Notes

Some general mental aspects:
There are times when you have been pressured alot that it's the best scenario to simply shoot the ball to their corner when given the chance instead of trying to be creative, just so your team can get a mental breather and get rid of some of that frustration that builds up from having to defend for a longer period, because when you are forced to defend for too long you often tend to lose patient and doing riskier and risker plays.

Likewise if you've been having short offensive possessions, perhaps play a bit simpler for a bit on O and just focus on having possession for a bit.

In a normal game or game where you find it easy to clear and aren't having trouble to get possession, don't be afraid to try a bit more difficult plays, like either a trick when given chance or a bit tougher pass then what you usually do, since you're able to get the possession back quite easily it doesn't really matter if you fail and lose the possession since there could be alot to gain from succeeding.

Defense has and always will be the most important factor to being a winning team in haxball.
Whenever I face a team that is a strong defensive team and maybe a bit lackluster offensively, I never go into thinking "okay what do we have to change or what can we do offensively to beat them" but instead my first and foremost thought is "our defense has to match theirs, we have to be perfect defensively".
The reason for that is because when you face a strong defense is that you can't afford any mistakes on your own defensive end since you can't simply go "okay they scored, well we still got time", that goal may never come.
Obviously I can have some tactics and small tidbits on how we can score on them but if I know that we are the better team, and that we will have more possession then they do then I want the game to progress to where my team in 10 minutes have maybe 3 clear-cut goal chances while they have 0.
That to me is perfect and just means that you should keep grinding it out, with this playstyle you have a 0% chance to lose.
I would never start gambling and taking risks just to trade 3-0 in chances to score to 5-2, that ruins your odds to win by a shitload.

General offense mentality:
In Slackers I always preached to things, TEMPO TEMPO TEMPO and ATTACK ATTACK ATTACK.
With tempo I mean that whatever you do, do it fast, don't fondle the ball because you only allow defense more time to settle and see what's going on, keep a high tempo with your passes and with your tricks to give as little time as possible to defenders to make the right decision.

By attack I mean to be aggressive once the ball gets infront of the goal, once the corner O has crossed the ball infront of the goal there is no reason for him to remain there and watch what is going on, he should get towards the goal in a position where he can be a threat.
Same with the mid, after the cross has came or if the mid himself has dumped the ball infront of the goal, there's no reason for him to remain there and watch what is going on, attack the ball and be a threat.

Why passing is so effective:
I will try to explain simply why passing the ball around is effective, passing backwards, sideways, forward, preferably in a high tempo.

Passing is effective because it forces the opponents to think about several things at once and make quick decisions.
While the ball is in the corner, the crossdefender will just get to the position he thinks is the best and stay there waiting for the cross to come, he only has to focus on one thing so his chances for making an error is extremely low.
Just take a simple backpass from the corner for example, all of a sudden the crossdefender has to focus on where the ball is moving, where the forward infront of the goal is moving and he also has to focus where he himself is moving trying to find the best position for him to be in.
The mid might pass the ball straight back to corner O, now the crossdefender has to move back to cover cross and also pay attention to where the forward infront of goal is.
The corner O decides to cross it infront of the goal, and the crossdefender anticipates the play and moves to stop the pass from reaching to the forward, but since he was moving backwards and having to follow several things at once his decision to reach the pass was a bad idea because he messed up the timing and it took him too long to change direction from backwards to forwards and the opponents can easily score.

I'm not saying passing is some magical weapon but it makes it more likely for defenders to make mistakes since the ball moves faster then players and you are forced to make very quick decisions, even if you read the situation perfectly right you might've gotten your positioning wrong or your timing to reach a ball wrong since you were constantly on the move having to focus on many things at once.

The better the passing the bigger the chance is for defensive errors.


Alot of this shit is outdated, some is just badly written or done but whatever.



Usual defensive setup: http://puu.sh/AoZA + http://puu.sh/Ap5v
It's important the FW2 doesn't just roam around but tries to be a way to be useful for us to clear the ball by either screening away the mid so corner D can clear it without hindrance from him, or he can go and screen the corner O to give the corner D some help to clear.
Try to have a purpose and sense of what you're doing in that "CP/Free role" because it's common that this player sometimes is useless in the help of defending and the help of clearing the ball.

The hip is the most important position on D, the GK can't cover the goal alone and when it comes to corner offense the GK is only responsible for holding the front post.
While the guy at the hip is responsible for covering the entire goal basically, so there can never be a sense of "it's not my job to go there", if you notice the GK is alone, and ur dimwit teammate isn't going there, you go there instantly.
Same when we try to clear the ball, the player at the hip is responsible for coverage of the goal untill the ball is on the other fucking side of the map, you can't leave from here until you're certain the ball is cleared, not about to be cleared.



http://www.speedyshare.com/Nhzx3/Slackers-how-to-put-pressure.rar
^This one might be a bit over the top though seeing as most teams here don't box anyway but there's still some useful things in there and if all 3 offensive players apply pressure correctly it's quite easy to win the ball.
I made it for Sweden-Turkey quarterfinals which we lost in OT :'(
If not watching the pictures or just gave them a quick scimthrough, it's basically about always make sure to move to block the passing angle first, before you put pressure on the guy with the ball.

Should also never be 3 guys rushing the ball, the player furthest away from the ball has to remain more central and be close enough to reach the far side if for example the GK crosses it to the mid, you should be able to get infront of the mid and stopping him from getting the ball forward.

Forwards should make sure they can't pass the ball forward alongside the wall, and the mid should be slightly behind the forwards ready to pop forward and intercept any pass that is ran between the 2 fwds.


Corner screen: http://puu.sh/AoYY + http://puu.sh/AoZ8


The box: 1) http://puu.sh/Ap7w 2) http://puu.sh/Ap7w 3) http://puu.sh/Ap7K
The defense is put up in a lol way in this picture but just neglect that.
With the box it's important that the ball is moved quickly, and also that the MF recievíng the first backpass from the corner makes sure to distance himself so he has room to work with.


The russian tactic: 1) http://puu.sh/ApdU 2) http://puu.sh/ApeV 3) http://puu.sh/Apgx 4) http://puu.sh/Apj5 5) http://puu.sh/Api9