hdsegal

Tried them as Man Utd. After some promising results, I suddenly began leaking goals and could play no higher than the #3 tactic. I may have another go later in the game. Thanks anyway.

retired_HAdvocate

Crazyrap: First of all if it´s your first season with United then you wouldn´t have a worldclass manager rating. So untill then you would mostly play tactic#5 away from home and switching to tactic#4 from time to time (against bottem 3-5 teams) and only using tactic#3 with long farrows when chasing a goal maybe after the first half. If this is not the case and you have worldclass reputation and have a killer squad then I would mostly use tactic#4, and then using tactic#3 against bottem league clubs or chasing a goal(with long farrows). In the last ten minutes of the game I would change to tactic#1 if I need a goal. I´ve tried to use the attacking tactics away from home but it´s way to risky and leak to many goals.

retired_HAdvocate

Just looking at your post again and I hope you don´t have to use tactic#3 on home turf. United first season (with low manager reputation) on home ground should almost always be tactic#2 and changing to tactic#1 if you notice the opponent switching to a 5-4-1 tactic, or another tactic with no farrows and the game clock is just running down with little chances. I play with extended highlights by the way. When you´re pressing further up the pitch it´s always godd to make sure you have a couple of fast defenders.

Nemesis

Loversleaver...I tried your #2 (short Farrow version) and #3 tactics. With Athletic vs Espanyol. At home.

I conceded three goals.

Thank you.

No, lol, I mean it. One was from a badly defended corner (my bad, had a 9 jumping guy in the box and a 18 one outside), and the other two were from Alex (yah, the brazilian AMC, dunno how espanyol bought him!) unstoppable shots from 30m. The tactics have hardly anything to blame for those three goals.

What matters: Espanyol didn't get near the box with both offensive tactics I used. Not nearly. Tamudo got changed with a 5. And I've been struggling with a black-hole-kind of defence for more than one season.

Each time I used #2, I scored. As soon as I was one goal up, I changed to #3. the 4-3 was scored in minute 85, then I changed to #6. They struggled to get to 1/3 inside my pitch.

I used Yeste as playmaker, Fernando Llorente as targetman (mixed balls)

Thanks again, for the first time since I got Athletic, I feel like my defence does what I want them to.

I'll be trying some more variations of the main theme.

Athletic:
GK- Lafuente-7
DR- Morgado-8 (one assist)
DL- Casas-7
DCL- Tarantino-7
DCR- Ocio-7
MC/DMC- Elustondo-7
MC/AMC- Yeste-8 (one assists)
AML - Dañobeitia-7
AMR - Aimar-7
FC - Joseba Llorente-9 (three goals)
FC- Fernando Llorente-8 (one goal, one assist)

(Morgado is 17 Y.O., Aimar 19. they got 8 and 7 respectively)
Final score: Athletic 4 - Espanyol 3

retired_sji4u82

I don´t really use your tactic , I made my own a long time ago , but they might as well be the same , you just wrote down how I play this game better than I could have done.
my tactic looks like a mix of #4 and #5 , I like to counter attack in italy

retired_HAdvocate

R4M: 4-3 tells of all action football although you didn´t mention match stats. Did you notice before the game the match-odds? There´s of course a little difference on how I would have aproached the game; if I was favorite I would have started with tactic#2 with long farrows on wings and then if I score first I would put short farrows on wings crossing from mixed instead of byline. In the second half if things are still going my way I take away the free roles on wingers and give the Forward not Holding on ball the freerole, and maybe changing to tactic#3 in the last 10-15 minutes. If the opponent is playing with attacking wingers (4-3-3, or 4-2-3-1) I would change both fullbacks Forward runs and Running with ball to mixed instead of often. Otherwise the way you played the game is how I would have basically played the match if I were not the favorite. What is your manager reputation? Have you assigned a good Defensive coach and made sure there the are maximum amount of stars available in training?

Nemesis

Don't recall the exact numbers, but I do recall that athletic was favorite by a very very small margin.


I don't really like long Farrows for the wingers unless I'm facing a 3-5-2. Dañobeitia is a pacy winger but has only average skill (dribbling) stats. Aimar, on the other hand, is growing to be a very good player but lacks pace and acceleration. with long Farrows when I'm in possesion they both are very near the opposition fullbacks, and none of them does well in such a situation. One because he can't dribble, and the other because he lacks pace for running after dribbling the FB.

I've tried with both versions of #2, long and short farrows,and both wingers tend to get more involved in the game with short ones. Of course if I need the most offensive approach because of how the game goes, I turn the long Farrows on.



National. Second season in Athletic, first one I was predicted to be around 10th, I finished 9th. Had an outragious start of season, truth to be told, and I consistently conceded loads of goals (52 in 38 matches ). However a quite good last third of season got me up to 9th.

BTW after that match I've played several more. I still concede a hell of a load of goals. Average of 2 per match, and this time my defence stats seems solid enough, I was hoping for conceding much less goals (in the first season all my DCs were lacking in the air and that hurted a lot...most goals conceded were from headers).

Is the first thing I do whenever I start a game. Defence has a four star training rating and I use one coach for backup (so there is no big workload in any discipline).

All the rest disciplines have four or five star ratings too. It's the best I could achieve going for reasonably priced coaches to hire.

retired_HAdvocate

R4M: Athletic as in Bilbao? So can you only get Basque players am I correct? Definatly you have weak defenders and it may take a while for you to get really good defenders. They might appear good but there are players who really do the job whilst others will take a lot of adapting to do. My guess is that it will take some seasons before your defense tightens up, especially with a 17 year old. Usally I concede 0.5-0.8 but thats when I have the right players. To bad with your team you can´t use any of those players mentioned in Good Buys Shortlist because they always do the job (not right away but when they mould into the team).
How´s you home/away record? How do you play your games away from home?

Nemesis

Yes, I'm Barcelona fan but I was born in Bilbao and I also cheer for Athletic.

The current defensive lineup I use is:

Casas-Tarantino-Ocio-Iraola

Morgado is first option if any of both fullbacks can't play, as I am training him for DL over his DR status. He's developing really really fast (in defensive skills he's got to similar levels to those of Casas, and he's just 17 atm)

They aren't the best defenders in FM but with their stats they should get the job done. Elustondo is my MC-DMC of choice, good all around DMC and also pretty young. Orbaiz has best attacking skills but Elustondo is better for defensive MC roles.

All in all I think I shouldn't be conceding so many goals, but I indeed am.

The tactics of choice when I'm away are #5 and #6 against a similar or better team, #3 (with some adjustements to make it a bit more defensive and with CA on) against worse teams than Athletic.

The current list of results since I'm working with your tactics (of course with small adjustements to accomodate for the players' abilities) is as follows:

Athletic-Espanyol: won 4-3
Xerez-Athletic: won 0-1
Athletic-Sevilla: draw 1-1
Elche-Athletic: lose 3-2 (This one annoyed the heck outta me. Was winning 2-1 and they scored twice in four minutes, between 80 and 84. Elche is doing a hell of a start of season,though, they're 6th in the table)

and

Athletic-Mallorca: agonic win 3-2. Here I started losing 0-1. Drawed 1-1 in 44'. Scored again in 60' for 2-1. Mallorca drawed 2-2 in '83. I used #1 tactics with team mentality of 20 (all out attack) and defence completely pushed up (offside on of course). I scored in minute 93 when I thought the draw was definitive.

I'm conceding way too many goals. Currently 5th in La Liga after six matches (first league match was 1-1 vs Atletico madrid, away, with my previous 4-1-2-1 tactics). 12 goals scored for 10 against. It's simply too much for comfort...

any advice will be more than helpful.

Nemesis

Little clarification here. I used the all out attack with defence completely up AFTER Mallorca scored the 2-2. Before I was using a mix of #2 and #3 as I usually do in home matches against teams of my, or lower, level.