Strikerless Advice

[CaptiveBridge]

Introduction
Hi. I think this may be my first ever thread created, so forgive me if it seems a bit undirected. The main thing I would like is opinions on how to breakdown or negate my tactic. If I know where it falters, I can think of workarounds when the need arises. I've seen a fair bit during my play that cause me a few issues - namely 4-4-2 Narrow Diamonds, overlapping fullbacks, etc and I've had to react to those situations. So it's not that I'm without tactical knowledge, would just want to open my ideas to criticisms (constructive on-topic criticisms). I'm managing 1860 Munich in March 2017 pushing for promotion to the Bundesliga. This is my first FM16 save, so I'm still learning the new stuff.

Tactical Philosophy
If I were to describe my tactical outlook, it'd have three tenets:

• Positioning - as a unit to push the opposition back so our average field positioning is higher up the pitch.
• Width - maintaining lateral width to increase playing surface and the zones in which the team pressures the opposition back up the pitch.
• Balance - to unbalance the opponents defensively by layering quick attacks and offensively by having the ball spend more time in areas where I cannot be directly hurt.

This, to me, translates to a high tempo, wide, high block tactic which combines the positional work of possession tactics and counterpress.

The Formation
View attachment 170839
I did mention that it's Strikerless, right? So the initial basis for the formation came out of the Shadow Striker Domination tactic by mcconnor8, Guido's website, and the Passion4FM website as well. That coupled with how I wanted to play led me to settle upon the 4-1-2-3-0 you see above.
View attachment 170856

Nothing special with player instructions with the exception of the GK, CBs, and AMCL/AMCR.

The CBs Close Down Much Less which prevents them from being to aggressive in the press. I value my CBs being in the right position, anticipating plays, and working to crowd out strikers rather than making that killer tackle. I view them as covering defenders that don't break my offside trap. They're not aggressive in the press so as to ensure that I can maintain an overload in the defensive phases, if we're pushed back I don't want my CB getting a rush of blood to the head and selling himself and as such a goal for a low, low price. If the DM line has not been breached, they should have no need to close down the ball.

The GK is set to distribute to defenders (CBs or FBs depending on opposition), take short kicks which sorta feels like the keeper equivalent to dictate tempo, and pass shorter. Eicher is slow, the slowest of the starting eleven, and he is slow. Great, by league standards, shot stopper, but I feel I could bake a cake faster than he could do a lap around the Allianz Arena. His pace is rarely caught out though as the attacking mids do a fair bit of cover for him - more on that in a bit.

Full backs are primarily for width, they both taker fewer risky passes as I want the primary impetus to be the attacking mids movements. Rather than a rushed or risky cross/through ball, give it to the DM-CM trio. That way I have less folks to be irritated at when they make a mistake on the ball. The CWBa and WBs roles are interchanged to exploit weakness or if the other wide defender needs a bit of break from all that running up and down with the ball, into space for a pass, pressing the opponent, etc. I get tired just thinking about how much Kovac and Schindler run on the right.

The DM-CM trio were originally played as DLPd (DM) - APa (MCL) - DLPs (MCR), so the MCL was made into a CMa to add a bit more directness to the attack. After all when an AM makes space, if someone is not attacking that space it's a bit of a waste. The roles are really more to bring a bit of patience and possession to the play while allowing other players more time to drift and find space. The DLPd and DLPs also place more importance on positioning so they can help snuff out transitions. For me they record the highest tackle attempts out of the entire team.

The AM trio is the real heartbeat of the team and what allows me to get my tenets met. The three of them, along with the high block and high press, allow me to push the opposing team back by causing an opposing MC, or two, to be withdrawn to help cover the defence. This allows everyone else to push higher up safer. By congesting and creating overloads in the middle, the opposing full backs have to sit narrower, which causes wingers to sit narrower as well because the MCs are withdrawn. The opponent narrows so we get to keep possession by playing it out wide to a WB and having them recycle possession through the DM-CM trio. They create an imbalance for the opponents as the centre gets crowded so there's less space and time for them to work the ball upwards. The AMs with the high block force opponents long, wide, or back. With the stress on positional play by defensive players, most long balls are either offsides or intercepted. With the AMs work rates, I rarely have long balls which force Eicher to have to speed off his line as the passers are hassled into bad passes.

View attachment 170857

The AMCL/AMCR is set up as above. I wanted them to create like playmakers but still work in the counter press. They're currently set up as Pacey - Target - Creator. The pacey AM creates more by using his speed to capitalise on gaps. The target is sorta like a DLF converted to Shadow Striker. The creator is the guy who you'd look at and say "you make a good Trequartista" with decent stamina and work rate or the winger turned AM I really didn't want to sell just in case in the future I need a traditional winger.

I hope that was sufficient enough of an explanation, feel free to ask more about the setup.

Issues
Like I said, the main thing is to have an idea of how one would break this down or potential flaws that could be capitalised upon. I currently have three that I see from time to time: set pieces, overlapping opposing fullbacks, and opposing AMCs. I've read enough of WJ's (a scholar and a gentleman, that one) comments to accept that I will not be making broad changes to my setup.

Set pieces are a bit irrelevant of a discussion here, as they're sorta the special teams situation of football (I made an Am. football reference in a football discussion, I should Pat(riots) myself on the back - I'll stop now). I'm more concerned about the transition from set pieces to the overall tactical scheme than I am about scoring/conceding from a set piece. Naive? Possibly, but that's my stance at the moment.

Overlapping fullbacks caused me some grief in a game against Ingolstadt and it was my first, "wow, this AI manager just made a radical shift in tactic to equlaise. Go SI!" Down by a goal, playing a 4-1-2-3 DM Wide, he put both fullbacks on an attacking duty to overload my wings. Now my go to reaction is to have my AMCL/AMCR man mark the respective full back if I even have a sniff of an attacking fullback being deployed. While it hasn't happened often since, I notice that the team does get more compact vertically when the AMCL/AMCR is man marking wide defenders. Could be wrong, could be a coincidence as it really hasn't happened often enough for the observation to be significant.

AMCs have always been a bane for me since FM 09, (I was in the US when I started playing it, so I was on Worldwide Soccer Manager 09 and I was so sad when I thought WSM 10 didn't exist - another story for another time) especially in a two striker system. I like numerical overloads in defence and considering how wide we play, not having that extra body can be detrimental at times. I man mark the AMC with DM, which is fine when they're them static enganches - however when they move around my DM is now taken out of the picture in transitions so I feel the need to change my two CMs to a more consevative holder/runner like a APa - DLPd or CMs - DLPd. I want to prevent transitions to attack for the opponent, so I feel like I need covering players higher up the pitch to accommodate my DM going on a 90 minute long date with their AMC. This leaves me a bit more blunt in offence, but I really feel it's necessary if they're AMC is Mr I'll-Tear-You-To-Shreds-If-I-Have-Space-Against-A-High-Line. ANy other thoughts on how to deal with an AMC?

Lastly, I can see promotion changing the game. I've never managed in Germany before so I have little idea of how to handle the top German teams as a team battling to stay in the division. So tis on things I may face there would also be appreciated.

Thanks for reading!


(PS what is a trackback? What's the proper etiquette for crediting someone else' work?)

 

[WJ]

Good post overall and I felt the need to reply to it, but I don't think I can offer anything particularly constructive. Hopefully Guido pops in as he's the strikerless guru. The most I've done is have a similarly aggressive strikerless system that Guido reviewed on his blog for FM14 I think it was.

Set-pieces account for around 7% of goals IRL, so as long as you make that up with a great tactical setup, it shouldn't hurt you too much. Might still be worth fiddling with (I don't know your players) to find something that takes advantage of their strengths.

You seem to have a handle on overlapping fullbacks as well. They can be very dangerous, as you well know, if you're getting into 1 v 2 situations against them. The important thing is to not ignore it. Man-marking is one way of dealing with them.

As for the roaming AMCs, I suppose it depends on the opposition setup. Drifting wide means drifting away from goal, so you can let your DM hold is position and let the fullback deal with it. If it's causing you to be in 1 v 2 situations with the drifting AMC and a winger, then man-marking is an option, of course as long as you can deal with whoever tries to exploit the vacancy at DM.

 

[CaptiveBridge]

Set-pieces account for around 7% of goals IRL, so as long as you make that up with a great tactical setup, it shouldn't hurt you too much. Might still be worth fiddling with (I don't know your players) to find something that takes advantage of their strengths.

My set piece frailty comes from some very weird decisions by the players, like all the ones who man-mark (normally my back line) will decide to saunter up the pitch and the ones who should be in the wall drop back to man-mark. So every once in a while I'll have two players trying to mark five and four players just walking up to say hello to the ones staying forward. Sometimes I get an offside call, sometimes I concede, sometimes the two men clear; either way I'm pretty sure that I'm not accounting for something in the ME. And the number of times it happens is few and far between.

As for the roaming AMCs, I suppose it depends on the opposition setup. Drifting wide means drifting away from goal, so you can let your DM hold is position and let the fullback deal with it. If it's causing you to be in 1 v 2 situations with the drifting AMC and a winger, then man-marking is an option, of course as long as you can deal with whoever tries to exploit the vacancy at DM.

I actually tried a similar thing in my games against Werder and Cottbus last night, narrowed the width to Balanced to get the fullbacks more involved against the roaming AMC. It helped more in the latter parts of the game when the opponents are pushing forward to score, ending up with something seemingly ridiculous like all 20 outfield players in a 30-35m band, vertically, in the centre of the pitch. For multiple AMCs would it just be more of the same? Ever came across any opposing managers that work with multiple AMCs?

 

[WJ]

3 AMC players will always outnumber my usual 1 DM. In a case like that, I narrow the width slightly and push up to compress space between the lines. If there is a particular AMC that worries me, he will be tight marked and closed down at minimum.

 

[CaptiveBridge]

Thanks much!

 

[duca015]

I just wanted to note something...

4-1-2-1-2 that you had problems with, as you noted on beginning of your post... This is primarily transition tactic. It works best when you create space out on wide for FB-s by forcing opponent to bring more players to middle. Then they create numbers advantage upfront by 2 strikers, AMC and two CM-s, and two FB-s providing width. Against high line, most usual way to take advantage of this is deep crosses for overlapping AMC or stretching defenses width width... It is similar concept as your formation has because it is hard to defend all 7 players that are attacking you. If you look at it, you have basically same problem with similar setup ( as 4-1-2-3 wide dm has similar back three setup, and similar numbers upfront), only here overlaps to deep crosses will not be made by AMC, but it will be made by his wingers on opposite side of ball.

Both setups give opponent tools to match your numbers in middle and give width to make fast attacks on sides or numerical advantage upfront.

Man marking could be solution, but not always, especially against deep crosses/overlapping runs as I found it works pretty badly in these situations.

I found that best way to deal with this is to cut down supply... I just man mark his main playmakers (FB-s, DM sometimes if he is good passer, and two CM-s. Then they are forced to play more direct balls froward, and most of time you will have at least 3-3 back there, and this is situation when your FB-s are not pushing forward, so you will not have problem to man mark those three players. If you still have issues, just put your RB to more tactically disciplined role and you will not have problem anymore...

 

[CaptiveBridge]

Really appreciate the feedback duca. This post will be a bit wondering as there was a lot of footy played: finished the 2 liga in first, played 13 preseason games, 10 bundesliga games, and a cup match. For now, in the Bundesliga I'm not coming across formations that use an AMC outside of 4-4-1-1. I've made the DM-CM trio a bit more conservative and made the left fullback as aggressive as the right fullback, but lowered both of their closing down PIs. It doesn't lower by much given then Shape/Mentality/TIs, but it does prevent them from closing down the opposing fullbacks if there are also wide attackers and the DM-CM trio end up doing more side to side defensive shuttling. The two CBs are also rather good tactically, so more often than not they catch attackers off and have the acceleration to make up that 10m gap to catch back up to the attacker if he does beat the trap as he has to control the ball. When both me and the opponent congest the middle, the balls over the top are really high arced so when the offside trap is beaten the attacker loses time trying to control. On average, a "cross from deep" means the opposing team is sending their crosses from their own half due to how far back we push them. Even in games where we don't have much of the ball, the ball still spends the least amount of time in our half. And as my two preferred DMs mature, I've noticed a lot of my issues with keeping an AMC quiet came down to the player not having the work rate to track back. For teams with marauding fullbacks, like Bayern, I've worked on a 4-4-2-0 Counter where I actively encourage them down the flanks but have disciplined players positionally to force them into back passes up their flank. There's a fair bit of luck in the results but it led me to 1-0 over Leverkusen and a 4-0 over Bayern. Played Bayern 9 games in and they only had 1 win, 3 draws, and 4 losses for their efforts so I thanked my lucky stars and saved immediately. As for the preferred tactic, I've lost three games and all three were set pieces so I've had to take a break and really look at set pieces. 4-1 loss to Schalke. A goal from a corner, two from freekicks, and one as a result of the high line (tackle in midfield sent the ball whizzing back to our goal, opposing striker gets to it and while under pressure from the CB and with the angle against him smashes one in for the opener). 3-1 loss to Hamburg, Two from a corner and one from a freekick. 2-0 to Dortmund, one from a corner and one from a penalty that came out of a freekick. I've conceded 10 goals, with only two from open play. Just realised that none of the set piece goals were conceded with the 4-4-2-0 so I'll have to compare the personnel and layout to see what the major differences are.

 

[duca015]

I've made the DM-CM trio a bit more conservative and made the left fullback as aggressive as the right fullback, but lowered both of their closing down PIs. It doesn't lower by much given then Shape/Mentality/TIs, but it does prevent them from closing down the opposing fullbacks if there are also wide attackers and the DM-CM trio end up doing more side to side defensive shuttling.

Yeah, it can be solution as well, although, one I do not like to use as much, as I am usually playing with lesser teams that lack mental awareness or work rate to do it properly, and I end up backed up on my half, which is not situation I like to find myself in...

 

[CaptiveBridge]

Yeah, it can be solution as well, although, one I do not like to use as much, as I am usually playing with lesser teams that lack mental awareness or work rate to do it properly, and I end up backed up on my half, which is not situation I like to find myself in...

Being a more "Fits Players into Preferred Tactic" sorta manager, mental attributes are something I've had to constantly focus on over the years of playing FM. Playing as 1860, I had the benefit of my central core and AMCs being filled with either runners or the strong mental types. Downside is that technically, they're horrid and they mainly get results through repetition.

Anyhow, I've ended my 1860 save because I got uber patriotic when I saw a db edit for Jamaica. Plus side being that with lesser quality players I have to refine the basics of my tactical setups more.