Consistently Inconsistent
In the last installment of Bottom at Christmas I finished on a heady note of optimism, talking about tactical switches that had seen us play ourselves into form (ish) using a 4–3–3. However, any Football Manager beta is a cruel mistress, and inconsistency has been just about the only constant in our form over the last 2 months.
It has been a scrappy, constantly changing tactical landscape — the 4–3–3 I alluded to in the previous post has been adapted, changed and rebuilt several times, many tactical articles have been read, discussed, chewed up and fired into the tactics screen, just to be spat back out by various defeats (shoutout to United and Liverpool especially).
Get ClassicKatyy’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
I don’t want to give too much away tactically at the moment (because what we’re settling into links heavily to a tactical identity i’ll be developing in the main game, but there were a couple of key moves, including offset Pressing Forwards in attack to win the ball back high and early to counter-attack, and a slight adaptation of the CM partnership I discussed in the last post.
I’ve also pulled our left winger back into a Defensive Winger role, to protect our defence a bit more, and give the Mezzala some more licence to roam forward into attacking positions. In general, we do need to do some in-depth recruitment over the summer, because some roles and positions do feel like we’re pushing square pegs into round holes, but before we can even consider our recruitment for next year, we’ve got a relegation battle to finish!
As you can see, our run-in isn’t the most straightforward of schedules, but a win against Bournemouth will give us a fighting chance of keeping our destiny in our own hands. If i’m honest, I don’t have many expectations in the last five: we need to take maximum points from Bournemouth and at least one of Fulham or Wolves to put ourselves in control; our recently improved press should put us in a strong position to achieve this, as long as we can avoid injuries to key players during the run-in.
Enjoyed this post? You Might also enjoy:
Consider following the blog to get instant updates whenever a new story is published! You can also follow me on Twitter
