FM 2015 Tactics Guide: How To Create a Tactic

Hey guys, this FM 2015 tactics guide is designed to teach you how to create a tactic in FM 2015. I am by no means a guru or have all the right answers, you should develop your own style and there are better tacticians out there than myself. But by listening to someone else’s approach you may get new ideas.

FM15 introduced some changes that will adjust how we make and approach tactics, we have more detail in player suitability, positioning is displayed better graphically and there is a whole new focus on picking the right player for the right role. The latter is something Miles Jacobson of Sports Interactive has warned us about for years.

As mentioned, SI have thrown an even bigger emphasis on player suitability for FM15, so much so that I believe we will start setting our systems around our players.

I’ll begin with my bullet point tips, then we’ll dive into detail for each point.

FM 2015 tactics guide: my 7 top tips

1. Look through your squad before thinking about what shape or style to play. Only start creating when you can grasp a general feeling for where your strengths and weakness’ lie
2. Once you find the key strength(s), place the player(s) in their suitable position and pick the role that best suits them. Now create your tactic around this foundation.
3. If you fancy using a particular role but don’t have a suitable player, avoid temptation, change the role to something that will suit your tactic and the players at your disposal.
4. Creating a good tactic is a fine balancing act. Find the right balance between your shape and roles, having too many gaps and not enough links between positions will see your system fall apart.
5. Set the formation and player roles before setting ‘team instructions’, ‘team shape’ and ‘mentality’. Its easier to set these when you can look at a shape.
6. Limit individual player instructions. These will just undo the default setting for said role. Only adjust/add player instructions if you see issues with your tactic in the match engine that can be tweaked.
7. Always be prepared to change system and shape. Never be too stubborn. If your best player is injured and the tactic revolves around him to create goals, chances are the backup won’t do the same job, then the whole system will fall apart.

FM 2015 tactics guide: Using your strengths

Easier said than done, placing one piece of a jigsaw is easy, but then finding the right pieces to fit around it is where the challenge begins.

Look through your squad and asses which players are key and your star assets. Once found place your main star in their best position(s) and assign the most suitable role as I have done below. For this we’ll use Roma as an example.

I have selected Ljajic, De Rossi and Pjanic as my key strengths. Ljajic is best as AML inside forward. De Rossi prefers DMC and ball winning midfielder while Pjanic is best suited to MC advanced playmaker.

FM 2015 tactics guide: finding balance

I am limited for forwards and prefer a lone striker so place Destro upfront with his preferred role of advanced forward. We already have an AML and I prefer symmetric systems, so an AMR is sensible and we have two very strong options in Gervinho and Iturbe. Gervinho prefers the winger role and that would make for a nice blend with my inside forward on the opposite wing.

I have an MC with an attacking role, so need someone to sit alongside and balance things out. All my remaining MC’s can do a bit of both, attack and defend so I pick a generic box to box midfielder with support duty.

It now feels like something is missing in midfield, somebody to really take charge of the ball and move it around. So my only option is to adjust De Rossi from his very best role of ball winning midfielder to his second best, roaming playmaker. The roaming playmaker will do everything, offer a pass to the defence, short option in midfield, break up play and also drive forward with the ball so it seems like the perfect link from defence to attack.

I am now left with no other option but a back four. I feel like my wingers need a bit of support but I’m also wary of having too many forward thinking players so I assign DR/DL full back with support duty. I always tend to pick central defenders unless player selection forces me to go limited.

Tip — Systems with little width could utilize wing backs, you’d want to get them bombing forward to offer support in the final third.

That is what I mean by finding balance, I had to do so in midfield with one attacking MC then two other players in supporting roles that are wary of their defensive duties, one of which sits in front of the defence as a shield.

You can’t have every player on the pitch in a perfect position and perfect role, it will rarely happen. You just need to know where you can make sacrifices. Piece by piece you should start to see a picture and as that begins to set you will find yourself going back and making minor tweaks to roles and duties in order to keep a balance to your system.

Below is the formation I wound up with following this structured approach.

Tip — You can easily compare all available players for a role by clicking next to the current player in your tactic as shown below.

A screen will appear like below. I have highlighted the circular bars, the star in the middle is colour coded to indicate how comfortable each player would be in the position, vibrant green been natural, edging out to darker green for accomplished etc. How filled the bar circling this star becomes the better that particular player is in said role. So for central defender my best player is Alderweireld, this is handy if you are not familiar with the team and players.

FM 2015 tactics guide: Setting instructions, mentality and shape

Your new tactic and the players within it should already cry out for a particular set of instructions. Use these instructions to enhance your formation, roles and strengths.

For instance if you have a tight nit formation with plenty of links and a team with good technique and ability, you may want to retain possession and work ball into the box. Equally, if you have gaps and a strong target upfront you may want to use direct passing.

Your formation will effect what defensive line you want to set, if you have lots of players in the attacking third and no support for your back four you may want to push higher up to close the gap, however slow defenders with this instruction could be disastrous. All of a sudden you have to make a compromise. What I am saying is its all logic and common sense, you need to sit down and iron out all the kinks in your system until you land on the perfect balance for your team.

Every setting will cause a ripple through your tactic, these need to be positive and moving in the same direction. I personally see team instructions in two halves, there are the must choose options, these define my style of play and usually consist of picking between two instructions, see them boxed below.

So my route of attack, my style of passing and the pace at which I want to play. Once I»ve picked between these coupled instructions I then refine my style with additional instructions. I feel like the rest can be left to default, you don’t need to push up or defend deep you can just keep a standard line unless shape and players dictate otherwise. Same goes for pressing the opponent and been expressive etc. Below are the instructions I landed on for Roma, all to compliment my formation, roles and players.

For me ‘mentality’ should be changed based on opposition. How you do this will vary from system to system but with Roma I use control for easy home games and counter for away days and very tough home matches. Changing mentality throughout the match can be vital, taking the lead could warrant tightening up and been less ambitious, while falling behind or chasing the result requires a more aggressive reaction. How aggressive you go will vary on the clock. I believe setting the correct strategy and knowing when to adjust has become very, very important.

‘Shape’ used to be called ‘philosophy’ in FM14, a change I personally welcome as the new terminology makes much more sense. All this does is set how free your players are to step outside of the system. You should asses a number of variables before deciding, how unpredictable you want to be, how organised you want to be and how capable your players are mentally to think for themselves.

FM 2015 tactics guide: Player instructions

Player instructions can be your worst enemy and too many will mask potential issues, making it hard to assign blame when watching the ME.

Tip — Leave player instructions alone for the first two or three games. It won’t take long to see faults in the match engine providing you watch in comprehensive highlights mode or extended as a minimum. Fix as you go.

Here are some examples of when to use player instructions. When shooting too often from distance, tackling too hard, general positional issues and passing. You may feel like no one is attempting that killer pass or your general play is too safe. If you don’t want to go direct for the entire team then you could just select your best technicians to go direct or play more risky passes.

FM 2015 tactics guide: If nothing changes, nothing changes

One of my favourite sayings, if nothing changes, nothing changes. Just because you have won five games on the bounce and feel like Guardiola doesn’t mean it can’t go wrong. Maybe you were up against the ‘right’ opponents for your system with the ‘wrong’ one just around the corner.

Always be vigilant and check the opposition formation, try to spot patterns in your losses, mark them down in a book and try to place blame. Poor individual performances may be as a result of bad team talks, but through analysis you could spot a weakness in your system against particular teams and systems.

The most important change can be as a result of injury, suspension or fatigue. If these hit one or two of your key stars go back to square one. Remember the start of this post, we have created your system around these key stars, so if they are missing you must assess whether the tactic still works and if not create another one or tweak the existing to suit. Here’s an example from my Roma game…

After a great run, I suffered injuries to all three of my stars, Ljajic, De Rossi and Pjanic. While the central areas are fairly well covered, I also lost Iturbe and Gervinho to fatigue and injury. My system relies heavily on wide players producing the goods, my options were the likes of Emanuelson who I don’t see as a goal threat. With little option but to change my focus I had to adjust everything.

I decided that with key players out I had to be more compact and make up for a lack of quality, three at the back would galvanize us defensively. Two wing backs pushed forward could provide the width. I then used my remaining central midfielders to form a trio and had two upfront. Destro remained an advanced forward while Totti was assigned false nine to draw defenders out and exploit the gap around AM. Below is the tactic I switched too and the relevant roles.

Notice my wing backs aren’t fully suitable for the role and position, I had no other option out wide. We exploited the middle to compensate.

This lead to a very tight performance in which we hit Chievo on the counter twice to win 2-0 away from home. I have no doubt that using second class players in my preferred tactic would have seen us picked off. The wingers would not have been good enough to take their chances and possession would have kept falling back with the opposition.

Well thats all for now, thanks for reading. I look forward to your comments and before writing please remember this is just how I go about creating tactics, I am not claiming to be a guru or know all there is to know, so no sarcastic or pointless comments please. :) If you did enjoy the post, we’d really appreciate a share or like through Facebook and Twitter!