1, I lost it last year as Legia decided to wake up.
4 from 5 though.
1, I lost it last year as Legia decided to wake up.
4 from 5 though.
Second is on.
My time in Latvia has come to and end:
I've managed to reach the semis in my maiden European campaign in the Conference League, after playing a veritable who's that of continental football I got St Mirren in the quarters which let me finally put an end to a tie that had been open-ended for 43 years. Fiorentina in the semis and I'm taking a 2-1 lead into the away leg which is where I think the storied journey surely ends for the season.
Just spotted this guy, he looks bonkers and I have no idea how he's at Southampton.
Some of the biggest clubs in Europe and Spurs are interested in him so I doubt he'll be there for much longer.
I've seen beda.
On my save, Mbappe signed for Liverpool on a free in 2022. Then signed for Real Madrid for free in 2026 and now he is off to Juve for free again, in 2030
Those signing on fees
Our first big award
The dickhead chairman has gone
Sadly it was a takeover from within and it seems the new guy is also a bit of a twat. He's come in and changed the club philosophies:
I may have the gut of Big Sam but sadly I don't set my teams to play like him.
Just reached the end of my ninth season in charge, and it was one with a decent bit of drama:
Transfers:
We continued our usual strategy of just adding youngsters to go through the development plan, with only a few players from the first team leaving. One of our least notable seasons of business all round, probably.
Domestic Cups:
We got to play in the Super Cup again this season, but failed to retain the trophy, losing 3-1 to Juventus. The Italian Cup also went to a new home this season, as we were eliminated in the semi finals by eventual winners (and now fierce rivals, apparently), Inter Milan.
Serie A:
Having racked up the losses on our way to second place last season, we looked more like our usual selves this year, going unbeaten the first 15 games of the year, before losing to Atalanta when the striker we loaned them scored in the 90th minuteWe managed to weather a couple of tough runs in the fixture list, and did the double over Juventus in the league, but we kept drawing games to allow Juve to stay in range, and a draw with bottom club Brescia in April saw Juve draw level with us. We lost our second game of the year against Lazio shortly after, and at that point we were relying on Juve slipping up over their last few games. Both sides held serve up until the final day, and we went in to a home game against Pisa knowing we still had a shot at the title if we could win & Roma could do us a favour by avoiding defeat against Juventus...
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Champions League:
We got a relatively decent draw in the group stages this season, especially when you consider we were paired with Real Madrid, who obviously steamrolled everyone else. We did what we had to though, and qualified second, which gave us a pretty winnable tie against Real Betis, and it proved to indeed by winnable, as we came out with 1-0 wins in both games to reach the quarter finals. We were lucky to avoid all the big teams & instead get paired with Newcastle, but a disappointing 0-0 draw at home made things tricky. We were the worse team in the second leg, but managed to draw 1-1, which took us to penalties, where we eventually triumphed.
We drew Juventus in the semi finals, and having lost the first leg 1-0 we flipped the switch & blew them away with a 4-0 win at home to send us to the final, where we faced Barcelona. Sadly, we fell at the final hurdle for the second time as Barcelona deservedly beat us 2-1 to take home the trophy.
Awards & Other Notes:
We didn't actually win too many awards this season - Arthur Cabral once again topped the Serie A scoring charts, and right winger Adam Becker retained the Best Young Player award, but that was about it.
We have one more season before our new stadium is ready, so hopefully we can say goodbye to the Artemio Franchi with a fifth title next season - out of the 9 seasons I've played we've now won 4 titles & Juventus have the other 5, so it's about time Inter stepped up to the plate really.
Since we sold Lucas Martinez Quarta a few seasons ago I've been struggling to settle on a CB to pair with Nikola Milenkovic, and with him now turning 32 that need is getting even more pressing. I've been investing a lot in young CBs with the hope that one or two are able to make the jump, but when I spotted that another guy I'd been following had suddenly put in a transfer request I knew I had to pull the trigger, so next season we will be getting another Argentine with three names - Juan Manuel Carrera, who looks like a beast. He had a £90m release clause, which feels pretty reasonable considering some of the values floating around on players at this point.
We also pinched another guy on a release clause, with Liban Elmi being available for £46m following Southampton's relegation, so he'll join & will likely be our new long term LB.
There's one more player of note joining us next year - I was doing some scouting on newgen spawing dates, and spotted an insane looking 15 year old at Bayern who hadn't yet signed a full contract. When I approached him I was shocked to see he was actually interested, and after throwing bucket fulls of cash at him we managed to lure him away & only have to pay £4m compensation. Ali Ozkan looks like he should be able to play CB, RB or CM/DM very well, and to be honest I think he might be able to play next season if we really wanted him to. He'll arrive in January when he turns 16, and I'll probably stick him straight on the bench until I can loan him out.
Lastly, Bayern have spent the entire season trying to unsettle the stud young striker I signed to replace Cabral, with news reports about their interest/scouts attending etc cropping up every few weeks. He's been out on loan at Shakhtar this year, and when he comes back I'll be swiftly setting his status to 'reject all offers' because he looks like he's going to be an absolute superstar.
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I'm planning on clearing some players out this season - I'd like to see Brenner & Fabio Carvalho leave before their contracts expire next season, and the youngsters will all be evaluated to see who makes the cut, but I'm thinking of moving towards my secondary 4312 formation as the primary tactic next season so that Cabral & Taurone can both play up front. It'll be an interesting offseason, and no doubt selling players will prove impossible once again, but next year should be the point where we start to transition towards the next wave of players who will take over as our stars & leaders.
97pts and no promotion :/
would have been enough to win the league outright in 10 of the previous 12 seasons, and good enough for second in all of them.
Pogon Siedlce 2033/34 Season Update:
Transfers Out:
Two first teamers leaving in Matty Jasinski and Tommy Walczak for big offers. I'd have accepted less for them tbh especially Walczak who I wanted to move on due to youth needing more games. It was still a shame to see him leave as he was officially a club legend:
Shame he didn't hit 100 but what a guy.
Transfers In:
Scouts have raved about him and his value has shot up.
My scouts loved him and then as soon as I signed him his potential ability dropped like a stone which is a little annoying as I only bought him due to scouts recommendation. At least he was free.
Potential through the roof as is his value since buying him. I'm a big fan.
When Jasinski left I felt we needed a replacement and who better than the guy who the board sold to Blackburn a few years ago which promoted me to sign Jasinski.
Annoying to see the red arrows but he's only just come back from a bad calf injury. He's been pretty good when I used him and I have high hopes for his future.
A cheap German/Pole who looks alright but again his potential looked better before we signed him.
Our big signing this year and I think this boy could be special. He's flashed some serious quality in a few matches this season and he had a really nice run in the league near the end of the season.
League:
No pissing about this year, we put our foot down early and because we didn't have to qualify I made sure we kept the tempo up and no one could touch us.
Cups:
A relatively easy draw meant I could play the youth in the early games and then switch to the first team in the last couple of rounds. It was important to win as I had promised some unhappy players the cup this year.
Europe:
A decent group showing in our easiest game but we were screwed by each team in each round.
Here's the Brugge game:
We smacked them and they got a lucky win which made the remaining group games nervy.
The Astana draw:
Being 2 up and outplaying them before dropping to a 2-2 draw.
United:
I have no idea how we got pumped by them in such an even game.
Bayern:
We deserved to lose but to concede two and have the win snatched away from us in the final few minutes was gutting.
Overall though I'm very pleased. I am however not happy with the coefficients as we've slipped from 9th to 12th this year. This season and last the other Polish teams have been shit and this year Austria, the Dutch and the Turks had great years. The other Polish teams need to pull their fingers out or we're going to slip hard as Czech Republic and Ukraine are breathing down our necks too.
Squad Stats:
Ragnar Hojgaard had another terrific season with this being his best goals output (he's increased his goals every season with the first team) and was what we needed. The Duraj boys (not brothers sadly) also stepped it up in the wake of Walczak leaving which is what I had hoped although I though Kacper would be the one to do more.
Also, the new dickhead chairman has decided to ask for even more changes to the philosophy for the upcoming season. In addition to defensively solid football (I'm ok with this as we're fine) and direct football (ugh) he now also wants us to play counter attacking football. I think this could end up being a major problem
Oh and the Croatian defender only needs 39 more days until he can get a Polish passport and play games for us
Poland 2034 World Cup Update:
Group Stage:
Second Round:
The timing of their last three goals is incredibly infuriating and it looks like it's going to cost me the job.
The media are SEETHING that I left out a shit 35 old from my squad and the Polish FA are disappointed with our performance with my job status listed as Insecure. RIP.
Edit: Poland have indeed sacked me.
Edit: I have decided I want revenge. I will win a World Cup before them.
Last edited by Sir Andy Mahowry; 04-04-2022 at 09:50 PM.
Ivory Coast, USA, England, France, Italy, Portugal, Sweden, Turkey, Wales and Serbia have offered jobs.
I'm leaning towards Serbia because of these three:
France, England, Italy and Portugal are out as I feel it would make the mission too easy and Wales won the World Cup on my save in 2028.
Edit: Looked through the rest of the squads and Turkey was a close second but those three above swung it firmly in Serbia's favour.
Last edited by Sir Andy Mahowry; 04-04-2022 at 10:32 PM.
How high were their expectations for that to lead to a sacking?
EDIT: Just hit the midseason break & Taurone has 20 league goals in 13(1) with an average rating on 8.27Cabral has 11 in 8(6) too, so things are going pretty well up front.
Last edited by Dan; 04-04-2022 at 11:39 PM.
They wanted me to get to the third round which is acceptable but when I'm up against the 6th placed nation (we were 16th) in the second round I think it's understandable that we didn't go further.
Especially considering they scored two goals in various injury times and a winner just before it went to penalties.
That definitely seems harsh then.
A very rough awakening. I probably should have done a bit more research before aiming for the title within three seasons. Turns out that when I took the job they'd already agreed to sell two of their best performers (a centre-back and a deep-lying playmaker). Plus, while overall player quality is an upgrade from Torino, there are still several clubs with better players, one of the reasons why Liverpool haven't finished higher than fourth in eight years.
Still, this was exceptionally bad.
The tactics I'd come up with initially just did not work. After I changed them up a bit I managed wins against Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham, but as soon as I rotated or lost players to injuries it all went to shit again. I'm honestly surprised they're not sacking me, decent Cup performance notwithstanding (won the Carabao Cup and got to the final of the Europa League, where I lost in extra time against Chelsea).
Back to the drawing board it is.
How many did Man City concede?
I'm a twit
16. Eleven of which they conceded at home, interestingly. They're almost impossible to score against in their away games. Their two draws (0-0s against Chelsea and Southampton) and their single defeat (0-1 against United) were on the road though, at home its all wins.
Ten seasons down now, and we're about to enter a new era.
Transfers:
This was probably our busiest window so far, with hundreds of millions going both ways as we cleared out a bunch of young players who've been through the system, as well as a couple of veteran starters in Brenner & Fabio Carvalho. This was part one of the process of transitioning from the era of the real players to the full newgen era, with only a few real players remaining in our squad & they'll likely all be gone by the end of next season.
Domestic Cups:
We seem to have started to assert our dominance here lately, despite me not really caring, as we managed to win both the Super Cup & the Italian Cup, beating rivals Inter in both competitions to put a cherry on the top.
Serie A:
We had a tough start to our season as we took on Milan in the opener, and when we lost I thought we might be in for a tricky season, but we came out & beat Bologna 5-1 the following week, and from there normal service was resumed as we blew through most of the league, powered by a ludicrous season from Emilio Taurone, who returned from loan to take the mantle as our star striker & basically couldn't be stopped. Juve took a small step back this year, so it was up to Milan to try to chase us down, but while they kept it close they were never within striking distance, and we sealed our fifth Serie A title with two games to spare, which was just as well as we had to play Napoli & Juve in those two, and ended up losing them both to make the final table look closer than it really was.
Champions League:
We got a decent group draw, with Man City being the only real threat, but we outplayed them in both matchups & ended up winning the group, only to draw another English team in Liverpool. We lost the first leg 2-1 but came back with a 2-0 win in the second leg, before seeing off Napoli in a pleasingly easy quarter final draw.
We drew PSG in the semis, and deservedly won 2-1 in the first leg at home, however we wasted a handful of good chances in the first half of the return game, and inevitably got punished, with Haaland scoring two second half goals, including an injury time winner to knock us out in heartbreaking fashion. The final slap in the face was that PSG then went & got beat 4-0 by Man City, who we'd bested in the groups
Awards Etc:
Emilio Taurone basically one everything imaginable this season. I'd put them all here but I literally have 13 images of all his awards & records, so I'll just list the main ones - World Player of the Year, Golden Ball, World Football of the Year & Best Player in Europe, and he broke the records for league goals, average rating & MOTM awards.
Arthur Cabral still played like a stud, but he had to play second fiddle & next season will likely be his last as his contract runs out at the end of the 31/32 season.
We'll also be losing club captain Nikola Milenkovic next season, and we've agreed a deal for goalkeeper Marco Carnesecchi to joing Real Madrid for £98.5m in the summer. Facundo Farias wants to leave too, so I think that will leave Giorgio Scalvini as the last real player in the squad.
The new stadium has been completed, and we'll be playing there next season, which should help boost our finances a bit more.
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I think this is as far as I've ever got in a save, so I'm definitely appreciating the more casual style of the Xbox version, but after a very successful first decade in charge it's time to revamp the squad, fully assert ourselves as the dominant team in Italy, and try to finally grab ourselves a Champions League trophy.
So I initially started with Newcastle. I won back to back Champions League and Premier League titles within four years because I basically bought the best possible team. It got boring dominating everything so for the first time ever in FM, I resigned and moved to a club in a different country.
The only decent team available was Atalanta who had just finished 2nd in Serie A. I went there and made the most of my limited budget by signing 34-year-olds in the last year of their contracts. I got like Griezmann, Coates and Koulibaly for a combined total of 10m or something. Somehow I dragged those corpses to the title in my first season. I tried it again the next season and got Van Dijk, Immobile, Alaba and Casemiro again for like 15m total. I've just won the double and I'm in the Champions League final against Newcastle now managed by Jurgen Klopp.
I'm probably going to resign from here regardless of the outcome of the final because I can't take Atalanta much further and I wanna see if I can go across the big 5 leagues and win the title. There's a really intriguing option in Spain where Albacete got taken over by an Arab tycoon. But they just got relegated from La Liga. I'm tempted to just make a project out of it because every good real player in the game is worth too much to buy meaning the only affordable players now (six seasons in) are regens. So I could get a nice bunch and probably win the league in 4 or 5 seasons. I'm also imagining how funny in real life it'd be if Pep or someone took over a second division side after playing in the CL final. Might just do it for the bants.
Jeez, I thought I was doing well
A couple of seasons worth of update from my Wolves game, as I was having trouble saving images.
Going back two seasons, you may remember I lost form and was pipped to the title by Man United. Into the 30-31 season and due to this being when I was having issues, I only have a couple of screenshots.
A great league season, taking advantage of the other top teams scoring relatively few points. Lots of echoes of the Leicester IRL season. Narrow defeat in the Champions League quarter finals which was still a good run for our first time. In a way, the biggest thing I took out of the season was managing the squad much better, both in terms of personnel and shape, meaning there was no tailing off, which is something I've suffered with a fair bit in the past.
...
Onto the season I've just completed, and firstly some shapes to look at:
The 4-3-3 remains my go-to, but at times when we struggled for form or only certain players were available, I experimented with the other two. The 4-1-1-4 suits our players, and the 4-1-3-2 with the false nines allows me to play actual strikers. You'll notice that the only real difference is there are two false nines in place of two mezzalas, meaning those two players are starting high and dropping (allowing others to run beyond), rather than vice versa. You can see from the first game I tried it that we absolutely destroyed AEK in the Champions League, but I had much more mixed results in the domestic cups.
It was a really tight season, and we were kind of done by the schedule in the end. Newcastle on Wednesday, Man City on Friday and Man United on Sunday to end our season. In hindsight, I should have just rested everyone for the Man City game and put everything into beating Man United at home. In the end, we flagged and lost both.
Still, we won the Europa League after failing to negotiate Inter Milan and Real Madrid in the Champions League group stages, and triumphed in the FA Cup too.
We have a couple of elite players in the squad now. Here are the pick:
And my two major signings of the summer so far:
It's a far cry from East Fife and Blyth Spartans!
My next job is to incorporate a tactic which gets the best out of these players, especially as Dufour is an out and out striker. Also, Nierynck is becoming annoyed that I'm playing him as a mezzala instead of an advanced playmaker. I could fit them all into a 4-2-3-1, but I dislike the shape and it would mean at least one of the central midfielders needing to have a defensive role.
What's the logic behind the strikerless formations? Was it just due to not having talent up front, or is that one of those things that just works well in the engine? Also noticed how much more info there is on every screen in the PC version than the console one, which makes me glad I'm on this version
Just finished season 11 so will get a review up later, and I'm also going to do a little overview of the game world & then a look at the squad, given we're about to enter the all-newgen era.
It works well as the match engine struggles to cope with runners from deeper areas. Hence central midfielders on attack and mezzalas are also very useful. Not just that though, it actually makes sense to me. I think of the shadow striker as being a false nine or deep-lying forward really, with four players, one in each channel, making runs either side of him, and him in the central channel causing a nuisance.
The first thing I look at when making a tactic is how I can fill all five channels when in an attacking transition/attack, and how the other five can shape up in rest defence. My formations on paper are usually 4-3-3, but they're anything between 4-1-4-1, 2-3-2-3 and 2-3-5, depending on the phase of play.
We've entered the second decade of my reign at Fiorentina, and to celebrate we moved in to a brand new stadium. We've split the ten previous Serie A titles down the middle with Juventus, but we're looking to establish ourselves as the best team in Italy, and having been defeated in two Champions League finals, we still have unfulfilled ambitions in Europe to push us forward.
Transfers:
Not much in the way of incoming talent, just the usual poaching of promising youngsters, however we had some big names leaving. Marco Carnesecchi was a great goalkeeper for us, but with a stable of young talent behind him waiting for their opportunity it was hard to turn down £98.5m from Real Madrid when they approached us in January last season. We kept him for the rest of the season, but now it's his time to move on. We also waved goodbye to another of the final real players in the squad in January this season, as Giorgio Scalvini was sold to Man Utd to help create room for the next wave of players. Facundo Farias was sold in the summer as he'd been wanting to leave for a few months, and LB Carlos Salinas was moved on to let the guy we signed last summer finally take the job permanently.
Domestic Cups:
Once again it was us against Inter for both trophies, and after winning both last year we split them this time around, with Inter beating us in the Super Cup only for us to get revenge in the Italian Cup.
Serie A:
We kicked off with a pretty tricky run of games, including taking on Inter in our first game in the new stadium, but we came out of that run with some key wins, including a 3-1 win over Inter, and from then on we pretty much had everyone at arm's length the rest of the way. After 30 games we were still unbeaten, and the only tough games still on the schedule were away games against Napoli & Roma to close the season, however we then immediately shit the bed & lost 2-0 away to Cagliari to torpedo the unbeaten season, and generally limped our way to a title we'd had all but wrapped up for weeks.
Champions League:
We had a fairly average draw in the groups this season, and despite starting slow we got it together in the second set of games, and ended up topping the group. Our reward was a tie against Barcelona, and after losing the first leg 4-2 in Spain we didn't feel particularly confident of progressing, however we quickly found ourselves 2-0 up in the second leg to bring the tie back to life. We couldn't finish the job though, and the game ended up going to penalties, where all of the first five penalty takers missed, and the next five all scored. Sadly, we were on the wrong side of the runs, and ended up going out 3-2 on penalties.
Other Stuff:
It's officially the end of an era, as we're saying goodbye to a pair of club icons, and the last two real players in the squad.
Club captain Nikola Milenkovic leaves us as the all time record holder for league appearances, with 473, and will annoyingly be signing with Milan, whilst vice-captain Arthur Cabral departs as the all time leader in league goals scored, netting 268 times in 380 games. He's currently a free agent, although plenty of teams are interested, so he'll show up again somewhere.
Despite only moving in to our stadium this season, we're already expanding, as the board have decided to add another 12,289 seats to take us up towards 75,000. I'd just requested an expansion the day before, and ended up getting a separate message about that a few days later, so I'm not entirely sure what's going to happen with the upgrades now as we seem to have two sets of work going on at once.
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I'm going to knock together a quick update on the wider game world shortly, just waiting for the Euros & Copa America to finish, and then I'll also try to get up an overview of the squad once everyone comes back & I start to figure out who fits where.
Fiorentina - 2032 World Overview
Okay, so I thought i'd just put a quick post together to summarise what's happened across the big leagues in my save, as well as highlighting the big international competitions & awards (image links are in the headings this time):
Premier League - Liverpool & the Manchester clubs have shared the titles between them here, and in general there doesn't seem to have been a lot of change here, although Newcastle have bought there way into the mix over the last five seasons, so maybe they'll be the ones to break through.
La Liga - Mostly Real Madrid here, and it's surprising to see that Real Santander (aka San Sebastian) have won more titles than Barcelona, who only claimed their first of the save this season. There looks to be a good bit of variety here, so this seems pretty solid to me.
Ligue 1 - PSG nearly swept the board, but Lyon managed to take on off them early on. Not sure it'll happen again until Mbappe & Haaland retire though.
Bundesliga - Just complete dominance from Bayern here, as seems to be the case most of the time. Hopefully someone stops them one day, but I doubt it.
Champions League - Manchester City look to have established themselves as the best team in Europe over the last decade, although they're maybe on the decline now. There's a huge English representation across the board, with only three seasons having a non-English winner.
Europa League - This looks pretty reasonable, with Hoffenheim probably the most surprising winner. English clubs generally doing well here too, it seems.
Copa America - Brazil & Argentina taking turns with the trophy like a couple divorced parents. It'll be interesting to see if one of them can take control of the trophy, but you'd imagine nobody else would get a turn for a while either way.
African Nations - Senegal emerging as the top team here, but there's still a lot of variety & this generally looks to be pretty open.
Euros - Pretty standard fare, with Spain doubling up before England ride their traditional FM boost to glory in the tournament that's just ended.
World Cup - We came so close to a shock with Norway reaching the 2026 final, but alas, they lost & it's just a list of the usual suspects.
I'll just list the main player awards below without comment, as these have mostly been won by real players so far:
Golden Ball
World Footballer of the Year
World Player of the Year
Goal 50
Golden Glove
Goalkeeper of the Year
I've also included the current global reputation rankings, as well as the global finance rankings, as there are some interesting teams who appear to have been handed buckets of cash over the last decade.
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No massive upheavals just yet, but there are a couple of spots where it looks like the opportunity is there, and as the real players continue to fade away it'll be interesting to see if the big teams can stay at the top, or if other teams will be able to bridge the gap. I'd like to see a bit less England power across the board, but that's always been an issue in FM so hopefully I'm not about to witness a decade of everything being won by English teams
Fiorentina 2032/33 Squad Overview
With all the real players now gone, we're in the process of building a new core to carry us forward for the next 5-10 years. There are a few players who've already proved the belong at the heart of the team, but we still have plenty of spots up for grabs & with a huge collection of talented young players on the books, we should be able to find quality players at every position, the question is, who will they be?
I'll quickly run you through the main players in our squad, and then go from back to front with an overview of the spots still to be determined, and the players who might take those jobs.
The Untouchables:
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The Core:
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The Squad Players:
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I've been busy developing a large youth system over the last decade, and we have plenty of players who can come out the other side to be key players for our future:
Goalkeeper:
We seem to have an endless supply of talent here, with the academy popping someone out almost every season to go along with the players we've poached from other teams. At the moment we have 21/22 academy graduate Antonio Rega pencilled in as our backup, with 26/27 academy kid Luca Merelli & youth team goalkeeper Sinisa Tomasevic as the pick of the players behind him.
We also had another 21/22 academy graduate on the books in Ivan Farina, however we've just accepted a £3m offer from Juve for him as he's out of contract after this season. We've also sold two other academy goalkeepers in the last few years who are starting for Serie A/B clubs, so we're pretty much the go to spot for young goalkeepers at this point.
Full Backs:
Lots of talent here, with Luis Dybala, Federico Amaro & Shane Solomon at RB & Kilian Langlet, Rafael De La Torre & August Hermansen at LB. We also have Ignacio Del Rio & Cesar Hernandez, who are both out on loan, and I'm expecting academy kid Maurizio Di Stefano to be part of our squad this season as utility backup.
Centre Backs:
I went through a stage of hoarding CBs when I was still looking for long term options to start at CB, and that has meant that we now have some excellent prospects who could push for the first team in the next couple of seasons. Mario Marquez, Orlando Martinez, Lucas Medina & Juraj Kovac are the pick of the bunch, but we have another handful of kids behind them who also look promising.]
I'd expect all the above to be loaned out this season, with Eddy Akbar & Jacob Nielsen joining the squad as backups who may get sold before their contracts run out at the end of the year.
Midfield:
The main name here is Ali Ozkan, who I stole from Bayern just after he generated, and who made his international debut over the summer. I forgot he couldn't be loaned abroad until he was 18, so he'll likely stay in the squad until January & then be sent out to play more regularly, but I'm expecting him to become a core player in the future. I'm also very excited about Andy Graham & Klemen Brkic, who could both also be fantastic players in a season or two.
Beyond them we have some more young players, as well as a couple of solid depth players from the academy in Enrico Lorusso & Kristian Elezi, although they both could also end up out the door this season, as well as some good young AMCs in Mladen Matosevic, Ilija Tasevski & Emil Kruse.
Attack:
We're pretty set up front, so I've not been hugely invested in securing young strikers, but Thapelo Shoai does look like a promising player, and we have a decent supply of strikers from the academy who could develop into contributors.
On the wings we have more options, with Zdenek David, Elkin Garcia & Rafael Marquez standing out alongside a couple of academy prospects in Samuele Negro & Fernando Lauria.
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I think that pretty much covers the roster for now. We're definitely set up well for continued success, and there will no doubt be further additions to the talent factory over the coming seasons to ensure we continue to spend an absolute fuckton on wages for players who aren't even playing for us
Great posts Dan. Your squad really does look good, especially with all those youth prospects waiting in the wings.
I've returned to the game after a couple of months or so away, and finally finished off my 3rd season with Llanelli Town. As expected TNS ran away with the title - they were unbeaten in 22 at one point - before easing up once they'd secured it with a few games to go. But we were solid enough and scrambled enough points in the final Championship Stage of the season to take 2nd spot and with it, European football next season!
We were helped by Bangor City drawing 7 matches in a row in the final stage, so whilst we only took 14 pts in the final 10 games, it was enough for us to secure the position thanks to a 4-2 win over Haverfordwest on the final day. TNS are ominous however, and they've already poached my star right-back away from me. It's very hard to attract players when TNS have that professional pull, but hopefully our appearance in the Conference League will help with finances and with reputation. My squad for the season was as follows:
A couple of key players in there, most notably our sole loanee, Harrison Poulter. 28 goals in all competitions (22 in the league - the highest) helped us win a number of tight matches and it was really the difference between us finishing 2nd or 4th. I'm already in talks with Scunthorpe to see if I can keep him for another season. If he goes, we're going to have to scour the depths for a good replacement. Lewis Ridd came in at the start of the season and has been very impressive in goal, pulling off a number of important stops, and I've tied him down to a 3 year deal to keep him at the club. And Gwion James was masterful in the number 10 role, and still is only 17. He also earned his first international call-up and made 3 appearances for the Welsh Under-18s, even managing to score.
Finally, we have to our mention our cup exploits. We stormed through most of the rounds, helped by a favourable draw. But ultimately we couldn't find a win when it mattered most...
Bangor City were just too good on the day, taking the lead with 20 minutes to go, and despite me sending players forward in search of the equaliser, they created numerous further opportunities on the break and a 2nd goal to wrap it up was inevitable. A shame, especially with TNS being dumped out early on in a cupset, but I'm sure the opportunity for silverware will be there soon.
Onto season 4 - I'm eagerly awaiting that European draw!
Our first NxGn winner
Our previous highest was 4th IIRC.
Not sure which of the first two is meant to be the Polish Mbappe though.
After a bit of playing around last pre-season, I came up with the tactics which best suited our players.
The problem being I don't like 4-2-3-1 and I don't find it as effective or as enjoyable to watch as a 4-3-3.
After a pretty strong season playing mostly in a 4-3-3 with an advanced forward instead of a shadow striker, we wobbled, and a heavy semi-final FA Cup loss to Leeds prompted me into action. I needed to come up with/find a couple of tactics that played the way I wanted, but also got the best out of my best players - an attacking midfielder and an out and out striker. Hence...
This is more or less perfect for the team, other than it not being particularly possession based. It was originally a downloaded tactic, but I've tweaked it to fit what I want. The only real differences between this and what I've been playing previously are the shadow striker moving to an advanced forward, and one central midfield moving into the attacking midfield strata. Team and player instructions, as well as player roles are very similar. You'll see the mentality is very attacking, which is a tweak that I've made, but that's just dependent on opposition and being home/away.
The other good thing about that shape is that it's almost identical to my total control tactic:
A completely different style of football, often more pleasing on the eye, but not nearly as effective. This will become my go-to tactic when we're trying to just control games as opposed to scoring plenty.
Finally, the above tactic has been a God send. Again, it's very similar to my previous 4-3-3 however the two wingers become shadow strikers, meaning the two inverted wing backs become traditional wing backs. This is almost identical to an old tactic I'd used, except for the very attacking mentality. It's not fool-proof as we shipped six away at Newcastle, but shifting to this in the Champions League Final changed the game. It's suits our players superbly, aside from our advanced forward who is still learning to play as a shadow striker. All in all, three slightly different tactics to what I've been using in the past, but all very effective in their own right.
An incredibly tight season, which couldn't have gone much more to the wire. It wasn't quite AGUERO but not far off.
As you can see, Defour is a world class striker and it's his arrival which led to me having to make a few adaptations.
That’s an excellent season - it does seem like an elite striker can take you up a level, which I guess makes a lot of sense. Also seems fitting that the asymmetrical formation made the difference.
I’ve put Fiorentina on hold for a bit as we’re in the month window where i vaguely care about baseball so I’ve started playing The Show instead, but I’ll inevitably get bored & be back on FM in 2-3 weeks time.
Pogon Siedlce & Serbia 2034/25 Season Update:
Transfers Out:
I didn't want to sell Luczywek as he can play across the entire backline and was good cover but the offer was more than good enough. With Kaczmarek I decided to let him go as I knew Topalovic the Croatian CB was going to be getting his passport soon. Schulze also left as it was a mental offer for a sub-standard goalkeeper (he's played in 7 games total, 4 off the bench for Madrid this year).
Other big names to leave were Smolarczyk the mental 15 year old who hasn't really progressed, Jan Jasinski who was never first choice for me and wasn't getting close to his original projected potential, Potoczny & Konieczny who was in the same boat as Jasinski plus Zyznowski who had been our starting AML for a few years but he wasn't good enough.
Transfers In:
He will never get meaningful game time with us but I feel he's someone who we can make a decent amount of money off.
Our annual RB. I felt we needed more cover (he can also play on the left) after sales.
Our first non-Pole of the year. I feel like this guy is special. He's a natural CDM who can play at CB and CM but I'm not sure where I'll use him yet (I still have just over 2 years to work out where his best position will be). He's going to sign a £19.75k in the Summer and I'll try to get him out on loan as soon as I can.
With Schulze going to Madrid I needed a new number 1. The pickings were slim and I ended up picking up this guy who did ok. He probably wont play much at all in the next season as Pahor now has his Polish passport.
Our record signing. I'm not sure why the small profile is showing CM as his best position as he's a natural ST. He'll be signing a £11.75k a week contract late this Summer so sadly I don't think we'll be able to find him a loan for the whole season. The kid has been ripping teams to shreds for the second team where all the non-Poles are kept until they have their papers.
I have been trying to bring this kid in for a season and a half I think and he's always rejected me but thankfully he finally accepted an offer. He had been ripping it up for the second team but he recently got injured.
Natural ST but can play as an AMR which is probably where he'll get most of his minutes. He is a Pole too so I have already given him a few games and he even scored on his debut.
League:
Jagiellonia did actually push us for quite a bit of the season but they crashed hard after the Winter break and we won it easily.
Cups:
Oh well.
Champions League:
It went how I expected although we really should have grabbed a point against PSG in both matches, especially our home game where they needed a 92nd minute winner.
Europa League:
First Knockout:
First leg was tight and either of us could have taken it. I'm glad we got one back though.
In the second leg I thought we'd win it easily with the two early goals and then we wobbled. Thankfully we didn't leave it for penalties.
Second Round:
We blew Wolfsburg away and I thought we'd be fine so I rested quite a few in the second leg and it almost fucked us over. Pahor made his European debut and he had a shaky night, thankfully we still had goals in us though.
Quarter-Final:
We should have beaten them in the first leg but I was still confident going into the second leg. At half-time in the second leg I thought we were done Hojgaard though (who I almost accepted an offer of £40m from Porto in January) decided we weren't losing and dragged us to victory.
Semi-Final:
Fucking Mason Mount, two late assists for the prick fucked us over. I really thought we'd win it in the second leg when Kucharski had levelled the tie even though we were down to 10. Sadly it wasn't to be and we lost our second Europa Semi-Final in 3/4 years. Juventus went on to win the tournament and then their manager, Jurgen Klopp, decided to take the Spurs job.
Squad:
I really like the squad and there's not much to trim. Better full backs would be nice but that seems to be a major problem in my save. I might let Hojgaard go as he's finding it harder to get into the side and has been struggling for goals this year. I'd also like Skopek to leave as he's getting older and I think the youngsters we have in his position and ready for more minutes.
Kucharski is probably our best player and I don't want him to go. He's wanted by most of Europe's top clubs though, although interest lessened when I slapped the £300m price tag on him, so he might end up leaving but it would have to be for something huge.
Our bank balance is just under £100m right now although it's highest was at £165m in the Winter.
Serbia:
A tough Nations group but we took first by a point over Italy.
Nice to pick up a win over Bottom Ireland to get qualification started but then a tough run resulting in fuck all.
Also, it's been a while so here are screenshots of each player in the first team not including those who were signed last year.
Toggle Spoiler
Lovely run in Europe. What's with the non Poles?
They're being signed and they stay in the second team/go out on loan to other Polish teams until they have a passport.
They do not get any senior minutes until they have their papers in order.
Just secured a loan to Lodz for one of the Non-Poles but he rejects them so I offer him out again.
Lodz comes back in and this time I use the option to persuade him to tell him he'd get a lot of game time (which he can't get here) and that it will be good for his development.
He says he likes my idea and agrees with me that it's for the best and is looking forward to the loan deal.
Which he then ends up rejecting...
Absolutely seething.
Their keeper had a 9.3 rating.
Pogon Siedlce 2035/36 Season Update:
Transfers Out:
Bought for £3.2m, I wanted to sell him last season but couldn't find a team to bid a good amount. Ajax did so this year though. A club legend but it was time for him to leave.
Signed for £900k and I wanted him to stay for many years but the dickhead chairman sold him to Blackburn for £15.5m. After three seasons there he went to Monchengladbach and after a season there I decided to bring him home for £12.25m. Benfica then came in with a big offer and I felt I had to accept.
I wanted to keep him as by attributes he was the best RB in my team but he was constantly moaning and playing like a dick so I cashed in.
I signed him last year to be my starting keeper after Madrid came in for our previous keeper (they then bought the keeper I had before him this season) and he was going to be backup this year as Pahor the non-Pole had his papers. So I cashed in.
Another legend but he was struggling to get into the first 11 so I decided to sell him. In hindsight I probably could have used him as my strikers were a bit shy at times this year.
Signed for £1.8m a few years ago and he was starting to get games but I felt the offer was too good.
Transfers In:
He is Polish and I wanted another body at CB. Cheap as well considering his apparent potential.
Our annual RB. I'm not sure why he has so many down arrows but his value has shot up and the potential makes me think he could be the one.
Our first non-Pole of the season. I almost signed him when he was 16 (we had agreed a deal for £18m) but I pulled out at the last minute when I realised he wouldn't come until his 18th. I tried to bring him in last February but he signed a new contract with Rangers but I wasn't going to let him go for a third time.
We have a brilliant LB already but this guy isn't far behind him despite only being 18. He's going to be a star.
Annoyingly (like most of my non-Poles) I couldn't secure a loan deal for him in Poland. I like him a lot though so hopefully I can get him some games next year.
Needed a backup GK so in came the best Polish youth GK I could find.
Not too convinced by him but I felt I had to scoop him up.
Not too big of a fan but cheap and I feel I'll make some decent money on him.
I wasn't planning on buying anyone else (especially a non-Pole) but when I saw him I needed him. Man United, City and Newcastle were also in for him so I went big and after 30 games he'll be on £86k p/w... He can't play for us for at least 3 years until he gets his papers though so I'm not too worried. This guy will be a lethal finisher.
League:
This was daylight robbery. We had so many foolish dropped points (like the post above) and I didn't think we'd win it. We were 5 points behind Gornik (who played out of their skins this year) with 2 games left and they ended up losing them both to Chrobry and Arka.
Cups:
Took it a bit more seriously this year, especially when it looked like we might not win the league. I couldn't fail on two fronts.
Europe:
Absolutely bottled the last game of the group and slipped to second. We had an xG of 2.38 to their 1.13 (their goal was a penalty too) and it was really annoying considering we only needed a point.
Atleti were then drawn to Monaco (fuck me, a dreamy draw) and we were tasked with facing Juventus.
We didn't deserve to be only a goal down but we had some really great finishing throughout the game and we actually took our chances.
Our luck ran out in the second leg though...
Squad:
Mariusz Duraj (from AML) and Stancyzk were on fire for most of the season but they'd go missing in many games and Kacper Duraj is still struggling to find goals despite having some really nice attributes although he does play well for us.
Serbia 2036 European Championship:
I wanted a draw and thought we'd get it (don't forget Wales are World Cup winners in my save) but we collapsed in the second half.
Should have won but we didn't take our chances and that's us gone.
I can't even take credit for this because when they made it 4-2 I started SEETHING and clicked simulate match.
Knockouts:
My game is officially busted. We've had Ukraine & Wales win World Cups and we've had Turkey and now England win the Euros.
I was obviously sacked after this and when the tournament ended I applied to all available international jobs. I got offers from France, Italy, Wales, Denmark, Uruguay and the team I decided on:
Colombia.
I have just noticed now that Southgate resigned as Poland manager to take over at Ireland so I have re-applied for the job I should have never lost.
Edit: Resigned as Colombian manager to try and boost my chances with Poland but they ended up hiring Scot fucking Gemmill over me
Last edited by Sir Andy Mahowry; 24-04-2022 at 01:10 PM.
Season 4 is in the books with Llanelli Town, and while we've dropped a position in the final table, it still felt like a year of solid progress - we earned more points, the squad feels stronger and we had our first European adventure.
3rd spot is still enough to earn us entry to the Conference League again, but both TNS and Bangor were too strong this season for me to properly challenge for the title. The professional status of those two clubs is a great pulling power and 7 out of 9 league losses were to those two. The league was full of drama though - Cardiff Met Uni earned the final European qualification spot after scoring twice in stoppage time in the playoff semi-final against Haverfordwest, and eventually beating Bala in the final with another late winner.
Not as dramatic as the relegation battle though - Newtown saving themselves on goal difference in the most remarkable manner and condemning their opponents in the process!
The squad was definitely improved on last season, although we were unable to coax Harrison Poulter back to lead the line.
Marquise Martins took over duties as the lone striker, and while he wasn't as prolific, he played a different role and was influential in allowing our wingers and attacking midfielder to push forwards. Connor Woods started the season in good goalscoring form but tailed off a little after Christmas, but Gwion James was once again brilliant all season long. Double figures for both goals and assists and he continues to develop well, despite still training as a semi-pro. We've already started recruiting for the new season, and the lure of European football is definitely helping us attract better players.
Speaking of Europe, our first campaign right at the start of the season helped boost the coffers and the Welsh co-efficient a little.
A historic win against Buducnost Podgorica helped earn us progression to the Second Qualifying Round, but Bohemians Praha were just a step up in quality and we couldn't hold on defensively in the away leg. The gate receipts from the two home games totalled approximately £85k, and the competition prize money itself was incredibly over £400k.
When you consider our annual expenditure currently sits at about £430k, this 4-week excursion was enough to ensure a profitable year was had. Hopefully we can mirror this (or even better it) this campaign and push for professional status!
So, my stint at Liverpool was unsurprisingly cut short. Early into my second season the club underwent a takeover and the new board were a lot less patient with my middling results. After a widly inconsistent first half of the season left us in ninth place I was duly sacked. Fair enough.
I then went to relegation-threatened Espanyol in Spain. I really wanted to try something new, so I created a deep-sitting anti-football setup:
Which led to us finishing in a comfortable 10th spot. The problem was that while I did regularly win points off the big teams, we struggled anytime we had to take control of a game. Plus a tactic like that is really dependent on the few attacking players in it. Thus when my lone striker stopped scoring early into the second season the writing was on the wall and I was sacked again, almost exactly a year after being shown the door by Liverpool.
At this point I thought about starting a new save altogether but I thought I'd try one last challenge before doing so. I accepted an offer from Schalke, who were sitting in the relegation zone in Germany. I went back to the attacking tactics I had used at Torino and adapted them for the players there.
Barely staved off relegation in 15th, but had some promising performances.
One season and a couple of transfers (mostly loans) later and things are looking quite different:
I'm a bit annoyed though, as once again, what worked best were variations of 4-2-3-1. Since that always seems to me like the laziest/least creative way to play the game, I'm already busy tinkering with other formations, and probably once again engineering my own downfall.
Pogon Siedlce 2036/37 Season Update:
Transfers Out:
I didn't want him to go but he was moaning and quite a few teams were willing to pay a decent amount.
Transfers In:
I didn't like the look at him but before he signed he had 4 star potential (I believe it was an early report) and I jumped on him. Oh well, he was cheap enough.
All non-Poles and thus wont feature for us for at least 3 years. Also, do not fret, Barilari is actually a RB. Not sure why he's highlighted as LB there, he is absolutely our annual RB.
Slow year for transfers but it's impossible to find Polish players who would come in ahead of our first 11 and it's hard to find decent looking youth prospects. I'm also trying to limit myself on the amount of Non-Poles as we're up to 11 in the second team plus two in our first team who are now Polish.
League:
Record breaking year and we've made it 5 in a row now.
Cup:
Whoops. I played my youth keeper that I bought last year (I had sent him on loan but we had injuries to all keepers and he was playing really well) for his first ever start and he conceded three ludicrous goals. I ended up taking him off and put on two first teamers to try and salvage at least a draw but it was too little too late.
Europe:
For the second straight year in a hard group we qualify but again we bottle it against the fourth side near the end meaning we take second rather than third. We even almost bottled our first game against Everton as we were losing 2-1 until the 84th minute.
Knockouts:
When we went 2-0 up we were all over them and I thought we'd walk it. Sadly we couldn't get a third in the first half and they came out firing in the second half. We didn't deserve the win over the whole game but I'll take it.
I want to cry. They were all over us throughout the first half and when we pulled one back in the second I thought we'd be alright. Sadly they came back into it and we fucked it at the end.
Also, we had a chance in the 93rd minute to send it to extra-time:
My left back shooting there and not passing it to Stanczyk who is our best striker who happened to be all alone in the box will haunt me for years.
Squad:
Mariusz Duraj, despite not being our best player by attributes, keeps performing the best for our team. Also, all hail our first 5* player:
It's a shame he's not a natural Pole but what a player he is. All for just £2m.
Also, I am back in international management. After being sacked from Serbia I took the Colombian job but resigned when Southgate left Poland for Ireland. I did not get my old job back and I went a few months with nothing but I ended up declaring interest in a few jobs and it ended up leading to me becoming the manager of Nigeria.
Pogon Siedlce 2037/28 Season Update:
Transfers In:
Finding it hard to find players who are worth buying right now (which is pissing the board off as they want me to throw money around) as most Polish youth look crap and I'm trying to limit the foreigners coming in.
Not too worried at the lack of real star potential here as we have some amazing AML's. I still don't think he's going to be special but I do think he'll be pretty good.
I think he's going to be absolutely bonkers and I hate that I have to wait 3 years (well 2 now) before I can use him.
I hope I can find a loan deal for him next year (it's proving hard to find homes for the foreigners at other clubs) as he needs game time. Could be amazing.
Also, sadly this breaks the RB streak
Transfers Out:
Only two out the door this year:
A backup goalkeeper who was never going to cut it here. £325k.
I wanted to keep him as he's a natural RB/AML but the guy was constantly moaning and I decided to give another of the RB's a chance. £30m was a hefty fee for him too.
League:
I thought we were going to win every game but sadly we got FM'd in a few. 6 in a row now.
Cups:
The second 11 are now far too good for this level.
Champions League:
I'm not sure why we struggled so much against Astana in qualifying as I sent out pretty much the first 11 but like in most of our European games this year we conceded a lot from small xG's for our opponents.
The group went well and we were minutes from taking the top spot as we were beating 10 man Chelsea in the final game (who had dropped points against Besiktas) but then my best CB decided to be an idiot:
He had gotten the ball from Chelsea's striker and then for some reason decided to attempt a backheel to my keeper. It was incredibly weak and didn't reach the keeper which gave the Chelsea striker an easy ball to run onto and round the keeper. I was seething.
We played really well and their two goals came from corners other than that they weren't in the game at all. It was disappointing to come away with only a draw.
We battered them and I thought we had fucked it when we gave away the penalty. Thankfully it was put well wide and then my LB (who fucked us last year against Bayern) got redemption by sending us through to face Chelsea.
We should have won so to go home down 3-1 was a real shitter.
I'm still angry at this. To concede two from an xG of 1.1 is awful and we were all over them especially after their second as we threw the kitchen sink at them. We really should have won over the two legs but at least we've finally won a Champions League knockout game.
Squad:
Nusret and Josemi got their Polish papers this year and they were big for the team. Also, despite Mariusz's goal record I'm thinking of moving him on.
As you can see he barely plays for me in Europe these days so he's just bullying small Polish teams. Also thinking of selling the old man of the group in Smolinski as a non-Pole is about to get his papers who is not far behind him in current ability despite only being 19.
I'm going to Poland myself on Thursday so I'm going to try and knock out another season and hopefully have my first Champions League won.
Nigeria Update:
Qualifiers:
Team clicked really nicely really early.
World Cup 2038:
Through in second as we had the same GD against Russia but they beat Saudi Arabia 3-1 to our 2-.
Second Round:
We were shit as a lot of the starters were tired so we were lucky to grab the winner late.
Third Round:
A little better but another tight game in which we easily could have lost.
Quarter-Final:
Their keeper was MOTM and we really should have put them awayGuess we used up our lucky in the previous rounds.
#Slump
What year are you in? That is indeed glorious.Originally Posted by SincereTheRebel
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