Man Marking, how to make it work....

First priority when looking at whether your team has the potential to man-mark, is deciding whether you think it will benefit your side? Your defenders will already stick to the opposition strikers like glue if they have any talent, so is it viable for you to risk your defender being turned inside out by the striker he's up against and being of no use to you.

To decide whether your team has the potential to use the Man-Marking tactic effectively I suggest you check the 'marking' ability of your main two Centre-backs. If it below 16 then you will find they will struggle in the Premiership and Europe.

16 is the magic number for most of the other important stats. Jumping is vital to prevent the opposition from just playing the ball 'over' your defender, as is strength. Although a short, weak defender can be very useful, sooner or later he will cost you a goal. Also important is pace and acceleration and of course tackling, after all it is no use your defender neither being able to keep up with Michael Owen or Alan Smith, and if they can, not being able to tackle them successfully. For every stat you are weaker than the opposition attacker you are effectively handing them the superiority and advantage, which the better European teams will use to their advantage.

My first hint would be to use the Man-Marking solely in a 5-3-2 formation and allow one of your defenders to sweep up zonally, or even only have one defender man-mark to double up on players such as Vieri who would otherwise decimate your defender.

Another method is using a top class DMC to man-mark the oppositions CM. Effectively this removes one of their players from the game, my personal favourite being Man-Marking Paul Scholes, and allows your regular MC's (if you play two), to run the show and run your oppositions sole midfielder ragged. However, unless you have top of the range players, with top of the range defenders it is likely you will be able to pull this off to any great extent, but even if your DMC manages to tackle Scholes 2/5 times. That's 2 times Scholes isn't in your box causing problems.

Another favourite tactic of mine is using two DM's to man mark their wingers. Give your DM's free-role even if they don't particularly enjoy it, and make them man-mark (they do need the stats still though) and watch as Beckham and Giggs are silenced for almost 90 minutes. Beware trying to do it without adequate players or stats though, as good teams such as Barcelona and United will merely ghost past your defenders and hammer you (pay attention to the match report for signs of your player struggling, or their player being effectively nullified).

David Challoner