Gundo's FM08 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge

[aaberdeenn]

Good luck on staying up iacovone. Nice to see Novalja with a chance.

If he is you're most important player then I'm quite confident. I've got a pair of CM's that look twice the player he is and I've got a striker with 6 caps for Croatia, and I've not even considered my two parent clubs yet.

Gonna get some time in for a few hours just now.

...and good luck there too emgergo, you'll do it next season.

[emgergo]

A warning to the curious: Slovenian 2nd league seems to be damn hard to get out of!

Just a look behind the scenes:

The difference in standard between the top tier and the second division is huge. Teams who go down have loads more quality than the regular second division outfits.

Let's see promotion and relegation in the save:

2007/08
- Relegated: Nafta
- Promoted: Triglav

2008/09
- Relegated: Livar (8 pts from safety)
- Promoted: Nafta (19-4-4, 7 pts clear of Aluminij)

2009/10
- Relegated: Triglav (17 pts from safety)
- Promoted: Livar (18-4-5, 7 pts clear)

2010/11
- Relegated: Nafta (11 pts from safety)
- Promoted: Mura (23-3-1, 22 pts clear over Triglav)

2011/12
- Relegated: Mura (13 pts from safety)
- Promoted: Triglav (24-2-1, 15 pts clear over Nafta)

You can see the pattern: usually the freshly relegated team goes back up (walking the league, too), and they have always reached at least the playoffs. No second division team, however, was able to win in the playoffs.

A further problem is, that even when a side goes up, it's almost always back in the second division in one (or two) seasons, so they cannot estabilish themselves.

The only team which was a regular in our division and gained promotion was Mura, who tok the league by storm last year, surprising pundits and even themselves.

Just to compare the league members in player value (this year):

1. Triglav 686K
2. Nafta 220K
3. Slovan 102K
4. Bela Krajina 40K
5. Krsko 28K
6. Bonifika 60K
7. Odranci 56K
8. Zavrc 50K
9. Izola 70K
10. NK Jadran Dekani 85K

Relegated Mura has a value of 220K.

Izola's and Jadran's value is over-representated because they gave senior contracts to 16-17 year olds, which means their value shot up; and I know that good performance also increases values. But still, you can see how much the top teams have over the others - that 2:1 ratio between Nafta and us is represented in quality on the pitch too.

The money I'm getting from the sale of my best ST can be good for buying maybe 2-3 players. If my lazy scouts find someone decent, we'll be stronger (if we find a good replacement in ST), but I really can't see how to cope with the big boys. It looks like that we're maybe a bit over the rest of the league, but if there is no radical improvement, we'll be eternal 3rd/4th.

My chance might be an awesome run (like Mura's, which lasted all year).

(sorry for being long, but I think this might be interesting)

You can see that

[iacovone]

Originally posted by aaberdeenn:
Good luck on staying up iacovone. Nice to see Novalja with a chance.

If he is you're most important player then I'm quite confident. I've got a pair of CM's that look twice the player he is and I've got a striker with 6 caps for Croatia, and I've not even considered my two parent clubs yet.

Gonna get some time in for a few hours just now.

...and good luck there too emgergo, you'll do it next season.

Showoff.

[Gundo]

Gundo's Randaberg IL 2008 End Of Season Report

This was an interesting season for me. Not for the managing in a foreign country (Norway, I'm kind of used to it now having managed their in last years challenge and having followed/monitored the Norwegian leagues irl recently) but because of the the patch 8.01 mainly. I do think it's changed the game quite significantly from the 'out of box' version. This is largely evident in the match engine, where tactically I have struggled a little (understatement). As the season progressed I gradually picked up what was needed and towards the later part of the season my frustrations lessened as I managed to figure out the tactics and it all started to make sense. \o/

My main jobs upon assuming control of Randaberg IL was to hire the relevant staff and sign some players to add to our 2! part-time contract players we currently had (excluding re-gen youth players), neither of them where going to be of any lasting use due to their severe lack of pace. So having managed to add to my squad I knew from who I had signed that we would have a tough job on to get promoted. I couldn't even tempt any decent loanees to join us and our parent club Bryne weren't helping matters by loaning their better youngsters to other division 2 clubs rather than to us!

The board wanted a respectable position and I duly agreed. The season it self was steady as anything and we managed to hover around mid-table for much of the season, eventually finishing 7th. The division we are in was in all truth awful, lighted up briefly by one or two players on-loan at other clubs that could have been plying their trade at a much higher level. The division also contained two reserve teams for Tippeligaen sides - Viking 2 and Start 2, who by the way cannot be promoted despite finishing 1st & 2nd respectively this season, that is another factor that adds to the interesting Norwegian league layout.

League table 2008.

League positions.

Randaberg squad.

I'm not going to bother mentioning any of my players as I don't think any of them are deserving of a mention.

Finances are in good shape, our coaches could be better and or overall confidence is fair to middling.

All in all I am satisfied with the way things went and I'll look to build on the foundations I've put down for next season. Now that my tactical experiments are out of the way (fingers crossed) I can settle down and really focus on finding players of the required quality. I will also be looking for a new parent club in the close season as I was far from impressed by Brynes antics!

Skjetten and Assiden IF beware because the Mighty Randaberg Il have arrived!

The final word is that this challenge is way harder than last years imo, but I'm loving the added difficulty of course.

[iacovone]

To be fair emgergo that's a good analysis. It was very similar for me in my Icelandic save. Once in the Prem, although we did make small steps up the league, there existed a 'big 4' that had such a huge advantage over the rest of the league that I just couldn't see anyone closing it. It could be a similar case for you here. I also think I may experience the same troubles in Croatia looking at my first season.

Despite all this, I actually think this is quite realistic and SI have done well here. In these smaller leagues, it is invariable that teams going up will struggle to attract the players they need to survive - why would a player from the 12th placed side move to a newly promoted team? And with the pool of talent being so small domestically, you would excpect promoted sides (unless they had a very rich and ambitious chairman) to struggle to attract the quality required.

[Gundo]

Damn links!

Graph.

Squad.

[Gundo]

Originally posted by freek_teek:
By popular demand,

Patrick Burda

Not really living up to the hype, tough...

Quality.

Can you get him scouted yet? Judging by the attributes I can see their, his ability doesn't look as impressive, maybe he'll develop into a really gem like in FM07 though.

[iacovone]

Nice start Gundo

Looks like having 2nd teams in the league will help your promotion aspirations.

aaberdeenn - it turns out the player I singled out earlier, Spicic, has been touted for the young player of the year award

Looks like you could end up walking the league! Although I have to say I think you underestimate Spicic - his pace has worked wonders!

[emgergo]

Spot on

It might be interesting looking at the leagues in this challenge, how hard is promotion from one to the other.

For example last year I've found basically no difference between the Swedish 4th and 3rd tier, then a huge step up for the 2nd, and another (but not so huge) to the Allsvenskan.

I think the dividing line is between the part- and the full-timers.

In the current save almost all Slovenian 1st league teams are absolutely full-time, some weaker sides have backups on part-time contracts. The recently relegated 2nd league teams are also full-time, but we (and the rest of the league) don't have a single full-time player.

Hard nut to crack, but I love the challenge

[Supermas2]

TKP Torun in the Polish Second Division
[i] Mid Season Update 08/09 [i]

Well after my last game, I was hoping to improve with TKP Torun, and thankfully have done so.

We started the season with a 2-1 away win, and although it took us until our 4th home game for our first home win, our home form has been good since with 4 wins, 1 draw, 1 defeat.

1-0 seems to be our prefered scorline, which is nervy toward the end of games!

But our strikers are decent, with one especially good one. Our goalie is also very good - screenshots of both will (if i remember!) be in the end of season report.

So, to the table. We sit 6th in the league after 19 (of 34) games, going into the 3 month winter break.

Lets hope we keep it up!

[aaberdeenn]

Although I have to say I think you underestimate Spicic - his pace has worked wonders!

I'm keeping a striker I've got purely on the fact that he has raw pace which could be very useful at this level, apart from that, he's carp.

[aaberdeenn]

Good first season there Gundo. I'm predicting a slight promotion challenge from you next season.

[Supermas2]

PS. Good start Gundo! Looks like a solid first season.

I do think the challenge will be harder this year - but that can be a good thing

[iacovone]

More like it supermas, keep it up!

aaberdeenn thats a great decision, especially considering how bad some of these defences are. Target man with 'run onto ball' usually works wonders....(are we allowed to talk tactics? not noticed anyone do it so far, so apologies if Im in the wrong!)

emgergo - I think the beauty of this challenge could be that we all struggle together! I have a feeling that other than the larger nations, we could all experience similar difficulties. To be honest, like people have said, I think this is a good thing.

[CoachFlu]

Meldert, Belgium - December 22nd 2013

Mid-season table

We had our almost traditional slow start to the season, with two defeats, but after that things went fairly smoothly.

The question is whether "fairly smoothly" will be enough to save my job. It's not under fire yet, but it will be before long.

Here's why: Finances.

Still in the black for now, but if you look at the Outstanding Loans, you can see that that won't last much longer. We'll be in the red by February. We'll be massively in the red by the end of the season. After that, I don't even dare to speculate.

(For those who missed it in a previous post: the board took out a massive loan last summer to build a new stadium, despite the club relegating back to the Second Division. I reported it as a bug, since this is a clear case of criminal mismanagement.)

To be honest, I'm not very optimistic about being able to finish the challenge under these circumstances. Not throwing in the towel just yet though, I wanna see how long I survive.

The only chance I have of hanging on to my job is if I consistently over-achieve on the pitch, to counterbalance the board's wrath about the finances. I'll have to do that for the next... erm... fifteen seasons or so.

Overachieving will already be a problem this season. After our brief stint in the top division, the board expects us to challenge for the Second Division title this season. Which is fair enough, really, just makes it kinda hard to over-achieve. Luckily I had a bit of a financial cushion, so I should survive until the end of the season. Hopefully.

But I have only one option: we HAVE to gain promotion this season. If not, I doubt I'll last long next season. If we promote, at least I'll score well on the "long term expectations" bar, and if the season expectations are to be relegation battlers, that gives me the possibility to over-achieve a little. Even if I'll have to do it without money.

After next season... no sense in thinking that far ahead. We may be declared bankrupt by then, or the board may not offer me a new contract. Or I may have gotten the sack already anyway. Time well tell. One step at a time. First step: promotion.

[iacovone]

Hang on in there mate! Be very interesting to see what happens, particularly if you get promoted. I think you rightly reported that as a bug, its a shame that it's happened to you but keep going.

[migwar]

a drop in the ocean, but thanks

I guess they're trying to keep us afloat. That leaves us £432k in the red. Ouch...

[Annihilator666]

Annihilator666 - Nortel - Season 08/09 - Northern Irish Second Division

Manager Profile - Manager Profile
Table - League Table | Position Graph
Results - Results #1 | Results #2
Transfers - Transfers Summary
Finances - Finance Summary
Other Info - Club Information | Manager Information
Top Scorer - Kenny Neilly
Fans' Player of the Year - Ross McMullan
Records - Team Overall Records | Team Season Records



A pretty good first season in the Second Division for Nortel. We actually hit the top of the league around about the half way point, but a run of four straight defeats ruined our chances of promotion.

In the cups, I had a good run to the Semi Finals of the Intermediate League Cup, but lost out to Ballyclare Comrades. My other cup runs weren't very good.

The board provided me with a very good parent club, Linfield. They're sending me a GK for the new season so hopefully he turns out to be good. Financially, the club is a mess. I was using about 85% of the club's wage budget, but still made a loss of £80k for the season. I have no idea where the hell I am going to make money from.

[cookie15]

Hey Gundo, watch your back mate, Skjetten are on their way

Well i say that, i've only managed 7 games so far in the season, hope to complete it later tonight

[Fire Bracelet]

Hey Annihilator, good work on the updates, but I have a question if you feel like it.

I've been doing this challenge in N.Ireland as well but have been too busy to update. How have you been doing in cup draws with amateur teams that have almost all grey players? I've been getting right destroyed by them all the time even though I got promoted my first year into the first division.

I lose these cup games to grey teams and can't score for my life and then go on next week to smash my league opponent or at least be very competitive. The sad thing is that in these cup draws I pray for full squad teams because I can't beat the amateur greys!

[rlipscombe]

Yes Gundo, do watch your back!! don't forget that mighty Assimes IF!!

on a personal level, i've not had chance to play much last few days but buoyed on by your success i think i'll have another dabble tonight.

a quick question though - where did you get the club badge and the league badges from?? i've had no look finding them so far... have you the kits too?

[MachinegunHead]

Originally posted by rlipscombe:
Yes Gundo, do watch your back!! don't forget that mighty Assimes IF!!

on a personal level, i've not had chance to play much last few days but buoyed on by your success i think i'll have another dabble tonight.

a quick question though - where did you get the club badge and the league badges from?? i've had no look finding them so far... have you the kits too?

For badges, check out this site about a quarter of the way down. Pretty much all the logos you could ever need.

That site also has a lot of kits too. Sortitoutsi.net is quality :P

[Gundo]

Originally posted by rlipscombe:
Yes Gundo, do watch your back!! don't forget that mighty Assimes IF!!

on a personal level, i've not had chance to play much last few days but buoyed on by your success i think i'll have another dabble tonight.

a quick question though - where did you get the club badge and the league badges from?? i've had no look finding them so far... have you the kits too?

Facepacks for Tippeligaen and 1.division here.

Adeccoligaen Standard Logos.

2.division Standard Logos.

Tippeligaen Standard Badges.

Kits for Tippeligaen - SS'08 Style.

I think that's most of them. No kits made for the 2.division yet.

No-one has made the non-league logos yet as far as i'm aware? I had just my Randaberg logo enhanced and resized over in the FMGlive forums. So if you can find a basic badge for your club somewhere on the net, then ask if someone can resize to small, normal, large and background r/l. You'll have map(config file) it into your game aswel.

Hope this helps.

[migwar]

note to self - warning to others

When commenting on penalty decisions, exercise caution.

Although it may endear you to your players to support them, it can lead to a touchline ban. Whilst this will not be news to you, let me tell you a story...

This was the case last night. I was banned for the first game after the mid-season break, an away game to the team who were languishing at the bottom of the table. The team who were giving me a great sense of ease, as, since they had won exactly zero games thus far, they were very likely to take the only relegation slot and thus guarantee my safety...

Anyway, I was due to serve my ban, so I set up my team with a fairly defensive look, but not too defensive. As I said, they didn't seem like too much of a threat.

Kick-off! And 10 minutes in one my strikers picks up a knock. You know, he has a green cross and his fitness has gone down a bit. The commentary says he should be able to run it off.

Now, I dont know about you, but I always take these players off if there's a significant drop in fitness. I am aware, however, that the AI does not follow this policy. Fitness drops to 75% instantly. I'm worried.

We reach half time, and its 0-0. There's been chances on each side, but most interestingly, my injured striker is, in my opinion, failing to run off his 'knock'. His motion is visibly slower as the second half begins. His fitness level? Below 50%...

When we conceded in the 75th minute his fitness was 14% and he was barely moving on the pitch. It was worse than playing with 10 men, because his bloody teammates were still playing through balls for him to run on to. Run? A dead horse could've moved faster...

So we go 1-0 down, but there's plenty of time left. A change in personel could be a good plan here, I'm thinking. Nope AI assistant just plods on, as does my injured striker...

81 minutes gone and we make some changes. Striker finally comes off on 9% fitness. Needless to say, we lost 1-0. And my striker? Out with a thigh strain for 4 months...

Awesome

[iacovone]

iacovone's End of Season Update, Slavonija, Croatian Second Division

Well I was right in my earlier update, we stayed up quite comfortbaly in the end and pressed on towards 6th place. The real problem in this League is shown by the top 3. All three of these clubs are professional whereas the rest of the league are part time. No mere coincidence that they finished where they did (and so comfortably). It is something emgergohas experienced in his save and it is definitely going to be interesting to see if it is the case elsewhere.

Our season really picked up after the halfway point. By this time my loanees were starting to gel and I had assembled something vaguely looking like a competent squad! As the graph shows we steadily climbed after a poor start.

Top goalscorer and key performer: Spicic

I was also very pleased with the two keepers I brought in. They were not loanees so will be around for sometime and despite not getting a great average rating, they rarely conceded soft goals and mainly blocked what I expected of them.

The Finances are still not looking rosy. We had to fork out 40k for squad bonuses this season, and I dare not offer the lowest next season! Hopefully with the new expansions to the stadium (seen on the info page) we can begin to generate more match day income.

Stats Corner

Looking at our results against the top 3 teams it makes for depressing reading. We were soundly beaten 3-0 and 3-1 by second place Kamen Ingrad. Our results were much closer with the league champions Sibenik. We lost 3-2 away after leading 2-1. But the worst was at home - the collapse of the ages. . We were 3-1 up with 5 minutes to go when Sibenik laid seige to our goal. 3 goals in 5 minutes led to a 4-3 loss. Truly mortifying! . We really do need to create a solid defensive formation to close out games.
Our results against third place Osijek (tipped for the title) were 3-0 and 4-0 defeats. Not good reading.

We conceded a whopping 13 penalties this season. 7 of which were scored, 2 were rebounds. So at least my keepers can save a pen. But this will have to be improved next season.


Ambitions
Hopefully make a profit.
Improve on 8th place.
Build the squad up and rely less on youth players.

Enjoying the challenge, good luck everyone else

[rlipscombe]

i do use sortitoutsi.net alot for kits etc and do already have quite a lot, but hadn't seen anything for Norway except for kits for top league and logos i already have. i have to admit i got a bit carried away seeing your squad with the logos!!

i'll see what i can do with regard to getting myself a logo done. thanks for your help!

[iacovone]

aaberdeenn sorry to say Novalja went down by one point on my save!

migwar thanks for the warning, that is pretty terrible news for the forward, hope it doesn't spoil your season. My advice? Sack the assistant!

[migwar]

oddly enough I'd oly just renewed hid contact for another 2 seasons...

[migwar]

Originally posted by migwar:
oddly enough I'd only just renewed his contract for another 2 seasons...

sorry, typing with my feet today

[rlipscombe]

Originally posted by rlipscombe:
Yes Gundo, do watch your back!! don't forget that mighty Assimes IF!!

on a personal level, i've not had chance to play much last few days but buoyed on by your success i think i'll have another dabble tonight.

a quick question though - where did you get the club badge and the league badges from?? i've had no look finding them so far... have you the kits too?

imagine my embarassment in realising i'd spelt the name of my team wrong!! it should obviously have read ASSIDEN IF.........

[Gundo]

Originally posted by rlipscombe:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by rlipscombe:
Yes Gundo, do watch your back!! don't forget that mighty Assimes IF!!

on a personal level, i've not had chance to play much last few days but buoyed on by your success i think i'll have another dabble tonight.

a quick question though - where did you get the club badge and the league badges from?? i've had no look finding them so far... have you the kits too?

imagine my embarassment in realising i'd spelt the name of my team wrong!! it should obviously have read ASSIDEN IF......... </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I thought you had, but didn't say anything.

[aaberdeenn]

aaberdeenn sorry to say Novalja went down by one point on my save!

Lets hope I can do a better job.

[Annihilator666]

Originally posted by Fire Bracelet:
Hey Annihilator, good work on the updates, but I have a question if you feel like it.

I've been doing this challenge in N.Ireland as well but have been too busy to update. How have you been doing in cup draws with amateur teams that have almost all grey players? I've been getting right destroyed by them all the time even though I got promoted my first year into the first division.

I lose these cup games to grey teams and can't score for my life and then go on next week to smash my league opponent or at least be very competitive. The sad thing is that in these cup draws I pray for full squad teams because I can't beat the amateur greys!

Ya, I've noticed it in this challenge and in dafuge's challenge. It was a bug which they said they had fixed in the final patch, but they haven't. If you look at some of the grey players on those teams, they have stats that are way better than your own players.

[rlipscombe]

Originally posted by Gundo:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by rlipscombe:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by rlipscombe:
Yes Gundo, do watch your back!! don't forget that mighty Assimes IF!!

on a personal level, i've not had chance to play much last few days but buoyed on by your success i think i'll have another dabble tonight.

a quick question though - where did you get the club badge and the league badges from?? i've had no look finding them so far... have you the kits too?

imagine my embarassment in realising i'd spelt the name of my team wrong!! it should obviously have read ASSIDEN IF......... </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I thought you had, but didn't say anything. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

should have kept quiet then!! ha ha. hopefully i manage them better than remembering their name....

[Annihilator666]

SI really need to fix the youth contracts in lower leagues. I have 16 youth players that I don't use, getting paid £55 per week. Most of my first team players don't get paid that much.

[aaberdeenn]

I've got 6 Croatian U19 internationals in my first team squad and each one of them is on £5 a week.

My wage budget is over 7k and I'm taking up just over 2k.

[iacovone]

6 Croatian Under 19 internationals?! Damn you aaberdeenn - I have zero.

[migwar]

I have a Slovakian U21 on loan, and a polish U21 who is only 17...

[Gundo]

Have I found Norway's answer to Patrik Burda?

Meet Stian Ringstad.

[iacovone]

Wow, I would have to say...YES! Was he a youth product or did you discover him??

[iacovone]

After seeing that the top 3 teams in my division were fully professional I've undertaken the painstaking task of offering full time contracts to all of my players. So far it's been promising, club captain - Nevio Berdi signing within 1 day.

[iacovone]

iacovone's Very Exciting Pre Season Update

Basically just a chance to show you the players I've brought in. It's been a productive off-season with plenty of young and talented players coming in having been released by the previous clubs. I've also given all the part-timers I wanted to keep full time contracts. The rest have been offloaded. 3 have left, 2 have retired and none of the loanees wanted to stay, so complete rebuilding had to be done.

We are predicted to come 10th which is just slightly below mid-table. Anyway here are the new boys:

Darko Verhas - very high hopes for this guy
Sasa Jelenic - potentially Verhas's long term partner at the back if he develops right
Ivan Glavina
Zvonko Bilic
Josip Soljic
Zdravko Semialjac - pace!
Luka Jovic - another great prospect

So all in all, a brand new squad, which definitely contains enough potential to far exceed the ability of last years squad (if they haven't already) I'm sure there will also be a few more additions coming soon.

aaberdeenn your club Novalja, despite going down, signed the Croatian Under 21 Captain from under my nose. It must be an attractive place to play!

[Annihilator666]

Originally posted by aaberdeenn:
I've got 6 Croatian U19 internationals in my first team squad and each one of them is on £5 a week.

My wage budget is over 7k and I'm taking up just over 2k.

So this is only happening in the Northern Irish leagues. I mean, almost half my wage budget (£880 out of £2000 per week) is going to unused youth players, and it totally sucks.

[Quacky]

Békéscsaba Elöre FC 2011/12 Winter Break

One word, ownage, before the season I bought some new defenders such as Mr Kiss to make up for my weak full backs last season. The money came from selling this brave guy for £100K (who then tore his achilles in his first game for new team tehe).

The new defence lets in the fewest goals in the league and some games is amazing, at the end of this game came the message, Duck's boys never looked like losing

All of this leaves me comfortably winning the league by quite a long way. I think its actually quite easy to have success in this league since the computer plays it full team in the sucky league cup where I play just reserves. This means their players have two games a week to my one, the cup is that bad.

Even my finances are starting to look up a bit, leveling off at least or i could optimistically say I'm making money.

[Fire Bracelet]

All my youth players get 100 a week while my main players get a lot less. I love the feature where you can't release them without giving them 5-10k each.

[Quacky]

That brave guys link doesn't seem to work, try this one.

[Annihilator666]

Originally posted by Fire Bracelet:
All my youth players get 100 a week while my main players get a lot less. I love the feature where you can't release them without giving them 5-10k each.

I found a small work-around. If you offer them new part time contracts on the same wages, but only until the end of the season, they will usually accept. So it means you will only have them for one season instead of the three year youth contract.

[Quacky]

Békéscsaba Elöre FC 2011/12 Ninja Update

To whoever said that Péter Odrobéna sucked, I think it was emgergo, he just solved my financial hole. I have no idea where the other team got the money from but I need a new DM.

[emgergo]

Originally posted by Quacky:
Békéscsaba Elöre FC 2011/12 Ninja Update

To whoever said that Péter Odrobéna sucked, I think it was emgergo, he just solved my financial hole. I have no idea where the other team got the money from but I need a new DM.

Yup, it was me. And yes, he does suck hairy arse IRL

Pápa has a quite rich owner, who owned several clubs earlier (Haladás and Tatabánya), and always jumped ship when his team were in trouble

[Gundo]

Originally posted by iacovone:
Wow, I would have to say...YES! Was he a youth product or did you discover him??

One of my scouts found him last season when he was only 16yo, I'd tracked him for the season. He went on to score 20 goals in 24 games that season at the age of just 16, so he is proven at this level at that age aswell!

The strange thing is our coach's/scouts don't rate him much in terms of potential, which is alittle odd?

[aaberdeenn]

I've got Semialjac too. Two of my U19's just got promoted to the U21's.

[iacovone]

Quaky you really are flying. Seems you've taken to this challenge like a duck to water!(sorry ) I take it that is the top division? European competition coming your way soon it seems. Keep it up.

[Quacky]

Yes its top division, I was in Intertoto this season already from the sucky cup that I'm avoiding like the plague this season. Hoping for much more than that this season (although I just lost 2-0 to the worst team in the league, failed to convert my many chances).

[emgergo]

The top league looks really strange to me, Quacky I miss some traditional greats (Honvéd, Vasas), but tbh they managed to relegate a few times IRL too

[emgergo]

Fifth season is on the way. Squad has more talent and depth than ever. We'll see, but it's encouraging that we're off with a 3-0 win, with goals from 3 new signings \o/

[iacovone]

We sold 9 more season tickets this year. The ground extension was clearly well worth it.

[iacovone]

Halellujah! My first genuine quality player. I give you the Bosnian - Tomislav Visevic

[Annihilator666]

Originally posted by iacovone:
Halellujah! My first genuine quality player. I give you the Bosnian - Tomislav Visevic

Good player, only 8 pace though. Wingers might just run past him every time...

[iacovone]

True. But I'm relying on my new find to adopt the "if the ball goes past me the man definitely won't" technique I've instilled at the club. (Hard Tackling)

Just been told the next home game will be a fan day

[iacovone]

Dammit, I gave him the kiss of death. Very next game the Bosnian gets burned for pace and gives away a pen

Thankfully new boy in goal saves it.

[aaberdeenn]

iacovone; if you think that's genuine quality, wait till you see my star player who is 17, in the Croatia U21 squad and playing rather well.

I'll post up some screenies of my young stars at the end of the season.

For the mean time, I just reached the mid-point of the season. 15 games to go; 2 more till the 2 month winter break. Currently unbeaten in 5.

Mid-Season Table.

Quite happy so far. It's took a while for my youngsters to gel but now we are starting to look like a team picking up points and wins over the top teams.

I'm hoping for a top half finish but you never know...

[Quacky]

Békéscsaba Elöre FC 2011/12 Full Season

The post Odrobéna era started in comical fashion when shortly afterwards his new team came to visit, they got thumped, their boss got sacked with me as the top manager linked to the post, naturally I declined. Pivotal in this victory was the replacement, much cheaper and quite possibly better than the original.

The dominance of the first half the season didn't quite carry over to after winter, probably due to the not quite so suck arse cup. Even so the title was wrapped up with four games to go and we did the double taking the Hungarian Cup too. I was dreading the massive player win bonus, turned out to be £122K overall, although thankfully the prize money for the league was £200K.

Champions league to come next season, our current European ranking is 59 places to 326th with Hungary lingering in 32nd with a coefficient of 8.333. We've drawn some more Armenians and then Sparta Prague, updates to come.

In other news, Croatia won 2012 European Championships, I would have just said what the score was but then I saw that it was lol.

[aaberdeenn]

Also, I'm 30/40k in the profit for the season with the balance at roughly -110k at the moment. Things looking bright.

I've also began work on assembling my squad for the new season. Signing the players I expect to play a big part onto full-time contracts, with the excess to leave on frees at the end of the season.

[aaberdeenn]

Go Croatia. \o/

[Quacky]

Békéscsaba Elöre FC 2012/13 Europa

In the 1st Qualifying we drew Ararat Yerevan of Armenia, they were a useless team and we spanked them 4-0 in Armenia and finished them off 6-0 on aggregate. The 2nd Qualifying was a much bigger challenge against Sparta Prague, we were unlucky to lose 1-0 at home with a disallowed goal and then got a 1-1 draw in Prague, not quite enough

Most annoying was that I was really hoping to reach the 3rd qualifying and be owned hard, it would have been against Real Madrid. On with winning the league again...

[Annihilator666]

Annihilator666 - Nortel - Season 09/10 - Northern Irish Second Division

Manager Profile - Manager Profile
Table - League Table | Position Graph
Results - Results #1 | Results #2
Transfers - Transfers Summary
Finances - Finance Summary
Other Info - Club Information | Manager Information
Top Scorer - Kenny Neilly
Fans' Player of the Year - Kenny Neilly
Records - Team Overall Records | Team Season Records


Well, a good season which ended with promotion. I was top for a couple of weeks, but was in 2nd position for a lot of the season. A bad run of 4 games without a win near the end almost cost us dearly, but the team pulled through and a win on the last day of the season confirmed promotion.

Had a decent run again in the Intermediate League Cup, getting to the Quarter Finals, but we lost to Lurgan Celtic. In the Irish Cup, we made it to a club best of the 5th round, but Ballyclare Comrades knocked us out on penalties.

Financially, the club had a slightly more stable season, breaking about even. However, I had to sell a couple of players to achieve this. I'm arranging as many friendlies as possible against lower league English teams this season to try and make some money. Also, a lot of youth contracts will expire so that should also help.

[Fire Bracelet]

Fire Bracelet - Sirocco Works - Season 08/09 - Northern Irish Second Division

Manager Profile - Manager Profile
Table - Table
Transfers- http://mysite.verizon.net/res7upsy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/transfers1.jpg

The year started off with me having a few youth players and no one on a senior contract, so I looked around the teams in my new division myself and found a few people willing to join up to create a new squad. Very little staff showed up for adverts so I used the search engine to look for them, other than these things I followed all LLM rules and plan to in the future.

Did rather well in the league that ended up with me being promoted, nothing spectacular happening except ending the season with a 5-0 win against the 3rd ranked team and followed that with a 4-2 win over Moyola Park to clinch the second promotion spot! Cups were rather disappointing and I got thrashed by several grey teams.

[Fire Bracelet]

Sorry this is my first time doing anything so complicated on the forums. Transfers

[emgergo]

Congratulations Quackyn on the double! \o/\o/

Your case with Odrobéna brings up an IRL memory: Békéscsaba had it's 'golden team' in the mid-90s, which challenged for the title for a few years. Then Győr bought 7 (!) players from them in a summer. Next season, first day, and a heavily-weakened Békéscsaba kicked Győr's arse 4-0

[Fire Bracelet]

Fire Bracelet - Sirocco Works - Season 08/09 - Northern Irish First Division

Manager Profile(end of this season) - Manager Profile
Table - Table

This season started out with me 100k in the hole financially due to promotion bonuses and a wage budget that's under the limit but it still too much for our finances. So I brought in almost no one and a very important MR on loan. Got a new good striker at the very end who got released, he scored two for us in the last game of the season.

To put it simply, the opposition was not improved at all over the second division and for the most part we dominated the first division pure and simple. We did much better in the Irish Cup getting to the quarters and losing due to two players getting two yellows. We were almost always on top in the First and trotted our way to the championship and promotion.

I have a bad feeling that after looking at the top clubs in the Premier Division that there will be a much bigger jump up in talent and I fear us being relegated next year. Hopefully we will make some money no matter what.

[Fire Bracelet]

Sorry that last post should read 09/10.

[iacovone]

Bravo Quaky, well done on the double and a very respectable two matches against Sparta Prague.

Oh, and go Croatia

[rlipscombe]

finally got round to playing my first pre-season friendly last night with Assiden IF. i have managed to cobble together so far a first XI with a couple of reserves and youth players on the bench for my first game, with a few players in on loan from my parent club, Stromsgodset.

going into the match against Gruben (some random club) away, i was optimistic of a decent result and told the players to relax and enjoy. and they did winning 5-0!!

hope the rest of the games are as easy!!

(Gundo, i must be an attractive team to play as Randaberg have just 'begged' me to play them in a pre-season friendly at our place.... )

[cookie15]

Originally posted by rlipscombe:
(Gundo, i must be an attractive team to play as Randaberg have just 'begged' me to play them in a pre-season friendly at our place.... )

Man they must be desperate

[JoseBlanco]

I'll have a go at this in Ukraine

[migwar]

i played the second half of my season last night.

it went pretty badly. we only won a couple of games, but i never realised the severity of my position until there was only 3 games left. the team who i thought were the league whipping boys were above me, and i was only 3 points and 3 places from bottom.

I left it with 2 games to play. I'm sitting 10th out of 12 and I've got 35 points. The 2 teams below me both have 33...

My last 2 games are against 2nd and 9th, and I really cant afford to go down. I feel that relegation, coupled with the half million overdraft, will be my head on a plate...

[iacovone]

You can do it migwar . No-one wants to see your head on a plate...

Top work so far Fire Bracelet good luck in the Prem.

[Gundo]

Originally posted by cookie15:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by rlipscombe:
(Gundo, i must be an attractive team to play as Randaberg have just 'begged' me to play them in a pre-season friendly at our place.... )

Man they must be desperate </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Our lads just needed an easy run-out.


I watched the Rosenborg BK- Chelsea game last night on tv, It kind of gave me even more inspiration to reach the Champions League with Randaberg. Shame Rosenborg got beat 4-0 in the end.

[Benjaminoo]

Hey lads.

Haven't got much gaming time in this week because of school work etc etc.

Should get my season finished on the weekend.

Glad to see your all doing well, KUTGW everyone

[iacovone]

Out of the Croatian Cup but so nearly caused an upset. Lost 1-0 at home to the mighty Hadjuk Split.

It's a shame how one result like that (relates nothing to the league) can spoil your form. We'd gone the first 7 league games unbeaten but currently 2 down at home to Osijek

aaberdeenn I'll have you know Mr Visevic would be a leading star for any prem team apparently! Happy with that! Also, how good is Semialjac?! His pace is incredible!

[aaberdeenn]

Also, how good is Semialjac?! His pace is incredible!

I've not given him that much game time so far, but he has 12 goals in 6 games for my U19's. I do have another striker, (the one I mentioned earlier) who is my top scorer. His pace is causing everyone problems.

I hope to finish my season tonight.

[rlipscombe]

Originally posted by Gundo:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by cookie15:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by rlipscombe:
(Gundo, i must be an attractive team to play as Randaberg have just 'begged' me to play them in a pre-season friendly at our place.... )

Man they must be desperate </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Our lads just needed an easy run-out.


I watched the Rosenborg BK- Chelsea game last night on tv, It kind of gave me even more inspiration to reach the Champions League with Randaberg. Shame Rosenborg got beat 4-0 in the end. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

haven't played the match yet... will do tonight and might even post a screenshot depending on the result!!

[CoachFlu]

Meldert, Belgium - May 12th 2014

End of Season table

I'm a bit disappointed that we didn't manage to win the title. We had a strong run after the winter and looked like we were gonna pull it off, but a combination of injuries and suspensions (4 red cards in the last six matches) saw us throw it away in the end.

So we'll have to snatch promotion through the playoffs. Emphasis on HAVE TO, if I want to keep my job longer than, say, January or so.
At the moment the board are still pleased, but being 1 mil in the red already (and dropping fast), I need to stay ahead of the long term expectations, which are to challenge for the title.

So, six more matches to play (it's a 4 team group stage type playoff, first place promotes). Six tough matches, because this is a "cream of the crop" playoff.
All three opponents have a history in the First Division (though admittedly, it's been a while for Kortrijk). But Germinal Beerschot even won the First Division in the 07/08 season. So I'm definitely up against it.

[Annihilator666]

Haha, just found a guy I went to school with playing against me in the Northern Irish First Division...

[Gundo]

I've just landed Stavanger IF (the club I managed in last years challenge) as my feeder club.

I've just had a board update and they are not entirely pleased with our performance so far and want me to achieve their expectations of a title change this season.

It's going to be a tough season, I just hope we've got the required quality to challenge.

[CoachFlu]

Meldert, Belgium - June 8th 2014

Mid-season table
End of season
Playoffs


Bah. Not good.
It came down to the last playoff round. We had to beat Germinal Beerschot, away, to promote. But we failed to do that, so another season in the Second Division it is.
Don't think I'll survive that long, but we'll see how far I get.

The team.

I'm generally pleased with the team. Most of the strikers were reasonably productive - except when it really counted.

Two players who stood out:
Anele Ngcongca. The pacey defender I desperately needed. Occasional South African international.

Melvin Zaalman. His 18 assists got him into the club's record books. Already did reasonable in last season's relegation team, but really excelled this season, almost exclusively on the right wing. Unfortunately his contract is up, and his wage demand is higher than my board allows.


All in all, not a bad season, but it won't be enough. 1.2 mil in the red, and it gets worse by 250-300k per month. The main question that remains is whether I'll get fired before or after the club goes bankrupt.

[Quacky]

Unlucky in those playoffs CoachFlu, my team was losing £30K a month until just now (3rd season in top flight) where I finally have enough people turning up to make a profit. Staying in those lower leagues kills you

[migwar]

i had a season ticket sales update on 6th june, telling me we'd sold 1194 season tickets for next year.

i had another update on 20th june telling me the same thing.

and another on 27th june, still saying 1194.

this in itself is not unusual, however, i've just had an update on 4th july telling me we've sold 1080!!

Did someone bring theirs back? That's just stupid...

[Fire Bracelet]

Originally posted by migwar:
i had a season ticket sales update on 6th june, telling me we'd sold 1194 season tickets for next year.

i had another update on 20th june telling me the same thing.

and another on 27th june, still saying 1194.

this in itself is not unusual, however, i've just had an update on 4th july telling me we've sold 1080!!

Did someone bring theirs back? That's just stupid...

It happens sometimes, if you lose a key player or someone fires the manager before the season starts.

[Annihilator666]

Annihilator666 - Nortel - Season 10/11 - Northern Irish Second Division

Manager Profile - Manager Profile
Table - League Table | Position Graph
Results - Results #1 | Results #2
Transfers - Transfers Summary
Finances - Finance Summary
Other Info - Club Information | Manager Information
Top Scorer - Kenny Neilly
Fans' Player of the Year - Kenny Neilly
Records - Team Overall Records | Team Season Records


First Division:

Yay! Promotion to the Premier League at the first attempt. Had a really strong season, and was rarely outside the top three. Oxford United Stars were above me in 2nd place for a lot of the season, but they fell away in the last few games and I nipped in ahead of them. I played Lurgan Celtic in the Promotion/Relegation playoff, and hammered them 4-1 in both legs to win promotion 8-2 on agg.!

This was mostly down to my star striker, as you can see in the screenshot above. I had an offer of £80k for him from Portadown, which is huge money in Northern Irish football. Obviously, I turned it down.


The Cups:

Another uneventful season in the cups for Nortel. A couple of losses to all grey teams, of course, which is quite annoying.


The Board, finances, etc.

Well, as you can see in my results screenshots above, I played a massive number of friendlies against middle division English clubs. These friendlies helped HUGELY with my finances, bringing in over £100k.

[Annihilator666]

Originally posted by Annihilator666:
Annihilator666 - Nortel - Season 10/11 - Northern Irish First Division

^^

[Fire Bracelet]

Well done there Annihilator, I found the First Division to be ridiculously easy too, we should schedule our teams for a friendly sometime.

[Annihilator666]

Originally posted by Fire Bracelet:
Well done there Annihilator, I found the First Division to be ridiculously easy too, we should schedule our teams for a friendly sometime.

Thanks! I've found that there really isn't much difference between the three leagues, except for the big three teams in the Premier Division (Linfield, Glentoran, Portadown).

[cookie15]

hmmmmm.......... you think you've got it tough Gundo!

My final friendly game was against Stromgodset (or whatever they're called) and the only poistive was my new 30 year old striker hammered in a brace. It was just the twelve you conceded at the other end which is a little worrying!!
Just to reinforce it, we lost 2-12

The boys got a proper rollicking for their efforts, or lack of, would be more accurate!!

We've managed just one pre-season victory and i'm desperately trying to find a keeper who'll come. My scouts have recommended a guy, so we'll see if he'll come.
Good luck guys with your respective games

[cookie15]

Originally posted by cookie15:
hmmmmm.......... you think you've got it tough Gundo!

My final friendly game was against Stromgodset (or whatever they're called) and the only positive was my new 30 year old striker who hammered in a brace. It was just the twelve <STRIKE>you</STRIKE> we conceded at the other end which is a little worrying!!
Just to reinforce it, we lost 2-12

The boys got a proper rollicking for their efforts, or lack of, would be more accurate!!

We've managed just one pre-season victory and i'm desperately trying to find a keeper who'll come. My scouts have recommended a guy, so we'll see if he'll come.
Good luck guys with your respective games

[Jimbokav1971]

we lost 2-12

It's results like that that make me want to get into this again.

[cookie15]

Originally posted by Jimbokav1971:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">we lost 2-12

It's results like that that make me want to get into this again. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Cheers mate, go on, kick a bloke when he's down
Good to have you back Jimbo

[rlipscombe]

managed to play a couple more pre-season firendlies last night, including the 'big' game against Randaberg. The experts expected Randaberg to win comfortably and odds of 1-3 for Randaberg against my 7-1 weren't encouraging......

we took the lead in the first half and i couldn't fault the lads. we rode our luck a couple of times but we had a number of other chances to score. in the second half i made a number of substitutions, giving some trialists a run-out. we conceded two late goals and lost 2-1. (yes Gundo, Randaberg won 2-1....) the experts said that we played well and should be pleased.

As far as my squad and how it's developing, i'm cautiously optimistic so far. secured a good young striker on loan from my parent club, Stromsgodset, called Knutsen who's playing well pre-season. got a few other players in from there too. i was worried about my GK situation, but i've brought in one from stromsgodset again, who's 23 and would be a good signing for a premier division club!! pleased with that too.

my squad is still a bit thin and lacking in depth, but i'm still working on this. with the apparent lack of quality available on free transfers, i might have to look at relying on loan signings a bit more than i would like, but needs must. i don't want to sign deadwood for the sake of building a squad.

hope to get some decent game time in over the weekend and get into the league season...

[Gundo]

Originally posted by rlipscombe:
yes Gundo, Randaberg won 2-1....

\o/

[rlipscombe]

Originally posted by Gundo:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by rlipscombe:
yes Gundo, Randaberg won 2-1....

\o/ </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

thought you'd like that.... shame i had to bring on my trialists before you could score.....