prakimus88

Alright, I'm not sure if this has been done before but I'd like to help others and expand my own FM tactical knowledge through a detailed analysis of a match which can hopefully shed some light on how to dissect what's wrong with a tactic, be it over the course of a season or in a match, and get the alterations right without innane guesswork.

As such, I hope all discussion in this thread can be civil and productive and that all suggestions are made with analysis and justification (not just, try using a targetman, it should be why with evidence from the match).

So the game i'd like to use is a game I just finished between two comparable class teams; Atletico Madrid (me) and Lyon in the champions league.

Background Note that this is only given as an indication of how and why the squad has/should be performing (you can omit it).
This is early season two on a game with atletico madrid. Season 1 i won the cup and league in a photo finish against real madrid and barcelona (with valencia close behind). The key players were Sergio Aguero (35 league goals), Maxi Rodriguez (captain and match winning performances), Leo Franco (consistent season as GK), and my CB pair of Pablo and Colocinni. The other key was depth in the midfield with players who could easily cover a lot of positions (Simao, Reyes, Luis Garcia). The signings made last season were Colocinni, Javi Martinez (Athletic Club) and Rafael Van der Vaart, Martinez was injured most of the year, while the other two were key first team players (although Van der Vaart was disappointing). Flamini was signed on loan from Arsenal in January and became the 1st choice for DM. Since last season I have flogged off a couple of squad players (Cieber Santana, Thiago Motta, Valera) as well as being forced to sell Reyes due to him being unsettled and serious financial troubles (ironically enough, he was sold to Lyon for 30mil). Adding to the squad, I have brought in Gyan from Udinese, D'Allesandro from Zaragoza as my left-wing replacement for reyes (although he is a different player) and Cassani as a new RB, although he has been injured so far and is yet to start. Signed on free transfers were Flamini (on loan from last season) as well as Gorlitz as RB from Bayern, and Edmilson from Barca, the last two in particular just to add to squad depth.

Gyan has settled well as an explosive striker very similar to aguero, and has scored 8 goals from 9 matches, D'Alessandro has been a regular starter and has been okay (a few assists, no MOTM or goals).

So far this season, the form has been okay and a bit patchy in places (not quite up to last years standards). We just overcame Athletic in the Super Cup and since then are sitting in 4th place, 6 points off an undefeated Real Madrid. Key results have been a league season opener loss 3-6 to Sevilla away followed by a 3-2 win against barca at home.

Match Lead Up
Following a string of 6 wins (including wins against Steau and PSV in my two ECC games so far), I lost 2-1 away to almeira, beat Getafe 3-0 at home and then drew against betis 1-1 in the lead up to this game. Morale in the squad is great, with most on Superb, a couple of V.Good and one or two on Good. In terms of injury, Cassani is yet to play, Seiteraids was out for this game and Maxi Rodriguez was just recovering from an injury and so he wasn't in good enough condition to use (I have tough away game against Villareal and the real madrid as the next two). No player has been in standout form and no one particularly bad.

Knowing I had some tough games coming up (and i'm fairly confident of qualifying from my home games in ECC), the squad i opted for this match was:
GK: Franco
DEF: R: Gorlitz C: Coloccini C: Pablo L: Antonio Lopez
MID: DM: Flamini R: Simao L: Luis Garcia AM: Van der Vaart
FOR: S: Gyan S: Forlan
BENCH: Bernabe (GK) Perea (DEF) Pernia (DEF) Martinez (MID) D'Alessandro (MID) Raul Garcia (MID) Aguero (ATT)
Due to injuries and for resting purposes, my midfield was a little weak (on the R and DM), RB gorlitz was largely untried and a key change was that Aguero was on the bench. Everyone on the bench was match fit and had a good level of recent game-time (except Bernabe).

With regards to Lyon, they were in 6th place but this was due to the inconsistency in the number of games played in the French Ligue (they were only 3 points off the pace with a game in hand), there recent form was a long string of five draws, a loss to St.Etienne and then two good wins. There squad was full strength bar injuries to Milan Baros (4th string striker) Grosso (2nd best LB) and their backup keeper (didn't matter in the game). They put forward their best XI on the day.

The key things i picked up about the team were the incredibly solid CB pairing of Cris and Squillaci, decent attacking fullbacks. They had an extremely strong attacking midfield in Reyes, Keita, Kallstrom and Toulalan and world class pacey attack in Benzema and Fred. They were a top quality team which was probably a little higher standard than mine.

Tactics
Alright so this is the important stuff. Lyon were playing a fairly conventional 442, but i won't comment on the actual tactics as i'd like to here what other people think about it.

On my side, my tactic was a fairly defensive, controlling 442 with very attacking midfielders, a diamond midfield and very defensive CBs. Counter-attacking is on and where i score a lot of my goals on. One of the more unique aspects (i think) is that i play with narrow width but passing down the flanks, this seems to allow me to use the talent of my strikers to run onto the ball and take on the keeper. My wingers are also able to play as a more midfielder role.
Otherwise I'll let the tactic speak for itself:
Atletico MkIV
This is a tactic i've been developing steadily since the release of FM08 with a fair amount of success. I was able to dominate with Roma, become a contender with Napoli and then of course, win the double last year with Atletico. I've been growing the tactic over that time, making tweaks from my results, letting them settle and then moving on. However the tactic was almost unchanged for most of last year as it was so successful (there was no team i couldn't compete with). This year, I've been trying to vary it up a bit after a series of poor performances at the end of last season (that almost lost me the title) and the start of this one (despite some wins). The majority of the defensive slow tempo nature of the tactic is a new addition from early this season, attempting to keep more possession and deal with the "reputation based reranking". Very recently, i've been tweaking the AMC role to get more out of Van der Vaart (who has been average and very disappointing compared to how well he was doing for me prepatch). As such, I've made him playmakers, reduced his creativity and given him a lot more attacking mentality.


Well that's enough about the match, here's the match as it happened, i'll post what i thought of the result and the changes i made during the game shortly but i'd love to hear what everyone else thinks.

ECL: Lyon VS Atletico

prakimus88

Alright my thoughts on the match:
I think the game was a fairly close one, which was bogged down a lot in the midfield area with a lot of poor long passing and intercepts being made. While my match report said Lyon grabbed a deserved win, i that for large periods the game was very even although Lyon did deserve the result.

Key changes made throughout the game:
Although he crossed into Gyan at the start of the game, Forlan wasn't doing anything as a striker during the game. He was outpaced by the CBs and just couldn't produce any real chances. when he took a knock in the first half (nothing serious), i decided it was time to replace him with aguero, who had a bit more luck.

I noticed early on that Van der Vaart was being very closely marked and basically taken out of the game. This was problematic as he was set to be playmaker as so this was leading to a lot of missed opportunities, particularly where Flamini (the key play starter with 41 passes) would find Van der Vaart but VDV would be in a bad position and unable to do anything, losing the ball quickly. As a result, i turned off his playmaker status and this helped a bit. VDV also seemed to get a bit more space after this, as he played my strikers into good positions a few times. I experienced a bug at the end of the first half where a tactical change made late in the 1st half meant that it didn't allow me to give a team talk for some reason and so i missed the chance to yell at my team (and maybe rouse a heroic performance).

After their third goal when lyon started to really press ahead, i took simao off, who had been a little toothless on the right. D'Alessandro was okay, but didn't really provide anything special; i really could have used the quality of maxi rodriguez on the right.


Comments on the Goals
The goal that put me up at the start of the match was a little fortuitous as it relied on two opposition blunders but showed how important it is to have players with good mental attributes (the anticipation/aggression/whatever to start the play and by luis garcia to win the second ball). The Lyon defense was pretty poor at this point as the marking, particularly on Gyan was woeful.

I think i mistake i made for the game was not to specifically man mark Benzema or Fred with my CBs but just give them tight marking/closing down from opp. instructions. As a result, you can see that Benzema is unmarked as he runs through, starting the play and then finishing it. Flamini was the key one to blame in this situation IMO, I had him on low closing down so that i could keep my form in the middle of the park and stop attackers 1-2ing me all the time. However, here he just let Toulalan run with the ball and set up the cross before running forward and occupying my CB (allowing Benzema to run through), postgame, i'm unsure how to set closing down for my DM.

The second Lyon goal was incredibly fortuitous and very frustrating. It was a stupid goalkeeper blunder which dealt with Reyes's ball in very poorly and left Benzema with an easy tap in (the CB couldn't have done anymore). Again, Flamini's low closing down was a problem as he approaches Reyes and then falls off to return to the position. Gorlitz sat idly back and did very little, but he was out of his depth for most of the game.

My second goal was classic counter-attacking play which showed the strength of two quick strikers. The cleared throw in forced the CBs to track back quickly, they weren't able to handle the ball well and Aguero-Gyan played of each other very well. The final finish was a little luck as it needed the deflection of the CB but it was certainly a straight forward chance. This was one of the few times in the match where the dribbling and attacking talent of my two strikers actually was on show, they were able to completely outplay the defenders.

The final goal of the match, was yet another one which relied on a lucky deflection (this time of gorlitz). However the goal came from good build up play that exposed a poor defensive decision on my part. Off the throw in, my attackers did well to hold their shape and thus force Lyon to push the ball around without going anywhere. However, the key problem was that Reyes wasn't being marked at all and so after pulling my DM off his line to deal with kallstrom, Lyon were free to use their winger who had all the time in the world to put in a cross. Gorlitz took an age to get onto his mark (which was odd as Reyes was also set to tight marking) but the problem was that i had set the Lyon ST to tight marking through opposition marking as opposed to specifically telling my CBs to man mark them, leading to this problem where Gorlitz waited for Pablo to return to his role so that the entire defensive line could shift to the right (by which time it was too late).

General Observations
Although Benzema scored a hat trick and was man of the match, his game was Inzaghi-esque, his only touches of note in the match were those that scored goals. Fred was the more valuable throughout the rest of the game for Lyon and seemed to generate a lot for them, particularly in the second half.

The CBs for both teams were top-notch, despite the scoreline. Pablo and Colocinni both made a lot of fouls for obstruction and the like, but also made an incredible number of key tackles to win the ball and stop goal-scoring chances. For Lyon, i was amazed that Cris and Squillaci were able to keep pace with Aguero and Gyan. The both have close to 10 pace/acceleration/agility while Gyan is 18 for all of them and Aguero is 18/20/17. That was one of the hardest things for me to swallow, as although we didn't have too many shots on target, there were plenty of half chances that the Lyon CBs simply got to first.

VDV was dealt with well, doing very little in the first half, and not being the match winner that his quality suggests in the second. I still don't think i've found the right use for him with this formation.

Simao couldn't generate anything on the right and luis garcia was also pretty average compared to some of the performances he has put in. Flamini was a key player in my attacking build up, playing a Pirlo style role, but the closing down instructions i had given him (v. low) which allowed him to stay in position and start attacks, also prevented him from acting as a ball winner, leading to a couple of goals. I'm not entirely sure how to deal with that problem.

Gorlitz was entirely out of his depth on the right. His passing was ambitious but woeful, he failed to handle reyes on his goal scoring opportunity and provided nothing going up front, i'm hoping this has more to do with a lack of quality than his tactics, as i generally get a lot more out of seiteradis.


Well, those are my thoughts on the match, I feel i've pinpointed all the key issues that the match raised. I'd love to hear what other people think and also what changes i should make tactically to deal with matches like this.

Cheers,
Prakimus

prakimus88

oh and i forgot to mention, at about 75 minutes when it still seemed like i wasn't generating enough attacking play, i switched to a much more attacking approach, with higher team attacking, higher tempo, less time wasting and a bit more width. The result was a few more chances but not nearly enough to make anything against a really solid Lyon defence.