Dr Naysay

Constructing your own tactic will only work if you put the effort in to analyze and implement incremental changes. When constructing a new tactic I will freeze frame games a lot both in attacking and defensive transitions I am looking for my player positioning in both phases, perhaps in an attacking transition we are committing too many players which means we are short defensively when we turn over the ball. There is no point blaming the CBs for a goal because being solid defensively begins at the point of when your team turns the ball over and understanding why your players are turning the ball over and where all the players are positioned when it happens. Every-time my team turns the ball over I make a note, if there is a repeating pattern I try to find out why. Perhaps the striker is dribbling in to blind alleys and getting the ball taken off him repeatedly, or maybe the play-maker is making repeated under-hit passes or dwelling too long on the ball. The fixes to the problems can be very varied, maybe a player has a PPM that doesn't suit what I want from him, maybe the player doesn't have the right attributes so he dribbles a lot but he can't dribble or he has terrible decision making . The fixes will be anything from incremental tactical changes to adding PIs on to certain players or even removing players entirely because they can't do what I need from them. I once took the time to play out someones Wolves save to prove to him that his tactic wasn't broken but he was indeed relying on the wrong players in critical roles(Inverted wingers) who were religiously turning the ball over when they ran in to traffic. All i did was look at every goal he conceded to see the pattern of where the ball was being turned over and why. Adama Traore is one of the dumbest players in the game, he's all instinct and no brains or technical ability, put him on a straight run down the line putting a cross in you will get a tune out of him but you can't expect a guy like him to turn in to the crowded center and do something useful with the ball. Stuff like that is why plug and play won't always work!

I think this is a really important thread to show people how to evolve a tactic without always ripping up and starting again, there's definitely a sweet spot between possession and being effective attacking wise and I like the fact you are showing people how to get to that result.

The HB is one of the most dynamic roles in the game. It all depends who you surround him with and the roles you give those players.

Yes it's a possession hungry tactic but I have had fun creating this one with Valencia. The roles allow me to produce this average shape in possession. And a 4-5-1 outwith possession.

@crusadertsar Did you manage to resolve this as I am in my first save and my scouts are turning up virtually nothing?

Bouillabaisse mon ami, or as the French say Vive le France when in Rome.

It depends on what you're trying to achieve for each role. For instance in previous iterations my two fullbacks were a key part of the attacking phase so I would set up my stats tracking around the attacking elements that I wanted from my fullback. Key passes/90, cross competition%, kms completed per 90(to find players used to covering a lot of ground), dribbles completed per 90 and stuff like that. Then only as a secondary option would I look at defensive stats as a sort of tie breaker. My lone striker is the primary goal scorer who plays as a complete forward so I would be looking at strikers who outperformed xg but who were also relatively comfortable as creators and able to dribble effectively. There is no universal indicator because if I wanted a Target man striker who holds the ball up and play other attackers in I would look at a completely different set of stats.

There is an interesting tidbit from Rashidis positional play video was how he got his Mez(Foden) to be one of the top scorers by using wingers instead if IW or IFs. Makes sense right, you have two wingers stretching the opposition defence and the Mez on attack surging in to that vacated space.

If you ever decide to do a regional save outwith Basque the best place to get all the towns and cities in a region is via the Editor. If you click on a region in the editor it lists them all there and then you are left to create a filter yourself from that list. I love your love for Sociedad, a very technically proficient team.

I really love the effort you put in and I have a soft spot for Marseille so I always love these threads.

I do a lot of those regional type saves where I only buy players from a certain region and I find the best way is to manually take the time to input each city and town where players are born in to a search filter till you have the whole region set up and then Scout the players that show up in that filter. It's very time consuming, but once it's done(normally withing 30 to 40 mins) it makes life easier. With regards to Basque it should be totally easy because you can put the the Basque nationality in and immediately see every player in the region and Scout them individually.