Football Manager 2021

[Adramelch]

Surely it's bad juju to get rid of someone called Blessing @Smjffy?

I am assuming you've tried him as a winger?

[Smjffy]

Yevrah and Oxford City.

An absolute cracker of a read that.

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Decided to take a break from the journeyman save and inspired by thommo have taken over at Oxford City, in the Vanarama South. A part time club with this magnificent stadium.



And here's my best player:



Financial responsibility will be the watchwords at this stage, which could be tricky as we have five grand in the bank.

There shall be plenty of that Jim.

My first signing as Oxford City manager, I'd be lying if I didn't admit the £50 a week price point was very attractive.

Conference life is brutal.



He'll probably never play for me again.

The class of 21' incoming.

I don't know what sort of fucked up shit this is, but people local to Oxford now have an hour and a half round trip to get to home games and it's costing the club £7k per annum.

Oxford City 2020/21 End of Season Update

A successful season as unlike many cowboys operating at this level, we managed to turn a profit:



A couple of things jump out there. Firstly I've no idea how our Staff Wages are so high, given we don't really have any and without the grants we'd have posted a whopping £80k loss, which just won't do. However, thanks to them and a modicum of financial responsibility the board have increased the wage budget by 17.5% to £4,700, which is probably necessary as we've had a fair few departures.

On the less important football side of things we finished a solid 12th in the league, hanging off the top half's coat tails.



The cups saw us go straight out of the FA Trophy, but we did make the first round proper of the FA Cup.

My players can't handle the truth, so I had to lie to them, but I'm hoping for a playoff spot for season 2.

Pre-season has gone swimmingly. Along with utterly abusing the loan system, we've signed a few players, two of which are properly exciting:



A former Arsenal man no less.



And this chap from Wolves' reject pile who already looks excellent.

On the finances, we have thirty-grand in the bank now too.

Bugarin!!!!!!!!!!

Scored in the 94th minute too.

I've got Richards at CAM, but he's definitely played for Merthyr.

It is my contract, I started with no badges or experience yet somehow I'm on £850 a week. Nuts.

Slough went straight out sadly, but it was to eventual playoff champions Dartford.

10 games in and we're unbeaten and doing very well, but of course this would be the year where a CPU team decides to make a charge for 100+ points. Havant's only loss is to us so far.

Ashford away in the FA cup 2nd qualifying round and £27k in the bank still, so definitely progress.

End of Season 2021/22 Update - Oxford City

Footballing achievements have surpassed the finances this season, so we start with those.



Honestly, more satisfying than anything in the journeyman game. We led the league for most of the season but surrendered top spot with about 8 games to go after a horrible run of form, only to get it back and secure promotion with one game left. 46 game seasons are absolutely brutal and had we shat the bed I'd have genuinely cried.

And here are the heroes that did it:



I'd question how ready any of them are for the conference, well bar Bugarin, who was absolutely the difference in getting us there. So pleased he's tied with us until 2024. I guess for the rest I'll treat them as reserves and set about building a new first team in the off-season, introducing them piecemeal when we get to the games.

Our chairman has also realised it's lunacy playing in Maidenhead.



On the finances front, we turned a profit again.



Not much movement from last year, although it oddly does seem cheaper to rent a stadium than own one. SI really should introduce depreciation and a balance sheet into things.

Huge transfer BREAKING news:



Difficult decision to sell, but he wasn't at this stage better than Owusu or Roberts so I pushed the button. Gives us our first transfer budget (of £36k) to go with our wage budget of £7,400.

We also now have £132k in the bank.

Annoying pre-season so far really. Being promoted doesn't seem to have done much for my pulling power and I even lost out on signing some of the players I had on loan last season. As an example, this is the best CAM I could find and he cost me £6k.



First actual cash money signing mind.

Cracking start to the season, driven by Bugarin who has 9 in the 10 games.

l

Doesn't seem a huge step up from tier 6, well apart from against the pro clubs in the division, so if we can keep players fit I'm now hoping for a playoff spot.

We then lost the next two games 3-0 and 5-1.

So I ventured into the market and picked up one of your lads thommo.

So after a decent start to the season in tier 5 in Oxford, we're in absolute freefall and there's seemingly nothing I can do to stop it - we're going to get relegated. Gutting and I really can't be arsed to try and get back up again.

Just coming up to Christmas time and we're fourth from bottom, but on a horrible run and the morale is all shot to shit. I've parked it for now.

I'm persevering and we're just above the drop zone having at least temporarily stopped the rot. Things I've learnt:

Parking the bus definitely helps when you're getting roundly humped (thanks Thommo!)
Morale is so key - get everyone out of the team with poor morale or you'll seemingly continue to spiral
Going hard on team talks when you're expected to bravely fight relegation is a bad idea, it only compounds the above.

I don't know if we'll stay up (I've no interest in the save if we don't), but things are looking slightly better than they were a month ago.

Three huge games against King's Lynn, Woking and Guiseley saw us secure a massive 7 points and move well clear of relegation:

And 1 point from 5 games puts us back in the shit again.



We play Darlington at home in the penultimate game.

Is there anyway I can force going pro or is it simply a case of getting promoted to League 2?

Barnet (A)
Darlington (H)
Eastleigh (H)

I reckon we need two wins.

Instant hero!



I've not smiled as much for two years as I did when Dunne got sent off.

Might as well give it a shot.

Oh, hello.

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They refused. Bastards

Bugarin!!!!!!!!!

89th minute.

Nearly knocked the laptop off the table.

Oxford City 2022/23 - Season Review

A tough one this, that nearly had me binning it, but glad I persevered.



A quick look at the professional status of those clubs shows that the top 9 are all operating full time, with Havant the highest placing semi-pro club.



Bugarin is good enough for this level, but unconvinced by the rest. I have too many 2.5/3 star players who're in the first team and I must improve that over the window.



Thankfully the board have recognised more excellent financial stewardship and increased the wage budget by £4k and given me a transfer WARCHEST of £33k.

They've also done this:



Back in Oxford and with a very doable 10 year loan at £16k to repay per month.

The financing of the stadium has messed the comparability of BAU up somewhat (and like fuck am I restating it), but suffice to say, we made an underlying profit again.

Wipe out debts (from the stadium build) good, cannot sign any players bad.

And on that note, it's going to be another long season for me.



We've been competitive in 8 of the 10 games, but the amount of worldy's I'm conceding is unreal. Bugarin only has three goals so far this season too. On the plus side, we've made some serious money in the window.



Mitchell was trousered from Arsenal's youth rejects and has pushed our bank balance up to over half a million a mere 13 months later.

A cracking run of form sees us move into the top half of the Conference, hopefully establishing us as a Conference National side.



Whisper it, but a playoff spot is actually achievable too. Bugarin now has 79 in 117 league games, the little legend.

4 for Bugarin in a 5-2 home win over Aldershot and we hit the playoff spots.



Not a bad run in for the final 7 games either.

Fantastic finish to the season, with two cracking late winners. Thought we'd fucked 3rd when we surrendered a 2-0 lead in the penultimate game, but Chesterfield shat the bed in their final game.





Third takes us straight through to the semi's, with a single leg tie at home to make the playoff final.

I'm shitting it.

Hold me.

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I need a lie down.

Some things that have happened since.



That seems remarkably low and doesn't even appear to be enough to give my current players full time contracts, let alone recruit some more.



Finally. Four years in the making and we are finally a pro club. I then looked at the finances and saw this:



I've no idea what this is for and I can see no news article in relation to it. It has utterly fucked us though.



New stadium complete.



Maybe the obscene ground maintenance charges were related to getting the new stadium up to league standard, but if so, why not build it like that in the first place and include that in the loan.

Oxford City Season 24/25 Transfers

As our debut season in the football league sees us in an utterly fucked financial position transfers were somewhat restricted. Once I'd let the shit go I had about £3k to £4k wage budget to play with so once again we hammered the loan system, leaving the below as actual signings.



Former Everton LAD, who according to our AM is now our best player.



Had this chap on loan for the last couple of seasons and he loves me, so when his contract expired we swooped in.



This one is actually a loan (no idea what National League Stockport are doing loaning him to me) but he played an instrumental part in promotion last year and his contract expires at the end of this season. Would love to make it permanent.



Can't actually play this guy yet as his WP application was rejected, but given he's our only player playing regular international football I'm hoping I can change that on appeal in November.



This is the first of two players who joined partway through last season, who have come on leaps and bounds since we went professional.



And here's the other one.

In terms of targets for this season, stay up just about covers it, with the bigger ambition being working out how the hell we clear this massive debt we find ourselves lumbered with. I'd assumed the new board would have restructured it, but they don't seem to care. Tossers.

And here's how we've started.



Only really been two league games we were outclassed in (vs Oldham and Mansfield). Bugarin's been out injured, but when he has played with Georgiou I've liked what I've seen a lot. The Cypriot's 10 goals put him second in the league two scoring charts.



And all that leaves us mid-table, with a very pleasing seven point buffer from relegation.

Oxford City 2024/25 Season (League Two) - Mid Season Update



Really pleasing first half of the season with a solid mid-table performance so far. A push for the playoffs would be brilliant, but that we're all but guaranteed to stay up already is brilliant.

Financial situation has improved slightly, with a couple of investments from the directors taking us up to £700k in the red, but still no idea how I clear that.

Fair point. Will have to wait until next season to try as we got knocked out in the first round by Non-League Ebbsfleet this season.

6 games to go and as last year in the conference we're in with a chance at the League 2 playoffs.



Cambridge (a)
Port Vale (h)
Scunthorpe (h)
Walsall (a)
Tranmere (a)
Accrington (h)

Do you think there's a danger of going up too quickly? I remember scraping in the playoffs for the Championship on my Dover save a few years ago, then getting absolutely battered and finishing bottom by about 10 points the following season.

Very much so. We're in no way ready for League One and we need to sort these finances first.

Oxford City End of Season Update 2024/25 - League Two



After being in with a shout of the playoffs with six games to go we didn't make it and fell to 12th. Still, to finish top half in our first season of League football is pretty pleasing, with one caveat and potential huge problem.



And that potential problem is our best player, by a country mile is a loan one. If we weren't so fucked financially we could buy Georgiou from Conference side Stockport, who clearly ran mad loaning him to me in the first place, but as it is the only hope we have of getting him back is via another loan. If we don't get him we have to replace 33 goals just to stand still. Bugarin might score more admittedly, but he's not gonna weigh in with 51.



A decent increase in wages there, up from £13.5k last year and closing in on the £1m per annum wage bill allowance. However, I then noticed that we're currently spending £15k p/w on wages and I hadn't a clue why. The first team squad can't add up to that and then it hit me, it's fucking youth prospects in my under 18 squad. My DoF has been signing them up on £150 p/w deals and there are 27 of the buggers! Now admittedly this was at my request when the summary landed in my inbox, but fuck me, rookie city as far as mistakes go that. £4k p/w of my wage expenditure was going on kids, £200k a year. I can release a fair few this summer, but the remaining are on deals up to 2027 and at this stage, we simply can't afford a youth team.

Which takes me on nicely to the finances.



We're in trouble. If it hadn't been for the club injecting three lump sums of £400k each time we'd be utterly screwed. As it is we're still £400k in the red, but a decent sale or cup run could get us out of that. Bigger problem now is that we don't really make money on the underlying business. Take out the investments and we'd have lost £250k this season. You could argue the loan is temporary, but that runs for another 8 years (with £1.5m still to pay on it) and even if I didn't have a youth team we'd have still not made it into the black.

Some more stuff...



Bizarrely these crept into the 2025/26 season's accounts, but that stings a bit.



This, however, is amazing. We're now only £87k in the red!

And perhaps best of all....

On the sponsorship, here's the list for the upcoming League 2 season.

I mean, I say , it does absolutely make sense. Well, possibly bar Tranmere.

Oxford City 2025/26 League Two - Mid Season Update



So the turn of the year has clicked by once more and as last year, we're in the hunt for a playoff spot once again. I don't feel we're quite good enough to make it, but we're getting closer. We concede far too many goals so I've resolved to get two new centre backs in the summer, be that permanent or on loan. Hopefully two mid-table seasons in League Two gives our rep a boost, lord knows we need it.

The cups have been a nightmare again, higher division (yet somehow non-lucrative) teams drawn all over the shop and this will be the second year in a row where we earn £0 prize money - I was pulling more in tier 6.

On the finances, we're £400k in the red, so if we can stay around that level until the end of the season and get the solidarity payment, sponsorship income (take off the bonuses), we could have a fighting chance of being in the black come the start of next season.

This is Moses Uzoka, he joined us on a free transfer from Chester two and a half seasons ago.



All was well and he was developing nicely and then in the summer just gone, Championship Swansea took a shine to him and started peppering me with derisory bids. I turned them down, Moses got annoyed. We rode the storm until the January window and back came Swansea, this time with better, but still not overly helpful bids. First was £100k, then £215k. I rejected them both, but now he's majorly pissed and upsetting the squad, so I thought sod it and offered him out for silly money, not for one minute thinking anyone would bite.

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Oxford City End of Season Update 2025/26 - League Two

So our second season in League Two ended with us in 11th, one place above our highest ever finish for the club last year.





Bugarin was back in player of the season for us form, but biggest win of the season bar staying up was the first £1m sale.



Cracking season on the finances, although no idea what happened to the fund raising department this season. The improved position has led to our highest balance to date:



And in turn, our highest transfer and wage budget:



Absolute key this summer is getting some more quality in the first team. A left winger and two centre backs being paramount. The playoffs has to be the aim at the very least.

It's great, but there is a lot of shit and everything is much harder (players whinge more, minimum fee release clauses mandatory etc). Plus there's Brexit, which unless I'm missing something completely rules out signing any foreign youngsters if you're managing in England.

And talking of bizarre...



So I can't get any players beyond goat herders and kids to join me, but Germany want to put me in charge of all of theirs.

Sadly Brexit has put paid to that. I’m 100% an Oxford City man too.

Oxford City Season 26/27 - League Two Run In

So our third season in League 2 is drawing to a close and we're roughly where we've been over the last two seasons, outside the playoffs, with a slim chance of making them.



Games left:

(a) Scunthorpe (18th)
(h) Mansfield (7th)
(h) Accrington (23rd)
(h) Bolton (5th)
(a) Colchester (14th)
(a) Notts County (4th)

Not a bad run in and if we can win the next three I might start to believe.

Oxford City 2026/27 League Two - End of Season Update



We didn't make it in the end, but in our last game against Notts County away, we drew 2-2 and would have done had we managed to get a winner. Annoying. Still, it's some progress, improving on the 12th and 11th place finishes over the last two years and 69 points in our highest to date in League Two.

The things that make this so hard, are:

Brexit - You literally cannot sign anyone from abroad at this level now. Or rather you can, but you just can't play them.
Reputation - At one and a half stars, we're far from an attractive choice. Established players shun us regularly if there's interest from other clubs, even when I attempt mad shit like offering them a 50% sell on clause. Which leaves young players as seemingly the best option.
Young Players - Some decent ones do want to join me, but if they're under contract the selling clubs invariably ask for more than we can afford.

Which is why I still have a £200k transfer budget burning a hole in my pocket.



I'll be attempting to spend it again this summer and now I've got the centre backs sorted I need a striker for depth who's good enough to play and two new wingers. Getting the loanees back in the first team below would be useful too. If not, the centre backs aren't sorted and I'll need one of those too.



Bugarin now has 158 goals for us.

Oxford City 2027/28 League Two Mid-Season Update

4th season in league two has reached the halfway stage so it's time for an update. Realised I neglected to post the finances at the end of last season, so here they are.



Not really any exceptional items in there, so if we don't sell players or have a decent cup run, we lose money over the course of a season. Not that one year of doing that is too much of an issue as we're still pretty well set due to the Max Roberts sale for £1m.

Transfers

We're starting to get more highly valued and decent players appearing in the interested list, which is nice and there were a number we went for that would have improved the squad significantly. Sadly, we still have the reputation of a radio DJ now who operated in the 70s so we lost out on all of them and were left with this chap as the only cash money signing:



£96k from Boreham Wood (a record signing) - I like his pace and dribbling a lot, but not much else.

These two also joined on free deals.





With a number of the original Oxford City players leaving on frees (they were too shit to stay) and Stockport finally seeing sense when it came to loaning us Georgiou again (they wouldn't), the squad was a tad threadbare, so once again we moved into the loan market, bringing in four players who I really liked.









This left us with in my mind the best squad we'd had so far and a real chance of going up. So how have we fared?



Frustratingly would be the honest answer. We've played excellently at times and then really poorly at others. Perhaps most annoyingly though we have a real habit of chucking in a two footed lunge to kill a good patch of form. I'm still quite hopeful we'll at least make the playoffs though.

Onto the cups, they've been very interesting.



The league cup gave us a nice home attendance vs. West Brom and the EFL Trophy continues to be a complete waste of time (I've been playing the reserves in it to preserve morale for the last two seasons now), but the FA Cup has been cracking. Through to the third round for the first time and we play Jose Mourinho's Tottenham (reigning Premier League champions no less) in our next game. I should rest the first team as we'll get humped whoever we put out, but I can't do it to the lads, so they will all start if fit.

Spurs put their kids out and we got humped, but look at that attendance.



£1.4m in gate receipts, less £300k VAT.

We've also sold a player. Didn't want to, but he was whinging badly.



And that little lot takes us to this in the bank:





Now to get promoted.

Holy shit.



We've lost our last two league games and selling him will do nothing for our promotion hopes this year, but fuck me, that deal (even after the fee to Bromley) is equivalent to six years of our wage bill.

Roberts out. We now have £6.4m in the bank and a transfer budget of £2m.

Given I'm seemingly consigned to a life of mid-table in League 2, the profit aspect of this has been the most enjoyable aspect for ages. Sadly.

Oxford City End of Season 2027/28 Update - League Two

So our 4th season in League Two drew to a close and we'd finally managed to string enough form together to have a serious chance of the playoffs and an outside chance of going up automatically.



More injuries and nonsense red cards hampered us somewhat, but we made it, a playoff berth at the 4th attempt.



Given we were 4th in the second half of the season table, I really fancied my chances going into the semi-final against Fleetwood.

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A cracking and comfortable win to set up a final against Gillingham, who we beat in our last game of the season.

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Gutting. Absolutely gutting and if I'm honest, we were never really in it despite equalising twice. A fifth season in League Two awaits.

Oxford City Summer Business Update - Season 2028/29 League Two

Long post is long.

Starting with the finances, a cracking year's business for us, with two key things that finally brought us FINANCIAL STABILITY.



The Max Roberts transfer was huge, bringing £5m in (albeit we had to pay £800k to Bromley for their sell on clause), which was also then supplemented by selling Keano Shaw to QPR for £550k (+ clauses). Biggest lol about Roberts is that after basically whinging for two years about playing in the Championship he now finds himself in the national league on loan at Swindon. Third round FA Cup bants at Tottenham also pushed our gate receipts higher than they've ever been before and all in all we ended the season with over six million quid in the bank. Leading to the following WARCHEST:

Transfer Budget of £4.8m and a Wage Budget of £38k p/w.

It was time to go shopping and nicely timed at that as our appearance in the playoff final also raised our rep to two stars.

Players Out

While the first team is pretty good, the squad itself still had more than a whiff of Vanarama about it so it was time to be brutal and cut ties with the players that had served us so well over the last 4 to 8 years. Contracts were expiring, so out went Ben Erickson (who was so upset by the news he quit football altogether - once you've had Yev you never go back I guess), Josh Ashby, Alex McSkeane, Joseph Hungbo, James Roberts, Fenton Green, Amarie Brown, Thomas Angell, Alex Sharpe and Ciaran Jones. Jayden Harris (£20k) and Sam Cartwright (£7.5k) also left for actual money.

This left us with a first 11 give or take, which I then (out of an abundance of caution) added to with loan renewals for the five players who'd joined us the season before. I'd hoped I'd be so successful in replacing the shit that I wouldn't need to use these players much and instead spend the season fending off their arse hole managers whinging about them not featuring. Better than being moaned at for playing them in the wrong role I guess (what a feature that is btw).

As it turned out, we had a splendid summer window of INs, to the point where I'm not sure what my best eleven now is.

Players In



Joined from Rochdale for £170k. 16 finishing and 15 determination for a twelve year old looked seriously promising. Now just need to get him to use his right foot.



A £300k signing from Premier League Fulham. My board went nuts and rated the deal an F, but the fans loved it and I managed to get him without a sell on fee percentage. Which, for the type of operation we're running here, is the motherload.



A former Millwall youth product who was picked up (and then binned off) by Man City. I seem to struggle to attract decent left wingers, so he had to do. £43.5k from Hull.



Made in Man City (where he failed), moved to Southampton (where he failed), he now joins the Oxford City PROJECT for £26.5k as our joint highest earner. I think that made him feel special, but what I didn't tell him was our board now allow wages of up to four grand a week.



Former Man Utd man who joins from Swindon for £425k and becomes our record signing. Central midfield was an area we had to shore up with wank so much last season and I loved his key stats.



Listed by Champinship Blackpool for £59k. His well roundedness made the deal a no brainer.



One for the future I hope. Joined for £2k from Boreham Wood.



Ball Winning Midfielder from Blackburn, who didn't win many balls for Blackburn. Signed for a bargain £6.75k.



Continuing our trend of signing Premier League rejects, Starkey (released by Liverpool) is the first of five free transfers we did over the summer.



And was joined by his mate from Liverpool, Davison. Tried to get this dude on loan last year and he turned me down. How the mighty have fallen.



From Chelsea's academy.



Released by Ajax and no English heritage so I wasn't expecting him to get a work permit, but he bizarrely did at the first time of asking. Lovely stuff.



This guy didn't get a work permit, but a recent experience I had (more on that below) made a punt on him potentially worthwhile.

Which leads me on nicely to perhaps our best addition and not a new signing at all:



Signed in 2024, this lad was my first pain brought about by Brexit as he sat in our reserves for two years, failing appeal after appeal. I guess playing for the international powerhouse that is Indonesia wasn't enough to swing it. He then spent the season before last in Hungary at Ferencvaros and then at Real Valladolid, improving hugely. With stats that don't belong in league Two I'm hopeful he can spearhead us finally into League One. Only downside is that he wants to leave and won't sign a new contract.

And that is it, business done. I won't try and start all of these new players at once as that would be insane, but if I can integrate them in an even semi-decent fashion we should be set for promotion this year, at the 5th time of asking. Now is the time. I can feel it in my bones.

Yep, we are a sieve. I've tried three or four different approaches and it doesn't make a difference, we just concede for fun.

Here's Roberts now:





He was a starter for us, but certainly dispensable for £5m. IIRC one team came in with a bid for £2.5m, which I accepted and then I offered him out for £5m and Roberts' first choice of Watford matched it.

Oxford City Mid Season Update - League Two 2028/29

Halfway point reached in our 5th season in League Two and just before the window SLAMMED SHUT there was another twist in the tale with another too good to refuse bid being received for one of our players.



At this point I'd say we've won the game in terms of lower league financial management, having over £9m in the bank (was over £10m when we sold) as we do. Sadly that's the only thing we're winning.



Not too bad I suppose, but after a succession of draws to start the season we hit our stride and were top for a bit before the shit set in AGAIN. This time it's our strikers. I have four good ones now and they've all stopped scoring.

We're through to the third round of the FA Cup again, with Cambridge away - an eminently winnable game, but I don't care, I just want to get out of League Two.

I should definitely be asleep by now, but this season is turning into a classic. After not being able to score I've gone into every game since January with a cautious mentality and it seems to be working.



Tightest finish I can recall in sight.

A loss to Aldershot, then wins over Northampton and Grimsby leave the table like so.

Two absolutely horrible games followed, the Port Vale one in particular properly hurt.





My team used to shit the bed when we reached the dizzy heights of the playoff spots, now they do it when we're in the automatic promotion ones, so I guess that's progress.

However, results elsewhere went our way and we're still in 3rd.



Albeit, it's now out of our hands.

Walsall away and Tranmere at home to finish.

Port Vale drop points, but Leyton Orient win to overtake us.

Starting to think the game hates me. At 2-1 up and just before they equalised Bugarin went clean through, rifled a shot past their keeper and it hits the bar. Hines then went clean through in injury time too, only to see his shot saved.



Any one of six teams can clinch the last automatic promotion spot and any one of the six can also miss out on the playoffs entirely.



You'd have to think neither Crawley nor Leyton Orient will blow it, albeit I can still finish ahead of the latter even if they win.

And with Scunthorpe playing Port Vale and the goal differences involved, we're all but guaranteed a playoff spot.

What in the actual fuck?



Does the rest of the 'final day' go ahead without me?

Seems that it does go ahead without us...



Crawley muffed it, but annoyingly Leyton Orient won big.



Goal Difference and then goals scored are the separators, so we need to win by six against Tranmere to go up automatically. However, if we lose by three we don't even make the playoffs.

My pitch is always getting waterlogged, it's a shambles.

I don't know what is wrong with this team.

We're in appalling form with one point from 12 and our strikers missing chances all over the shop, so we're going one up front and stinking the place out for the playoffs. It's the only way.

A sixth season in League Two beckons.

Looks like Coventry have been mirroring our fun in League Two, in League One.

I was going to wait until we got promoted to the Championship to start upgrading facilities, but given that's not going to happen I may as well start now. Here's what we're currently working with:



Pretty shit, it must be said.

I mean, if I actually spent all that we'd be screwed.

In other news, the board will relay the pitch and improve youth recruitment but improving the training facilities is a hard no.

Cheers Luke.

Asked for all the Youth stuff I can and the board accepted this too.

That's rough.

I've decided that my 10th season with Oxford City will be my last if we don't go up.

Oxford City Mid-Season Update 2029/30

Our 6th season in League Two and starting with playoff HEARTBREAK happening in the last two.

Business was kept to a minimum over the summer, with the rationale being another year bedding in for all of the players I bought last summer really should be enough for us to go up.

With that in mind, I brought only two of the loan players from last year back and made one signing. Another raid on Ajax frees, this one didn't get a work permit first time though so he went straight out on loan.



In other news the board let us upgrade our Youth Recruitment for a second time, admittedly after I whinged a bit.



But most importantly, what's been happening on the pitch?

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Is this finally the year?

First choice goalkeeper out for 2 months.

A disgusting run of form since posting the table above.



My strikers have all forgotten how to score again. Does anyone else get that, or is it me? It happens every single season and only changing tactic stops it.

Automatic is surely gone, so four games to secure a playoff spot (and win) to save the save.

Honestly, it's nuts. And it's all down to strikers stopping scoring. Go on a good run and it's inevitable it'll happen.

They all have scored loads of goals at one time or another and they are again now. It won't last.



We spunked a 2-0 lead at home, so that could have been one point behind.



I don't know how it's still mathematically possible to go up. We've won 8 games since the turn of the year.

Swindon won so it was academic, but we lost anyway for good measure.

Yev out.

I will be soon, I don't doubt.

Well well well...

Cheers Igor. We won the second leg too, and would face Shrewsbury in the final who ran out 9-6 winners over Walsall.

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Probably the most 'enjoyable' single match I've ever had on FM

Can't really say anyone was the hero given how the season went, but it would have been Bugarin had he scored in the 4th minute of injury time in the Playoff final when clean through, but he hit the post.



Still, 216 goals for us is not too shabby.

I'll keep the core of the squad and just buy quality where it's available. Not sure how much difference there is between League 2 and League 1, I'm hoping not a lot.

I did want it so much after the support for the save. I realise now I can't let this club and their 300 season ticket holders (+ 1,200 more interchangeable fans) down.

We are going to the top!

Oxford City Season 2029/30 - Some Things

I whinged again at the board about our Youth and they caved again.



Leaving our Facilities looking like so:



This is the WARCHEST for League One



More on that later, but basically my board are morons.

And we have three players going to the World Cup!

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All from English academies and moulded at Oxford CITY. I'm so proud of them.

Oxford City Mid Season Update 2030/31 - League One

Our first season in League One starts with a look at the finances and a realisation our current position is unsustainable.



With wages at over 50% of income and even factoring in some of the tax bill was due to prior year profits, we're on a run rate of losing over £1m a year. Things get worse as well when you consider that the wage figure there relates to League Two's bill, which was about £40k per week. Now we've gone up and the promotion clauses have kicked in it's more like £55k. Yet my insane board are happy for me to spend £5.5m on transfers and £65k on wages.

On the plus side, prior year sales mean we've still over £5m in the bank (as of now) so we have some time, but we need to get out of League One and into the Championship as soon as possible.

Transfers

With the above in mind, deals were kept to a minimum over the summer, with a couple of loans renewed and the following new players brought in:



On loan from Man City for the season, will probably play left wing.



£190k from Burton. We needed a centre back and this chap will do nicely.



Quite excited about this one. Released by Man Utd and wanted ten grand a week, but we got him for £7k + a 50% of any next transfer fee. He's costing over 10% of my wage bill, so he'd better deliver.

On the transfers out side of things a couple of players were released and we pulled in £700k from the sale of Bignami, who finally got a work permit but with only a year left on his contract it was clear he wasn't going to sign another one so we cashed in.

Facilities

Two huge things happened here. First our 3rd upgrade on the Youth Recruitment front:



And perhaps more importantly, the board have finally agreed our training facilities should be upgraded. Under the guise of a reward for me, the perverts, but no matter, it was much needed. My players seem to develop more on loan (at any club) than they do while playing for me.



FFP

Oh yes, my favourite subject has come to haunt me, we've failed it.



The game doesn't explain how the limit is calculated, but I assume it's different for every club and is based on a % of income, so given our wage % of revenue it sort of makes sense that it's caught us. We're still only pulling 2,300 fans a game in League One, the lowest in the division by a mile and it kills us. As well as being under a transfer embargo, my board also won't let me renew contracts, or rather they will, as long as my players accept £20 a week.

No matter, a couple of sales/loans out in the January window should sort things.

On the Pitch

It's been brilliant, and at the turn of the year we're in the playoff spots.



There have been a couple of humpings, but the best result of the season so far was this on the opening day:



No idea whether we'll hold on and I'm not that bothered, we've already secured survival and that was the main aim before a ball was kicked.

Leicester up next in the 3rd round of the FA Cup.

Just found the FFP rules. Max 60% of turnover on wages, with U21 players excluded from the calc.

In the game, no.



It does say we have 'top billing' when we play each other though.

My youth intake is absolute toilet, so much for having 'Excellent' Youth Recruitment.

The run in message hasn't appeared in my inbox, so I'm going to have to do it myself.

Coming to the end of our first season in League One and we're still in CONTENTION.



(a) vs. MK Dons
(a) vs. Charlton
(h) vs. Blackpool
(h) vs. Lincoln

Blackpool game will be huge and while beggars can't be choosers, if we are to make the playoffs 4th or 5th place would be a right result.

Huge win in Milton Keynes and pleasing to see we didn't get humped by Charlton.



All on Blackpool.

Blackpool was brilliant and never in doubt, but results elsewhere meant we needed to follow it up with a win over Lincoln to both guarantee a playoff spot and finish 5th. In previous seasons we'd have fucked it, but this time the LADS cruised home. They've come of age.



wullie, we are coming for your boys!

Hold me.

Well...

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Absolutely battered them.





Dickheads. They've been pissing about with a takeover for the last two months too, which still isn't finalised.

We were expected to battle bravely against relegation, but my board are such wankers. 'Rewarding me' with training ground upgrades and pissing about with takeovers. Tossers.

Hines is the real deal I think.



He got 27 this season, but was rampant in the run in. I've tied him down with a 3 year + 3 more optional years deal as well. Mwahahaha.

Oxford City Season 2031/32 Championship - Summer Update Stuff

Starting with the finances for our League One campaign.



Another season, another loss, but we did spend £1.6m on ground improvements that were much needed. Wages were back to a reasonable level of turnover too, even stripping out the income from player sales. Heading into our debut season in the Championship we have £6m in the bank, leading to a WARCHEST of:



Flush with cash still, we did two things next. First, sent the chaps on their first training camp abroad.



And tied Corness down for 4 years.



Obscene terms, but I genuinely don't think we'd have gone up without him.

Another whinge and another upgrade to our Youth Recruitment.



And talking of which. Sad times, but sadly he was technically bereft.



Facilities are now at a semi-reasonable level.



The Championship

First news on our upcoming season was a far more sensible set of FFP rules. Gone is the % of revenue bollocks and we're now dealing with pure profits and losses.



Which will be helped by this news.



Six times what we received last year and ten times what we've been used to over the last few years.

Hopefully more media exposure will lead to the lazy fucks of Oxford coming to see us. Not a high bar to beat.



And finally, the opening fixtures.



Scary stuff. I'll do the summer business in another post as I'm still looking for a centre back to round things off.

A couple more successful board requests.



And having had a request to improve the training facilities turned down I then asked about the Youth Facilities instead.



If I'd known that was gonna cost £1.6m I might have thought twice. Down to £2.5m in the bank now.

Summer Business

Distinctly underwhelming in terms of new arrivals now, but in looking for players I could attract I realised I simply don't have the pulling power or financial muscle to take this team to the Premier League and beyond without taking a punt on youth.

So in now, we have:



Had him on loan from Southampton a couple of times already, this time we got him permanently on a free.



From Aldershot for £250k. Unbelievably perhaps, he becomes our first choice left winger.



Former Leicester man, £500k from Bromley.



On loan, but much needed.



£700k from Ajax, he won't join for 18 months, but that means I get to enjoy their youth training facilities for that time and he's already been given a work permit. No idea how.



Also £700k from Benfica. No work permit this time, but he has technicals at 16 that are better than most of my first team players.

West Ham away to kick the season off in a week.

A point per game was the target and after 10 games we're 40% ahead of that.



Hines and Koumis have been brilliant. Just as pleasingly we don't seem to be haemorrhaging cash either. Attendances are up to 4,500 on average (so it might be time to think about asking for a new stadium) and with the TV money we're covering the wage bill.

Oxford City End of Season 2031/32 Update - Championship

Starting with the finances.



Our first profitable season for three years, with much going on. Firstly, we're now a PLC.



And the loan was cleared upon takeover.



Training Facilities were upgraded again:



And more yuff stuff.



Would be nice to finally get someone decent through my Youth intake.

Perhaps most excitingly though, it's stadium expansion time.



And we get to play at Oxford Utd's ground (with their 13,000 capacity) while it's built.

Season Happenings

A moment, if you will, for Erik Bugarin.



I really wanted to have him score a goal in each of the top six tiers for me, but he wanted a new challenge so it was time to part ways.



An absolute hero.

Leicester came calling:



But I told them to do one.

January business was kept to a minimum but we did pick up this chap.



No work permit as of yet, but hopefully some loans will change that.

The Table



Chuffed to stay up so comfortably but it puts into sharp focus the size of the task to go up. With parachute payments to those coming down I could be in the Championship for longer than I was in League Two.



Happy with much of the squad now, but half of it is not even Championship quality and arguably the only player I have who could cut it in the Premier League is Hines. As soon as he works that out we'll be in trouble.

2032/33 Season

Started with this lovely bonus.



But even then it's only enough to give us this as a WARCHEST:



But I thought I'd treat the boys and they're off to Portugal to double team some schlags, or whatever it is footballers get up to these days.



In terms of expectations for the year ahead, I don't think we're close to being good enough for a playoff place, so survival is the aim again.

Cheers Quince. Genuinely no idea what it'll take to go up. The money the teams get for playing in the Premier League (+ parachute payments) is so obscene that even Roberto Martinez would struggle to not get them back up again - one season of it is more than Oxford City have earned in 12 seasons of this save.

I'll do it eventually though and then we're onto the Eibar phase of the save.

Oxford City End of Season Update 2032/33 - Championship

Second season in the Championship complete and probably not a surprise to say we're still in it.

Summer Business

Only added two permanents, but did bring the three loan players back. Joining the PROJECT were:



£325k from Sheffied Utd, goes straight into the first team.



On a free having been released from Chelsea. Quite excited about this one, or at least I was until he got injured for 6 months.



One of the deals we agreed last year also joined in January. He looks pretty good and came with a work permit, but the winger we have on loan from Man City has kept him out of the side.



And not a new signing, but Sagura's been on loan at Eibar to get him a work permit and he's improved hugely while playing in La Liga.

Facilities

No further improvements as the finances don't really allow it, but we did complete the stadium expansion.



For some games we are now taking as much as £200k.

The Season



Really pleased with how we did, but we never really properly threatened making the playoffs. That will have to be the aim for next season now though.



Good performances all round, with Hines still being the star of the show.

Finances



£1m loss for the year, which is a bit of a worry given the season is pretty representative of life in the Championship. Our bonus costs rose ludicrously, which I can only assume if the price for finishing 8th, which is technically worth no more to me than 18th.

The above also screams out when you look at our transfer budget for next season, which is the lowest for years.



If I don't get out of the Championship in the next year or two I might have to sell a first team player or two.

As soon as they made an offer I rejected all other bids.

Oxford City End of Season 2033/34 Update - Championship

Third season in the Championship, with the aim having to be to make the playoffs after last season's 8th placed finished.

Transfers

With a few players shipped out on loan and with some done to get work permits, our only sale in the summer was Liam Potter to Swindon, for £250k. With finances at a minimum only two players joined:



Joined on a free and immediately packed off on loan.



£700k from Benfica. With the deal done a while ago Daniel had progressed nicely since it had been and joined armed with a work permit. Lovely stuff.

Kolar joined at the turn of the year:



And then this happened:



Which was massive. He'd never played for us as he hadn't yet got a work permit, but had been doing pretty well on loan. Palace came in with a bid I managed to negotiate up to £5m and then decided to whore him out for £10m in the hope of some takers. Premier League Everton bit and we now had some money to do something in the January window.

After scouring the market I couldn't find anyone to buy to improve the first team, so whacked the increase in budget into wages and snapped these two up on loan.





Both went straight into the first team, improving the spine of our side immeasurably and hopefully giving us the push to make the playoffs.

The Championship



The thing to note here and what I was absolutely ecstatic about was that the three newly relegated sides (Palace, West Ham and Watford) all had shocking seasons, which made the points required pretty low. It all came down to the last day and we needed a win over Palace to guarantee a playoff spot. The other dynamic was hoping to avoid Derby in the semi's if we did make it as they were in fantastic form. We drew with Palace, but Boro coudn't manage a win and we'd made it. Perhaps even better Norwich lost again and in form Derby snatched the second automatic spot, setting up a playoff Semi against the East Anglian side.

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An absolutely brilliant win, with Shaun Hines coming up with the goods. Could we see it out at Carrow Road?

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No words here really. Shaun Hines needs the freedom of the City and we're in the playoff final against Birmingham

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I genuinely thought we'd fucked it with half an hour to go and then again when Birmingham equalised in extra time, but Shaun Hines was on hand to grab the winner and take this tiny club into the Premier League after fifteen seasons of grind.

Oxford City End of Season 2033/34 Update - Championship

Finances



Hopefully what you see above our the last set of finances from the football league, but I imagine staying up is going to be tricky.

The thing that should stick out like a sore thumb there is caused by this:



Guessing the existing one couldn't be expanded any further, we play at Reading's ground until it's complete.



We now have this debt to pay off too.



Within there was also a little bonus for me!



Looking forward to next season and the money involved is obscene.



Leading to this WARCHEST.



Quick fag packet calc looks like they're being conservative with that given the tv money coming in, but at least I can spend it all safe in the knowledge it won't bankrupt us. I can now offer £76k p/w wages, my highest earner (Hines) is on £15k a week at the moment.

I can finally have a full compliment of backroom staff so key tasks are sorting that and going shopping for a goalkeeper, a quality centre back and a quality midfielder.

Both those things drove me mad. On the season meeting I just ended up telling the players whatever the board wanted of us.

He's still only favoured personnel. Only I've managed to become and icon, but no one touches John Woodley.

Here's Hines:





He's a legend to me.

And cheers Thommo, just staying up will see me well chuffed.

They might not be wrong. There are free agents that won't even speak to me and the Costa Rican I had out on loan won't sign a new contract.

I've nearly finished my summer business and it would have been genuinely hard to spend £80m had the board given it to me, as it is I'm struggling to do the £30m. Most depressing was having a bid accepted on a good midfielder only to see he was more interested in Championship sides than me. I pulled the stops out with the wage offer and he still joined one of them.

Oxford City Season 2034/35 - The PREMIER LEAGUE

To immerse us all in the game World a bit more (and especially me as I've been paying no attention to what's been happening at the top of the game) I thought I'd do a bit of a recap of the last 15 years. For part one, we'll look at the International game.

World Cup



England made one final, but yet to win it (I am shocked). Waistcoat was sacked after the 2021 Euros, having not quite had the luxury draw he did in real life, falling to France in the second round. Sean Dyce then took up the helm, inexplicably lasting for 6 years and 354 days, before handing the baton to Paulo Fonseca and then the current manager Jose Bordalas. It's nice that England haven't won anything yet as it sort of keeps me interested in managing them one day.

England's finest:



For those wondering what hosting fun was being had in 2026, it was split between the US, Canada and Mexico. Is that the deal in real life?

Onto the Euros:



So Portugal and France the powerhouses of the modern international game. The current 'best player (chosen by value)' from each:





Balloon Door Winners:



Dai Chao the first newgen to win it.



Offensively good.

Mbappe left PSG on a free and went to Liverpool. He retires at 35 years old tomorrow. Ronaldo and Messi seemed to go quite young too, so I hope they sort that for FM22.

Oxford City Season 2034/35 - The PREMIER LEAGUE

The European Game



Proof, I think, that the game is in safe hands with UEFA and the closed shop the super league would have brought about has been gladly avoided.



And that definitely doesn't read like a list of teams who finished third in their Champions League groups.



Which ironically leaves it up to a tournament nobody asked for, nor wanted, to actually provide some diversity with its winners.

The Europa Conference League, you are in Oxford City's sights.

Oxford City Season 2034/35 - The PREMIER LEAGUE

Domestic Football



Man Utd the team to beat. I was gonna post the cups too, but they've all been won every year by either Man Utd, Man City, Chelsea or Liverpool. bar one year for both where Wolves somehow snuck in.



Sunderland should really be sacking their commercial director. We're 2,000-1 to win it, not sure what that would make us to stay up.

Oxford City - Summer Business

The (hopefully) magnificent seven brought in to help us avoid the drop.



Former Southampton man, brought back to England for £5.25m from Vancouver.



£6.75m from Bournemouth.



Been on loan with us for the last four years. City released him on July 1st and we swooped.



On loan from newly relegated Villa.



£7.5m from Brentford. Becomes our record signing.



On loan from Man Utd.



£750k from Bournemouth.

Just gotta sort the backroom team and the massacre can begin.

Oxford City Season 2034/35 Aug to Oct update - Premier League

AND IT'S LIVE!



A brilliant start to the season, but one that illustrates how fragile the grip on our stay in this division is. I'm simply not going to take any points from the top 6/8 clubs and will struggle against the next four to six, so it's vital we beat or at least don't lose to the shite. We've done that very well so far with an opening day win over Sunderland followed up with wins over West Brom and Reading.



38 points remains the target. 32% of the way there.

Oh and the money in this league is amazing. We were in the red in July once we finished our spending and we've now got £13m in the bank.

No, but this might have been just as traumatic...

And we break a 110 year old record.

Oxford City Season 2034/35 Mid Season Update - Premier League



A tough run to say the least, but vital wins against Wolves and Bournemouth (I punched the air for both Corness goals) to keep us 15th.



Squad morale was damaged by both Grant and Murtagh whinging about inconsequential shit as we headed into December, so they'll both be gone in January. The players will learn, nothing gets in the way of us staying in THE BEST LEAGUE IN THE WORLD.

The board have given me a new deal.

True, but I have been there for 15 now. I'll earn more in a year on that deal than I have in my entire time so far.

A son would be amazing (I've never had that in a game before), but just one usable newgen would do me. Reis Bartlett was the best and he was ultimately rubbish.

Oxford City Season 2034/35 Jan to Mar Update - Premier League

First some business in January. In came:



£800k from Dinamo. No work permit, so straight out on loan.



And this chap, who might turn out to be the best or worst bit of business I've done. Man Utd and PSG were sniffing around him at the same time our £600k bid was accepted by Leon. The kid then wanted £25k p/w, which both horrified me and intrigued me in equal measure. Is he a complete chancer or really that good? Further down his list of contract demands was a minimum fee release clause, normally they're set fairly low and the type of kid who'll join Oxford City can easily be persuaded to remove them, normally. His was hard coded and set to a mind boggling £78m and to clubs in a continental competition (the first player to ask that of me). Thinking I wouldn't get him anyway as some big boys were after him and even if I did how would he get a work permit, I perhaps foolishly (or brilliantly) offered him £40k p/w. The first of two surprises happened when that was enough to seal the deal and the second was that he only went a got a bloody work permit too (confusing me even more as to how those actually work).

The shithouses mentioned earlier also left the club.



Grim stuff this, punctuated by a cracking win over Newcastle.



Tight and nerve wracking as fuck. Our final 8 games:



I think I'd give up an organ for a win over Fulham.

Oh and we now have £40m in the bank, having trousered £77.7m of TV money so far this season.



Utterly nuts.

He's still managing Man Utd in mine too and Lewis may want to look away here...



4th most successful manager of all-time.

Oxford City End of Season 2034/35 Update - Premier League

We did indeed beat Fulham, but then in an admitted tough run of fixtures, hit a wall.



Which left the final day looking like this:



If we beat Bournemouth away it wouldn't matter what happened in the 16:30 kick off (witafbtw) between Reading and Derby, if we didn't a Reading win would send us down.

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We lost 4-2 and then I had to wait in agonizing fashion to see that Reading had won 2-0. We are down, in 18th place.

Onto the finances, with a comparison to our very first season.



That tv money. Closing the season out we had over £60m in the bank.

You'll come straight back up, at least. Gutting to lose it on the last day.

As ridiculous as this question might be - any danger at all of the sack?

Yeah, I hope I'll come straight back up, we should be pretty well set for it with two shit teams going down with us and Villa and Palace coming back up the other way. Due to the way the funding works we should have an obscene WARCHEST if we do come back at the first attempt.

The board seem fine, so it's looking ok on that score and while some of the players won't sign new deals they're not agitating for moves (bar one, who I'll detail in the next update).

It's got to be youth this season as for the most part Premier League ready talent still won't join our club and its 3 star reputation (which we pleasingly held onto after relegation). If I do go back up and have £60m or so to spend on players I might try and get a couple of heavy hitters then.

That is so true Jim. I lost count of the number of times I was 3-0 down inside 8 minutes to one of the big teams. I'm watching in 2D and it's ludicrous how fast the dots move.

Oxford City Summer Update 2035/36 Season - Championship

God it hurt typing that last word. Anyway, gonna do this piecemeal as there's a shit ton to get through in what I think has been our best off season yet. Starting with finances, some exciting things happened in mid June.

Firstly our three star reputation led to some new sponsorship deals being done:



Bringing £14m into the coffers and up from £1m the previous year.

Then the parachute arrived:



Unlike the tv money in the premier league you get this in one lump sum and we were now sporting a bank balance of over one hundred and ten million quid. Our wages would go on to rise a bit but they're still under £500k a week, so the £25m per annum cost there would take a while to touch the sides. Safe in the knowledge of financial security for at least three seasons, I peppered the board with requests to get the Oxford City structure up to snuff.

And one after the other, they accepted...









In addition, the John Woodley II Stadium completed:



Which took our facilities to a frankly outrageous level:



The board have just recently agreed to this as well.



So I think that's just one more training ground upgrade to go and maybe a bit more on the Youth/Junior side and we're perfect. After that it's just the stadium, which I did ask to expand (about a month after they'd finished building it) but they weren't having it.

Still, excellent progress.

Humping the fuck out of the xg only to lose or draw against someone shit 1-1 at home has been my 'favourite' part of this whole journey.

Oxford City Summer Update 2035/36 Season - Championship

Onto the player movements. This was our best 11 in the Premier League.



Hines and Valpoort the star performers so I'd love to keep hold of them both, a decent bid received for anyone else wouldn't bother me too much, albeit we have a few relegation release clauses that could be an issue.

Players Out



Hamblin was the first to exercise such a clause as he moved to Premier League Palace for £14.75m. Annoyingly he also trousered half of that himself.

Valpoort then signed a new deal that got rid of his clause, which just left Derosa who followed suit the week after. A few other players on the periphery left, before the motherload happened.





Clearly a fantastic player, but try as I might I couldn't get a work permit for him and as he only had a year left on his deal I had to tout him for sale. Selling him to a future relegation rival might prove to be a mistake, but the 50% of profit from next sale could well make up for that.

And finally this chap, who became a fan favourite at the club, holds our record for league appearances with 462 and played in every division with us bar tier 6.





Shame his only Premier League game was that one against Liverpool. Just checked and he's since found a home for himself at League Two Wrexham.

Players In

We set up deals for a shit load of youngsters, including raiding PSG's youth squad three times, but in terms of first team squad INS, you're looking at the following:



Not a new signing, but bought three years ago and he's been out on loan since. Finally got a work permit for him and he's absolute mustard.



Former Man City Man who can basically play anywhere on the right side of the pitch. Picked up on a free, albeit we did give him a £350k loyalty bonus to seal the deal.



Former Atleti' player who also joined on a free. £450k on the loyalty bonus for this one.



£9.5m from Bristol City, becomes our record signing.



£550k from Bradford. Brought in for backup reasons really. I'll do a separate post for the kids as it'll be facking huge. Oh and Brobbey and France came back on loan as well.

Oxford City Summer Update 2035/36 Season - Championship

Youth signings

Some joined now that had been queued up previously and some (actually many) were arranged for a later date. Those who joined the club in the window are:



£4m from Blackburn. On loan now, but injuries mean I could actually do with him back. Forgot to put an option to recall in the deal though.



£750k from Red Star. No Work Permit, so off he trots.



No work permit and looks more than a bit suspect physically, but I need to take a chance on youth, centre backs especially.

Future Ins

Some of these were queued up before, but most done after we were relegated:

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Into Jan 2036 now and this one has just joined.





















Quite hopeful on a fair few of those.

Oxford City Mid-Season Update 2035/36 Season - Championship

And to get us bang up to date, our first half season back in the Championship.

Firstly, more upgrade news:







A bit of a dodgy start but we then hit our stride. We really should be top and both finished and started the year in incredibly frustrating fashion drawing 1-1 (always 1-1) against some relegation fodder, so instead we sit 2nd.



The further good news here is that Huddersfield haven't been in the Premier League before so if one or even two of the teams going up (hopefully with me) are in that boat it'd be fantastic. I still have £100m in the bank so lord only knows what budget I'd get while they're falling victim to the prudent approach of understandably cautious chairman.

Yeah, I have particularly high hopes for him, the Serb midfielder and the Polish striker.

This window is a nightmare so far, I'm having to fend off bids from lower half Premier League teams and Chinese clubs at every click of continue.

Just checked and I'm behind almost all of the teams in the Championship on the list and even a team in League One (Norwich).

Not even half way through January yet.



All shocking bids as well.

Hines has been a legend. Not a peep and Watford just came in for him with a £22m bid and he didn't even want to talk to them.

Great work thommo! My solitary trophy remains the Vanarama South.

A cracking run that saw us unbeaten for nearly two months in the league has put us on the brink.

And we're back.

I think on the way up it's been fine, but getting relegated and finishing mid-table in the Championship would have been an absolute joke with all that cash flying about.

And I hope so. Not finished the summer business yet, but I think we've already got a better squad than we had at the first attempt. The field might be slightly stronger though. I feel if we manage to stay up once, that'll be it and we'll be an established (albeit at the low end) Premier League side.

Indeed. They're like bloody gold dust. I went big on young centre backs in the last summer window in the hope of one of them developing into a top half Premier League player in due course and I'll be doing it again if I can find any this window. The number of defenders with 15 for Tackling, Heading, Marking, Strength, Anticipation and Positioning is pitifully small. Even worse if you try and add decent pace and acceleration into the mix.

On the flip side, fast and composed strikers, who can dribble, seem ten a penny.

Another thing I need is a proper leader. Shaun Hines is my captain now, but he doesn't particularly have the stats for it.

I also need more English players. We're ok for now, but with a 17 foreigner limit I could see us being a bit screwed in a couple or few seasons. My supposedly Level 1/Exceptional Youth Academy could really do with producing someone.

Oxford City End of Season 2035/36 Update - Championship

To tie up the loose ends from last season.



The Birmingham defeat made it three in a row and I really was starting to wonder if we were going to fuck it. I shouldn't have worried as we got back to winning ways against Notts Forest and then sealed promotion with the win over Blackburn. The game at home to Watford was amazing. Full house in attendance to celebrate our promotion and they were treated to a special performance. 4-0 up, then back to 5-3, then 5-4, we eventually ran out 8-5 winners with Hines scoring 4 and that was it the title sealed. Only my second trophy in 16 seasons.



Only downside was that West Ham beat Huddersfield to take the other automatic spot. However, 6th placed Stoke sneaking in is very pleasing.

We celebrated the championship with Hines signing a new deal.



No '10 goal contributions' bonus for this man. Straight in with pure goals and 30 of them before he gets anything. After seeing that I just gave him the £40k a week wages he wanted.



Best 11 for the season. Think I'm gonna let France go back to Man Utd and see if I can get a better central defender on loan. Happy enough with the attacking midfielders and forwards, so the defensive side of things will be the focus.

Some records were also broken.



And we did some more facilities stuff.





And here's our WARCHEST:



Was perhaps expecting more on the transfer budget, but the £1m for wages is We're only spending about £500k p/w at the moment so we can flip some of that should we need to too.



Another corking season for the finances, as I type we're sat on £90m in the bank.

This summer is shaping up to be the best yet. We've got some properly good youngsters either here or on their way now.

I probably need an older English head or two to bring the PASSION in addition to Shaun Hines, but things are looking promising.

We're gonna sell about 11,100 season tickets this season, so the board have agreed to expand our stadium. Don't get too excited though, I did and it was wasted.



If we need a John Woodley stadium III to get a decent capacity I'm going to cry. I like when they say start immediately they actually mean in 10 months.

I feel your pain. Lost out to someone who chose Bournemouth instead in exactly the same circumstances.

Oxford City - Season 2036/37 Summer Business - Premier League

So business done.

First off, another on the work permit conveyor belt:



Been out on loan for the last couple of seasons and has broken into Croatia's first team squad. Looks a promising box to box mid which will allow me to move my 5' 5" Peruvian Chavez further forward.



Duez who we signed last summer has landed and with a work permit. He'll play second fiddle to Kolar this season, but Kolar is whinging about moving to a big club and only has two years left on his deal so will be moving on next summer.



At £21m from Dinamo he becomes our record signing.



Was with us on loan from Chelsea in 2033/34 in the Championship and he's improved hugely since them. Will hopefully add the steel we need in midfield.



Another loan, but should strengthen us at centre back. That position still remains a problem, but we did find one for the future this summer that I'm very hopeful about.



At £11.5m from Palmeiras he's comfortably our most expensive youth signing, but with 15 tackling, 14 Anticipation and glowing reports from my scouts about his future I'm very hopeful he'll become what I need after he joins in 18 months.

And bar a couple of other youth signings who're not much to write home about at this stage, that is pretty much it. The Polish striker and Lyon keeper signed last summer will join in August when they turn 18 and the former will act as backup to Hines.

We start with Liverpool away then Spurs at home.

Oh and we're also now spending £700k p/w on wages. It's amazing how the renewals add up. Every fucker wants £30k p/w minimum as well it seems.

Well this didn't happen last time.... They rested a few looking at their squad, but Spurs are reigning Premier League champions and that's our biggest scalp by a country mile.

Oxford City 2036/37 End of Season Update - Premier League

AND IT'S LIVE!

Second season in the Premier League after our relegation two years ago and Championship winning promotion last season.

A tale of two halves this one.



Having started the season so well with 4 wins in 6, including one over reigning champions Spurs, we were struck with a 3 month run of injuries that is about as bad as I've ever seen playing FM. Top of the injury charts for the Premier League for that whole time, there wasn't a day where we didn't have at least 6 players from the first 11 and bench out. Valpoort got injured three times in that period, the second and third times before he'd even set foot back on the pitch again, and even Shaun Hines (who is never injured) got in on the act.

Towards the end of December the players were all coming back and the plague stopped, but when we lost to Spurs on New Year's Day we were 18th in the Premier League again.



I was planning to bin the FA Cup off as I did the League Cup earlier in the season, but with our strongest first 11 available for selection and relatively fit for the first time in months I played them all and it was something of a turning point. A much needed win, the first for two and a half months, and we were up and running. We then went on a cracking run (including the best performance in my time at the club with a 6-0 demolition of Everton) to secure Premier League survival fairly comfortably in the end.



The top 6 looks something of a closed shop, but as we shouldn't be flirting with relegation again, the next aim is to get into Europe. Burnley, we are coming for you.

In the middle of all that another work permit was granted.

[/url]

So more dirt cheap Eastern European talent entered the first team squad.



Hines got the Golden Boot and with it his 30 goal a season bonus of £185k. Rapidly becoming my favourite player ever in FM and I'd love to see him get an England cap. He's still inexplicably nowhere near Slaven Bilic's (lol) team.



First time I can remember I was so settled on what my best 11 is. Shame two of them are loan players. Oh and special mention to Koumis, he's been with us since League One and I've no idea how he's made the step up to the Premier League, but he has. His stats aren't even that good, but he's my Ji Sung Park or Dirk Kuyt in that we're so much more solid when he's in the team.



This summer's warchest:



And more pissing about with the stadium.



We hadn't even begun the pitiful expansion of 2,700 ish seats announced last year when this news popped up and now we've got to go and slum it in Milton Keynes for a year while our current piece of shit is expanded to a level that's not even upper Championship tier. I assume we're restrained by planning permission and we'll need to build a third John Woodley stadium to finally get a decent capacity, but for the love of God and all that's holy, just fecking do that now.

And talking of John:



I don't know what it'll take to get above him in that list, but I'm bloody doing it.

I definitely need more squad depth. It's why I'd opted on binning the cups off (even though it goes against my very soul) in an effort to stay in the Premier League at all costs.

And yes, the 13 game run without a win was horrendous. I was thinking to myself the whole time, we have a far better squad than we did two years ago but we're doing worse now than we were then. But in the back of my mind I knew if I could get the players back out on the pitch we'd been fine. What I'd seen in the first six games was enough to know that - it was light years ahead of last time.

What's really been annoying me A LOT this season, is that every player believes he deserves a first-team status. I have Dunn who's been with us for 5 seasons now, my coaches say he's at League One level and yet he won't sign a contract with anything less than Regular Starter status. I guess I'll just let him go, but I wanted to keep him for that sort of emergency situations with injuries etc (and he's british so there's that).

That was exactly the point I was going to make with the squad depth bit above before my mind fucked off to the pub, in that it's a bloody nightmare keeping a stocked squad happy in this game. Once we get to Europe it'll be easier, but for now I'm basically playing 40 games a season and if my best 11 are available, they're starting.

His brother is OGB's Assistant Manager.

Hmmm...

If ever there was something that illustrated perfectly how desperately we need a reputation boost, it's this.



He's playing in Belgium. Belgium.

Hopefully I'll start well enough in the league to be able to give it a go.

The base of the squad is pretty much sorted for the next season and it's only early July, but with Oliviera gone I have over £150m burning a hole in the club's coffers. Such a struggle to find players that will both improve on what I have while being willing to join.

Oxford City 2037/38 - Premier League

A few more of the youth queued up joined, which left our only major signing as this chap.



£6.75m clause-tastic from relegated West Ham. He wanted £120k per week so we ultimatum'd the shit out of it and West Ham agreed to pay some to let the move happen. As a man stuck in the early 2000's I don't think I'm ready to pay £100k p/w yet.



A disappointing start to the season, with the forced sale of Oliveira seemingly hitting us hard up front as we stodge the shit out of things on a game to game basis. Hines is still scoring, but not as much and the fluidity we ended last season with has (hopefully only) temporarily left us.



Very much a not bad, not great situation there. Worry is that there's surely no way Chelsea will stay in the relegation zone. We play them away next.

Oh and we've hit 3 and a half stars for rep, but it doesn't appear to have changed much so I've now realised 4 stars is what we actually need.

I need a feeder club.

Oxford United would be pretty swish.

Just been utterly screwed.

Had four more u-21 forriners coming in January, not realising there was a limit of six per season. The game just cancelled two of them, including the seriously promising centre back, without giving me any sort of choice.

What a bollocks.

Oxford City End of Season Update 2037/38

Another season of two halves, this time not to do with injuries but more to do with who I had in the team and where. First half looked like this:



That little lot left us 17th and then in January the following things happened. My two players who could play at LW were out for a game and I had to move Cipric there, he was a revelation, but that also allowed me to play the two cracking right backs I had, moving Kolar to left back. Additionally Chavez my diminutive Peruvian finally pissed me off one too many times with his shit performances, so I binned him off on loan to Turkey and installed Koumis as our number one attacking midfielder. The transformation was unreal.



An amazing run of results that sees us 10 games unbeaten and the best win of the save so far by a country mile. Sadly, our shit start meant we finished mid table again but at least top half this time.





A slower season for Hines, but always a man with a sense of occasion his winner against Reading was the goal that did this:



Which pushed him to icon status.

Oxford City End of Season Update 2037/38

Onto the facilities and finances. Starting with the former, we're back home.



And have now finished the facilities.



A quick look at the spreadsheet shows us it cost £96,115,930 to get there.



The finances are in staggeringly rude health, with a £97m profit posted for the season, and this wedge in the bank:



leading to a WARCHEST of:



Plans for next season

I've been playing the kids I've bought too soon and I need to sort that with better depth in the squad, the sort of player Jim was alluding to. I've also got some crap that needs to be shifted now. Corness, for example, sadly isn't good enough. As a result I'm going through the squad assigning a 'keep', 'loan' or 'bin' to each player and then filling in the gaps for what I need with the budget space I have. We're only £700k on wages now too, so we've a million to play with there as well as the ludicrous transfer budget.

I'll consider anything less than a top 7 finish next season or winning a trophy, a failure. It's time to kick on.

Oxford City Season 2038/39 Summer Update - BPLSBB

After scouring the market I failed to find anyone knew I wanted to get so the only players to join us were the two young uns that had fallen foul of the limit on forrin under-21s joining in January and Jose Carlos Ruiz, who we signed permanently from Valencia for a record (for us of) £23m. Many loans out were done and we ended the summer with with a 24 man first team squad that was hopefully ready to go. And third time lucky (well fourth really) we started a Premier League season superbly.



So pleased to win the first four (including a last 5 minute turnaround against Everton), our second team then lost to Villa before we encountered some next level bullshit against Man City. 3-0 down inside 8 minutes we were utterly ruined for 90 minutes. That seemed to spill over into the Chelsea game and when we found ourselves 2-0 down against Southampton I was fearing the worst. Shaun Hines got us back on track and another 7 points from the next 9 puts us 2nd.



I'm really only looking at the gap between us and 7th at the moment (which would be nice to have been more than six points given our start), but if we're still in the top four come the turn of the year I might start to believe we could actually make the Champions League.

I see so many crazy good forwards that are cheap as fuck and I genuinely need to muster all my strength to not sign them.

Insanely good start there Yev. Not like you had that easy a schedule either.

Had a similar issue in the window above and too had to use all the will power I could muster.

I'm in a similar boat. I need good English talent and a fair bit of it quite soon.

An increase of 5,000 seats. We fill the current stadium every single week. Utter morons.

Oxford City Season 2038/39

Taking things up to he turn of the year.



20 for Hines.

And I guess we're in a race for top 4.

Brentford. Shower of absolute cunts. I pray they never make it to the Premier League.

End of January and we're still in the hunt!

The Champions League is slipping away.



But, the FA Cup is ON!

All to play for...

First 4 go into the CL groups for definite, not sure about the Wafer qualifying. I quite fancy the Conference league if we don't make the CL though. Albeit maybe we're already guaranteed Europa due to Liverpool being in the CL.

This shit was much easier to follow when I was younger.

Yeah, it'd be nice to play in all of the European trophies at some stage. Sounds like I've bypassed the Conference league, for this season at least.

We're running on empty....



And the CL is definitely out.

It is now. We beat West Ham 3-0 and Bournemouth draw with Leicester so 5th is secured. It has come at a cost though.

Toggle Spoiler

He was BACK TO HIS BEST again.

Still 3 and a half stars sadly.

Players out of favour at big clubs are now interested in joining me though, so we're getting there.

We'll kick the roaring 40s off with a stadium that'll hold over 30,000 fans.



That almost feels like actual progress.

Another trophy:



I could get used to this...

The tactic cracking fairy has definitely paid us a visit.



Such an easy start as well. Should have had 9 points from that lot.

Could have been a fair bit better given what was in the pots.

The Burnley game was even on chances, about 9 each (so for them to score four was so lol), Wolves we shat our way passed and then Newcastle outclassed us. A change to the 4-2-4 it is.

Oxford City 2039/40 Mid Season Update - AND IT'S LIVE

4th season back in the Premier League and with the Wafer Cup to go at and a 30,000+ capacity stadium on the horizon, things were looking very promising.

Only two things of note happened in the window.



This LAD joined from the free transfer list, having been released by Inter. No pace whatsoever, but happy to be a fringe player which was much needed.

I also got involved with a protracted contract negotiation with Valpoort, which I have to give kudos to SI for as it felt like the sort of thing that happens in real life. Back and forth we went, with Valpoort starting by asking for £130k per week (I'm loathed to break the £100k barrier), refusing my offer, having a mini-tanty, coming back to the negotiating table, rejecting it again, asking for £160k, asking to leave, then asking to stay and finally, fucking finally, signing.



With that done we reduced the number of loans out, to settle on a squad of 28 hopeful heroes to make an assault on five fronts.

BPLSBB

5th last year, we've had a cracking first half of the season, book ended by shite.



Some brilliant wins and the nine game winning run was immense.



Not sure we've got enough in the tank to sustain a title challenge, but with a seven point gap to 4th I'd be disappointed if we didn't get the Champions League.

Domestic Cups



Cracking to win the Charity Shield and take home the delicious hall of fame points. The Spurs loss in the League Cup was annoying and the start of our weak end to the calendar year. Another Premier League team drawn in the FA Cup, we seem to do that very often, more than is statistically likely. But as holders, we'll be taking it seriously.

Europ



Nailed our wafer cup group, which was cracking and raked in about £4m prize money.



Topping it means we skip straight to the last 16, but on the downside PSG muffed their CL group and are a potential opponent at some stage. Is the draw for the last 16 random?

The finances remain in rude health as we sit on £182m in the bank, but contract renewals have pushed the wage expenditure up to £1.3m per week. I remember a time when we wouldn't spend that in a year.

PSG are going in hard for my Belgian full back. Just rejected a £70m bid but he has a min fee clause of £103m and I suspect as we're only 5 days into the window they're going to meet it.

He's now in the first team squad (with limited opportunities) having been out on loan for the last two seasons at Shrewsbury. Not great yet but still promising. I'm still re-training him as a winger on the back of your shout that sounded like a great one.

The money in the Premier League is so nuts that we don't really need it, as much as it would soften the blow. Finishing top 5 is more than £130m alone in tv and prize money. I would like to get £1bn in the bank at some point though. Never done that in a save before.

A tough run of games.





Grrr.

And this is both awesome and annoying.

1-0 win (3-2) on agg against Milan and we're in the Quarter-Finals.



PSG in the semi's should we make it.

Gutted.



I knew after about 20 minutes that we were bound to lose on away goals.

And here's the league table.

It's so tough maintaining a challenge on all fronts.

Final table.



9 points more than last year but 5th again. Not bad, not great.

Best 11 after 20 years at City.

[Smjffy]

Surely it's bad juju to get rid of someone called Blessing @Smjffy?

I am assuming you've tried him as a winger?

I did until I had to shift Parker there so Blessing went central. I could use Parker up top but that means I'd have to go back to three up front as I don't want to drop Cummings and I can't drop Blake.

Just feel like I'm not getting a good return for him, especially given he's quite expensive wage wise.

[Adramelch]

So, while I complained about the bonkers schedule and the ridiculous Leicester game, the truth is that we only needed 2 points in those 4 games. We mustered a MASSIVE three points, but even zero would have been enough since City lost their two remaining games:





The silly thing being, that's exactly how many points we got last season, when we finished sixth, and I can tell you that we were (ever so slightly) worse this season as we scored one less goal and conceded five more. But still, Champions League awaits. United somehow remembered they are a good team and demolished pretty much everybody, earning a record 102 points and scoring a record 113 goals. Seeing as they are our cryptonite when it comes to big teams, this means that we did better than our competition (who were collectively horrible as you can see) in the rest of the games and that's what got us 3rd place. And, miraculously, Diaz finally managed to finish top scorer:



Sulejmani is the guy that beat him the last two seasons, but even though they demolished the league, he failed to do so this season.

You will have noticed that City ended up qualifying for the Champions League anyway, by virtue of winning the Europa League final versus Rangers (!), after beating us in the semis:



All in all, a tougher run than last season, yet we still did very well and were in fact close to taking City to extra time, but truth is they were the better team over the two games. In other news, United also won the Champions League by beating Everton on penalties in the final, as well as the league cup. Arsenal managed to salvage their disastrous season through a FA cup win over Chelsea, the team that knocked us out in the semis. Last but not least, a special mention to Sheff Wed who got into Europe, completely out nowhere, almost doubling their points compared to last season. I don't recall the last time I saw a team getting hard-carried by a player or two, but their pair of strikers bagged an incredible 61 (out of 77) league goals between them.

As for our squad:



Another 40 goals from Diaz, bringing his total for the club up to 122 in 3 seasons. That said, this season was his worst of the three, as for the first time he actually had a goalless spell, lasting two full months. Bartos struggled to adjust to the AMC position, however his stats are on par with Antunovic and Blanco from the previous 3 seasons, so I can't complain too much, but it might be one of the positions we'll look to improve on. Ramirez also had a great first season here, so with him being just 20 and Bartos being 23 I think we have that position (which has been problematic for us in general) sorted for the foreseeable future. Finally, I made some tweaks to our corner routine, meaning we got more goals from our defenders and Ismoilov racked up an incredible 24 assists.

The (potentially bad) news is that we are going through yet another potential takeover and having a transfer embargo for the second consecutive time just as we are entering a transfer window is annoying to say the least.

[Baz]

[Alan Shearer The 2nd]

Currently in one of my addictive FM spells. Still going strong in my FM2012 save...has anyone else encountered something like this before?



I've never seen a ratio like it.

[Manc]

Get his attributes up.

[Alan Shearer The 2nd]

Closest I had before was a chap who scored 47 in 28 games.



Still got 8 games left. Usually start resting him in the league and saving him for the European cup but might play him as much as possible and see what he can get to.

[Shindig]

I once got 85 goals out of Alan Shearer in 01/02 by man-marking the keeper. And copious reloads.

[Yevrah]

You could get over 100 from RvN in a season, in whatever patch he rocked up in.

[Gray Fox]

So that's Fernando Torres in the timeline without the crippling knee injuries.

[Adramelch]

We're once again at the halfway point of the season and it's been quite a ride so far. First off, the signings:



We were on the market for an affordable central defender that would improve on our current starters and this guy got transfer-listed by PSG so we snapped him up for a club-record 22m.



A transfer we arranged back in March. He comes with very high potential and he's incredibly versatile so I expect that he will see a decent amount of football here. Cost us just above 7m.



Got to admit that this was an impulse buy, rather than something we really needed. He was rated at 4.5 stars whenever we signed him (and I don't see why he's now at 3.5, but not like that matters) and the concept was that I wanted to have another top rated striker at the club, in case Diaz went through another dry spell or, god forbid, picked up an injury. Seeing as he will want first team football, however, the plan is to use him on the right as an inside forward, since, despite Reyes' consistency, it's not like he's had any impressive seasons here. In the end, what started as an impulse buy ended up being a great decision, since this happened at the start of November:



In terms of the league, our first half of the season is pretty much the same as the last couple of seasons, however this time around things are very competitive at the top with only 5 points separating 1st from 7th. Unlike last season, we've already had most of the big teams at home, so I am excepting a dip in results come spring.



And that brings us to the exciting part of the season, that being the Champions League. The board are expecting us to reach the first knockout round, which I find a bit preposterous given that we were seeded 4th in the draw. Nevertheless, we got a fairly reasonable group, comprising of Juventus, Porto and Rangers, thankfully avoiding the group of death that would have us playing PSG, Atletico and Milan instead. Having beaten Porto relatively easily in the Europa League last season, I fancied our chances of going through, and go through we did:



Most of our wins were relatively tight affairs, but we were the better team in all of them, so I am glad that was reflected in the final scorelines. On the contrary, it might seem like we got demolished in Italy, but Juventus essentially fluked their way to three goals in what was otherwise a fairly tight affair as well, albeit one that they probably deserved to win. We were drawn against Dortmund in the first knockout round, and while it could have been easier, with Club Brugge and Ajax as options, I am just glad we avoided Barcelona, Atletico and Bayern.

All in all, I am happy with our performance so far. That said, I don't really fancy our chances at returning to the Champions League next season, as we have a fairly hard schedule ahead and most of the teams have been fairly competitive so far. I am just hoping that the money from this season's run as well as the (hopefully) increased reputation will allows to go for players of a higher calibre, as for now our ceiling seems to be "good Premier League player".

[igor_balis]

Star ratings are relative only to the rest of your other players, it has nothing to do with how good they are in terms of the league etc.

[Baz]

That's certainly something I miss in 01/02. Star ratings. No idea of my actual best 11, I just play the ones I like.

'Compare players' is good though. Barely used it back in the day but it's a bit of a godsend really.

[Adramelch]

He remained 4.5 for like the first month with us and then just randomly dropped a full star randomly. Usually it's form related when that happens but it didn't feel like it's the case here. Anyway, I don't care much about stars.

[Alan Shearer The 2nd]

You could get over 100 from RvN in a season, in whatever patch he rocked up in.

League only?

[Yevrah]

Nah, all comps.

[Alan Shearer The 2nd]

That makes more sense. I save this guy for the league and late stages of the champions league so would be interesting to see what he could get playing every game possible.

[Clunge]

Absolute filth at League 2 level.

[Baz]

Third season complete:





Chanko is mega.

Also lost the FA Cup final 1-0 to Premier League winners Arsenal so I'm in the UEFA Cup again next season. Could do without the distraction from trying to win the Premier League tbh, considering the extra money isn't even noticeable.

[Shindig]

I haven't got CM 01-02 installed on this PC. That'll change at the weekend. All those names, man. All that's missing is an injured David Prutton.

[Smjffy]

Pre season is turning into a bit of a slog and I've only completed six weeks since end of last season. This however has me stumped.







The one that got away?

Compared to my current no1.

[Adramelch]

Liverpool went and bought my back-up goalkeeper for like 150k when I was in my first season in the Championship. I guess AI likes to gather goalkeepers, just in case.

[Smjffy]

Surely it's bad juju to get rid of someone called Blessing @Smjffy?

I am assuming you've tried him as a winger?

We're going to find out today.



Nearly £250M in sales at this moment in time as we look to reduce the squad. I want most of them out of the league so they don't come back to haunt me on a regular basis. This is the last season for YDWAWK as I just feel it's getting a little stale which is why I've stalled this season so maybe after this year we'll start signing players instead as there are so many I want to try manage.

[Adramelch]

Our best season yet has come to an end. This happened at some point in February, for the first time in our history:



Obviously, I didn't expect it to last, but it was still a very nice moment. As it turns out we weren't that far off:



In fact, I'd say we had a realistic chance of winning the title, but fixture congestion meant we threw stupid points, losing away to Stoke and Burnley of all teams, and drawing at home to Cardiff, with a Gateshead classic, conceding an equaliser in injury time. All those, as well as an expected loss at Anfield, happened in the same month, most notably a month we played 9 games in. Still, we managed to improve our points total over the previous two seasons, and still made the Champions League. I went with my plan of only fielding our second string in the cups, which means our first team players got some valuable rest time, but the problem is our second string won even the challenging games, which led to this stupid scheduling. Speaking of cups, we had a deep run in the FA cup:



We managed to beat Liverpool's first team with our second string, when we barely manage to keep up with them in the league games, when we play our strongest squad. That set-up a semi-final against Arsenal, in which I decided to play a strong squad, resulting in us being 5-0 up after 45 minutes. Then we just simply switched off and gave them hopes of getting back into the game, but conceding 5 goals would have been silly even for us. Everton were waiting in the final, a team that we hadn't lost to (or dropped points for that matter) in the last 3.5 years. That's a good sign right?

Toggle Spoiler

Unforunately it wasn't to be. I post the above picture for two reasons. First, just to complain once again at how easily we concede and how bad we can be at finishing. Don't get me wrong, Everton were the better team and deserved the win, but the 3-0 definitely seems harsh. That said, that Villalba guy is a player we tried to sign whenever we signed Renan instead, but he chose to go to Everton and finished the season with 38 goals. In fact, we tried to sign him last January too, but talks broke down because I tried to remove the "bring a suitable player to help him settle" clause, which has never happened to me before. Afterwards, he wasn't willing to talk terms before the transfer window was over.

Last, but not least, Europe.



We essentially managed to kill the tie against Dortmund in the first leg, so I fielded backup players in the return fixutre and we almost paid for it. Still we went through and next up were Barcelona. We inexplicably only mustered a draw at home, with them scoring from their singular shot of the game, while we wasted chance after chance (notice a pattern?). Everyone thought we were done after that game, but we proved them wrong as we played excellently in Camp Nou, winning 3-1, even missing a penalty. Then Atletico waited in what was an infuriating tie. We were the better team, but 2 out of the 3 goals we conceded were from corners, and we somehow managed to miss a penalty in each game (meaning we missed 3 consecutive penalties). Seeing as Juventus were waiting in the final, it feels like it was a golden opportunity to win the whole thing. Still, I am delighted that we made the semis in our debut season, showing the world we are a force to be reckoned with. As a sidenote, at the end of the season we received 7m from Champions League TV revenue. That has to be wrong surely?

Onto the squad:



As I showed in my previous updated, Diaz picked a 3 month injury which definitely showed in our scoring, but, even more importantly, affected him. He just wasn't the same player afterwards, and while he did manage to pick another 12 goals after returning, that amount of goals in 4 months just isn't up to his standard. Hopefully, he'll be back to his old self next season. That said, Renan proved to be a magnificent signing as he replaced him up front and kept us more than competitive. He was definitely the MVP of the season, as he played in three different positions for extended periods of time and still managed to provide the goods. Ramirez wasn't as good as last season, but he also missed about 2.5 months through two different injuries, which didn't help. Us playing Renan as an inside forward on the opposite wing also meant fewer crosses came Ramirez' way, so that contributed a bit. Onto the negative points, Luce once again has a good average rating but I just feel he's not a keeper that actually wins us points, so I will be actively looking for a replacement. Ismoilov is also now on my radar. Him missing 3 penalties made him a target, but the truth is that I don't know that his set-piece taking is enough to keep him in the team. The American youngster I brought in last summer seems to be a much better player so I think he'll dethrone Ismoilov.

I've lined up some very exciting transfers, so I am also expecting people to leave. Apart from Luce, I will be looking to offload Ndlovu as well. He's a good player overall, but he's not good enough to be our backup striker, he is occupying a foreign slot and I reckon we can get upwards of 30m for him. Humberto will also be leaving, and joining him will be a few of the youngsters I've signed that haven't met my expectations.

[Baz]

Everton? Get outta here.

[Adramelch]

They won another one about 7-8 years ago and have finished 2nd twice since then. Also won the Champions League two seasons ago and made the final the season after.

[Smjffy]

6th is the highest they have ever finished on mine and that was last season although they have lifted the Europa Conference League twice. 2022 and 2032.

Enrico Chiesa is their oldest ever goalscorer. I love getting deep into it when the current players start taking over everywhere.

[Smjffy]

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Six weeks?
https://imgur.com/dM4f8JVhttps://imgur.com/dM4f8JVhttps://imgur.com/dM4f8JV

[Gray Fox]

I'm assuming they changed his squad status or whatever it's called now, not long after he joined and he's chucked the toys out of the pram.

Also, Wesley Sneijder as DoF?

[Smjffy]

I'm assuming they changed his squad status or whatever it's called now, not long after he joined and he's chucked the toys out of the pram.

Also, Wesley Sneijder as DoF?

I also have:

Gary Cahill, Dimitar Berbatov, James Beattie, James Collins, Cristiano Ronaldo, Jermain Defoe, Joao Ferreira, Hendo, Robbie Keane, Luka Modric, Sergio Ramos, Sam Vokes, Robin van Persie, and of course, James Milner.

[thommo]

Just a quick update on our first season in the Championship with Slough Town as we enter the business end of the season. It's been a really solid season in general and we seem to be pretty safely set for a mid-table finish with 10 games to go.



We've been a little streaky at times, following up a 6 game stretch without a win over Christmas with a 7 game unbeaten run through January and February. One of the most important things was signing Papadopoulos onto a new deal - it took about 4 months of sulking but finally in December, his unhappiness relented and I swooped in with a new 4 year contract offer. It upped his wages from £700 p/w to £3.5k p/w, and he insisted on a minimum fee release clause for PL teams (which I maxed out to £12.5m), but it's key to lock him down - he's once again been brilliant this season with 7 goals and 7 assists from central midfield.

The aim is to finish strong, hopefully in the top half. I'm currently scouring youth teams across Europe for some out of contract youngsters that I can bring in and develop. Unfortunately Oxford City, my affiliate, are floundering in 19th in the National League South, despite the best efforts of a young Kiwi full back I sent on loan, the ONLY player of mine that accepted going there for a season.

[Smjffy]

Blake.

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First Ballon d'Or winner for Wrexham.

[Adramelch]

Good season by the looks of it thommo. I remember my first season being a series of one goal wins and say three/four goal losses, so by your goal difference I am assuming that hasn't been the case for you. You are on track to finish where we did in our second season.

[Smjffy]

What would you do? He's got one year left on his deal and he's pretty miffed at the moment.

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[Dark Soldier]

Looks like the 22 Beta drops tonight

[Spikey M]

I expect back to back 12-0 wins by dawn.

[Dark Soldier]

Out now lads

[Adramelch]

Time for (yet another) update. It was a very busy, as well as high spending, transfer window. I sold a lot of players that just weren't up to our standards anymore, which brought about 170m in, meaning we had a warchest™, which coupled with our now high reputation of 4.5 stars, made me decide to make big changes in the squad:

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First-team



The big one. A massive improvement over Luce, that becomes our transfer record by quite some margin, at a cost of 60m (with half of it spread over 3 years). Luce eventually (fucker kept rejecting contracts from other clubs) went to Independiente for 20m.



Right-back wasn't quite a position I was looking to strengthen, but this guy is already better than Novacic, and we only had to pay 13m for him so it was an easy decision. Meanwhile Novacic joined Tottenham for 35m, so a big win on that department.



Identical case to Smicer. A big improvement over Bicanic, at a cost of just 18m. Bicanic still stays at the club as a backup while Bonz will move to Cardiff in January for 4m (his contract was expiring at the end of the season anyway).



Incredibly versatile player that joined us for free from Lyon. Best transfer in my stint here in terms of value for money.

Backup



Wasn't happy with Ndlovu as our backup striker (in the "impact sub" sense), so when we got a 40m offer from Ajax, I decided to let him go and bring in a replacement. Hernandez joins us for just 8.5m and he's a significant upgrade over Ndlovu.



A guy I signed for a measly 2.2m just because of his potential, but when he joined he was already capable of getting some game time. If he can improve his end product, I reckon he'll be a mainstay here.



Finally, a guy we again signed for his potential for 5.5m, but he's already first-team material. Will be joining us in January.

In terms of action, we've been nothing sort of magnificent:



Just a solitary loss all season, to Leeds of all teams. The big difference is our defensive record, with us conceding just 12 goals in 19 games, while in the previous seasons this would be at around the 20-25 mark. I am not sure how much the new full-backs contribute to that, but I can certainly tell you that the new keeper is worth every penny we paid for him. Our forwards took a while to get going, but until then O'Shea (the american kid I talked about in my previous update) more than made up for it, with him already having 11 goals and 6 assists from the centre of midfield. Diaz had a very rough start with 2 goal in the first 8 games, but he found his form after that and he's scored 16 goals in 17 games since.

As for Europe, we unfortunately were seeded 3rd in the group draw, courtesy of Roma randomly winning Serie A for the first time since 2001 and grabbing that top seed, knocking us down from 2nd seed. We got a really competitive group consisting of Inter, Lyon and Leipzig, where it felt like there were no heavy favourites in any of the games. Still, we managed to remain undefeated, with 3 wins and 3 draws, topping the group in the process:



The knockout round draw was fairly kind to us as we got Milan. Ajax, Roma and Rangers were also options, but we did avoid Bayern and Dortmund, so all in all I am happy. Assuming all the favourites win their ties, the quarters are going to be very competitive, but even making it there will be a big success in my books. We are also already guaranteed at least a second seed next season, which is lovely.

[thommo]

What would you do? He's got one year left on his deal and he's pretty miffed at the moment.

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Probably sell, that's an great offer considering he only has a year left. Did you change his position or has his output just got worse?

Good season by the looks of it thommo. I remember my first season being a series of one goal wins and say three/four goal losses, so by your goal difference I am assuming that hasn't been the case for you. You are on track to finish where we did in our second season.

Yeah we've been pretty good, surprisingly so. Keeping the core squad together has been so key, I rarely feel like we're blown away in games. We've actually just beaten top of the table Cardiff in our next game. If we get a bit more money in the wage budget next season, a playoff push is a definite possibility.

Cracking start to your season too. Your squad additions definitely seem to have pushed you on to the next level and challenging for titles now. Glavacevic looks brilliant.

[Adramelch]

I just blew 100m on a central defender, and I am not ashamed to admit that half of it was just for the name:



Not usually a fan of defenders with a low jumping reach, but I couldn't pass up on the opportunity.

[Raoul Duke]

He's outrageous, but I'm mostly keen to hear the fans chants. Just imagine that name being sung by people with a Newcastle accent

[Shindig]

Yeah, you can't fit that in Seven Nation Army.

[Lofty]

Just become aware that Touch 22 is Switch only, so I either have to buy a switch or a laptop if I want to play FM more than the puddle deep Mobile version.

[Smjffy]

Anyone ever had this?

[Giggles]

Just become aware that Touch 22 is Switch only, so I either have to buy a switch or a laptop if I want to play FM more than the puddle deep Mobile version.

Yeah no iPad version means I won’t be getting it at all. I can’t be arsed with a bulky laptop going around.

[Browning]

Didn’t they say they’re still doing all the other versions just without the touch name? No idea what the point of that is though.

[Adramelch]

Well, this happened:



Our form just never dropped, especially when it came to playing the top teams, seeing as we only dropped a total of 7 points against top-half sides. Even more importantly, we managed to beat United in both league games, when our previous record against them was 0-3-11 with 11 goals scored and 35 conceded. Had those two games gone the other way, they would have won the league instead. Our defence was definitely our strongest point, with just the 23 goals conceded, the 6th lowest in Premier League history.

In terms of cups, we stuck to playing our second fiddle, which inevitably failed when we were drawn against Liverpool in the league cup and Arsenal in the FA cup. As for Europe, we beat Milan 5-0 on aggregate, to set a quarter final tie against Atletico. We had an annoying first leg at their place, where we conceded three goals in the last twenty minutes. Still we gave it our best at home, going into half-time at 2-0, however we never managed to get a third and they even scored a goal in injury time when we went full out for a goal. Still they were the better team over the two games, so the result was fair.



I am really happy with every player in the squad really. Diaz picked a 2-month injury again, but he still managed to pick 29 goals, which, while far fewer than his best, was still an improvement over his previous season. Renan, Reyes, Bartos and O'Shea all took turns in singehandedly winning us games. That said, the star of the season was definitely Miquet, even managing to finish with the highest average rating in the squad. He only picked 3 player of the match awards, which means his rating wasn't down to the odd "superkeeper" performance, but just him being consistently good.

Plans for next season are to keep the same squad and just sign a high quality central defender to partner with <I will not attempt to spell his name>. Which we already have:



Cost a combined 110m which is a ton of money, but it feels like he was worth it, especially given how rare good defenders seem to be in my save. We brought in 130m by selling youngsters that didn't cut it, as well as Rogelio Gonzalez for 50m, so all in all, a profitable window. I also attempted to sign a great young english striker from Chelsea, but they wouldn't sell for even 150m, so I let it go.

Where do we go from here? I guess consistently winning the Premier League is our next goal, and eventually winning (or at least challenging for) the Champions League.

[Yevrah]

Cracking stuff Adra!

[Raoul Duke]

Nice work. Sounds like <He who shall not be named> was the key (although I suspect that mega keeper might have been The One)