[FM16] The Last Great City: Building Berlin

JD nawrat · March 22, 2016

London, Paris, Rome, Milan, Madrid, Barcelona, Munich, Manchester, Glasgow... Great footballing cities, littered with teams with a great history and a prominent name in European and domestic football. Absent from the list? Berlin.

Ah, Berlin... a great city, home to over three and a half million citizens; a city wrought with a deep and tremendous history and yet lacking in the one thing that makes it stand out from the rest of the cities mentioned... it lacks the presence of a glorious footballing side.

For years, the city of Munich has dominated the German football scene. Undeniably, Munich is home to a great club and is worthy of its name at the forefront of German, and by extension, of European football. But Berlin... Berlin hasn't yet made that mark on the sport.

Until now. Meet the man determined to change the face of football in Berlin and Germany forever. Meet Jörg Rosenberg.

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Born in the city of Berlin, Rosenberg is a product of all the city has to offer, but he also holds the drive and determination to make Hertha Berlin great. Born in April of 1974, the 41 year old is set to take up management for the first time in his career. Having previously never played at a level higher than professional mid-table and enjoying a relatively quiet playing career, Rosenberg has worked his way through the coaching system and enjoyed a fruitful career at Hertha, working with multiple levels of the youth team and a short seasonal spell as a first team coach.

So here we are. The tactical setups of our manager. The man who plans to change the fortunes of Hertha and German football.

And the early results:

A pretty fleeting OP, just getting to the point. Will be posting some more in-depth stuff shortly.

But just a few quick pointers: I tried a similar save with Union Berlin last season's version of FM but it didn't work out in the end. I'm going to do something similar but I didn't want to use Union again, so I've opted for Hertha.

I'll be doing monthly updates with results, stand out players etc - if you've ever read one of my FMCU threads, it'll be the same as those.

The Aims:

- Qualify for European Football - Achieved 2015-16

- Qualify for Champions League Football - Achieved 2015-16

- Win the DFB-Pokal

- Win the Bundesliga - Achieved 2016-17

- Win a European Honour

- Win the Champions League

- Establish Hertha as a major force in German football, where victory in most games is expected

- Establish Hertha as a major force in European football

 Season | Bundesliga | DFB-Pokal | European Football | Other Notes
--------|------------|-----------|-------------------|-----------------------------------------------
2015-16 |     3rd    | 2nd Round |        N/A        | Qualified for CL
--------|------------|-----------|-------------------|-----------------------------------------------
2016-17 |     1st    |   Semis   |  1st Rnd KO of EL | Manager of the Season
--------|------------|-----------|-------------------|-----------------------------------------------
2017-18 |     1st    | 2nd Round |   Quarter-Finals  | Manager of the Season

kingjericho · March 22, 2016

Good luck m8y

JD nawrat · March 22, 2016

Building Berlin - August 2015

So after a reasonably strong pre-season where the foundations of the new system were set, I brought in nobody due to a lack of transfer funds made available to me from the board. With a strong squad, it wasn't really an issue - we could have perhaps benefitted from a new CB as there was only two present at the club, but instead I called up young Nico Beyer from our U19s squad. He won't feature a great deal due to his inexperience but he definitely looks like he has the potential to be a regular featuring player in the Berlin team.

A German Cup tie away to Lubeck represented a decent opportunity for my first competitive match to kick off with victory. And victory we achieved. We dominated from kick-off and blasted Lubeck away with an early 3-0 lead. The second half we typically became complacent, stopped challenging the opposition and allowed them a consolation goal. Disappointing but ho hum, I'm happy to take the victory all the same!

In the league I wasn't quite sure what to expect, another game of complacency would be dangerous. But away to Darmstadt didn't represent the hardest of the challenges - they are new to the Bundesliga and are strongly tipped for relegation, and it proved as such. Despite a slow and tiresome performance from ourselves, Darmstadt failed to really challenge and we saw them aside with ease, thanks to American centre back John Brooks smashing home after a game of ping-pong in the box following a corner. Three points and a clean sheet in my league debut was pretty swell and would set a good precedent as we followed up in our first home game with another win to nil, this time disposing of HSV. Another side not really predicted to be near the top but definitely not a bad result, especially as it would turn out HSV would win the other two games in the league this month. Third up was Ingolstadt, another newly promoted side. At home I expected us to cruise past them and cruise we did - it turned out to be a standard performance with a decent two-nil victory.

So the league standings see us second after the first month of the season has passed. Definitely something to be pleased about. We're playing well and we look solid defensively which is very important to me, even though I'm likely to be a manager who favours goals more than clean sheets

Standout Players:

3. Valentin Stocker - The Swiss left winger was a thorn in the side of every team we played this month. He didn't get as involved as I had hoped which is pretty remarkable considering he played extremely well. Only the one goal, and a tap-in at that, but a good start all the same.

2. Genki Haraguchi - Until Roy Beerens got injured just days before the season started, Genki wasn't even in my XI plans. But he's grabbed the opportunity by the balls and has been sensational going down the flank, finding space and delivering dangerous balls into the box on a regular basis. Only the one assist to show for it but probably a couple dozen dangerous/key passes.

1. Vladimir Darida - The Czech midfielder has been our best player thus far, bagging a beautiful goal against Hamburg to open the scoring and generally being a danger in the central midfield area. Assisting the only goal of the game against Darmstadt helped him stand out as our player of the month for August.

Looking ahead to next month:

An early season top of the table clash between Dortmund and ourselves, who share identical results thus far, and then a couple of games that will give us a chance to keep up the victories hopefully.

Plenty to be happy with so far at Hertha

JD nawrat · March 22, 2016

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Unlikely victory but an extremely satisfying victory :cool: :cool:

dllu · March 22, 2016

Bayern may have the trophies, but you have the greatest stadium in all of Germany, if not all of Europe... :thup:

Dexter_Morgan · March 22, 2016

I've had a habit of starting Hertha games in the past (mostly when they were in the 2nd division) and never doing more than 2/3 seasons where some other save idea pops in to my head but i've always felt there's a lot of potential with them if you have the patience to keep at it due to decent facilities, the stadium and size of city :thup: Good luck and i'll be following

JD nawrat · March 23, 2016

Thanks for the messages guys

September update incoming...

JD nawrat · March 23, 2016

Building Berlin - September 2015

A flawless start to the season was all I had hoped for, but now we would look to continue that through the month of September. Two home ties and two away ties - including a trip to the Signal Iduna - represented some potentially tricky matches.

But they were some matches we were more than prepared for! The match against Dortmund we rode our luck, limited them to shots from the edge of the area and from difficult wide positions. We managed to snag a well worked goal which was Vedad Ibisevic's first for the club. We definitely got more than we deserved but you won't hear me complaining. The match after I thought we'd be in for an easier match, but after taking the lead through a stunning effort from Plattenhardt, we got complacent and conceded our first goal in the German top flight. We also dropped points for the first time which was obviously disappointing but it gave us enough to ensure we would stay undefeated, which in itself is great news. Mainz would be a challenge similar to Dortmund, surprisingly, as they came at us with everything they had. We managed to score against the run of play but once we got that goal things settled and we went back to our usual style of play and saw out a great win, 1-0. After that, Hoffe would try and deliver the first loss to Hertha but we stood strong and got a solid 2-0 victory, seeing us undefeated at the end of September with only one goal conceded in total.

So the league standings see us sitting top at this early stage. If only the league could end now

The best defence and the third best attack - everything bodes well for us right now. Obviously I'm not quite expecting to stay this high in the table but would be wonderful if we could finish top 6 in the first season. Certainly, so far, I'm feeling that we can do something like that. Although we have faced quite a few 'easy' challenges to this point, Dortmund aside.

Standout Players:

3. Genki Haraguchi - Following his inclusion in last month's standouts, Genki once again has appeared following a string of good performances with a couple of assists to boot. More of the same in terms of bright and entertaining performances with dangerous runs and a lot of exciting play.

2. Nicklas Stark - The lone defensive midfielder is doing a great job defensively, with a number of clean sheets, but he's also chipping in at the other end. He's a new signing at Hertha but I'm extremely pleased with the way he is playing. He's still very young, too, which is doubly pleasing.

1. Marvin Plattenhardt - Perhaps surprising to see a Left Back included here, but considering his strong defensive performances and contributions to clean sheets, the goal against Koln - a sublime finish from the edge of the box into the top corner - Plattenhardt has proven himself to be a hugely important player to the team so far through the season.

Looking ahead to next month:

A match against Bayern represents our biggest challenge yet but we'll look forward to it. After that we have a bunch of away games which will be tough but if the start of our season is anything to go by then I am fancying our chances in these games. First we have to get through the tough match against Bayern.

DavidBeckham · March 23, 2016

Finally you are back mate! Really looking forward to this and will definitely follow closely

Iggyhood · March 23, 2016

Ah Hertha! Remember a great save in the old CM days where I made them a German powerhouse before Bayern approached me ....IRL I still follow them and have visited the Olympiastadion a couple of times for games. Good luck!!!

JD nawrat · March 24, 2016

Building Berlin - October 2015

After two months we are still sitting near the top, but after October - almost a third of the way through the season - we'd have a clearer idea of what sort of position we'd be in.

And after two wins, two losses and a draw, you might expect I'd be unhappy, but it was a great month for us and I'm very pleased with how things went! Granted we struggled against Bayern - they had 25 shots to our 2 and the reality is that this could have quite easily been a 10-0 victory or something insane like that, but we showed enough quality defensively to not pour goals and we came away with a somewhat respectable lose (and I don't enjoy saying that because I'm never really happy to lose). Gladbach are not a team in form but they're a good team who have to be respected and so drawing at their place is something I can live with. We followed it up with a poor performance against Stuttgart (actually, it was our best performance of the season but in the next game I got a problem that meant I had to replay this match and the Koln match, both outcomes were the same), but we got another win with another clean sheet - we'd yet to concede in a winning effort, which is pretty remarkable, barring our 1st round game. We would of course lose that record, beating Wolfsburg 2-1. We came from behind and they ended the game with 9 men, but you won't catch me complaining. We played extremely well an we got a victory that is immensely pleasing. Not quite as satisfying as beating Dortmund, but not far from it. Sandwiched in the middle there was a loss to Koln. Perhaps I should have played a stronger team because they took points from us in the league at home and I should have expected a tough match, but I ****ed up and we are out of the Cup. I can live with that, to be honest.

Well colour me impressed. We're second in the league, one third through the league. I can't quite believe how well this season is going. I'm still getting questions about being relegated :lol:

:D

To be 9 points ahead of 5th place is a brilliant start to the league, and if we can keep this sort of form up through the season we will definitely be looking at a top four finish. Rather interestingly, Koln are bottom of the league and so far they've got a win and a draw out of me. Only Bayern can sport a better record

Standout Players:

3. John Brooks - Brooks is my favourite Hertha player in real life so by extension, at the moment, he's my favourite player on this save. The reason is because of his celebration at the World Cup when he realised he had scored. If you haven't seen it before, google it. Great moment. And every time he scores for us, I imagine he does this celebration. And even if he doesn't, who cares, because he's awesome

Brooks has been a dominant rock at the back for me. His rating is slightly boosted by missing out on the Bayern game through international duty, but what's the say he wouldn't have been the difference between a point and a 0-0 for us? Top player, though, someone I plan on building this team around and someone I hope to keep in the first team for the next 10 years if possible.

2. Valentin Stocker - The Swiss international is undoubtedly one of my best and most valuable players this season, and after two assists and a goal, he is proving to be invaluable to me. He has a lot of clubs interested in him as you can see and I'm worried I might not be able to keep him. But he is definitely top quality and I'm loving his performances. He'll feature here a couple more times in the future, I'm sure.

1. Genki Haraguchi - You could be forgiven for thinking I have a bit of a hard-on for Mr. Haraguchi. And I probably do. The Japanese international hasn't even scored for me this season, but once again his directness and his energy is unbelievable. I don't even have much more to say about the player, because his performances do all the talking for me. He is a real talent and similar to Stocker, I am concerned I may not be able to hang onto him, although it seems that that won't be an immediate issue, unlike Stocker who is generating interest already.

Looking ahead to next month:

Just the three games but what a huge three games it could be. Leverkusen are obviously right behind us, and whilst Schalke aren't doing well (11th), they're still a team that demand respect and I will have to be wary of. I wouldn't be surprised if they trouble us most, since we are away from home there. Early signs in the season definitely suggest we are going to be a far better home team than an away one. Hannover could turn out to be the only game where I get points, and this is one game I am aiming for all three, as I don't want to see less than three points being earned. That's a sort of bear-minimum target.

As an aside - following the loss to Koln (rather funnily) I got offered a new contract, which I obviously accepted. I'll be here for the next three seasons :cool:

(My laptop randomly cut out mid-way through typing this post up so apologies if there's remnants from the C+P job I carried out from last month's post)

Darius1998 · March 24, 2016

You're doing better than Hertha have done irl this season. Keep it up. :thup:

vossmaj · March 24, 2016

Bayern may have the trophies, but you have the greatest stadium in all of Germany, if not all of Europe...

That's strange... many people consider Hertha's home - the Olympiastadion - as pretty outstanding. And at the same time it seems to be one of the reasons why Hertha seems to fail to attract a decent attendance. They just did some research why so few people come to visit their matches (despite their current success sitting comforrtably third in the league) and one of the main reasons was the Stadium with it's track-and-field Thing (what's the English word for that?) keeping the supporters pretty far away from the pitch. Plus it seems to be a cold and windy place... :rolleyes: So maybe it's only a great Stadium when watching on TV or being their for the big matches and a sold out crowd guaranteeing a great atmosphere.

FYI: With regard to the average attendance Hertha is ranked 9th with 45,600 this season (despite having one of the biggest Stadiums in the by far biggest city of the country). And looking at the usage of capacity Hertha is by (very) far dead last with 63%. The next better club is Hannover with 82%...

JDownie, I really hope your impressive success so far gets the Berlin hipster crowd going!

@Dllu: Unless you have not been talking about Dortmund... who actually DO have the best stadium in Europe...

JD nawrat · March 24, 2016

The architecture of the stadium itself is beautiful, but the running track surrounding the pitch removes the fans from its atmosphere imo. It is definitely one of the most beautiful stadiums, but the separation from pitch to crowd is definitely a disappointing thing.

And cheers for the messages. I'm loving this save.

Jason the Yank · March 25, 2016

Not Union?

JD nawrat · March 25, 2016

Not Union?

Didn't want to use your suggestion two seasons in a row, might develop an ego

Plus I don't really like Union, whereas I have a soft spot for Hertha irl for some reason.

Didn't play today but will be continuing over the weekend, especially Saturday night because I'm off work on Sunday :cool:

JD nawrat · March 27, 2016

Building Berlin - November 2015

Nearing the half point of the season, we were getting to the nitty gritty and taking on the tougher teams. But we've got Genki Haraguchi - anything is possible :cool:

I aimed for a minimum of three and we almost took max :cool:

Two home wins and a strong away draw, featuring two clean sheets, puts us in a supreme position and keeps our season looking fantastic so far.

The match against Hannover was settled by a solitary goal from Nicklas Stark, who is now our joint top goalscorer this season. Pretty remarkable, huh?

DM who plays as a BWM/S is joint top scorer... dear oh dear. But as long as we keep picking up the wins I'm more than happy - Hannover didn't threaten us once the whole game, they had three shots and none of them were on target, compared to our 13. So to only score once was a tad disappointing but it'll do the trick nicely.

The trip to Schalke represented one of our biggest challenges yet and I wasn't entirely excited about it despite their poor form, but we managed to hold strong defensively and even had a couple of decent chances. Unfortunately we couldn't find the net so we had to settle for a single point, but I'll take it. It's a good point to get.

The third game of the month was an interesting tie against Bayer Leverkusen. Coming into the game, the top three teams were Bayern, Bayer and ourselves, all on the same point (30), all separated by GD (and, in fact, Bayer were only ahead of us on GF cos we had the same GD). But we would prove to be the better side on the day, as we romped into a two-goal lead courtesy of Roy Beerens - playing due to injury to Stocker - and GENKI HARAGUCHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII. His first goal of the season saw us win the game and he topped it with a man of the match performance. But the bigger picture here was that we managed to take victory against a very good Bayer side and we are now joint top with Bayern...

Three games shy of the mid-season break and we're sitting joint with Bayern at the top of the table... remarkable stuff

Not much else to say - our defence is impeccable and we go into most games expecting not to concede. We aren't banging them in unfortunately but as long as we're not throwing goals away I can live with this predicament.

Standout Players:

3. Marvin Plattenhardt - Plattenhardt has featured here before and he will probably feature many more times. He's a very good talent and an important factor in our defensive efforts. Not much gets past him. Three top performances saw him average 7.43 for the month, which is great to see.

2. Niklas Stark - As aforementioned, he is our joint top goalscorer at the moment going into December, which in itself is incredible, but the work he does in shielding the defence from opposition attacks just further adds to his impressive season. Averaging 7.43, just like Plattenhardt, made him an easy selection for the top three of the month, but added with a match winning goal against Hannover this was one of the easiest selections I've made. He's only 20 and if he keeps these sort of performances up for the next few seasons he'll turn into an outstanding player. He's almost there already.

1. Genki Haraguchi - This will be the least surprising inclusion of all time by now I'm sure

An average rating in the three games of 7.53, his first goal of the season and a man of the match performance in the game against Leverkusen saw the main man himself take yet another player of the month for Hertha. I'm running out of things to say about this guy, he's just immense. Remarkably Haraguchi is only ranked the 10th best player on average rating in the Bundesliga, but his importance to the team and helping us be in this position makes him one of the most valuable players of the season :cool:

Looking ahead to next month:

Usually with this sort of set of fixtures I'd say something like "Should be 9 points" and then we'll get two or worse. So I'll say nothing and remain optimistic. It's the last set of games before the winter break so I'll be hoping to end on a high and come up with some good performances. We're looking good regardless - already 9 ahead of a non-CL spot and with our defence I fancy our chances of continuing with the great performances.

JD nawrat · March 27, 2016

Ugh. The game can be frustrating. Just had John Brooks ask to leave for PSG because the best players need to play in CL and that's not something we can provide... we're joint top of the league, we're almost certainly going to be in the CL next season :rolleyes:

e: to add to the frustration, there's no option for me to say "We'll get CL this season" or anything like that :thdn:

JD nawrat · March 27, 2016

Building Berlin - December 2015

So bringing 2015 to a close saw two away ties and a home tie, and a possibility of ending the first half of the season on top...

So it was a bit of a tough month. We struggled away from home big time. We managed to do well in the home game - albeit we spoiled a clean sheet late on - but otherwise I'm not exactly thrilled with our performances.

The match away to Frankfurt we cut them open multiple times but Salomon Kalou couldn't finish his dinner nevermind the wealth of opportunities handed to him by the midfield. A draw isn't a bad result but the three points were there for the taking and we failed to grasp them, quite simply. Considering their position in the table and our ability/form I really expected victory so to come away with nothing is disappointing.

The match at home to Augsburg represented one of our best performances of the season, limiting the opposition to just two shots and absolutely smashing them in their own half. Vedad Ibisevic started - but didn't finish the game due to injury - and proved to be much better at finishing the chances handed to him (although tbf he hasn't been much use this season until this game). His two goals put him joint top scorer in the team, on 4, which is hilarious considering he's only started 4 games. Shows how much we're struggling for goals, really.

The match against Bremen was always going to be tough as coming into the game they topped the form table with 5 wins and 1 loss in their previous 6. We dominated the first half and should have gone in ahead - but unsurprisingly Kalou can't finish - which only served to fire up Bremen who came flying out in the second half and did to us what we did to them first half... swings and roundabouts. A solid point against a resurgent team.

Full league table since it's the halfway point/winter break. We sit second still, joint with Bayern, and this represents a fantastic first half of the season beyond my expectations. We could have been top had we beaten Bremen but it wasn't to be, I suppose. We're in a commanding position and look good to finish in the top 4 though, so I'm delighted to be quite honest.

Standout Players:

3. Vedad Ibisevic - Despite a 6.5 and a 6.6 (albeit off the bench) surrounding his brace game, Ibisevic still makes it into my top three of the month, averaging 7.33. Hard to ignore him when he's the only man to score in the month of December, to be fair to him. Two goals topping off fantastic attacking moves were the highlight of the month and I'm pleased that Ibisevic finally scored. When he's fit I'll be hoping to see him score much more now that he seems to finally be performing.

2. Vladimir Darida - After a couple of quiet months compared to his start to the season, Darida finally looked class once again with two assists in three games, setting up both of Ibisevic's goals. An average rating of 7.6 over the three matches helps him stand out as one of the performers of the month and I'm delighted for him as he's been a solid if unspectacular performer for us so far this season.

1. Genki Haraguchi - #GenkiCarries. The Japanese winger once again is my standout of the month, averaging 7.66 with three brilliant performances. He didn't score nor assist, but once again, his quality going forward proved to be of quality. The man is truly fantastic in his role on RM and I love watching him play. He's definitely going to be up there or thereabouts for player of the season, hard to imagine anyone overtaking him, at least.

Looking ahead to next month:

We have a couple of friendlies before returning for the league season. Three winnable games but considering our away form I am less than excited for those away matches... to put it simply, we have won just ONE of our last SEVEN away matches in all competitions - ironically at Wolfsburg, one of the toughest of the lot - which is a run stretching back to the end of September. We are struggling big time away from home. The flipside is that we've won 8 of 9 in all competitions this season at home. The contrast is unbelievable.

With the window coming up I'm going to be trying to hang onto everyone, but a few I could sell and be quite happy to do so, such as fringe players and back-ups. But I might struggle to hold onto Stocker and Brooks. We'll see I guess.

JD nawrat · March 28, 2016

Building Berlin - January 2016

A fantastic 2015 saw us sitting joint top at the halfway point, but would 2016 be so kind with a troubling Transfer Window kicking the year off for us?

Uhhhh, it could have been kinder, certainly, as we picked up our 5th goalless draw in 7 games. Talk about struggling for goals!

Hamburg weren't ever going to be easy and honestly taking a point here was a good result for us. We got what we deserved in all honesty. It was the sort of game where both teams could have nicked a goal but really nobody deserved that.

Darmstadt, in a rich vein of form, would be a tough game for us but at home I expected us to take an easy three points... their resilience in defence made it impossible for our misfiring attack to break then down and the best we could do was not concede. Hugely disappointing as it is only the second game of the season we haven't won at home.

Last up was Ingolstadt away. Considering our shocking away form of late I expected a draw at best, but we ACTUALLY SCORED A GOAL and kept up our fine defence for a 1-0. Still not great but at least we didn't have three 0-0s for the month....

Draw city bitch has seen us drop behind Bayern but only slightly. We're still in a great position. We've been 9 points ahead of 5th place for a while and although it'd be nice to open that gap further, it's not a bad place to be. Gives me very good belief that we will seal top 4, despite our inability to score goals...

Standout Players:

3. Thomas Kraft - Our man between the sticks pulled off three clean sheets and put in a stunning performance against Ingolstadt to help ensure we finally got three points away from home. An average rating of 7.26 for the month saw him claim his spot in the standouts.

2. Marvin Plattenhardt - Another defender unsurprisingly. With an average rating of 7.3 and three clean sheets on top of some good attacking play, it's not at all surprising that Plattenhardt is included here once again. He's proving to be one of our standouts for the season, nevermind individual months.

1. Genki Haraguchi - Surprise! An average rating of 7.56 saw Genki be our standout player once again despite a very poor performance against HSV (6.5). Two very good performances against Darmstadt and Ingolstadt see him take the player of the month once more for us... Getting a bit boring seeing his name here, isn't it?

Looking ahead to next month:

Finally back to playing 4 games in the month which is good news! Dortmund at home will be tough but if we can get at least a point and then take advantage of the other three teams - the bottom three in the league - then we will hopefully be able to finally hit some bloody winning form. Albeit we're undefeated in about 12, we're drawing far too many games. I'm hoping that a couple of wins in a row will spark us to hit top form, but honestly top form isn't going to happen whilst we can score goals...

Transfer Window

Well it was interesting. I got absolutely robbed and forced to sell John Brooks - 7M up front, 2M over 12 months and 30% of any profits made from future sales... sounds decent but for a 22 year old CB, who is my best defender and top three players, I've been mugged big time. I also sold club captain Fabian Lustenberger for 1M. The money was decent for a fairly old player who doesn't play for me. To replace him as captain I chose Niklas Stark, as he has good attributes and is first team. He is still only young but I hope this means I'll have a captain for a solid 10 years or so.

To replace John Brooks I brought in a similarly young player, but one of German descent. Marc-Oliver Kempf came in from Freiburg for a total of 5M. A little on the expensive side but he'll be a solid player for us for years to come, I hope.

Offers came in for Kalou, Haraguchi and Stocker. I knocked back the offers for Haraguchi and Stocker, to which Genki asked why. I told him that a move to Dortmund wasn't for the best and that if he wanted CL, we'd be there after this season. He decided to give me to the end of the season to qualify for CL or he wants to leave. Stocker was quite pleased to stay and didn't question why I wasn't selling him. Kalou knocked back the move to Bournemouth on the basis of wage, appearance fee etc etc, boring *******. Wish he'd have left.

JD nawrat · March 29, 2016

Building Berlin - February 2016

Could too many draws spoil our season? Probably not, as everyone else is taking points from each other and we might be able to get away with it... maybe.

More 0-0s. That's 7 0-0s for the season. And rather bizarrely a game with five (YES, FIVE) goals. But 8 points out of 12 is a very good return and it keeps our top four hopes well and truly alive.

A bore 0-0 with Dortmund where the game only had 5 shots in total (yes, you read that right!) saw us start the month with a good point. We've taken 4 points from Dortmund this season which is definitely pleasing. A dreadful, dreadful game. But I'm happy with the point.

Next up was Koln. Dead last in the league, but they'd beaten us twice this season, so I was expecting a tough game. And they delivered...they slapped us about the pitch and on another day could've won 3, 4-0. But our defence held on and we managed to take away a big three points and FINALLY beat Koln. Julian Schieber scored his first goal for the club this season and it was on his birthday too, which was kinda cool.

Mainz represented another team in the relegation zone and at home should have been a routine win. But after they equalised it seemed as though we were heading for yet another draw, albeit a score draw this time. Instead we fired ahead into a 3-1 lead and a late goal from Mainz saw us concede two in the league for only the second time all season (Bayern being the other time). Thankfully we got three goals somehow - one was an OG tbf - and that saw us through for a second win a row, the first time we've done that since the final week of October/first week of November.

Last of the month was a trip to Hoffenheim. Their incredible return of 9 in 23 meant I wasn't worried defensively, but offensively we just could not get going once more. The chance to win three straight went a-beggin' and we only took a point. Made more frustrating by us hitting the woodwork twice and them finishing the final 20 minutes with only 10 men. Booo.

Bayern are starting to pull away from us but that's pretty much exactly what was expected of them. We're 10 ahead of 5th and look very good value for making the top 4 right now, so I'm still very happy.

Standout Players:

3. Marvin Plattenhardt - This guy again. He's up there with Haraguchi in terms of being Mr. Consistent and also a bit of Mr. Brilliant. He didn't contribute a great deal to the team in terms of goals/assists but his general play is always brightening, he finds space and he makes good passes/crosses and defensively he's extremely good.

2. Sinan Kurt - With an average rating of 7.15 over the month, including two appearances from the bench, Kurt was a solid if unspectacular player. He's definitely earned his place in the standouts. He asked to play more and I decided to oblige and he's done fairly well, filling in both CM and LM and doing a job in both. Only the one assist as a return but a man of the match performance in the game against Koln sees him up here.

1. Marc-Oliver Kempf - No Haraguchi?! I haven't gone mental

He missed a game through injury and was an average 7.2 in the other three games

Higher averages than the two above but the two above played in all games, so they get precedence... ANYWAY, yeah, new signing Marc-Oliver Kempf introduced himself in a big way, netting a goal and taking three clean sheets in four games. Not a bad signing by the look of it. He's walked in very easily to fill Brooks' boots. What a man.

Looking ahead to next month:

Ahh, the dreaded match against Bayern. They're undefeated in 21, compared to our run of 16. They haven't conceded in 9 straight games, and we've only conceded in one of our last 8. So you might say I'm hopeful of our 8th 0-0 of the season, but yeah... probably not. They're banging goals in for fun in most games. Hopefully we can get wins against Gladbach and Stuttgart which would represent a good month regardless of the result against Bayern.

JD nawrat · March 30, 2016

Building Berlin - March 2016

Well and truly into the business end of the season, things are looking tight.

No clean sheets and only four points... bad month

Bayern travelled to the Olympiastadion as the only team to beat us in the league this season, and they'd leave as the only team who would do it twice, which is quite a good thing. But also frustrating, as they beat us through an OG that hit about 10 different people after a corner... gutting, moreso as we missed a golden opportunity in injury time to take a point, which I personally feel we deserved, but hey ho.

Gladbach next represented a chance to get the month up and running, but it didn't quite work out that way. Gladbach were leading 0-2 at HT and it looked like our season was falling to pieces, before two goals from ourselves brought us straight back into it. On the fact of it, a point at home isn't great, but it felt like a victory when we bagged the second goal to take a point.

Last up for the month was a trip to Stuttgart, who were in pretty good form and could easily have piled on our misery for the month. And after going up 1-0 early on, I genuinely felt that was going to be the case. But then we pegged them back early and had another great second half as we scored two more goals to take a huge three points that put our season back on track.

The title challenge is all but dead, but I was only ever really hoping for top 7, so to be in a position to take top 4 is huuuuge for us. Sitting 7 ahead of Dortmund puts us in a great position to get top 4 and that's really what the minimum aim is now.

Standout Players:

3. Tolga Cigerci - Cigerci had been complaining about a lack of performances so I gave him the opportunity and an average rating over the three games came out at 7.3, which is more than satisfying. Definitely someone I want to keep in the first team after these performances.

2. Marvin Plattenhardt - Once again Plattenhardt appears here and it won't come as a surprise that he's one of the standouts of the season. An average rating of 7.5 over the three games was impressive and he was one of our best players in the Bayern game, doing a good job of keeping Arjen Robben quiet. Someone I will have at the team for a few seasons at least, I imagine.

1. Genki Haraguchi - Back to business as usual. Two goals and an average rating of 7.63 make him the best of the month for what feels like the 100th time. I can't say anything else about him to be honest.

Looking ahead to next month:

April is a huge month. Both figuratively and literally. I'll manage five games that will take us down to just the final two games, but it also features some big matches and it could be a real struggle to pick up points at the most important point of the season, especially with our latest form. On the flipside, a few wins might just seal top 4 because we do have to take on the teams immediately around us... It's gonna be interesting, anyway

Jason the Yank · March 30, 2016

Don't blow it!

On the bright side, your defending looks pretty fearsome so you've got a good chance of nicking some more 0-0 draws.

JD nawrat · March 31, 2016

Don't blow it!
On the bright side, your defending looks pretty fearsome so you've got a good chance of nicking some more 0-0 draws.

Our defending has been dreadful in April but the next update will reveal all

JD nawrat · March 31, 2016

Building Berlin - April 2016

Our biggest tests of the season would be in April, and with the possibility of Champions League on the line, the ability to not bottle would be great!

We tried our best to bottle, but we just about struggled over the line

The first match of the month saw us hosting Wolfsburg. A great first half saw us fly into a 2-0 lead and then Wolfsburg saw a red card (their third red card in two games against us this season), which meant we could ease to victory and even added to our tally with a third. A huge win that gave us a great chance of top 4. Niklas Stark scored the highlight of the goal, turning his man on the edge of the box before pinging it top bags. Wunderbar!

An away trip to Hannover represented a potentially tricky tie but also a potential must-win. Thankfully we delivered with a clean sheet and two good goals to put us into prime position for CL qualification.

Schalke at home would be a tough game despite their middling form throughout the season. We drew 0-0 at the VELTINS earlier in the season and I would've happily taken this again, but unfortunately we weren't up to the task as we looked weak defensively and offered nothing going forward... which was incredibly frustrating after two great performances in the previous two games.

Leverkusen, like Schalke, was always going to be tough. Moreso as we were away from home. We went into the game even on point with us ahead on GD in 2nd. Unfortunately we offered very little and allowed them to swat us aside, consigning ourselves to chasing third at best in reality. A win here would've saw us qualify for the CL so the failure to win was pretty hard hitting, but there was enough time left to get a result that would see us qualify...

Thankfully, the very next game was that game. Hosting Frankfurt should've been fairly routine, and despite dominating, we somehow went 0-1 down. We showed some resilience though and scored late on to take a draw, which proved to be a huge point, as Wolfsburg would also drop points the next day and see us qualify for the CL play-offs at the very least. Very pleasing!

The battle for second isn't completely dead, but really I'm just trying to focus on getting top three now. If we do have to play in a qualifier it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world but obviously I'd rather not have to go through that process. Getting top 3 means automatic qualification which means a happy JD

Standout Players:

3. Mitchell Weiser - Weiser is someone who started off the season barely playing, came into the team and didn't really impress, dropped back out, and then had to play due to injury to Pekarik. But this month he really impressed and showed that he deserves to be in the first team. As a young German it's pleasing for me personally. An average rating of 7.54 is very impressive.

2. Marvin Plattenhardt - It's yer man, again. A 7.7 rating over this month's five games makes this an extremely easy choice.

1. Genki Haraguchi - Genki Genki Haraguchi! 8.14 average rating. Hero.

Looking ahead to next month:

With CL qualification sealed, these two games take less importance than they previously would have. But with automatic promotion and potentially even 2nd place available, it would be nice to keep going. Dortmund's superior GD means that we need 4 points, as only taking three would cost us the third place spot we desire.

On a side note, I got given my early budgets - 9M and 150K spare wages. Not exactly great, but our finances have been atrocious this season. With any luck we'll be given more money once we get prize money and TV money. Ideally we'll get about 20M but honestly anything extra I can be spared would be enough. I really need to target a ST and a CB as my most important positions, the rest I can live with what I have.

JD nawrat · March 31, 2016

Hamburg finished the season 7th or 8th if I recall correctly. A good season by all means.

I finished the season and got to near July last night. Made two cracking signings. I'll reveal all tonight

e: turns out Hamburg had a horrible end to the season and ended up 12th. Only 5 points off of 7th. Ouch.

JD nawrat · March 31, 2016

Building Berlin - 2015-2016 Season Review

Bundesliga

Standings

Fixtures 1 | Fixtures 2

So my first season as manager of Hertha sees us finish a fantastic third place and qualifying for the Champions League. It's a great start to life in Berlin but there's a lot of work to be done, especially as we showed in the second half of the season that we aren't as good as I initially thought. Yes, we earned third place and thoroughly deserved it, but winning just 6 of our league games in the second half of the season is pretty shocking and disappointing. But hopefully with the right additions we won't have to worry about that.

My defence is mean, son. I mean really mean. 20 Clean Sheets in 34 games is remarkable in a league as competitive as the Bundesliga. Literally only a lack of goals cost us from challenging Bayern to the very death. If we could have turned even half of those 0-0s into sneaky 1-0s, it would have put us 10 points better off and only two points behind the eventual Champions.

DFB-Pokal

Fixtures

Unfortunately we bombed out of the competition very early, which was disappointing but did allow us to focus purely on the league. Next season I won't tolerate a performance as poor as this in the cup. I'll be aiming for the Quarters as a bare minimum.

-----

The Squad & Stats

The 'Best' Stats

The Notables of the Season

-----

The Standouts

In the least surprising turn of events ever, here are my top three players of the season...

3. Niklas Stark - The 20 year old (now 21) is a new signing at Hertha, albeit I wasn't the one to sign him. In his first season in the team, he bagged the second most goals, got named as the captain of the squad and delighted the fans with some immense performances over the course of the season. He did also rack up the most yellows in the team and missed about 5 games through suspension, but we'll gloss over that because this kid immense. He's still young enough to improve and become a better player, which is exciting, especially with him being the Captain. At the end of the season he asked for a new contract to reflect his performances through the season and his squad status as captain, which I was more than happy to oblige. He'll be here until 2021 and he's on a much improved 35k. A great bit of business if you ask me.

2. Marvin Plattenhardt - In all honesty I didn't expect Plattenhardt to be so influential or full of quality as he was this season. He was easily our best defender (although John Brooks may have taken that title had he stayed) and was our second best player in terms of average rating, so this inclusion is unquestionable in my humble opinion. If his Marking and Positioning were better, he'd genuinely be one of the left backs in the game I think, because everything else looks fantastic. Plattenhardt hasn't had any interest in him, which is strange, but also something I'm thankful for. He's going nowhere and he'll be a big boost to our defence next season, which is great.

1. Genki Haraguchi - It is only now that I'm seeing how poor Genki's attributes actually are :lol:

But man, the boy can play. An outstanding performer for us over the season and undeniably our star of the season. Second most goals, second most assists, beat so many men he's wanted for GBH... He's decided he doesn't want to leave for CL football because we can provide it, and he's going to be a massive player for us next season. I'm delighted to have someone as capable as him. It certainly helps knowing that we have someone who can produce magic from his sleeve. What a player. What a man.

For next season, the aim is simple - qualify for the CL once again, do our best in Europe (dependent on draws, be in European football post-Christmas, but we are 4th seeds so could be tough), get into the QFs of the Cup at least. Easy, right?

JD nawrat · March 31, 2016

Transfers Update

So I figured that during the off-season I'd just post transfers like this instead of waiting until the window closes, because why not?

It would prove to be a BIG summer for us early doors, as we broke our transfer record not once, but twice. The first signing to break it was this fella :cool:

With Stuttgart being relegated - despite winning the DFB-Pokal - I seized the opportunity to sign their star of the future, young Timo Werner. He needs no introduction, anyone worth their FM salt knows this sensation. You might think he'd cost a lot, but that's where you'd be wrong. The Wonderkid was signed for a paltry 7M. :eek:

This signing broke our record of 5M, set by some other guy and matched by Marc-Oliver Kempf's signing in January. Timo will slot straight into the first team as starting striker in hope that he can be the answer to our problem finding the back of the net.

Joining Werner and breaking his record signing fee, would be another German wunderkind. :cool:

Hoffenheim's relegation opened the door for the signing of Niklas Sule. I opened negotiations with a cheeky 2.5M bid which was laughed out of the door unexpectedly, but perseverance was the key and we managed to haggle Hoffe's asking price from 18.5M down to a very agreeable 8M

The future German international (hopefully!) will slot straight into my backline along Kempf and replacing Langkamp, but he won't be leaving the club, he'll be third choice CB. Sule represents another fantastic piece of business and he'll hopefully be leading from the back for a good 10 years or so.

I've definitely looked to bring in young Germans so far, with these acquisitions and Kempf, also. It's something I'll be looking to continue doing as I progress through my career at Hertha.

The flipside of signing these two for a combined 15M was that I had to sell to buy, as the aforementioned budget of 9M was all the board were willing to give me, despite our huge 40M+ winnings from finishing third in the Bundesliga.

So far only two have left, and barring some deadwood like Ronny, I don't intend on the figure increasing bar two. The first to leave was Salomon Kalou, who I'm glad to be shot of. The Ivorian international just couldn't score goals when I needed him to, and so he won't really be a miss, it's sad to say. He's off to Rennes for 1.1M, which isn't a great fee but considering how poor he was for us this past season I'm not exactly surprised he was tough to sell off.

The second man departing is actually a player I had zero intentions of selling; Mitchell Weiser. The youngster is a potential German international, equally adept at going forward as he is working at the back. But a release clause of 4.6M was triggered and when Roma (and Monaco) came a-callin', he just wasn't interested in staying here, which was very disappointing to be perfectly honest. He'll be a big miss as he really impressed in the final few months of the season but hopefully Pekarik will come back into the team after injury and continue where he left off with some highly impressive performances. The only good thing to come out of me losing Weiser is that it did fund signing Sule. Unless something changes, I'm not able to afford a new RB of a standard or age worth signing, and so I've decided to promote from within. Youth academy product Panzu Ernesto will come into the first team as a back-up to Pekarik, but he's unlikely to really play any games for obvious reasons. At only 17 he shouldn't and won't be playing more than I need him to.

JD nawrat · April 1, 2016

Tough Champions League group, but the board don't expect anything from us. We'll do our best and probably be in with a shout at third. I can't ask for much more than that.

e: Oh and btw I forgot to include it in my seasonal review, but we ended last season as the second best away side in the whole league, earning only one point less than Bayern Munich. Funny seeing as I said our away form is what would cost us. By contrast we were about 6th best home side

JD nawrat · April 1, 2016

Building Berlin - August 2016

So we begin our second season at Hertha with much to be happy about. But if the first season was a resounding success, then the second season would have to, at the very least, follow in line and exceed on the accomplishments of the prior season. No easy task though. We strengthened in a couple of areas but we largely have the same squad, including the exact same midfield five. So the real test is asking whether or not we can compete on more fronts this time round and, if we can, will it cost our Bundesliga campaign?

Three wins wahey! Mainz was a tricky as hell tie. We went down 1-0 almost instantly and I feared the worst, but Timo Werner made an instant impact (he didn't play in cup so this was his debut), bringing us back to 1-1. After going down 2-1, Valentin Stocker and Genki Haraguchi combined to make it 2-2 and then a late penalty, confidently dispatched by Timo once more, made all the difference. Poor defensively but I'm trying to make an effort to be more offensive this season. So this is encouraging!

Hosting Furth represented taking on a new boy, and also my next round opponent in the Pokal (I'm at home there too). We absolutely tanked them. Not even a slight doubt at any point in the game that they would get close to us. Plattenhardt pinged in a direct free kick beautifully to make it 1-0 and then Timo Werner picked the ball up thirty yards from goal before beating two and then the GK at his near post. A sensational pair of goals in all honesty. Skjelbred scored possibly his first goal for me, nodding home from a corner, which was nice to see. Also gave us a commanding victory which was a fair reflection of our dominance.

The cup game was a routine win against nobodies, as the first round always is. I was missing a couple of players like Sule and Werner due to Olympics and a couple of others were tired because we had a friendly two days before this game, so I played as second string as second string can get and we won comfortably. They didn't have a single shot and the highlight of their game was getting a corner (the corner was due to a misplaced pass, too

).

So a pleasing start. We have 6 goals in just two games, which is unthinkable in all honest with mostly the same squad. Timo Werner is making a big difference already. Last season it took us 4 games to hit 6 goals, so unless we get two goalless draws we're already off to a better (goalscoring) start than last season. Defensively we looked quality in the Furth game but not in the Mainz game... Mainz are always a tricky side though, I'm sure we failed to keep a CS at their place last season too, although I ain't 100% sure on that stat.

Standout Players:

3. Valentin Stocker - Stocker seems to be criminally underrated in the game. He was one of my best players last season and his value is only 3.3M. He had plenty of interest in him in the Winter window but after that interest has died completely. I'm pleased with that though because it means one of my key players isn't being chased, but still... he deserves more recognition. He had a great month and was certainly one of the best players on the pitch in our league games.

2. Per Cjilian Skelbred - The Norwegian international has been used in multiple capacities for me so far, as the Defensive, Support and Attacking player in my midfield trio. He's also my vice captain. He doesn't do anything spectacular, but he does everything well. But he's started this season extremely well and rightfully is recognised for his performances in August. Hopefully he keeps this up!

1. Timo Werner - The newly capped German international, Timo Werner, takes the first player of the month award for me. He's almost halfway to matching the total goals tally of last season's top scorer (7, Ibisevic) and we're two games into the season. He's adapted extremely well and he's going to be huge for us. As a Trequartista he just finds the space and then terrifies defence. If he keeps this up he'll be instrumental in our goalscoring threat throughout the season, for sure.

Looking ahead to next month:

Yikes

So in one month we'll be facing Bayern, PSG, Chelsea, Wolfsburg and Werder Bremen. Not to mention a game against Ingolstadt. Going to be fun... We're hitting the big time but the real question is whether we can actually challenge the big time. All while staying relevant in the Bundesliga. It's going to be interesting, and tough, but I think I'm prepared for it. I hope I am, at least.

Just on a side note, I made one more signing since the previous transfers post, bringing in Sebastian Jung for a very good fee of 1.3M. He is on 55k, which is 20k more than my next highest earner (Niklas Stark), but I hope he'll prove to be worth it. This meant that Panzu Ernesto went back to the U19s team, and I brought up a young LB instead, Enes Akyol. He's already played a couple of times due to injury to Plattenhardt, but Plattenhardt has returned already and will hopefully miss no more games, as he did last season (playing every single game in the BuLi). Genki Haraguchi also went off to Japanese international duty and came back with a 2 month injury, which is absolutely gutting. Roy Beerens will start most games in RM but I've also brought up young Julius Kade from our Youth Academy to be a back-up to Beerens. Kade was always going to come into the first team at some point, so this injury represents the perfect time for him. He probably won't get more than a handful of appearances but it's going to be good to bring him into the first team, all the same.

vossmaj · April 1, 2016

wrt your season 1: Pretty impressive to reach a 3rd rank with this few Goals and a top striker scoring only 7... And by the way, 19 yellow cards are impressive, too, Mr Stark

And Darmstadt in Europe... well... would you mind, updating us on their European progress at some point?

And excellent signings. Sad about Weiser but Süle and Werner are excellent, at least in the future. Furthermore I find it obvious that you could trade Kraft for another German goalie. There are plenty with pretty nice clauses to take advantage of... :brock:

JD nawrat · April 1, 2016

Timo Horn is mighty tempting, it's true, but Kraft has been class for us (joint most clean sheets and 4th most saves last season) and it'd feel a bit wrong to replace him, especially when I don't really have the money to. If I get more money mid-season or enough at the end of the season I will probably look to sign him tbf, but for now I'm happy to keep Kraft

Darmstadt's manager got manager of the season for their performance in the Bundesliga, which is incredible (their performances, not him getting the award). I came third, Pep second (although ofc he's at City with Ancelotti at Bayern now). And yeah, I'll let you know how Darmstadt do in Europe

I think us coming third was as much down to the teams around us bottling their chances than us being great to be honest. The fact we only won 6 of our last 18 games says a lot about our quality (or lack thereof).

JD nawrat · April 1, 2016

Just had a look - Darmstadt got through the Europa League play-offs by winning 6-0 against a team called Rudar. They got drawn into a group alongside Leicester City, Valencia and Dinamo (of Croatia), who made it into the CL first round knockout last season, so are obviously a very decent side... they lost their first game of the groups, but still a long way to go

vossmaj · April 1, 2016

Ah, thanks for the update. So Darmstadt do ok in Europe, too. Is that still Dirk Schuster in your save?

Horn and Zieler have nice Exit clauses, but you still need some money, sure. I rather thought of getting into business after season 2. Both should have the potential to get better than Kraft will.

JD nawrat · April 1, 2016

It is indeed Schuster

Horn would be my preferable target as I'm sure he's both younger and cheaper. Probably better, too, in the long term, if not immediately. GK is definitely somewhere worth upgrading in the future, but as my next update will show when I get round to posting it (tomorrow probably), Kraft is an excellent GK. Been MOTM in both of my CL games

JD nawrat · April 2, 2016

Building Berlin - September 2016

Six games in the month of September was a sign of how busy our future months can and will be. It's going to take some adapting to but hopefully we can live up to my expectations and we'll do well...

One the face of it, just one win in 6 could be construed as a bad month, but the reality is that I'm actually very pleased with this return. Bayern was a tough game as expected. They dominated us and gave us little time on the ball, so after going 2-0 down I basically tried to go all out attack and focus on breaking from the back with pace. It paid off immediately as Timo Werner got through on goal but a foul - and a yellow, although imo it should have been a red - was committed and Werner scored once again to give us a lifeline. Unfortunately our team just couldn't cope with the set piece prowess of Bayern and they scored their third - Philipp Lahm with a header. Their third headed goal of the game. Christ almighty. We kept going to the very end and Werner could've bagged a brace but it wasn't to be as Neuer snuffed him out and we lost 3-1. Disappointing but not surprising. I didn't go to the Allianz expecting a win. I'm not too upset.

Next was our CL debut. Remarkably we were the favourites for the tie and unremarkably we didn't even come close. PSG dominated us but Thomas Kraft's MOTM performance was enough to give us a huge point. The fans, the media and the players were disappointed with our showing but honestly I don't know what they expected. I was delighted with this point.

Ingolstadt, on the face of it, should have been a routine match and victory but the continental hangover was always bound to play into effect and it did precisely that. We were slow out of the blocks and had a dreadful first half. We rallied in the second half but Ingolstadt were quite impressive and we had to make-do with a point. Ho hum. Not a good result but I did honestly expect us to drop points here.

Werder Bremen would be our fourth game in just ten days, and unprecedented number of games for us under my charge. Player rotation and injuries meant I had half a team that I would have liked to have picked, and it showed as Bremen raced into a 2-0 lead and dominated us. I genuinely didn't even know how to come back into it, everything I tried they stopped and continued to dominate. I was running out of options when, from nowhere, Sinan Kurt bagged a goal to give us a lifeline ten minuets from time. It was enough to galvanise the players and Darida came off the bench to knock in another to give us a huge point. It felt like a win in all honesty and to come from 2-0 down despite the lack of first team players showed real quality.

Our 5th game in just 13 days saw us host Wolfsburg in a game I was very nervous about. Failure to win would represent a most likely winless month and that's not something I can live with, even if we had gotten a draw from Die Wolfe. A dismal first half and a dismal second half, but one moment of glory from THAT MAN saw us get a ****ing massive three points. No other way to put it. We have shown real character this month, if nothing else.

Last of the month was a trip to London to take on Chelsea. Overwhelming favourites for the match and understandably so, but we managed to do ourselves justice. We hit them on the counter well and if it wasn't for Courtois doing his thang, we might have got a couple of goals. We snuffed them out pretty well, thanks largely to Thomas Kraft producing a MOTM performance. Unfortunately Skelbred gave away the stupidest of stupid penos when he hand-balled the ball in his own box under no pressure 9 minutes from time. Hazard dispatched it and consigned us to a loss. Very frustrating because we definitely deserved more but we weren't really expected to get anything so I'm not too disheartened... I don't really go to Chelsea at this stage and expect a win

On the face of it, one win in 6 through the month would seem disastrous, but as you can see we're in a very good position in the league. I can't complain with that. HSV have started very well but I don't really expect them to keep this form up and so to only be a point behind Bayern and Schalke is good going thus far, I'd say. What is important now is to make sure we do start winning and keep ourselves in the mix with these teams and challenging for top 4 once again.

The CL is going pretty much as expected. With back to back ties against CSKA coming up in Europe, it's imperative that we get at least four points out them, in my opinion. If we want to be in post-Christmas European Football then we definitely need to get points from them. And although it's unlikely, the way we played at the Bridge gives me hope that we could maybe even nick a spot for the KOs ahead of Chelsea, but I'm not really expecting that at the moment.

Standout Players:

3. Sinan Kurt - Injury to Stocker meant that Kurt played in all six of our September games, and the young winger impressed enough to be mentioned here. An average rating of 7.17 in a month where we only won once is pleasing, not to mention his goal and assist through the month.

2. Marvin Plattenhardt - Plattenhardt continues to be one of the best players at the club with another strong month. An average rating of 7.25 and a mental 81 completed passes against Bremen

Plattenhardt is consistently good and that's what I need if I'm to get anywhere this season. He's definitely up there as one of my key and favourite players.

1. Thomas 'The Hands' Kraft - The man between the sticks had a sensational month, picking up two MOTM awards and pulling off a host of top saves to keep us in games and to keep us from conceding too many. An average rating of 7.5 makes Kraft our player of the month, and what a player he is. Performances like he's given us are the precise reason I'm in no rush to replace him. Top keeper. And only 27, so he could realistically be my number 1 for a number of years to come.

Looking ahead to next month:

I am hoping this month will be a lot more comfortable for us than last. We do have some tough games including a trip to Gelsenkirchen, Moscow and Leipzig, but the other three games are must-wins. I think that we can definitely get points out of Schalke and Moscow and despite Leipzig being new, they have adapted well (probably due to their financial backing) so could be tough. Reality is, I will be expecting a win here but we'll have to wait and see how it goes...

Looking forward to this month. It's a chance to build some momentum going into October.

JD nawrat · April 2, 2016

Aaaaaand, Timo Werner has matched Vedad Ibisevic's top goalscoring record of seven goals in the whole of last season, after just 7 games

D1DEBD478E7657F055FC85ED2E3A6B2531B1E69D

JD nawrat · April 4, 2016

Building Berlin - October 2016

Defence is over, baby!

A month in which we kept one clean sheet in 6 is a vast contrast to last season where we'd probably have kept 5 clean sheets in 6

But the thing is that we're still not winning every game, because we are too shaky defensively. Other than the Koln result I am actually very pleased with our month, but we dominated CSKA and should've won it quite comfortably to give us a great chance of 3rd and a decent chance of top 2. Progress in the Pokal is extremely pleasing and we'll hopefully have further to go in that competition.

Two draws couldn't halt our league progress and we are still in very good shape to challenge top four, and possibly even the title. The top of the table is extremely tight but it is still very early in the season so it's not all bad, as long as we can keep up some good form I think we'll have a very good season.

Still winless in Europe of course but not in a terrible position and if we can win our home game against CSKA at least then I fancy us to get through into KO European football!

Standout Players:

3. Genki Haraguchi - A return from injury and an immediate return to form for our star player. Haraguchi was instrumental in our successful month, averaging 7.48 in 5 games (he missed Schalke). Top stuff.

2. Vladimir Darida - The Czech international has had a poor start to the season but an average rating of 7.25 in 6 games including some bench appearances was very pleasing, and Darida is starting to come into his best form again.

1. Timo Werner - Mr Goals is doing his thang, and an average rating of 7.61 plus a few goals makes this an easy choice for my player of the month.

Looking ahead to next month:

A potentially massive month with our final three group CL games and three winnable BuLi games. I'm hoping we can come out of this looking very good but the way we're playing I honestly don't know if we're going to win 5-0 or lose 5-0

Apologies for the shortened length of the post - the truth is that I'm spending like 30-45 minutes making a monthly update and it's interrupting my play/enjoyment of this save a fair bit, so I'm shortening the format for now. I might eventually move to just two massive updates per season (mid-season and end of season), with some small/interesting key point thrown in here and there... We'll see.

vossmaj · April 5, 2016

That's pretty tight in the Top6. You still only lost one match, still impressive. I finally managed to get htrough my very first season in FMT16 at the Weekend with Köln, managed to reach 15th in my last match of the season against, you guessed it, Hertha. We held on to a draw at the Olympiastadion and secured that spot. Hertha goes down (17th) alongside Ingolstadt. Werder is still to do the relegation playoffs against Braunschweig.

My next move has to be to check the Hertha squad for nice and cheap folks to strengthen ours.

BTW: How do you manage to keep your bench match sharp? I guess Hertha II is not active in any competitive league matches? Or do you use some league expansion file? I Keep scheduling friendlies for Köln II which is kind of tedious...

JD nawrat · April 5, 2016

Try sign Plattenhardt, Haraguchi and Stark (he will get booked loads though). Definitely the three best players imo.

My bench doesn't really stay match sharp, I'm having to rotate CBs a lot because Sule hasn't been fit because the Olympics means he's had shocking fitness all season and I bring FBs off the bench a lot. The rest of my bench just makes a few sub appearances here and there and due to poor fitness after 6 games or whatever I'll get someone to sit out a game or two, but I tend to have one set XI so my rotation is pretty bad.

JD nawrat · April 6, 2016

Building Berlin - November 2016

I rotated! And we still won! Some games anyway... A huge win in the CL (our first, and only, CL win) against CSKA gave us almost guaranteed qualification for the EL with hope of a CL KO match. But more importantly we won two of our three league games, which makes it four (yes, four) wins in our last five Bundesliga matches! A loss to PSG was tough to take as we probably deserved a draw and the draw to Chelsea was unlucky as we smashed them and should have won by 2/3 goals... their only goal was an OG where the GK tried to clear it, smashed it off my CB, and it looped into the net :applause:

Our purple patch of winning form has put us right up there now and Bayern drawing 4 times in a row drops them a fair bit. They're still only one point behind us but they've gone from being comfortably in front to fourth. I enjoy this

Losing just twice is quality. Especially since they were narrow 1-0s in Paris and London and we should have got a point out of both. But oh well! A very decent first season in Europe considering how tough the group was, the fact that we were 4th seeds and the fact that I didn't really feel prepared for the campaign. Next up we have the Europa League, and post-Christmas football was what I was aiming for, so I'm extremely happy :cool:

Standout Players:

3. Vladimir Darida - Once again the Czech appears because of a very good month. He only played in 4 games but in three of those four he was unbelievable (and this was with a pen miss Vs. Chelsea...) and unplayable at times. One poor game and poor fitness meant I dropped him for two games but nonetheless it was a great month for him.

2. Valentin Stocker - The left midfielder is a consistent but perhaps unspectacular performer for us, so it's nice to see him step up when players like Genki Haraguchi are (once again) injured. A 7.52 average over 5 games in the month represents a top return!

1. Timo Werner - I love goals goals goals goals, GOALS I DO ADORE (cookie for the reference!). Mr Goals continues to bag, notching his 5th brace of the season and we're not even in December. Unbelievable stuff. 7M is all I keep thinking of when he bags. Madness. You'll also note he has scored his first international goal, also. THE BOY CAN PLAY. An average of 8.3 for the month is beautiful.

Looking ahead to next month:

LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Exciting point of the season. No Europe means that all of these games are very winnable and for the first time, maybe ever, we could genuinely achieve a clean sweep. It might and probably won't happen, but at the very least I'll be hoping I get enough wins to keep us where we are and also get through the Pokal.

Some notes:

Florian Kohls bagged his first and second goals for the club. He's a youth academy product so this is great.

Timo Werner is great.

Genki Haraguchi just can't get into the team through injuries, it's disrupting his season so much. And the thing is that I know he'd be insane alongside Werner.

Niklas Stark has 9 Yellows in 16 appearances

And he's also had an injury but the team is still coping very well. Skjelbred is stepping up big time.

Timo Werner is GOD.

JD nawrat · April 7, 2016

Julius Kade just scored his first ever goal for the club, making him our youngest ever goalscorer. Very pleasing

Him and Kohls both bagging this season, two youth academy products getting their firsts for the club. Still only 17 and making quite a few first team appearances for the club. Played in all 6 of our Champions League games and everything. I'm like a proud dad.

Got high hopes for him and his future at the club!

vossmaj · April 9, 2016

Did it

https://gyazo.com/aad34f4c13e35b2a5a3bea41374b0327

JD nawrat · April 9, 2016

Excellent signing :cool:

He's finally back from injury so I'm hoping he can stay fit. He's not even injury prone, just been really unlucky. Have one game left in December and then I'll make a post. Just about to load FM, not had much time to play recently.

So I played the final game and advanced to early January, took all of my screenshots then shut down FM with the intention of updating this evening. Forgot to bloody save didn't I? I have hope that I saved after the game but something tells me I didn't.

Loaded up and I'd last save just before the Hamburg game Damn. Hopefully get the same result/outcome.

JD nawrat · April 11, 2016

Got a similar result - well, same outcome, marginally better result (won 1-0 before; 2-0 this time).

Update incoming...

JD nawrat · April 11, 2016

Building Berlin - December 2016

Almost perfect :cool:

4 clean sheets in 5, 4 wins in 5, into Pokal QFs... Superb month for us, in all honesty. Werner continues to bag goals and now the defence looks to be improving back to the same stage of last season where we can comfortably expect not to ship goals, unlike the start of this season. It was a month that was defined for us by late goals - a late equaliser to take a point from Dortmund; a last-kick-of-the-ball winner for Vladimir Darida against Leverkusen and then a late goal to seal what was a bit of a shaky win against Hamburg, although that was mostly due to the fact I played the same team three games in a row and most conditioning was <70% by FT.

We can't...can we?

Bayern have two in hand due to the Club World Cup, and I don't doubt that when they return they'll smash it. But look at their recent form and their number of draws for the season... they're winning less often than getting the actual W.

Standout Players:

3. Vladimir Darida - This guy was #3 last month and he does the same again this month. 2 goals and 2 assists warrant higher than a 7.2 average across 4 games imo, especially given that although it was just a penalty he scored, it was under immense pressure. Another highly pleasing month from the Czech international midfielder.

2. Valentin Stocker - Last month's #2 is also this month's #2, as well! Stocker is an absolute delight to manage because the guy literally has everything. And an average rating of 7.9 in 5 big games proves how invaluable he is to me, despite his value only being <4M. He's easily one of my best players this season thus far.

1. Timo Werner - Hands up if you're surprised! No? Nobody? Thought not

Timo Werner is stealing the show just as Genki Haraguchi did last season, but Werner is doing it even better than our Japanese superstar. Three goals and one assists in five games, with an average rating of just 8.02 sees Timo be our standout player yet again. That's 4 out of 5 months he's been number one. Ridiculous.

Looking ahead to next month:

Just the two league games, should be fairly comfortable games too I would hope. I think if we want to be viewed as serious title challengers then these are the sort of games we should be winning comfortably, so although it'll only be games #18 and #19, I think they're two of our biggest games of the season so far.

My finances are usually on point but in an attempt to make us better, I spent so much on Sule and Werner, as well as a massive wage on Jung, that I've got £0 budget and I'm spending 45k per week more than I want. The issue this represents is that I can't offer Thomas Kraft or Per Scilian Skjelbred new contracts and might lose them at the end of the season. If this is to happen, I will obviously live with it and continue my policy of bringing in young Germans. But Kraft especially I don't wish to lose so soon and would like to keep him around for a while longer.

JD nawrat · April 11, 2016

Bayern have won just two of their last 10, drawing the other eight :eek:

If I don't get at least a draw against them...

JD nawrat · April 11, 2016

B33569764C4FDC137183A1DD7645D0B849D11821

OH MAN. What a result! First I've beaten them and what a way to do it! :cool: Is this a sign of the future?

JD nawrat · April 11, 2016

Building Berlin - January 2017

A very comfortable match against Mainz despite the scoreline suggesting it might have been tough, but a very late goal (like 91st minute) made them look decent. Shame to lose a CS so late but Kraft is out for 6 weeks so I'm happy with Korber (20 year old back-up) doing so well, despite conceding in the end. We absolutely tonked Furth which was immensely pleasing and Werner bagged his first hattrick after coming so close to one multiple times already this season. What a man. Last up we rested many against Hoffe and almost went out, but Korber saving two Pens in the shootout saved us from a 4-2 loss to win 4-3. Brilliant stuff. Into the semi-finals against Leverkusen!

The more I see this the more confident I feel. Still a lot of football to be played but it's looking very good for us! 7 ahead of Bayern, and I've obviously spoiled the Bayern result, so 10 ahead at the start of February... madness. If we do this

Standout Players:

3. Genki Haraguchi - He's back! :cool:

What a man. Only the two games played as it was a short month, but an average rating of 7.9 shows he's not far from hitting his best against.

2. Per Ciljan Skjelbred - The Norwegian has been so important this season and is currently our top assister with 7, so it's easy to see why I want to recontract him asap. Just the two games again but an average rating of 8.25 in those two is pleasing.

1. Timo Werner - 4 goals in three games, including a hattrick, makes Timo yet again the standout. An 8.5 average rating is fantastic, especially considering the third appearance of the month was off the bench against Hoffe and that was only to try and get us to avoid ET/Pens.

Looking ahead to next month:

A huge month. Bayern, Sporting, Bremen and Wolfsburg could really define the outlook on our ambitions come May. I'm quietly confident that we can do something big seeing as we've been in fantastic form as of late. Europa League isn't a top priority but I'd like to go far in that, just to increase coefficients if nothing else.

noikeee · April 12, 2016

Bloody hell, you're doing mini-miracles with Hertha. Incredible performance so far.

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[FM16] The Last Great City: Building Berlin

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