| Tester | Team | ME | Win % | PPG | AGF | AGA | GD | PL | W | D | L |
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Hello guys, welcome to my new tactic emulation video. This time I tried to emulated Sir Alex Ferguson's tactic at Manchester Utd in the season 1998-1999, when he won the treble (Premier League, Cup and Champions League). Well, I did even better because I won not 2 but three domestic trophies and the UEFA Champions League. I used the 1998-99 season database you can find online so I emulated in all aspects that great season. I tried (unless I had injuries or red cards) to keep the same starting XI Ferguson' used as you can see in the video, and I did not buy/sell any player in the two player bargains sessions of the season 2022-23. With this tactic you can see a great and attacking play, a lot of crosses and a lot of beautiful goals. Yorke scored around 60 goals in this season and Cole scored around 40. Our team Xg were well above average with a 2,92 xG per game. Despite being an attacking tactic, we had the 3rd best defense of the Premier League with only 33 goals (0,87 goals x game) conceeded, behind Liverpool (23 goals conceeded) and Arsenal (29). Let's now analyze how I created this tactic on Football Manager 2023. Ferguson during his career mostly used a standard 4-4-2 formation with an exception in the season 2007-08 when he won his second and last Champions League in the final agains Chelsea. In the season 1998-99 he used a 4-4-2, so in Football Manager we start with a standard 4-4-2, with an attacking mentality. I created two different version of this 4-4-2, the second is different only in the positions of Giggs and Beckham, who play as an inverted winger and a wide playmaker instead of as two wingers. I tried this variation to stick more to their real roles in Ferguson's Manchester, because Giggs loved to cut inside with the ball from the left while David Beckham loved to play in the center too, rather than only on the right side like a winger does. My first tactic maybe suits better to the game AI while the second is more realistic. Anyway, I tested both of them during this season and I had outstanding results and always played a pleasing to the eye football as you can see in the highlights. Except for these differences in Beckham and Giggs roles, the 2 tactics are the same. Let's analyze now the player roles. As goalkeeper, we have a simple gk on defend, then we have two full-backs on support, a ball playing defender and a central defender both on defend. The midfield 4-lines is made by two wingers (Beckham and Giggs) on attack, a deep-lying playmaker on defend (Scholes) and a box to box midfielder (Keane). Lastly, the forward-duo Cole-Yorke, we have two advanced forwards on attack. You can find each player's instructions in the video. Now, let's examine the team instructions. In possession: attacking width: fairly wide, Ferguson wanted to exploit the flanks but also the central area so I used the single player's instruction to decide what to do. Pass into space, overlap left and right because the full-backs, the Newille twins could overlap very often exploiting the space left by Giggs and Beckham when they cut inside. Play out of defence. Sligthly more direct passes and higher tempo because Ferguson wanted his team to play faster and not retain possession too much. Low crosses, play for set pieces, run at defense, be more expressive (this instruction with great players like Manchester Utd had in that season is a must). In transition: counter-press and counter because Ferguson wanted his team to press the opponent and once gained the ball, start a fast counter-attack and go straight to the goal, we scored a lot of goals by counter-attacks. As for the GK passing instructions, I set him to pass the ball both to central defenders and full backs to give him more options and take short kicks. Out of possession: High press, higher defensive line, trigger press: more often (not much more often because Manchester Utd knew when to wait in order to avoid the opponent played long-balls behind Manchester's lines when the team was pressing. Prevent short gk distribution and step up more In Football Manager 2023, the instruction step up more tells the players to use the off-side trap like in FM 22 the instruction "use off-side trap" did. That's all for this tactic, I hope it works for you too. If you like my video please smash the like button and subscribe to my channel to stay updated with my new contents.
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ALEX FERGUSON'S EMUL... (43.68 KiB)
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