[FM13] Third time lucky, another attempt at a failed Journeyman career

[berty1978]

I might get it right one day, after the last failed attempt due to a problem with the Chilean league I'm trying again. I am pretty certain I know what the problem was, not one of the additional leagues but a competition I had added, I now only have leagues added which I have tested with the Chilean league also loaded, so fingers crossed no problems this time.

The concept

Same as last time, I'm so indecisive when it comes to choosing which leagues to load up that I'm going to attempt a more dynamic game where I'm constantly adding/removing leagues. The idea is to have four constant 'big' leagues (England, Spain, Germany and Brazil) and then randomise the others, probably ten more to start with and possibly add more depending on the speed. Each season I will remove a random league or two and add another, this way I'll never know where I could end up next and gives me the opportunity to manage in new nations.

Additional leagues

Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Ghana, Morocco, Nigeria, Tunisia

Americas: Jamaica

Asia: Iran, Iraq, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, UAE, Uzbekistan

Europe : Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Cyprus, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro

Oceania: New Zealand

I haven't added more from North or South America because the majority use the 'Apartura / Clausura' system and it seems that we can't create those using the editor.

The setup

The ten leagues to come out of the hat are:

Argentina, Armenia, Colombia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Malaysia, Mexico, Moldova, Slovenia and The United States, which I am loading with England, Spain, Germany and Brazil, all down to the lowest available level.

Also using the 'huge' database.

[cerud]

Some very unique leagues in there! Should make for a great career thread

[berty1978]

Some very unique leagues in there! Should make for a great career thread

Thanks, I hope this one goes smoothly and a long career awaits.

[berty1978]

This time I've randomly chosen a Moldovan manager by the name of Nicolae Călmăţui, I don't even know how to pronounce the surname which is why I chose it.

[berty1978]

Plenty of job offers:

[berty1978]

I'm disregarding the Defense y Justicia because that's just stupidly unrealistic, get offered that one every time. Tarvas in Estonia is tempting, best wage budget offered and they're top of the league almost half way through the season, however I'd look even more of a muppet if I screw it up. Realistically I'd go to Moldova but a lot of clubs don't have any facilities or ground listed, only Intersport-Aroma do of the teams I've been offered.

[noikeee]

Good luck! I'd go as low as possible with probably one of the amateur sides in your "home" nation Moldova, I am assuming amateur status is why they have "N/A" for transfer and wage budget.

But that depends on how difficult you want your game to be!

[berty1978]

Also been approached by Smartno (another thread ) and Havant & Waterlooville (bit meh), so I've gone to Intersport in Moldova.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - update

General information | Facilities

At least we have a ground, shabby facilities though, would have thought Intersport would have made sure the club are reasonably well off.

Finances

Not sure how a club this size can come to be almost half a million in debt, something wrong there, hopefully it won't be too much of a problem, just means no upgrades in the immediate future.

Decent view of the ground, lovely surrounding area. :saywhatnow:

At least the away dressing room is in good shape.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - update

Not sure what to make of this squad, certainly got a few good players in there (for this level) but there's a lot of rubbish too. The assistant is so poor that he's giving 28 year old players half a star CA and 5 stars PA, like at 28 they can improve that much. I'll have to use my instinct a lot with this bunch, there's a few good young players though as shown in the U18s squad, though with the poor facilities it looks unlikely they'll improve much.

Key players

Vladimir Jӑpӑlӑu - Glad we've got a good 'keeper, he should give some confidence at the back, the highest earner on £20pw so he'd better be worth it.

Egor Fiodorov - Just signed on a free, Excellent player to have in front of the back four.

Ion Besarab - Another of the high earners, he should fit in well in midfield but I certainly won't be asking him to mark the tall players.

Igoe Tampei - The best striker at the club and he's got pretty good finishing and heading so could be a good target man.

[B.W.G]

Best of luck in Moldova

[DodgeeD]

Good luck with this Nice to see some obscure leagues loaded

[noikeee]

Great ground! Tampei looks a superb player for that level but I've never played in Moldova so wouldn't really know.

[berty1978]

Best of luck in Moldova

Good luck with this Nice to see some obscure leagues loaded

Thanks guys, the Armenian league is most obscure of the top divisions, slightly lower than the Welsh premier in the rankings.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - update

A massive 65 season tickets sold, our finances will be sorted in no time.

The team had played a couple of friendlies before I took over and yes I did draw against the U18s, though the performance in the next friendly a day later gave me a bit more hope. We've made a decent start to the league though Sfintul Gheorghe seem to be way too good, we've already fallen behind the top two and it looks like a mammoth task ahead.

The best performer so far.

[cerud]

Not a bad start to the season. In looking at your standings, do only the top two clubs get promoted? No playoffs?

[deltablue]

Moldova, wow!

[B.W.G]

Good start to the season

[berty1978]

Great ground! Tampei looks a superb player for that level but I've never played in Moldova so wouldn't really know.

He is a good player and scored a number of goals already, though unfortunately when it comes to renewing his contract he wants £65pw, I can only offer up to £10pw.

Not a bad start to the season. In looking at your standings, do only the top two clubs get promoted? No playoffs?

Yes, only the top two outright as IRL, though obviously the II teams can't go up, there are a few in there so a team in 3rd or even lower could get promoted. In fact Intersport should have gone up last season but I can't make out the reason why not, something to do with licensing.

Moldova, wow!

Good start to the season

Thanks.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - update

We had a fantastic start to September with a resounding 7-1 win, though that didn't last as we had to play at Sfintul Gheorghe again, this time in the cup, the fact we took them to extra time doesn't tell the story that they dominated the game. After a very poor defeat to Dinamo-Auto we remained unbeaten for the rest of September through October, but we really should have had more victories especially against Veris where we let a 2-0 lead slip and could have lost it. We are in the promotion places though, so there is some light at the end of the tunnel.

Just had this news come up, we could be in trouble.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - update

A short update this time as we go into a long winter break, we got a very good win at Zimbru II but it was a very poor 0-0 against Real Succes. No surprise as we lost against Sfintul Gheorghe again, luckily that's the last time this season we have to play them. We got things back on track with a scrappy 2-1 win at Maiak but they all count, however a couple of poor results allowed Gagauzia to overtake us again.

We're still in administration but with the debt wiped out and a loan paying back £1k pm that should ensure our short term safety, though £1k pm is still around twice our wage budget.

[noikeee]

Good season I think - I have no idea how strong your team is compared to the rest. Debt is looking bad though!

[berty1978]

That's the debt sorted, out of administration and paying back £525pm.

Hmm, I had the chance of giving higher expectations but with the same £200pw wage budget, I don't think so.

[berty1978]

Good season I think - I have no idea how strong your team is compared to the rest. Debt is looking bad though!

Good question, I'll give a few teams reports for comparison.

Sfintul Gheoghe - Pretty much tells why they're storming the league, one player on £170pw, almost our entire wage budget.

Sheriff II - By far the best team in Moldova obvously has a good B-team, although a few positions have to be made up by 'greyed out players'

Gagauzia - The team battling for the second promotion spot, outstanding strike force, one player on £300pw.

Victoria Bardar - The bottom side, quite a gap between top and bottom, also an amateur side.

CF Locomotiva Balti - Decent side, but can see why they are struggling.

I guess in conclusion, we should be up near the top though just because there are amateur sides in there doesn't mean they are useless. I've tried signing some of the best amateur players and they want wages of up to £95pw, I can only offer £10. We were predicted to finish 8th btw, so my job's safe if we don't go up.

[cerud]

Debt in lower leagues is always a problem...Hopefully you can get promoted soon to have less of a worry!

[berty1978]

Debt in lower leagues is always a problem...Hopefully you can get promoted soon to have less of a worry!

I'm only losing around £5000 pm but we started off with an unrealistic amount of debt, maybe it was randomly generated, but we should be alright for a few years now.

Actually, we lost £5000 in a month we weren't playing, only lost £77 in march.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - youth intake

You don't often see a youth intake with all 5 star potential, I can't say I'm surprised though because according to my Ass Man (who is useless) 5 stars is only a decent player for the level I'm at now. Though the way things look some of these guys will get a chance sooner rather than later.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - update

Well, I don't know what happened in the friendlies, to say we were shockingly bad is an understatement. To make things worse, the final two friendlies were against lower league opposition. I knew we didn't stand much chance against Sheriff II, and they didn't surprise anyone by beating us 3-1. Things did finally get better with a couple of victories but a shocking home defeat against Dinamo-Auto was then followed by a massive game against promotion rivals Gagauzia, thankfully we held out for a thrilling 4-3 win to take us 7 points clear.

[berty1978]

We've got a couple of matches to go so it's nice to get promotion early. It certainly seems unexpected, we were predicted to finish 8th but there's a lot of junk in that league.

Signed a new contract on £10pw, I don't know what to spend it all on, have to open a savings account I think.

Had a chuckle about this player / Ass Man, until a couple of games ago it looked like Veris could make a late push for promotion, talk about a one man team. They are actually an amateur team and for some reason he is on a mammoth wage of £1800pw, to give you an idea how ridiculous that is, Sheriff's highest paid player is on £1200pw. Needless to say Veris are insecure and he is out of contract in the summer and no chance of renewing his contract, he was willing to speak terms with us but he won't accept £10pw.

[Dexter_Morgan]

That ground is bloody amazing Decent start so far and at least you have a good points advantage over 4th.

[berty1978]

That ground is bloody amazing Decent start so far and at least you have a good points advantage over 4th.

Thanks, luckily for us the teams around us were losing matches, and Gagauzia completely bottled it.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2012/13 - Season review

Fixtures 1 | Fixtures 2

League table | Graph

We were a bit too inconsistant at the start of the season to challenge for the title, Sfintul Gheorghe were far and away the best team in the league and we just couldn't compete in the end. I have to be pleased with promotion none the less, some excellent form at the end of the season when we needed it ensured we finished 3rd, with Sheriff II ineligible for promotion of course.

Average attendances

Wage bills

Our average attendance wasn't too bad, obviously helped with us performing well, but I hope it will increase significantly next season of course. Also I didn't realise until now our wage bill is one of the lowest in the league, only two semi-pro clubs had a lower wage bill than us.

Squad stats

Seasons best XI

Key Players:

Vladimir Jăpălău - Any 'keeper that can maintain an average rating of over 7 in a season is pretty good.

Roman Ghencea - The best performing of the defenders, consistant all season and chipped in with a few goals.

Ahmet Barakoev - Very good loan signing from Zimbru, we got a nice system going with him behind Tampei.

Nicolai Ilescu - Bit of an unsung hero, only rated a couple of silver stars by my (rubbish) Ass man but I gave him a chance and he took it.

Igor Tampei - By far our best striker and played most of the season as a lone striker, 23 goals and 11 assists, player of the season by a mile.

Season  | Team managed           | League (Country)  (Position) | Cups                                   | Notes
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2012/13 | Intersport Aroma       | Divizia "A" (Moldova)  (3rd) | Cupa Moldovei - 3rd round              | Promoted

[DodgeeD]

COngrats on the promotion - even more impressive when considering your financial difficulties. Is there much more money in the top flight?

[deltablue]

Nice one.

[B.W.G]

Congrats on winning promotion

[Dexter_Morgan]

Well done on promotion, hopefully you can go pro next year

[berty1978]

COngrats on the promotion - even more impressive when considering your financial difficulties. Is there much more money in the top flight?

Nice one.

Congrats on winning promotion

Well done on promotion, hopefully you can go pro next year

Thanks everyone, I will do a sort of pre-season update soon, a lot to catch up on actually but questions will be answered.

[berty1978]

Actually, while I think of it here's last seasons Divizia National final table for those interested. As you can see Sheriff are head and shoulders above the rest as they should be, though the team at the bottom is a bit of a weird one as they are a B team of a club in the third tier (just got promotion), think someone got mixed up there. That does mean that both first and B team are playing in the second tier though, I hope it doesn't cause a problem somewhere along the line.

[berty1978]

These are actually positions I applied for last summer while unemployed, did they want to see if I was any good before approaching me, cheeky *%$*.

[berty1978]

So we do turn professional, and a wage budget of £2k pw is a major increase, also just looking at the player search shows how much of a difference that makes.

Nice season ticket sales figures, considering our average attendance last season was 270, our capacity is only 1000.

Did I mention Sheriff are the biggest team in Moldova, I'd fancy putting a fiver on us at 2000-1, to get relegated that is. We've been predicted to finish 11th, so not bottom.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2013/14 - update

This is the squad just before the start of the season, interestingly as we were signing better players the stars decreased twice. To give you an idea of the quality difference, last seasons player of the season Tampei is now rated half a star, he is 34 and on the decrease though.

Luka Mandelj - One of the high earners at the club, I hope he'll repay that with performances on the pitch.

Alexandr Muziciuc - Excellent signing, only 19 so he can get better.

Constantin Iavorschi - Our best permanent signing, coaches say he can become a leading Divisia National striker.

I signed a new 'keeper after the first match.

Aljosa Urdih - One of a few loan signings, I wanted him permanent but ran out of funds, much better than our current 'keeper.

[berty1978]

[video=youtube;OTYEJS3YW4k]

I have played the first match, tricky one against a leading side predicted to finish 3rd. I'll compare this to getting promoted to the PL and beating Chelsea 3-0 in the first match, well almost. Things can only get worse.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2013/14 - update

We had a decent pre-season, beating two top division sides comprehensively and a draw against another, Milsami. The match against CSKA reserves was always going to be tough despite us being favourites (apparently). I couldn't quite believe the result against Zimbru, but luckily I didn't get carried away as we haven't won since. We should have beaten Tiraspol and the two defeats were against the current top two sides, and then two decent draws but we need to start winning more games. I wouldn't bet on it being next though as we host Sheriff for the first time.

[berty1978]

Sheriff just signed a striker on deadline day for £1.1m, as they do, just in time for our match, odds on him getting a debut hat-trick, slim.

[deltablue]

Busy summer, hope the signings are good enough.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2013/14 - update

An extemely tough couple of months started off with our first meeting with Sheriff and we didn't know how to contain them as they ran riot in front of a capacity crowd. The defeat at Sfintul Gheorghe was unacceptable though against fellow relegation candidates, after that confidence was low and a draw and loss against two more teams near the bottom of the league. We finally got the win we wanted against Tiraspol, a massive win and we should have beaten Iskra-Stal though I would have taken a point before the match against the team in third. The win and draw leaves us still in bottom place but within touching distance of the pack above us, if we do go down I want to go down fighting rather than getting hammered every game.

[berty1978]

Busy summer, hope the signings are good enough.

I thought they would be but this is a bigger step up than I expected, tough times ahead.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2013/14 - update

November started off in familiar fashion, with two heavy defeats and we're looking even more doomed. The draw against Sheriff was massive, not only gaining a point but for confidence as well, doesn't matter that we were 1-0 and 2-1 up because they absolutely hammered us and we were lucky not to lose. The winter break has come at the wrong time from our point of view however as three successive victories will have to wait until March to find out if we can keep the run going. We've got Milsami at home in the Cup quarter-finals, winnable but not confident.

[berty1978]

Rather than removing random leagues I've decided to remove Armenia and Malaysia for the end of this season (very weak leagues), and the randomiser has chosen Iran and Georgia to replace them.

[berty1978]

CF Intersport-Aroma Cobusca Nouă - Season 2013/14 - update

The friendlies didn't really do us much good, a couple of victories against weaker opposition was followed by a heavy defeat against a fellow Divizia Nationla side. The home draw against bottom side Constuleni was poor, we should have had it wrapped up even though their equaliser came in the 6th minute of 4 minutes added time (because we went down to ten men due to injury). If that wasn't bad enough the performance against Academia was shocking, another side we should be beating if we want to avoid relegation. Again we lost a lead against Zimbru as we couldn't repeat our opening day win, and a poor defeat at Tiraspol. We were at our best in beating Olimpia Balti, epecially as we lost the same fixture 5-1 early in the season, and we were less than a minute away from winning at 3rd placed Iskra-Stal. Again though, inconistancy and the inability to beat teams around us is costing us dear and we need to keep picking up points before it's too late.

Also, the youth intake was so bad that we didn't sign any players.