Tuchel 4-3-1-2

FM 2014 – The Tuchel System

Replicating real life formations in FM14 can often be incredibly frustrating due to the well documented limitations of the newest match engine. However, this was one of the main aspects I enjoyed about the series, and thus I have continued to do so – with varying degrees of success.

As I write these paragraphs, I have yet to even open FM14 and start to build this system, as first I want to let you know about Thomas Tuchel – the manager of Mainz in Germany. He plays a very high pressure 4-3-1-2 formation that I am a huge fan of. The formation is very simple and relies on hard work, superb positional discipline and fast attacking football that is often very easy on the eye.

The formation presses very high up the pitch, and can leave a lot of space in behind, but if our forward players are pressing in the correct manner, closing down players with an eye for a pass and letting them shift possession onto players uncomfortable with the ball (traditionally the defensive players) – we should see a lot of passes lumped forward with no real target, thus gifting us possession.

My aim through this thread is to implement this system into working for a team in the Premier League that I truly believe is suited to this style of play – Newcastle United. It also helps that I know the club inside out and know how different players play – something that will only help us moving forward.

First things first – we need our basic formation set, and I am going for this set up:



The full backs and box to box midfielders are key to this tactic – they must be able to close down and harass the opposition for 90 minutes, requiring great stamina, work rate and positioning – the same as the Defensive Forward. All 3 players in the front line are instructed to close down defenders and tackle them high up the pitch, with their movement in between the lines hopefully confusing defenders leading to CCC’s and inevitably goals. The anchorman and the two centre backs are simply told to tightly mark key goalscoring threats, in hope that the rest of the team will not be able to pick them out due to the high pressure we’re operating in the centre of the park.

With this in mind, the starting eleven which I consider my strongest will be the following:



How this will work is another question – so we must progress to the start of the season to inspect whether this tactic will reap rewards – and if not we must analyse where we are going wrong and correct this.



During pre-season, I figured the position we were weak in the most was probably defensive midfield, with only Tiote available to play the anchorman role with any degree of aptitude. For this reason I have brought in Mohamed Diame from West Ham for a fee of £3.5m. He fits the role perfectly, and could possibly provide cover in the box to box midfield slots.

Throughout pre-season I organized the maximum amount of friendlies I feel I could have whilst maintaining good squad fitness and allowing the new tactic to become fluid. We only lost twice – one to Juventus away and one to Dinamo Kiev at home. This was however before the tactic got fluid, and the result against P.S.G. is a great one for us.



A key part of this tactic is being able to identify and stop the creative forces of the opposition – we can then use the opposition instructions in an attempt to stop them playing the way they want to. Our first opponents are Norwich City, and this is the likely lineup that my scouts have predicted they will play.



I feel their biggest passing threats are Johnson and Howson, so they will be closed down and tightly marked at all times – as well as the two forward players and the wingers. Part of this tactic is defending from the front too, so I will set my team to close down the centre backs and full backs in hope that they will hoof the ball long for our defenders to pick up.



The match went well, our first half tactic of closing them down very highly up the pitch worked very well and they were forced into long ball after long ball which Coloccini and Yanga-Mbiwa easily dealt with. Both of them contested 15 aerial battles, Mbiwa won every single one and Coloccini only lost one – showing this tactic is extremely effective if your defenders are good in the air.

Meanwhile – going forward we looked excellent, the front 3 of Ben Arfa, Gouffran and Remy all grabbed a goal – while Ben Arfa set up two himself. Our shots all came from a central position which is what we are aiming for by clicking the “Exploit the middle” shout – as that is where all 3 of our attacking players are situated.



Next time we will look at what happens against top teams, as my next game is Chelsea away – a game we are not expected to win. I will show you what my plans are for dealing with this type of game and hopefully we can come away with a draw or a narrow win.


Last time out, we seen the 4-3-1-2 record a 5-2 victory over Norwich, but a much sterner test was lying await – Chelsea are the visitors at St. James’s Park today and will provide a very tough test to the new system I am intending to play. The tactic is not fully fluid yet, so defeat is a real possibility – however I am hoping the system that I am employing will keep the scoreline respectable.

When I got through the scout report, our scout Ian Sampson predicted Chelsea would line up with the 4-2-3-1 formation that the 4-3-1-2 is excellent against.



It allows our defensive midfielder Cheick Tiote to man mark the player in the hole, which in this case is Oscar. It allows basically our entire team to man mark their forward line, with the two centre backs doubling up on any danger man.



With Chelsea’s team how it is however, the likes of Eden Hazard and Willian are players that can roam all over the pitch, so I decided against tight marking as it would move our team all over the place and our shape would be disrupted – which is what makes the tactic so solid. I chose to tightly mark their striker as balls over the top may damage us, however.

Throughout the game we were excellent, closing down extremely well and tackled with heart and desire. The instructions to confine Chelsea to their own half and hope for balls over the top worked extremely well – look at the amount of tackles we made in their half here.


This is paramount to what we are trying to do, as it will allow the attackers to attack against fewer men, due to the players Chelsea will be committing forward to their attacks. This is important as the players we have upfront – Yoan Gouffran, Ben Arfa and Loic Remy all attack with great pace, and we can exploit the space that is left.

These tackles up the pitch resulted in a 3-1 winning margin, as we dominated the game from start to finish. The goal they scored was again from a corner; something we are going to need to brush up on as we are conceding way too many from set pieces, but that is for another time. You can clearly see the domination we held over our more illustrious opponents:


Our tactics worked to perfection, as Tiote completely man marked the influential Oscar out the game, and Mourinho decided to change to a more defensive 4-5-1, slinging both Hazard and Oscar from the pitch at 56 minutes. You only have to look here to see how poorly Oscar played, as every touch he took he was quickly met with a tackle or block from Tiote, who was the best player on the pitch.



I am now going to play out the season to truly test the tactic out, once it is fluid we should see better ball retention between midfield and attack, and more challenges further up the pitch, leaving us able to attack against a formation that is unsettled due to players committing to attacks.


When we last visited the Tuchel system in place at Newcastle, the system was proving highly effective in stopping attacks before they have the chance to build, allowing us to move quickly in on the opponents goal from their own half. We had just beaten Chelsea 3-1 to move into the top 4. My aim at the start of the season was to finish somewhere between 5th and 8th – allowing European participation next season which should hopefully see some better talent arriving at the club.

What happened was quite amazing, we went on several great runs – easily dispatching teams like Arsenal and Southampton on our way to a 3rd place finish. Here are just some of the great results we have achieved throughout the 2013/2014 season:



The main part of our attacking impetus was our front 3 of Remy, Gouffran and the man sitting in behind – Hatem Ben Arfa. 52 goals and 36 assists came from these 3, showing the vital effect they had on our teams attacking play.



Obviously, we had slumps – and the majority of these were when we didn’t have players capable enough to step in and replace the players we were losing. When Ben Arfa was injured our only option was to drop Gouffran into the SS(A) position, leaving Cisse to take over his role as the DF(s) – something he is not cut out to do. This made our shape disjointed and we were unable to stop attacks high up the pitch, due to Cisse’s lack of work rate and stamina. I made this a key position to improve upon in the summer, and I found 2 players that were perfect to fit this role – Simon Zoller of Kaiserslautern and Tom Ince from Blackpool. Their stats are below:



Both of these players have good stamina, work rate and determination – while also being blessed with technical ability to make the difference in the final third. We need them both to learn the PPM Runs with Ball Through Centre and Gets Forward Whenever Possible – but by the end of the season that should be done and these 2 will be perfectly capable of stepping into the shoes of Hatem Ben Arfa when he is either injured or suspended.

Our squad strengthening was somewhat disrupted by the lack of ambition shown by the board, with only 14m to repeat last seasons heroics – without our top goalscorer as he went back to QPR – no intention of joining Newcastle permanently. This is obviously a concern, so I had to spend a decent proportion of the transfer budget on a 15-20 goal a season striker, and one that can drop straight into the starting XI. Luckily my South American scout found me a beauty – Carlos Carbonero. While not blessed with outstanding finishing ability (12) – his pace, acceleration, work rate, stamina and determination all make for a superb forward to lead the line in a Tuchel type system. He does possess the PPM 'Arrives Late in the Opponent Area' which we will have to try and remove, but apart from that he is a very good striker for our system - his attributes are below:



I was happy enough to leave this as it Is, analyse where my team was playing poorly and act on this in the Winter transfer window – but a player by the name of Gaston Gil Romero was offered to me and I could not pass up the chance – my scouts highly rate him and say he will become better than any of my current crop, so 4m of my transfer fund went in his direction to bring him in for a total fee of 7.5m. I also brought in Joleon Lescott on a free transfer to replace the outgoing Steven Taylor and Mike Williamson – he will also make a decent tutor for young defender Remie Streete, who I have high hopes for.

I hope this piece helps people understand that the forward players in a high pressing, aggressive 4-3-1-2 cannot simply be technically able – they must possess the right attitude and physical stats to succeed in order for the formation to hold its worth. Next time I will go into depth about the correct type of training and tutoring we must use to ensure the young players coming from the academy and beyond develop into the correct type of player that will fit this system, in order to create a legacy at the club based around a playing style.