I seem to find i have far more success in matches if, after playing a match for 10 mins or less and the score is 0-0, rather than swapping shouts or dropping defence deeper or anything like that, i swap around the mentality of attacking unit and the 2 DM's untill i score a goal.
I had a lot of success applying this method to Seans tactic for fm2013 and it seems to be following the same trend for fm2014.
All i've been doing is exactly like Sean stated in the OP but switching either of the following things to get goals:
Wingers from attacking to support
Wingers to Wide Midfielders, Inside forwards or Defensive Wingers (which also give the option of defensive and automatic)
CF to trequartista and dropped to an advanced midfield position
CF to attack instead of support
DM's to Defence or support
If however the opposition team changes its formation, i dont change any of the above, but i change my formation to counter act this.
If the team changes its mentality (you will see a message saying something like "*** team are now operating more defensively"), i change mine to counter this also. In the previous example i would most likely change to "Overload".
Generally i tend to only ever use Attack at home, away vs weak sides or Home vs a strong side who swap to a defensive mentality, control away from home or vs stronger sides at home or overload against similar or weaker sides who swap to defensive at home and sometimes away matches depending on the other team.
But to spell things out, every time i go through a period of 10 mins of play with no goals, the way i see it is like this. The better your team is doing at putting the opposition under pressure, the closer you are to scoring a goal and you need to identify fewer things in your approach that need altering.
For example. Your playing a very poor side and your 1-0 up but yet regardless of the infinite amount of chances your creating, you cant make it 2-0 because their 10k valued keeper who is in the worst form of his life has suddenly become an unstoppable force of nature after conceding 1 goal, sound familiar?
Yet if you change something like both wingers to support instead of attack for example, you could get a 2nd goal. Now dont get me wrong, i am not saying that changing wingers to support will be the correct change to make each time as different teams will play different tactics against you. You just have to find the correct alteration that unlocks their defence. What i am saying, is this is a computer program and not real life, so when you make the correct change the computer will realise this and you will then score your 2nd goal. I personally have followed this method through all my 6 years of playing the football manager series and it always seems to work. If people wish to see some evidence, i can try to take some screenshots.
There is a downside to this method however. If you get the wrong change, it could potentially cause you to concede a goal. But if you figure out the correct changes, it can make your teams unstoppable regardless of who you are playing. Naturally against stronger opposition you will have to be a lot more careful with your changes as 1 wrong tactical decision vs Real Madrid for example, will cause you to have to pay for it dearly.
Ive only acquired fm2014 for christmas and not had a load of time to play it but randomly took on the job of managing AS Saint-Etienne in France and after 7 games, things are going pretty well considering ive only been able to spend 2.5M on 3 players, nick a good free transfer (who's now injured /sigh) and take on 3 additional loan signings.
Can post a few updates to show my progress as the season goes on