How Are You Doing On CM?

[GingerFurball]

It helps that Song is probably perfect for it and can play in the centre of defence anyway, but if I went another team and used this tactic I'd probably still use a DM to play the role.

My system is based on Biesla's "spare man at the back" theory. If a team plays 4-4-2, I'll counter it with the 3-4-3 - both centre halfs man mark their opposite number and Song is the free man. If they change to 4-2-3-1 then Song comes out of the back line into a DM role and man marks the opposition's AM, and Vertonghen becomes the free man at the back. I'm considering developing a 4-2-1-3 tactic for use at home against pish opposition, that would line up something like this:

              Szczesny

Isla    Koscielny    Vertonghen    Santos

            Song    Arteta

               Hazard

  Walcott    van Persie    Muniain

Started off quite well so far; have beaten Stoke 3-0 away, Udinese 3-0 at home and Chelsea 1-0 at home (Cech was man of the match with a 9.3 performance, and the woodwork was probably Chelsea's 2nd best player). As in my previous Clyde game, I'm finding that my team is pretty wasteful with chances (had a 2-0 preseason win against River Plate that featured almost 30 shots on goal with something like 5 on target.)

edit: the other advantage of playing Song in defence is that if the opposition changes tactics during the game I don't have to waste a substitution to counter it.

[GingerFurball]

Has anyone ever had any success playing no strikers? I'm tempted to play my front 3 as an AML, AMR and AMC - I'm playing van Persie as a Trequartista anyway - might try it out in the Carling Cup with Luuk de Jong 'up front'.

[sledger]

Almost always play 4-5-1, stick to it almost religiously in most cases. Find it's flexible enough to defend well against most opposition tactics with minimal jiggery pokery, and if you've got decent attacking players you can score a lot of goals with it as well.

[GingerFurball]

Originally Posted by sledger

Almost always play 4-5-1, stick to it almost religiously in most cases. Find it's flexible enough to defend well against most opposition tactics with minimal jiggery pokery, and if you've got decent attacking players you can score a lot of goals with it as well.

That's what I usually go with (with Dortmund in an earlier game I used 4-2-3-1, with Clyde I used mostly 4-1-2-3 because there were no wide players at the club when I took over and I never really got round to signing wingers), but recently I've started to like the theory of playing 3 at the back and I want to tinker around with my theory of playing no strikers.

The other one I've been thinking about is setting the back 4 up as 1 CB, 2 WBs and a DM. Might experiment with that against fodder at home.

[sledger]

Originally Posted by GingerFurball

That's what I usually go with (with Dortmund in an earlier game I used 4-2-3-1, with Clyde I used mostly 4-1-2-3 because there were no wide players at the club when I took over and I never really got round to signing wingers), but recently I've started to like the theory of playing 3 at the back and I want to tinker around with my theory of playing no strikers.

The other one I've been thinking about is setting the back 4 up as 1 CB, 2 WBs and a DM. Might experiment with that against fodder at home.

This used to work a treat on CM01/02. Never been brave enough to try it out on games with a more sophisticated match engine though.

[sledger]

Just got fined £35k for failing to control players after getting 2 red cards and 6 yellows in a 2-0 defeat to Chelsea. Pretty funny, never had that happen before.

[cpr]

GIMH, forget either of them and get New Star Soccer instead, basically manage your own career as a player up the ranks. Its actually a pretty decent PC game too (though I've not played past NSS3, which the iphone version seems to be nearest to)

[GingerFurball]

5 games in and we've won all 5 without conceding a goal.

Stoke (a) W 3-0 (van Persie 2, Walcott)
Chelsea (h) W 1-0 (van Persie)
Aston Villa (h) W 5-0 (Muniain 2, Gervinho 2, Oxlade-Chamberlain)
Wolves (a) W 3-0 (Vertonghen, Gervinho, Muniain)
Everton (h) W 5-0 (Vertonghen, van Persie 2, Arteta, Gervinho)

[Johnners]

Out of interest GF, for you front 3 are they all on the forward line, or are Walcott/Muniain set at AMR/AML?

[Marcuss]

Clinging on to my Arsenal job.
Got the old "Must win game for Deane" and pipped Liverpool 3-2 after being 2-0 down at HT and scoring twice in the last 8 minutes. Liverpool's 2 red cards definitely helping.

[GingerFurball]

Originally Posted by Johnners

Out of interest GF, for you front 3 are they all on the forward line, or are Walcott/Muniain set at AMR/AML?

When I play 4-3-3 then they're all on the forward line - Muniain and Walcott play in the FL and FR positions, when I'm playing 3-4-3 they're as AML and AMR. I'm not sure why I've set it up differently tbh. Probably because I tend to use the 3-4-3 away from home when teams go with two strikers and I want the wide players to be slightly closer to the midfield and be more defensively involved.

[GingerFurball]

Originally Posted by Marcuss

Clinging on to my Arsenal job.
Got the old "Must win game for Deane" and pipped Liverpool 3-2 after being 2-0 down at HT and scoring twice in the last 8 minutes. Liverpool's 2 red cards definitely helping.

How on earth are you struggling as Arsenal?

[Marcuss]

Not really sure. Just went on a horror run. Exactly the same squad that was league runners up, CL Semi Finalists, FA Cup winners and League Cup runners up. Plus Wilshere's been fully abavailable. RVP getting injured the only excuse.

[GIMH]

Originally Posted by Marcuss

Not really sure. Just went on a horror run. Exactly the same squad that was league runners up, CL Semi Finalists, FA Cup winners and League Cup runners up. Plus Wilshere's been fully abavailable. RVP getting injured the only excuse.

Were there two League cups that season?

[Marcuss]

No, why?

Anyway, have since gone on a good run and am up to 7th. 6 points off 4th. Having beaten Liverpool, City, Chelsea and Tottenham (the top 4)