retired_Mango Smoothie

Right. I'm currently in 2016/2017 season, in my San Marino game. For the past 5 seasons, I've been in Serie A, with 3 3rd place finishes and 1 2nd place finish in the league for the past 4 seasons.

This season however, things have fallen apart a bit. Current league table:
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">TeamP W D L GF GAMilan24 18 1 5 51 22Roma 24 16 4 4 53 21Palermo23 15 4 4 35 13Inter22 12 5 5 34 17San Mar24 12 5 7 41 27 </pre>

While goals scored is not too bad, goals conceded is. I can't say the goals we score aren't the important ones: I win a few games by two goals and only have one 4-1 win. So I think the conceding is the problem.

I've tried to do something about my defender situation, my last two big purchases were both DCs (valued around 10-14M, bought for around 25M; one bought last season, one this winter)

Who can help me diagnose what's wrong with my team?

Formation is currently 4132.
At DL plays a D/DM RLC
At DR plays a D/M R
At DC play my two DCs
DM plays a DMC
The 3 midfielders are AMCL, AMC, AM/S RC
Up front I have a SC and a AM/F RC

Tactics: Normal mentality, short passing, normal tackling. Pressing. Experimenting with offside. No counter, no men behind ball. No playmaker.

Players are on the young side. Of the regular starters, maybe two 25+.

Any suggestions? What should I pay attention to in game commentary or statistics? What kind of information do you need extra for a good diagnosis?

retired_niquila

I also play 4-1-3-2 but appear to be sound defensively as i hardly ever concede more than 10 league goals in a season.

Try changing to attacking mentality and direct passing. I would play hard tackling and press in my own half only. If you wish to play offside then zonal marking but I find my side is tighter if I man mark. I set my two central defenders to man marking and my DMC to man marking. I set my two full backs to zonal marking. Usually the three MC's are not set to any marking.

Also you will need to change forward runs as your two full backs may be set to making forward runs. Set this to No. I find that since I done this the goals against tally is vastly reduced.

Essentially you are playing with five players defnding and five players going forward who should bang in the goals.

retired_Mango Smoothie

10 goals conceded per season? Wow...

I think the full backs are having forward runs and run with ball; I might have to play with that, though they are providing quite some assists IIRC.

I have several candidates for DMC. How do you select which one to play? What attributes are key, which ones are good to have and what are your tie-breaking nice-to-haves?

A player with no marking set will not close down if pressing is set to "yes", right?

retired_niquila

All my DMC's have had good tackling (usually 20). Also though I am looking for good midfield satts like passing etc. Makoun at the start is excellent. Just now I am using two regens alternatively on rotation namely Thomas (French) and Sousa (Brazilian). I will check their stats soon and report back on their attributes.

retired_niquila

Also meant to say don't worry about the full backs. Both my full back still score at least 6-8 goals a season between them. I would be more minded to play Dr/MR rather than a DM though. They usually chip in with 6-8 assists in a season.

If your forward 5 are talented they will carry the bulk of your goals and assists.

My central midfielder easily scores 20 a season playing this way.

retired_Mango Smoothie

A note to tell you I had a pretty good end of the season. 11 wins and 3 losses in the last 14 matches of the season. 30 goals scored, 15 goals against.

To be serious, I thought I would end up 4th, but Inter lost against Juve on the last day! Here's the table:

<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">TeamP W D L GF GA GD PtRoma38 27 6 5 79 29 +50 87Milan38 28 2 8 79 29 +50 86San Mar38 23 5 10 71 42 +29 74Inter38 22 7 9 56 30 +26 73Palermo38 20 8 10 48 29 +19 68</pre>

The only thing I changed since posting here were turning offside to No and resetting some marking instructions (zonal on the fullbacks, man mark on centrebacks and DM; one of my strikers and my two wider AMs are on zonal. Pressing set to yes); attacking mentality.

Suddenly, the DM is (changed nothing for him) is playing very well, scoring 8s mostly and some 7s, while previously he (and his subs) seemed a bit shoddy.

Looking at the tables, I have a fairly good home record, but a bad away record. 49 points (+28 GD) in home games, 25 (+1 GD) in away games.

I'm not quite sure how I could have "seen" the telltale signs that this change would be a good solution. But from the commentary, it does seem that most build up offensively go through the DM who then passes the ball onwards to one of the AMs; or a fullback crossing in a ball (they still seem to do this, even without forward runs or run with ball)

Still, my DC positions still are a bit of a worry. They don't seem to be able to get consistent performances, with 5s cropping up regularly, mixed with some good 8s a match later. Don't exactly know what's going on there, but one of the players broke something and is injured for 8 months... Had to play my other DCs there: one is very inconsistent, the other is ok, but is prone to injuries...

retired_Mango Smoothie

Well, four games into the new season, and it's looking good. I still concede too many goals I think (1 every match), but score so many goals that it doesn't matter yet (4 games played, 15 goals scored). I even gave my nemesis from last year Inter a good smacking, resulting in 1-3 at San Siro.

My new DMC is having a good start of the season already. I also had a cheap but good DC added to my roster, but he got injured before the season even started properly! I really have bad luck with my defenders.

What are the telltale signs I should look out for to see if my defence is too weak? 1 goal per match conceded is not good enough I think, so I need to see if it's a fluke-ish period or something structural.

retired_Mango Smoothie

Update: despite a rather dramatic end season slump where San Marino threw away a 10 point lead, we did gain the Serie A title.

The final match day, San Marino had a 1 point lead, lost 0-3 to Lazio; to my amazement, Roma only drew, so we ended on equal points: having a better goal difference, I took the title!

By the way, I'm still conceding a bit more goals than Roma and Milan, but not as bad as last season. Fortunately, my first three quarters of the season were great, scoring lots more goals than the opposition! *whew*

retired_niquila

TeeWee

I'm not in the office so much just now and will try and post more detailed information regarding my tactics and defensive solidity.

I have just finished season 2018/2019 (i think) playing as Rangers. I went undefeated all season and won all domestic trophies as well as the European Super Cup and the Champions League.

In total I scored 169 goals and conceded 26 over all competitions!!!

retired_brotwoman

Dont undetstand??

Where is pressing in your own half? cant see that option??