FM16 The International World Cup Challenge

[Forest]

The World Cup Challenge

Introduction

Well, football is a bloody beautiful game and the most important trophy of all is the World Cup. As I love to manage Nations and International Football, I was searching for a good challenge to share with you.

International Management was never that realistic in any football manager game as in the FM16, so here we go.

The Aim of the Challenge

There are a lot of teams out there, who had never been to World Cup before. The Aim of the challenge is to qualify for World Cup with a nation who hasn´t been there before and go as far as you can. Below is a list with all the countries who are avaibale.

Of course with some nations (like Venezuela) it´s easier than with others (for example Guam). So I thought a bit about that and I came with a good solution. The winner of the challenge will be the one who take the nation with the lowest FIFA Ranking to a World Cup.

[ashton321]

Love this idea. I am in.

What rankings are we using? Is it the initial game ones?

What screen shots do you require?

What national team are you starting off with?

[Forest]

well I don´t know exactly, maybe a caribbean or african nation.

Yes we take the inital game ranks, I think that´s pretty good. Well screens you can post as much as you love to, the most important one is when you qualify for World Cup

[Makoto Nakamura]

I'm in as well Not sure who with yet, but I love international saves.

[ashton321]

Ok no worries I will more than likely do yearly updates.

I have actually not long since done this with Gabon.

I suppose I could stick those screen shots in as my opening gambit.

I think this time Asia will be where I go.

[ashton321]

Surely you have to go San Marino Makoto ?

[Forest]

yeah Makoto is the San Marino addicted

[Makoto Nakamura]

Surely you have to go San Marino Makoto ?

Definitely not, especially with the 8 year bug, I'm fancying an African nation.

[ashton321]

Can I ask couple of quick questions.

1. Am I ok to add extra International competitions from the Classen DB. (Maybe even the league of my nation, so we get a constant stream of players.)

2. Does anyone know how you try and persuade some one of dual nationality to come and play for your nation?

[Forest]

Can I ask couple of quick questions.

1. Am I ok to add extra International competitions from the Classen DB. (Maybe even the league of my nation, so we get a constant stream of players.)

2. Does anyone know how you try and persuade some one of dual nationality to come and play for your nation?

Of course you can use the updates of claasen, which I recommend to all players doing this challenge. Also load every player from the nation /continent you are playing on, will generate A good pool of players.

However, you can select your database how you like. Big, medium etc

[Makoto Nakamura]

Ready for salmon fishing in the Yemen?

The Yemen national football team (Arabic: منتخب اليمن الوطني لكرة القدم‎‎), is the national team of Yemen and is controlled by the Yemen Football Association.

When the nation was split into North Yemen and South Yemen before 1990, two national teams existed. After unification, the Yemen national football team is considered the successor of the North Yemen national football team. See the article South Yemen national football team for details on the South Yemen team.

Yemen (or North Yemen) has never appeared at a FIFA World Cup.

Despite being the 6th most populated country in the Middle East, Yemen has never achieved the same success as those with smaller populations like United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Syria, and Oman.



Yemen Info - WCQ Group - First Team - Hot Prospect - Key Player

Our first game is at home to the Philippines in September.

I loaded just the Yemeni league with a large database plus all international players around the world.

[Forest]

very intresting choice

wish you good luck and you got a real diamant with Jaber

[ashton321]

He looks good. How you getting on finding players and scouting them?

[Mushtaq]

Definitely keen for this. Used to play a lot of international saves but haven't done so for a couple of years.

A question - does anyone know of a database that has the initial number of players a nation has? I remember this from a couple of years back but don't know if there is an updated one. If not is there an easy enough way to find that out in the editor?

[ashton321]

Im not so sure pal.

What I have done is loaded a league from the Classen database and added players to playable teams.

This gives you roughly 800 players usually to pick from

[ashton321]

Vietnam

Vietnam have never done anything in the World Football scene at all. They have won the AFF Championship the once. The country is famous for nothing much more than the war. I will try to change this whilst I am here.

At present they are 135th in the World. The first task for me will be to take this team into the top 100.

[CCSantos]

I know it's a challenge for the FM16, but can I join, even though the FM15 ?

My idea is playing in Caribbean or Asia.

Cheers!

[Mushtaq]

What are the rules around club management alongside managing your nation?

[sherwinriga]

What are the other databases recommended for this challenge aside from the claasen Megapack?

[Forest]

I always recommend to load all the players of the country you are playing with or better, load all the players from the continent you are playing on. But only if your hardware allow it.

Of course additional leagues are always good, so your player at least got playing time. Loading all international players is also recommended, so you never play against national teams with grey players. The rest is up to you. You even could load all the players that exists in FM, but I think that will crush most of our PC´s

[Tardelli]

Luxembourg

Luxembourg have also never done anything in the World Football scene at all. The country is famous for being under the Top 20 in the 2015 World Happiness Report. Also The European Court of Justice is in Luxembourg.

At present they are 140th in the World. I hope to be somewhat competitive in the upcoming matches. I will report back, after the first year.

[RTG]

Why do some teams in the original post have a cross to the right of them?

[Forest]

Why do some teams in the original post have a cross to the right of them?

I copied the list from wikipedia. It says "Marked with † (a dagger) are teams that are still in contention for a place in the finals and may potentially make their FIFA World Cup debut in 2018."

so in fact, you can ignore it

[RTG]

Gabon



The Gabon national football team, nicknamed Les Panthères (The Panthers), is the national team of Gabon and is controlled by the Fédération Gabonaise de Football. They have never qualified for the World Cup finals, but have qualified five times for the Africa Cup of Nations

Gabon Info

Gabon Squad



At present we are currently ranked 65th in the world, i will provide yearly updates.

[Forest]

oh hell, you got aubameyang. thats fantastic, goal machine upfront

[Lenzar]

Do teams like Georgia count? Georgians played at the World Cup as part of the USSR.

[Forest]

yes of course, in that time it was not independent, it was Soviet. So surely you can take them, you can take all nations from the opening post

[CFuller]

I quite like the sound of this challenge. It looks quite similar to

"PH71's Cool Runnings Challenge" from FM08, which I attempted with Rwanda before giving up rather quickly. This time, I'm rather more determined to see this challenge through.

The nation I've chosen may have one of the highest-ranked eligible teams, so I probably won't 'win' this challenge, but I've always liked the idea of taking them to a first ever World Cup.



A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

INTRODUCTION

Uzbekistan is a republic in Central Asia that gained independence from the former Soviet Union in 1991. It has a population of around 31.5million, with 2.3million living in the capital city of Tashkent. It is one of only two doubly-landlocked countries, the other being Liechtenstein.

Uzbekistan's football team has never qualified for the FIFA World Cup, although they reached the final group phase of the Asian qualifiers in their previous five attempts. They lost play-off matches against Bahrain in 2006 (on away goals) and Jordan in 2014 (on penalties) that, had they won, would have sent them into the intercontinental play-offs.

They have also participated at every AFC Asian Cup since independence and have reached the Quarter Finals of each of their last four tournaments. Their best performance was in 2011, when they finished 4th.

As of May 2015, the 'White Wolves' are ranked 73rd in the world. And that's where I - a 35-year-old Englishman with no previous managerial experience - come in.

My first objective is to get Uzbekistan through a Second Round qualifying group that also includes Bahrain, North Korea, Philippines and Yemen. Only the winner automatically qualifies for the Third Round, with the four best runners-up across the eight groups also advancing.

I'll soon be starting my reign with the first two qualifiers, against North Korea at home and the Philippines away. This is my squad for those opening games - it's exactly the same as it was at the start of the save, but I'll be picking my own players from September onwards.

I've made a few significant changes before diving into the action. One of them was to change my assistant manager. My original assistant was some useless old Ukrainian bloke who seemingly only got the job because he was born in Tashkent. At least Vladimir Maminov, my new assistant, has some decent attributes as well as some previous international experience with Uzbekistan. While I was at it, I brought in a couple of coaches to help us out.

My other major change was to take the captaincy away from midfielder Odil Ahmedov (excellent player, but not enough of a leader for my liking) and hand it to another of my key men - left-back Vitaly Denisov.

I'll hopefully be back in a week or so to inform you of my progress in the World Cup qualifiers. It all depends on when I can find the time to play through this challenge.

NOTES: I have loaded claassen's Uzbekistan league file and all international players as part of my database.

[sherwinriga]

I believe that Uzbekistan is a great contender in getting to the World Cup like in real life, but that's an awesome pick to get in thru the World Cup.

[RTG]

results 2015

results 2016

World Cup African Qualifying Section

We aren't doing too bad at the moment, our only defeat in 90 minutes coming against Ivory Coast (a game in which we dominated) sadly we lost out on qualiying for the african cup of nations on penalties against cameroon. Our world cup qualifying group contains Mali,Tunisia and Zambia so it's going to be very difficult as only the winners of each group qualify.

[CFuller]

A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

PART 1

So far, so good. I've played seven matches with Uzbekistan, and we're still unbeaten, although it hasn't always been easy. This is our story so far...





And so, with three matches left to go, our World Cup Second Round qualifying group looks like this. If we can win our remaining home games against Philippines and Yemen in November, we should be well on course for the next round, but the visit to Bahrain in March could well be the decider.

Our FIFA World Ranking hasn't changed a great deal, to be honest. We're currently 70th, which is as high as we've been so far.

My key players so far have been our main frontmen, Aleksandr Geynrix and Bahodir Nasimov. Geynrix is the top goalscorer in this team with four so far, but deep-lying forward Nasimov has been more consistent and has provided two goals and four assists. Another strong performer is defensive midfielder Odil Ahmedov (you've already met him), who has received high match ratings in all of our qualifying matches.

I'll check back in once the Second Round has concluded to let you know if we've succeeded in qualifying for the next phase.

UZBEKISTAN 0-0 North Korea (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - This was a pretty dull way to kick off my reign. The less said, the better.

Philippines 1-2 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - Much better. We played brilliantly and went two goals clear against arguably the weakest team in the group, and although the Philippines pulled one back, we held on for the win.

Lebanon 1-2 UZBEKISTAN (Friendly) - After a shaky start, we battled back to win, thanks to two first-time international scorers. Indeed, the match-winner was actually making his debut!

UZBEKISTAN 1-1 Bahrain (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - Bahrain were perhaps our biggest obstacle in terms of qualifying for the group. It didn't bode well when they scored early on, but we managed to save a draw.

Yemen 1-3 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - It nearly went horribly wrong here, as we trailed 1-0 at half-time to a much weaker team. I switched to a more attacking strategy in the second half, and it paid off as three goals got our campaign back on track.

North Korea 0-2 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - This was a potential banana skin, but our star striker scored with our only two shots on target as we took control of the group.

UZBEKISTAN 1-1 China (Friendly) - A spirited display against another strong Asian nation. We led 1-0 at the break, and although China levelled very early in the second period, that was as good as it got for them.

[CFuller]

A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

PART 2

When I brought you my last update, I was close to getting Uzbekistan to the final round of the AFC World Cup Qualifiers. And this is how Round 2 ended...





...and then news emerged that North Korea had beaten our closest rivals Bahrain. We had qualified for Round 3 as group winners, with time to spare! In addition, we became the first team to officially secure our qualification for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup!

In other news, Aleksandr Geynrix became Uzbekistan's record scorer with 35 goals (surpassing Maxym Shatskykh), and winger Husniddin Gafurov was named the 2015 AFC Young Player of the Year.







If Round 2 had been easy-peasy, Round 3 will surely be incredibly testing. Alongside us in Group A are China, Iraq, Japan, Kuwait and South Korea. Only the top two will qualify automatically for the 2018 World Cup, while the 3rd-placed team goes into a play-off. (Gulp)

We'll have to negotiate the final qualifying round without our second most-capped player, midfielder Server Djeparov. He retired from football in May at the age of 33.

We do, though, still have the three players who started every game in Round 2: Geynrix, Odil Ahmedov, and our goalkeeper Ignatiy Nesterov. I probably should've given someone else an opportunity in goal, but frankly, none of our other keepers can hold a candle to Nesterov.

I guess that's all for now. I'll see you on the other side of 2016, with a Round 3 half-time report!

UZBEKISTAN 4-2 Philippines (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - It looked so easy at first, as we sauntered into a 2-0 lead before a couple of excellent strikes got the Philippines back level. I gave my team a half-time 'hairdryer', and they responded by finishing the game off and keeping us top.

UZBEKISTAN 3-0 Yemen (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - Perhaps our most emphatic performance of this qualifying round. A comfortable win put us on the brink of qualification...

Bahrain 0-2 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 2) - I wouldn't have complained if we'd taken our foot off the pedal in what was now a dead rubber to us. Pleasingly, though, a strong second-half display ensured that we would finish the round unbeaten, and NINE POINTS CLEAR at the top of Group 8.

[CFuller]

A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

PART 3

This town is coming like a ghost town...

Although nobody else has provided any challenge updates for a while, I'm still plugging away with this... and things have gone rather well for Uzbekistan in Round 3 of the AFC Qualifiers for the 2018 World Cup.

China 1-1 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - Our round got off to the worst possible start, with China scoring within a matter of seconds. After plenty of toil, thouygh, we managed to squeeze in an equaliser and take home a point.
UZBEKISTAN 2-3 South Korea (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - Aleksandar Geynrix got us off to a flyer and a shock win looked on the cards... until Lee Chung-Yong turned up. He scored twice and won a penalty, all before half-time, and a valiant performance ended with my very first defeat as Uzbekistan boss.
Japan 2-3 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - I did not see this coming. Geynrix was absolutely lethal, firing us into 2-0 and 3-1 leads against the group favourites. Although Japan clawed another goal back, we battened down the hatches and claimed a famous victory!
UZBEKISTAN 4-3 Kuwait (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - When we went 2-0 up in the first 10 minutes, I thought we were going to cruise to victory. Then complacency set in, Kuwait got back into the game, and things got rather edgy. I was fearing a disappointing draw until a 21-year-old midfield substitute prodded in an injury-time winner and saved the day.
UZBEKISTAN 3-1 China (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - Much like in Beijing, China took the lead early on and dictated much of the first half. It took a half-time rollicking, and a second-half hat-trick from Nasimov, to turn the tie around and give our qualification hopes a massive boost.
Kyrgyzstan 0-2 UZBEKISTAN (Friendly) - We dominated this friendly against our Central Asian rivals from start to finish. By full-time, the only surprise was that we'd only scored two goals.

And so, at the halfway point, we are 3rd in Group A - six points clear of our nearest rivals for that play-off place. Because of our sensational win over Japan, an automatic qualification spot is still very possible, although we'll probably have to cause another upset to overtake either the Samurai Blue or leaders South Korea.

That victory in Tokyo shot us up to a record 39th in the FIFA World Rankings for October 2016. A month later, we moved up another three places... to 36th!

Our excellent form is a pleasant surprise, considering I've been having all sorts of injury problems recently - particularly at left-back, where captain Vitaly Denisov's deputies kept dropping like flies! On a couple of occasions, I called someone up to replace an injured player, only for them to suddenly pick up an injury themselves! A more serious issue arose in November, when my first-choice keeper Ignatiy Nesterov got hurt and I had to give debuts to his deputies. All was well in the end, though...

Here's a typical Uzbekistan squad as of the end of 2016, including an injured Nesterov. You can see there that Aleksandar Geynrix's scoring record in the qualifiers is rather impressive. Geynrix is now on the verge of 100 caps, and I'm hoping that he can get well beyond 50 goals before he hangs up his boots.

2016 concluded on a bright note for midfielder Odil Ahmedov, who was named as the AFC Player of the Year. Surprisingly, he didn't get into the Asian All-Star XI... but another Uzbek midfielder, Azizbek Xaydarov, did.

 

And I think that's about it for now. I'll check back in just before Round 3 draws to a close, as we edge closer to a possible World Cup debut in Russia.

P.S. You'll never guess who won UEFA Euro 2016. (Seriously, SI... sort it out!)

[mark wilson27]

A good set of results their especially over Japan and South Korea. Lets hope for more and good luck mate

[CFuller]

1 minute ago, mark wilson27 said:

A good set of results their especially over Japan and South Korea. Lets hope for more and good luck mate

Thanks for popping along, Mark. I thought even losing narrowly to South Korea was an excellent result... but the Japan game was just astonishing. Undoubtedly one of my best ever international results in CM/FM.

[CFuller]

A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

PART 4

This isn't a massive update, just a quick recap of how our last few games have gone since we reached the halfway point of the final World Cup qualifying round. I'm going to call this section "Reality Bites".

UZBEKISTAN 0-0 Iraq (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - My goodness, we were awful. Considering how good our recent form had been, we should have made light work of Iraq - but, for some reason, we didn't.
South Korea 2-2 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - We've only gone and taken points off the big boys on their own patch again. I feared the worst after we went 2-0 down inside 24 minutes, but a penalty late in the first half turned the tide. A second-half equaliser was followed by some heroic defending before we secured a priceless draw.
UZBEKISTAN 0-2 Japan (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - There was to be no repeat of Tokyo. Japan got their revenge, and then some. On another day, they would surely have beaten us by 5, 6, maybe even 7-0.
UZBEKISTAN 1-3 Morocco (Friendly) - This was my first match against non-Asian opposition. It, er, didn't go too well. Morocco have some pretty decent players, apparently.

So, here's the situation. With just two rounds to go, Uzbekistan are in 3rd place in Group A - four points adrift of 2nd-placed South Korea, and the same margin ahead of 4th-placed Iraq.

One more victory against either Iraq or Kuwait will guarantee a play-off place at worst. Realistically, though, we won't be qualifying automatically unless we win both of our remaining fixtures, and South Korea somehow manage to screw up against both Japan and China. It's possible, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Although we should make it to the play-offs now, those last four results don't fill me with much confidence ahead of the final two games. We've yet to win a match in 2017, and part of me fears that nerves might get to us as the end draws nearer.

Can we hold our nerve? You'll find out the answer when I come back...

[CFuller]

A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

PART 5

And now for the conclusion to Round 3 of the 2018 AFC World Cup qualifiers...

We went into our penultimate away game against Iraq knowing that a draw would be enough to book our place in the play-offs. Victory for Iraq would keep their hopes alive going into the final round, while Kuwait had to beat China to stay in the hunt as well.

Iraq 2-2 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - Conceding a penalty in the second minute was not in the script for me. Although Nesterov saved it, Ismail tucked in the rebound to give Iraq the perfect start. 1-0 was how it stayed until half-time, but I remained calm, reassuring their players that they could fight back...

...and fight back they did. Strikers Geynrix and Nasimov were each on target as we virtually secured a 3rd-place finish in Group A. We also maintained a slim chance of finishing in the top two, as long as South Korea came back from 1-0 down in Japan (they didn't) and we held on for a win (we didn't, thanks to a 93rd-minute Iraqi goal).

3rd place it was, then. Primary objective complete for me - we were in the play-offs.

Kuwait 2-0 UZBEKISTAN (World Cup Qual. Round 3) - A load of my more important players were risking suspensions, so I rested them and selected quite a few fringe players for the final group match. The result was unsurprising, unsurprising, and unimportant.

And here's the final Group A table in all her glory. South Korea and Japan qualify for their umpteenth successive World Cups, while we go into Round 4 - the continental play-off round to decide who goes into the intercontinental play-off round. And we will play...

...Saudi Arabia. Well, it could've been worse. It looked like being Australia until they got an 85th-minute winner against Jordan to qualify automatically.

And so, as of September 2017, we are still in contention for the 2018 World Cup... but for how much longer? We've gone six games without winning, we've forgotten how to defend, and - worst of all - I somehow managed to cheese off virtually my entire squad when I made my concerns clear at the end-of-round debrief.

That's not great, but there's more. Two of my key defenders - captain Vitaly Denisov and centre-half Fozil Musaev - will miss both legs of the Saudi Arabia tie. Oh for fu... 

[swooperproop]

On 23.06.2016. at 01:34, CCSantos said:

I know it's a challenge for the FM16, but can I join, even though the FM15 ?

My idea is playing in Caribbean or Asia.

Cheers!

Same question here. (except that my idea is going with a nation ranked as low as possible)

[CFuller]

A Song of Ice and Fire: Managing the White Wolves of Uzbekistan

PART 6

It's October 2017, and time for our World Cup qualifying play-off against Saudi Arabia. If we could beat the Falcons over two legs, we would go through to a final, intercontinental play-off round.

FIRST LEG:

I gambled on a debutant in midfield, and it paid off when he gave us the lead after just 12 minutes. Here's the lad - Jaloliddin Masharipov. The rest of the first leg was very stressful, as we picked up a load of yellow cards and Saudi Arabia came at us hammer and tongs. They had a goal disallowed fairly early in the first half, but they wouldn't be able to get that vital away goal in the end.

At the end of an exhausting match, virtually all of our players were out on their feet. Key men had to drop to the bench for the second leg, while our attacking talisman Aleksandar Geynrix was out of contention altogether after straining his thigh during the first game. With our captain and now our vice-captain unavailable, things were looking bloomin' marvellous. 

SECOND LEG:

Injuries and tiredness were bound to take their toll at some point... and they did so in our most important match yet. Saudi Arabia went 1-0 up in the opening half, thus negating our first-leg advantage, but I was hopeful that we could grab an away goal in the second half to put the Saudis under real pressure. Then our rookie centre-back Jamshid Boltaboev knocked the ball into his own net, giving the Falcons an aggregate lead. After that, it all went wrong... spectacularly wrong. 

Our 2018 World Cup dream was over. Saudi Arabia won 4-1 on aggregate and went through to face Canada in the intercontinental play-offs.

Despite that heavy loss, I've not given up on Uzbekistan yet. Over the next year or so before the 2019 AFC Asian Cup begins, I'll be phasing in some younger players and phasing out the likes of 36-year-old midfielder Timur Kapadze, whose international career will end on a record 130 caps.

So, I will - in all likelihood - be continuing this save. However, I won't be providing any more updates... at least not in this thread. I'm seriously considering taking this story over to the Career Updates sub-forum and carrying it on from there.

Ta-ra for now.

[dynaboyj]

Nice! Hope to see you there.

[Garmt02]

Andorra haven't done anything in the world cup or european championship. 

Andorra is now 203th in the world ranking.