71% possession, 91% pass completion and Champions League glory — the refined FM26 recreation of Luis Enrique's PSG 4-3-3, rebuilt for total dominance.
At the beginning of the Football Manager 26 cycle, I took it upon myself to recreate my favourite, and, arguably, the most interesting side in European football: Paris St. Germain. I was happy enough with my initial recreation, however, I wasn't entirely at ease with the quality of the recreation in the end. Therefore, as I've gone on to understand the game's match engine further, I've taken it upon myself, again, to recreate their system in more depth and detail. In this article, I'll be going through the changes to the system I made in FM26 to optimise the recreation — if you'd like tactical analysis of Enrique's PSG side, you can read through the original PSG FM26 tactic article here.
Dominating Possession with an Attacking Mentality
In my original recreation, I applied the 'Attacking' mentality to the system. The idea behind this selection was to recreate PSG's immense flexibility and unpredictability, wherefrom they can go from dominating possession with complete control to springing forward with numbers in transition. However, I combined this with an abundance of risk-inducing player instructions, adding a further layer of attacking impetus to an overall system that was already heavily encouraged to commit to attacking situations. The result of this, ultimately, was that games in testing could, at times, descend into chaotic basketball-esque matches, of which the result could easily swing either way. Also, the result of this would be a relative decrease to our possession dominance, and a decrease to our pass completion rate and field tilt statistics.
This 2.0 update of this tactic lowers the accumulative risk-taking within this tactic, with the introduction of the 'Take Fewer Risks' player instruction to multiple roles in the tactic and a slight alteration to team instructions to optimise our ball dominance. The result of this, in testing with PSG on FM26:
- Ligue 1 Average Possession (%): 71%
- UEFA Champions League Average Possession (%): 65%
- Average Pass Completion (%): 91%
- Average Field Tilt (%): 85.3%
This is a vast improvement on the original version of the tactic, where, in testing on the latest FM26 update with PSG, we accumulated these statistics:
- Ligue 1 Average Possession: 64%
- UEFA Champions League Average Possession: 61%
- Average Pass Completion (%): 90%
- Average Field Tilt (%): 79.9%
This dominance of possession didn't, however, thwart our attacking output, as we achieved superior attacking output statistically:
- Ligue 1 Goals: 107
- Ligue 1 xG: 97.06xG
- Ligue 1 Goals per 90: 3.1
This is improved on the original tactic's attacking output:
- Ligue 1 Goals: 97
- Ligue 1 xG: 85.88
- Ligue 1 Goals per 90: 2.9
Implementing a Man-Marking-Based Pressing System
A key facet of PSG's system is their hyperintense, man-to-man, high-pressing system — this system gives PSG the platform to completely suffocate their opponents. However, due to the early nature of FM26 way back when, I didn't take the time nor care to implement this in-game with my previous tactic. For a deeper look at how pressing systems and formation-specific approaches interact in FM26, our FM26 pressing principles guide is an excellent companion read.
Therefore, in accordance with this 2.0 version of this tactic, I implemented formation-specific tactics for you to load into your game if and when you need them.
Let's Break Down the Tactic
In Possession
I adapted the tactic's Passing Directness to 'Much Shorter' to encourage the team to play short as often as possible, in alignment with the 'Attacking' mentality. Additionally, I removed the 'Counter-Attack' team instruction to allow the side to pick and choose when to launch a counter-attack, giving them scope to hold shape if the situation finds it necessary in-game. Furthermore, to encourage the side to retain possession more often, I applied 'Discourage' to the side's dribbling tendencies, asking them to focus more on team moves, rather than individual moments of quality.
Out of Possession
I made two key tweaks to our defensive approach in-game: firstly, I removed a specific instruction based on our defensive line's mentality, as I felt this aligned more with PSG in real life. The same reasoning can be used in regard to the removal of the 'Trap Outside' team instruction.
Player Roles
Goalkeeper | Sweeper Keeper
Here, I made a slight adjustment to the 'keeper's role from the original tactic. In the original tactic, I selected the 'Ball-Playing Goalkeeper' role as I felt that described the role best. However, upon further review of both PSG's 'keeper in real life and how each role plays in-game, I felt this role actually suited best. Additionally, I applied the 'Take Fewer Risks' and 'Shorter Passing' instructions to optimise our possession-based approach.
Wing-Back | Pressing Full-Back
The adjustment to Hakimi's role is simply based off of my feeling that Hakimi's prior role, the Advanced Wing-Back, positioned him too high in-game and this interrupted our possession exploits.
(DCR) Centre-Back | Centre-Back
The only adjustment I made to Marquinhos' prior role was the addition of the 'Dribble Less' instruction, with the aim of optimising our possession-based game at the forefront.
(DCL) Centre-Back | Centre-Back
Pacho's role is also tweaked, this time with the further addition of the 'Take Fewer Risks' instruction — this difference between both centre-backs' instructions reflects Marquinhos' relative tendency to progress play more often than his centre-half partner with his passing.
Inside Full-Back | Full-Back
I made a few slight tweaks to Mendes' role: firstly, I applied the 'Run Wide With Ball' instruction to encourage more autonomy in his positioning, allowing him to either invert or move wider based on the game's situation. Next, to try and replicate Mendes' trademark progressive passes from the 'left centre-back' position, I applied the 'Take More Risks' instruction, whilst also applying the 'Shorter Passing' instruction to add a bit more balance.
Deep-Lying Playmaker | Defensive Midfielder
The only change I made to Vitinha's role (ignoring the UI glitch in the image — 'Stay Wider'???) was applying the 'Shoot More Often' instruction, reflecting the Portuguese's tendency to shoot from distance in real life.
Central Midfielder | Central Midfielder
I did apply a few further instructions to Neves' role: 'Dribble More' reflects his natural tendency, in real life, to carry the ball forward; 'Makes More Runs' also reflects his tendency to make off-the-ball runs and crash the penalty area late; finally, the 'Take Fewer Risks' instruction adds a level of security to the midfield on the ball, escaping the potential issue of possessing too many risk-taking roles in midfield.
Channel Midfielder | Central Midfielder
No adjustments were made for Fabián's role. Both central midfielders' out-of-possession roles were adjusted from the original 'Pressing Central Midfielder' as that role was too aggressive in their positioning, often advancing beyond the opposition's midfielders.
(AMR) Winger | Winger
I changed Doué's role simply due to a preference for which role was most realistic. This also incorporated the removal of the 'Take More Risks' instruction, as I felt this worked best.
(AML) Winger | Winger
I tweaked a few of Kvaratskhelia's instructions to better replicate his performance in real life. This included the emergence of the 'Hold Up Ball' instruction, as this encourages either Mendes or Fabián to provide underlapping runs from deep akin to that of real life — additionally, this replicates Kvaratskhelia's tendency to patiently size up an opponent 1v1, before swiftly bursting past with ease. Additionally, I removed the 'Cross from Byline' instruction, as this was found to be actually counter-intuitive upon review. Furthermore, to encourage the Georgian to make more runs in-behind, I applied the relevant 'Make More Runs' instruction to his role.
False Nine | Centre Forward
No adjustments were made to this role.
Results
Ligue 1
In testing with PSG, we actually eclipsed the performance of the original tactic, as we gained four more points having amassed a total of 93 points — to achieve this, we won 30 of our 34 league games, whilst drawing 3 games, and losing just 1 game all season! Across our 34 league games, we scored 107 goals (3.1 goals per game) and conceded just 30 goals (0.9 goals per game) — however, the xG table suggests that we should've conceded fewer goals than this!
Domestic Cups
We won our first piece of silverware for the season in the season's curtain-raiser, beating Spurs 1-2 to lift the UEFA Super Cup! We followed this with success in the 'International Champion', defeating Al-Ahli 4-1 in the Final, making it two trophies before we clocked into 2026. We got off to the perfect start to 2026, as we defeated rivals Marseille 1-2 in the Final to secure our third trophy: the Trophée des Champions! However, Marseille would eventually get revenge as they were incredibly fortunate to defeat us 0-2 in the French Cup Quarter-Finals, as our dreams of an incredible SEXTUPLE were heartbreakingly extinguished.
UEFA Champions League
We made it two in a row for this 'incroyable' PSG side, as we produced pure dominance to overcome Arsenal in the Final. On our way to further European success, we saw off FC Barcelona (0-6 AGG), Real Madrid (2-5 AGG), and Atalanta (4-1 AGG), having finished 2nd in the League Phase!
Conclusion
PSG are incredible... or shall I say 'incroyable'?! They not only won the UEFA Champions League in 24/25 — they made a mockery of it, and are looking to stunningly replicate this feat after humiliating English outfit Chelsea 2-8 on aggregate recently. They, for me, are modern-day footballing utopia — the crown jewel of European football at this stage. If you want a taste of this 'magnifique' tactic, make sure to download the tactic using the link attached to this article and make sure to follow FM Blog (@fmbIog) and myself (@AshtonGgmu) on our respective socials. I hope you have enjoyed this article, and I wish you much success with this tactic on your saves! Thanks for reading!
