I'm desperately trying to create such a player but I never succeed.
What I want is a player who is natural striker AND natural winger to drop into space and take the ball from the midfield wings, and then cut inside and shoot, do a double pass or get into the area.
I don't want him to run to the byline and then cross. I don't have any good heading strikers. Therefore I hope to turn my player into a Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo, who do score a lot of goals (or at least assists) by cutting inside.
I tried it on severaly ways:
1. Position him as striker, and then with a diagonal arrow to AMR position (or otherwise an AMR with diagonal arrow to striker). But that only created the problem, that my player was too far off from the midfield, and therefore didn't get any balls. Mentality slider didn't change that much.
2. Position him as AMR and use the mentality slider and Run With Ball to get him to cut inside. But he just won't do that. He gets many balls on the wing, but when he runs he only runs to the byline instead of doing a sharp cut inside. (Btw even player with PPM "cuts inside" don't cut inside...)

So I need your help guys. Tell me how you got your ManU/Barcelona team to have C.Ronaldo/Messi cutting inside and scoring goals, instead of crossing and get Rooney another lost header.

For this, if you want them to cut inside instead of taking it out wide, you will need to play narrow and have the cross ball instruction set to rarely. If you have them playing wide, then naturally they will go wide. Narrowing things up will make them less likely to go wide.

Instructing them to cross the ball rarely should do exactly that. They should take the ball on themselves a bit more.

Sadly, crossing only means they won't cross while standing at the byline. They are instead passing the ball back to the middle behind the area or something like that. But crossing won't affect their running destinations.

Narrow play only makes my wingers being positioned more in the middle while my team attacks.
But that only means I will get me less space in the attacking third, because they (and therefore their opp. players) are standing closer to the middle strikers and to each other.
So there is no more space for dribbling through because there are 3 or 4 opp. players nearby.

I really want them to start on the wings (like C. Ronaldo), and then use their speed and technique to cut inside and use the space (which is there because the opp. full-backs are marking my wingers on the wings) to get through to the goal

I'm not so sure about playing narrow, but one thing that does help is to have the player run with the ball often and to cross rarely. I have Vicente and Joaquin set to this and they both cut inside regularly. If set to this (and if you are using 8.0.2), the players will run with the ball into the space available but will pass if no space is available (even if this means passing backwards).

It does seem quite tough to be honest to get players to behave like that. I think maybe that's one problem with FM and it doesn't reflect real life in terms of goals scored by players who don't play up front.

Lampard, Gerrard & Ronaldo are all players who score lots of goals from either midfield or the wing. However FM doesn't seem to be able to replicate this unfortunately.

Or perhaps it does, but I just haven't found out how to yet

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Well I have him set Run With Ball to often and crosses to rarely, but he still will only run along the line. He's everything but dangerous of scoring a goal.
What's your setting of creative freedom for Vicente and Joaquin? I have it set above normal or even high, because I hope by that he will behave "un-like" a winger and therefore like a striker

I have found that if I play a left footed player on the right and a right footed player on the left, they are forced to cut in more.

Well I have him set Run With Ball to often and crosses to rarely, but he still will only run along the line. He's everything but dangerous of scoring a goal.
What's your setting of creative freedom for Vicente and Joaquin? I have it set above normal or even high, because I hope by that he will behave "un-like" a winger and therefore like a striker </BLOCKQUOTE>

I have their CF set to 5 notches to the left of centre. I also have them set as AMR/L with diagonal arrows to the FR/FL positions as you have. Something I've just realised is that I have now set them to swap positions so I wonder if Drewstar is right when he says that the cut in more to be on their preferred foot. i.e. It is maybe only happening when the swap positions. I'll check this out in the game and let you know.

But just for clarification, I get them to do this about 3-4 times in a game (watching extended highlights) so there is a set of intructions that gets them to do it. I'll just have to work out why it happens for me and not you. Isn't the game great because there are so many contributing factors?

hi

"cuts inside" is one of the preferred moves actually.

however c.ronaldo or messi don't have it as far as i remember.

i would try minimising the cross ball option
and maybe trying long shots often for wingers.

still i believe you cant make every player do this and "preferred moves" makes a difference.