4-4-2 Narrow Diamond Help

[leftfield010]

Hi Guys,

I have started playing round with tactics again as opposed to downloading them and i think i am about 60% of the way to creating something half decent

The tactic is an attacking 442 narrow diamond as shown below
View attachment 118399

The plan is to screen the defence with the anchor man, allowing the wing backs to get forward. Mt only player instructions are for the CM s to get forward more and the AP a to hold the ball to stop him dribbling into blind alleys as much.

It is working OK but i am fining i am dominating possession, creating a lot of shots but not many CCCs

A typical match is

View attachment 118398

Like i said it is not broken but i think with a few more changes it could be pretty good.

Also i need to try and make a more defensive version but i am struggling with that so any tips on how to modify it would be great also

Thanks for any help!

 

[ggwood]

No expert, but I would definitely try "look for overlap" team instruction to look for those wingbacks to provide width. You have four midfielders, so I would try a possession-oriented tactic by "shorter passing" or "retain possession".
Generally, I like both strikers to have support roles, unless one is a vastly better finisher than the other. I want more ways to score, and not to funnel all attacks through one guy. My philosophy is, even if one guy has a bad day, we still should win.
I've played around a lot with defensive midfielders in earlier years of FM, but basically none this year, so maybe this is wrong.
The anchor man is not going to roam far. Benefit: hard for them to play straight through the middle. Downside: if they are attacking from wider positions, that may be a problem. In FM'13, I ended up using a DM(D) as a good compromise between the anchor man and the BWM(D). The BWM (ball winning midfielder) will run around all over and thus get pulled out of position a lot. The first year they put in the halfback(D), I really, really like the halfback.
I've used the attacking midfielder as an enganche, or as just a plain AM(A) (attacking midfielder, on attack duty), to overlap a pair of support strikers. If you have a really good finisher in the AMC position, I would consider a shadow striker. You get three very narrow strikers.
Instead of the CM(S), I like the box to box role, as I find they are more active.

To make a defensive version, I might consider reigning in one wingback, to either support or defend duty, and having the central mid on the opposite side a defend duty. You can pull the mentality back to "control" or "standard". Let's say the opponent has a very good right winger, so I pull my left wingback to defend. Now, I lack width on the left of attack. I can give my left striker a "plays wider" instruction of some kind. I would like him to probably be left footed at this point, so he can put in crosses more naturally, but this is not critical, also he should be a bit fast, more like a winger. If I'm struggling to score, I might need to put my left sided central mid to a CM(Atk) role/duty so he will be a bit more like a central winger and get up, inside the now-wide striker and provide another way to score. Remember, I've pulled my left sided central mid to defend duty, so overall we are pretty defensive.

 

[Sauzee]

I have been tweaking a similar set up and think I have got something that works for me.

The two full backs bring a lot to it, they need to be good and get up and down. Make sure you have look for overlap.

I also agree with changing the CM into a B2B midfielder, give more up front and when chasing back to win possession.
Up front I was having similar issues lots of chances but not doing a lot with them. I added work ball into box, so shooting less but creating more quality chances.

Top of my diamond is a support and with work ball into box I now have both forwards as AF. This also helps as it means one is normally pushing further wide allowing my b2b m and ap space to get into the box.

To kill a game i drop back, ap in line with other midfielders, wing backs to full backs, one striker change to def forward and generally try to stop the other team playing and when i do have possession slow it down.

 

[leftfield010]

Brilliant thanks guys, will try some of these out