Most of my evidence is anecdotal. Any empirical evidence wasn't archived. I meant you set up your team to fail with those orders, not that you personally deserved to lose. Whenever i use counter attacks at home in cup/cl ties I concede early while attending. I don't understand why you would want to throw away your home possession advantage by forcing counters. If anything, if you are attending a home leg and the other manager is absent you should switch to long passing as the increased shooting and possession discrepancy is sure to lead to more goals unless he is playing a deep defensive formation. Some members of my association wonder why they don't score goals when they use short passing in defensive formations almost exclusively. You were down 3:1 and needed goals and you played counters with short passing in a 4141? all he has to do is high press and your defenders will never advance the ball past midfield. The powertraining may have been a factor as well.