FM10 · RC Lens · Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis

Overview

Founded in 1906.

Nicknamed "les Sang et Or" (Blood and Gold)

Enjoys a national reputation.

Rival teams are Lille, PSG, OM, OL and Valenciennes.

Plays in Ligue 1, France.

Media prediction: 13th.

Does not take part to any European competition during the 2009/10 season.

Ranking UEFA: 66th.

Chairman is Gervais Martel, who loves the club.

Finances are secure.

Estimated value is € 45M.

Plays home games at Stade Félix-Bollaert, 41.229 all-seater built in 1932 (currently being expanded).

The stadium capacity is greater than the city population.

Disposes of top training facilities.

Disposes of good youth facilities and of a youth academy.

The captain is Eric Chelle.

Icons of the club are Tony Vairelles, Jean-Guy Wallemme, Daniel Leclercq, Guillaume Warmuz, Eric Sikora, Seydou Keita, Philippe Vercruysse, Wagneau Eloi, Vladimir Smicer and Roger Lemerre.

Number 17 has been retired in honor of Marc-Vivien Foé; number 12 has been retired in honor of the club's dedicated fans.

History

Foundend in 1906, the Racing Club de Lens was born by initiative of a group of high school students, following the example of the English and of some nearby cities, namely Roubaix and Arras.

Originally dressed in green and black, the Lens' players adopted the red and yellow in 1923, thus gaining the famous nickname "Sang et Or", Blood and Gold.

RC Lens reached Ligue 1 in 1937; after some good runs in Coupe de France, the club activities were put to a halt by WWII; after its end, despite all the efforts, economic problems led to relegation, and Lens remained for a couple of years in the second divisions.

Despite being promoted in 1949, the difficulties continued: with the crisis of the mines in the region, financial support ceased and results got worse and worse.

In 1968 RC Lens was relegated again to Ligue 2, then became an amateur club when relegated to the third tier of French football.

Little by little, the fans began to forsake its team, which didn't manage to get back up; still, thanks to some men like Henri Trannin, Arnold Sowinski and Andre Delelis, Lens undertook its rebuilding: in 1973 it got promoted back to the first division, and two years later it reached the Coupe de France final.

At this point, the club added some European pages to its history.

In the subsequent decades Lens got stabilized and became an important reality of French football; the biggest result came in 1998, when Lens was crowned French champion. One year later the Coupe de la Ligue was added to the palmares.

After a streak of good results (UEFA Cup semi-finals in 2000, Ligue 1 runner up in 2002), Lens slipped back to Ligue 2 in 2008, but got a promotion right away and is now ready to enjoy a new spell of successes, adding prestige to its history, over a hundred years long.

National Honours

Ligue 1: 1998

Coupe de la Ligue: 1994, 1999

Ligue 2: 1937, 1949, 1973, 2009

Coupe Charles Drago: 1959, 1960, 1965

Ligue U19: 2009

Coupe Gambardella: 1957, 1958, 1992

European Honours

Intertoto Cup: 2005

Coupe de l'Amitié: 1962

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Analysis

Start of season expectations

Avoid relegation: transfers € 0 · wages € 1,2M

Mid-table // Winner: transfers € 0 · wages € 1,3M

Current wages: € 903.182 per month

The Team

Goalkeepers

Runje

Kasraoui

Atrous

Goeman

Centrals

Chelle

Yahia

El Adoua

Sartre

Gaillard

Touré

Right Backs

Laurenti

Blanc

Left Backs

Ramos

Demartin

Defensive Midfielders

Kovacevic

Hermach

Sow

Kibundu

Remy

Dufour

Central Midfielders

Milovanovic

Doumeng

Leclerc

Rogie

Attacking Midfielders

Omrani

Diakité

Fofana

Mantel

Right Wingers

Boukari

Demont

Monrose

Left Wingers

Akalé

Roudet

Jemaa

Carney

Strikers

Maoulida

Eduardo

Monnet-Paquet

Pottiez

Bilal

Planard

Pollet

Dindane

What can we do with what we have?

A flat four is probably the best bet for the defense, as with the players at our disposal a 3 DCs, with or without WBs, seems pretty ruled out.

The wings are fine, so two more spots are gone for AML and AMR.

The big decision is if one wants to play with anchorman and lone striker or two strikers.

Either Kovacevic acts as a screen in the DM spot, with Milovanovic and Doumeng in the middle; or Kovacevic and Milovanovic play MCs with different duties.

No AMC is good enough as of now, so, unless you bring in a couple, forget that.

What is badly needed?

Absolutely, a left back. Backup could be enough, as we can live with Ramos.

Next, if, like me, you want to play with an anchorman, bring in a central midfielder, either a solid all-round backup or an offensive-oriented one who can take Doumeng's place in the first team.

If you go for the 4-4-2 you might (I definitely would) look for a solid striker.

What else?

With just those two additions, the gaps should be filled.

Now the team, as a whole, ain't bad; surely not great, but should prove solid enough to survive Ligue 1.

What is lacking is individuality: there's no crazy winger, no iper-creative playmaker, no assault-striker and no quiet midfielder with a thing for screamers.

So, if you have any spare cash, try to look for someone who can put a little magic into a bore draw to give you the 3 points, instead of two or three fine but unimpressive signings.

Just my two cents, eh!

U18s

Superb [ **** ]

Situ DC, DMC, ST

Very good [ ***· ]

Terrien GK

Good [ *** ]

Coeff MC, AMC

Abeid AMC, ST

Fairly good [ **· ]

Hazard AML, ML

Decouré ST

Useful [ ** ]

Kondogbia AMC, MC

Gaillard AMR, MR

Decent [ *· ]

Chauveau GK

Babaouche DC, DL

Cargol DR, WBR

Below average [ · ]

Ba DC, DL

Ritter DL, WBL

To do: Staff

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Why playing RC Lens?

· A nice fat stadium (under expansion), top training facilities and a good youth setup.

· The challenge of taking a newly promoted team back to the top.

· Playing in Ligue 1: it's just unpredictable, in FM as IRL.

· Bringing some valuable European silver into an empty cabinet.

· Very low expectations in the first season.

· Whoever laughed watching Welcome To The Sticks has the moral obligation to give 'em a shot.

Nice OP. Sow, Coeff, Situ, and Monnet-Paquet usually all turn into good-very good players.

Never managed in France before,

I might give it a shot and see how it goes when the full game comes out, and yes, Welcome to the Sticks had me rolling around on the floor XD

You've missed out Aurier, who also becomes class act. Brilliant OP i have to say though, might be worth giving these a try out.

Only just noticed this. Nice work on the OP.

Hazard, Situ, Aurier

Due to all these youth, i might give them a go. Looks promising Anyone else had a save with them?

I've put my Bari save down to do this (which I an have wanted to do for a long time due to the OP more than anything:cool:)

The starting budget isn't too much of a problem, when asked for expectations I said mid budget and then scouted for a month until the season tickets were announced. Then I asked the board for transfer funds and got £4.25M (asked for wages too, but didn't allow me that) In the mean time while I was scouting I decided that the wingers at the club were not good enough and as soon as I could get better personnel in i'd be playing a 4-4-2 diamond for the first season at least and selling all the wingers I could.

That decision left me with these in and outs It may seem a tad too much but the fact I lost to Lyon and Nancy 2-0 in the first two games left me without much option.

So with all my transfers done, I have turned it around and beaten Montpellier 5-0 and followed it up with a 3-0 win at L'Orient then a further 10 points from 4 games so it is looking like it may pay off.

Eventually I will want a winger system up in place, but until players develop in other positions I don't want to leave myself open.

The other long term aim is to have a mostly French/African squad, which I have already planned ahead with the signings of Torric and Otoo who my scouts said potentially looked better than the likes of Sani Emmanuel and Okoro.

Tutoring is already in place for Situ ect; and they have all been put in the reserves. I'm hoping to get 2 of them good enough to be in the first team eventually, though 4 would be superb.

So I finished my first season at Lens and here is the table.

An absolutely stunning effort by the team, with only a few added to the squad after my last post. Milevskyi was the star of the show with 21 goals and 6 assists in 34 (2) games.

The diamond formation was only ever meant to be a tactic to help us have numbers in the center to give us a solid first season (I would have been happy with 10th place and above) but as we grew in to the season it was apparent that it suited the players and only playing at a counter attacking pace seemed to lure other teams in to a false sense of security as most of our goals came from defending our own end and moving quickly when we did have the ball.

A center half, right back and a keeper are my main targets for next season, i'd like a left back too if budgets allow but I think I can cope if need be. The youngsters have all done pretty well in the reserves and they will spend all next season there and if they dominate that division like they should then they will get a 1st team chance the year after

Super delay but great season winning the league SMPL.

Cheers Hopey. It was totally out of the blue TBH though the signings I made thanks to selling the wingers and money after the season tickets certainly made it a lot easier.

I've found the Lens board to be one of the most supportive i've had on this years game. I was given £30M in transfer money this season with which I made these my dealings. They've since then given me a further £17M without even asking for it.

The CL group has drawn us against Bayern, Real and Beskitas. It's a tough group but a win against Bayern in the first game has given us hope and I think we are capable of getting a point at least from Real at home after losing 3-1 away and hopefully 6 from Beskitas and I think it'll be enough to see us through.

These make up my first team squad and this is the main core of the reserves. Aurier and Torric are both coming on superbly there. Torric is being tutored by Skjedbred and it is one of the best improvements i've seen in a short period of time.

I also forgot to mention that Metz were relegated to the National last season, i've saved the game at that point if anyone fancies a go at it (20 divisions loaded altogether)

Went big on Sakho, also not sure about Drenthe or AVB but otherwise not bad dealings.

Tried to get Sakho for less and my determination to get as French as possible long term meant I had to pay it. Drenthe is nothing more than a stop gap as he is better than what I had. Also he was available at a decent price and with any luck I can get a profit once I either find a long term LB or Helan starts getting his backside in to gear.

AVB is just a utility man. I knew when signing him he wouldn't be spectacular but he should do a job when there's a few injuries or need to give players a rest, even though we are champions we are still limited on the class of player we can get. Only having one spare non EU spot isn't helping either (will be looking to get rid of Nenad Kovacevic in Jan though, so that should give us a bit of room)

Ah yes PSG and Sakho. Many of us have been down that road, it's possibly worse for us a little bit more as I'm Lyon so not exactly flavour of the month with the Parisians.

Ah yes PSG and Sakho. Many of us have been down that road, it's possibly worse for us a little bit more as I'm Lyon so not exactly flavour of the month with the Parisians.

He's not been performing overly well for me TBH. Playing as as central defender with defend instructions.

Not had much playing time this week, but going to give it a hammering today

Currently top on GD after lying around 4th/5th until mid December, i've got through the group stage of the CL. Results were

Bayern (h) 1-0

Real (a) 1-3

Beskitas (h) 2-1

Beskitas (a) 1-0

Bayern (a) 1-1

Real (h) 1-2

took the lead in both games against Real, so disappointed not to have at least got a point in the home game.

Been given Bremen in the first knockout. I've had a look at the German league and they are really struggling, so hopefully I can get past that one. (I set myself a target of the quarters as long as we avoided a Man Utd or Barca anyway) Anything after that would be a bonus.

I've added Neymar (only just in Jan so not played yet, never bought him in any save either) and Moussa Sissoko. I'm really tempted to bring M'Vila in, i've been lucky with injuries on the whole so far, especially in midfield where there is always 3 playing.

I've been offered the OM job. Saved that as a separate game and may possibly take it on at some point (sorry Hopey ) But I am enjoying this too much to even think about it right now.

Deary me, OM.

Still having issues with Sakho? If so, post a screenshot of his current instructions and I'll take a look if you like.

Thing is we aren't actually letting in that many goals. Only 10 in the league mid way through Jan (wanted to be a lot further by now but spent ages checking Brazil for newgens as usual ) Here's the instructions anyway. Nothing changed to the CD defender role.

As for OM, won't be able to do that now anyway, carried on playing without doing a second save

Currently 2nd on GD, just had a good 1-1 away at leaders Lyon, we have a good run of 6 games not playing a top side now, so hopefully we can break away.

Well if you’re happy that's alright then! Sakho can take a little while to settle, also not sure the mentality suits him currently which would be magnified if you have a defensive line higher than say eight.

Are you playing what FM calls a Nike defence ? I.e. One CB on 10 for mentality, the other CB on 8 etc?

Otamendi is a limited defender with defend duty (again nothing altered there, as I don't like to overdo it with my CB's at all) The defensive line is slightly heading towards deep (so from center it's be 3 notches to the left) as neither are the quickest in the world, if that helps (thanks for taking the time BTW)

Notch seven then. Roles I used were Stopper and Cover, but I always modified them so there never on default. Personal preference however plus I'm fussy and a perfectionist so I'm usually tweaking to find that perfect setting.

But you seem to be doing fine with the settings, so if it isn't broke don't fix it eh? I'm sure Sakho will pick up.

Could just be that the ratings are due to the midfield tending to dominate (Annan being the main anchor man so not much gets past him anyway ) therefore we don't have a lot of chances against us in most matches for either to need to do much.

With the pressure to have a title bid I don't think i'll change anything for now, but next season I will have a tweak.

Cheers:cool:

EDIT. Just got Grenier on a Bosman for next year

Another amazing season at Lens. As I said in an earlier post the lead kept changing between ourselves and Lyon, but then I had a run of a few draws and find myself 4 points behind them going in to April. Lyon then drew at home to Bordeaux whilst I scabbed a late winner at Lens which narrowed the gap. They then lost against OM whilst I could only draw at home to PSG, this whilst seeming like I had blown my chance at the time, turned in to one of the most vital points of the season.

I was playing out a 2-2 draw at home to Barca in the CL semi final (full knockout results here) and going out on the away goals rule, but whilst that was happening Lyon were playing a league game at home to PSG (a few days earlier than my next game due to their involvement in the French cup final on the same day) We beat Le Mans 4-0 at home to go 2 points clear and caught up quite a bit of the goal difference with them on level games. Next came our last away game of the year and a superb Ait Fana hat trick gave us a 7-1 win and a +2 goal difference. Lyon won their game too and the following game a day ahead of us 2-0 at home to Le Mans leveling the GD up. We went on to beat Nice 4-1 at home leaving the final game for us as a must win at home to relegated Lorient.

Another Ait Fana hat trick led us on to another 4-1 win and the title in the bag as Lyon limped along to a 1 goal victory of their own.

This title win was probably better than last years (even though then I never expected to win it) due to Lyon's lead for a while and their reluctance to drop many points for a long spell (even though we were unbeaten from the 5th game in, we drew too many)

Even though we made the semi final of the CL it was pretty uninspiring (bar the effort in the 2 games v Barca) if i'm honest, we struggled to break teams down and let some silly goals in the earlier rounds and the home leg v Barca.

I've got in mind who will stay this coming season and who will go. Aurier will be promoted for sure and I am going to get a proper left back in as Helan still isn't ready (though he has played well for the reserves.)

Torric and Otto will get some games in the cups too I think as they are the other two have impressed me the most from the reserve side.

Can't beleive you sold Kevin MP. Has the potential to be one of the best French players on the game

Clément on a free. Congrats with the season, good run in the CL as-well.

Cheers Hopey.

In season 3 now Mitev and Amos are my only signings of the summer, I recouped all of that through a few sell on clauses that came my way and the sales of Bedimo and Kovacevic. This may have to change though as I have this injury list

Milevskyi - 1 month

Otto - 2-3 months

Kadlec 4 months

Drenthe 1 month

Otamendi 1 month

Sow - 1 week left but has already been out for 6 weeks

Ait Fana and Neymar are only 70% fit after coming back from 3 week injuries

Amos 2 weeks left of 6

Remy 6 months

Situ 2 weeks

I've also got Annan suspended and Skjedbred just coming back from a 3 weeker. I've never known anything like it Currently 11 points off top after 12 games, luckily we beat Lyon just before the injuries got as unmanageable as they have or it could have been a lot worse

I'm literally writing the title off now and just hoping we can stay in the hunt for a top 3 place, it's almost pointless using the joker window to sign anyone because once everyone is back i'll be overloaded for whichever area I decide to cover

Mitev I would imagine will be more a midfielder than left back or wing back? Amos could be good as a treq in a few years. Abit harsh with the injuries, pretty it didn't come before you played Lyon.

I'll reply in here rather than clutter the thread

I've absolutely no choice at all regarding Grenier. I've just had to promote Torric, Abeid, Coeff and Helan to the first team as it is because we're so short on numbers, there's only really Torric who is anywhere near good enough at the moment but I have no other choice and now i've lost Aurier and Haruna for 5-6 days each. I'm not giving them heavy training either, I am crap at doing schedules so I use Tugs training (the only thing i've ever downloaded in regards to helping you in the game )

My CL campaign is hanging by a thread now too, 1 point from a double header against Shaktar, who i'd have at least beaten at home with 3 more players fit has left me points behind with games at home to Barca and Standard left to play. The one thing I have going for me is the next game in that comp isn't for another 3 weeks so I may have something resembling a decent team to play at home to Barca who are already through.

EDIT. Mitev is actually a natural LB, Amos is natural at both the left wing and forward, he's right footed too and has the cut inside PPM

The best managers adapt in difficult circumstances. I thought you wanted a challenge?

Well we've just come back from 1-0 down, got it to 1-1 with 15 minutes to play to win 4-1 against Le Mans and Lyon drew 0-0 at bottom Grenoble to make the gap 9 points after 13 games so it's on!

Since thew easy cup win last post I lost at Toulouse and went 10 points behind. In January after a few easy cup wins we had Lyon in the CDL and OM in the French cup. I decided that the league was more important and played the reserves in both games,

First was Lyon in the CDL and we lost 1-0, we went on to win the next league game and Lyon lost theirs, so that turned out to be a justified decision.

Next was OM, and we lost 2-1 in the cup game and then played them 4 days later in the league and won 4-0, so again it justified the decision not to play my first team.

Next up was Valencia in the CL, we drew 0-0 at home there and inbetween the second leg we won a few more games in the league and along the way Lyon dropped points. Next up we wo 3-1 at Valencia and then played Lyon in the league, we went to their place and won 1-0 to go top by 2 points., which is still the case now.

Quarters of the CL seen us paired against Real Madrid where we drew 2-2 at their place (Lass Diarra scored his 1st goal for Real from a 30 yard free kick, so work that one out ) and then I beat them at home 2-1 to go through to the semis where we've been paired against Lyon. I'm going to sacrifice the league on this occasion and try and beat them as I know it is in the team to do it as long as everyone plays well.

Signed this lad for next season too, even at this early stage he looks class and has potential to be better than Sissoko according to my scout.

Well we managed what I didn't think we could do for at least another year and went on to become champions of Europe for the first time in our history.

I got a bit lucky with Inters own injury list and went on to win 2-0

It was a tough route to the final as well.

Been offered the United and Sevilla jobs, so saved both as a separate game in case I fancy it later.

Managed to win the league even with all the injuries we had between September and December, really shocked at how we kept pulling results out of the hat around that time TBH. Certainly the best title win of the 3 and i'm also pleased how our goals tally improved by a big margin compared to the last 2 years.

Bit of a player bragging now

Otamendi was top again

Aurier has had a good 1st season as a starter

Situ is coming along well but can't dislodge Otamendi and Sakho yet, going to play him a bit more this year though.

Mitev is a really good LB and has settled in well.

Amos got a lot better after changing him from an inside forward to advanced .

Haruna and Sissoko are superb and i'm hoping Torric will provide good back up this year.

Grenier plays better than his stats suggest there and got 4 in 7 for the first team when I had the injury problems, so rhopefully he will turn in to a gem.

I can't get Kadlec going at all in any role which is a shame as he does look good, though I have higher hopes for Otto who i'll be loaning out next season as he is simply too good now to be a reserve.

Ait Fana had another good year and is always getting called in to the French squad.

Neymar has been top since I turned him in to a trequartista and asked him to run round the keeper when 1 on 1.

My profile so far ...1... ....2.... bit shocked my tactical consistency isn't higher considering I have only played 2 main formations, also thought the domestic player bias would have been higher given my signings.

I'm going to sell Milevskyi while he has some value and also loan out Torric to see how he does in a full season before deciding on whether to let him go or keep him in place of Samba Sow.

Playing aims are to win the lot basically. I think the squad is capable of it as long as we don't have another injury list like last years. In addition to the newgen posted above i'm going to bring another winger in and that'll be it.

We're losing £2-3m a month for most of the season due to all the 48 month deals at the start so my main aim in that department is to keep the balance above £50M all year (currently £63M) I am also hoping that we can fill the 1000 or so empty seats we have for most matches so I can ask for a capacity upgrade either to the current stadium or a new one (not sure which will happen) I'm also going to try and get a few commercial links up and running to help us out.

Congrats with the CL! Probably need to utilise Kadlec abit better, more a poacher perhaps? But his twelve for composure doesn't help.