[FM10] Derby County presents Paul Green as their new Manager!!!

[squaddie198]

2015 / 2016 Season Update

Barclays Premier League

We have carried our impressive run of results with:

West Brom 1 - 4 Derby

The Hawthorns Att 26200

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (9.3)

A good result over one of our local rivals. We went into this game on a good run of form and it carried over into the game. We fired into them from the first whistle and had Augusto Fernandez give us an early 8th minute lead. Petr Mikhailov doubled that on 20 minutes as we completely dominated the first half. I told them to keep up performing like this and they did just that, with Darren Bent grabbing his 1st goal of the season in the 50th minute and then straight from kick-off Mikhailov grabbing his 2nd and our 4th. Chris Wood grabbed a consolation for them in the 75th but it was over as a game long before then.

Birmingham 1 - 2 Derby

St Andrews Att 20608

We stayed in the 2nd City for another away game, this time The Blues of Birmingham. I stuck with the same team that hammered their local rivals and looked good again in the 1st half, Bent adding to his tally with a goal on the 21st minute. We continued to push and was dominating possession but just couldn't get another. Luckily John Dickinson popped up in the 65th to score his 1st ever goal for the club with a 20 yarder that snuck between keeper and post. Birmingham pulled a goal back in the 79th but we kept hold of the ball and run down the clock to the final whistle.

Derby 3 - 0 Everton

Pride Park Att 44000

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (9.3)

First place visited second place in the biggest game of the season so far. A cagey opening saw a lot of good football being played by us, but equally good defending from The Toffeemen and they deservingly went in at half-time without conceding. I tweeked our formation slightly, giving Mark Brown (AML) and Augusto Fernandez (AMR) an attacking mentality. This gave us much more attacking threat and in the 60th minute Mikailov opened the scoring for us. As Everton pushed on, we hit them again in the 68th through Fernandez, and Mikhailov finished the scoring in the 79th with our 3rd.

Derby 1 - 1 Burnley

Pride Park Att 42894

MoM - Mark Brown (8.4)

An awful game from us against this seasons surprise package in Burnley. They came to Pride Park in 3rd place and made the league leaders look silly in front of their own fans. We dominated possession having 67% of the ball but only created 6 shot (2 on target) all game long. Burnley meanwhile had 12 shots (2 on target) and scored in the 39th with a OG from Daniel Rojas. I tried everything to try and get us back into the game and Kapadopoulos scored in the 89th to take our most least deserved point of the season.

UEFA Champions League

Group E

Derby 2 - 0 Napoli

Pride Park Att 42611

MoM - Oscar Ustari (8.6)

Napoli arrived sat in the relegation zone of Serie A after taking a point from their first 5 games, and absolutely battered us all over the park. We just couldn't stop their midfielders from running the game and only our GK Oscar Ustari kept us in the game making 7 great saves from their 19 shots on goal. It was a luckily goal from us in the 60th from Darren Bent against the run of play that gave us the lead and in the 75th we hit them again on the counter attack with Fernandez to seal a lucky 3 points for us.

Derby 0 - 0 Bayer Leverkusen

Pride Park Att 41784

An unfortunate result for us as we did to Leverkusen what Napoli had done to us in the previous ECL game. We dominated all game long having 65% of possession and 14 shots on goal (4 on target). We just couldn't get that goal to take the win and suffered 2 injuries, to Jano Ananidze (dead leg) and Diego Suarez (concussion). I wasn't impressed with the referree and stated that in the press conference, getting a ticking off from the FA for my comments!

Carling Cup

Third Round

Barnsley 0 - 4 Derby

Oakwell Att 23186

MoM - Kyriakos Papadopoulos (9.0)

I sent out the best team possible as I really want to win a domestic cup this season and wanted to keep the squad in the same frame of mind as they were without tinkering too much. 2 goals in either half gave us a good win, with Adam Bradshaw and Petr Mikhailov grabbing the goals. In the second half I brought on a couple of youngsters and they did well, creating goals for Mikhailov again and Kapadopoulos.

[squaddie198]

Season insert

The transfer policy has started to bite me in the ass finances wise....we're bleeding money every month right now due to the clauses in contracts and also the wage bill has grown massively over these last couple of years. I'm going to need a good finish to the season as the prize money is gonna clear the debts for the year. I think there's going to have to be a big re-think for next season for me, i've got to get the finances under control otherwise our long term future is bleek, without a Man City style Sheik taking over!

[RichG]

Always read the small print . those top players are only after the cash.

Sell them all and develop your youth players. Take the England U19 or 20 job and just poach all the players early lol.

Going well though mate so keep it up

[squaddie198]

Always read the small print . those top players are only after the cash.

Sell them all and develop your youth players. Take the England U19 or 20 job and just poach all the players early lol.

Going well though mate so keep it up

I would RichG if my youth players were any good. So far i've only had 2 players come through and make any impression on the 1st team squad and they're not even that good. I've got a long hard think ahead of me on how I want and need to turn this club around financially

[RichG]

in previous games i used to scout all prem teams u18 teams and pinch the 15 and 16 y/o so they would sign their first pro deal thus making them home grown if loads of league loaded then you could do it all over europe. takes about 30-40 mins to go through the teams but worth it to save cash in the long run

[squaddie198]

in previous games i used to scout all prem teams u18 teams and pinch the 15 and 16 y/o so they would sign their first pro deal thus making them home grown if loads of league loaded then you could do it all over europe. takes about 30-40 mins to go through the teams but worth it to save cash in the long run

I might have to have a play with that tonight then buddy....I think the players i've signed over the last couple of years will start coming through soon for me, but now i'm doing so well with Derby and challenging for league and european titles I don't know if I want to lose that now!

Might have to make the dealing with the finances last more than the couple of seasons I was hoping to make it last!!!

Just coming upto the January transfer window and already started with a couple of transfers out of players, so will update once the window has closed.

[squaddie198]

October/November/December Update

Carling Cup : Derby 2 - 0 Millwall

Pride Park - Att 43156

MoM - Derek Richardson (8.3)

I decided to give the majority of my first team players the game off, only starting with Miles Addison, Petr Mikhailov and Darren Bent in the starting XI. Even so I still had to make an enforced change with Paul Courtney getting injured in the 7th minute meaning Stephen Brown didn't much of a rest. Even so the team played well and we took the lead in the 16th minute through Darren Bent. We continued to control the game scored our 2nd and last goal through MoM Derek Richardson in the 40th minute.

Barclays Premier League : Derby 3 - 0 Manchester United

Pride Park - Att 44000

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (8.8)

A really close game that went our way due to us taking our chances when they came along. In a frantic opening, United opened us up a few times but to waste their chances in goal. We on the other hand didn't, That man Mikhailov popped up in the 13th minute to put us 1-0 up with a near post finish and for Kapadopoulos to add to that 4 minutes later with a header from a deep corner. Again United kept pushing on at us and we just kept hitting them on the counter, with who else but Mikhailov getting his 2nd with a 20 yard curler in the 79th minute to finish the game off.

UEFA Champions League : Bayer Leverkusen 1 - 3 Derby

BayArena - Att 28823

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (8.6)

Another good performance from us in europe, beating a lacklustre Leverkusen side with yet another brace from Petr Mikhailov in the 14th and penalty on 45+2 mins. Leverkusen came out better in the 2nd half, no doubt after a rant from their manager Krasimir Balakov. They finally nicked a goal in the 86th through Thomas Muller to make the last few minutes nervy, but Adam Bradshaw tied the game up with our 3rd a minute into injury time to take the win.

Barclays Premier League : Reading 0 - 3 Derby

The Madejski Stadium - Att 24161

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (8.8)

We dominated from start to finish and should really have scored more than we did. The day got off to a bad start though with Daniel Rojas collecting a knock in the 6th minute but it didn't knock us out of our stride and it wasn't long before Augusto Fernandez fired us into a 22nd minute lead. Half-time came and went and we went out and hit Reading hard peppering their keeper with shots from all ranges, and finally finished the game off with another brace for that brilliant Russian dynamo Petr Mikhailov (53, 61). God I love that guy!

Barclays Premier League : Stoke 1 - 2 Derby

Britannia Stadium - Att 27500

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (8.8)

We again dominated possession with a good 59% and made it count once more with another goals from Mikhailov in the 23nd and 49th minute. He is making a mockery of the £12.75m I paid for him now as in the 3 and 1/2 seasons he played for us he has already scored 100 goals for us. Anyway back to the game, and after we got our 2nd the team seemed to relax too much and Stoke pinched a late 83rd minute goal through De Sutter to make us sweat a bit, but we held on for the win. 8 goals in 4 games for Mikhailov now.

UEFA Champions League : Derby 6 - 1 Paris Saint-Germain

Pride Park - Att 42519

MoM - Augusto Fernandez (9.0)

The players knew that a win would qualify us for the knockout stages and win Group E and they didn't hang about on getting the job done. Diego Suarez started off the rout in the 8th minute with a curler from the edge of the area, before PSG fell apart in the last 10 minutes of the half. Mikhailov hit a screamer from 30 yards which slammed into the post and back against the keeper and went in for an OG. Suarez popped up 6 minutes later to get his 2nd with a far post tap-in after good work from Fernandez. Mikhailov got his just deserts after nipping in with a near post header from another Fernandez cross. PSG got 1 back through Gignac in 1st half injury time but the damage had been done. Other goals from Ananidze and Oztekin (pen) won us Group E.

Barclays Premier League : Derby 1 - 0 Middlesborough

Pride Park - Att 43582

Continental Effect.....that's what we suffered today against a stubborn Boro side who made us work for the 3 points. In a spirited 1st half, Boro dominated as we just could not seem to get started. Only a couple of good saves from Ustari kept us level at half-time against a side hovering just above the drop zone. I gave them a bit of a rollocking and after the break they started to play some better football, with Mikhailov getting what proved to be the winner in the 63rd minute.

Carling Cup : Derby 0 - 1 Aston Villa

Quarter Final

Pride Park - Att 44000

A full house came to see a cup game between the top 2 teams in English football and we didn't disapoint, serving up a cracker even though only 1 goal was scored. We absolutely hammered The Villans for 115 minutes having 33 goals on goal (20 on target) only for Stephen Warnock to fluke a goal to stun Pride Park, me and the 11 on the pitch.

Barclays Premier League : Chelsea 2 - 2 Derby

Zola Arena - Att 56447

I think we were still feeling a little sorry for ourselves after the cup game as we could only draw with a team who had not won in the last 5 games, losing 3 of those. Still we started ok and Fernandez gave us the lead in the 28th minute, for us to be level again 2 minutes later after some sloppy defending. We were just the same in the 2nd half too, this time it being Bent putting back in front on the 73rd, for Chelsea to get back on level terms again 13 minutes later with Sanchez's 2nd of the game.

UEFA Champions League : Napoli 4 - 1 Derby

San Paolo - Att 63671

I made a terrible decision in the starting line-up for this game. I rested the entire starting XI and gave the young lads a chance to show me how they are progressing "Fergie style". Big mistake!!!! Napoli absolutely tore the lads to shreds and should have scored more than the 4 they did after having 28 shots on goal (12 on target). Not one of my guys played well, and Frawley, Courtney and Gibson having absolute howlers.....none of them getting a rating over 5.3.

Barclays Premier League : Derby 3 - 0 Wolves

Pride Park - Att 44000

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (9.1)

I restored the entire starting XI and they showed the youngsters how it should be done. We should've scored more than the 3 we did through Suarez (14) and the usual hero Mikhailov (72, 86). But after having 69% possession and 26 shots on goal (11 on target) I should've won by more, but we were back on track after the blip against Napoli.

Club World Cup : AS Douanes (SEN) 0 - 6 Derby

Semi Final

Stade Leopold Sedar Senghor - Att 31022

MoM - Petr Mikhailov (9.6)

A sensational hat-trick from Mikhailov set the tone for this semi final game. He had already scored 2 before 10 minutes had passed (2, 8) and completed his triple on the 31st minute. Second half goals from Addison (54), Mark Brown (57) and Diego Suarez (68) sealed the final spot. Unfortunately Mark Brown took a knock and this would keep him out of the final which he didn't deserve.

Club World Cup : America (MEX) 0 - 2 Derby

Final

Stade Leopold Sedar Senghor - Att 60000

MoM - Jano Ananidze (7.7)

A tough game against a well organised side who pushed and fought us all the way through the 90 minutes. Their 3-4-1-2 causing us problems all game long allowing them to get plenty of shots on goal, luckily Oscar Ustari was in good form and had a good game saving everything they hit at him. It took until the 87th minute for us to break them down, but it needed a thunderbolt from Ananidze to break the deadlock. They cleared a header to him and he drilled it from 35 yards into the top right corner. This must've devastated the Mexicans they didn't do anything when Oztekin waltzed from the half-way line to score the clinching 2nd goal 2 minutes into injury time to make Derby County World Club Champions.

Barclays Premier League : Blackburn 1 - 10 Derby

Ewood Park - Att 25691

MoM - Diego Suarez (9.6)

An absolute demolition of Blackburn from the newly crowned World Champions. Blackburn must wished they never gave us the guard of honour onto the pitch as we took them apart as a reward! Diego Suarez started the torture after 33 seconds before Mikhailov added the 1st of his brace in the 5th minute. Oztekin then grabbed our 3rd in the 41st min before Blackburn pinched their solitary goal 2 minutes in 1st-half injury time. But then second half we went goal crazy scoring goals through Mikhailov (48), Suarez (50, 55) completing his hat-trick, Oztekin (60), Bent (69, 85) and Fernandez (74).

Barclays Premier League : Derby 1 - 0 Aston Villa

Pride Park - Att 44000

MoM - Stephen Brown (9.0)

A hard fought win over the current league leaders. They're only top having played 4 more games than me and winning this has put us back on top of the table. Stephen Brown scored the important goal with a header from a corner after 23 minutes to take the points. But without Oscar Ustari having a blinder in goal, it could've been much different.

Barclays Premier League : Tottenham 0 - 2 Derby

White Hart Lane - Att 36310

MoM - Oscar Ustari (8.5)

A disapointing game despite the result. We didn't play well really and Spurs had too many shots on goal for my liking, but we stole the points with goals from Suarez (34) and Bent (69).

[squaddie198]

January Update

Transfers

In

Adam Wood* £2.7m Arsenal (possibly rising to £7m)

Total Out £2.7m

Out

Antunes £9m Man Utd

Jack Cork £2m Swansea

Sofiane Feghouli £9.75m Siena (staggered payments)

Jukka Raitala Bosman CSKA Moscow (End of season)

Total In £20.75m

I didn’t want to see Antunes leave, but £9m upfront for someone I bought for £200k 5 seasons previously represented a good return on my gamble I felt. Plus I have Peter Rayner who is now starting to prove himself in the 1st team. Adam Wood is a 16 year old left winger that I found still on a youth contract and he was rated at being a 4* player in the future so I snapped him up on the last day of the transfer window.

Awards

Petr Mikhailov wins European Striker Of The Year and is named in the World Team Of The Year after scoring 53 in 55 games.

Oscar Ustari 2nd in European Goalkeeper Of The Year and wins Premier League Player Of The Month.

Stephen Brown wins Premier League Young Player Of The Month, Derek Richardson 2nd Peter Rayner 3rd.

I won Premier League Manager of The Month for December after 5 wins in last 6 games.

[squaddie198]

January Results

A busy month including a run of 3 games in 7 days

FA Cup 3rd Round – Birmingham (A) 1-3

Goals – Bent, Fernandez, Mikhailov

Premier League – Arsenal (A) 1-1

Goals – Bent

Premier League – West Ham (A) 4-1

Goals – Fernandez

Premier League – Sunderland (A) 0-5

Bent (2), Mikhailov (3)

Premier League – Sunderland (H) 9-2

Goals – Mikhailov (4), Ananidze, M. Brown, Richardson, Bent, Hobbs (OG)

FA Cup 4th Round – Arsenal (H) 3-0

Goals – Mikhailov (3)

Premier League – Bristol City (A) 2-1

Goals – Papadopoulos, Bent

Premier League – West Brom (H) 3-0

Goals – Mikhailov (2), Oztekin

The Sunderland game was just an amazing game, we didn’t dominate the game as we have done in recent games, but had 10 shots on target from the 21 shots in total we had and scored with 9 of them! They subbed their starting GK after 37 minutes as he conceded 4 already! Their backup GK didn’t do any better though!

The West Ham game was a shocker though and they destroyed us fair and squarely. I had no complaints and made the players aware of that afterwards!

We’re currently sat in 1st place after 25 games 9 points clear of Arsenal and 10 clear of Liverpool but they have 2 games in hand over us, and they are our next opponents. We have Schalke coming up soon in the 1st knockout phase of the Champions League and Liverpool in the 5th Round of the FA Cup too.

[squaddie198]

February 2016

Premier League – Liverpool (A) 0-0

A tight game against the main contenders for the League title. Fizzled out into a disappointing goalless draw

Premier League – Burnley (A) 0-3

Goals – Clay, Mikhailov (2)

A first ever goal for Ian Clay and Mikhailov’s 75th and 76th league goals gave us the win over a hard working Burnley side.

Premier League – Birmingham (H) 5-0

Goals – M. Brown, Mikhailov (2), Suarez, Bent

A devastating footballing display saw us take Birmingham apart with some fantastic football. As usual Mikhailov won MoM but the midfield won the game after dominating the Birmingham midfield.

FA Cup 5th Round – Liverpool (A) 1-1

Goals – Bent

A scrappy game with neither team playing well. We took the lead only for Torres to equalise almost immediately. I’m confident we will win at Pride Park in the replay though.

Premier League – Everton (A) 0-0

Goals –

A poor game us, especially Frawley and Oztekin. We had more possession but only 6 shots on goal, not good enough. Hopefully these poor performances don’t carry for much longer.

Champions League – Schalke (A)1-0

Goals –

Our poor form continues with a disappointing display against an average German side. Since the win over Birmingham, we have played poorly. Fair enough we have 4 1st team starters out injured for a while, but our backup players have usually done a good job. But right now the whole team is poor and if we’re not careful our season will fall apart on us.

Summary

We were going fine until the first FA Cup game against Liverpool and after that the wheels seemed to come off a little bit. Injuries this month to Papadopoulos, Addison, Ananidze, Fernandez and a loss of form from Mikhailov have hurt us, but I hope we can turn it around and make this another good season for the fans.

[RichG]

selling 20m in January can't help your season. Hope you have some good back up players until the summer

[squaddie198]

selling 20m in January can't help your season. Hope you have some good back up players until the summer

To be honest RichG only Antunes was a 1st team player. Both Cork and Feghouli were sat in my reserves and had not made an appearance in the 1st team all season long. Antunes fair enough was my number one LB, but Peter Rayner has been getting better and better all season long and was pushing him for his slot just before the window. Even though my assistant manager rates him at 1.5* he has come in from the turn of the new year and has a rating of 7.36 over the 12 games he has played so I am feeling fairly confident that I made the right decision.

Anyway for next season I have Joe Mattock coming into the squad after getting him for £2.7m from Athletico Madrid after he had fallen out of favour with their manager. He was rated 3.5* so for that money I can't complain and I think he will bring on Rayner too.

[squaddie198]

March 2016

FA Cup 5th Round replay – Liverpool (H) 2-1

Goals – S. Brown, Bent

Liverpool were the more attacking and adventurous of the two sides but, a battling defensive display and good counter attacking football got us the win we needed after the previous 3 poor games.

FA Cup 6th Round – Blackburn (H) 1-0

Goals – Papadopoulos

That’s better! We played more like the Derby of a month ago than the last 2 weeks. Dominated possession and deserved to win through to the FA Cup semi-final against Aston Villa.

Premier League – Manchester United (A) 2-1

Goals – Richardson

And we’re back to the poor play again. We had the majority of possession but AGAIN didn’t create enough chances. 6 shots on goal compared to United’s 18. We’re going to throw this league away if we don’t sort this out and soon.

Champions League – Schalke (H) 2-0

Goals – Mikhailov, Howe

A close game which we edged due to our strikers. Mikhailov ended a hour dry spell to level the tie for Nathan Howe to score his 1st ever goal to put us through.

Premier League – Reading (H) 5-0

Goals – Mikhailov (2), Richardson, Bent (2)

What started out as a poor 1st half turned into a fantastic 2nd half as we ran riot against The Royals. The formation tweek from Standard to Control looks like it did the trick.

Premier League – Arsenal (H) 1-2

Goals – Howe

I just don’t understand what is going on with this team at this moment in time. We can’t string any form together and if we’re not careful we will only a point ahead of Liverpool if they win their 2 games in hand.

Premier League – Stoke (H) 6-0

Goals – Bent, Mikhailov (2), Dickinson, Oztekin, Clay

It was the Derby of old! We hammered Stoke off the pitch with 21 shots to their 5. Their only shot on target a trademark thunderbolt from 37 year old Frank Lampard! Hopefully we are back in business.

Champions League Qtr-final 1st leg – Liverpool (A) 1-2

Goals – Mikhailov, Bent

A great result for us away from home, got a little bit lucky with the 2nd goal though, as it may have been offside but I don’t care!

Summary

A strange month, with us not playing well really the entire month but stringing the odd game here and there together fairly well. Hopefully next month will be better and get our season back on track.

[squaddie198]

April 2016 Update

Premier League – Middlesbrough (A) 1-1

Goals – Oztekin

I rested a few of my 1st team players ready for the crunch game against Liverpool in the Champions League so couldn’t really moan at only taking a point against ‘Boro. It was all we deserved really.

Champions League Quarter Final 2nd Leg – Liverpool (H) 1-0

Goals – Oztekin

Burak Oztekin was the hero who settled the tie and put us into a semi-final with AC Milan with a well placed goal. Oliver Gibson got 2 yellows though to put pressure on us for the rest of the game but we hung on in there.

FA Cup Semi-final – Aston Villa (N) 5-1

Goals – Mikhailov (3), S. Brown, Oztekin

We destroyed Villa with some fantastic football, lead from the front by Petr Mikhailov as always! He scored a great hat-t-rick and set up the other 2 goals to put us in our 1st FA Cup final since 1946.

Premier League – Chelsea (H) 0-0

Goals –

We dominated the entire game against Chelsea, but just couldn’t get the goal to give us the win. To make matters worse, Liverpool won again to now be only 4 points behind and still have a game in hand over us. “Squeaky bum time” is on it’s way I think!

Premier League – Wolves (A) 2-2

Goals – Papadopoulos, Suarez

A damaging draw for us in the chase for the title against a team who played almost the last hour with 10 men after Wolves had a player sent off.

Champions League Semi Final 1st leg – AC Milan (H) 2-2

Goals – M. Brown, Howe

We should really have won this tie. We had enough chances to take a lead to the San Siro but didn’t take them. The ref shouldn’t have let their 2nd goal stand though as he was offside.

Premier League – Blackburn (H) 2-0

Goals – Oztekin (2)

A great win for us, which puts the pressure back on Liverpool to win their game against Arsenal. Burak Oztekin was the hero with 2 fantastic headers in either half to seal the win for us.

Champions League Semi-final 2nd leg – AC Milan (A) 1-2 [3-4 on agg]

Goals – Mikhailov, Oztekin

What a nerve racking end to the game! Huntelaar scored for Milan on 85 minutes and that looked like the tie was over. But Petr Mikhailov grabbed a leveller on 90 minutes and when I thought all hope had gone Ozetekin popped in a near post finish 3 minutes into injury time to put us in the final for the 2nd year running.....FANTASTIC!!!

[squaddie198]

May 2016 Update

Premier League – Aston Villa (A) 1-3

Goals – Oztekin, Mikhailov (2)

A great result for us against a tough Villa side pushing for the 4th Champions League slot. This put us back to the top of the table and means the final game against Liverpool will decide the title.

Premier League – Liverpool (H) 2-0

Goals – Bent, Mikhailov

League Champions for the 3rd time in a row! What a fantastic end to the league with a point needed to take the title over Liverpool. We went out and pushed hard in the first few minutes and Bent grabbed an early lead. Mikhailov put us in reach of the title, but 2 injuries and a sending off for us towards the end left us celebrating with 8 men!

FA Cup Final (N) – Sunderland

Goals – S. Brown, Mikhailov

We ran easy winners the Cup final to claim the 1st FA Cup since 1946 for Derby. This also clinched us a domestic double.

Champions League Final (N) – Athletico Madrid

Goals – Ananidze

We fully deserved to retain our Champions League title after dominating the whole 90 minutes against Athetico. I couldn’t have asked anymore from the players than I did, but they gave me more than I expected. What a fantastic season once again!

Summary

We achieved an unprecedented Quadruple this season, which I think is absolutely astonishing and probably won’t be seen again. Some of the players have raised their game and is nice to see things coming together for some of the young players I took a risk on

[squaddie198]

July 2016 Update

Transfers

Transfers Out

I have decided to try and get the wage bill down as over the season, that is the main drain on the finances. So I had to make a tough decision and offered out the following players:

Diego Suarez moved to Man City for £43.5m

Daniel Rojas moved to Juventus for £46.5m

Augusto Fernandez moved to Athletico Madrid for £45.5m

Adam Wood moved to Napoli for £25m

Mark O'Brien moved to Athletico Madrid for £10m

Total raised - £171m

Plus I also let leave on free transfers:

Jukka Raitala to CSKA Moscow

Marc Shakespear

Carl Burton on loan to Hartlepool

Chris Ritchie on loan to Bolton

Transfers In

The only major transfer in was Carlos Torrico from Dinamo Kiev. As well as Darren Bent played last season for us, he is coming upto 32 years old and can't carry on forever. So I brought in Torrico as his stats were fantastic for a 22 year old.

Carlos Torrico signed from Dinamo Kiev for £13m

Joe Mattock signed from Athletico Madrid for £2.7m

Perry Scholes signed from Ipswich for £3m

Xavier Brunel signed from Toulouse for £3m

Frank Otte signed from Leverkusen for £4.3m

Total spent - £26m

[squaddie198]

Is anybody reading this thread anymore???

If not then I will stop updating it

[Murrayzoster]

Am reading, but you shouldnt ask if people are reading, people read without posting

[squaddie198]

Am reading, but you shouldnt ask if people are reading, people read without posting

Sorry Murrayzoster I was just curious that's all.

I've an update coming after i've got to 10 games played in the Premier League

[Springscotland]

Is anybody reading this thread anymore???

If not then I will stop updating it

Yeah please update, I want to see if the Quadruple can be done again after selling your best players!

[squaddie198]

Here's the update as promised!!!!

Pre Season

After wheeling and dealing as shown in post #66, the pre-season friendlies were a chance to let the new guys come into the squad and try and fit into our way of playing and to see if any tweeks were needed to the tactics. We had 6 friendlies, all but 1 being away, away games at lech, Hartlepool, Raith, Burton and Mantova and the home game being against Real Madrid...I thanked my assistant for organising that game....NOT!!!

We scored 35 goals in those 6 games and only conceded 6, Mantova scoring 3 of those 6 goals somehow. Carlos Torrico hit the ground running scoring 8 in those and outscoring the goalmachine Petr Mikhailov, who finished with a paltry 7! We won all 5 away games with ease and had a 1-1 draw against Real Madrid, which the fans were unhappy against! Fickle or what!!!

Season Kick-off

A slightly dull Community Shield kicked off the new season between us and Liverpool, a game which just couldn't get into gear for the whole 90 minutes. The action came in the penalty shootout, where Oscar Ustari did us proud saving 2 penalties to give us the win 4-2 on pens and retain the trophy for the 3rd year running. Bring on the Premier League!!!

An opening 3 games of Chelsea, West Brom (both away) and Arsenal at home had us on 5 points after a boring 0-0 draw at Chelsea's Zola Arena, a shaky 1-0 win at The Hawthorn and an end to end 4-4 thriller against Arsenal at Pride Park. Not the best form to take into the European Super Cup against Man City, but we dug in and won the game 2-1 with goals from Addison and Courtney. Trophy count - 2 out of 2!

I think the guys were still hungover for the game against newly promoted Ipswich as we only just scraped a 1-1 at Portman Road, which wasn't the best preparation for the first game of the Battle Of Britain against Rangers in the Champions League group phase. To make things worse, Ustari broke his thumb on international duty which left me with my inexperienced back-up keeper. This showed as he conceded 2 sloppy goals but the strikers got us out of jail with equalisers.

Luckily Wigan came along for the next 2 games, Premier League and Carling Cup and the players took full advantage, hammering them 4-0 in the League and 3-0 in the Cup and that lead us nicely into the Burnley where we continued the good recent form to beat them 4-1. The ECL group whipping boys of Club Brugge were up next and we smashed them 5-0 to prepare for the trip to surprise tabletoppers Newcastle, who had scored a fantastic 18 goals in their opening 6 games. It wasn't even a contest as we hammered them 4-1 and then Bristol City 4-2 in the following game.

Then came the clash of the top 2, as we went to new tabletoppers Everton. A nervy tight game was settled by Darren Bent's 200 league goal, as we took over top spot following that result. Unfortunately we couldn't take our good form to Marseille with us as they turned us over 2-1 in the Velodrome. It was a POOR performance from the entire team and everything I tried just couldn't get the team to spark. Not the best way to prepare for Man Utd coming to Pride Park, especially as they have the upper hand over us in the head-to-head over my career so far, one of the few teams who have I might add. But luckily we pulled a result out of the fire with the big Greek Kapadopoulos getting the only goal of the match.

Summary

Well a better start than I was expecting to be honest with you, especially after all the big name players I sold during the off season. This has obviously helped the finances with all that transfer money in, but also on the wages side of life as that was starting to spiral out of control a bit. Plus a lot of my monthly payments for players had ended too.

As usual Petr Mikhailov is leading the scoring for the club with an amazing 16 in 16 games (all competitions), with the next best being Carlos Torrico on 4. Torrico has settled in to our way of playing having an ave. rating of 7.13 from his 13 games. Four players have been ever-present this season so far: Mikhailov, Papadopoulos, Addison and Joe Mattock. He is another of the new guys to have settled in well, in fact he looks like he's been my LB forever!

Awards wise, Mikhailov won the September Player of the Month award with Burak Oztekin picking up the 3rd place. Mark Brown collected 2nd in August's Young Player of the Month, to then collect 1st place in September. Frank Otte got reward for his form with 3rd place. I picked up the Manager of the Month for September whilst Mikhailov was 3rd in September's Goal of the Month.

[Paggioram]

I am still reading mate. I am really enjoying it.