So long as all this wasn't because they were trying to go down the road of that FIFA/FC sticker album muck.
So long as all this wasn't because they were trying to go down the road of that FIFA/FC sticker album muck.
Ironic that the tag of this thread is ‘completed it mate’
something something "the off season"Originally Posted by Dan
They should re-release 01/02 and watch the money pour in.
I'm sure they were legally forced to leave it up for pre-order all these months.
Not even going to bother spoilering this one, as it's pretty obvious that we were going to win the league at a canter.
We broke most of the league records, winning 34 games & becoming the first team to break the 100pt barrier. We scored 96 goals, which still isn't even a good indication of how dominant we were as we were also the biggest underperformers on xG, netting 16 goals less than we should've. We also had a good run in the Copa del Rey, beating three La Liga sides 3-0, including Real Madrid, before Sociedad put us out in the quarter finals.
In terms of key players, Max Moerstedt went crazy after the winter break, going on a ten game scoring streak on his way to 35 goals for the season at more than a goal per game. He was ably complimented by Emmanuel Yeboah, who was excellent despite having a few injuries, and Marcos Leonardo, who was signed to rotate up top but ended up being impressive out on the left after Robin Hack broke his leg.
We've got about £60m to spend for next season, along with around £250k p/w of available wages, so we should be able to make some decent upgrades. I've already spend £13m on Willie Gnonto to come & be our new LW, but I'll be looking for a new GK, some FBs & then anyone else that looks like an upgrade.
You'd imagine we should be okay to avoid a relegation battle next season, especially given the results from the Copa del Rey, but it'll be interesting to see exactly where we end up slotting in on our return to the big time. I'm optimistic we can aim for midtable, but hopefully the expectations will be a bit more modest.
After a lengthy break, I got back on my save. First full season in the J3 league is over.
We've reached midseason in our return to La Liga so time for an update.
I got exactly what I wanted in the quote above, with us predicted to finish midtable but only expected to avoid relegation by the board. We had about £60m to spend, which we've put to good use, bringing in some more established players to improve us across the board, including Willie Gnonto, Tjark Ernst & Christian McFarlane, who are on last season's transfer page as we got them in early.
It's been a reasonable start to the season, with us struggling to string together a run of results but also managing to avoid any horrific streaks of bad results. It's quite tight in the middle of the league, so whilst we're a bit higher than I'd expected so far we'll definitely need to step it up a little if we're going to hold on to our position.
I've had a few issues sticking to the wage budget this year, with us £150k p/w over at one point. We got back under, but then I brought another couple of players in so we're back to £40k over, which has put me in the position where I've had to sell Marcos Leonardo, who has been okay this season but is one of our top earners & isn't really important enough to deserve his money. I've already spend some of the wages we'll save from selling him on a replacement, but we have about £15k left to use so I might be able to sign one more player in January.
We've also seen regression from the guy ahead of him in the lineup, as Max Moerstedt has gone from scoring 36 times last season to a grand total of 1 goal so far this year. He did miss 5 weeks with an injury at the start of the season, and he's been in & out a bit as he's tried to get form & fitness back. but we definitely need a lot more from him in the second half of the season.
Well, we did not step it up & we did not hold on to our position. It's still a decent first season for a newly promoted side, and it was exactly what I said I hoped we be able to achieve, but we absolutely died not long after the transfer window shut & Cesc couldn't find any answers as we slowly drifted down the table.
It was a very frustrating run & one that has convinced me it's time to move on again. We're constantly up against the wage budget, which is a bigger issue than I'd anticipated when I put the rule in that I can't just shift the budgets around at will, and the board have set next seasons wage budget at £3k p/w lower than we're already spending, which pretty much killed the last remaining chance of me staying. Real & Barca finished 18pts clear of the rest of the league, and with us having one hand tied behind our back it has the feel of a long slog to get to title contention. Barca now have Cole Palmer, Xavi Simons & Dusan Vlahovic alongside Yamal, Cubarsi & co. They just broke the league record for goals scored with results like an 11-2 against Racing & a 9-0 against Granada where they scored 7 with ten men. I did get an offer for an interview at Monaco around midseason that I turned down, and I went for one with Atletico that I didn't get, but there are a few jobs potentially coming available in the summer that look very appealing, so hopefully I'll be able to get one of them.
Didn't take long
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That is definitely a more attractive offer. I've been playing FM23 on my steam deck and decided to take PNE to the top, first season and the final game I am sat in 6th with Blackburn in 7th and one game left to decide who gets the final play off spot
Drew Sheff Utd in the semis, won the first leg at home 3-1. Second leg they were 1-0 and predictably the game ran well beyond the 3 minutes stoppage time to allow a 94th minute goal from them to force penalties.
Fortunately we won the shootout, and ended up with a final against Vincent Kompany's Burnley. Cue a spate of injuries in the interim which made me dread the worst, but came in at HT 2-0 up and finished 3-0
I am now the greatest hero Deepdale has ever seen after a single season, the board have allocated £525k a week salary budget and £37m for transfers. The whole squad needs an overhaul so probably wont go far but if I could sign the on loan Liam Delap and Troy Parrott permanently that would be a start.
Predictably all my 3 star shit munchers who were on 5k a week now want 40k a week. I've already been ferreting around firing contract offers to all 5 star potential youngsters who are about to be out of contract. Given I am expected to be relegated anyway are there any repercussions beyond a drop in form if I just axe everyone over 30 and below 3 1/2 stars if I deem them not useful? Seems like a good a time as any to take the hit on reshaping the squad Forest/Chelsea style.
My main problem is the best loan players I had last season are valued insanely high. Palace, Brighton and Fulham went down but all their decent players are valued over £50m, Fulham are in the conference league somehow though lol.
Something that seems to happen a lot.
I've got a world class player, and for the previous 3 years the likes of PSG, Barca and Man City have made offers of $130m-$180m... I've rejected, no issues from the player and life goes on. However, this time the player got cheesed off that I rejected it, so I just said he could leave. Offered him out and an absolutely nobody willing to bid even $90m for him. I literally turned down a $180m bid from PSG last week. #FirstWorldProblems
There’s another match engine tweet thing out
https://www.reddit.com/r/footballman...s/s/lCAamAdhyy
https://fmtweak.com/
Surely it’s not long before Miles takes this down after realising a bunch of geeks just made his old game a million times better than FM26 will be, and for free.
Was offered the West Ham job on my save, should have split my save really as it was teed up nicely for a PL team picking the bones out of the shock relegation teams. Turned it down, first game of the season and Arne Slot's Hammers put me to the sword.
So far the only point we've managed is a goalless draw at home to WBA. Definitely think based on how badly the big money signings are playing it would be aswell to recall all high potential youth players from their loans and pump minutes into them in a season that there's no expectation in anyway.
I don't see how he can. People who bough the game are free to mod as they like, surely? Perhaps stuff like this will lead them to lock down the code a bit more, but I guess that's the least of their issues right now
Well, I ended up playing all the way through my first season with Arsenal. We've got quite a lot to go through...
Transfers
We had £150m to spend, plus a load of players who could be moved on to free up wages & generate extra funds, and we certainly did that.
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Domestic Cups
We had a decent run in the FA Cup before losing to Man City in the fifth round, but made it all the way to the final of the League Cup, where we would face Man Utd:
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Champions League
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Premier League
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The Players
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I think that probably covers everything. I'd expect this summer to be much quieter than the last one, but with the core players still at their peak we've got a great opportunity to push on & try to start racking up some big trophies over the next few seasons, so it'll be interesting to see how high we can climb & whether we can overhaul a Barcelona side containing the likes of Cole Palmer & Samu which looks to still be the best team in the world.
Nice work.
My second season at Preston has crashed and burned, between the African nations robbing me of my best players, some bad long term injuries and the big money striker I brought in being a turkey we've spent the majority of the season propping up the table. Tried several tactics but nothing turning the tide and I suspect I will be sacked.
Not sure if it is a bug but the having asked for a new contract when we got promoted my best CB and captain decided to ask for another one 3 months into the new season, which I didn't want to give him and the budget was too stretched to meet anyway. So that's tanked my dressing room all season too. Given this is FM23 realising Gyokeres was still at Coventry for peanuts once I had blown my beans on Ndiaye was particularly galling.
Got relegated
The cheeky twats kept insinuating a loss against the top 4 I had to play for my final games would see me sacked, but it never came to fruition. I upset my squad of loafers telling them I wanted to aim for the playoffs because it was too ambitious. I am just binning off as many of the fuckers as I can to pave the way for some sweet sweet quality. Offered Conor Bradley a contract as his is about to expire but I think we won't be his best offer.
Decided to switch up to a 352 attacking dreadnought formation and with the right additions I think I can monster the league and create a more stable tactic for dealing with big teams instead of the grinding relentless losses. i was tempted to revert to what got me promoted in my first season but the triple centre half kamikaze wing backs method is stuck in my head now, if I can recruit good enough wing backs that is.
I actually have a good right wing back but he wants to leave because I was too nasty about them continually shipping goals.
Loki Doki is doing a Preston save & getting smashed every week in the Prem so I’d say it’s Preston’s fault tbh.
I thought that was Sandra's fault?
Coincidentally she’s also getting smashed every week.
Had a pretty epic summer where via the Sports Almanac of playing FM23 in 2025 i managed to bag Mika Biereth and Conor Bradley on free transfers. Add in Rodrigo Muniz and we were in business, the 352 running riot for the first part of the season and propelling us to 4th, beating Palace on penalties on the league cup.
Since then however our form has gone to rat shit and no tweaks to the tactics or personnel seem to help. Firmly entrenched in mid table and more annoyingly currently losing against all the bottom teams when ideally those would be easy points. About to hit the January transfer window so all I can do is try and find some real quality at a good price: typically though the interested South American player far too good for us and listed for £300k can't get a work permit
Liverpool are in serious trouble here
They're down.
-£165m in the bank too
What about in the real world m8?
<looks at where United are in that table>
Twice in 4 years that the local council have blocked the building of a new 84000 stadium. Welsh cunts.
Hitchin Town 2048/49 Season Update:
League:
Our highest finish and points total which is nice and we scored the joint highest goals (71) with Arsenal. Just a shame our defence is shit.
Also, lol at Liverpool.
Double over Liverpool, beating United 6-0 and beating Arsenal 5-2 were the highlights.
Cups:
A very kind run to the final for us.
Final:
2 kick off goals for Fulham which was annoying as shit, we also dominated them in normal time but in ET we struggled. Thankfully my keeper saved one penalty and the decider was smashed against the post.
Squad:
Gumbs is starting to become our main man now. Keeper and defence our main issue. No real CBs of note coming through (unless I play Townley there who has had some decent games at RB) but we do have a really good Aussie prospect at goalkeeper. He was on loan at Burton Albion in League Two this year and did really well.
My current transfer budget is $700m....
FUCKING CUNTS at the Japanese FA just sacked me. Started a new save and proceeded to launch a 20 odd game unbeaten streak. WON the EEAF title, WON The Asian Cup... 2026 World Cup started shaky with defeats to Ecuador and Belgium but managed to qualify beating the MIGHTY Suriname. Second round absolutely smashed Netherlands 3-0, arguably the greatest result in modern Japanese football. Then got knocked out by France.
Current Asian cup, strolled into the semi's, including a 7-0 over Oman and 3-0 over the Aussies. In the semi's South Korea got lucky with an extra time winner to go through 3-2.
AND THEY FUCKING SACKED ME.
Pricks.
Last edited by John Arne; 19-03-2025 at 04:28 AM.
Looking for a fellow Asian team to take over and knock the shit out the Japanese twats at some stage.
Was there anything in the vision you were not meeting?
I just split my Preston save as I was offered the Lazio job, I like the prospect of picking up that save later in the database I've been playing.
After a charge at promotion that came so close only to fail (last five games had 3 of the top 4) I decided go for broke and upgrade positions and let the squad dynamics land where they may. Got a new keeper who is a slight upgrade, can't offload the old keeper due to his wage demands so that should be fun. Brought in two top class midfielders on mega deals, Nicolo Fagiolo and Santiago Hezze. Liam Delap is transfer listed having spent the last three seasons on loan with me and I am his favoured personnel. Hope City are open to installments because those other signings depleted my kitty.
I need more depth at striker, a 28 year old Neal Maupay is a free agent. His attributes tick the boxes but I am still wary, how much cuntishness can be in the hidden attributes?
So unfortunately, the only national job that was available in Asia was North Korea, and their team was shit.
Instead, I took over Kashiwa Reysol (who are somewhat known to have a decent academy). They were in J2, and had sold essentially their best 5 players in the previous off-season. Loadsa money in the bank, and managed to get promoted having taken over when they were mid-table. We finished 6th and went up through the play-offs.
I then got somewhat conflicting messages about our new owner, Tsubasa Okada.
10 days later...
Not sure where this leaves us.
We've won our first ever European games 4-0, 7-0 and now 8-0.
What year you in now?
2049.
We've also started well in the Premiership.
Wonder if Miles has patched FM23 on the sly to spite me, 3 of my four strikers out with big injuries, loaned one in for cover, got injured on his debut
Managed to make some top quality January loans, which helped solidify my excellent run of form when things had started to look threadbare. Annoyingly I took part in deadline day to try and offload some moaners and ended up getting stung with a transfer bid that unsettled Conor Bradley. Managed to agree a move but defer it to the summer, still not ideal. His understudy has been moaning they aren't playing as a wing back in the right back position and instead as a wing back in the wing back position so they are getting binned too.
Managed to pip Norwich to 2nd by a point on the final day ensuring automatic promotion, so back in the PL with £40m to spend.
Captured a bit of that classic FM magic this evening, went looking for a cheap wonderkid and spotted a 19 year old far too undervalued, landed him for £2m and his work permit appeal squeaked through just before the transfer deadline. First game an FA Cup tie with Chelsea, bring him on in the second half and he immediately scores and sees us through
I had a great couple of years at Kashiwa Reysol, and then left the day after winning the AFC Champions League, just before European summer. Managed to get a gig at 1860 Munich, who had just been relegated to the 3.Liga. I think it's fair to say that it is NOT a happy camp.
That could he a nice save in itself: getting them back to the big time. Though good luck with that atmosphere haha.
Yeah, we should smash 3.Liga.
Only thing holding us back is the tiny 4,000 stadium. Hopefully we can move back into the Allianz at some point.
See as a new manager the unhappy with agreed playing time thing should not apply. But Miles says differently I guess.
I like that the delay to the next one has let me go ridiculous with 24 instead
I can't lay claim to the Championship, one of the FA Cups and the two League One trophies but I also won a Friendly Cup that we hosted as part of the first season at James Maddison Stadium but for some reason it doesn't include that
Imagine the DVD sales for the James Maddison cup
I've been watching Season 2 of Sunderland til I die (which is excellent) and it's given me a hankering to get back into this.
What was the real team/competition name update that didn't do the stupid shit of calling the Italian Golden boot something like the capocanioneribianco so you had absolutely no idea what each award was?
Ta muchly.
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