Oops, I'm promoted.

Has anyone ever.. uhm.. felt sad that they got promoted?.

I've been playing Truro City from the start of the second season in FM2011 when they got promoted to BSS, I somehow managed to stumble consecutive promotions through playoffs mostly (one win - BSP) and find myself in the championship, I'm out of depth here, I put together a good squad, and decide, I'll play through this season, I'll aim for mid-table finish, try and use the time to upgrade my stadium and expand the teams resources and reputation, I had no intentions of promotion.

Yet, going through, even holidaying a lot of the games and letting my assistant take charge for at least half of them - most of which ended up draws, we had lots of draws, not many losses, and a reasonable amount of wins I found Truro sliding into the playoffs with the season closing, I started commanding more matches, it went well and I found myself in the playoffs, I throught "brilliant, maybe we can get into the final, that should be a good money-spinner" full well expecting to get trounced even if I made it that far.

Had a heroic effort and a lot of luck in the first leg against cardiff, 1-0 down, but we get a lucky goal, and they get a player sent off, and we get another, both in the last 10 minutes. So we go into the next leg, they look dangerous, but we win fairly comfortably. Then it's the final - West Brom, they outclass me completely and utterly in terms of laying staff, but turns otu to be an exciting tie, 5 clear cut chances a piece, and it ends 2 - 1 with my little 21 year old vice captain defender scoring both goals from corners.

I'm stunned, I didn't.. want to go up, I was hoping I wouldn't. Yet we did. This isn't a thread to brag, I put the entire season down to luck, I mean some of our best wins were managed by my assistant even.. with his 10 tactical knowledge. It wasn't even me half the time! in fact I often did dire when I did take control.

So uhm, the point of the topic is two fold, have you ever regretted winning? have you ever lost on purpose knowing you'd be better off in the long-term doing so?.

Also, I'd love to know some survival tips.. I'll need them.. I'm going into the premiership with a 4500 terrace stadium and I have no seating at all.. already doomed.. I'm thinking I'll have to re-negotiate all my contracts and remove all relegation release clauses.. because I'm going dooooown!.

When you're a small team with no expectation, its much easier to survive in big leagues in my experience. Sit back, play defensive, on the counter. Go in hard tackling and try to break the opposition teams. You'll find that because you dont have anything to lose, even with rubbish players, you'll upset a fair few big clubs. I find myself even at my worst low to mid table, even with a terrible team, as long as im not playing to win. You'll lose to teams you feel you could beat, but you'll gain points on bigger teams who choke. Try to grab draws here and there, and make your home your fortress. You'll be suprised by how well you can do with rubbish, i predict that you can get 16th or thereabouts, and then hopefully regroup for the next season. its the second season that will really test you. the first you can go out and suprise.

If you don't enjoy winning promotion you shouldn't be playing the game.

Unless you cheated, in which case in my eyes it's not worth playing the game.

Yea when i got promoted with derby with a classic 4-4-2 with a bunch of people on loan basically, Was too easy with a really basic formation.

I have deliberately lost games towards the end of the season to ensure I do not get promoted. I just did not have the team, they were all too young and I would have had to buy a brand new squad - which I did not have the money to do. Now, the players are maturing and I have just been promoted again to the Premier League (started with Oldham - L1). I do not think it is the best idea to get promoted unless you believe the club is ready for it. I have had this 'problem' twice, but the second time to the Premier League, I decided that I would have the money to develop the club even though the team probably was not ready for it.

That's what I'm doing now, trying to develop the club. As for tips, I am trying to develop the club and buy players that are out of contract, as well as buying a few players that are cheap. Other than that, just try to survive the first season and then you can build for the next.

I'm currently third in the Championship with Swindon after taking over last season. I don't want to get promoted yet, because I know that I'm in nowhere near a good enough position to survive and I don't want to go up and come straight back down again.

Has anyone ever.. uhm.. felt sad that they got promoted?.

I'm stunned, I didn't.. want to go up, I was hoping I wouldn't. Yet we did. This isn't a thread to brag, I put the entire season down to luck, I mean some of our best wins were managed by my assistant even.. with his 10 tactical knowledge. It wasn't even me half the time! in fact I often did dire when I did take control..

It,s not a sin to talk about your successes. Enjoy it. Theres enough talk about things not going well. As Gary Player said "the hard i work the luckier i get".

i don't get it when people say 'i dont want to get promoted because i dont have the squad/resources/facilities' when the only way to get those things is through more income...and what league generates the most? The Premier League. You'll be able to get those things quicker by getting into the prem...

In the OPs case, yeah, you may lose a load of games and struggle to the lowest points tally in premiership history...but you'll generate a huge amount of income from tv deals alone and once relegated you'll be in a greatly improved financial position...

My advice would be to spend as little as possible...not buy any players and play defensive as hell. That way, when the inevitable happens and you return to the championship, you'll be financial sound and be better equipped to 'build' up a great club.

I've had that feeling, With Swindon on my current save. In my first season in the championship I just wanted to have a steady mid table finish because I had a young team and alot of loan players. To my surprise the first 5 games I end up winning. I was consistently near the top of the table even though I was getting outplayed every game... I would just play counter attack and I would knick a goal and sit back and it worked . Ended up in the playoffs in which I won beating Bristol city and then Cardiff in the final.

Worries were stupid I signed many of the loan players because there contracts were expiring and used the same tactics and survived my first season .

i don't get it when people say 'i dont want to get promoted because i dont have the squad/resources/facilities' when the only way to get those things is through more income...and what league generates the most? The Premier League. You'll be able to get those things quicker by getting into the prem...

In the OPs case, yeah, you may lose a load of games and struggle to the lowest points tally in premiership history...but you'll generate a huge amount of income from tv deals alone and once relegated you'll be in a greatly improved financial position...

My advice would be to spend as little as possible...not buy any players and play defensive as hell. That way, when the inevitable happens and you return to the championship, you'll be financial sound and be better equipped to 'build' up a great club.

Yeah, I mean at worst, I'll have gone from a 4500 all-terrace stadium to having 8000 seats for a stadium (league requirements forced us to get that). So I will be in a better position, I might struggle even in the championship though as I might struggle to re-negotiate contracts to the level I can afford - so I may have to sell off some players, but the payments I get should more than cover the transition and I will be in a better stead. Yet it'll be tough, I do want to spend though - I've adjusted my transfer budget to give me more wage budget and i intend to see who I can get - it may cost me in the short term, but i believe even if I get relegated, I should be able to sell off some of these players and earn some of the money back.

It's a gamble, but I refuse to go down as the worst tally in history, I have to go down fighting. Although with our regional reputation and tiny stadium I don't gold much faith, but I'll give it a go.

let us know how u get on, hate that first season in the prem, so much at stake.

I did have the same with Bradford, I expected to get promoted the first season of course, but then right off the bat in league 1 I ended up in the play-offs and promoted again, in the Championship I had about £400k to spend and thought this season I'll do well to survive, but my strikers and defenders had other ideas, I'd loaned Jordan Spence and Jay Emmanuel Thomas for 3 seasons consecutively along with Laura Dalla Valle so they had become very competent instead of wasting away in the clubs reserves and the promotions made it so it was stepping them up along the way. Astounding myself I ended up in the premiership at the end of the year, my total spendings to get there were somewhere in the region of £500k - £750k because of loans and frees. First few games of August I got some tonkings and finally relented and dipped into the £12m budget I'd been given and signed a few players to bolster the ranks and I survived, that said however the promise faded despite the consecutive promotions up to that point the club did then get stuck in a rut around 15th and I just couldn't push the club any further.

I think my first game well and truly prooves we're not fit for the premiership, I signed 7-8 odd players to improve the quality of the squad, I know they havent had time to settle, but my first game against media prediction 16th sunderland, and we lose 5-1. With Gyan hitting a hat-trick, despite the fact I set him to be man-marked and closed down and.. tackled hard. He just made a joke out of us.

had a surprise win against man utd.. a extremely lucky one, then trounced by man city 2-0, but they had 48 shotsl! 48! bloody hell I was lucky not to be like 8-0 down. Also had a my board accept a bid for one of my backup players who I rated quite highly, which was a bit annoying, but it was £1 million for a player I'd be surprised to get half that for, and I was lucky to find an 18 year old close to his quality on a free - so overall it ended a nice profit and not a big disadvantage.

Replying to myself! but one or two asked me to update how I get along, I'm moving slowly through the season and only 14 games in so far, I seem to hover around 13th, and get absolutely trounced some games, then pull off a surprise win or draw a game later. It's very topsy turvy, and some games are absolutely nerve-wrecking because the enemy has so many shots. But that's to be expected really, we're the worst passer's in the league and we don't have the quality of any other team. Yet we're doing surprisingly well, and we've pulled off wins against the two teams I got promoted alongside, generally we do a lot better against the lower teams although, although it's very hit and miss. Either way, I finally believe we can survive in the premiership for this season.

I moved all of the transfer budget I could into wages, and we're at.. 140k/week max and despite this move, we're raking money in, gone from 2 million in debt to almost 7 million in the bank and I'm only at the end of november. I'm very glad I didnt try to save money and not spend.

If you don't enjoy winning promotion you shouldn't be playing the game.

Unless you cheated, in which case in my eyes it's not worth playing the game.

I took over as manager of Alicante when they were promoted to the Liga Adelante and in my second season in the division I was in the promotion race. In January the Chairman began talk over talks with a "fans trust" and those talks ran for seven months, I was promoted I lost several players a few due to retirement and a few back-up players on free's and not being able to strenghen the squad in the Summer I was actually a little gutted to have acheived promotion. Luckily the takeover was completed two weeks before the window shut and managed to get a few players in and one or two loanee's and just about survived my first season in Liga BBVA.

That's the only time I wasn't exactly happy being promoted but did enjoy the challenge of trying to keep them in top division.

I actually had my best save ever last year when i took a poor west ham side to the premiership. I signed 2 Brazilians,a striker and an attacking midfielder and they were absolutely brilliant for me. Iactually ended up finishing 12th in the league and even upsetting a few big name teams too.You should take charge of every game now instead of going on holiday,it will be really enjoyable.

I do still holiday some games to be honest, - thing is, when I go up against a big team and they do 46 shots on goal it's a bit unbearable to watch, It's like.. just painful.

We survived! 14th, around 3 points clear of relegation, it was a close-fought battle. Got an incredible cup run too we kept getting championship teams, even when we were drew against liverpool or the team 18th in the championship... I was thinking "Oh ****, we cant beat liverpool" and you know what happened? the championship team did it for us! hah. I only had to face two premier league teams, and that was Bolton who finished 17th, and Wolves who were involved in the relegation dogfight but had a run of form to push them to 11th. Newcastle were in the semi's too, so it was like "battle of the relegation favourites" in cup form. We scraped by Bolton on penalties after a 2-2 game, and then when the final against Wolves came, I wasn't very confident, they were in good form, and I hadn't fared well against wolves before, lost 1, drawn 1, didnt look like we had a chance of beating them in the league. So I take a gamble, I throw in 4-3-3 a formation we don't usually use as I feel I have to try *something* different. We end up winning 2-0, with us dominating posession, but Wolves getting a lot of shots in still - and 3 clear cut chances.

Now I have a problem though, despite us getting a european place and some silverware, all of my best players refuse to negotate new contracts and have "very little interest". Even my goalkeeper who has performed magnifiscently this season, he's literally saved my season, and got himself a scotland call-up from it to boot, he's been doing brilliantly, but he'd struggle to get first team football elsewhere I honestly think as his stats aren't stunning.

I don't get it, they've been enjoying football with us, they've been doing fantastic, yet, they dont want to stay, it's ridiculous.

What's happened with your stadium exactly? Did they give you a new one when you went up?