Football Manager 23

[wullie]

That's got 'string of wins and defeat to Vienna' written all over it.

[thommo]

I'm approaching the halfway point of the second season with Folkestone, and it's been a surprisingly vast improvement over the tense relegation battle we experienced last season. A combination of youth players to rotate in and out, a strong team cohesion and a pretty robust defensive tactic has made us really hard to beat, and we've been grinding out results consistently.



Lots of great moments so far this season - the 3-2 win away at Weymouth early on was brilliant, with 16-year-old Rob Hewitt assisting two goals in stoppage time to turn it around. Hewitt himself has been the best of the youngsters, always seems to have an impact when he comes off the bench. Filipovic and Brooker have also contributed, with Brooker even grabbing a 95th minute equaliser against Truro City.

The biggest difference from last season has to be the improved defence - we kept only 3 clean sheets in the league throughout the entirety of the first season, and we already have managed to keep 5 as we enter December. The tactic is quite defensive, with less pressing and the lines quite deep, plus a Cautious mentality. This has really helped to prevent the main source of goals in non-league football - the hopeful punt over the backline for pacey strikers. We do concede more from low crosses as the line drops back into the area, but it's a compromise I'm willing to make.

All this leaves the table looking like so:



That recent 2-1 win over Slough Town looks even better now. I don't think we'll keep this up throughout the season - there are still times when fatigue really affects the squad and we have busy periods yet to play. But I think a top-half finish is genuinely possible.

[Adramelch]

That's got 'string of wins and defeat to Vienna' written all over it.

Lost to Arsenal and Liverpool and drew at Vienna (all of them away), while winning the rest. Not too bad an outcome at all.

That's some top effort there @thommo. I never had the patience (or the tactical flexibility) to do a save like that so it's so impressive to me.

[Adramelch]

What a season that was!

I didn't expect us to be that good, but basically take a squad on the up and add some world class (in my mind at least) players and this happens I guess? Let's start with two big departures both of which happened in January. Novotny had been making noises about moving to a bigger club for quite some time now so when United came in with a 100m euro offer for him, I just couldn't say no. The other player to leave was Rangel, who had thrown a fit about losing his place to Lecourt and wouldn't let it go so he joined Flamengo on loan, for 30m in installments and a future fee of another 30m. In came several players, the most important of which are the following 5:



Vibe was really solid last season so I wasn't in the market for another strong keeper, but this guy became available for just 10m and last time Vibe was injured we really struggled so I just went for it.



Probably the only high profile player to join in a position we were severely lacking. Heaps above what we had at the club and with much needed experience in his resume. Our record transfer, joined for 30m from Luton of all clubs.



One more case of "we didn't quite need strengthening in that position, but he was available so why not". It wasn't a hard decision mind you, as he only cost 15m and he is considered to be the most promising player in the world.



Him being available was the catalyst for the Rangel transfer. A player for his calibre only being available for 22m is just one of those bargains I just can't overlook.



Last time I was raving about how great Atkinson has been for us. But then this guy was available for 9m, which instantly made me go "Atkinson who?". My best signing so far in this save I'd say.



We reached the top spot around 10 games into the season and never left since. It became close at the end with a few unexpected defeats, but Arsenal didn't do much better. We went into the last game of the season only needing to avoid a heavy (6+ goal) defeat at their place, but we ended up beating them for good measure. We weren't much better defensively than last season but we scored 104 goals and it showed. In the grand scheme of things though, one could argue that Arsenal threw it away with their 12 draws, but they were essentially playing anti-football (63 scored, 25 conceded) so it serves them right I say. As a sidenote, half the clubs in the league qualified for Europe (with all three European trophies going to English sides - us, City and Liverpool).



A very dominant performance once again, as we went through the season unbeaten, breaking yet another record for goals scored (58 with the previous one being 45 including qualis). Funnily, Austria Vienna were the one side that came closest to beating us, although it was (partially) because I played the second string in both games. The final was an affair of two halves, as we dominated the first and should have been way out of reach, but we only scored two and an early goal from them in the second half made things way more tense than they should have been. In the end, we managed to hold on and marked my first time winning both European mickey mouse cups in the same save.



Great performances across the board, with Seral and Williams being the stand out performers. Seral was easily the most influential player in the squad, vastly improving our football when he was on the pitch, while Williams was lethal in front of goal, both in open play and from set-pieces. Bringing in a lot of those players that we didn't urgently need meant we were spoilt for options and we could afford to rotate more, which is what probably led to our league title. Special mention should go to Peña and Kunze, who have been at the club for 6 seasons now and will probably be here for more years to come. Another one worth mentioning is Henao, who has flown under the radar (I'm not sure I've even mentioned his name before) but has been a consistent squad player for us these last two seasons. I signed him to be our primary striker three seasons ago (for 600k!), only for him to instantly pick a long-term injury and lose his place to Rangel. At some point we had noone else available to play behind the striker so I just played him and he did really well. A few months later we had noone to play left wing and once again he was there with some great performances. This season, he took advantage of Kunze's 5-month injury, which saw him play a lot more and he didn't disappoint. As for the goalkeepers, you'll notice Vibe in the list with just 30 games to his name. I played him in every home game and Obradovic in every away game and they both performed rather good overall. The latter threw a fit about not playing every game early on in the season and has been holding a grudge since, but I don't really care. Maybe if he stops acting like a child, I'll take him more seriously, who knows?

[John Arne]

Squeaky bum time.



My run in is Man Utd, Liverpool, Norwich then Arsenal.

[John Arne]

I beat Man Utd 5-0, and though "this is on". Then this happened...



Leaves the table looking like this...



Second'll do.

[John Arne]

Ended up third. Beaten 0-1 away to Arsenal on the final day of the season.

We go again.

[John Arne]

A 10 minute own goal hattrick

[Dan]

I’m still on FM23 but have been messing around with a few saves on a custom database where I’ve added most of the main summer transfers & tweaked a few things. I’ve also been going to a lot of Pompey games this season, and given they’ve started the traditional turn of the year collapse it seemed like the ideal time to do a Pompey save for the first time in a while.

I’d planned to make it harder by handing off transfers, contracts etc to the staff, but when we were a few months in & only had two GK coaches in our coaching team, and every time I tried to loan someone in it said they can’t because of some imaginary rules, I’ve already binned most of that off & gone back to doing it all myself.

Zipped through the 23/24 season keeping the team as it is in real life & we won the league pretty comfortably by engaging Man City mode around Xmas then not losing another league game for the rest of the season. We also won the EFL Trophy & beat Southampton in the FA Cup before getting knocked out by Fulham.

In terms of key players, Colby Bishop & Ronan Curtis scored almost 80 goals between them, but to be honest most of the squad will be phased out over the next couple of seasons as it’s basically all just good League One players who’d be limited in the Championship - I think Alex Robertson, Joe Morrell, Paddy Lane & Regan Poole are the only ones who might stick around for a few seasons.

I’m coming to the end of preseason & I feel like we should have a decent shot at staying up, but we’re also likely to take a few kickings from the better teams - we’re predicted 21st in the season preview & that would be just fine with me.

Just hit the end of 2024 so it's time for an update:

Transfers:

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We had about £4m to spend, which soon became £7.5m when we were taken over just before the start of the season. I converted a decent bit of that into wages since half the team had big promotion wage increases in their contracts thanks to the DOF, so we were basically at the budget before we even did anything.

The first move was to get Alex Robertson back - he was apparently interested in a loan, which was my preference as he was out of contract at the end of this season, but for some reason he kept turning down loans & he was still valued highly by City so we had to fork out £1m up front plus another £2.5m when we get to the Prem, which is good enough for me. We also made use of our affiliation with Man City to get Joel Ndala on loan, and he's joined by fellow loanees Simone Pafundi & Rhys Williams. We tried to work on the cheap, signing a couple of young CBs that had been released in Loic Mbe Soh & Malachi Fagan-Walcott, as well as bringing in Charlie Patino & Aaron Connolly on frees. We also had Antonio Blanco offered to us midway through the season, so I snapped him uo & chucked him straight into the team.

Aside from Robertson, the only bits of cash we spent were on a promising LB in Sean Roughan & a new goalkeeper, with Nathan Baxter looking like a pretty good Championship GK to take over from Will Norris. We also sold the other two senior GKs in the squad, which may or may not be relevant later. Conor Shaughnessy was probably the only notable departure, and a bit of an odd one - he's a CB but can also play DM & CM, although he always played CB for us, which made it rather confusing when he suddenly got annoyed because he decided we'd signed Charlie Patino, a central midfielder, to take his place in the team. I'd already planned to make him a squad player this year, so when he carried on getting pissy about it & the squad started getting involved it was just easier to tell him to fuck off.

Results:

Err...

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I don't know how this has happened, and to be honest I'm a little bit pissed off that we've come up & immediately mugged everyone off as I was hoping to have a few years in the Championship to complete the overhaul of the team, but as it stands we're legitimately in the hunt for back to back promotions. I think League One players might be a bit too close to the Championship level - in real life it feels like a pretty clear difference in quality between the two leagues but in FM solid L1 players like Colby Bishop & Connor Ogilvie aren't that much different from most of the players on Championship teams.

We've had a fun last month though, as at the start of December both Nathan Baxter & Will Norris picked up 4-5 week injuries on the same day, meaning we had to roll with two pretty rubbish teenage goalkeepers for the whole month as we also tried to sign a free agent GK but they couldn't get a work permit. To top it off, the kid I decided to start ended up getting the flu after three games so we were down to the last man standing for the run through Xmas It didn't hurt as as much as it could've, as a couple of those games were against teams in the relegation zone who didn't manage a shot on target & we also got three penalties in one game, but we did lose 3-1 to Ipswich with some pretty questionable play between the sticks.

We're out of the Carabao as we lost 1-0 to Rotherham days after they'd beaten us 3-0 in the league, so that was nice. We've also got Fulham in the FA Cup again this year after they knocked us out in the fifth round last season - I'd imagine they'll see us off again.

We start 2025 off with a game against Norwich on new years day, which seems like a great bit of scheduling, but at this point it's kinda playing with house money so given we also don't have much room for transfers we'll just keep pushing on & see where we end up.

[Dquincy]

Wow. Although Guinea are ranked 16th in the world.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

I tried Holidaying a few seasons with Miyagi Sensei (and creating perfect players to win the Miyagi cup) to see if we get league games, we don't. I then tried to add a manager in our league and spotted that we are one of only three teams in the division. As such I have killed the save, RIP Mr. Miyagi I will always wax on and off.

So I have started a new game and I have STOLEN Thommo's idea. I have Holidayed 7 times to get Hitchin Town (my home town) promoted to the Vanarama National League N/S (so I don't have to deal with a shit db) and will be doing YA only:



Here is the squad:



Not much there. Also, there are no players in the U18s and ZERO staff, plus no one in the team is sadly there in real life.

Here is our key player:



I have started scouting him with my 0 scouts to see how good he is...

Here are some photos of the club, team and town in general:

[Baz]

Do you not have coaches? Why must you scout your own player? Usually you get your coaches assessment or assistant managers rating.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Do you not have coaches? Why must you scout your own player? Usually you get your coaches assessment or assistant managers rating.

There was no staff at all, I was the only one in the building. I have since got staff.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Just lost my first player.

34 year old McQuoid. He was on a non-contract with £500 appearance fee. Hastings United and Bognor Regis came in for him so I offered him a part time deal with £425 a week and £80 appearance fee.

He decided to go to Hastings in the tier below us (so non-playable) for £350 appearance fee...

Fucking moron.

[Dan]

Portsmouth 2024/25 Season Review

We start 2025 off with a game against Norwich on new years day, which seems like a great bit of scheduling, but at this point it's kinda playing with house money so given we also don't have much room for transfers we'll just keep pushing on & see where we end up.

Just finished the season - could we continue our unexpected push for back to back promotions or would we come crashing back to reality?

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Yeah, it was the second one. It's a pretty realistic Portsmouth season as we do love to completely collapse around the new year, but we did so in proper FM fashion as towards the end of January we just randomly started two footing people for a few weeks, and then at the end of the season we did whatever the fuck this was, all of which left the final standings looking like this:

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By the end it started to feel inevitable that we'd get jumped by someone, but it wasn't clear who it was going to be as Burnley & Sheffield United were also trying their best to not get promoted. Sheffield United overtook us then immediately lost to hand it back, then when we played each other & drew 0-0 Burnley passed both of us, only to choke on the final day & hand it straight back to Sheffield United.

That meant it was playoffs for us, with Sunderland up first:

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We were looking good at 2-0 up but then decided to just stop playing for a couple of minutes so they could catch up. It's not too bad of a result though, given we have the second leg to come at Fratton Park...

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Not sure where this came from, but I'm not going to complain. Absolutely mauled them to set up a game against Burnley in the final:

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It was a competitive game & we took the lead from some nonsensical FM defending, but they equalised from a corner that the guy on the post probably could've prevented if he'd moved at all, and after we had a goal ruled out for offside they nicked it in extra time when they went route one, with the keeper hoofing it long, the ball being flicked on & Kasper Dolberg delivering an exquisite chip of the goalie from 25 yards out to send them up.

We also lost to Fulham in the third round of the FA Cup but who cares? Well, maybe Thommo I guess.

The positive is that Southampton got relegated so that's an easy 6pts next year

The Squad:

Thought I'd also do a quick overview of the squad & my plans for the summer.

Goalkeepers

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Nathan Baxter is the number one & will stay there next season - he performed slighly above expectations with +0.12xg prevented per 90mins, although his save percentage (80%) was three points below expected so it's not exactly been a stellar season either. Will Norris was the primary backup, although with his contract ending next season I'll probably think about moving on from him, despite the injury problems at the end of 2023 that saw us playing Toby Steward & Malachi Osei-Owusu. We did bring in Kayode Bankole in January as extra insurance in case it happened again, and he'll be the most likely candidate to take over as the backup if Norris leaves. I'd like to send the kids out on loan, but they kept refusing to join any of my parent clubs last season so hopefully we'll have more success this time.

Defenders

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There was a lot of rotation here as for some reason most of our guys struggled to play 90mins despite us not playing high tempo, or running a high gegenpress system, but the main four were probably Sean Roughan at LB, Regan Poole & Loic Mbe Soh at CB & Joe Rafferty at RB, although we did start to move Poole to RB & use Rhys Williams at CB instead towards the end of the season as I think Poole might have to be the guy there next year if we can't bring someone else in & we have a few other good CBs out on loan who can cover the gap.

Zak Swanson is a decent squad player due to his versatility, but he got injured a lot in the second half of the year & he's not someone I'd imagine will be getting another deal here, and we'll probably also try to move on from Connor Ogilvie, who would be following Sean Raggett out the door - I'm hoping he becomes a decent coach though as I'd like to have him back some day.

Midfielders

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We mostly rolled with Charlie Patino as the deep lying playmaker, with Antonio Blanco replacing Joe Morrell as the box to box midfielder after his arrival. Alex Robertson has done well as the attacking midfielder, and then we had Miguel Azeez & Simone Pafundi as the next guys up to fill those three spots. Club captain Marlon Pack didn't play a lot this year but came back in towards the end of the year when we were wobbling & immediately took control of the game, but he's looking for more playing time so we'll see whether he stays, goes or retires. We've already moved Ben Stevenson, so we'll probably ask about getting Pafundi back & then maybe look for one other guy to round the group out - we have a couple of guys out on loan who could probably do the job, but I won't rule out us bringing someone in from elsewhere either.

Wingers

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Joel Ndala was the main guy on the left wing & there's an argument that he was our most influential player - when he played well during the first half of the year we were rolling, then we dropped off as he went through a lull in form down the back half of the season. i've already managed to get his loan extended until the end of next season, so hopefully he can keep his level high for the whole campaign. On the right it was mostly Paddy Lane, with guys like Gavin Whyte & Anthony Scully coming in when needed. We also brought through our first newgen here, with Dan Davis coming from our youth intake last season & getting the odd game since he was too young to loan out, which will hopefully be what happens next year.

Strikers

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I wasn't overly impressed with our guys here, so it's going to be a focus for the summer. Colby Bishop went from almost 50 goals last year to a fringe player by the end of this season, so I'd like to send him back to League One where he belongs. Ronan Curtis had a decent campaign playing both up front & on the left wing, but he was also the chief culprit of the stupid red cards, which goes against him slightly as much as I love him - ideally he'll be playing mainly from the bench next year, but I feel like he'll end up seeing more time than anticipated. Aaron Connolly was the guy I was hoping would lead the line this season, but he struggled out of the gate & at one point I was considering cutting my losses & trying to move him on. He improved as the season went on though, and ended up tying Curtis for the top scorer on the team, so it's not out of the question that he starts the season as the guy, although the leash will probably remain fairly short.

We were struggling a bit for money by the end of the year, running out of transfer budget, wage budget & scouting budget on a few occasions each, so I'm not expecting to be handed a big stack of cash to spend, and I doubt we'll be doing any upgrades to the stadium or facilities either. Might be another year or mostly loans & free agents

[wullie]

Just lost my first player.

34 year old McQuoid. He was on a non-contract with £500 appearance fee. Hastings United and Bognor Regis came in for him so I offered him a part time deal with £425 a week and £80 appearance fee.

He decided to go to Hastings in the tier below us (so non-playable) for £350 appearance fee...

Fucking moron.

Is it Josh McQuoid? If so based on his real life spell with us you've had a result there

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Is it Josh McQuoid? If so based on his real life spell with us you've had a result there

It is indeed.

He was doing alright but I needed him as he was my only AMC.

I now only have 11 non-grey players until my youth intake.

[Baz]

Nothing worse than losing the playoff final. Feels like such a waste of a season.

Our network game got accidentally holidayed too far but Oldham are now in the premier league in 2038. My mate was asked from Leicester for not doing anything for 8 years, so he’s got the Man Utd job. Mike completed it with City by doing six in a row so says he’s not rejoining.

[Baz]

Which keeper shall I give the number 1 spot to?

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[John Arne]

Which keeper shall I give the number 1 spot to?

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Either of them like/not like big matches? What is each personality?

[Manc]

Agility & reflexes are king when it comes to goalkeepers.

[Mike]

Nothing worse than losing the playoff final. Feels like such a waste of a season.

Our network game got accidentally holidayed too far but Oldham are now in the premier league in 2038. My mate was asked from Leicester for not doing anything for 8 years, so he’s got the Man Utd job. Mike completed it with City by doing six in a row so says he’s not rejoining.

And two champions leagues.

[Baz]

Either of them like/not like big matches? What is each personality?

Perez relishes big matches and is spirited.
Pereira enjoys big matches and is model citizen.

[Mike]

Model Citizen.

Is the bug still in where if a model citizen welcomes a new signing they become one too?

[Mike]

This might result in a change of formation if the AM is good.


Was a busy January deadline day


We have had a real dip in form, but it's all still looking good.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

My only left back has decided to turn down a £130 a week part time contract to drop down to tier 10 with AFC Whyteleaf. His contract? £0 a week...



Down to 10 non-grey players.

[Mike]

We can beat Brøndby

[Dquincy]

Into the year 2087 on my FM11 save. As I approach my 104th birthday, I feel a retirement is on the horizon. Not because I want to, but because it's borked my reputation so I am struggling to get job offers from any high profile clubs.

Story of this season is summed up by the post below. We won all major competitions.



Having done this, I wanted to leave the club for a new adventure, but as per above I'm not getting a sniff at any of the high profile clubs. Not wanting to join a low level club each time I want a new venture, I am deciding to retire. With this, I post below my profile and career stats.



Lastly, a list of the clubs and nations I managed along the way.

[Mike]

That's some impressive stuff. Both Barce and Real, and love how often you return to Ayr

[Manc]

3935 games is some effort.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Hitchin Town 2024/25 Season Update:

League:






Really happy with how we did, we never slipped into the relegation zone (20th was our worst) for a single minute this season. February really saved us as I was starting to get scared after January that we might be in trouble.

Cups:



Disappointed we didn't make the FA Cup proper as we should have beaten the flamingo fuckers.

Squad:



We lost two senior players in the season which hurt us as we only had 10 actual players for a while, although the grey LB we had did fairly well.

Youth Intake:

Here are all the players so I'll spoiler it:

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Not a bad intake for our first, we've got a lot of physical specimens which will do well at this level but it's hard to see any of them being with us throughout our journey. Not sure why we have so many non-English lads (all my staff are English bar the U18s Ass Man who is English/Angolan).

Facilities & Finances:

I didn't ask for any training/youth facility upgrades but I did ask for Youth Recruitment upgrades and both times they were accepted by the board which is great. I will continue to ask.

In terms of cash, we have £126k in the bank and we're making money, although we now have a lot more players on the books.

[Baz]

Bit sick of pootling along with Oldham. Are there any super broken exploit tactics?
@Dark Soldier

[John Arne]

Another one for the great names compilation.

[Dark Soldier]

Bit sick of pootling along with Oldham. Are there any super broken exploit tactics?
@Dark Soldier

No idea mate not played it in ages.

[Mike]

On we go

[John Arne]

Bloody Newcastle won the Europa League and took my Champions League spot. Cunts.

[Adramelch]

That seems like a bug? I am fairly certain that winning the Champions League/Europa League gives an additional spot rather than taking it away from the 4th team.

[John Arne]

That seems like a bug? I am fairly certain that winning the Champions League/Europa League gives an additional spot rather than taking it away from the 4th team.

Fortunately, England was awarded the extra coefficient spot, so I got in $$$$$

[Mike]

Milan have drawn three in a row.

[Mike]

Anyone elses team look like world beaters, then just fall about for a game?

[Dan]

Portsmouth 2024/25 Season Review

We were struggling a bit for money by the end of the year, running out of transfer budget, wage budget & scouting budget on a few occasions each, so I'm not expecting to be handed a big stack of cash to spend, and I doubt we'll be doing any upgrades to the stadium or facilities either. Might be another year or mostly loans & free agents

Portsmouth 2025/26 Midseason Update

After falling apart in the second half of last season, we're back to try again & as expected we're on a budget, and with West Ham & Southampton dropping down into the Championship this season there's a decent group of big name teams for us to scrap with if we're going to go one better this time around.

Transfers:

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Unsurprisingly we had to rely on a lot of loans to improve the side this summer, and thanks to some contract extensions & the board deciding they didn't want to let me play with the budgets, we found ourselves going from £40k under budget on wages to over budget & unable to bring anyone in that wasn't a free loan, so that was fantastic.

We were having a pretty quiet summer window until the last few days, as we'd only brought back Joel Ndala & added Rory Wilson, but a few more players became available on free loans in the last few days so we managed to also get Simone Pafundi back again after his move to Liverpool, along with Joao Fonseca, and then on deadline day things kicked off.

Out of nowhere we got offers for Antonio Blanco & Nathan Baxter, both of whom immediately then handed in transfer requests once I rejected the offers. Since we were desperate for money I decided to let them both go, so we ended up moving Blanco to Fulham for £9m & Baxter is off to RB Salzburg for around £14m, although his deal dragged out long enough for him to actually still be here until January. Obviously we replaced them with free loans

You might also notice another name at the bottom of the incoming transfers - I decided to get myself a Christmas present by bringing in a 40 year old Luka Modric on a free to help with mentoring & provide some cover at AMC. He only wanted £750 a week & is still amazing so seems like a bargain to me.

Results:

Once again we've made a quick exit from the Carabao Cup, losing to West Brom on penalties in the second round, but the real focus in the league:

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We're in great shape again, so hopefully we can see it through this time. The first few month of the season were a bit inconsistent, with a lot of average performances that we managed to turn into draws or good performances that we managed to turn into draws, but in the last 5-10 games we've picked it up a bit & have started to look like we actually belong towards the top of the table. I'd be a bit disappointed if we fall back into the playoffs again this year, but hopefully we can't collapse quite as badly this year so automatic promotion is the goal, and the title would be a bonus.

I don't think we'll be going very far in the FA Cup this year as we've drawn our parent club Man City in the third round, but maybe we'll spring an upset & go on to win the whole thing...

[Mike]

So near, and yet so far.

[Mike]

What a wet fart of an end of the season.

[Mike]

Sulked all day. Anyways, heres the season:

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[Dquincy]

Oh Mike. That's a shitter. Sack them all in anger and replace with a new first 11? Or, remain calm and give the same players another chance next season?

[Mike]

They'll mostly stay, but, as I always do, I've lined up way to many players to join in the summer. Got like 4CB's coming in haha. My big worry, is bigger teams coming in and buying my better players.

In better news..

[Adramelch]

I do the same but it's all youngsters. I currently have 5 right-backs that are 20 years old or younger with 4+ stars potential.

[Gray Fox]

You've got to get your loan farm up and running.

[Adramelch]

I'm trying to get them to qualify as home-grown is my issue, so given they all signed at 18 loaning them out ain't it. I guess I don't need all 5 of them to be home-grown, I just can't choose.

[Clunge]

I’ve been having a very enjoyable save with Parma which, in season five, is now seeing me go toe-to-toe with Milan and Inter for Serie A.

I’ve backed off that for a bit to do a more YDWAWK style save with Red Star in France to see if I can start a new communist dynasty in Paris.