retired_hope

Essiens Goal - My View
Terry fouls Torres on the halfway line. Ze Gasto(DC) tries to find Valera, who is beaten to the ball by Ballack. He clears it up toward Shevchenko. By the time shevheno makes his pass to Drogba, Athletico have all 5 defensive players behind the ball. Somoza(DMC) fails to intercept this pass and this is the key mistake that leads to the goal. You could not do anything about it, other than have played another DMC with better positoning and anticipation. However things are still favourable you have 4 players behind the ball, Chelsea have none. Drogba passes to Essien but still have the numbers. Essien has three options, Joe Cole to the right, Shevchenko to the left or running into the space offered to him. This is what he does, and unleases a fantasic 30 yrd shot past the keeper. He had the time and the space to pick his shot.

Ze-Gasto Freekick
Looking at how the Athletico positon themselves at the free-kick, I don't see to much wrong here. The DC's are on the halfway line, the fullbacks are higher up the field but only about 10 yards outside the penalty area. DMC is in line with the fullbacks and the rest of the team are on the edge of the penalty area. This isn't what you originally posted Luketi, but look again and you will see this to be the case.

Chelsea formations
Chelsea started out with the 4-1-2-2-1, but switch to 4-4-2 Attacking in the second half when Robben got injured. I think your choice of the 4-1-4-1 to counter this was a good one.

That man Essien
There is now doubt looking at the passing stats that Essien was the playmaker for Chelsea. You could have put a midfielder to mark him specifically, to reduce his influence on the game.

Torres chance
Just before Essiens goal Torres had a great chance to put the ball in a empty net, he missed. Cech had come up for the corner and Torres just needed to get it on target. (Maybe he should take lessions from Sammy Igoe - League 2 Playoff Final)

Timewasting
I saw no evidence of timewasting in the match, but assume that aroung 80 mins you would have set it to the max. I still didn't think Athletico played narrow enough for an ultra defensive formation.

Conclusion
1-0 was a much better result than 6-1, you were unlucky and in all honest must accept that Chelsea do have the better team. Again, I think you need to try to score a goal on the break, playing purely defensively may work sometimes, but if you can score one Chelsea would need 3. I think in this case the defensive line setting is what worked against you, Essien had time to pick his shot. Also my biggest critisim of you this time was what you did in extra time, after Chelsea when 2-0 up, you still only needed to score 1 goal to go through on away goals. You left it on the 4-1-4-1, chelsea went defensive, end result 2-0. Again unlucky my friend, but you got to the semi-final of the ECL so you must be doing something right

Defensive Line
You are correct, you cannot have your defensive line play deep when you are in possession, however no team in the world would play like this.

Miguel Damas Award for Punditry
Goes to himself, what was the point of your post? You will still be posting negative comment's like this after FM2008 comes out.

How has that helped Luketi, have you even watched the match?

retired_hope

Just looked at it again. Chelsea play so wide, their just waiting for a fast striker to hit them on the break. Counter Attacking is definetly the way to go, especiall when they go 4-4-2.

retired_krpotram

dear leroy yoda master of FM i watch the match.
It´s pointless my oppinion cause i see that kind of errors all the time and you will always come with some inteligent answer about the with or the tempo or the line up.....players are suppusod to be inteligent right? why they don´t adapt to the opposition? That´s waht happen in real football (and thats what SI want´s to replicate) i think that you can be suprised with a change of formation but players going up or giving the ball to opposition e stupid situacions occur to many times , showing players with no inteligence and then players from oposition with atributes by far worst scoring goals from 30 mts..... I still playing but in my opinion this is not the best from the saga......and i still playing because i am sturburn and this is the game i love most since the very first one in my comoddore amiga 500 and i have faith in coming with a good tactic like in others versions ( and i have been sucessufll in various saves but despite the game are fabulous , fail in tactic-the most important.....)

retired_hope

Miguel,

Apologies about the sarcasm, but why post something so negative.

I am not a tactical genius, this game can catch me out as much as the next person. I am just offering trying to help someone who clearly has a problem with the game.

If I thought that it was impossible to achieve success then I would say so, but I don't.

You clearly are a lover of both this game and football in general, it is a passionate game. I respect that.

What were your conclusions from viewing the match? Would you do anything different?

retired_krpotram

Leroy it´s ok. Everybody loves the game and some people cant accept that the game is a little....strange in tactic...lol
In the chelsea-atleti i wouldn´t play in ultra defensive. I never play ultra defensivebecause that order override the players personal orders.
I have a bad experince with second legs , home or away. But problaly i would play normal with several offensive players with hold up ball. For my experience the loosing time is awfull cause players give up from the ball to early and severall errors occur. I am trying to play with a high defensive line testing the line of atacking the oposition but i am playing with tenerife....lol...so is normal more errors.

retired_krpotram

by the way Leroy
1883 it´s a year?
the born of some club?

retired_rayrhi

It's the number of times he slept with Liz Hurley. He's quite a catch.

retired_krpotram

lol

retired_hope

Actually, it's the number of times i'd wished I slept with Liz Hurley, also the year Bristol Rovers were founded in England.

Luketi

Leroy:

Again, thanks for your very useful post. You have made a right analyssis of Essien`s goal...but I still think that the positions of my players during the free-kick is totally nonsense. If a team has a free kick, given the circumstances of the game I played, it`s expected it has to be taken by a midfielder, with the back four behind him, and only the strikers upfield. There is NO NEED to put 7 players upfield in such situation.
And the most annoying is that the defenders has the instruction of STAY BACK, so....why they did not stay back? What does exactly mean "stay back" if they join the attack?