Kyanite

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☁ THE TROOPER ☁ by KYANITE
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After releasing IL DEVASTO, I slowly started developing what I wanted to be THE killer tactic. I didn't want to develop any old tactic though. I wanted the tactic to completely resemble my own personal footballing philosophy. I am a big fan of counter attacking football and what I call transitional formations (when a formation changes depending on whether your team has possession of the ball or not).

The formation employed is a 4-2-3-1 in my eyes, however you can call it whatever you wish. Let's call it THE TROOPER formation, because it counter attacks rapidly like the song 'Iron Maiden - The Trooper' and if you haven't yet realised, the formation too looks like a plane.

You want strong, solid center backs who are good in the air.
Good full backs who can tackle as well as run forward and make crosses into the box.
Your two defensive midfielders have to be good in the air and are your ball winners.
The central midfielder finds himself often making runs from time to time as well as acting as the catalyst of the side. He connects the defence to the attack.
The wingers track back and help out the team. They have to be pacey and must be good crossers of the ball.
The lone striker has to be an all rounder. He needs pace, finishing ability and it would help greatly if he was good in the air as well.

You will find your team playing some nice 'on the floor' football when they have possession. However, when off the ball every player knows their defensive duty and a mixture of - 1) zonal & man marking, 2) pressing & standing off - is used to effectively pressurize and simultaneously confuse your opposition. You will get the ball back and your team will counter attack beautifully. Each player too knows their role when going forward and after a season or two of enforcing this philosophy upon your players, you will find that they do it with their eyes closed.

An example of a bog standard everyday counter attacking goal with this tactic can be viewed within the video below. There are two reasons I used this clip. One, because it happened on my FM save whilst writing this. Two, the initial assist by Mendez (the amazing back pass at 0:15) was beautiful to watch. It emphasized how fluid the tactic's philosophy is upon the players and how little effort it takes them to score a goal after the opposition fall straight into their trap.
THE TROOPER FM13 - YouTube

I won't go on for too long regarding this tactic. The results speak to themselves. I rotated this tactic with
IL DEVASTO in my first two seasons where it was beneficial to play with two strikers. However, after establishing myself as a top side, my two midfielders would struggle against teams who had three in midfield... and so THE TROOPER came to existence.

- Large pitch size.
- Tactics Only training until 1-2 weeks after 100% familiarity. Teamwork for about 2-3 months. Once you approach December/January, let your assistant take control of training. 2-3 months later switch back to Teamwork. Continue this loop.
- No opposition instructions.
- Make sure you have the right player types. I've won two Premier Leagues, two Community Shields and reached a Europa league final with a mediocre squad which should be mid table at best.
Results:
Blackburn Rovers
1st Prem Winning Season
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Here is the mediocre side that won the PL:
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Consecutive PL titles:
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Jordan Rhodes has won too many awards to count in all honesty:
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Second season squad, still nothing compared to the £60M+ that Utd, City, Chelsea spent (apologise for the cut off image):
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Going to test this out. I am guessing it'll be a struggle with the wingers of Bayern Munich(Robben & Ribery) with this tactic?
 
Going to test this out. I am guessing it'll be a struggle with the wingers of Bayern Munich(Robben & Ribery) with this tactic?
Not at all.
I think you'll get the exact Bayern way of playing which we saw in yesterday's final.
The wingers are perfect for counter attacking football.
Once the tactic is fluid, you should hopefully see the impossible happening - which is Robben actually tracking back!
 
Alright thanks for the quick reply. Going to give it a go right now then and will give you any updates I have in 10-15 games time!
 
hi i love your il devasto and i 'm gonna give this one a try in a rotation with the il devasto because i'm in my second season and it look like the teams are adapted to the il devasto i'll give you some feedbacks ^^)
 
Not at all.
I think you'll get the exact Bayern way of playing which we saw in yesterday's final.
The wingers are perfect for counter attacking football.
Once the tactic is fluid, you should hopefully see the impossible happening - which is Robben actually tracking back!

What about with guys like Sturridge and Borini on the wings?
 
What about with guys like Sturridge and Borini on the wings?
I know they're pacey, but how's their crossing & work rate?
If crossing is 12+
Work rate 14+
Then you can give them a go.
Make sure you have right footed on the right and left footed on the left though.
 
Working great defensively, and it scores goals, but I don't see it playing the way Bayern necessarily play like you said. Bayern's philosophy is based a lot more on possession the past couple of years, and this has been struggling for possession for me. Same for you? Or am I setting it up wrong
 
Working great defensively, and it scores goals, but I don't see it playing the way Bayern necessarily play like you said. Bayern's philosophy is based a lot more on possession the past couple of years, and this has been struggling for possession for me. Same for you? Or am I setting it up wrong

Dunno, what I've seen from Bayern is the all players except Mandzukic behind the ball when defending then exploding on the counter.
Which is what I've seen from the tactic with Blackburn at least.
It's not meant to keep possession. Perhaps Bayern NATURALLY have more possession against weaker Bundesliga sides in real life because the approach might be different, but Bayern vs Barca, this tactic I have found portrays the way Bayern played.
 
Dunno, what I've seen from Bayern is the all players except Mandzukic behind the ball when defending then exploding on the counter.
Which is what I've seen from the tactic with Blackburn at least.
It's not meant to keep possession. Perhaps Bayern NATURALLY have more possession against weaker Bundesliga sides in real life because the approach might be different, but Bayern vs Barca, this tactic I have found portrays the way Bayern played.

Bayern Munich Statistics | WhoScored.com

Bayern play possession football.

Still though, this tactic looks good, well done!
 
Bayern's philosophy changed over the past couple of years, since losing to Barca in CL and since Germany lost to Spain. Both Germany and Bayern have become more possession focused, if you look at the stats for all of Europe, Bayern's possession stats are only bettered by Barca, which by no means is because they are playing lesser teams.

Mandzukic also plays a defensive role, and the reason he is in the team intead of Gomez (scored less goals than Gomez) is because of his effort defensively, helping Muller/Kroos to press the CBs, they press as a unit a lot more now.

By no means am I saying your tactic is bad, I played several games with it and it's great, getting good results for me :) I just wandered if you intended for a greater percentage of possession, you can see from the CL game Bayern got 63% possession. The Barca match is probably the only time this year Bayern have admitted defeat in terms of possession, because why wouldn't you...it's Barca :p
 
Bayern's philosophy changed over the past couple of years, since losing to Barca in CL and since Germany lost to Spain. Both Germany and Bayern have become more possession focused, if you look at the stats for all of Europe, Bayern's possession stats are only bettered by Barca, which by no means is because they are playing lesser teams.

Mandzukic also plays a defensive role, and the reason he is in the team intead of Gomez (scored less goals than Gomez) is because of his effort defensively, helping Muller/Kroos to press the CBs, they press as a unit a lot more now.

By no means am I saying your tactic is bad, I played several games with it and it's great, getting good results for me :) I just wandered if you intended for a greater percentage of possession, you can see from the CL game Bayern got 63% possession. The Barca match is probably the only time this year Bayern have admitted defeat in terms of possession, because why wouldn't you...it's Barca :p

I understand the tactic is fine.
But note I said "the way of playing which we saw in yesterday's final".
I've watched Bayern play two games this season, vs Barca & vs Dortmund.
In both games a lot of their attacking opportunities would come through utilising Ribery & Robben's pace to either whip something towards Mandzukic or just a general counter attack with a quick direct yet fluid style.
Forget possession statistics. Perhaps they aim to keep the ball better than this tactic does, however it doesn't really bother me because it isn't built around the Bayern way of playing. The back four don't close down with this tactic, nor do the rest of the midfielders much in most cases unlike Bayern's defensive philosophy which plays a much higher line and so forth so NATURALLY they will have more possession.
But counter-attacking wise, this tactic (or what I've seen from it so far) has Bayern vs Barcelona counter-attacking written all over it.
The difference is they use inside forwards and this tactic uses old fashioned wingers.

I never said this tactic will truly emulate Bayern. It isn't meant to truly emulate Bayern. I'm Kyanite not Jupp Heynckes! It plays how I want it to play... but again, surely a lot of your goals scored will be from quick counter attacking football.

It also wouldn't surprise me if you got less goals from counter attacking football on FM with Bayern because you will dominate more matches, no matter what tactic you're using. My Blackburn champions aren't that storng of a side so they will be on the backfoot a lot of the time which of course will bring out the counter attacking capabilities of the tactic much more.

In conclusion, this tactic has provided me with Bayern-like counter attacking (vs Barca & Dortmund) capabilities. It is by no means actually based on Bayern nor does it aim to get possession statistics that Bayern do lol
 
Yeah I understand that they are the aims of the tactic, and thanks for clearing up your aims for the tactic :D Because I am actually using yours at the moment, just trying to tweak it for greater pressing/possession! Will post if I get any success anyway
 
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