Building around Messi

The main criteria of this team is to gather only short players. I went with a rule of only accepting players at 169cm and under, to not overshadow L. Messi (170cm). Also, excluding the 170cm players makes it a real challenge: many good players are 170cm tall (Jordi Alba, M. Diaby, J. Alvarez, R. Sertling, Y. Ben Yedder, etc...). If you ask me, they probably lied about that. eFootball being a game where you can very easily play an All-Time XI, I wanted to play differently. It's not "Who are the best players for my team?" but ''What tactic to build with the limited selection of players I can choose from?"

Note: a great tool to look for players, with or without a weird challenge as this one, is eFootballHub (website or app).

I want Messi to be my top scorer and my top assister, the king of the team. So here, let’s see how to put him in the best conditions. First, here what I want to achieve:

I want him to be in this zone: at the edge of the box, slightly out centered to the right so his able to curl the ball with his left foot, to score or to pass to another attacker. A half-space demon.

To replicate it in game, the best position is right striker, as an SS. Maybe a Roaming Flank could be effective, but unfortunately, I don’t have this rare version of Messi. Speaking about the devil, let’s have a look the card I actually have:

As you can see, he’s primarily a sniper. Coupled with some great shooting skills (Long Range Shooting, Long Range Curl), I built him to be a dangerous long-range threat, from this edge of the box.

So here he should be, between the opposition’s LB and CB, ready to shoot, dribble or assist. Now that we got him in position, let’s organize the team around him to give him as much as space and/or solutions:

• The other striker, unlike Messi, should push the defense away with repeated runs. That’s way I’m taking a Goal Poacher or Fox in the box. He’ll make central runs.
• To lure the LB, we need a winger. But to not make him step on Messi’s foot, we’ll need a Cross Specialist: this way, we create a dilemma for the LB: attack Messi and free the winger or mark the winger and free Messi.
• To give Messi an option to switch the play, we’ll create a similar dilemma for the opposite RB. This time, our two protagonists will be a winger and a fullback, with the Individual Instruction Attack.

Messi receives the ball. As an SS, he’s not stuck to the defense and got time. He got three options running behind the defense: the right winger, the other central striker, and the left winger.

In this situation, my right winger created a little of panic in the defense. Guess who wait for him at his best position? As an SS, Messi will make less runs, and will patiently wait for the ball, free, once the defense has been pushed back.

The left winger: LWF or SS?

There is actually an important difference between both. As a LWF, this player will have the ‘’priority’’ on the side, versus the LB. As an SS, the LB will be the wide man. You can see in both screenshot below how does this affect their positionings.

As a LWF, the winger is wide

As a SS, the winger is more central, in the half space

I alternate between both, really depending on the opposition. The main objective is to put the winger in the best situations, the LB being only there to lur ethe opposition and pass the ball. I expect the forwards to make the dribble and shoots. So everything depends on if you want to give him more space

Some reasons I set it up as a LWF:

• I’m having difficulties dribbling this opponent, so I make sure the winger is in 1vs1 situations.
• I want a wide target to exploit counters.

Some reasons I set it up as a SS:

• I’m having difficulties keeping the ball, so I need a player comfortable on the ball in the central area.
• I have trouble getting him in the box, I need more people shooting.

The rest of the team

So now that we defined the role of 5 attacking players, we’ll use the rest of them to make a credible defense. Having already used the LB, I will make a 4 at the back, giving me 2 midfielders.

On the left side, where my LB is joining the attack, I need an Anchor Man to balance it. The other midfield will be Marco Verratti, not necessarily because of his playstyle, but simply because he’s one the best short player available. He’s great at defending, holding the ball under pressure, and making the long killer pass if Messi isn’t free. To stop it from roaming to much (the attack being already set and the defense already weak), I’ll give him the Individual Instruction Defense to remain in place. For the same reason, I also put him as a DMF.

Playstyle

I chose the Possession Playstyle for three reasons: 

• I want to exploit the wide areas with all those dilemmas.
• I need time to build, otherwise the attacking RB won’t have the time to join the attack.
• My defenders may be smalls, but they are fasts: a high line of defense shouldn’t be that big of problem then. 
•  

Players

Getting competent short players was the real challenge of this team. I was regularly looking at the trending pack to see if any of them would meet my criteria. This results in dilemmas between the perfect player as a weak standard or a better card of player not incredibly suitable to the tactic.

But this add some real-life challenge where the manager doesn’t choose all his players, and this is welcome in a game as generous as eFootball, where you have an easy access to great cards in permanence.

Special cards in blue

GK: Khalid Eisa (173cm) Smallest still abled GK I could find. There are some others at exactly 170cm but weaker, and I wanted to remain competitive.

LB: C. Towsend (168cm). I raised his stamina to 92 to not need a substitution.

CB: A. Cresswell (170cm), J. Clasie (169cm), Dodô (166cm) and F. Viafara (167cm) are all LB/RB/DMF with CB as a secondary position, that I trained to be central defenders. I also raised their jumping reach to sometimes 85, so they are still able to win aerial duels (with a nice surprise effect when your short defender win an aerial duals against big stikers).

RB: P. Monroy (169cm) is strong as he’s a special card, and that’s the main reason of its presence in the squad. If I want more solidity, I’ve got the Defensive Fullback C. Maloney (167cm) as a back-up.

DMF (Anchor Man): Fran Beltran (165cm) and S. Kawahara (169cm) are both candidates to the starting eleven.

DMF (Orchestrator): M. Verratti (165cm), excellent at both passing and defense. For back-up and substitutions, I’ve got Marcos Antônio (168cm) and K. Watanabe (165cm). They are different type of players so I can vary the midfield depending on the needs, while still using the Individual Instruction Defense if necessary.

LWF: L. Insigne (163cm) is the starter, and on the bench, there are Chanathip Songkrasin (158cm), I. Chair (158cm) and N. Barrios (156cm). All of them are excellent dribbler and I really encourage to try them, despite not being special card. As they are small and lightweight, and can really get past the best defenders. However, Insigne get the advantage of being also good at shooting.

CF (Left): The recent free card Safee Sali (168cm) is the perfect player. The back-up is the standard card of M. Obafemi (169cm), goal poacher, one of the only short CF not being a Deep Lying Forward.

CF (right): L. Messi (170cm)

RMF: R. Morishita (168cm) is the starter as my only Cross Specialist, and for back-up/subs I’ve got D. Lainez (167cm) and A.Mena (168cm). Despite being not Cross Specialist, the Possession Playstyle will still decently keep them wide. But they are mainly here as they are special cards. 

Last comments

• Yes, defending corners is a nightmare.
• I play my corners with shorts solutions.
• This Messi is already a fantastic free kick taker, that’s a real additional threat in this team.
• N’Golo Kanté (168cm) would have been a top contender, however I used him so much in another tactic, so this is purely a personal choice. But one of the DMF being required to be an Anchor Man, he could only take the place of Verratti.

Conclusion

It's a really fun team to play: you have incredibles dribblers, and a long-range option with L. Messi in its best position. You will suffer against Haaland of course, but it's part of the charm of the team. 

In term of effectiveness, it's a solid tactic, but not more. Don't get me wrong, you will have good results with it, but it's nothing more than a well organised 4-4-2.