FM 2009: Valencia CF: Los Che

Valencia CF, one of my definite favourite teams to manage in FM08 is an exciting and challenging team with a proud history. They have sadly had mixed fortunes in La Liga the last few years with managers coming and going. In La Liga 2006-07 they finished 4th but the next year they fought relegation and finished 10th. This year in FM09 they have an extremely strong squad with loads of talented youngsters and solid established players.

So, can you turn the ship around and do better than a 5th finish? How about dominating the league and Europe?

City of Valencia:

Valencia is the capital of the Spanish autonomous community of Valencia and its province. It is the third largest city in Spain and the 21st largest in the European Union. It forms part of an industrial area on the Costa del Azahar. The estimated population of the city of Valencia proper was 797,654 as of 2007.

The city of Valencia, is in the region known in ancient days as Edetania. The Roman historian Florus says that Junius Brutus, transferred there (140 BC) the soldiers who had fought under him. Later it was a Roman military colony. In punishment for its adherence to Sertorius it was destroyed by Pompey, but was later rebuilt, and Pomponius Mela says that it was one of the principal cities of Hispania Tarraconensis province. The city was founded by the Romans in 137 BC on the site of a former Iberian town, by the river Turia. The city has been occupied by the Visigoths, Moors, and the Aragonese.

I've personally visited Valencia on holiday, and it is such a charming and interesting city, possibly my favourite European city! Because they've been under Roman, Arabic and French rulers it's a real melting-pot of cultures, but it's also a modern city. Due to their fierce independence it is not like any other Spanish city, it's simply amazing. I'm going to stop myself as I don't want to sound silly, but to summarize everyone should visit Valencia during their lifetime (twice)!

Valencia CF:

Full name: Valencia Club de Fútbol

Nickname(s): Merengots, Xotos, Los Che

Founded: 1919

Ground: Mestalla, Valencia, Spain (Capacity: 55,000)

Chairman: Vicente Soriano

Manager: Unai Emery

League: 2007/08 La Liga, 10th

Valencia Club de Fútbol play in La Liga and are one of the most successful and biggest clubs in Spanish football. Valencia have won six La Liga titles, seven Copa del Rey trophies, one UEFA Cup, two Fairs Cups, one UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, two UEFA Super Cups and two Spanish Super Cups. They have also reached two UEFA Champions League finals in a row, losing to La Liga rivals Real Madrid in 2000 and German club Bayern Munich in 2001. Valencia are also members of the G-14 group of leading European football clubs.

Valencia CF are soon to move into the 75,000-seater Nou Mestalla in the north-west of the city in 2009. Valencia have a long-standing rivalry with Levante, also located in Valencia, and with another club in the Valencian Community region, Villarreal.

Valencia is the third most popular football team in Spain, only behind Real Madrid and FC Barcelona. It is also one of the biggest clubs in the world in terms of number of associates (registered paying supporters), with more than 45,000 season ticket holders and another 20,000+ season ticket holders on the waiting list, which will come into effect once the new 75,000-seater stadium is built.

Squad:

Your squad is very solid and full of quality, but there is a couple of weaknesses. I feel you can eliminate these weaknesses by selecting a clever formation though.

Goalkeepers

GK - Timo Hildebrand*

GK - Renan^

GK - Ludovic Butelle

Defenders

DRC - Alexis

D/WBR - Miguel

D/WBR - Curro Torres

DC - Iván Helguera

DC - Carlos Marchena*

DC - Raúl Albiol^

DC - David Navarro

DLC/WBL - Emiliano Moretti

D/WBL - Asier Del Horno

D/WBL - Jorge Paredes

Midfielders

DMC/MC - Ruben Baraja

DMC/MC - David Albelda

DMC/MC - Sunny^

DMC/MC - Hugo Viana

DMC/MC - Edu

DMC/MC - Ever Banega^

DMC/MC - Hedwiges Maduro

MC - Manuel Fernandes

AMR - Joaquín*

AMR - Pablo Hernández

AMRLC - David Silva*

AML - Vicente

AMC - Ignacio Gonzalez

Forwards

AML/ST - Juan Manuel Mata^

AMRC/ST - Aaron Niguez

ST - Fernando Morientes

ST - David Villa*

ST - Nikola Žigić

The players marked with ^ are promising and capable youngster, the ones with * are important and established players. In my opinion of course...

Players out: (Most important transfers, not complete)

DC - David Navarro (loan Mallorca)

AMC - Ignacio Gonzalez (loan Newcastle United)

GK - Ludovic Butelle (loan Lille)

DMC/MC - Sunny (loan Osasuna)

DMC/MC - Ever Banega (loan Athletico Madrid)

AMRC/ST - Aaron Niguez (loan Rangers)

Luckly, Valencia has not sold any players since last year but they have loaned at some real quality youth. They've also not brought in to many players.

State of Affairs

Most of you will already be aware, but IRL Mata has been a revelation this season and is quickly becoming very hot property. The two wide wingers Joaquín and Vicente has annoyingly been down-graded for FM09, so they might not be as impressive anymore. You might even consider off-loading one of them if you need money. Particularly Vicente is looking rather slow and average with only a few stats on 16 and nothing higher.

You should try your hardest to hold on to David Villa (obviously), as he might be one of the best strikers in FM09 and should be amazing for Valencia as always. Morientes is getting old, but should be a good player for a year or two. Your defence is over-all quite solid, but you might want to look at getting a right back as Miguel is not so impressive as in FM08. However, you do have four very high quality CBs, and if you're short of money you could possibly sell one of them and bring in a cheaper option.

I feel you should be able to get a top three or four finish with a few clever signings, so go for Continental finish. For the slightly less ambitious you can try top-half or midtable.

Best Established Player

David Villa - ST

David Villa Sánchez (born December 3, 1981 in Langreo, Asturias, Spain), nicknamed El Guaje (The Kid in Asturian) is a Spanish football player, who currently plays for Valencia CF.

Villa got his professional breakthrough at his local club Sporting de Gijón, for whom he made his first-team debut in the 2000–01 season. The next season he was a first team regular, scoring 18 league goals, and scored 20 the next season. After over 50 goals in just three seasons at Gijón, he got his chance in Spain's top-flight La Liga, when promoted Real Zaragoza bought him in the summer of 2003. He had no trouble adapting to the step up in class and scored 17 times in his first season at Zaragoza. Villa led Zaragoza to a Copa del Rey victory scoring a crucial goal against Real Madrid.

Soon after he earned his first international call-up and cap, Valencia decided to take a chance on him and parted with €12 million (£8.2 million) to secure his services in the summer of 2005.

The Spanish researchers has finally done Villa justice, he has amazing stats in FM09 and is absolutely certain to be your top goalscorer. He's quick and technical, with excellent mental stats. Two of his mental stats are actually clean 20s. I'd strongly recommend the first thing you do is to sign him on a long and expensive contract, hopefully you'll be able to keep him at Valencia CF! An interesting fact, my best scout rates him better than Robinho...

Best Young Player

Juan Manuel Mata - AML/ST

Juan Manuel Mata García, Mata (born April 28, 1988 in Burgos), is a Spanish football player, who currently plays as a winger for Valencia CF.

Mata started his football career at Real Oviedo, where his father spent most of his career. He stayed there for 3 years before joining Real Madrid at age 15. After appearing for Cadete A, he swiftly progressed through the junior teams, Juvenil C and finally the Juvenil A. In his last campaign (2005-06) he scored 18 goals in the league and 3 more in the Copa de Campeones, including the winner in the final against Real Valladolid, adding another 3 in the Spanish Juvenil Cup.

Switching to Real Madrid Castilla in 2006-07, he was given the number 34 shirt in the first team, while wearing number 28 in Castilla. In spite of Castilla's final relegation, Mata finished the season as the side's second best scorer at 10. Mata had a contractual clause at Real Madrid during his last season at the club, and eventually agreed to sign for Valencia CF on March 2007.

On September 25, 2008, Mata's understanding with Villa proved to be growing in efficiency, as he set up both of his teammate's goals in a 2-0 away win over Málaga CF. Three days later, Mata put in a superb performance against Deportivo de La Coruña, scoring one and creating the other three, in a 4-2 home victory.

It's fair to say that this is one of them players that suddenly blossomed in the last two season. Supposedly he got his break as Vicente had a lot of injuries and Koeman's strange selection policies. He looks to be an absolute quality winger which can also perform well as a striker, all depends on your formation I'd guess...

To give you an idea of his potential, I scouted him in FM09 and he got six stars, saying he can be a lot better than Martin Petrov!

Misc...::

If you feel I've said something wrong or picked the wrong people or whatever, please shout out.

As always, any comments/corrections/feedback more than welcome, don't hesitate to get involved!

Hi great post.

I have been playing Valencia on the demo, in prepartaion for the full game just to work on tactics etc.

The main problem with the Valencia squad is in my opinion a lack of squad depth especially regarding the fullbacks and central midfield. I have signed two players Lassana Diarra and Joao Moutinho to make the centre of the park stronger and Fernandes and Albelda do not seem too bad as backups.

my normal formation is 4-4-1-1: Renan;Miguel,Marchena/Alexis,Albiol,Moretti;Joaquin,Diarra,Moutinho,Vicente/Mata;Silva;Villa.

So far I am fourth in La Liga after 8 games having won 4, drawn 3 and lost 1.

I plan when I start the full game to try and keep my squad fairly Spanish, Valencia have a history of providing quite a few players to the Spanish national team. players to look at would be Asenjo, Martinez, Camacho, Capel etc. I would recommend strengthening the fullback positions as soon as you can as well.

I have one question regarding a Mestalla player called Ximo Navarro, I have seen him mentioned on Sky Sports News as being a right back, but in the game he is an AMC. Is this a mistake by the researcher?

To be honest I don't know much about Ximo Navarro, never heard about him...

Sometimes with young players you get them being trained in different positions I suppose.

On goal.com he's listed as a midfielder, but another site lists him as a defender :confused:

To be honest I don't know much about Ximo Navarro, never heard about him...

Sometimes with young players you get them being trained in different positions I suppose.

On goal.com he's listed as a midfielder, but another site lists him as a defender :confused:

This was the articles I have seen about him:

http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11837_4425994,00.html

This is from the Valencia website, and it says he is a right back, think I will put this in the data issues thread.

http://217.116.5.146/noticias/prelimin.asp?idnoticia=16897&idioma=2&IdBanner=Aleatorio

Aye go on, you're probably right...

Any other comments on the thread?

Btw, your three draws where they goalless?

When you start the game and choose that you will gain continental qualification you are given a transfer budget of £900k, but I asked the board for more money and it was increased to about £12 million. I have sold Angulo to Celta for £1.6m and loaned out Viana, Zigic and Muduro to reduce the wage budget so I could bring in new staff members.

My three draws have been 1:1 away at Villarreal, 2:2 at home to Deportivo and 0:0 away at Espanyol, my loss was 1:2 at home to Real Madrid. I am struggling to make my tactics work a the moment, especially in away games, but with the players available 4-4-1-1 or 4-2-3-1 are possibly the best tactics unless you want to play 3 at the back which I don't..

Right I see, no the reason I was asking because a lot tactics people use for FM09 they're struggling to score. I'm playing a game at Man City now, and it's pretty free scoring. All I did was put ALL midfielders/attacking midfielders/striker to Try Through Balls Often and max creativity on strikers... You might want to try it mate

I will give it a go, thanks!

BTW, if any needs a quality cheap CB look at this guy:

The "other" Yakubu (the CB not ST!)

I've had him on the demo for Lyon, Man City, Palermo and Sporting CP and he's always had an average rating of more than 7, and never failed me!

In all seriousness, I snapped him up for £1.2m from Vitesse. He look absolutely rock solid... If he had +1 or +2 on his Physical and some of his Technical stats he would be a god. But even so, how much better can you get for £1.2m? He also has a personality of Perfectionist which I've not seen too often

Great post.Ximo Navarro is indeed a right back and i have put a post in the data issues thread but dont know if anything is being done about it.

Cheers!

About Yakubu, I've noticed his stats are a bit random... The lowest I've seen him is -1 or -2 on most stats compared to that screenshot, but you can get him cheaper then.

While playing in the demo i have sold Hildebrand for £4m,Edu for £1.2m.Angulo £1m,Helguera £1m,Viana£1.2m.All adds to the budget!

Dunno if you can get him as it's one of Valencia's rivals... But the best keeper I've found (except for like ulta-expensive Cech and similar) is Leo Franco from Athletico Madrid! You should try and get him mate

Also you can get Mosquera on a season-long loan from Sevilla for next to nothing...

Do you have any suggestions for good left backs? I dont really rate Moretti or Del Horno much. I have not had much time to play the last few days thanks to Uni but should get a couple of hours in tonight.

Try Fabio Aurelio on loan, much better than morretti. Sell Del Horno for approx. £2.5m-£3m.

I play 4-4-2 works fine apart from zigic getting all the damm goals.....

Sell Del Horno, Edu, Viana, Helguera, Hildebrand (after Cup final. If before supercup make sure you have brought in another keeper as renan goes awol at olympics, so to maduro), Possibly morientes. This reduces Massive wage bill and raises lodsamoney!!! but do this after requesting extra money otherwise board won't give u extra. Then Bring in Aurelio, Diarra (pompey), Owen, O'Shea/Mosquera, then the final 1 or 2 players are up to whoever you think will help best. personally it is worth trying to get srna if budget allows it.

MADURO is missing from team list, but other than that great post. Hope to hear more info/advice about los ches here!

the dud looks like youve took up the proffesion of team threads lol! Its a great opening post mate and like the analysis on mata, surely your not going to be playing with all of these teams though?

Valenciaingles: Added Maduro, dunno what happened there hehe... Yeah, there's quite a few players you can sell to raise some cash. On my demo game, I sold Vicente and Joaquin, as I don't play wingers... Got almost £15m out of the two

jess boi: Yeh, I quite like doing those threads Dunno, I try to pick teams that generally interest me and that I'll hopefully play at least once during the next year But I do love playing Valencia, so I'll without doubt play them! But even If I make a thread for a team I wont play, I'll still be able to discuss and give advise, and other people will probably post in them anyway.....

Bit of advice for selling people (found this on another thread, sorry don't know how to link(think it is liverpool thread?)), set loan status to unavailable, then transfer list for 1.5-3xthe players actual value, and then offer around to other clubs. raised 4mil for hildebrand, 3.8 for del horno, 1.5mil for helguera and 1mil for morientes.

Could be helpful although i think it is just a minor bug in the system.

Cheers, that a good wee tip

So, who's gonna play as Valencia tomorrow then?

Wow all your treads at the same place on the top of the page.

I will not be getting the game as early as tomorrow. The latest I will be able to play is next month when my exams get over...

Wow all your treads at the same place on the top of the page.

I will not be getting the game as early as tomorrow. The latest I will be able to play is next month when my exams get over...

I feel for you! hard luck.

That is tough luck mate!

That's what you get for being young and trying to get yourself a decent education!

Yes I know

Just now I was listening to an inspirational speech by Steve Jobs. About how he dropped out to fulfill his dream. And I am thinking...

Hehe, tempting aye? Can't blame you mate

Anyone managed to get more money out of the board?They seem a lot tighter than in the demo!!

Just installing the full game now In the demo I had to sell a few players to get a decent transfer budget, my tactics has no wingers so I sold Vincente and Joaquin

Hi, have finally installed the full game! Have started a new game as Valencia, as always I have started the game with transfer funds not allowed so will have to make do with the current squad until jan, think I should have enough strength in depth. Im going to change to a 4-4-2 formation insted of 4-4-1-1 as with Villa upfront I am not scoringmy too many, Zigic seems to play well upfront alone which is annoying!

Do you mean with no transfers allowed in first window? I never use that option, but suppose it makes it more challenging...

I had to give Villa some time before he started, but he was immense after a while

Yeh, for some reason I just hate Zigic :o

Yea no transfers in the first window, i find it more realistic, and i think the Valencia squad is probably good enough to last until jan with no new players. It does limit what new staff I can bring in as well as many of the free staff are not that good, maybe i should give the silva/villa combination more time then! I dont like Zigic but should be decent backup and gives my crosses a target.

Just started with Valencia.

Sold Hildebrand for 2.2m£ and decided to go with Guaita for the Supercopa since Renan was at the Olympics.

Guaita did his job and we won 3-3 on away goals.

Otherwise I loaned out Curro Torres to Celta and promoted the youngster Ximo Navarro instead. He will be good for Copa del Rey matches and such.

Also brought in Aquino for 2.3m£

Great to see the Valencia youth is not underrated more by SI. Jordi Alba will also be interesting to see in the future.

Hello all, just started my Valencia game, looking to desperately offload some of the higher wage users.

I'm looking bring in one more midfielder, i'm going with Yeste, who'll cost me about 4m.

Also looking at diarra and hopefully one more striker

On an interesting note, i was looking in Brazil, found a striker called Keirrison. Scout says he could be as good as Villa! :O

will let you know how i get on

Sold Hildebrand for £4.2mil, allowed me the chance to bring in decent keeper in Leo Franco. Rasied cash from board (extra £12mil). Sold angulo £1.9mil, sold Curro Torres £400k, Sold Viana and Edu (£2.8mil total). Then managed to get Lahm for £11mil (what the HECK!!) and Gomez for £8.75mil (again what the HECK!!!), allowed me to sell morientes £1.4mil. Del Horno gone for £3.8mil. Hell i raised plenty of cash to buy the players i needed. Don't really know why german league players are so cheap for a sudden?!? but seems a bonus when it comes to building up my squad.

Valenciaingles: Yeah, there's quite a few players you can sell to raise some cash. On my demo game, I sold Vicente and Joaquin, as I don't play wingers... Got almost £15m out of the two

You got ripped off tbh, should be looking for about £15m each, not between the two.

Anyway, my current 08 save is with Valencia and was really good. Tried them in the demo and couldn't get into it, especially as my main tactic from 08 with them wasn't working. May well give it another go at some time though, good luck to all.

sean_oc16, well I know but it was on the demo hehe

Yeh, the Match Engine is different now, you need to create a new tactic probably... But I think it's more realistic this one.

Valenciaingles, wow Lahm is an absolute steal at that price!! And BTW, I had Leo Franco on a different save, and I'd say he's absolutely amazing in FM09!

And for anyone looking for a midfielder, you cannot go wrong with Diarra! Just a pure beast!

I have just named my newly formed club as FC Valencia (we will be endorsed by the fiesta plant in valencia, hence the name), my self and 4 friends currrently play for Billericay town in the isthmian league, in need of a challenege, we are starting are own side next year and plan on working our way through the leagues to senior level as soon as possible.

so rather looking forward to play as los che on this game. good thread

sean_oc16, well I know but it was on the demo hehe

Yeh, the Match Engine is different now, you need to create a new tactic probably... But I think it's more realistic this one.

Valenciaingles, wow Lahm is an absolute steal at that price!! And BTW, I had Leo Franco on a different save, and I'd say he's absolutely amazing in FM09!

And for anyone looking for a midfielder, you cannot go wrong with Diarra! Just a pure beast!

Yeah for some reason though his (diarra's) price has changed since the demo (in my full game. I'm beginning to wonder if this is because of the leagues i have selected. Italy, england, spain and germany), from £5mil (ish) to approx £10.25mil, in my game so possibly better bargains out there. will post back when i find one!! lol (maybe veloso is better at 10mil sort of price range.)

hell yeah, picked up on your tip for leo franco. very good keeper.

Hi, hows everyones Valencia games going? I have not had much time of late to play but finally played the 2nd leg of the Super Cup, I won the 1st leg 3-1 thanks to 2 Real own goals and then drew 0-0 at the Bernabeu. Quite happy with the result seeing as I cant make any transfers, Silva has been injured for a bit but Mata has filled his role very well!

Just finished the first season of my Valencia season.

I'm desperate for a new right back, and I wouldn't mind replacing Joaquin.

Any tips, preferably with an EU passport...

Chretien

He is good, but £9m good?

I have my reservations...

He's in the bracket of £5-7Million for a FB, yes he is good. There's others out there, look in the Full Backs Thread which can be found via the links thread at the top.

I have looked...and they're after 12m for him on mine, now.

Also, who would be the better left wing player, Silva or Mata? I play Silva in the hole but I'm considering swapping them around, who performs better in the middle and better in the hole out of the two?

Either are fine on the left, I'd suggest Mata should go on the left because I don't think he's suited to playing in the hole.

I would agree with Hopey, Mata is better on the left with Silva in the middle. I have finally got some transfer funds and can start to buy players. Im in my first season approaching the Jan transfer window. I am looking for a LB (Mathieu?), cover for RB (Chreiten hopefully or Rafinha if I can afford him). I also want one or two central midfielders (Diarra, Veloso, Moutinho are the main targets). Can anyone reccomend anyone else to go for, I have £18.7m to spend.

Ok I have now got Kolarov, Mathieu and Santon arriving in Jan. Viana is leaving for PSV and hopefully Zigic will leave too, I will put Del Horno and Moretti on the transfer list too. My main priority is now to sign a central midfielder, also do you think Miguel and Santon are sufficient for the RB slot or should I consider bidding for Chreiten again, his club are not willing to sell him but should I keep trying? Thanks

My current Valencia defenders are:

Albiol

Thiago Silva

Alexis

Chretien

Davide Santon

Armand Traore

Del Horno

I need another left back, though.

Managed to get 15m for Marchena, 11m for Miguel after a season, 7.5m for Moretti, 1.5m for Helguera and 4m for Hildebrand.

JacketB

Miguel and Santon should be fine, as-long as you know that Santon is still developing so he will make the odd mistake along the way.

Snoop Robbie Rob

Erm, have a look at Mathieu? He's pretty solid.

Yeah I made a few bids for Mathieu during the Summer, but nothing materialized.

I'll try again in Jan or next season, I'm not desperate for a left back, but he would be nice.

Anybody else had problems with Banega's stats?

He just seems to be going down on mine.

Thanks Hopey, Miguel is not too old so got plenty of time for Santon to develop. Im not playing the game as much as I have with previous versions, only in Dec of first season, its good as I have too much uni work to be addicted to the game!

Hi there Valencia players. I am not currently playing as Valencia, I am actually managing AC Milan but I have the option to buy Ever Banega for £6m due to him being transfer listed in January 2009, the question is, does anybody know how good he will be in a few years? And will he be AC Milan standard?

Thanks .