Diamonds Are Forever... Annoying Me (Pt 1)

I’m not sure what it is about a 4-4-2 diamond formation, but for some reason I struggle to deal with it. Whether it’s a wide diamond (DMC, ML, MR, AMC), a narrow one (DMC, MCL, MCR, AMC), or even a non-diamond narrow formation (2x DMC, 2x MC) it seems that my sides struggle to carve out chances against them compared to the more familiar flat 4-4-2 or 4-3-3 type of shapes. Defensively we don’t necessarily find it any tougher than any other match, but up front it’s another story and we’ve been frustrated on a number of occasions.

I’m not sure why that sort of shape change should impact our attacking, the most likely thing being that the addition of that pesky DMC makes all the difference, but I can’t say that I’ve noticed the same issues against a pair of DMCs in 4-4-2 or 4-2-3-1 variants - perhaps as those shapes then tend to leave a lot of space in the middle of the park?

Whatever the reason, with my Karlsruher SC side sitting in a very nice spot as the season closes out, and the visit of Union Berlin and their wide diamond, I decided that it’s probably time for me to have a go at seriously analysing their approach and working out what to do about it.

Onwards and... well, not upwards unfortunately.

Frustrations and Patience 

or ‘How not to give up and start a new save just because you’re not tearing up the leagues’.

First let me qualify that title by stating that I’ve never been one to crave success to the point where I just keep flitting between different top teams, but in the past I have had a history of starting various saves that only lasted for a season or two. That wasn’t due to performance, but was more down to my writing on the Stories Forum over at SI Games – and the fact that my imagination and ideas ran far faster than my ability to keep up with them. I used to have at least two saves running at all times, sometimes as many as four, and it wasn’t unusual for at least a couple of them to be very short-lived.

In terms of career games I actually prefer something of a slow-burn to start, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t occasionally suffer from itchy feet when things get into a rut. Towards the end of the 2014/15 season I found myself beginning to think that way at times, but more on that later.

WHEELING AND DEALING

Two factors dictated the deals made in December, firstly the concern that we were effectively operating with just two first-team strikers, and secondly the fact that one of them (David Ledy) refused my continued attempts to extend his contract and signed a deal for a summer move to Angers SCO. Even ignoring the potential for injuries, it made no sense to just keep plugging away with David and wait until summer to bring replacements in, so with that in mind I picked out the following players from my scouts’ reports.

Pressing On. Questions Questions.

SCHOOLBOY ERROR

Right, first up it's time for an admission. As a long-time player of the series, and not helped by the fact that the advent of digital delivery has removed the paper manual, I have a habit of assuming that I know roughly what I’m doing. It seems that’s not always the case.

Thanks go, as usual, to @Cleon81 for some useful information I discovered whilst reading his excellent piece on player development, as part of his Santos Project.

I’m halfway through my season in the French 3^rd tier, and my team aren’t ‘getting’ my tactical approach. Whilst most elements are nailed down, their level of familiarity with the Formation itself is still rated as awkward. Now I appreciate that it is a fairly non-conventional setup, and also that I have a grand total of two coaches – with Tactics rated at only 2 stars – but I would still expect things to have started bedding in by now.

It was only when reading Cleon’s piece that I realised my approach of setting General Training to ‘Tactics – High’ was not working, as it’s apparently Match Training that is used to increase the overall tactical familiarity. You live and learn. The upshot of this is that, for the remainder of this season at least, I’ve decided to go for a more familiar formation in the hope that it’ll give us some consistency.

It’ll still allow me to work on my understanding of tactics, but I do also need to make sure that we maintain our push for promotion. However, for much of the below, I was still experimenting a little.