Cleon

I'm kinda bored today so I have just started a new game on FM and thought id give this another whirl. I don't know how far I will get in game terms but hopefully it will be long enough to get a stable version of this up and running.

Anyone else fancy giving it ago? I have started a new game with Liverpool as I have morealess a squad capable of playing this way. The other option was Arsenal but I like the depth Liverpool have more.

The W-M formation was invented by the great Arsenal manager Herbert Chapman in response to the change in the off-side law in 1925. Following the change, whereby a player was offside if only one (rather than two) players stand between him and goal, there was a glut of goals as forwards took full advantage. The Arsenal inside-forward Charlie Buchan suggested to his manager that the centre-half be withdrawn into the centre of defence as a 'stopper': a player whose only role was to prevent opponents from scoring. To make up for the loss of the creative centre-half, one of the inside forwards would play in midfield. This modification of the Pyramid formation has been termed the 'third-back game'. Chapman ultimately accepted this proposal but continued to develop the system, so that both inside-forwards would drop back to form a midfield quadrangle with the two wing-halves; the fullbacks would pivot around the new central defender and mark the opposing wingers. The new formation looked on paper like the players formed a W-shape over an M-shape, like this:

http://www.football-librarian.com/Formations.htm#W-M

Arsenal had great success with this formation, and soon most British teams began to play it themselves throughout the 30s right until the mid-1960s. The rest of the world was slower to adopt this new tactic. Many international sides began to play this way in the 30s, but Italy, for example did not use what they called 'Sistema' until 1950; Uruguay never adopted it; and Brazil tried unsuccessfully in 1954 and soon changed their minds. Variations on the W-M formation included the inversion of the inside forwards, so that the centre-forward dropped into midfield while the two inside-forwards played up front. This idea was most famously employed by Hungary in the early 1950s.

I'm unsure as to wether use 2 AMC or 2 MC's, I'll need to play a few games first to see which I find most effective for me.

bRAzIL

Sounds good Cleon, will be watching closely. I'd give it a go but I am busy with the WHU challenge.

Good luck.

lyw_85

Many of the tactic here are based on the central striker being a tall and strong target man who is able to head the ball.

Why not make a tactic that keeps the ball on the ground and use fast strikers?

I dun really have any idea of how to keep the ball on the ground.

mitjabarbic

i play similar but i play with 2 strikers 2 wingers and 1 AMC but u can easily put one striker to AMC

Cleon

Right,

I'm going to start off using this shape W-M link and see how it goes in the friendlies. If I find I am not creating enough I will change things. I'm unsure as to what instructions I am going to use yet so I'll get back to you a little later.

lyw_85

I'm not really a fan of a 1 Striker tactic because its hard to find a tall strong striker but I would really like to try a 3 Man defence tactic.
Will give this a go with Derby County.

Hope to see the tactic instructions up soon.
Gk - Lewis Price
DR - Tyrone Mears
DC - Claude Davis
DL - Jay Mcevely
DMC - Andy Todd, Matt Oakley
MC - David Jones, Giles Barnes
FL - Stephen Pearson
FR - Craig Fagan
FC - Steve Howard

Of course the first thing to do is to buy Eddie Johnson

norwichaggy

Cleon, I have played with the defence and DMs like that before. It works great against teams with one man upfront, not so brilliantly against two.

One thing which did help me was to have the RB and LB in the sweeper RB and LB position (not centrally). This meant that the CB closed down and challenged both opposition forwards, but the RB and LB were in better positions to recover if they got past the CB.

neckus

Im gonna go out on a limm (spelling) here. Even though im not good at FM im gonna try your challenge.

Tactic seems hard though as I think I'll need a DRC and a DLC instead of newskool fullbacks. Im thinking about Grygera (pace) or Heitinga (strength) for DRC and Chivu (strength, vision and pace) or Vermaelen (also both) for the DLC position. I think its best to have the dline pull back to avoid big counters.

Inside left and right ... are those like AMLC and AMRC ??

skioks2

is an hard project, but i want to partecipate.

The problams are, the cover at the side of the field and the defende with only 3 defender

lyw_85

Hi Cleon,

I have tried to implement the tactic and have noticed that whenever my team has a goalkick, the MC are so forward that the midfield is empty and the 2 MC are nearly on the same line as the striker.

Would it be better to take away the farrows?