Lower League Management....My Dilema !, Please advise ..

The scenario, I started a full time Career game. Sunday League footballer as past experiance and unemployed. 20 Divisions loaded in 8 Countries, All England, All Scotland, Top 2 Italy, Top 2 Spain, Top 2 Germany, Top 2 France, and the Top League in both Portugal and Holland. I also loaded all players from Argentina and Brazil. I did this as I wanted to have an authentic as possible game and decent Eoropean competition without "greys" . I started as unemployed and was planning to take the 1st available "realistic" job offered to me (ie I would only take a job in either the Scots 3rd Division or the English BSS or BSN) . This is where my management teeth in FM2008 would be cut. I set my favourite club as Aberdeen as I wanted to eventually take over them and lead them to past glories not witnessed since the Fergie Glory days of the eary 80's.

March 2008 and I was offered my 1st job, Eastleigh in the BSS, 18th position (media prediction 16th !!!, why was the manager sacked ?). Wage budget £4321 per week. and a Transfer kitty of 0. The prev manager had spent whatever there was and had bought carp. They were 275K in debt and wanted to have a respectable position in the BSS by the end of the 2 year plan. They were also £365 per week above the wage budget (massive in lower league management) My Stadium (nay stand) was / is 2300 with 175 seated and the average attendance was 452 !!!!!.

I had expected to spend maybe 4-5 seasons fixing the finances and get them promoted and possible push to league 2 and all the while raising my reputation and hopefully better job offers. I wanted to travel the leagues of Europe before arriving as the Messiah at Pittodrie.

My dilema ?, I have done all of this within 2 years and my name is being touted around the English Championship and League 1 as well as any job available in the Scot's 1st and lower.

Why ?,

1st season and with only 8 games to play I won 4 and drew 4 only just missing out on the play off's by 4 point's. I brought in a couple of Free's , a goalkeeper, winger and striker.

2nd season and my 1st full season, nothing spectacular in any of the cups, but I clinched the championship on the last day of the season by 1 point when the 2 teams that were above me played each other and could only draw. (the promotion came despite the fact I was quoted as 50-1 outsiders). I lowered the wage budget by releasing about 20 players that were dead wood. I couldn't do anything about the balance, it wasn't getting any worse but -300k is not nice. Each month update would come with the congrats on the wages but we are deeply concerned about the bank balance.

This season I have managed to sell a couple of the hero's from the promotion team for 35K, 75K, 80K and then 100K, all of these at the time were club record fee's , all of them went with a +50% future fee as weel .

So the finance are healthy, my squad is good, and I am firing on all cylinders. But I don't know wether I would leave or not . I know it is only a game but I am totally immersed .Now this is a good thing and I have made a rule, I will not apply for any job but will move if I am approached and I like the appeal. However if I say move to a club in Scotland, then obviously Aberdeen will see 1st hand my credentials and hopefully will offer me a job sooner or later, or would they ? Also if i did move to another club and then did just as well, Aberddeen came in for me , and I accepted, i don't think I would ever leave them, therefor miss out on a decent globetrotting career. At the moment I am 10th in the BSP after telling the board I would avoid relegation (so I am well exceeding expectations) I am also in all cups and have knocked both Leyton Orient and Barnsley (both L1 teams out of the FA Cup) to reach the 4th round draw.) I am on a 9 game unbeaten run, (8 wins in a row) and i seriously think I can reach the play-offs. I would back my team against any other in the division in a knock out competition.

Here's a few links to my achievments so far

As you can see, i ain't doing too bad , but I can't seem to keep a clean sheet. well proud of my 2 FA cup results though.

So my question is this should i stay or should I go ?, Stick with the one club or travel in the hope of a fulfilling career. Also Aberdeen are in serious danger of being relegated and the manager is in serious threat, would i be considered a contender this early in my careeer ?

The scenario, I started a full time Career game. Sunday League footballer as past experiance and unemployed. 20 Divisions loaded in 8 Countries, All England, All Scotland, Top 2 Italy, Top 2 Spain, Top 2 Germany, Top 2 France, and the Top League in both Portugal and Holland. I also loaded all players from Argentina and Brazil. I did this as I wanted to have an authentic as possible game and decent Eoropean competition without "greys" . I started as unemployed and was planning to take the 1st available "realistic" job offered to me (ie I would only take a job in either the Scots 3rd Division or the English BSS or BSN) . This is where my management teeth in FM2008 would be cut. I set my favourite club as Aberdeen as I wanted to eventually take over them and lead them to past glories not witnessed since the Fergie Glory days of the eary 80's.

March 2008 and I was offered my 1st job, Eastleigh in the BSS, 18th position (media prediction 16th !!!, why was the manager sacked ?). Wage budget £4321 per week. and a Transfer kitty of 0. The prev manager had spent whatever there was and had bought carp. They were 275K in debt and wanted to have a respectable position in the BSS by the end of the 2 year plan. They were also £365 per week above the wage budget (massive in lower league management) My Stadium (nay stand) was / is 2300 with 175 seated and the average attendance was 452 !!!!!.

I had expected to spend maybe 4-5 seasons fixing the finances and get them promoted and possible push to league 2 and all the while raising my reputation and hopefully better job offers. I wanted to travel the leagues of Europe before arriving as the Messiah at Pittodrie.

My dilema ?, I have done all of this within 2 years and my name is being touted around the English Championship and League 1 as well as any job available in the Scot's 1st and lower.

Why ?,

1st season and with only 8 games to play I won 4 and drew 4 only just missing out on the play off's by 4 point's. I brought in a couple of Free's , a goalkeeper, winger and striker.

2nd season and my 1st full season, nothing spectacular in any of the cups, but I clinched the championship on the last day of the season by 1 point when the 2 teams that were above me played each other and could only draw. (the promotion came despite the fact I was quoted as 50-1 outsiders). I lowered the wage budget by releasing about 20 players that were dead wood. I couldn't do anything about the balance, it wasn't getting any worse but -300k is not nice. Each month update would come with the congrats on the wages but we are deeply concerned about the bank balance.

This season I have managed to sell a couple of the hero's from the promotion team for 35K, 75K, 80K and then 100K, all of these at the time were club record fee's , all of them went with a +50% future fee as weel .

So the finance are healthy, my squad is good, and I am firing on all cylinders. But I don't know wether I would leave or not . I know it is only a game but I am totally immersed .Now this is a good thing and I have made a rule, I will not apply for any job but will move if I am approached and I like the appeal. However if I say move to a club in Scotland, then obviously Aberdeen will see 1st hand my credentials and hopefully will offer me a job sooner or later, or would they ? Also if i did move to another club and then did just as well, Aberddeen came in for me , and I accepted, i don't think I would ever leave them, therefor miss out on a decent globetrotting career. At the moment I am 10th in the BSP after telling the board I would avoid relegation (so I am well exceeding expectations) I am also in all cups and have knocked both Leyton Orient and Barnsley (both L1 teams out of the FA Cup) to reach the 4th round draw.) I am on a 9 game unbeaten run, (8 wins in a row) and i seriously think I can reach the play-offs. I would back my team against any other in the division in a knock out competition.

Here's a few links to my achievments so far

As you can see, i ain't doing too bad , but I can't seem to keep a clean sheet. well proud of my 2 FA cup results though.

So my question is this should i stay or should I go ?, Stick with the one club or travel in the hope of a fulfilling career. Also Aberdeen are in serious danger of being relegated and the manager is in serious threat, would i be considered a contender this early in my careeer ?

Stay mate. Always stay. in 10 more seasons, I'm sure you'll be Champ/Div 1 maybe even Prem, and it'll be fully worth it.

Stay there is great Satisfaction in taking a team all the way up the leagues

Good writing - this is one of those rare long original posts that I can actually get through.

Personally I would say that if Aberdeen opens up, you should go for it (they're your favorite club for a reason). Also, who knows when it might open up again.

Otherwise, I would consider clubs a few levels above yours, but can definitely see the good points of the two posts directly above mine.

I would leave. Life is too short to spend all your life in the non-leagues. Take a Championship offer with a view to in another couple of years taking over at Aberdeen. Wasn't that your target in the first place?

i would say stay there a few more seasons, like till you get to L2, or till a decent scottish div 1 or 2 opens up, and move to them.

you will need to manage in scotland (to gain knowledge of scotland) its a silly thing, but it has to happen. that is if you want them to offer you the job, if you just want to manage them full stop, it doesn't matter about managing in scotland.

congrats on your success with eastleigh

liked the post and i will keep returning to check on your progress

stay i think, i did the same as you but with redditch, BSN to L2 in 3 seasons(1000-11 outsiders first time and 50-1 second) just started my fifth season i think ill complete this on then move on.

how did you get considered for champions ship jobs, i got 2 promotions and 2 fourth round fa cups and most i can hope for is a ddecent league 2 club.

Thank you all for the replies, some good sound advice . I can honestly see the appeal in staying long term, untold glory with theultimate underdog. I can also see the appeal of moving from club to club, building my cv and knowledge on the way. However I honestly feel that if I was to be offered the Aberdeen job (and I don't expect to get an approach for a few seasons at least) then once I am there I will not leave for no one. So despite the great advice my dilema remains. I suppose there is always the option of different saves, ie keep one game with LLM going, a new one for any globetrotting and one exclusively for Aberdeen. I like to try ad be as fair as possible (no cheat tools, my own designed tactics, training schedules (all 36 of them and even player and staff search filters) so if i used seperate saves would that not constitute cheating ?

Also just had time to re-read my post, sorry about the spellings , it was written really late and the ability not to edit your posts here is shocking. Also I have a few weeks holiday and since the kids are at school and my other half is ill (therefor wants to say in bed) I have time to commit to my adventure , will keep updated.

Finally a link to my title winning pic, seems the original was uploaded upside down

Personally I would stay, but I too see the benefit in expanding your CV. The most fun I have had on FM's is bringing a club from nowhere to the forefront of world football!

What was your aim when you began the game? Do you want to stick with it or change the focus?

Me, I tend to do what I would do IRL, which is usually move to the better position. Then again, I often start new games to get new experiences.

I think you should stay until you literally cannot do any more with what you've got. At the moment you've probably got scope to get this team through a couple more divisions, so go with it.

On CM3 I took Hereford from the Conference to the Premiership. Whilst it was a great achievement, staying in the Premiership was an impossibility, the club had over extended itself. I was getting gates of 12000 in the prem with a stadium capacity of 15000 (hereford isn't a big place). The wages demanded were much higher than the club could afford, so I lost all my best players (ungrateful sods!). I couldn't attract any good players, so I knew the time had come to move on. So, keep playing with Eastleigh until you get the feeling that there is nothing more you can do.

i had a similar situation on 07 thinking about it...

i got southend to win the champions league in the 11/12 season. then i got arsenal offer me a job. i am a southend fan and i couldn't decide, so much so that it had me thinking bout it for days. so at the end i saved it and did both. cheating i know but i couldnt choose, even though i hate arsenal, i wanted a change kinda...

good luck tho. hows it going?

not doing too bad, well a lot better than either the board or bookies had expected, 40 - 1 to win BSP, and although I didn't win it (no-where near) I did sneak a play-off place on the 2nd to last game of the season .

As I had said in my previous post I would back me against any other in the division in a knock out game and so it proved. I drew 1-1 against Rochdale in the 1st leg at home, and beat them 2-1 in the 2nd leg to win 3-2 on agg (that despite the fans being pessimistic and wanting to keep the score respectable), I had never beat them prior to the 2nd leg. The final was against Oxford (another team I had failed to beat), but luckilly the 4 players I got on loan from my Parent Club Portsmouth were all fit and on fire, I played REALLY defensive and counter attack, beat them 2-0, which resulted in little old Eastleigh being promoted to the dizzying heights of League 2.

The press linking me to other jobs seems to have dried up, I guess when you are winning things as opposed to just challenging for the play offs you are more in the public eye. Aberdeen seem to be going from bad to desperate, they now have a former Hearts (our most hated rivals after Rangers in charge) Jim Jeffries, that is just sacrilege, I will make a point this season of commenting on his every move whenever a result goes against my beloved Dons.

It's really late now and the missus has been in twice now telling me to go to bed (I have been playing over 4 hours non stop , she doesn't seem to understand my devotion to this game . Anyway The outlook for this season is BOard expectation, avoid relegation and gain comfortable L2 status after 3 years, my aim is mid table this year and play-offs maybe next year or the year after (if I am still there). Despite me keeping the wages well within limit for 2 seasons now and the finances to be really secure 800k +, I still have not been given a transfer fund. So it looks like i will be selling my hero's again and scraping the free tyransfer barrell.

Some screen shots to be posted tomorrow. Please excuse any sp mistakes.........it's late

Wow, my grammer and writing goes all to pot the later it get's , time to start giving this thread some structure.

Starting with some screen shots depicting how promotion was achieved last season.

My last screen shot of the original post shows of my proud achievement of beating succesive L1 teams (Leyton Orient and then Barnsley) to reach the 4th Round of the FA Cup.

I have often wondered wether there was such a thing as a Cup Hangover (the fabled excuse always trotted out whenever a good Cup run is blamed for poor results elsewhere.) As this screen shot shows I would say it does. prior to playing Championship Wolves I was in contention for an easy top 3 finish and still in both the Setanta Shield and FA Trophy.

So out of all three Cup Competitions in the matter of a few days (lack of self belief / mental strength or too may games in quick succession ?).

After the Wolves game as well as defeats in the other Cups I also went on a patchy league run (12 points from 24).

Then the TV camera's roll into town (for the 1st and only time that season), we win 1-0 (a clean sheet yeah ! . We then went on a run to the end of the season when we were beat only once more (Rochdale, they were quickly becoming my bogey team)

Alas I had a morale boosting 3-0 win on the last day of the season against the Champs York. which left my players on a high and ready for anything...Rochdale in the play-off's could it get any more difficult ?, well yes it could, Oxford in the Final (had yet to beat the as well). The Players went onto the field with a "no pressure" in their ears and then a "for the fans" at half time, it worked we won 2-0 and 3 of my players praised my team talk after the match .

here's the last set of results and the final league table,

So here I am about to enter a brave new world in charge of a fully proffesional club for the first time in their history. How do you celebrate such a feat ?, the only you can if your Board still refuse any transfer funds. Sell your best players and bring in more bargain basement boys.

A few notes on these, although the fees look small, I was getting rid of those on high wages and also the ones that although had good stats they lacked pace. I have come to the conclusion that I have leaked so may goals due to the overall slowness of my team, something I hope to rectify this season.

Also it is a fond farewell to my 1st two signings Zouzou (a Dutch rock at the heart of my BSS winning team) and Neagu (a Romanian Legend that score 28 goals in 36 games for me). Alas they got less than 10 games between them last season, and when the 25% wage increase for promotion kicked in they had to go.......no room for sentiment.

I have also found that the difference in wages betwen part time and full time contracts to be astronomical. I was getting away with part time contracts on anything from £5 per week to £125. This meant I could sign up almost any free transfer that was willing to come and then sell them on at a profit (something I have taken advantage off over the past 2 seasons). This season with more realistic wages I have signed fewer players but doubled my wages .

Another note, in the matter of a few days I SMASHED my Transfer fee paid record £1k and then £10k ha ha (the players were worth £51k and £85k respectively though, so i guess my extravagence is justified).

Going to start this season now, hoping to be finished by Wednesday, so will post more updates when able to.

sorry, here's the correct link to my transfres

Also I have been made odd's on favourites for relegation (media prediction 24th of 24 . And odds of 40-1 to win the league. It's gonna be a tough season, wish me luck .

ps i found myself looking for Eastleighs reult in real life at the weekend (anyone else do this ?) They lost 4-1 at home to Hayes and Yeading

Stay! I've made the mistake of falling for big club's lures before. Sacked from Inter Milan for lack of instant success and also the same from Real Madrid. I should've stuck with my brilliant, young Leeds side.

yea, when i take a lil club on, i look at their results

i did it a few years back with aldershot!

and leave poor jim jeffries alone

ok he's not as good as craig levien, but still... and yes, i am a jambo lol

good job gettin a romanian, they always do well in the english leagues

looks like you are doing well, i was thinking of starting a similar game the other day, but instead i started a scotland game. knocked italy out at qualifying stages and i have england swiss and germans in the euro cup group stages :s

but we are playing rele well undefeated

Beware of signing seyfo soley!

Always sign him for L1 or L2 clubs but he plays carp.

Why did you release Matonne Awang? I signed him for my debut League 2 season with Kettering and he looked promising. How did he do for your team? Cheers.

Fantastic posts by the way.

As for Seyfo, I am in BSS, with Potters Bar, yes ignore my team I edited them into the league haha. I also sigend Mr Soley, and he came in in my second game in the league, after 4 appearances he has 4 Goals, 1 MoM and several assists. Currently in a fight for the player I rate the highest...

Yes thats why i said i sign him for L1 or L2 clubs. So can you read the posts carefully before replying with sarcastic undertones please.

i have officially started this game, but have no club yet...

i have all english, scottish and belgian leagues, the top few of italy, france, germany, spain, portugal, holland, and romania.

dont rele mind what club i end up managing, as long as its not a club i have in another game (at least not in the first few years)

i am employed as manager of stafford in mid september.

i been away for a bit so i've not done much yet