Gungnir; A Dirty Strikerless Tactic

Nom de Guerre

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The basic premise for the Gungnir setup was born out of necessity (and being too lazy to go scouting during Beta). The rest of the tactic built itself around this chaotic conduit I constructed in midfield, generating a fluid, sexy brand of football.

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Come on, don't we all love some fluid, sexy football?


The shape

I usually start my tactics building from a 4-1-2-3-0 shape, and this one started (and ended up) similarly. A sweeper keeper, four defenders, one defensive midfielder, two regular midfielders and three players in attacking midfield make up our entire squad.

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So what does it look like when you put it all into motion?










Go on, that looks pretty **** good, doesn't it?

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On a more serious note, the tactic is well-rounded. You would think (and probably rightfully so based on my earlier work) that a tactic built around feints and misdirection would be unstable in terms of its effectiveness. In this case, you would be wrong.

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As you can see, fairly well-rounded.


While it is true that we score a lot of goals from through-balls, we score a lot of goals overall and we are doing quite nicely when it comes to crosses and set pieces as well.

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Again, well-rounded when you look at the build-up.


We can see similar numbers when we look at where the assists are coming from. The way the tactic is setup offers variation, rather than exploiting a certain loophole. I'm fairly certain that according to popular views, that's a new tune for Strikerless.

The tactical (role) evolution of Gungnir

I'll not bore you with the name of the tactic. I just like my Norse mythology and ran with this name. **** off if you think it's pretentious, I like it.

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Just try it. It won't hurt.


Tactical evolution though. The tactic has undergone changes since I started working on it and I want to highlight a few of them to give you some insight into the voodoo that I do.

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There's some method to the madness, or so I like to pretend anyway.


We will start with the forward three. I never changed the role of the Inverted Winger but I did heavily tweak the other two offensive roles. Initially, they were both Shadow Strikers. I quickly found that because of their hardcoded behaviour, they moved all over the place but failed to act as a focal point for direct passes forward.

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You can't remove the "move into channels" instruction, which sees these Shadow Strikers wander around aimlessly unless their movement is curbed by others.


The movement into channels of the Shadow Striker I kept, the left one, is now curbed by the presence of the attacking midfielder to his right and either the Mezzala or the Inverted Winger cutting inside on his left. This means he tends to move into the penalty area a lot, which is where we want him, penetrating that back-line.

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The other attacking midfielder has morphed into a regular attacking midfielder, though with slightly modified instructions. We have asked him to hold up the ball, to allow team-mates to link up and generate more movement before playing a pass.

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The Carrilero / Mezzala combination seems ideal and well-balanced, so I have not touched that specific pairing. I have tweaked the defensive midfielder and his role. Initially, this role was a Regista, because I love the forward drive the Regista offers. When the Mezzala surges forward, the Regista takes his place in central midfield.

This specific forward movement leaves the central defenders relatively unprotected however and since long balls over the top are rather accurate in this build of the match engine, I needed a more holding midfielder without entirely sacrificing all forward movement. The DLP on Support was the only possible compromise.

To combat these dreadfully accurate long passes, I have also changed the central defenders. Ball-playing defenders are great for your build-up from the back but they also tend to wander forward and get caught out of position. Regular defenders, one on cover-duty and one on defence should do nicely.

The final change (so far) took place in the right wing-back zone. Initially, a complete wingback on attack duty covered the entire flank. With the team's natural inclination towards the right side, this wing-back was often ignored or ended up isolated on the flank. An Inverted Wingback made more sense, to get him involved in the game far more often.

The playing style

Trying to define a playing style is difficult. For me, it's about the behaviour my players show as a collective when they try to achieve the team goals during the offensive, defensive and transitional phases of the game. You can try to define a style by looking how the team acts as they try to breach the opposing defence when on the attack, as they form up as a defensive unit and as they transition between the attacking and defensive phases.

The attacking phase

During the attacking phase of play, the aim is to get the forward three and the Mezzala into a position where they can hurt the opposing team. We want to break forward fast and take the game to the opposing team. Short passing is preferable to long balls but we want the passing to be incisive and not just keeping the ball without intent.

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The instructions I have given to the squad gives them a sense of urgency without resorting to blindly hoofing the ball forward at the first opportunity.

Our transitional phase

When we lose the ball, I want to see elements of counter-pressing out on the pitch. We want to take the game to the opposition, put pressure on them. We will use the flanks to evade initial pressure and then break forward down the central areas.

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Our defensive phase

To help with the pressing, we will play in a high defensive block. We will cede control of the flanks, allowing us to dominate the central areas of the pitch. All of our players are involved in defending, if only in harassing opposing players.

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Balancing the phases

Each game phase, while treated on paper as an isolated phase in a match, actively influences what happens in the other phases. Take the counter-pressing I mentioned above. If I were to use counter-pressing but with a low defensive block, would it really be as effective? When we win the ball, it triggers the next game phase and if we want to break forward fast but are deep inside our own half, will it really be that effective?

Dividing a match into phases helps a manager to recognise recurring patterns but as a manager, you also have to make sure your instructions make sense and don't counter-act each other.

Additional information

I don't use Opposition Instructions. Well, almost never anyway. Training is something my assistant handles. Don't ask me about these things, because I honest-to-God hardly ever look at these aspects of the game.
 

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Great post. I've followed your website for years now, but haven't ventured into playing strikerless tactics yet this version. That quickly changed when I was roped in by all of the Archer gifs ;)

Super small sample size so far, but I've plugged it in with my Arsenal team for the North London Derby. One 6-2 win later, and I'm already excited about the future with this tactic!
 
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How can anyone NOT like Archer. Or GIFs? Welcome to the Dark Side, sir.

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Nice to hear the first result was spot on. I hope you continue to do well using my special brand of insanity.
 
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Head on , will also try this out.
Long time I tested a strikerless tactic. Used to love them before.
 
I'm going to give this tactic a try on my Aston Villa save, currently playing a striker less tactic but not doing too well, 16th after 6 games and conceding a lot.

I'm playing fm touch and cannot download the tactic, are there any other player instructions I need to change except for the ones you have screen shot? Also any advice for the set peices?
 
I'm going to give this tactic a try on my Aston Villa save, currently playing a striker less tactic but not doing too well, 16th after 6 games and conceding a lot.

I'm playing fm touch and cannot download the tactic, are there any other player instructions I need to change except for the ones you have screen shot? Also any advice for the set peices?

The AM/a is asked to hold up the ball, that's it.
 
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