Nowhere to Hyde...

[WillHoward42]

Huge result to get promotion, congratulations!

The challenge starts now...

[optimusprimal82]

Season 7 Preview

It's all been building to this - it's crunch time as we get ready to take our place in the Premier League for the first time! Little Hyde, minnows in every sense of the word will be going up against some of the biggest sides in world football, armed only with players we've brought through ourselves... Yikes!

 

 

 

Climbing Everest...!

In seasons past I've posted pictures of the 'Team Report - comparison' screen but there seems to be little point this year - we are bottom/lowest average for every stat except jumping (for which we are a mighty 19th). Now as proved over the last few years, it's not exactly the be all/end all but it certainly highlights the scale of our task and the gulf between us and the other sides - we need quality reinforcements and soon lest we find ourselves in a perennial relegation battle - fingers crossed our youth recruitment team do the business this year as we're in dire need of an upgrade across the pitch technically, tactically and physically.

In terms of coach opinions/actual squad strength, a quick look reveals we're not quite as 'great' anymore;

Indeed, the only players given that title are Owen Willis (22C - RB), John Jeffs (23D - DC), Jared Kenyon (24A - MC), Fraser Meaney (21A - MC/AMC/STC), Colin Turnbull (always plays terribly for us - 23B - MC/AMC) & Shaquille Smith (24B - playoff hero - STC)

Of course these screens are only of limited use, as looking at the PA equivalent you'd think there's no problem - we'll have a great team soon enough etc, but we all know it doesn't quite work like that;

There definitely is a lot of potential to unlock in some of these guys but hand on heart I'm not sure that even if everyone reached their peak that we'd ever have enough to finish in the top 4 (there I go again talking down our chances!). If you think of the top level players in the game and compare them to our lot currently then it's not even close - even our two best players Meaney & Kenyon are lacking in comparison so we know we're up against it. Listening to the coaches then Bob Reed could well be one who can make a difference at this level, he just needs some time to reach his peak as he's currently only rocking 2 of his 5 stars so it's the waiting game (or hungry hungry hippos!) until we see what he can really do.

There have been quite a few changes to the squad this year, some forced, some through choice as they haven't improved sufficiently/won't ever reach the level we need. Leaving the squad this year are Matty Hughes (retired), Kyle Harrison (Free xfer), Jordan Fagbola (Free xfer), Emeka Jibrin (20B - moved to release list), Stephen Wells (20A - moved to release list), Joe Nolan (22B - moved to release list). We haven't got a lot of quality to bring up to bolster the squad but Tommy Holmes (25C), Jack Appleby (24F) & Luke Fisher (25D) have been brought up from the U18's (we're yet to get an U23 side); numbers wise I'm happy as the squad is still on the large side, we just have a lack of quality across the pitch, something I hope will be remedied ASAP in the coming youth intakes.

One issue with us moving through the divisions is that as the playing standard is so much higher, it's tricky to play the really young/undeveloped guys as the gap between their CA/PA is so great - there's a few on the team that I'll consequently be looking to move out on loan in the hope they get some serious playing time and improve quicker than they otherwise would by sitting on our bench.

Looking at the CA levels we're pretty low again this year - now this can be misleading given it's rated against the highest quality guy at the club - but given that our highest ability player is (apparently) Kenyon (24A) and he'd be unlikely to get into a lot of Premier League sides... Well it shows the struggle we'll have this year? There looks to be a lot of 'potential stars'there left to gain, but a lot of them are for players over 24 which means they're unlikely to improve all that much - what i'm really looking for from these guys is to try and stabilise us until we can get a few superstars through our academy!

We've been playing primarily in a 4141 formation since the start of the save with some tweaking and experimentation with 2 up top and attacking wingers but this season may have to see us experimenting in the other direction - instead of a 4141/4132 I might have to test out things such as a 4231 or even >shudders< a full 451 - what I don't want to do though is drop so deep and abandon all attacking impetus such that we never look like scoring - 'attack is the best form of defence' has been our mantra throughout so I'd rather get relegated trying to win games than slide out with a whimper - 2 wins and 8 losses is better than 5 draws/5 losses for an easy example!

Luckily as we're not allowed to buy players, the financial disparity isn't quite such a big deal, but if ever we were unsure as to exactly how far behind we are this is pretty sobering;

 

Aiming high...?

Somewhat unsurprisingly it looks like relegation battle time again, although the board have asked for fourth & third rounds in the FA/Carabao cup respectively - we've never been past the second round in the Carabao so we need to make sure we don't slip up and give the board an early mark against me!

No real surprise we're listed as favourites for the drop - we are by far the worst side in the division on paper which brings us nicely onto this years 'beat the drop' scoreboard - I long for the days this won't be required but I think it's set to stay for a few seasons yet! Now a widely uttered sentiment amongst Premier League managers in charge of relegation threatened sides is the need to get to the 40 point mark - as you may have seen in one of my previous posts, the safety mark in this save for the Premier League has actually been considerably lower than that with an average of 33 points being enough to guarantee safety. As is the norm I'm loathe to aim that low and be embarrassed so I'll up the mark to 38 points to guarantee our safety  - which is a big ask right now but it'll take a few games before we see just how tough it's going to be - we'll need to rely on our home form and games against the lower sides to keep us safe this year, there's no way we're competing with the likes of Everton, let alone City/Liverpool etc just yet;

[optimusprimal82]

Vultures.

As if Huddersfield haven't caused me enough misery today!? With the full time whistle ringing in my ears after yet another abject United performance this lands in my FM inbox;

Now my coaches have been raving about this kid for the last few months and whilst not initially convinced I'm starting to understand why as he's improving pretty rapidly - he's only played 2 games for us so far and did pretty badly in both of them but he is still just 16 years old? The fact a Premier League side is snooping around him already however has me taking more note than just my coaches word - maybe we really do have something/someone special on our hands - could this season be all about Bob?

Now in seasons past that would have been a tempting amount of money and I'd almost certainly have had to fight with the board - considering we were in the red last I checked (just a few weeks ago in-game) I panicked on first seeing the offer, frantically reading to see if they'd accepted it but luckily the decision was left solely to me - on closer inspection I see why they're probably happy right now; in just one month our coffers have swelled from -£880,000 up to £7,841,817 thanks to TV money and season tickets;

We're miles below our wage budget at present but there are a lot of players asking for new contracts so I expect that to change, but the omens are good that we'll make a huge profit this year so hopefully that should help us fend off bids for players we don't want to sell!

[optimusprimal82]

2 hours ago, WillHoward42 said:

Huge result to get promotion, congratulations!

The challenge starts now...

Thank you! Yeah it was something of a bittersweet feeling getting promoted when we're clearly not ready, but I'm buzzing and ready for the challenge now we're here - bring it on!  

[optimusprimal82]

Know your enemy...

So essentially the two best players currently at our club (and Bob Reed may change that if the coaches are to be believed) are Fraser Meaney (21A) and Jared Kenyon (24A) - if we look at them, neither are bad but you can see why I may have some concerns going into the Premier League with them as the quality in my side drops off after these two very quickly;

 

Now all you've had so far is my constant stream of written noise about how bad we are with nothing really to compare against...? With this mail coming out;

I thought it'd be a good opportunity to show you what we'll be up against this year - naturally not every player from every team will be of this quality but holy heck I imagine a naked lap of my living room is on the cards (no, there won't be a gif - sorry to disappoint) if anyone like these guys should come through my academy (NB: all but Mbappe & Pogba are - I believe - newgens, so don't consider this player naming - please let me know if otherwise/you'd prefer me to screen them though and I can spoiler tag them out - I haven't included Kylian & Paul for this reason, but as I'm sure you know/can guess, they're quite good!);

To really rub salt in the wound, this is Man Utd's current bkup/prospect striker who's tipped as joint 4th for highest scorer >sigh - one day<

[Hootieleece]

Good Luck in the Premier League.

I am reliving the 2025-2026 season all over again. (I tried to go Professional after coming in 14th after 25 Draws! the first time around) and I resigned. Unfortunately the only save I have before the resignation is from preseason.

I'm making the same personnel decisions and as long as I finish midtable the save won't be too corrupted.

I am just about fed up with my board...

[optimusprimal82]

9 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

Good Luck in the Premier League.

I am reliving the 2025-2026 season all over again. (I tried to go Professional after coming in 14th after 25 Draws! the first time around) and I resigned. Unfortunately the only save I have before the resignation is from preseason.

I'm making the same personnel decisions and as long as I finish midtable the save won't be too corrupted.

I am just about fed up with my board...

Argh - nightmare! Hope you get back to where you were quickly!

Do you think going pro is all that's standing between you and promotion? I ask because (obviously) Pro is better than semi-pro but I can never quantify by just how much - back when we were still semi-pro in our final season we were up against pro teams and I got annoyed by the drop off in match sharpness/recovery which I felt was holding us back, but if you'd offered me going pro or a decent striker (for example) i'd have taken the latter at that point in time?

I know the board feeling (think I posted 'bored with the board' many pages back!), it's impressive how SI have it in the game but I look forward to the future when maybe/hopefully you can discuss things with them in more complexity/with better context - i.e. you can tell them "look how close to promotion we are, this could be the thing that gets us there" although as I'm writing that it sounds like a good way for a lot of clubs to go bust? Hmm... 

The timing of me posting this is dreadful given your board frustrations but your struggles plus our recent TV money injection inspired me to go upgrade hunting/assessing - there's not a lot left for me to ask for with a stadium being constructed and both youth/training facilities already being upgraded but I did manage to get another junior coaching/youth recruitment upgrade out of them. Ignoring the main Training/Youth ones we were in an ok place facilities wise with this being our current setup - not bad but definitely room for improvement;

I'm not sure to what level the Youth/Training facilities will be increased but they've spent close to £5 million on them so I'm hoping for/expecting a suitable jump - adequate and basic are just way too far off the level we're at now - there's not long to go now until they're finished though so fingers crossed;

I had to stress the point a little but the board didn't take a whole heap of convincing and they afforded me upgrades to both youth recruitment and junior coaching - I'm not certain/an expert but I think that puts our junior coaching to the highest possible level and 1 (maybe 2?) off the top for recruitment?

Ok, so it was bugging me - I went and looked it up (the article doesn't explicitly state it's for FM19 - the logo on the page is in fact for 18 I believe - but it was updated in January this year so I believe it should be mostly accurate);

Training Facilities

So as suspected, we have plenty of room for improvement here - explains why my guys develop so so slowly too (although extra coaches i've been able to hire this year should help with that!)

 

Youth Facilities

So we're not quite as far behind here as our main training facilities but we're still in the bottom half standards wise - this & training facilities are the two most expensive to upgrade too (at least in terms of pure initial cash outlay - but I believe they also increase your club status/rep with players?)

 

Junior Coaching

We look to have this one sewn up for now at least!

 

Youth Recruitment

So that confirms we are still 1 level away for this - naturally as soon as I can I'll be nagging again - one thing I'll have to keep an eye on is how much it costs in case we do get relegated; we were making a slight profit last year in the Championship but even with 25% relegation wage drops our wage bill will still be much higher if we go down than it was last year as players are asking for up to 500% higher wages now we're in the Premier League (which is madness - and yes i've made notes of who's holding us to ransom so i can get rid if im ever in a position to be able to - long memory and all that!). I believe that we would/do get parachute payments if we go down but not sure exactly how much they are/will cover, but if we're in dire straits i'm not sure that just an extra level of youth recruitment is what will break us - might just be we have to offload someone like Morgan James whose wages now match his ego but not his goal output (but still one of our better options for now sadly).

We're only 5 days away from the first game of the season (Liverpool beat City in the Community Shield) and I've just found out I will have a U23 team this year which is great news - means I can play some of the younger players who're too old for the U18's! Also means - along with the additional cash-money - that i'll be much more relaxed at youth intake day and likely sign everyone to keep numbers high between the two teams. The other bonus is I'm now allowed to hire 5 U23 coaches who of course will help out with the other teams in a coaching capacity so we'll have a big increase this year in coaching level across the board.

On a similar note, having had our HoyD for a long time I've changed it up. I'm not in love with our new guy and in some ways (namely determination) he may actually be a step down, but i want ed to at least try something different for a year and see if it has any noticeable effects on our intake. I had no idea what the professionalism was of my last guy but the new guy is 'fairly professional' so that should stand us in reasonable stead. We still didn't have a huge amount of choice but i'll keep monitoring (his determination is 14 compared to my previous guys '20' fwiw). The other bonus is my old HoyD had a slightly weird/intesne/unsettling staff photograph which gave me a weird thing of having to click off his mails if i was in the room and they were on-screen as it felt like he was watching me! New guy has no photo so I'm all good - but you lot aren't (you're welcome);

 

[optimusprimal82]

1 month down...

A strange first month in that it confirmed that we are - at times - completely outclassed in this division, and then at others there's enough there to think we can do this? I think the fixture computer was kind to us as far as opening months go - ok playing both Chelsea and City in the same month isn't something I'd ordinarily be happy about but with regard to the top 6, who cares? Let's just get those games done, dusted and out of the way - we are going to need serious luck (as like back in our magical FA cup game all those years ago!) to get anything and I think i'm more likely to just rest players when I'm playing against those sides, saving them for games we have a more realistic chance of winning/getting a result in? I played Shaquille Smith (24B) in our last game out versus City against my better judgement and he's now out for 5 weeks which is annoying as he's been incredible for us (so not incredible by some FM standards, but in terms of strikers for our team he's been amazing!) so far this season, guess it means Bob Reed will get a run out now in his stead (silver lining?)?

A bittersweet opening day saw us pegged back by Reading - I was happy at full time with the draw but on reflection it was disappointing that we let a 2 goal lead slip to one of the lesser lights in the division? I feared the same may happen in the very next game as we raced into a 3 goal lead against WBA (courtesy of two great goals from Shaq!) before a questionable penalty for the baggies swung momentum back in their favour. They finished the match statistically well in front but it was one of those games where I don't feel the stats tell the full story, and ultimately we got the 3 points so who cares?! Burnley again undid us with a goal late in the second half when we were winning 2-1. If games were only 45 minutes long this season I expect we'd be top as there are two worrying second half trends, namely that we concede too many and don't score enough - only 1 of our 10 goals coming in the second half so far... Am I getting the game management that has stood us in such good stead so far wrong? Or are we ultimately just not quite good enough defensively to hold teams off at this level? We are scoring goals which is a huge positive, unfortunately we do look incredibly fragile against everyone but there's not much else we can expect given the difference in class - Chelsea fielded a side with Havertz, Leon Bailey, Rodrygo & a ridiculous newgen STC against us for example so I can't be too hard on my guys, we're just not at that level yet? Whilst 5/15  points sounds bad, it would ultimately be enough to keep us up I believe so we can't be too unhappy - as the Burnley game proved though, there will be no easy games here where we can catch up on dropped points so if we fall behind our monthly requirement at any point it could prove fatal - there are likely to be a few surprise results in both directions before the season ends though, I'm sure!

This was the table after 2 games;

sadly my plea to the FA to end the season there fell on cruel and deaf ears so we're forced to continue;

 

Premier League or Vanarama?

WE got what I thought was a very favourable Carabao cup draw at home to Crawley Town; helpful given our board set a target of the 4th round. I was hopeful a good cup run could help keep morale high and the wolf from the door if our league form suffered but was stunned to see this in a memo from my coaches before the game. Now I never start a game on positive/attacking or any other mentality really than 'Cautious' so whatever it's set to by default is a bit of a nonsense - fwiw I leave it at positive often because it seems to be less recommended by coaches overall so they'll often tell you to change it to something which can be a useful indicator of how much better /worse the game thinks your team/the opposition are - this beggared belief though. Us as a Premier League team at home being told to play defensively? I'm not saying that from an ego point of view (which is where I think a lot of managers fall down; I'm xxxxx, I have to attack! etc) more from the thinking "are we really that bad?! Crawley are 18th (they were 16th when we played them) in League One, and playing away!? I guess it shows why in a lot of my coach training reports they're still telling me certain players are at Vanarama National level etc.

Fast forward to the game itself and holy heck, seems they were right! We made life incredibly difficult for ourselves; Morgan James got us off to a flyer before Steve Robinson (23C) got himself stupidly sent off in the 19th minute which meant a torturous wait until the final whistle. Crawley had a number of chances, but thankfully spurned their best one which meant we sneaked through but wow, did we make hard work of it against a supposedly much inferior team? We've been drawn away to West Ham in the next round so I guess it makes little difference now - can't see us getting the better of the Hammers who're in 9th in the Premier League so far this season (and have players such as Julian Draxler playing for them).

Two good things to come from the game were Bob Reed (25A) made his first real contribution, beating several players before threading a great throughball to Morgan James for the goal, Luke Fisher (25D) also made his debut, he's a highly rated DR prospect so we could do with him getting up to speed and see if he's an upgrade on what we currently have. As far as Reed goes, I'm starting so suspect he has a high PA under the hood as Everton and Tottenham are circling with intent... They've both taken what Id call 'pot shots' as opening bids. The money is very average right now (around £2 million) and I worry that we may be forced to sell him before we ever really get to see what he's about/he can do? I'll play him as much as I can this year but it's tricky when we're so up against it (and Shaq has started in such great form!)

NB: Ian Pollock is my young goalkeeper so don't worry about the FK recommendations, he doesn't play often atm so isn't taking them - i'll return to the GK scoring challenge when we're a little stronger in the division!

 

If you build it, they...

Won't fit? Yep, we're playing in a temporary stadium (rented from Bolton) whilst our new stadium is being built. What this meant is we've smashed a lot of records such as gate receipt takings and attendance, but hilariously our new attendance record, heck - even our current average attendance - are both higher than the capacity for the new ground they're building which smacks of grade-A incompetence >sigh< Now that I know we can still build another one in the not too distant then it's not world ending, just stupid. On the flip side, we had a huge increase in season tickets this year which brought in a nice little cash bonus - although that's been dwarfed by the TV income;

It means our finances have never been in ruder health and will be interesting to see how much we make come the end of the year - either way I hope it'll help prevent the board from forcing sales on us!

 

Lack of depth...?

Now I'm not sure exactly what it is in the underlying game that causes this issue to crop up - I'm sure most of you have had it/some variation where the players in your team "feel there isn't sufficient depth in x"? We've had it before in this save regarding our attack which all I could do was agree with? Since the start of this year I've noticed a number of our players are complaining about a lack of depth in midfield which is slightly strange as I'd consider it possibly our strongest area - but does midfield include wingers? Technically yes, but in the players minds? Maybe? In which case I agree as our wingers just aren't good enough for this level (as aptly demonstrated by City & Chelsea). Unfortunately there's little I can do about it right now but we all know how well unhappy players tend to play so it's a cause for concern and something I hope doesn't start to become an issue when renewing contracts etc. I've been giving Luke Madden (23L) & Tommy Holmes (25C) minutes to try and improve the winger situation (apparently our two highest PA wingers) and they've done... ok? Ish? so far, but it's yet another area we could do with the intake providing for - maybe a Messi or two oh wise and noble FM gods? Please?! Heck, I'd take a Bebe and a Babel right now even...!

 

Tactical Tweaks

I mentioned before the start of the season that I may make some changes and I did during pre-season and we've been using a new shape so far to the above detailed 'decent effect'. I cannot stand the fact we're playing with 2 x DMC's but there's not a lot we can do about that just at present, we're just getting overpowered a lot of the time otherwise. The knock on here is that we're not blessed with a huge amount of players that can play in DMC so I'm struggling to rotate a little which suggests to me that the physio's will start suggesting certain players need resting before long (or they'll just get injured). One issue with only having 1 x MC is that I can't use my beloved Mezzala role - a big source of goals for our team! I've circumvented that (a little) by putting the CM on Attack duty and letting them have essentially a free role to get forward and support our STC. Speaking of the STC, I've made no secret of my issues with getting a lone frontman to score - Shaquille Smith (24B) has thrived in this setup so far this year, playing as a 'Complete Forward' which is a role I use a lot in training but rarely (at least until now) in games. I've tended to avoid it as it seems to be a bit of a catch all/do anything role that I always feels requires better strikers than I usually have available? The striker is certainly playing better with that role/duty than I've seen in the last few seasons regardless so i'm loathe to change anything just yet, but I'm excited for when I can tinker a bit more/my team isn't so weak to see just how effective I can make it? This is the basic way we lineup now in any case, always starting with 'cautious' mentality and adopting my 'masterplan' approach from there;

We're using regroup mostly in this division and mostly direct passing (I tweak it a little for certain players) and that's how we're scoring the majority of our goals, through fast transitions. Meaney has played every game at MC so far and has 2 goals which suggests the CM/Attack role is deputising well for the Mezzala (he seems to arrive in the box to support the striker a lot too which is nice). One final note is that the role for the FB's changes a lot as I try to find the best fit for the team/my guys.

 

Still a long way to go with this - only three league games this coming month, none of them look easy (Watford currently 6th, Wolves 11th);

[optimusprimal82]

The one that got away?

With our bank balance now topping £20 million (geezus the Premier league money is insane - will be tough to go back after this!) I'm hopeful that we won't be forced to sell any more youngsters that we don't want to (i.e. we won't be forced by the board). Now I'm not saying the issue may not rear it's head again if we get a stupendous prospect and someone bids silly money for him (like Jimbo's recent adventures in the xfer market!) but hopefully - for the most part - we're safe, and sales will be more strategically planned, although as I can't buy players there isn't much of an appetite from me for selling anyone (i think after the challenge is completed this will change and i'll definitely look to do something youth based where I can utilise the market though)?

With all that in mind, we've been pretty lucky in this save as we've only really lost one player (although both Meaney 21A & Kenyon 24A were close several times) and I thought it was about time we checked back in on him. Lewis Brown (22D) is probably the player I've been most excited about from any of my intakes, purely because he was that rare combination of high PA and good attributes all packaged up as a central defender. It's now a couple of years on since we were forced to sell him to Sheffield Wednesday so let's take a look how his career has gone since he abandoned left us;

So he still has both me and my assistant in his favoured personnel and he's still classed as a Hyde supporter. Awesome, makes sense that he left - wonder if he regrets it seeing that we've made it to the Premier League at exactly the same time as him?

Ah, that seems about right, he's yet to play for Wednesday, so all those clauses the board were rubbing their hands about worked out well it seems...? Oh...

The figures involved are completely inconsequential now which is a common trend when the board step in - they seem to have limited powers of context/foresight with the clauses, accepting based on overall monetary value rather than thinking "Hmm, 5 million every game for 30 games... but will he actually ever play for XXXX?" etc.

Attributes wise he still looks decent but maybe not quite as amazing as he did when we were lower down - obviously I'm now facing premier league players so there's 17-19's everywhere attribute wise as opposed to the 10's when we first brought him through! He still looks a decent prospect though and I'd prefer he was with us than against, that said, despite my scout's recommendation I don't think I'd sign him if I had no affinity for him, his acceleration, passing and first touch would potentially put me off for a Premier League level player, but any lower divisionally and i'd take him in a heartbeat!;

Sadly under the rules of the challenge we aren't allowed to buy him back but his presence would certainly have been an upgrade on our current options at DC;

[optimusprimal82]

Away day blues...

A great start to September was undone once the away games rolled around, conceding 10 goals in 2 games and getting a stark reminder of what we're up against, just in case any minds had started to wander following what has been an encouraging start to the season;

With Shaquille Smith (24B) injured for approximately 5 weeks, we needed to play someone else up top and who better than the coaches favourite, young Bob Reed (25A)? Yet to score in a senior game, the decision paid off inside the first minute as he slipped a cool through ball for Fraser Meaney (21A) to bag his 3rd of the season and what is now also Hyde's fastest ever goal!

After that it was the Bob Reed show as he smashed in his first two senior goals in the next 9 minutes to put us 3 up with just 10 minutes played! Naturally there's no easy games up in this league and so it proved as Watford managed to pull one back before half time, piling on the pressure and adding another after the break. Luckily (and it was lucky at the end) we held on to record a much needed win. Unsurprisingly Reed took home the PoM award which was fully deserved!

Obviously any player can have a good game, but the real test of a player is whether he can sustain it so Reed got his chance in the next game against Wolves - a chance he duly took with another brace earning him his second PoM award in two games! We didn't have the match completely our own way (of course), in fact it was far from it with Wolves actually taking the lead twice - the second time coming in the 71st minute to give them a 2-1 lead. Sensing that we could get a result I changed us to a more attacking setup and to my utter delight we smashed in three second half goals (2 in injury time) to take the 3 points!

Sadly that was the end of the good news this month, as London became a very unhappy hunting ground for us as we were trounced and kicked out of the League cup by West Ham before being taken apart just a few days later at the Emirates. I appreciate we're going to lose quite a few games this year, but the way we rolled over in both of those games wasn't good so i'll need to keep working and find a better approach. It sounds bizarre to say it but we might need to go more attacking away from home than i've been doing as we're just being taken apart and offering little in return - it doesn't seem likely we'll keep a lot of clean sheets on the road so we'll have to score at least 1 to get a result so I think i just maybe need to find a better balance.

 

Can we do a deal...?

Put simply, no Paco, we can't;

There are quite a few teams sniffing around young winger Tommy Holmes (25C), one of whom is Watford. Now I ordinarily quite like Watford (based on a CM save many moons ago), but their current manager can jog on after his little rant just a few days earlier - yes, I am that petty (in game)!  

 

EDIT: Whoops, forgot to include the current table - looking good so far, mainly because the teams at the bottom have done really badly - if they win a few (which i'm sure they will at some point) then I'm sure a nerve or two will come along - still very early days so far.

[optimusprimal82]

Throwing it away in Fergie time...

The last minute concessions are now seriously becoming an issue for us as we're throwing wins away - it's cost us two victories this month and those extra 4 points would have been a massive bonus with a very difficult month coming up next!

Three draws isn't terrible - far from it - on the face of things, but Southampton equalised in the 92nd minute and Brighton in the 89th to leave me feeling more like we lost those games. IT's a tricky issue, at first I thought maybe I needed to make us tighter, then perhaps that I'm dropping too deep - I'll keep searching but I actually think it may be an intensity problem over the whole game and my team are just a bit more fatigued as the game goes on? I'll keep searching for answers but I've not really had this issue on 19 until this season/this save, with closing the game out usually one of my specialities so it's a learning experience if nothing else!  

Next month looks really tough fixture wise, gut feeling is that we'll do well to get even a point - naturally I'll be targeting the home game against West Ham, but they're having a decent season so far so we'll be up against it. There's an outside chance of a draw against Wednesday, but they beat me soundly at their place last season and I've no reason to expect anything different - but we'll try!

 

The table never lies...?

Being perfectly honest, I could care less where we finish above the relegation zone, just so long as we do - I'm more than happy with our current position though, focusing more on the points gap to 18th than the actual placing. 

Switching to home/away view it's clear where our troubles lie - but this is pretty realistic given most promoted teams tend to rely on their home form to stay up in that first season so I'm not unduly worried (somewhat ironically I notice Burnley have yet to win a single point at home this season!);

Now obviously I can't just look at a few screens and leave it there, so I drilled down a little more and spotted that we're second overall for chances created which is hugely encouraging and probably goes a long way to explaining how we've secured as many points as we have already. A lot of our goals have come on the counter and from crosses with us having to play far more percentage stuff this year than I'd like but that goes with the territory. We've also conceded the most goals in the league, but that's a price I'm willing to pay as we could draw every game in a season 0-0 and still be at risk of going down - you need goals to win games so it's a trade off I'm happy with. I'd like to redress it at some point (especially as we're having victories stolen away) but given the quality of our players overall I think we should just be grateful with how we're doing than trying to be too critical - but it never hurts to assess where you're strong/weak when planning for the future/settling in a new tactical approach.

Also interesting to note we've conceded 2 DFK's this season and 4 IFK's so that's something else we can work on - try to give less fouls away (i've removed hard tackling this year completely following last years yellow card debacle, but we're giving away a lot of fouls I suspect because we're so much lower quality wise)

 

I hate contract negotiations...

An area of the game that could be massively improved for me - it's incredibly irritating when a player talks to you about wanting a new contract, you tell him you'll discuss one but his agent slaps a non-negotiable minimum-fee clause in there of <£5 million. Having made the promise (and I don't like the promise system) not giving me any option to discuss or at least say 'your agent is being unreasonable, drop the demands and i'll compensate you' (or at least warning him you won't be able to agree terms?) is super annoying - I've got three players that have all been in this situation this year and now two of them are unhappy with me - I guess this is one of the other pitfalls of their value being so low, a £4 million release clause sounds high when the player is valued at £100k, it's just obviously we know from experience that it's actually scandalously low. 

 

The coffers, they are a filling...!

In slightly better news, the cash continues to pour in and we're looking really sweet for this year, making approximately 7.5 million profit every month! Means we'll get an annoyingly huge tax bill come year end but I can't spend it (yet) so not really a huge issue - means we could be close to £100 million in the bank come season end with prize money factored in!

 

14 points from 11 games has us well on track, could start to get dicier by the end of next month when it could feasibly be 14 points from 15 games! If the month does go badly I'll just have to try and mitigate the morale drop off as we have some winnable looking home games at the start of December so we'll need to bounce back quickly!

[optimusprimal82]

It's dark down here...

With no wins in 8 games we're down something of a form hole and it seems we're not quite done with the digging just yet... One of our games was moved for TV so it was just 3 games we played this month overall, but that didn't make the results feel any better;

The West Ham game had a rollercoaster of an ending as we scored what we'd have hoped would be the winner in the 88th minute, only to see West Ham score a screamer 5 minutes later with almost the last kick of the game!

Not much to say about our other games - a fair contest they were not and I was actually happy to get away with the scorelines we did!  

It's certainly not panic stations yet, but we have now fallen just short of our target 4 points per month - luckily it's a very loose target as naturally not all months will be created equal (we're not at the halfway point yet for example yet we've played all of the top 6 bar spurs)! We certainly need a good xmas period else we may start to be sucked in towards the relegation battle brewing below, thankfully there are some decent looking fixtures (and a few tricky ones) next month, although the sheer number of games will test us as our quality drops quickly away from our starting XI (and our starting XI is already way off most teams);

[Hootieleece]

Just become the master of the Draw...like my season I lost.

I set a VNL record with 22 Draws!

38 Draws=38points in Premier League

In your case 23 more Draws are needed, easy as pie...LOL!

Have fun either way.

Your players are probably NOT ready for the Premier League.

Just like mine are probably not really ready to be pros...yet we keep grinding out results draws are as good as wins if you stay up! 

[optimusprimal82]

17 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

Just become the master of the Draw...like my season I lost.

I set a VNL record with 22 Draws!

38 Draws=38points in Premier League

In your case 23 more Draws are needed, easy as pie...LOL!

Have fun either way.

Your players are probably NOT ready for the Premier League.

Just like mine are probably not really ready to be pros...yet we keep grinding out results draws are as good as wins if you stay up! 

22 draws? Yikes... Still struggling to score goals? To be that irritating 'positive git' who always pipes up when you just want to vent, at least those draws aren't defeats?  

You might need a braver man than me to try and match that feat with my lot - I can't trust them for 5 minutes with keeping the scores level so playing for a draw would be akin to throwing the game away I reckon!

My guys are 100%, absolutely totally & utterly not good enough for this league, on that we can unequivocally agree. Whilst I'll defend them to the hilt there is sadly not one of them I would buy/attempt to buy if I was in charge of another Premier League team, or even a Championship team if I'm being honest, which is pretty damning. Go a bit lower and I'd have a look at Meaney & Kenyon but otherwise nope - very much more than the sum of our parts (and lucky as all hell) over the last few years!

Game is loaded back up - here we go! Four (hopefully) winnable games before an away defeat to Spurs and a lottery at home to Newcastle!  

 

[Hootieleece]

I have one game to go in my re-done season. It came out about the same a few more wins and a few less draws (20), but I can still set the VNL record with one more draw.

I will still end up about 14-15th place which is the same as the "lost" season.

I will ask for professional status again but won't resign over it.

I need it because the players were beginning to get fatigued with all the matches. Had two good cup runs ( FA Cup 3rd RD and FA Trophy Semi-Finals)

The only thing that suck and is different is my youth intake,,,,got a bunch of low determination and unambitious types instead of Fairly Professionals!

 

 

[optimusprimal82]

Finally, a little bit of cheer - it is Christmas after all!?

A miserable, MISERABLE start to December saw our poor run of form continue and enabled us to set a new record for games without winning - I was worried the mail would add pressure and make my guys nervous, but they held it together & and lost like heroes, even adding a cherry to the top of the cake with an extra defeat just to stretch it a little further!

We did manage to get a win - having lost to Norwich the home game against Reading was another I'd pencilled in as a good chance to get some solid points on the board and so it proved with a comfortable-ish win - largely thanks to the returning Shaquille Smith (24B) who'd been out for several weeks through injury - he's now up to 6 goals in 12 appearances this season which ok, isn't the best return ever, but for this save is extremely incredible (although Bob Reed - 25A is on 5 in 8 which you could argue is even more impressive!?)! His goals saw him included in Team of the week alongside some other goalscorer you may have heard of? I wonder if he fancies a move to Hyde? Would be nice to play the two together!?  

Frustratingly, following the Reading game we had a tricky looking trip to Spurs which went slightly better than I expected, especially as I chose to field an entire second string given we were playing Newcastle just 2 days later at home in a game I thought we had a chance of points in (they were just two positions above us at the time). The reserves did well but sadly the gulf in class was too stark & the scoreline finished respectable but predictable. 7 points from 18 isn't the greatest return, but it's taken us past the halfway point in the season and we're comfortably halfway to our target so there's few complaints from me! We've got a big month ahead now with our only home fixtures being in the FA cup or against Chelsea/Man City so our chances of getting any points are greatly diminished - best we can likely hope for is a few score draws? Our away form is abysmal and we're yet to win a game on the road so I think suggesting anything better than that is the talk of a mad man!

It's especially interesting looking at the for/against column in the table - I'm having to play slightly more attacking than I'd like in games to get us on the scoresheet (and yes it's backfiring on occasion I'm sure), the side effect being we've conceded a lot more than our relegation counterparts. The tradeoff is that we've also scored a lot more than them too, (double Wednesday/Burnley, almost the same with Reading) which leads me to feel vindicated in taking what could easily be considered a reckless approach. Now whilst I like attacking football I'm also a huge fan of a clean sheet so this trade-off sadly won't be something I can tolerate forever, but whilst we're effectively fielding a 'Dog & Duck XI' I'll take whatever I can get!

Speaking of getting, lovely lovely cash continues to pour in - this was actually from the end of November (I haven't seen/must have missed the December one, but we now have over £50 million sat in the bank doing very little - I'm hoping it will be used as a 'mega stadium' fund in the next few seasons but that's a long way away, especially when you consider our temporary stadium this year has a capacity of just 28,723 and we a) haven't sold it out once & b) have an average attendance so far of (just) 14,183.

Fixtures for next month (ouch - at least the FA cup game is at home?);

 

EDIT: Apologies, forgot to mention that my cynicism last intake day over Tommy Holmes (25C) was completely put to bed in the Newcastle game as he scored a hat trick from MR - sure it's happened before in my FM career but it's not a frequent occurrence...? AMR/AML? Sure, but not so from the more reserved wing positions! To make matters even better, his wing partner from the left (Luke Madden - 23L) finished 3rd! Tommy is having a decent season with a rating of 6.99 from 18 games, helped by him having scored 7 goals in all competitions! No assists as yet, but there's time yet (and we are struggling a little as a team so I can forgive that for now, especially from a 16 year old!). The hat-trick was enough to see him pick up the young player of the month award which again - at 16 - is pretty incredible (and shows how pushed for quality we are! The bad news is that the January window has just opened and Watford and West Brom are both sniffing around him again - I've a few players who've got admiring glances in their direction right now, Bob Reed (25A), Shaquille Smith (24B) & Luke Fisher (25D) being the most notable;

[Hootieleece]

I noticed that playing on Balanced instead of Defensive helped get on the scoresheet as well.

I think because AI Teams had gotten used to me playing defensive they were much more attacking and my Attacking players were able to find space in behind them.

I am currently getting killed by tall Targetmen, because my CB's are almost all ONLY 5'10" Tall. Stalybridge must be populated by dwarfs...LOL 

Try to save those kids that are being "sniffed" around!

[optimusprimal82]

One for the road...

I mentioned in my last post how we'd yet to win a game on the road this season and thankfully that was something we finally put to bed with us coming away from Turd Moor 3 points the richer. Have to admit I was delighted to get those points on the board/that monkey off our back as although we have a lot of home games left this season in the league (we had 9 at the time of that game), there were only really 4 I gave us any real chance in, with the others being against teams like City/United - our league position is built on home wins this year so far so with that at risk I considered a 3 points earned away, as was the 3 points we somehow stole - and I use that word very deliberately - from Chelsea (the first time we've beaten one of the 'top 6' in this save) If the Burnley result was fortuitous (and with us having just 36% possession that's certainly one way of describing it), the game against Chelsea was staggering;

With match stats like that I'd have been ok with a 3-0 loss, let alone a 2-1 win and it was one of those 'pure FM' games where you can't quite explain how it happened...? Keenan Quansah - a natural DC who's spent most of his Hyde career playing in DMC (and is a former winner of the prestigious 'managers player of the year award') - received the ball (unmarked) back on the edge of the area and 'Kompany'd' it in at the near post (ok, it wasn't quite that important or spectacular, but it was on his left peg from the edge of the box) which i've never seen him do in all the seasons i've been here!?

Fast forward 50 minutes and the game was pretty much in the balance before that man Quansah (again) utilised every ounce of his '5' for passing to launch a sumptuous long ball over the Chelsea backline that landed at the feet of a grateful Shaquille Smith (24B) who did the rest, sending us 2-0 up and into fantasy land!

Now bearing in mind chelseas lineup (see below) this was an impossible scoreline so I prepared for the inevitable onslaught and a few minutes later it started - Chelsea going gung-ho in search of a lifeline. Changing down the gears to 'repel' mode we couldn't completely hold out, but we did enough to record what is our probably our best result of the save so far (needless to say, Quansah got the PoM award!)!

Some of the Chelsea side are (stupidly good) newgens, but I think there are enough names in the XI that you can see what we were up against - what a forward line!

And here's Quansah - a player that was at the team when I took over that we've done well to hold on to - he was our best player for a few years and he still plays regularly now despite my coaches constantly referring to him as a 'backup player';

Note the traits? Might have to get rid of the 'avoids using weaker foot' one if he has that in his locker!

Sadly that was to be the end of the miracles for the month, with us drawing Liverpool in the FA cup and City to play it went as you'd expect, a narrow away defeat to Watford really about as much as we deserved too;

IT's be dangerous to think 'mission accomplished just yet, but with us now on 28 points and Burnley (in 18th) on 14, it seems likely that we've done enough - is it reasonable to expect Burnley to double their points total in the remaining 14 games? Possible yes, likely...? Well, I guess stranger things have happened? Regardless, I know 38 points is our target but I reckon another win - two at the most - will be enough to see us safe (oh how I hope that doesn't come back to bite!)

 

Just how bad are we...?

Off the field, some more strange things cropping up in the media; we were drawn at home to Millwall in the FA cup yet they were touted as heavy favourites in the lead up to the game? They're having a decent season being high in the Championship but that still seems a little odd (but reflects how much emphasis the game seems to place on reputation?);

At least we shut him up anyway.

 

Happiness is a new contract. Apparently.

Given the salary discrepancies in my side I totally understand why some of my guys want new deals, but - as I've mentioned before - I'm getting tired of the constant bickering when they all insist on asking for stupidly low clauses and refusing to negotiate - it's making players really unhappy because they don't get new deals, but in the example of Shaquille Smith, he's scored 12 goals this year, is now worth £300k in-game yet his agent won't budge (locked red padlock in every negotiation) from a £1 million minimum fee clause. With Everton, Norwich & Newcastle all interested in him - and did I mention he's English and we have the annoying foreign limit Brexit? - giving him that contract would be signing off on selling him for way below his value which is a nonsense. He only has 12 months left on his deal which will eventually force my hand, but i'm hoping that if we stay up, the increase in reputation might at least push the values they insist on up a little. In the meantime he's stuck on £130 per week, whilst John Jeffs (23D) - our current top earner - pockets £16k p/w, but i've got no way of pointing that out to the player which seems really stupid, but I digress.

In other news, I noticed that we seem to have had a lot more injuries this year, a surprising amount in the ~5 week area too, on the back of that I realised it had been a long time since I'd checked out our medical staff with us still employing our starting physio - needless to say, one shakeup later and I hope we see some reductions (improvement in training facilities hopefully helping there too).

On the subject of training facilities, the board agreed to upgrade them and the youth facilities again at a combined expense of £2.7 million. My hope is that rather than doing it one level at a time, they pay a bit more and we can jump a few levels - would teams really incrementally improve them like this irl? Surely much less cost effective, especially when you've got £60 million sat in the bank doing jack like we have?

Another tricky month ahead with Leicester at home our likely best chance of points, we did draw 2-2 in the away fixture so that gives me some hope, otherwise we may be relying on our ridiculous luck once again. Only 1 month to go now until the youth intake - a friend asked why I get quite so excited and I told him that it determines how the rest of the save goes really - with a rubbish intake, next season/probably the one after will be more of the same as this, but with a decent one we can push on a little and maybe hold our own? Considering that the one day is like our entire transfer window I literally cannot wait to see who we get in, so much so please accept this advance apology for the inevitable downbeat post following the draft - there's no way they're going to be as good as I've built them up to be in my head, heck, I can't even decide if I'd prefer 5 good players or 2 superstars (current thinking is 5 good players would be better with superstars next year - but let's be honest, I may just get 3 johnny averages - there are absolutely no guarantees and we are competing with City/United for youth players!)

As a reward for his performances/(winner against Chelsea), Shaq received the young player of the month with young full back Owen Willis (20C) finishing third;

Willis has been around so long/many season now that in my head he's about 25, but because of how early I've been having to play these kids in order to improve my side I was shocked to see he's still only 20, yet has made close to 150 appearances for the first team! 

[optimusprimal82]

10 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

I noticed that playing on Balanced instead of Defensive helped get on the scoresheet as well.

I think because AI Teams had gotten used to me playing defensive they were much more attacking and my Attacking players were able to find space in behind them.

I am currently getting killed by tall Targetmen, because my CB's are almost all ONLY 5'10" Tall. Stalybridge must be populated by dwarfs...LOL 

Try to save those kids that are being "sniffed" around!

Yeah I'm never sure why the staff in-game seem so quick to suggest the extremely defensive mentalities - you can score goals on cautious/balance and still keep things pretty tight. I'll admit I'm having a harder time than normal this season but then my players are rubbish for this division - but with my all conquering side recently I'd often score the first on attacking and the rest on balanced/cautious as the other team would attack and get picked off repeatedly - a pattern it seems you've found/been using to your advantage!  

I asked in GD about the height earlier in this save actually as I was having a similar issue as you with both DC's & STC's. One intake solved the DC problem (I now have 3 x 190+ cm monsters) but my tallest striker is still only 181cm. (I do have a reserve STC that's 190 but he just doesn't seem to want to develop at all.

Aside from the contract issues I moan about above, we managed to survive the transfer window intact!

[optimusprimal82]

 

Ha, I've created monsters - received both a text message and a private message letting me know I forgot to include a pic of the league table and the relegation countdown!  All jokes aside, I'm super happy/pleased/glad that people are enjoying the journey, have read some great threads here over the years and it was pretty daunting starting this at first, naturally the kind words/support have helped enormously!

Here's the league table correct as of the end of January - a lovely 14 point gap to the relegation spots - surely we can't mess it up from there (believe I've uttered that line before in this save!!);

So that means that;

Yep, we're very close to 'official safety' now but as I said above, I'd be incredibly surprised if we were dragged into the scrap now?

As a bonus for this unexpected update let's do a little 'Meaney-watch'... Our best player for the majority of the save, you might have spotted his name doesn't get banded around anywhere near as much nowadays and it's likely for the reason you expect - when he started with us he was a class above, now he's a class (or two) below our opponent generally. He's still one of our better performers - one of my favourite things about him is his consistency, so rare is it that he has a bad game - but he doesn't run the show/steal the headlines like he used to.

This is him as of today;

Certainly not a bad player by any stretch -  he continues to be one of our better ones; good physical stats, just limited technically for this level really with questionable work rate and teamwork for a team fighting relegation. He's been immense for us though let's cut him some slack - even at this level he's had a reasonable year with 5 goals and 3 assists (He's still only 20 remember too!);

The fans love him a teeny bit more than me too so who am I to judge?  

 

Will hopefully get more time tonight to bash through February - then it (should be) intake time!!  

[optimusprimal82]

A wasted opportunity...

A very quick month with just the three games in it after our trip to Southampton was moved for TV (had so many games rescheduled this season - seems the camera loves us!). An incredibly disappointing performance was followed up with an absolute robbery at our own ground; when I 'FM' another team I usually chuckle to myself, imagining how angry I'd be if the situation had been reversed, on this occasion though I actually wanted to apologise to the Arsenal manager (somebody named Zidane?) given that our equaliser was our only shot on target (and only our second shot in total) of the entire game (compared to 6/17 for them). In the end though it's tough, we're awful and they should be able to beat us - plus we need the points more than they do. Kind of.

Sadly we weren't able to capitalise on that bonus point as we played a Leicester side that on paper are facing relegation but who on the pitch thought they were playing for the title - I was both surprised and caught out by just how aggressively they played (in what was something of a relegation six pointer) and whilst the good news is that we managed to grab an equaliser, overall our opponent was the stronger team and we didn't deserve much more! We're still in a great position, but winning this game would have been a great step towards safety! Shaquille Smith (24B) has been in great form again this month, getting 2 of our 3 goals, taking him to 14 for the season - it's great to have a striker that can score goals (finally), be interesting to see just how far he can take us!

Youth intake day is imminent (It's possible the rearranged Southampton game - another important relegation battle - could come first though!) so I have pretty much everything crossed! Whilst the excited kid in me would love a wonder-striker/winger, the realist in me is desperate for a solid central defender or defensive midfielder. A goalkeeper - whilst boring - would be ultra useful too.

 

[optimusprimal82]

Note to self...

With my beloved club (Man United for those not in the know) in turmoil in the real world, I could be forgiven for exorcising some demons by considering a stint at the helm should they come calling post challenge - need to remember that it may not quite be the place I know and love judging by recent shenanigans... You may recall I spotted that Mr Carlo Ancelotti had been fired late last season following 5 premier league & 4 Champions league titles (in just six years!)? Well fast forward some 278 days and they've again dispensed with the manger, this time Mr Tuchel , his departure "is thought to have been triggered by the clubs poor league position". Riiiiight...

We actually play United very soon and I'm hoping against all hope that Simeone doesn't get the job - his strange & direct 442 is - for me at least - one of the most difficult tactics I've faced on this years game and if he's got top level players it's incredibly tough to get on top of (he took over United in my last save strangely enough, beating me to the title one year on goal difference!

Regardless, if my team come a calling later in the save, someone remind me to tell them I'm not in/to leave a message...

NB: They also got to the final of the Carabo cup, the fourth round of the FA Cup (eliminated by Arsenal) and are still in the Champions league. Odd.

[optimusprimal82]

Youth Intake 2026

The intake seems to be getting later every year - have to write this quickly because it's late here now (Australia!) but couldn't go to bed before seeing who we got in this year! Something that will come as a complete surprise to nobody is that our HoyD thinks we could have the makings of a 'golden generation'...! Now where have I heard that before?

To be fair, based purely on the squad screen stars he may well have a point as overall it's by far and away the most impressive we've had at first glance (bear in mind our facilities are also at the best they've ever been too!) - as previous years have taught us though, it doesn't always turn out to be the case once we've looked at them in more detail - the personalities already suggesting there's work to be done/improvements to be made!

I'll do the more 'in-depth' look tomorrow, but for now my first thoughts are that there are some strange positional combinations on a few of the guys but that's not a huge issue - just have to work out their best one/role/duty and train accordingly. A 4-5 star goalkeeper makes me smile, although his personality does not, and the 2 DC's in the group are - at least at first glance - very average (although Shulberg is only 15, tall and has a decent personality). The HoyD singled out Nathan Long so let's take a look at him as the suppose star of the group;

Certainly not terrible in terms of raw stats, but his relatively high CA (2.5) has me a little worried that maybe he may not improve all that much (coaches say he will)? I'll certainly keep him (he looks nice and quick if nothing else at this point) but wondering if there might not be a better position for him than out wide - will have to have a think as nothing else stands out either right now. 

[endtime]

Not to detract from your achievements (you've done a superb job), but I can't help feeling a bit disappointed that the game makes it possible to compete in the Premier League with the standard of players you have. Based on attributes alone, you should get hammered week in week out.

[optimusprimal82]

6 hours ago, endtime said:

Not to detract from your achievements (you've done a superb job), but I can't help feeling a bit disappointed that the game makes it possible to compete in the Premier League with the standard of players you have. Based on attributes alone, you should get hammered week in week out.

Thank you - I completely understand what you're saying, no worries and honestly I don't disagree, in fact I posted several times about my disappointment a few pages back. One of my favourite parts of the game is being challenged and I don't think it's really all that surprising that my favourite two seasons so far in the save have been our first year in league two (when we finished down in 18th (i think it was?) and this season when - although the results suggest otherwise - we're really struggling in games.

I think this years game has definitely got the balance between tactical effectiveness and player attributes much closer than they maybe have in previous years, but leaving the Premier League aside for a second, some of the promotions we've had when being comparatively much weaker are a bit of a nonsense. I don't believe you always need the strongest team - technical ability isn't all you need (just ask Barcelona after this week!) - but i think it's clear from quite a lot of the saves you can read about - this one of mine and my previous one (which i didn't record here - that it's still possibly too... easy (? not sure if that's the right word?) to overachieve...? But then if we took away all the lucky breaks i've had in this save would we be where we are? Almost certainly not, but that still doesn't change the base problem you mention which is that i'm effectively surviving in the Premier League with a League Two/One level side? Threads such as this also help highlight some of the ME/mentality struggles this year - in that example it's when playing against poor teams when you're a world beater, but it's also an issue the other way round with many a team coming to play against me in this save with way (way) too attacking a lineup, leaving a ton of space to be exploited?

Attributes obviously do play a big part in performance - someone like Fraser Meaney (21A) was tearing the leagues a new one in his first few years, but as his attributes became less spectacular and comparatively average he rarely gets a mention in the match/end of month awards - just perhaps the balance is still not quite there...? Other problem is that for every person who finds the game easy/unrealistic, there are plenty who find it too difficult - I've spent an awful lot of time helping people out on a Discord channel i'm part of this year for example and I doubt many of them consider it easy? That's the problem with a game catering to such a diverse fanbase I guess - for tactical nerds such as me, the dream end goal is an AI learning opponent that you have to pit your wits against, but that would likely frustrate some of the other guys I know who just want to download a tactic and take their favourite team to glory each year? Seen a suggestion that difficulty levels could increase/decrease the effectiveness of attributes and someone from SI would have to decide how effective that would be as we don't know how effective they are to begin with - it's a delicate balancing act for sure and one a) I'm glad I'm not responsible for and b) that must be incredibly difficult to get 'right' when 'right' is often subjective?

The final thing I've been considering this season is whether I stop 'playing' matches... The 'mentality masterplan' stuff I worked on had me studying the match engine for so long that it feels almost like second nature when to change/adapt & potentially like I have an unfair advantage at times which is admittedly a bit silly when considering the opponent can change things at any time too (and can often do so with unerring precision - watch the AI teams in cup games during the last 10 minutes of a game with their formation window open - doesn't happen all the time but there have been teams that change their formation every time the ball goes out of play which is hilarious to watch). I have considered swapping to the 'instant result' method I know a few here prefer as it'd prevent me from rescuing my guys in certain games from disaster (like spotting we're playing too offensively, or seeing a chance to go attacking against a team that have dropped too deep), but my thoughts on that have always been am I even playing the game then if I'm not able to do transfers or play the matches? I agree at this point it would be interesting to see how much of a difference it makes, as I wouldn't be able to start on cautious and move through the 'mentality gears/my equivalent tactical variants as I do' (I know the match plans are a thing, but they're far too primitive to be truly effective yet imo) but maybe it's yield more realistic results - by all means if people would prefer me to go down that route then speak up and I can try it - I'd just need to assess whether it killed my enjoyment then or not (would your average FPS player like their game if it became a text-based adventure for example?)

 

 

 

[Hootieleece]

I am by no means an expert or a tactical wizard, but I have felt that my team plays much better when I manage them personally. I have an instant result button that allows me to speed through seasons. I generally manage ALL the home matches and away matches against relegation candidates especially now that I am managing a relegation candidate. 

When I play a bigger team I often insta-result the league matches and only manage in the Europa or Champions League.

I have a pretty good understanding of how a 4-2-3-1 Wide and appropriate roles...learned over several FM's.

I am currently trying to figure out a 4-1-4-1 Wide DM with the current team...

Been noticing that I can up the mentality against the AI because it is either All out Attack or All out Defense when I manage against it. Especially when I am an underdog.

 

I appreciate the insight this and all of the careers have give me into FM.

[optimusprimal82]

Youth Intake 2026 - Breakdown

That's right, the new recruits have been put through their paces - or rather under the Excel microscope - and I've now pre-judged and pigeonholed them all accordingly aaaaaaand... They're ok?

Joking aside, there's some wonderful potential here if my coaches are to be believed (and I've had a slight upgrade in judging stats this year although still no 20's sadly) but there's no-one that blows me away as being in 'wonderkid/ready to play now' territory. The top rated prospect Nathan Long is already rated at 2.5 stars CA, yes as mentioned the other day, he looks ok but not someone I'd be throwing mega-bucks at to keep (no doubt United, Real and Barca will be on the phone as soon as I post this!)? Whilst I'm pleased to see a decent rated GK in the group, his mercenary personality is a bit of a put-off but the biggest disappointment is the absence of a dominant DC, the one position we are fundamentally weak in (and only getting weaker with an ageing squad). With improved facilities I just want to leave these guys for 6-9 months and see if/how much they improve? I don't believe I can loan them until they're a little bit older (will have to check) but that may be an option - I've actually had an affiliate setup since my last post, however quite disappointingly the options given to me were all Vanarama National clubs (presumably due to my low rep), no offence to them, but I'd like these guys to be playing at a slightly higher standard if we're trying to get them to improve - I'd need to know 'under the hood' numbers I guess to know which would improve them more efficiently; poor quality premier league training facilities with a lot of decent coaches or abysmal facilities, with few poor coaches but first team football albeit at a much lower level?

With our new Hoyd in charge, one pleasing thing immediately noticeable is the amount of 'green' in the professionalism column - note that I've simplified it in my spreadsheet with 'good' being any value equal/above 13 (which ties in with certain media handling styles). There's still far (far) too many unambitious guys there, but following a discussion that took place in another thread (think it was the full academy challenge thread?) we think that may now be something that's tied to youngsters in England (and no, not certain on that at all, just a theory based on the amount of people with decent HoyD's in English saves all being afflicted with unambitious youngsters)

All of these youngsters are being retained in order to boost numbers for my new U23 team, but naturally given the drain on coaching resources I'll be running the rule over them frequently and releasing as I go - anyone less than 2 stars PA is already skating on thin ice!

[optimusprimal82]

What in the blue heck...?

As if my beloved real life team isn't going through enough drama off the pitch?! You may remember I posted about Man United sacking Thomas Tuchel a few posts back? Well that was on Wednesday 25th February (2026) in-game. Didn't really pay it much attention after that until my inbox (11th March in-game) just came up with;

I'm not sure this can really be classed as a bug or more a logic loophole? Suspect maybe they appointed him and his approval was immediately so low because of being a (presumably) disliked person of the club/fans in-game? Stoopid but I guess crazier things have happened irl?

Interestingly I have Man Utd next game... not sure right now if that's a good thing or bad (but im hoping we play them before they appoint their new guy)

EDIT: They really are desperate, after trying Pep they're now turning to the Force;

[optimusprimal82]

Smell that...? Yep, that's safety you can smell...!

A disappointing result at home to Brighton (disappointing only in the sense that we were surprisingly the better team) was offset by a rare (just the second of the season) away victory at Southampton. With our form decidedly average & with the saints on top for the first 60 minutes, I made a tactical switch, moving to our old friend the 4141 for a bit and we were rewarded with a (deserved) penalty that swung the game completely towards us as our opponents walked straight into a counter attack whilst chasing the game. Despite using the 4141 for the majority of the save, you may recall I abandoned it early this season in favour of our more defensive 4231 to provide more cover at the back. I still think the switch overall has helped us, but perhaps with Southampton attacking us more expecting us to be sat back, they afforded us far (far) too much space which we were able to take full advantage of.

If that was lucky, what happened in the United game was comical. United had taken an early lead but midway through the second half, the United left back played an awful back pass that - under pressure - the Goalkeeper mis-controlled straight to a grateful Shaquille Smith (24B). Despite the abundance of riches that United  had on the field, they were unable to get a second goal, the result seeing Man City take over at the top of the table with just 6 games to play (painful even in a game!)

That was it for March, only the three game, but a decent points return see's us move on to 35 points which means we're one win away from our pre-season safety target with six games to go! 16 points clear of the relegation spots (other teams have had a dreadful season!?), I think we can all start to breathe a little more easily, but let's hope we can make sure under our own steam in the coming month and pick up a few more points!

Such a decent month results wise was reflected in the monthly awards with a certain Fraser Meaney (21A) picking up his first award in the Premier League with RB Owen Willis (22C) not far behind;

Fraser has been 'solid but unspectacular' this year, largely down to the step up in class and our more defensive style of play, yet he's still chipped in with 6 goals, 3 assists (and 8 yellows, sigh) with an average rating of 6.89 - so he really was on form this month!

Feeding frenzy...

I touched on this a little in my youth intake analysis; Likely due to our terrible reputation, there's not a lot of interest from teams in terms of loaning our youngsters - due to this I decided to take the unusual (for me) step of asking for an affiliate club, the main purpose being to get my younger players with low CA/high PA plenty of game time to help them develop quicker. Unfortunately - again likely due to our low reputation - the teams suggested are all playing down in the non-league divisions which isn't ideal in terms of development. Given my affinity for FC United I selected them and I'll be doing my best to help them out in moving up the divisions by lending them players because... Well, why not? They're already on track to move up to the Vanarama National this season which will help us out too. They requested to take Charlie Lenehan (23K) on loan until the end of the season - keen to see how my players fared I allowed him to go out (he's in my first team squad but has only played 6 times this season so far) so it'll be interesting to see how he gets on!

[Hootieleece]

@optimusprimal82: you posted the wrong league table. The one posted is from much earlier in the season!

Cheers for you most likely surviving in the Premier League...

[optimusprimal82]

13 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

@optimusprimal82: you posted the wrong league table. The one posted is from much earlier in the season!

Cheers for you most likely surviving in the Premier League...

Oops - thank you! Guess that’s what happens when playing late at night with so many screenshots lying around!

I’ll fix when home later today, be a good excuse to fire the game up and blast through another month!

 

Edit: actually looking at the table i see what i’ve done, that is the current table, but i’ve got the ‘away’ filter set as I was checking how many away games i’d won for the last update! As you can see, we are pretty terrible away from home - should maybe post the ‘home’ version to balance it out!  

What does everyone think of the home/away balance in 19 btw? Seen a few threads in GD suggesting it’s skewed too much towards home teams, not sure i have a concrete opinion either way - the difficulty for me to achieve an away win this season feels about right for example?

EDIT #2: The table in the above post has been changed, it's got an additional game played from the Start of April, (unsurprisingly) a loss to West Ham!