FM 2013 Tactics Review: Jose’s 4-1-4-1

Hey guys, time for another analysis of a FM 2013 tactic, this time we’ll be looking at a tactic that was submitted for review by one of our readers, Jose Laguarta. But before going into the  actual tactic review, let’s remember the testing procedure:

We install the tactic and use it through pre-season plus six league matches with Spurs. Then we watch each match closely, see what happens and come up with the best review we’re capable of. We will also keep track of various statistics in order to be able to compare the essential numbers between this and other tactics that have been or will be analysed. It is more or less like a benchmarking tool for FM 2013 tactics.

Now let’s see what Jose’s FM 2013 tactic is all about.

Formation

The formation uses a flat back four, an anchor man in front of defence, four midfielders and a lone poacher up front. The interesting aspect is that the left wing looks more attacking than the right flank, with both the left back and the left midfielder being given more attacking roles and duties. In fact, those two will often work together to create danger on that flank but the right wing will produce some goodies in attack as well.

Team Instructions

There are some things I don’t really agree with in the team instructions, for instance I wouldn’t give more creative freedom while using a rigid style. Apart from that, the strategy is set to control, the players are encouraged to roam (again fairly conflicting with the rigid style) and also to press and be aggressive. The right side central midfielder is the playmaker while the striker is the target man. There are quite a few individual player instructions set up, we’ll go into detail on some of them later.

Average Positions

The average positions show that the team plays quite high up the pitch, pressing the opponents and keeping a pretty pushed up back line. It is fairly compact in the middle, the only player that seems to be quite lonely in there is the striker, with about 25 to 30 yards between him and the closest midfielder.

Defending

The team will rarely defend on two lines, parking the bus in front of the penalty area. The midfielders and the defenders as well will always try to press their opponents. And that usually worked, we got the ball back quite a few times doing so. In the screen shot above you can see that the right back is pressing his opponent while the right side centre back also pushes up to press his opponent. The only player that doesn’t do much when defending is the striker.

Attacking

I haven’t been able to notice too many patterns when attacking, at least not too many good patterns. The team mostly created chances through pressing the opponents and forcing them to make mistakes, not through our own flowing moves. The screen shot above shows the partnership between the two lads on the left flank, the left midfielder cuts inside with the opposition right back chasing him, which left plenty of room for our wing back to advance, do the overlap, receive the ball and deliver a cross.

Results

The three consecutive goalless draws were a bit of a disappointment, but in the end we managed to go through all six games unbeaten, clinching a nice draw at Chelsea in the process. Jermain Defoe was the most effective player, mostly speculating errors inside the opposition half.

Statistics

Goals scored: 7 (1.16 per game)

Goals conceded: 3 (0.5 per game)

Shots on target for: 6 per game

Shots on target against: 1.66 per game

Clear cut chances for: 1 per game

Clear cut chances against: 0.66 per game

Half chances for: 1.83 per game

Half chances against: 0.66 per game

Ball possession average: 50.16%

The most impressive part about these numbers comes from defence, we haven’t conceded many goals and the opponents haven’t been able to create many chances either. However, we haven’t created much in attack either, even though we did have quite a few shots on target on average. Most of those were from distance though.

+

Unbeaten in six games.

Solid defending.

Excellent pressing, as shown in the screen shot below. The whole team is involved in pressing when the opponents have the ball and that results in quite a few situations of getting the ball back inside the opposition half.

—

No goals scored from flowing team moves.

Quite a few players instructed to shoot from distance, which resulted in many wasted attacks.

The striker is too far away from the rest of the team in most occasions (see screen shot below), and that makes him unable to contribute to the build up of the attacks.

Suggested Tweaks

I would sort out the team instructions first, using a rigid style doesn’t go well with creative freedom and roaming, at least in theory.

I would restrict the shooting from distance to rarely for midfielders, at least for the right midfielder who wasted tons of attacks during testing.

I would give another role to the lone striker, maybe complete forward, in order to have him drop a bit deeper and contribute to creating the attacks.

FM 2013 Tactic Download

Download the 4-1-4-1 FM 2013 tactic by clicking on the image below:

After downloading the tactic follow these simple steps to install it in FM 2013:

1. Put the downloaded file into this folder: Documents>Sports Interactive>Football Manager 2013>tactics

2. Start your game and go to your team’s tactics screen.

3. Click on the little arrow located to the right of your starting tactic name, move your mouse cursor over “archived tactics” and select this tactic from the menu.

I hope you enjoyed this review and I’m looking forward to your comments. If you want to submit your tactic for analysis please do so using the form below:

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We will publish one of these every Saturday, and some people have already submitted their tactics for review, so the waiting list is as follows:

1. Karl

2. Eoin

3. Gaurav

4. Shubhayan

5. Poobington

6. Kevin

7. Jayshamji

8. Carver07

9. Igor