Is possession and alot of passes necessary?

WiffGiff

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I usually try to get my teams to hold the ball within the team more or less, sometimes I make the team play more direct then just holding the ball to create more chances. But in general many shortpasses and offensive football with alot of possession is something I always strive for.

However I have started a game with Shakhtar, where I played 12 games, I lead the league with 8 points infront of Metalist and i scored around 67 goals. Most games my possession is around 55-60%, sometimes higher, sometimes lower. My games often get pretty high scoring affairs from my side, recently my CM Fernandinho scored 4 goals in a 7-2 game and previously one half ended 6-0.

BUt my players dont dominante the statistics when it comes to passes. My backline have something like 25-35 passes in average, and my DM sometimes reach that region but mostly he accomplish like 25-30 passes. My 3 AM just have average of 10-15 passes, my CM something similar but usually more, and my forward, well he have probably 5-10 passes. In total my team probably passes 200-250 passes per game, might be more. But to have around 200-350 is low I think. 400-600 is more usual for a top team to have. Guardian slammed the english team for just have an average of 300 passes a game which was lower then any other top nation in the Euros, and a indication they were bad offensivly.

So these stats bother me a bit, which made me think that I might try to combine my effective fast pace attacking fluid football with more shortpassing and less through balls. But then again, why should I? Does it matter if my midfielders just make 5, 10, 15 or 20 passes a game when they score 5-10 goals? I mean against top teams I stil perform I have defeated Man City with 2-0 and 1-0 in CL. So my team doesnt only perform against bad teams.

My tactic so far is:

Mentality: Attacking
Philosoph: FLuid
Passing: Shorter
Closing down: Much


Backline: Normal
Width: Normal
Tempo: Normal

COunter attacking: Yes
Offsidetrap: No

And I havea 4-2-3-1 with 1 DM and 1 CM. No playmaker.
 
No, they mean nothing. You are playing à really really attacking Football including always looking for à Swift counter attack. Here, your players wont get tons Of passes as they get the ball forward.

What matters is key passes, good chances, being able to restrict the opponent from having possession in Advanced positions and limit the time they are not under pressure.
 
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use the possession tactic I linked for you, try and do the things I mention there if you want to make a "possession" tactic, there are a lot of good idea's/discussions littered through the thread over and above the OP :)

I would not make a possession tactic for Shakthar, they need to run at the defenders and take them on with Douglas Costa/Alex Teixeria/Willian/Srna etc :)
 
Well with Inter i played possession for nearly all sesons except one half of the fourth season where I try to use more direct kind of football, but that didnt work.

However I will use your tactic on my INter team and see what happens.

Ganso is playing in my Shakhtar team and he have had mixed perfomances, does he work in such a fast quick attacking team? He is playing in the central attacking midfield position. Maybe should use him deeper down the field were his great passing and vision comes to better use?
 
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You are playing à really really attacking Football including always looking for à Swift counter attack. Here, your players wont get tons Of passes as they get the ball forward.
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You are playing à really really attacking Football including always looking for à Swift counter attack. Here, your players wont get tons Of passes as they get the ball forward.
g.gif

I know, Raikan already explained that.
 
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