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*** | iacovone's Behind The Curtain: Travels in Eastern Europe | ***


iacovone

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Hello, welcome. You may remember me from such careers as....oh what? It appears last year's career has been purged. Taken against it's will (allegedly). Anyway, I once had a good career that I documented here okay?

Where to begin...I've spent most of FM12 seeing to the big European nation small club to big club challenge. If you're at all interested in my Novese file (which went on to Champions League victory no less) you can find it here.

Now, onto more pressing matters. This is a career I hoped to get underway last year but never got round to. It had endured countless discussions with Crouchaldinho but sadly never came to fruition because of various commitments.

This time however, I'm taking the plunge!

behind-the-curtain.jpg

The plan?

Based on Jonathan Wilson's book Behind the Curtain I will embark on an escapade around the Eastern European nations. Therefore I have loaded the following leagues:

Belarus | Bulgaria | Croatia | Czech Rep. | Hungary | Poland | Romania | Russia | Serbia | Slovakia | Slovenia | Ukraine |

To provide a source of crap south American's to the database I've also added:

Brazil | Argentina | Mexico

I may add some more leagues as I progress but the plan is to remain in eastern Europe. Hopefully I'll be able to create one of the great dynasties, much like Valeriy Lobanovsky's Dynamo Kiev. Because that's the beauty of eastern European football. As fractious as the nationhood is, there has always been enduring tales from truly unlikely places.

I hope to create the next in the list.

My setup:

Start Date: June 2011

Manager Name: Alexander Romantsev

Manager Nationality: Lithuanian

Manager Reputation: Sunday League footballer

Attribute masking is on

Starting unemployed

My rules

As ever, I will play this game as realistically as possible. So if a genuinely fantastic managerial offer comes in, I'll take it. I won't deliberately plunge my team into hideous debt just for the sake of signing the 'next whoever'. I will attempt to manage in all 12 nations along the way but will begin with the lowest reputation possible.

I think that's everything. Wish me luck :)

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| Season  |      Club     |      League      | Position |      Achievements      | Wage p/w |
|---------|---------------|------------------|----------|------------------------|----------|
| 2011/12 |      HASK     |  Croatian Div 2  |   11th   |        Survived        |  £1,000  |
| 2012/13 |      HASK     |  Croatian Div 2  |   16th   |  Sacked after 5 games  |  £1,000  |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| 2013    | Dnepr Mogilev | Belorusian Div 2 |   16th   | Resigned after 5 games |  £1,200  |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

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Humble Beginnings

NK HASK

Transfer Budget: £2,600

Wage Budget: £3.6k p/w

Founded in 1903 and based in Zagreb, HASK have long tradition in Croatian football. They were refounded in 1990 and later merged with NK Naftas in 2006. The NK HASK Stadion holds a mere 2000 people with the vast majority housed in the below stand.

We're predicted to come 12th out of 15 in a league that relegates four teams. This could be tricky.

Stadion_NK_HASK_Nasice.jpg

The club are affectionately known as 'Akademicari' or The Academics :cool:

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Looking forward to this!
Good luck mate! :)
Good Luck with this.

Thanks chaps :)

Good luck iacovone, it will make for a good change to be back at a very low level after winning everything with Novese.

I think so too Romanista. I've missed slugging it out at the very bottom! Going to avoid using the tactic I used with Novese and develop something new. See if I've learnt anything :D

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This is going to be worth following. It just HASK to be!

Best of luck.

:D Brilliant.

Good Luck Iacovone, this looks excellent, I will follow with interest, as I do all your stories. This here is something I have always thought about doing as well, some sort of Eastern European Career.

Cheers LLR, I'm excited :)

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Welcome back Iacovone and good luck with Hask
Awesome stuff! Great opening and looking forward to following your adventures, Iacovone!

And I may even be tempted to 'join' you in the not too distant future.

Good luck in your first job at HASK!

Good to see you back iacovone! Looking forward to this.
An iacovone career!

Yeeeeeeeeessssssssssssssssssss. :D

I was sorta lurking in the Big Euro Nation challenge thread towards the end of your career with Novese, so I will be following this one all the way :D Good luck in Croatia!

Thanks guys, I feel like a celebrity :D

This is awesome. They guy who got me reading this forum is back.

:applause:

Too kind!

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HASK - August 2011 Update

So I've managed to upset the players already.

After saying it wasn't my dream job, I proceeded to offer them a 'low' bonus for the league and cup. We've got to stay reasonably financially prudent after all!

Then, they alerted me to the fact we didn't have a coach with fitness > 1. So I'm addressing that now. But suffice to say, with a few days before the league season kicks off, we're already in a bit of bother!

Anyway, the players I believe will be good enough to keep us in the division:

Stipe Nevistic (GK)

Igor Tolic (SW/DRC)

Mirko Selak (AML/ST)

Dado Hamzagic (M/AMC)

I don't expect much, just a bit of fight! Hamzagic should be the best of the lot whilst Nevistic is a very useful keeper for this level (particularly being 18 too). Tolic is the club captain and Selak looks good enough to grab some goals. Let's see.

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A quick update: we're doing ok. Sitting mid-table after 7 games. But I have a major problem! My captain Tolic just refuses to listen to me! Every team talk I give he switches off and loses morale. It's 'abysmal' every game. Not good!

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HASK - November 2011 Update

So it's been a pretty good start to my time at HASK. The main man has been Kresimir Trepsic who joined us on loan from Zagreb. He has 5 in 5 so far. I was particularly disappointed with our heavy 4-0 loss to 10 man Junar but the win at Medimurje more than made up for it. I'm getting stuck into the other managers in the league who keep touting us for relegation too. Love a bit of verbal sparring with these two-bob nobodies! Unlike me of course...

:D

NKHASKFixtures_Fixtures-1.jpg

CroatianSecondDivisionOverview_Stages-1.jpg

It's a fairly short season - just the 28 games so we're making good progress. If we carry on in this vein we should stay up. Not bad for my first venture!

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Going well so far. Really tempted to join you on this adventure in my own save. :D

Ha! I forgot how much I missed a career save. Having the option to just up sticks and leave if I get bored is great. Though I'm also a little regretful that I only did eastern Europe (despite the name of the thread and idea behind it!). May well open up a ton of new leagues at the end of the season :D

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My new club, Brescia, have just picked up their first point with me as manager against Taranto at the Erasmo Iacovone. Reminded me of someone but I can't think who....... :p

:D Love those little guys

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HASK - April 2012 Update

NKHASKFixtures_Fixtures-2-1.jpg

CroatianSecondDivisionOverview_Stages-2-1.jpg

So with just seven games remaining we're just about on course to survive the dreaded relegation in my first year at HASK. As you can see, results up to the Winter break were pretty awful and that led to my decision to switch to formations.

We're now playing with a much more open 3-5-2 set-up which has been much more productive. Aside from the thrashing Solin handed us, we've competed well in 2012, snatching three victories and a couple of draws to keep our heads above water.

We should be okay in the run-in though I am acutely aware that we've not won in three games now. If I can address that mini-slump, we'll be charging our glasses to a wonderful campaign (ish).

Off the pitch has been eventful. Making Igor Tolic my captain is just about the worst decision I've made on FM. He's now been relegated to the bench even despite me adding an additional CB in our formation. He switches off in teamtalks, has scored an own goal and is constantly injured. He really hates me. But in spite of all that, I've kept him as far from disrupting the team as possible. I may have to rethink that captaincy choice in the summer.

I'll hopefully be reporting on a survival story come the next update. Stay tuned!

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