Stand Off & Counter / Park the Bus

[WalkerRFC]

Hi all,

I am a big fan of keeping things tight at the back. Especially in big away games, I would prefer to secure the draw and maybe a lucky win, than risk a loss. My strategy would be to take them at home.

I haven't seen many tactics that follow this philosophy.

Any idea how you would set up? I have tried a host of styles but can't seem to replicate a quality park the bus. 4141 always seems an appropriate formation to allow you a lucky break going forward but it doesn't seem to be as successful this version. How would I set this up?

Thanks.

 

[WJ]

Why not start with the preset tactical style and tweak from there?

 

[Sugar GG]

Hi!

What I would do is play with a counter mentality in a structured shape. Counter lets you sit deep and defend and allow your opposition to push higher allocating more space for your pacy forwards to exploit. Structured shape tells your defensive players to sit deeper and contribute to only the defense and rarely help the attack. I would line up with a 4141 like this:

Poacher (a)

Winger(s) BBM(s) DLP(s) Winger(s)
DM (d)
FB(d) CB(d) BPD(s) FB(d)
GK (d)

Play deep, fast tempo, close down normal, no offside trap (you wont need it anyways), very narrow formation, get stuck in, tight mark, DONT prevent short GK distribution, pump the ball into the box.

Task your fb's to cross from deep
Your BPD will try to start counter attacks with long range passes.
Task your wingers to run wide and your DLP to shoot more if he is a good long range shooter.
Use pacy wingers and poacher
With a little bit of luck and a cocky enemy team, you could score 2 or 3 on the counter and concede nothing

Hope that helped you!
If i am wrong in anyway please correct me!

 

[WJ]

in a structured shape. Structured shape tells your defensive players to sit deeper and contribute to only the defense and rarely help the attack.

Shape is gone in FM19, just FWIW.

 

[Sugar GG]

Shape is gone in FM19, just FWIW.

Oops sorry! I didn't know