Assistant Manager Setting Up Friendlies

Hi,

I've just completed my first season of FM10 with Liverpool. That's a bit of an achievement for me actually, since it's the first full season I've completed in a SI game since CM01/02...all the ones since have lacked the magic for me and I've just got frustrated or bored with them and given up. I've kept buying them though, so I'm thankful SI have finally developed another game that's got me hooked and I can now get my last 7 year's money's worth!

Anyway, on to my question. I've completed the first season (won the league and FA Cup incidentally) and I have my assistant manager setting up friendlies for me, and managing the team in friendly matches on the team settings screen. However, Mr Lee, for whatever reason possessed him, only set up one friendly against HSV. As a result I didn't pay attention to what was going on and entered the season starting with the charity shield with all my players lacking match fitness.

Does anybody know why this is? Is the assistant manager setting up friendlies thing broke or was I just unlucky? Do I need to set up friendlies myself next season? I remember getting some messages about teams accepting or rejecting friendlies but didn't bother to read them closely since I thought Sammy Lee was taking care of them. I can remember for sure that Celtic accepted a friendly but why didn't it happen?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Nad

PS: two weeks into the season and the aforementioned Mr Lee has just bug.gered off to be a coach(!) at West Ham, who finished 17th in the league last season. The traitorous bar steward (who's supposed to be fairly loyal on his personality and has Liverpool as a favoured club!) has left me in the lurch and now I can't even filter the staff who are even interested in working for me! Do you think he was a fifth columnist and had a deliberate plan to screw me over?

I always do it myself at the end of every season, and they've made it pretty easy on this one. They've got that similar level, smaller club, etc... menu and the offers are always accepted.

I tend to tour a random country (4 matches 3 days apart for each) then add one or two usually against teams with a similar reputation to test new tactics out. Makes the process take no more than 10 seconds.

I always let my ass. arrange friendlies but after the day where all his ones get accepted/declined I always check out the dates etc. as they're usually useless (leave a 3-4 week gap before the season starts) so I usually do a couple of tours of my own. Maybe a cup.

Also, I don't let him take control of friendlies either as none of my team got match fit in the pre-seasons he was in control of and he would play random players I had no intention of using instead of my squad players.

It's annoying but my team are a lot more fitter now during the season (used to get the 'soandso is worried about the state of our fitness compared to other teams in the league' and we are a lot more successful

I have no problems with my Ass Man other than sometimes he's crappy with team talks in pre season.

I've noticed a similar thing with Maidenhead. Got a 7 emails, 3 saying that friendlies had been accepted, 4 saying they'd been refused but my assman didn't try to make any further friendlies. Took those no's and left it there. I ended up getting a couple of EPL team's reserves (with attendances of 91 and 87) in to get some match practise in front of the home fans.

Couldn't SI put in an option for the Assman to ask you how many friendlies you want and he / she will just keep trying until this number is filled or there are no more realistic clubs to ask?

i have a standard schedule for mine:

1 week before the season starts a tough away game against a big side

2 weeks before the season starts a 2 day cup against tough sides

5 days before the start i have a friendly away to a strong side, similar to me, but not quite as good

3 days back form this is the end game of my tour, the tour has 4 games with 2 days rest in between, the tour is normally austria, switzerland, hungary or poland.

and i begin with a friendly against a local minnows

the idea is the earlier games build up your fitness and confidence with easy wins - the latter allow proper competitive experience

I have never let my Ass Man set up friendlies, always do it myself. Usually start with 2 low level clubs, then a mini 3 game tour in North or South America, and then a home game against a tough European team 5 days before the opening game.

If you want to do it yourself make sure you are in time, else all bigger teams will have a full schedule and you are forced to play non-league teams. But sometimes I let my assistent put things up (especially when managing smaller teams), then cancel one or two and try to get a bigger opponent int.