Thought I'd give a little tip. I've finished a season in the Northern League Division 1 using a truly woeful team-at first (Newcastle Blue Star which I brought back from extinct in editor). The players were initially of very, very poor quality, but as it was an amateur club I was able to bring in reinforcements, but the key attributes I looked for were pace, fitness, teamwork and workrate. My primary formation was initially a very basic 4-4-2 with the following: rigid formation, drilling the crosses, passing short, medium tempo, sticking to position, stand off players, fairly deep line, no playmaker, zonal marking (due to poor positioning and poor concentration levels) and creativity restricted and used a balanced approach with standard philosophy. At first I had a few bumps in the road, but after a few matches it started to work. However as I started to have less success with the 4-4-2 I pushed the left and right midfielders up to make them AM's and as a result, caused problems for the opposition defences. Although I stuck to only one formation type in the entire season, because the midfielders were versatile and quick enough, I was able to adjust accordingly during the matches if I fell behind or was heading for a draw.
As a result I achieved promotion in my first season though I was tipped to finish 21st, losing 10 and drawing 12. I also used absolutely no pregame instructions before kickoff. And because I stuck to one formation, they were able to adapt to it and gel fairly quickly.
Hope that gives a bit of help