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Eastern Europe (vol II) Starting in: the murky seas of the lower leagues

withnail316

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withnail316

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You're picking up points at an early stage which is always a big plus :thup:

Yeah, it's nice to be mid-table at this stage. My target for the year is 30 points, which should see us comfortably safe.

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Wow, would be interesting to see who they spend their money on for that club.
That would be an interesting project.

I'll be honest, if they approached me I'd have to consider it.

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September

UPL: Metalist 2-4 FC Sumy

Jaw dropping. Metalist came into this with a 100% record having scored 23 and conceded 5, yet we ripped them apart. Igor Melnyk scored two in the first 10 minutes to have us in dreamland, and new arrival Beljic had us three in front on the hour. A few nervy moments as Cristaldo and Xavier had them back in it with 13 minutes left, but substitute Maxym Ilyuk secured a precious win late on. It wasn't all good news though, Igor Melnyk picked up a knock scoring his second goal which will see him miss the next three months.

UPL: FC Sumy 0-0 Sevastopol

A poor draw in the battle of the newly promoted sides. Still, it's another point closer to safety.

Ukrainian Cup 2nd round: Obolon 1-2 FC Sumy

We were victims of an upset last year, crashing out in the first round, but there was no danger of a repeat here. Johan Vucinic scored his first two goals for the club, and despite us conceding late on, we hung on to put our name in the hat for the third round.

UPL: Tavria 4-1 FC Sumy

Just before this game, I held a team meeting and congratulated the lads on how they'd been playing. They rewarded me with the worst performance of my Sumy career, and made the second bottom side look like Real Madrid. All four of their goals could have been scored by Zidane, they were mental! Yesyp scored our late consolation, but we were awful.

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October

UPL: FC Sumy 2-1 Zorya

A huge result, but we had to come from behind to win it. Goals from Beljic and Lozinskiy in the final 25 minutes secured the points.

UPL: FC Sumy 3-1 Chornomorets Odesa

A cracking win against the Sailors, and we dominated from start to finish. Goals from Beljic, Lozinskiy and Vucinic secured back-to-back wins.

UPL: Arsenal Kyiv 2-3 FC Sumy

Another win, which is truly astonishing. Two goals from Yesyp and one from Andrevskyi sees us move up to 23 points.

Ukrainian Cup 3rd round: Karpaty Lviv 0-1 FC Sumy

An excellent defensive display, a second half Yesyp goal sees us into the quarter finals. Hopefully we can avoid one of the big boys!

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Brilliant start to the season :thup:

If that Tarlungeni takeover goes through could you upload that please? That would make an interesting side game :D

Upload so you could take it on, you mean? Sure, but you'll have to talk me through how I do it...

Oh, and cheers. I'm still blown away where we are, but it won't last.

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Yeah thanks. Buying the club for 60k to invest 25mil is madness. You'd think he'd just buy a slightly better club for more money :D

Just 10% of that £25m should make them pretty much unbeatable at that level. He might need to spend a bit of money on the stadium instead, which has a capacity of 1,000!

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Brilliant. Just use this site > choose file > pick the save closest to the takeover > then copy the URL once it has been uploaded and post on here. Cheers for that :thup:

On the case. Just waiting for it to upload, I'll post a link when it's up and ready to go.

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Good going in the Premier Division, keep us posted on goings on in Romania.
Nice result for the month

Cheers, lads. Will keep you posted on how it's going in Romania. They're currently firmly in mid-table just before the half-way point of the season.

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Dexter_Morgan

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Here's that link for Dexter, and anybody else who fancies it for that matter:

Tarlungeni

Cheers for that again mate, :thup:

I'd be curious to see how anyone gets on with your save playing as Targlungeni :)

I've had a quick look and there is no money for transfers but a £14k wage budget (7k spare) but they've agreed to any requests. I imagine if any money was to come through it'd be in January time, I'm a bit hooked on my save but will give this a proper go in the week and might make a separate thread for it so not to ruin this one :)

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Cheers for that again mate, :thup:

I've had a quick look and there is no money for transfers but a £14k wage budget (7k spare) but they've agreed to any requests. I imagine if any money was to come through it'd be in January time, I'm a bit hooked on my save but will give this a proper go in the week and might make a separate thread for it so not to ruin this one :)

No worries, hope you enjoy it. Give me a nudge if you do write another thread on it, btw.

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November

UPL: FC Sumy 1-1 Metalurh Donetsk

A decent display even though we were on the back foot for most of the game. Johan Vucinic secured us a point against the cup holders, and by my reckoning we're 6 points off securing our top flight status after 15 games.

UPL: FC Sumy 1-0 Kryvbas Kryvyi Rih

We didn't play at all well against the bottom side, but a late Ilyuk goal was enough for the points.

UPL: Karpaty Lviv 1-1 FC Sumy

Quite pleased with a point here, but with the chances we had it could have been more. Central defender Eugene Lozinskiy with our goal.

UPL: FC Sumy 0-0 Illichivets Mariupol

A fairly mediocre display in the final game of the Autumn round, and we even had to rely on keeper Shelikov to save a penalty to get that.

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FC Sumy- mid-season report 13/14

So far so good then for life in the top flight. Flying high in the top half of the table, into the cup quarter finals and with just about enough points to already be safe, it's quite difficult for me to complain about anything at the moment. However, I'm not naive enough to think we're going to stay in those European places, and it's quite noticeable that just five points separate us in 4th and Volyn in 11th.

The other issue is our finances. We're now about £1m in the red and the club is officially financially insecure. I'd like to say I've a couple of star players I could sell to sort that out, but that's not really the case with my squad. I'm hoping that either the chairman will pump some cash in, or we'll be targeted for a takeover in the coming weeks and months.

I'm already beginning to think about next year, and we have as many as five first team players out of contract in the summer, and countless others in the reserves and youth side. I've identified three or four I THINK I could convince to sign on a Bosman in the summer, but of course those plans could be impeded by the current financial situation. I do think however it's imperative I find a goal scorer as soon as I can, especially when you consider that nobody has more than five so far this season.

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Dexter_Morgan

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You are doing so well at Sumy that from a readers point of view it'd be good to see how you do there for a season or 2. On the other hand though your finances are poor and I can tell that it's a worry for you, I had 3-4 years of nothing at Skjold and it is frustrating at times and the offer you have is a very good one.

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Tempting indeed :)
You are doing so well at Sumy that from a readers point of view it'd be good to see how you do there for a season or 2. On the other hand though your finances are poor and I can tell that it's a worry for you, I had 3-4 years of nothing at Skjold and it is frustrating at times and the offer you have is a very good one.
I'd definitely stay at Sumy for now.

I'm in no rush to move, I'll be honest. Yes, I'm a little frustrated at the financial position we're in as I've spent peanuts, but it's the reality of managing one of the smaller clubs in Eastern Europe. Going to Partizan would be like managing Shakhtar, Dynamo or Metalist, and there's not much challenge there for me. Every trophy I win at a club like Sumy would be worth five that I win at a club like that.

Having said that, if the Chornomorets Odesa job comes up in the near future, I'll be sorely tempted after my last career there.

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Good decision to reject the move to Partizan,winning trophies with Sumy will be worth a lot more with them being a much smaller club!

Yeah, that was my thinking. I'm not sure Partizan would have that much longevity to be honest, especially as there seems to be a bit of money there as well.

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I'm nearly through the winter, and this has happened again:

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Very handy, especially as I have signed pre-contract agreements with 6 players for next year.

I've also took steps to cure our goal scoring problems with this signing:

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As a consequence, I've decided not to renew the contract of striker Igor Melnyk, so last year's top scorer will be leaving in the summer.

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March

UPL: Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk 2-5 FC Sumy

This was an incredible win, and a great way for the season to resume. Goals from Yampol (2) Taschy (2) and Rud.

UPL: FC Sumy 1-0 Vorskla Poltava

A very even game, but a stoppage time Stephen Worgu header on his debut secured another victory.

Not much to write home about with this year's youth intake. I really need an upgrade:

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UPL: Volyn Lutsk 1-1 FC Sumy

Stephen Worgu grabbed another one here, and we were unlucky not to take all three points. Still, a decent result.

UPL: FC Sumy 0-1 Dynamo Kyiv

All good things have to come to an end, and we deserved nothing from this game either.

UPL: Shakhtar Donetsk 0-0 FC Sumy

Absolutely delighted with a point here. We shut down Shakhtar, and although we offered very little going forward, I'm chuffed to bits to come away with a point.

UPL: FC Sumy 1-1 Metalist Kharkiv

A game of two stoppage time goals. Despite us falling behind to a simple header from a corner, Worgu grabbed his third of the season straight after.

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April

UPL: Sevastopol 0-3 FC Sumy

Worgu is turning in to some signing. He grabbed two more in this game, before Yampol secured the points in stoppage time.

UPL: FC Sumy 1-1 Tavriya Simferopol

We didn't play at all well, but Worgu scored yet another to ensure we took something from the game.

Ukrainian Cup Quarter Final: FC Sumy 1-0 Dynamo Kyiv

Wow, we didn't deserve this at all but I'll take it! We had one shot on target, they had 12, yet Worgu (again) was the difference.

UPL: Zorya Luhansk 0-0 FC Sumy

No goals, but another valuable point.

UPL: Chornomorets Odesa 1-0 FC Sumy

We conceded after 30 seconds and never looked like getting back into this.

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May

Ukrainian Cup Semi Final: Sevastopol 1-2 FC Sumy

Incredible stuff, we're into the final! Kontantyn Rud put us in front before our fellow promoted side levelled before the break. The second half was tight and tense, but a late OG sees us off to play in the national stadium in the club's first ever cup final. We'll meet Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk there so we're very much underdogs, but who knows?

UPL: FC Sumy 1-1 Arsenal Kyiv

An 11th draw of the season, but we should have taken all three points here. Beljic grabbed our goal, but we were wasteful and should have won by three or four.

UPL: Metalurh Donetsk 0-3 FC Sumy

A wonderful end to a wonderful season. Worgu scored two more and Rud grabbed another to see us finish the season in style.

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Кубок України (The Ukrainian Cup)

Sunday May 11th 2014

Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk Vs FC Sumy

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A first ever cup final for FC Sumy then, and it is against one of the big boys. Dnipro certainly have the financial muscle to test most clubs in Eastern Europe, but the club haven't won a trophy since the old USSR cup in 1989. Whatever happens, history is about to be made.

Disappointingly, in the week building up to the game I lost not one but two key players, both of whom play in my midfield 3, so we're going to have to hope their understudies have the game of their lives. I decided to play a relatively conservative 4-3-2-1 system and try and catch Dnipro on the break. It was the same system I had used when we beat them 5-2 earlier on in the campaign, and we'd need a similar performance if we are to have any chance of taking the cup home and ensuring European qualification. As the game kicked off, Dnipro were 3rd in the league, 4 places and 13 points clear of us. They had however lost 4 games this season, which is 3 less than us in our first year.

First half

Not too much to write home about, although after a few minutes our midfield problems got worse. Rud was caught from behind and picked up a knock, but he was quickly back up and involved. He combined with Boris Taschy, and then found a through ball to Worgu in behind who slotted home his 8th of the season. HT: 0-1

Second half

The second half started well, we were largely on top for the first 10 minutes. A couple of early corners brought great saves from Dnipro's keeper, but the next goal came from one of their corners. Zozulya's delivery was nodded away by Melnyk and picked up by Yampol. Yampol found another perfect through ball for Worgu, who found a sumptuous chip for his second of the game. For the remaining half an hour, we had to defend for our lives as Dnipro ramped up the pressure. 12 minutes from time they were back in it, as Zozulya took advantage of a knock for Melnyk and powered home from the edge of the area. However, they couldn't find another, and we'd won the trophy! FT 1-2

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FC Sumy: Season Summary 2013/14

League

Media prediction: 16th (of 16 - relegated)

Finished: 6th

Cups

Ukrainian Cup: Winners

Top scorers

Stephen Worgu (15 apps) 13 starts - 11 goals (8 in the league)

Positives

Well, I can't say I expected that. What a wonderful first season in the top flight, and the club's first piece of major silverware to boot! So many positives, from the cup run to the signing of Worgu in the winter window, and the incredible form of defender Segiy Melnyk. I'm absolutely delighted with 6th place, which ordinarily would have got me into the very early rounds of the Europa League, but the cup sees us straight into the play offs.

Concerns

Once again, my concerns are financial. Although the board have pumped £950,000 in to the club this year, we're no closer to being in the black and so I'm still a long way off upgrading both our youth and training facilities. I can cope with not having a transfer budget if there are youngsters coming through, so I'm hoping if we can squeeze into the group stages our burden will be somewhat lightened next season.

Ambitions

I'm not going to get ahead of myself, but next year is about building on our 6th place finish and also adding two or three quality players to the squad.

Surprise of the season

Normally I write about positive surprises here, but this year it's a negative one. Jovan Vucinic, who I had really high hopes for, has been a total disappointment both on the pitch and in training. I really hope he improves next year.

Player of the season

Sergiy Melnyk

Attendances

Lowest attendance: 8,694 (Vs Volyn, UPL)

Highest attendance: 15,472 (Vs Shakhtar, UPL)

Average attendance: 10,519 (10,316 in UPL)

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Well done :thup: Fought against the odds to get a very respectable finish in your first top flight season and a cup too, well done mate :cool:

Cheers Dexter. Hope I can build on it next year.

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cerud

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Great job for your first season in the top flight! Ukraine can be tough to break into the top 4 spots. Hopefully next year, you can challenge for a European spot and earn some prize cash.

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Great job for your first season in the top flight! Ukraine can be tough to break into the top 4 spots. Hopefully next year, you can challenge for a European spot and earn some prize cash.

Cheers Cerud. The great thing about Ukraine is there are 6 European spots available, so there's certainly a carrot dangled each year in a 16 team league! I'm now hoping for a kind European draw in the EL play offs, but I won't get my hopes up.

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