Even when he doesn’t, it isn’t hard for him to use his Technique to find a different way to beat his man, then face the keeper one-on-one. With his Acceleration he gets up to Pace quickly, and can often burn his man during that turn. He brings the ball down, turns past his man, and begins running for the goal. When we do, we have a brilliant forward with good First Touch and Technique. In transition, you might expect us to Counter-Press as well as Counter, but in fact we Regroup when we lose possession, then begin the Counter-Press again to try and snatch the ball away. Our passing is direct, and the tempo is high – we’re coming for your goal, and we’re coming fast.īut the key to this tactic happens out of possession. That’s the orthodox part of our play, or what happens when we’re in possession. This leads to a good number of crosses finding targets in the box. In possession, we play extremely wide, using overlaps by the fullbacks to create wing overloads. I want my players always thinking upfield, looking for their outlet pass. We play a counter-attacking style, but we don’t play defensively as such. Sometimes, if I feel we’re being overrun a bit, I’ll drop it to Balanced, o r if we need a goal badly I’ll go up to Attacking, but those are generally the only three mentalities I use. To start, you’ll notice we play on Positive mentality. To continue with this anecdotal evidence, let’s have a look at what my tactical counter looks like in the game. But it’s no longer the first style I reach for when designing a tactic to suit my team. Possession football is still quite possible in FM21, of course, if your team is good enough at passing and movement. Combine this with the “block passing lanes” play described above, and you’re going to see more possession lost, which again leads to counter possibilities. This is also important: central players, particularly playmaker types, will attempt more risky, direct passes. “The entire philosophy around central play is now built around getting the most impactful attacking players on the ball quicker which means certain players will look to play riskier, more direct passes into team-mates occupying central attacking areas.” This plays into a counter-attacking style in obvious ways: the ball taken away in midfield, played to a rushing forward, and the counter is on. The players now intercept more intelligently, blocking passing lanes more effectively, and thus are disrupting possession football more. I believe this is the key to the whole thing. Players will also now actively look to block passing lanes rather than following the movement of the ball.” “One of the most obvious examples of this is the way that we have increased the number of interceptions across the pitch but particularly in midfield areas. I suggest it’s because of the FM 21 match engine improvements. But that’s not much worse than the high-possession teams, and the median five have the best positions overall. It’s also possible that poorer teams are less likely to control possession. There might be a slight disadvantage in being low-possession, as four of the five teams are in the bottom half. The positions of the bottom five possession teams: 20, 1, 14, 11, 17. In fact, here are the league positions of the top five possession teams: 15, 13, 5, 6, and 10. And even though we’re that low in possession, we’re currently (seven games into the season) top of the league. With this tactic, I’m averaging 41% possession, the second-lowest in the league. In this series, I’m using a Custom Wing Play style, which suits the excellent wingers I have at the club. He’s built a pyramid in the USA, with full promotion and relegation, that replaces MLS and the non-playable leagues below it. In the other save (The Loyal), I’m playing with San Diego Loyal, in a 9-tier custom database by FM Digi. In this series, it’s hard to tell the effectiveness of the tactic because of the nature of the players I’m using, so I’m not going to talk about it again. So it’s not quite possession football, but it’s effective enough. In one (the Demi-Gods), I’m playing a custom gegenpress tactic, which generally gets an even amount of possession – 50% either way. I have two saves going at the moment, both series on YouTube (so you can check this out yourself). In FM21, though, I’ve found it’s quite possible to play well without controlling the ball. Possession football was a king in FM20’s match engine, making Tiki Taka and Control Possession enormously useful tactical styles. It’s an argument as old as football statistics: is it more important to play possession football, or can you get away with letting the other team control the ball, and taking your chances on the counter? If you’d asked me six months ago, I’d have said no.
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