As a Crystal Palace fan, there is one thing I have become used to over the years, having absolutely none of the ball. Checking possession stats and seeing "36%" is a pretty average match. If you asked me 5 years ago, I would've bemoaned it, being a fan of attacking wing backs and dominating a game. Now however, I have seen the light of Glasner-ball, incorporating a 5 at the back system with ruthless wing backs that smacks you in the face as soon as you're drawn in.
This was the inspiration for the tactic I built this year, combined with trying out the Women's database added, I noticed that strength and height was at an absolute premium. This tactic aims to lure opponents into attempting to exploit the space in the centre of the pitch left as the CM transitions back into DM with longer balls, only to be cut out by a taller, stronger player to head down to the playmakers, who have bombing wing backs to push the play out wide, whilst a Target Forward gives them a forward outlet.
Tactical Breakdown
We employ a counter low block, this is the core of the tactic. We want to be defensively solid when luring opponents into our half, whilst still being able to send lots of players forward in transition as soon as we get the ball back without sacrificing stability. To this end, we employ an urgency in our press and encourage our players to get stuck in as soon as the opponent overextends, usually into the wide areas, whilst regrouping and not counter pressing when we lose the ball. Stopping crosses is employed mostly to get our wing-backs pressing with urgency, as they are responsible for alot of the pressing duty and our biggest threats if they do win the ball back.
In possession we want to stretch the pitch and bomb up the pitch quickly, committing lots of players forward and transitioning to 2 players remaining back, whilst our central defender moves up to support the midfield playmaker and offer another option to find a long ball onto the flanks. The wing backs will be responsible for most of your width, whilst your target forward takes on alot of the responsibility in linking up as a central outlet to support your finishers. The Poacher can be moved to a traditional inside forward on the left, and I did have this before, with the attacking midfielder moving more central, but I felt they do not get on the end of some of the lower whipped crosses and rebounds that the poacher thrives on.
Adjustments by skill and sample size
The primitive version of this tactic was been developed on a Crewe Alexandra tactic that I took from League 2 to Championship before swapping over to two women's database saves. The first was a Trelleborgs save over two seasons, I decided to restart after I had this tactic refined down to this version. The second which employed this version of the tactic from start to finish, was with C.F Huelva, who I joined after simming a season with extra database additions from tier 4 of Spain up in 3 back to back unbeaten seasons to Tier 1 where I am currently still also undefeated and have decided to post this tactic.
Due to this, I would say this tactic needs adjustment depending on skill level of your players and these are the three I employed in lower divisons. "Creative Freedom" should be set to "Balanced" if you have lower skill players. The tempo can also be reduced to "lower" to prevent as many silly turnovers from poor passers and slower wing backs. The final adjustment I made when in the lower divisions was moving "Dribbling" to "Discourage" to stop my players from wasting possession dribbling into a turnover and instead go long where the danger of a turnover is lesser. Last one is a positional change listed below:
(All losses are in cup competitions currently)
Player archetypes by position
Overall, we value physical stats highly. On our attackers and wing backs, we value speed, agility, balance and stamina all highly. On the Target Forward and centre backs, we value height, strength and aerial prowess, our tactic relies on winning long balls. We also value work rate universally as a good attribute for urgently pressing and transitioning.
GK - This is arguably the position that is most important, but that's just a universality in a football. We don't need a sweeper, we need a shot stopper who will bail us out when we concede silly chances. No real specialisation, just a reminder, get a good keeper. Prioritise a good keeper.
RWB/LWB - These are the actual stars of your tactic if we discount the goalkeeper. These should be your priority to keep as your exceptional players with a good backup for each side. We want physical attributes as stated before, but we also want them to have good 'Off The Ball', 'Crossing' and 'Teamwork'. These are all essential attributes for our wing backs as we want them to be our main wide options in all phases of play. 'Finishing' and 'Heading' are also surprisingly good on Wing Backs in this tactic, due to how often crosses from the opposite side come their way in dangerous positions. "Gets forward whenever possible" is a natural trait addition to any wing back in this tactic.
Wide Centre Backs - These should be considered as your traditional Centre-Back pairing. You want tall, strong, aerial units. Alot of attacks coming your way will be long balls into the centre looking to exploit space left as you transition, or crosses given up as your wing back is beaten whilst pressing. Both of these suit aerial players to deal with the attack. Most important is just overall good centre-back stats combined with this, but passing is still a good stat to open up another player capable of splitting a defence.
Advanced Wing Back (Change to Ball Playing Centre Back in lower divisions) - This is your main creative outlet from the back. We still want a player who is tall, strong, capable defensively and aerially, but this is basically where we put our 'star' centre-back who is also capable of penetrating a defence with a killer ball to unleash our wing backs or attackers. It is essential they have good positioning and off the ball for the transitionary phase as advanced centre-back, In lower divisions, I find that centre-backs will drift out of position into midfield too much and get caught on the counter, so this position becomes a ball-playing defender instead. In higher divisions, this player will also step up into midfield to act as a link in the midfield as we bomb forward. "Dictates Tempo", "Tries Killer Balls Often" are good on this player.
Midfield Playmaker/DM - This player is the beating heart of your midfield. They're responsible for containing tricky attacking midfielders whilst acting as the main outlet to start attacks. We prioritise passing/vision/teamwork/decisions above all. Secondary are being good defensively with positioning/tackling etc. We ideally want them to be average height and not too short, but this can be overlooked for a creative maestro. "Comes Deep To Get Ball", "Dictates Tempo", "Tries Killer Balls Often", "Liks Ball Played into Feet" and "Looks for Pass Rather than Attempting to Score" are all excellent traits.
Advanced Playmaker (Can be swapped to Free Role) - Why is this role not a free role? Quite simple, finding a player who excels at Free Role are a dime a dozen. AP is a much more reliable role. The idea of this player is to give an outlet to the Target Forward in midfield without having to go backwards whilst also getting forward to get on the end of crosses or loose balls. This is the player who will end up having the stinkiest games, followed by the best games. For this role, we want a creative player who is physically good and can get on the end of a loose ball with a decent finishing stat. This role is where you would put your best 'All around' attacking midfielder. "Dictates Tempo", "Moves into Channels", "Tries killer balls often" and most crucially, "Plays One-Twos" are your most important traits.
RW - This is your traditional inside forward. You know how an inside forward works. You're on an FM page. They stay wide in transition to pull defenders away from the target man.
Poacher - This is your assassin. You want someone who does very little defensively, we don't care about them passing the ball around either. They have one job, to get onto the end of a goalscoring opportunity. They will get involved in build-up, but realistically, we just want them to be extremely good finishers, capable of heading the ball (we want them at least above-average height) and physically dominating. Defensively, they operate as an inside outlet winger to give us a bit more width similar to the RW, but also capable of getting on the end of a forward header from the Target Forward. They want to be quick off the mark with good 'off the ball' and 'composure'. "Places Shots" or "Shoots with Power" are good, anything that makes them a better finisher, in combination with "Plays one-twos", so they have an extra option off the Target Forward.
Target Forward - The spearhead of your attack. If I was to characterise the type of player you want, it's Harry Kane. You want someone tall, physically imposing and capable of getting their head on the ball, whilst also being able to link in your supporting attackers. We value height, strength, balance and aerial prowess above all. Teamwork, Passing and Bravery are our next priorities. Finishing is obviously important, you don't want a target forward who's useless at finishing, obviously, but it's a slightly lesser priority. This will usually be your top scorer regardless. Anything that makes them a better finisher as a trait is good. "Plays With Back to Goal" is good too. I also tend to get "Plays One-Twos" but this is mostly to get them to play one-twos TO the Inside Forward and the Poacher, but I'm not sure if it's flawed thinking to do this, honestly. It seems to work.
Final Thoughts
Welp, that's about it. I hope you can now have the enjoyment of having less than 40% possession whilst still outshooting your opponent two or three to one and battering them with quick counters.
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Discussion: The 5-3-2 Counter Punch
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