Magnifique Eric Roy Tactic

Eric Roy. FC Voluntari. And this gorgeous tactic.

What do they have in common? Winning. And in style.

Eric Roy is a former football player, now manager, who has played for 16 years or 405 career appearances.

He played for Nice, Toulon, Marseille, Sunderland but spent the most time at Olympique Lyon.

After retiring, in September 2005, from Nice, he was hired as director of marketing, communication and public relations at the club.

He even became manager at the club at some point and all went well until It didn’t. In 2012, after a phone call, he was sacked from Nice.

The news is, though, that this sacking turned into a whole scandal. He was accused of having made a 12-day trip to Argentina with an unlicensed agent despite opposition from management and without prior preparation.

However, he contested the reason for his dismissal and after a few rounds in court, the case was judged in his favour. The court ordered Nice to pay Roy nearly 300k euros for wrongful dismissal.

After this unfortunate event, he took a job as sporting director at Lens in 2017. After a move to Watford, he was appointed manager of Stade Brestois on January 3rd 2023.

Whoever made this appointment was very inspired. As currently, Stade Brestois are 2nd in Ligue 1, trailing only Paris Saint Germain.

And let me remind you, Stade Brestois was fighting relegation a couple of seasons ago, barely escaping it by the skin of their teeth.

This season, Stade Brestois won 15 games, drew 8 and lost 5. At least up until this moment.

And all of this was done using a simple, but very effective tactic. A 4-2-3-1 based on unity, smart plays, and a mountain…sorry, Steve Mounie.

In goal, we have a sweeper keeper on attack duty. The goalkeeper must become an option for passes, to evade the opposition’s pressing game.

In front of him, a back four formed by an inverted wing back on support duty, two ball playing defenders on defend duty and one wing back on support.

The inverted wing back must be on support duty, to step up in midfield when in possession. Eric Roy’s game is based on crowding the midfield area, keeping possession of the ball and move it slightly to the right side before releasing it on the left side, where space is created.

Basically, this player must become a decoy. For this reason, the right-sided ball playing defender is told to stay wider in possession, to cover the space left by the inverted wing back.

The wing back is told to sit narrower, to help with the passing game, to escape the opposition’s pressure.

This 4-2-3-1 formation is made with central midfielders, not defensive ones. For this reason, a box-to-box midfielders and a central one on support take up this space here.

Both are told to mark tighter, to shrink the space the opposition has in possession and hopefully win the ball back fast and start a counterattack.

On the right side, an inverted winger on attack duty is used. To fully mimic Eric Roy’s tactic, it’s recommended that this player has the left foot as the base one.

He is told to stay wider, so he would stretch the opposition’s defence.

The winger is told to cut inside with the ball, especially to make room for the wing back to overlap.

An attacking midfielder is used to distribute passes and to aid congesting this area here. The 2 central midfielders, the attacking one and the inverted wing back are meant to crowd this space here, draw the opposition to a rondo and release the ball to the attack when the opportunity arises.

A complete forward on support duty makes up the formation. Eric Roy is using Steve Mounie as a target forward in his tactic. However, in the match engine the target forward is a bit static. The complete forward mimics better Steve Mounie’s movement.

To fully play like Stade Brestois this season, the goalkeeper can be told to play the ball long to the striker. Especially if you have a player like Steve Mounie.

The attacking midfielder is told to move into channels, to attack the goal when possible.

As mentality, positive. How else would Stade Brestois reach the 2nd place in Ligue 1 if not with a positive mentality?

In possession, fairly wide, overlap on the left side, shorter passing and slightly higher tempo and mixed crosses.

In transition, counter-press, counter, distribute the ball quickly and as I said, to the striker. However, I left the tactic untouched here as I want to tailor this separately per each game.

Out of possession, high line of engagement, higher defensive line, trigger press more often and prevent goalkeeper short distribution.

Eric Roy tries to make the pitch small for the opposition when losing possession in the final third, cutting their passing options as much as possible.

Stade Brestois use a very effective and aggressive pressing system this season, trying to recover the ball as fast as possible.

Les Pirates might not win the title this season, but the feat they achieved is amazing. And as amazing is how the tactic plays in the match engine.

For my team, FC Voluntari, it did wonders, helping us win the title in a commanding fashion. Scoring 110 goals and conceding 31.

In the Champions League, we won the games we should have won and nearly lost the ones in which we were not favourites.

But we did qualify to the last 16 phase, being eliminated by Arsenal after a 2-2 draw in Romania.

Domestically, we have won the treble. Which has become a habit for us in this save. However, the way this tactic plays makes me really want that Stade Brestois would win the Ligue 1 one day.