Chat Question - Best Formations for a ‘High / Intense Press’ ?!

[DanEnglish]

A question for you all, to help us prepare for FMM23 …

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Real World
The recent Arsenal vs Liverpool game surprised me - as both teams played an extremely high line + intense press.

Quote

“there’s almost no midfield whatsoever. 

Jordan Henderson is alone in the centre circle with barely anyone within 15 yards of him”
the Athletic

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Normal FMM
I haven’t seen much success with a high defensive line + intense press in FMM … but that’s usually because I play more cautious tactics than many of you 

If you setup for a high press, perhaps you may use a normal 41221 (above) or 4231 (below) - with different player roles suitable for an “intense press” …

Note - I’ve never used these two sets of player roles, they’re just as examples.

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Intense Press FMM
I haven’t seen this on the forums + I haven’t tested it … but is it more effective to PUSH FORWARD most players’ positions?  

Example - a 41221 ‘pushed forward’

… or a 4231 ‘pushed forward’

Note - see the higher wide attackers (PF/IF), higher midfield three (only in the 41221: SS, SS, CM?), and pushed forward IWBs.  

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The Question
In your experience - what are the best formations in FMM for an intense press?

Would love to read your thoughts 🙂 

Edited October 14, 2022 by DanEnglish

[Meow]

My initial thoughts is a single moment in a real life match isn't a fair representation of the formation at play.

Back to the FMM world though, formation and positions are more rigid than in real life. However player work rate is more important to "high press" success than formation, in my experience.

 

30 minutes ago, DanEnglish said:

Example - a 41221 ‘pushed forward’

I've used a variant of this actually, but wide PF tucked back to AM line as IF. Front W of IF, SS, TF, SS, IF.

I found my performance was better when I push my workhorse B2B centre mids up to AM than playing my immensely talented and creative (but low work rate) AP as the SS.

Edited October 14, 2022 by Meow

[DanEnglish]

15 hours ago, Meow said:

My initial thoughts is a single moment in a real life match isn't a fair representation of the formation at play.

Thanks for the reply. You are right that we shouldn’t use a single moment to judge an entire match - however the Athletic article has dozens of these photos, as it was happening through most of the game, I just used one photo as an example 👍 

15 hours ago, Meow said:

Back to the FMM world though, formation and positions are more rigid than in real life. However player work rate is more important to "high press" success than formation, in my experience.

It would be good if FMM had options to better replicate real life positional flexibility. Teams often switch formations during transition - like the graphic below. Wouldn’t it be great to have these options in FMM ! 😄 

Good point about the importance of “work rate” - I’d forgotten about that. 

Edit - so you used a 4141 - with high IWBs, one MC, two SS, with an IF either side, with a TM upfront … huh! Interesting 🙂 

Edited October 15, 2022 by DanEnglish

[Meow]

2 hours ago, DanEnglish said:

Wouldn’t it be great to have these options in FMM ! 😄 

Interesting you chose the tucked-in fullback here, I know this quite well. What if I told you the option was there?

 

The 3 Layers of How A Player Plays

If you've played FM, you'll know team instructions, player instructions (roles are just a set of partially locked player instructions) and player traits. But more importantly, how these interact with one another. Just because on FMM player instructions are fully locked behind roles, doesn't mean this dynamic doesn't exist. It's also why I am more eager for FMM to get proper player traits before anything else.

 

My Interpretation of Elbow-Back Via The Team Instructions

While it's true that elbow backs could be implemented on the player instruction layer by adding a role (and that is actually preferable), it's possible to do it currently. I've discussed with @sscout on Discord how overlaps do not affect the WB role.

This means to achieve an elbow-back, you can set a player (who doesn't have "gets forward whenever possible" or "stay back at all times" in the player traits) as a fullback with overlaps off (while the other flank can be WB who already has instructions to overload).

 

Defensive Phase

Flat in a back 3, anticipating a goal kick from Ederson.

 

Attacking Phase

Look at the position taken by number 5 as an "elbow-back" to receive the ball from 14 in the same game with the same instructions

To be clear, I'm not saying these shouldn't be new tactical features in new editions. In fact, I would love it if this was less implicit in FMM. I just thought to point out that roles are but 1 layer of how a player plays. Even with semi-control over team instructions, player instructions and player traits, there is a surprising amount that we can still do.

 

How I Realised How Important The Other Layers Are

If you would like to see a clear and extremely obvious example of this. Try finding these 2 types of players: A right-footed natural right winger, with cuts inside in his role traits and a right-footed right wingback retrained to play right wing.

Same position, the same role, and the same team around them. Watch extended highlights. This is also how I realised well in my case it was both right-wingers one with cuts inside and one with hugs line.

 

Using a High 4141

2 hours ago, DanEnglish said:

Edit - so you used a 4141 - with high IWBs, one MC, two SS, with an IF either side, with a TM upfront … huh! Interesting 🙂 

It's quite a common counter against back 3 formations, especially early on when the AI hasn't dismantled the well-built real-life teams.

Edited October 15, 2022 by Meow

[sscout]

Just wanted to add a very short and quick note on "elbow backs", the pattern of one full back pushing up his flank while his opposite side fullback tucks in to create a sorta lopsided back three is a pretty common and fundamental concept in most teams playing a back 4(unless they're going for a defensive flat 4). And this can be replicated in FMM, I mean I have done it a few times here and there. Mostly I've see it happen a lot with a WB-CD-CD-WB formation, the key thing being that the WBs must be in the DRL position and not the WBRL position. But then again the WBs were probably held back by the fact I was running a more defensive counter mentality at the time. As @Meow said, it's all layers down the road. You get layers like player positions(DRL vs WBRL), player roles(FB vs WB), team mentality(counter vs overload), the player themselves(someone with good crossing, dribbling, movement, but poor tackling, positioning vs vice versa), player traits, etc etc. 

Despite how light and simple FMM looks on the surface, there's a lot of tiny details that go on in the background.