benrollo

Got good numbers in the right areas hasn't he. Our senior side is probably strongest up front, need to make sure he gets minutes!

Appreciate it mate cheers! Being a Data Analyst for a living has its advantages

A pretty similar season to last time out really. Flirted with the playoffs but I don't think we were as good as our position shows - good home form carried us through to be honest. Youth players mostly played out of necessity than them blowing us away with their ability. We were super short at centre back, which is why Koichi Mori 24-6 ended up with most appearances of our graduates. He really is pretty crap, and our defense as a whole were way below J3 league average. Thankfully, offensively we were way above average, and that carried us through. Hiroki Scharod Akai was our best player, with 12 goals and 2 assists on his way to a 7.06 rating. Shinsuke Sato 24-2 was actually our best player average rating wise, but whilst he made 21 appearances, 16 were off the bench. We had multiple upgrades to Youth Recruitment and Junior Coaching over the season, along with a training facilities upgrade too. Things might slow down a bit now until I can get those facilities upgraded again, but I'll keep pestering the board! On the 2025 graduates front, there was definitely a step up from 2024. But still nothing particularly mind blowing! Suzuki being marked as 5* potential probably says more about our coaching staff than his ability. But we were so weak at left back that he's already first choice! Quick and a decent finisher. Maybe not much more than that, but there could be something here if Kikuchi develops. A young promising keeper is always a nice sight. Those attributes don't really scream that he'll be ready any time soon though. Our 32 year old number 1 will need to stick around for a few more years I reckon!

With the financials I've seen so far with Criacao in J3, the money to fund youth recruitment and junior coaching etc is definitely there. It's simply a case of pestering the board enough to get them to cave in! I managed it by May time (started with them in January), and saw youth candidates come through in November.

I holidayed forward 3 seasons in Japan yesterday to check intakes. All clubs had yearly intakes of youngsters, but they didn't show up in that tab at all. A bug surely!

Another FM, another chance to dust off the Power BI report :D. A successful opening season. A real challenge starting with nothing on the youth front, but after constant pestering, the board relented about 3 months in to the season. Managed to get two more recruitment upgrades in over the season too. Things were shaky at times though. With only 14 players in the club, there were times when our backup keeper had to play out on pitch. And we regularly played with formations like this just to get the most out of the players we had. Far and away our outstanding looking prospect. We are actually relatively strong up top, but won't be long before Murakami is a regular I imagine. Sato had the highest total attribute count of all the new players, without standing out as much as Murakami. My weird asymmetric formation had a left winger and an AM, mostly because we had basically nobody able to play on the right. Not sure if Sato is that guy, but we'll find out. Probably says quite a bit that Hiraoka is a top 3 prospect. We're pretty thin on the ground. But I've got my eye on a potential ball winning midfielder here I think. Next season hopefully we push on with the upgrades and get some more promising prospects through. The squad are aging, with 9 of my original 14 aged 29 or older. So let's get some more talented fresh blood in there!

Edit: I actually wonder if there's a bug causing this conflict. Looking at the Intake Distribution, it looks like there are no players who have come through. Wonder if that's why it's a half star intake?

Honestly if they get the youth recruitment sorted for JFL clubs there's a lot of potential. Decent financials from what I can see so far. Waiting to see if I've managed to get my recruitment increased in sufficient time to get a batch of youngsters this season!

It took pretty much constant pestering for months but in mid May we've made a big step forward:

A pretty unremarkable 3-1 victory which we did just about deserve... Notable for the fact that Yu Kanoshima is my number 2 goalie. Outfield rating of 1, but 81% pass completion! 4 injuries and zero youth players = desperate times.

Ah this is interesting, and concerning. I'll holiday forward a few seasons and see what it looks like

Yeah that is painful. Hope my team at least have a few decent players kicking about to get off to a good start and get the board onside

So after 69 (nice) re-loads and 8 different teams coming up, I've decided to go for... Criacao finished 15th of 16 teams in 2022, but managed to avoid relegation because 2 teams from the JFL were promoted to the J3 league that season. Should be an interesting test!

Yeah Honda seem interesting. I'm on my 17th reset now and defo seen them the most. I wonder if that motor company money will help them out? Seen 6 different teams come up, but not Okinawa yet. I'm going to keep going Edit: Okinawa only got promoted into the 4th tier last season, would be a long shot to see them come up I think!

OK, more Japan spam and then I'm done until I find the right team! I've tested a few save points to get fresh teams on the 15th January, and it looks like 30th November might be the sweet spot. Save on that date, then holiday to the 15th January, and you should get fresh teams each time. Happy hunting!