Help improving my tactic

[whoark]

After having a glorious save using TFF's tactics, I decided I'd try coming up with my own tactic. So I started with the obvious: I picked the best 3 players of my team and started to build a tactic around them. This led me to winning State Championship, but whenever I faced better or even same level teams, I struggled.

As you can see from my results, I tied with SAN, SEP (2x), which are same level/better teams, tied with Boavista (much poorer team) and Ferroviaria (much poorer team).
I won a match against COR, which is a same level team too.
However, I lost matches against AMG, Colon, BTF, and Red Bull Brasil, all of them are lower level teams.

Even though I won a title already, having my team being "underdog" in the final, I feel there's ways to improve.

So, enough with the talk, let's see the images:

Formation

Spoiler

I picked this team because I had two 4* AMC, and none of them performs well as an AMR, as they aren't fast enough. While one was left responsible for creating plays, I left the other as a SS, since he also have good attributes and plays as a S.
The AML is an Inside Forward, 4* too, which helps creating goal opportunities and gives me some width.

I'm considering giving up on using two AMC to get more width on the right side, or changing the BBM to a Mezzala, and change sides with the DLP.

Team Instruction

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I selected what it felt right to me, might have made a huge mistake. As I don't have width on my right side, I chose to play more narrower. My team also lacks team work and work rate, so I tried not to demand much from them by pressing the opponent or playing offside trap. However, I like my team to always get stuck in when marking.

Results

Spoiler

 

[wicksy360]

Your problem is that formations like 4-2-3-1 in the sense that most fm base players prefer, is extremely top heavy. This means that their is very limited space for each player to play in, without clashing with another teammate.

The key thought of FM tactics is space, where are the opposition leaving it, how can you exploit it, and what space are you giving up.

What you have done by adding two AMC and no AMR is then compact this pace even further, so these two players are both trying to play in the central attacking corridor. Then you have an inside forward, again comes inside to play in this space. Then you have a BBM who pushes forward into the box, into the exact same space you have asked the others to play in. Even further to that you have a CF who will drop deep to receive the ball. So everyone is playing in the exact same area.

Where does this leave the space?
Your right flank is left completely exposed. If the wing back pushes forward, there is no player to cover him, so the opposition can take a merry stroll down and then cross into your box.
Your left wing back again has no cover as the IF and BBM will seek to attack the box, so both flanks have nobody to protect them. If your centre backs push out to press a wide attacker, then your centre literally has 0 or 1 defender.
Opposition midfielders, particularly CAMs will have no problem picking you apart, as only having one sitting midfielder, who is not a capable ball winner, will give them as much time as they need to pick the perfect pass

All in all, i dont mean to sounds horrible or take a dump on your tactic, but there are some very obvious deficiencies that need to be solved before the quality of play will improve. Its likely that your winning of the championship is simply down to having better players than the oppositions

Hopefully some of these points help you going forwards