I've been googling and searching for this, but a lot that comes up is pre-patch, so I decided to make a thread.
I've been playing FM with a 4-4-2 with Sheff United for more than 20 seasons now. Before the patch auto-installed itself (Steam) I would win almost every game in a season and concede very few goals (22 per season recently, but I got as low as 14 at one point) while scoring between 80 and 100 goals. I had one season where I lost no games at all in the league. The same tactic worked with lower league teams, taking AFC Telford from BSP to L1 in two seasons.
However since the patch installed itself, the tactic has stopped working. I've tinkered around with it and drawn the conclusion that the main problem is the midfield and creating enough chances. My defence is still extremely tight, so no problems there, but going forward there seem to be too few options for my midfielders to exploit.
Now my midfield is far from poor. The lynchpin is probably the best regen MC I've ever seen (stamina, creativity, anticipation, technique and teamwork all 20, with no attribute lower than 12 except jumping/aggression) valued at 35M. No members of my first team are worse than "leading star for a Premiership team".
The difficulty is in getting either the wingers to cut in often enough or the strikers to make enough runs. As it stands the MCs will run with or hold the ball (usually with at least one opponent shadowing them) before stopping and passing it back to a DC/CB. The alternative is that my wingers make a great run, but float in crosses which are headed over 100% of the time. The patch seems to have affected this aspect quite radically.
I'm unwilling to change from 4-4-2 because my youth policy is set up to fill in players for a 4-4-2 setup. I have considered switching to 3 at the back, but it's slightly risky and I have no DMCs. Switching player roles hasn't altered very much. I had limited success with (ironically) switching from direct to short passing play, but found it created too many 0-0s to be interesting enough. Any suggestions on how to get more out of MCs without altering the formation?
Cheers.
I've been playing FM with a 4-4-2 with Sheff United for more than 20 seasons now. Before the patch auto-installed itself (Steam) I would win almost every game in a season and concede very few goals (22 per season recently, but I got as low as 14 at one point) while scoring between 80 and 100 goals. I had one season where I lost no games at all in the league. The same tactic worked with lower league teams, taking AFC Telford from BSP to L1 in two seasons.
However since the patch installed itself, the tactic has stopped working. I've tinkered around with it and drawn the conclusion that the main problem is the midfield and creating enough chances. My defence is still extremely tight, so no problems there, but going forward there seem to be too few options for my midfielders to exploit.
Now my midfield is far from poor. The lynchpin is probably the best regen MC I've ever seen (stamina, creativity, anticipation, technique and teamwork all 20, with no attribute lower than 12 except jumping/aggression) valued at 35M. No members of my first team are worse than "leading star for a Premiership team".
The difficulty is in getting either the wingers to cut in often enough or the strikers to make enough runs. As it stands the MCs will run with or hold the ball (usually with at least one opponent shadowing them) before stopping and passing it back to a DC/CB. The alternative is that my wingers make a great run, but float in crosses which are headed over 100% of the time. The patch seems to have affected this aspect quite radically.
I'm unwilling to change from 4-4-2 because my youth policy is set up to fill in players for a 4-4-2 setup. I have considered switching to 3 at the back, but it's slightly risky and I have no DMCs. Switching player roles hasn't altered very much. I had limited success with (ironically) switching from direct to short passing play, but found it created too many 0-0s to be interesting enough. Any suggestions on how to get more out of MCs without altering the formation?
Cheers.