (F9) before releasing #7 clear on goal.

I also think that the difference in individual mentality between CM/AM (very attacking) and the front 3 (Balanced) plays a part into this. And that's the reason I gone with IW on support and manually added Get further forward thank choose an attack duty which increases their mentality to Attacking (with underlap) or Very Attacking (without).

 

Also another thing that I'm very interested in is changing a couple the build up setup depending on the opposition formation. For example, against Braga's 4-2-3-1 I was having trouble playing out of the back because their ST and AM closed down hard on my CB's, their wingers cut the passing lane to my IWB and my DLP just couldn't get the ball. So I changed DLP -> HB inverting our 2-3 to a 3-2 and suddenly we bypass their press with ease. That detail really got me thinking about the possible changes we can make keeping the same formation and general principles.

Didn't mean to hijack your thread and got a little carried away but would love to your (and the other members) view on that!

Who would you say were your main goal threats in this formation?

[Playing On The Edge: Dominating Possession with only one CB]

On 14/02/2021 at 23:10, crusadertsar said:

So it's the last few games of the 2022-2023 season. And we just had another dismantling of Barcelona. 4-1 this time. Again not even close. We simply dominated them. We are sitting comfortably in 5th position and there are three more games left against more inferior opposition so finishing 4th and getting Champions League football next season is still a possibility. 

I would like to use this post to bring attention to what I believe is one of the best aspects of the game. Its also why I think more "unusual" tactics like my 3-4-3 get better over time, the deeper you get into your game. That is once the "newgen" players start showing up.

I have played three years into my Real Sociedad save and while a lot of the well-known "real" players are still dominating headlines, there have been some surprising changes. As is to be expected in any Football Manager game that allows the possibility of alternate football worlds. In my game Real Madrid has become an absolute goal-scoring powerhouse. Which is to be expected as they managed to amass some great attacking talent. In addition to their own superstars Vinicius Junior and aging Hazard and Benzema (joining Lille this summer) they now have Salah, Bernardo Silva, Icardi and Anthony Martial. 

Playing their 4-3-3 DM formation, they manage to score the most goals this season with 114 (next closest was Barca with 97 and then us with 71) while Martial netted 38 of those. Real Madrid also won the league three seasons in a row since I started this game. So its not surprising that to date the best we could manage against them is getting one tie. They are just on another level from Barca. But we are getting closer and we have youth of our side. 

What made our Barcelona victory even more special is that we had 5 young "newgen" players in our First Team squad. Three of the five being homegrown Basque youth that came from our own Academy/Cantera.  

So what makes these young players so special and why are they going to be key in this tactic?

Would you be able to drop a link to this tactic - so we can have all the instructions you use.