[FM17] If you think you're too small to make a difference you haven’t spent a night with a mosquito

[Number seven]

Read through the thread now and I love the African Journey. Keep it going!

[Benjoe]

On 31/12/2018 at 16:59, Rikulec said:

*takes bow*

On 31/12/2018 at 17:20, Bitner said:

Then congratulations on winning the league. Where are our intrepid heroes going next?

Cheers,
Bitner 

Firstly to Zanzibar to celebrate!

Then next up is hopefully sending some players with big salaries on permanent holidays before we re-win the league as well as not embarrassing ourselves in the Champions League!

5 hours ago, Number seven said:

Read through the thread now and I love the African Journey. Keep it going!

Cheers @Number seven glad to have you reading along!

 

 

During the summer something very unexpected has happened. 

Aside of getting ridiculous low-ball offers from everywhere for the players I've been looking to sell. All has been rejected because we're not that desperate. But close.

 

A certain event however might fix most of our problems - at least for a while.

ES Sahel, the Tunisian Champions and a major, major team in Africa in general, comes in with a big time offer for our great striker, Lamine Sow. 

Before the summer I was certain I would never let any of my three main strikers go, but this got my attention. 

I negotiated a bit with them until they suddenly lost patience with me and bid 1.2M in cash + 50% of a future sale.

I couldn't refuse that kind of offer.

The really big thing could be that inclusion of 50% from a future sale as this club is one of those who could be selling him on for a huge sum to a European side. 

 

We'll see what we can use the money for. That sum has put our finances back to black numbers for the first time in a loooong time. 
Let's hope we can get to spend some extra £££ on our youth academy.

[Benjoe]

All hail the mighty, magnificent Nelson Mandela Jr!

 

Even with more than 10 players away on international duties Lupoopoo stood no chance.

[Benjoe]

 

[Benjoe]

Seeing as I am hoping that the money we received for Lamine Sow could be used in part on our youth development I am doing a cleanup of our youth teams. 

Not a lot of yellow stars to look at...

After an extensive cleanout, the two youth teams look like this:

The U21's

 

This team has been added a lot of free transfers - a grand total of 6 players for this team. Expensive work, but I would like us to be able to have competitive reserve and u-18s team. 
Eventually these guys would ideally be players from our own academy working their way towards a breakthrough to the first team. For now though, it's a mix of foreign talent and a couple Congolese lads and a few OA kids.

Here are a couple of the main guys:

 

The u18s

 

This team is purely our own guys. It shows.

Only a few of these are really interesting in terms of the stars they've been given, but to be fair to the guys a few of them look more promising than this. 

An example of this is the 3 defenders who have notes. These guys looks like having the right stats to be no-nonsense defenders despite low potential so I could see them making their way to the first team eventually as squaddies.

The most promising guys:

Sompa the main event here. Being retrained as a striker and he could potentially become devastating with that pace.

[Benjoe]

It's also about time to talk about the finished transfer window for the first team!

 

So the biggest thing was that we sold Lamine Sow for that massive £1.2M deal with 50% of next sale. 

Apart of this, we didn't manage to sell any of the guys we wanted to...

Bullsh*t offers were all we got for the players and I was not prepared to lose valuable players at a cut price just for the sake of it, so they stayed.

That didn't mean that we didn't sign some extra guys anyway. 

Murphy Bembo-Leta was shown in the post before, but here is Musa Okoro.

I promised @kidthekid that I would sign a Nigerian lad before I signed anyone of any other nation. Proper racecar work from us there.

However, it wasn't possible to get anyone of proper quality without paying a huge price, so Okoro here is a nice backup to our main strikers, and he has potential to develop his interesting skills as well as potentially be possible to acquire on a free. 

 

This guy was a blind transfer. He had played a lot of games for some good Egyptian teams, and a lot of teams were after him so decided to snap him up.

When I saw his stats I instantly regretted.

Loan him until he is out of his contract...

 

We actually paid money for this guy, Rare occasion. I just really like his physical stats, but would appreciate a bit better heading skills. Eh. Can't get it all. 

He's been injured a long time so hasn't had his debut yet, but soon enough he'll get his chance in central defence.

 

We have also handed contracts so some guys who will be joining when their contracts are done with their current clubs.

Some of these are going to the revamped reserves team, some to the first team, and some I haven't a clue.

I imagine that we will see some big offers for some of our players as we enter Champions League this season, so the following guys could also be replacements here.

 

Super exciting players! 

But we're already stacked so we'll figure something out in 2 months when most of them join. 

[Benjoe]

[Benjoe]

 

"Talented manager Nelson Mandela Jr" Did you hear that Mumbu!?"

[Benjoe]

10th November, 2024

Things are going splendid as you can see!

However it's not been down to the usual domination from Nuhu and Diop.

Diop has been injured all season and hasn't played yet,

And Nuhu's head got turned due to some Egyptian team. I refused their approach as they bid something w*nk like 200k. We need at least what we got for Sow to even consider it.
He's been pissed ever since and it has really hurt his performances.

Asiedu and Kayo have stepped up lately however.

[kidthekid]

too bad the guy is actually terrible, but it's the effort that counts.

Quote

I promised @kidthekid that I would sign a Nigerian lad before I signed anyone of any other nation. Proper racecar work from us there.

 

[Benjoe]

46 minutes ago, kidthekid said:

too bad the guy is actually terrible, but it's the effort that counts.

 

Hey hey! 
He's a great dribbler! But agreed. He'll not have his loan extended. 

Okpala here looks to be promising though! Proper defensive anchor. Not that we really need that, as we have Sambou and Tresor for that. (Tresor has been pushed out of central defence after a bad run there lately, so he's backup DLP in cm atm) 

18 hours ago, Benjoe said:

 

 

[Benjoe]

Okay okay! 

You don't have to wait much  before another update is up!

In the meantime you can all enjoy this beauty by fan-favorite Joshua Nuhu.

[Benjoe]

22 Feb, 2025

A decent run to finish off the group stages of the league.

 

So, naturally we're back in the Championship playoff to defend our title!

Transfer wise we've had a few insignificant sales and then we had 3 players join after the deals we signed with them before the window opened.

  

 

We have also entered the African Champions League at last!

Ngaya Club from Comoros was no challenge in the first match even though we rotated heavily to have a fully rested first team against AS Dauphin. 
Well, we got a red card after 20 minutes, and got 2 injured players, one of them a broken ankle, so there's that.

I've also decided to snatch this kid up.

Mental stats for a 16 year old!

Our finances are still looking great!

We've made a profit of 1.6M pounds this season and yet, we manage to be 266k in the red. Marvelous. 

 

[Benjoe]

This is so annoying.

This should be a goal. But, but, but. Nuhu is offside. 

Ugh. At least we're dominating this game so won't make a difference in this one. 

But it has happened a lot of times...

[Benjoe]

Another wonder from Joshua Nuhu!

This time in the ACL! 

[Benjoe]

 

...

Well ****.

The second best team in the Tunisian league.. 

The Tunisian league is the 3rd best in Africa, the Congolese (DR) is the 12th atm.

But we'll see what we can do. 

Nuhu is warm at least!

 

11 goals and 4 assists in the last 5 games. 9.12 rating on avg. Solid. 

[Benjoe]

 

First game against ES Tunis was a ride I did not enjoy!

Up 3-0 at half time, then I jinxed myself royally in a Whatsapp group, and then it ended 4-3. 

This goal was the one that finished us off....

 

In the following game we met Vita Club, and same pattern once again. Quickly leading 3-0, but ending up losing 3-4! 

So, naturally I wasn't feeling very confident leading up to the return match against the Tunisian runner up. 

 

Things would turn our way however! Two early goals again and then we finally managed to shut down somewhat. I mean, we still allowed a huge amount of shots, but we scored one more and went through on away goals!

 

Next round is Egyptian runner up, Zamalek.

A team, quite a bit above ES Tunis, and of course then, quite a bite extra above us on paper at least. 

This will be a great way to get a proper beating...

 

 

[Benjoe]

Youth Intake anno 2025

We didn't hit jackpot to be fair, but we have some decent prospects in here!

Still, a mile up to some of the talent that TP Mazembe and Vita are raking in, but eh.

[Benjoe]

First leg with few surprises. 

We had more shots and equal possesion. We we'rent completely off in other words, but they smashed us relentlessly.

 

Leading to the second game I took a stern, long, hard look a the Ween.

What could be done to improve potency and longevity? 

The shape had to be kept intact. Maybe trim the edges a little? Nah, the shape was perfect as is.

Instead, making the centre more solid, and have the tip more aggressive. 

Narrow it down and go straight through the middle of the Ween. Pass into space, Close down and work it into the box with Shorter passes. 

Irresistible combination. 

 

It looks proper mad. Or Proper Fraud. No matter, the end result was an orgasm of relief.

We completely smashed them!

Now we sit in the same group as some real heavyweights. Al-Ahly won it last year, and both of the Casablanca clubs are terrific too. 

Vita Club somehow managed to get through as well! They beat Nigerian side Kano Pillars (sorry, @kidthekid) so great succes for Congolese football!

 

Now we await the circumcision that awaits in this terrifying group.  

 

[Benjoe]

And of course, Highly Structured to keep the Ween hard and firm throughout the match. Not going to penetrate much if it's Very Fluid.

 

[Benjoe]

In terms of the league, we only have 4 games left!

We lost to TP Mazembe and Vita Club but came back strong!

Now we have TP Mazembe and Vita again, to finish the league off.

And we're 3 teams tied at first and Vita is on 4th just 3 points behind.  

This will be intense!

[Benjoe]

*tensions rising*

[ManUtd1]

32 minutes ago, Benjoe said:

And of course, Highly Structured to keep the Ween hard and firm throughout the match. Not going to penetrate much if it's Very Fluid.

R Kelly supports your decision to go Very Fluid. Right, @oriole01?

[Benjoe]

9 minutes ago, ManUtd1 said:

R Kelly supports your decision to go Very Fluid. Right, @oriole01?

Now you're just taking the ****.

[Benjoe]

*sweating heavily*

Mazembe next!

[Benjoe]

 

ARRRRRGH

 

[Benjoe]

 

[Benjoe]

Now we have a month until we enter the Group stages of the ACL. 

So we'll be lacking match fitness for the entire group stages it seems.

Great stuff.

[Benjoe]

So, I thought the Lamine Sow sale for +1M was huge. 

Man City started showing interest for one of my strikers. Said striker started to get uneasy and wanted the move to happen.

Man City comes to the table with a 1.9M offer.

We end up with an immense deal! 

The hope is, that he does really well, but not enough to want them to keep him so they offload him to PSG in a year for 30M. 

 

Hugely important striker for us leaving so we will need to do something good with all this money. 

Signing him for 4k 2 years ago, now selling for 4M. Nice business!

[oriole01]

9 hours ago, ManUtd1 said:

R Kelly supports your decision to go Very Fluid. Right, @oriole01?

[Benjoe]

The big time tournament!

How would we fare? 

Could we match? 

Were Nelson and Mumbu's weens ready for this?

 

 

 

[oriole01]

Looks like there's still some work to do then 

[Deisler26]

Mumbu sad

[Benjoe]

On 23/01/2019 at 22:04, oriole01 said:

Looks like there's still some work to do then 

Oh yeah. Big time!

 

On 23/01/2019 at 23:54, Deisler26 said:

Mumbu sad

 

 

I have been playing on the save the past days but been too stressed to update so we're actually done with most of the season by now! 

Updates on this will follow!

[Benjoe]

Quick summarization of minor events:

Dooooon't sign players when you only know 10% about his stats. 

Why you ask?

Because of stuff llike this. 

 

Nuhu won an award!

 

And he's a part of the Inter-Club XI and African XI!

 

Nelson is taking over the world. One nation at a time!

 

We had an insane(!) intake this year!

I will provide screens of these guys at a later time when I'm going through the squad in greater detail but I have taken screenshots at them from the intake day so you won't miss out!

 

We did it again boys!

Nelson has become a favoured person! Who'd have thought that could ever happen! Nuhu an icon - not a surprise though!

 

Another massive part of the season is the way we've managed to slim down the squad!

We've sent players away for far less than they should've gone for in the process though, but it's the only way to save the economy.

I mean, even though we've sold for profits of 1.3M in last season and 4.4m this season we're only 1.8M in the green. 

 

We made it through for a new year of African Champions League as well! We beat the Comoran champions (Coin Nord), the Cameroonian champions (Astres) and the Malian champions (Djoliba) in the process.

We got a tough, tough group though!

ASEC are great, Al-Ahly we lost to 9-2 in total over 2 games last year when they won it for the 3rd time in 4 years, and Hearts of Oak, the 2nd place from Ghana are not to be taken too lightly either. We'll see what happens this year! 

 

i'Lastly we have a quite huge signing joining in a month. A South African gem joining on a free transfer from Kaiser Chiefs,

I'm super excited about unlocking his full potential with those attributes. He could be a machine behind our FRAUD three strikers in front. We just need to get him to stop the nonsense with short simple passes. What the actual f**k is that.

He's got 76 games for Kaiser Chiefs in 5 seasons so he's no chump!

[Deisler26]

Good signing!!

[Benjoe]

11 hours ago, Deisler26 said:

Good signing!!

How do you like him in the Dragons colors?

 

The guy I really want on a free though, is his former teammate.

Not happening though but wow.

 

We've started the Champions League like the true Dragons we are!

 

[oriole01]

These African players are starting to look absolutely world class! Surprising that they're interested in staying on the continent for their move and not going to Europe or elsewhere. Looks like they're starting to pay dividends for you though, great start to the CL so far .

[Benjoe]

19 minutes ago, oriole01 said:

These African players are starting to look absolutely world class! Surprising that they're interested in staying on the continent for their move and not going to Europe or elsewhere. Looks like they're starting to pay dividends for you though, great start to the CL so far .

Cheers man!

But yeah, they're definitely starting to take a step the right direction. Players are staying here more often, which is going against what I would have expected. Seeing as I have far more African leagues active than any other continent, so I would expect European clubs being poaching like carnivores constantly. Somehow we get to keep most of our stars still. 

Like take these three for instance:

In total they've costed me 24K. Masawudu for free, and 12k for both the strikers. 

Nuhu has produced like this and has broken into the international scene with so-so succes too. 

Yet no big clubs have been serious about approaching him. 

However, Raja Casablanca decided to splash 1M on our AMC.

I'm okay with that when we just signed Gumede. Only issue is, that Gumede is tied for the ACL, so we'll be without any top class AMC for the remainder of the tournament. Oh well, cash is good.

 

Other things are making me wonder though.

We've won the league 2 times in 3 years and been in the ****ing group stages of ACL now for the second time. HOW ARE WE NOT BECOMING MORE REPUTABLE.

WE'RE DE-GRESSING. WHAT.

 

[Benjoe]

BOOOM!

 

Are we seriously doing this?

[FiftyBeforeThirty]

Ho buddy have I had a little to catch up on...wait, there's a 2 in front of the 1...I have 20 more pages to read...well this season is going well, give me 2-3 working days and I'll be back with the verdict on the rest!

Great stuff though pal and loving catching up and reading about these mad adventures (madventures?)!

[Benjoe]

Chicago calling!

Chancel Badibanga-Kasongo is a guy we picked up on a free and gave a big salary. Joining us from Belgian Anderlect, we signed him because I was considering moving to a formation with 2 wingers (still no FBs of course). Shortly after signing him and only playing one match with wingers I decided to bin that idea and as such Badibanga-Kasongo fell out of the squad again despite his obvious talent.

We've received an offer Chicago Fire on 1M straight up, 500k over 12 months and then 30% of next sale which is perfect!

EDIT; Okay, so as I'm writing this and waiting for the transfer to get confirmed I get notified that it's been cancelled due to some registration rules prohibiting the transfer.....

 

[Benjoe]

On 28/01/2019 at 17:03, FiftyBeforeThirty said:

Ho buddy have I had a little to catch up on...wait, there's a 2 in front of the 1...I have 20 more pages to read...well this season is going well, give me 2-3 working days and I'll be back with the verdict on the rest!

Great stuff though pal and loving catching up and reading about these mad adventures (madventures?)!

Thanks a lot mate! Much appreciated!

Looking forward to your verdict! #madventures

[Benjoe]

 

Our attendance is ridiculous...

And we're suddenly looking far from as certain to go through as we did 2 games ago!

We have Hearts of Oak in the last which is by far the "easiest" matchup in this group, but we need to draw or win to go through. 

 

We're taking a lot of steps the right direction though!

 

[Benjoe]

Another big time effort from Nuhu and we're through to the semi-finals!

 

Next up is Kaiser Chiefs.. Well, ****. They're mad good. 

Even after losing Gumede to us and Shumana who became a free agent and refuses to negotiate with us (no wonder, he's insane...)

 

They have guys like these

I'm sure they have more top quality players but most of them are completely unknown to Nelson and Mumbu.. 

 

 

Coming up is Nelson's NT-managerial debut for DR Congo in a game against Chad. 

Will Nelson whip out the good ol' ween for the NT? 

Will Mumbu get hired to be his assistant here as well?

Will Mumbu show up in his bush pig costume - whether he's hired or not?

 

Do we even wanna know? 

 

[Benjoe]

Just looking through the DR Congo squad atm. 

Pressed auto select squad so I'm kinda stuck with what they gave me. It's a very ageing squad.

So we'll have to do a major revolution in the squad soon, but we do have a lot of quality players so it's a pity as I don't think the next generation is anywhere near the current old generation. 

 

Also just realized, we're ranked 10th in the world atm. What the hell.

[Benjoe]

Oh - and the squad is actually perfect for some Obscene-Ween-Supreme action as we have **** full-backs and wingers. 

[ManUtd1]

31 minutes ago, Benjoe said:

Oh - and the squad is actually perfect for some Obscene-Ween-Supreme action as we have **** full-backs and wingers. 

[Benjoe]

29 minutes ago, ManUtd1 said:

****ing hell man!

You just stole my gif!

Was going to post that gif in direct response to:

1 hour ago, Benjoe said:

Will Nelson whip out the good ol' ween for the NT? 

in a description of how Nelson did the pregame interview. 

Gotta find another angle then... 

[Benjoe]

DR CONGO

The Squad

Nelson Mandela Jr had taken over the reigns of an ageing Congolese national team. A lot of the bearing stars were either pushing 30 or already in their early 30s. Only a few promising players here and there in the mid 20s.

   

  

   

 

Of course Nelson and Mumbu brought the Ween to the international stage as well.