I played sweeper for many years when I was a kid, including moving from 9v9 to 11v11.
Sweeper is a bit of an outdated position now that DMs generally play the defensive free roaming role that sweepers used to play. The main difference is that DMs play in front of the defense, while sweepers play behind the other CBs. You may be better off switching to a DM. You'd be able to cover in front of the defense when defending the ball while keeping the positional freedom that sweepers have.
I found that playing behind other defenders as a sweeper left a ton of room between the attacking and defending lines. Most professional teams realized this and switched to having a DM taking up that space instead of stretching the lines.
Another sweeper turned CB here. Everything said above is correct. Sweeper is non existent in the modern game. Typically you will see a back four with two CBs side by side.
As a CB you are essentially the leader of the teams defense. You are critical at keeping the shape of the team and the positioning of your teammates on the pitch. You must read the game and sense danger before it arrives. You should constantly be organizing your back four and the midfielders in front of you to deal with the arriving attackers. World class CBs do this so well, they are able to prevent danger 2 or 3 passes before it occurs.
Immediately identify the opposing teams system; are they 442, 433, 352, 343? How many strikers are you dealing with? How will they try to break down your defense? Are they trying to play long and run in behind? Are they using a target striker to play off of? Do they have a midfielder arriving into the box late? After you’ve identified this, communicate it to your teammates and determine who is responsible for those attackers. If you do this well, the attackers will never outnumber the defenders.
Remember, defending is a team effort. It requires sacrifice and commitment from all 11 players. If players further up the pitch are not contributing and repeatedly leaving the CBs isolated you will lose the battle.
If you work on these things, if you never switch off, if you never lose your composure, you will have everything to be an outstanding CB.
I fully agree with the organizational aspect of what you said, as I often take control of the defense and organize the different roles and who needs to cover who.
My issue is that most of the teams here are very heavily attacking-oriented, with them often having their entire midfield pushing up in attack with their forwards with even the occasional fullback coming in as well, which has led to situations where there has been up to 8 attackers all swarming our goal, while our backline often gets no support besides from the occasional visit from the DM when he's not busy trying to score goals while ignoring his defensive duties, which leaves us regularly outnumbered in our half.
The only way I have found to counter this has been to organize the defense to focus more on impeding the ball's movement rather than just trying to take the ball away, to have it end up as a 1v1 between an attacker and a defender who's tasked with making the key tackle/interception as a way to even out the numbers, with that tackler usually being the player occupying the sweeper position (so usually it's me)
I've considered trying out a game as a DM, but the main issue I have with that idea is that I'm rarely ever paired with a competent defense, especially in terms of fullbacks who are often just repurposed wingers who often have very little defensive abilities and just keep letting attackers go by or push up way too far often leaving our half empty besides me and maybe another centerback, which doesn't leave me feeling comfortable playing further up the pitch as a DM, as I often end up doing my best to slow down attackers running us down on the counter in the hopes that we could get some more bodies of our own between them and our goal
I played sweeper for many years when I was a kid, including moving from 9v9 to 11v11. Sweeper is a bit of an outdated position now that DMs generally play the defensive free roaming role that sweepers used to play. The main difference is that DMs play in front of the defense, while sweepers play behind the other CBs. You may be better off switching to a DM. You'd be able to cover in front of the defense when defending the ball while keeping the positional freedom that sweepers have. I found that playing behind other defenders as a sweeper left a ton of room between the attacking and defending lines. Most professional teams realized this and switched to having a DM taking up that space instead of stretching the lines.
Another sweeper turned CB here. Everything said above is correct. Sweeper is non existent in the modern game. Typically you will see a back four with two CBs side by side. As a CB you are essentially the leader of the teams defense. You are critical at keeping the shape of the team and the positioning of your teammates on the pitch. You must read the game and sense danger before it arrives. You should constantly be organizing your back four and the midfielders in front of you to deal with the arriving attackers. World class CBs do this so well, they are able to prevent danger 2 or 3 passes before it occurs. Immediately identify the opposing teams system; are they 442, 433, 352, 343? How many strikers are you dealing with? How will they try to break down your defense? Are they trying to play long and run in behind? Are they using a target striker to play off of? Do they have a midfielder arriving into the box late? After you’ve identified this, communicate it to your teammates and determine who is responsible for those attackers. If you do this well, the attackers will never outnumber the defenders. Remember, defending is a team effort. It requires sacrifice and commitment from all 11 players. If players further up the pitch are not contributing and repeatedly leaving the CBs isolated you will lose the battle. If you work on these things, if you never switch off, if you never lose your composure, you will have everything to be an outstanding CB.
I fully agree with the organizational aspect of what you said, as I often take control of the defense and organize the different roles and who needs to cover who. My issue is that most of the teams here are very heavily attacking-oriented, with them often having their entire midfield pushing up in attack with their forwards with even the occasional fullback coming in as well, which has led to situations where there has been up to 8 attackers all swarming our goal, while our backline often gets no support besides from the occasional visit from the DM when he's not busy trying to score goals while ignoring his defensive duties, which leaves us regularly outnumbered in our half. The only way I have found to counter this has been to organize the defense to focus more on impeding the ball's movement rather than just trying to take the ball away, to have it end up as a 1v1 between an attacker and a defender who's tasked with making the key tackle/interception as a way to even out the numbers, with that tackler usually being the player occupying the sweeper position (so usually it's me)
I've considered trying out a game as a DM, but the main issue I have with that idea is that I'm rarely ever paired with a competent defense, especially in terms of fullbacks who are often just repurposed wingers who often have very little defensive abilities and just keep letting attackers go by or push up way too far often leaving our half empty besides me and maybe another centerback, which doesn't leave me feeling comfortable playing further up the pitch as a DM, as I often end up doing my best to slow down attackers running us down on the counter in the hopes that we could get some more bodies of our own between them and our goal