[FM19] One night in Serravalle

[_Ben_]

October/November 2030

#

These bi-monthly updates get pretty hard to write when we only score in two of our eight matches but six games without a win in this period quickly turns into five without defeat and we fly back up the table. A few injury issues have no subsided as I move into the December and new year period, so I hope to be able to pick up plenty of points.

[_Ben_]

December 2030, January and February 2031

 

With five unbeaten games brought up over the October and November spell, we extended that to a really solid thirteen before a tough loss at home to Benevento. We fought back admirably, destroyed Citadella in their own back yard and seeing us score four for the first time (in ages and maybe even at this level) was a great performance. This period has seen some big games - a win over Torino was somewhat unexpected and has probably evened out with the home loss to Benevento.

With this start - playoffs must now be my goal. Whether we have enough to hold our own over a few games against teams at this level will remain to be seen.

We also managed to balance our books with the sale of youth full back Nunzo D'Elia for £900k. He's good, not yet great, and not really up to par technically (although not a lot of my team actually is) but the income stems a leak in our bank balance for the next few months, at least.

[scarp]

Great results last three month! Only a while until you are promoted

[kidthekid]

nice run of games there. Hopefully you can make the plaoffs.

[_Ben_]

2030/31 Youth Intake

A strange one, really, as I don't necessarily see this as a particularly strong intake. We have, once again, shown that we can get better personalities through the youth team with only Missiroli and Ceccoli having really bad ones, Dolcini not having the best and Albani and Farris' being due to an attribute. 

Angelli is the pick of the bunch but with Balanced/Media Friendly, I can't take too much from him about how he might develop. Good tackler, going at positioning himself and concentrating, reasonably physical and exceptionally brave - he's an old school centre back. Sadly, this is not really what I want from a modern thinking centre half - his passing is poor, technique virtually non-existent and no kind of composure on the ball. He'll, initially anyway, train as broadly as he can, either on the Libero or BPD schedule and, assuming the rest of the team are lacking in technical ability too - will spend a good amount of time focusing on that.

[john1]

Still going well  Angelli, looks pretty decent  

[_Ben_]

15 hours ago, john1 said:

Still going well  Angelli, looks pretty decent  

He does, yes. He'll certainly get some first team football. Ideally, he'd have been left footed to compliment Selva, my best centre half but I don't have too many qualms with running a backline of two right-footers.

[_Ben_]

March/April 2031

We've all but secured our place in the convoluted play-off system but have hit some poor form at the worst time. Molinari has stopped scoring and, with the only depth behind him being a seventeen year old less than ten senior games into his career, it has largely been down to him to play his way out of it. Hopeful that a couple of good performances in the last games will set us up, in morale terms at least, for a good shot at making Serie A.

[john1]

Hit and miss for April month   Hopefully you can win the play off.

[_Ben_]

Youth Training: Has it worked?

To recap - last summer, I decided that I would approach youth training slightly differently and on a year-to-year basis, ironing out as many gaps in the whole of the team as possible, thus giving me a better chance of integrating more players, even as just back ups. I obviously wanted to develop them in a way that would be fitting of my ideology for the club - patient passing football at the back and incisive quick transitions through the final third. Below is the schedule I came up with that I ran with for the whole season:

A mix of physical training, in order to develop their physicality at a younger age whereby they should already have a natural progression but supplementing that with a lot of 'team' driven sessions and a fair amount of work on ball retention, given the style I want to play. I also added team bonding and community outreach each week as it adds little to the workload but does improve team work - a key asset in my teams and the way I want to play.

Over the course of the season, I lost a couple of players so have excluded them from the initial and post experiment screenshot. Below shows the results:

First thing to note is that I don't have any comparison of a 'vanilla' schedule - i.e. I cannot compare this to a season of normal training and say that what I have done has worked. However, what I can take from this is that the areas that have improved the most are anticipation, balance, decisions, stamina, technique and vision - all key parts of my style of football for the first team. I would expect a natural physical development and that has happened - with acceleration and pace improved an average of 1 point a piece. Elsewhere, I need to take into account that there are some low scores on technical attributes - corners, freekicks, penalties and long throws which have brought down the mean and probably the progress score as I haven't been focusing on them, at all.

Obviously, each player has been on their own individual regime with Ciavatta, Valentini and Zafferani learning new positions, too. 

In my eyes, this experiment looks to have worked - there are far less 'weak areas' within the team now and players are developing well and being able to be integrated into first team football where possible (of this lot, Ciavatta, Bologna, Zafferani, Zavoli and Mucciolo have all played first team minutes) but the impact has been measured over a much shorter time than necessary to get proper results. If/when I am a massive team with a squad full of world class players - the breakthrough of my youth will come much later. If I was to continue this next season - I'd be adding the extra dimension of impact of first team minutes (particularly for Zafferani who is becoming a regular) and that is not a variable that I want to include.

[_Ben_]

So - I'm 2-0 up after the semi-final first leg against Torino. Yet the Sammarinese FA clearly don't want us to go any further...

[_Ben_]

2030/31 End of Season

 

Sadly, the Sammarinese FA are solely to blame here. We had played our hearts out beating Torino but then had to field a team where there was six players making a debut and none of my first choice XI available. We scored early but in the end, class told and we bowed out. Next season - we either need to avoid this playoff, make sure there is no international football (I couldn't stop my players joining up) or ensure my team is deep enough to play well (although they will all probably be full internationals in that case).

To be fair, we are still a few years away from Serie A material anyway, and the squad is still rather threadbare. My players' performances are below:

There is more rotation here than ever before - the trio of Molinari, Lorenzo Zafferani and Marco Casali were able to rotate with each other and that, to some extent, allowed us to pick on form for the first time in my career. The top minute-makers all pretty much name themselves and have performed well. 

Onwards and hopefully upwards next season!

 

[_Ben_]

Player Sale

I thought long and hard about this one. Bianchi is one of my best, and most consistent performers and is, in my eyes, good enough for Serie A. Here is his profile - noting his excellent pace and good ability on the ball going forward - as you would expect from a converted winger. However, the deal, for me, has turned into a no brainer. I will be able to replace him with a player from my youth sides, who, despite being not as good, will slot in as a more defensive FB(s) rather than a WB(s) to offer more support.

The other thing that swayed me was my finances - we, before the deal went through, had -£438,000 in the bank and were on the end of a worrying trend where we have lost between £2.5m and £3m per season. Two years ago, I sold Andrea Arzilli, a striker, for £6m to Atalanta and it is only now that this money has ran out. The £5.5m upfront has cleared our negative balance (and with a buyout from another sale - Percassi to Foggia) I now have £5,940,787 in the bank. The key to this deal though is the £875,000 I get twice a season, totalling £1,750,000 for the next two years. If my expenditure remains as it is: no increase to the wage bill and similar gate receipts and prize money, I would then expect to offset my losses to between £750,000 and £1,250,000 a season. My aim is to now reach Serie A, and the riches that it potentially will bring, before my balance runs out - around the next three years (two years at smaller losses and then a larger ~£2.5m to ~£3m loss in the final season). 

It also gives me the possibility to further increase my facilities:

The facilities screen says that they remain 'exceptional' indicating that we are now probably at the upper echelon of the 'number' that describes it. I have no idea how much more this costs compared to the pre-upgrade but my three year financial plan will also be beneficial if I offset a small amount of money allowing us to better develop younger players and, as such, give us a better chance in Serie A.

Now I've thought properly about it - the deal seems like a no-brainer off the pitch and now I need to make sure it does work on the pitch.

[_Ben_]

2031/32 Youth Training

This cohort is weaker across the board compared to the last one but still starts with good acceleration and decisions, like last year (remembering that some of the players are the same and some of the better ones are involved in the U20 squad). The squad, mirroring that of the first team, struggle with dribbling and that is fine - we don't really want to play that away anyway. First touch is a little low across the board, with only Gasperoni being classed as 'good' in that area. Passing too is weak, only Muccioli is good there. Aside from strength, all of the physical attributes (bar jumping but I place less onus on that) are in double figures and, as such, plan to move out a couple of the physical sessions for more technique work based on the results I had last time.

Therefore, the slightly tweaked weekly schedule is below:

Resistance works balance (11), Jumping (7.5), Strength (7.8), Work rate (9.8) and aerial reach (for goalkeepers). Team bonding focuses on Teamwork (9.5), likewise Community Outreach does the same. Possession prioritises (60%) Dribbling (4.5), First touch (7), Passing (7.3), Technique (8.6), Anticipation (8.4), Composure (6.1), Decisions (12),Off the ball (6), Teamwork (9.5) and Vision (7.3). The 20% focuses on marking, tackling, aggression, concentration, positioning and a few others - meaning that it is fine to get plenty of this in despite having largely defensive players here - they also have their own role to supplement this. Ball retention focuses on First touch, anticipation, Composure, Decisions and Teamwork. All of these areas are reasonably strong but focusing on them now will set our players apart at this young age. 

I have added Chance Conversion (finishing, heading, long shots, technique, anticipation and composure) as well as Chance Creation (crossing, passing, technique, decisions, flair, off the ball and vision) instead of two physical sessions to help develop the poor technical attributes (again, partially skewed by long shots [4.3], long throws [2.4], penalties [3.8] and free kicks [3.6]). To partially address this (although I don't mind too much), I have added Delivery on a Friday instead of the overall attacking focus. This session focuses on free kick taking, corners, long throws and technique as well as working on the defenders' core skills and some goalkeeping skills, too.

Lets see how this works!

[_Ben_]

New affiliate club

Normally, I wouldn't be interested in an amateur French team as my affiliate. They have not produced a single player since the game started but I have a hunch here. When clicking their facilities screen, it is completely blank - indicating that they don't have a stadium. However, when I got to choose the affiliate, it said that they have 'Great Youth Facilities' which would indicate that they are one of a number of French academies within the game - with the others with the same name listed below:

Now, in an ideal world - this academy provides the next Zidane, Henry, Desailly etc to my youth team who then turn to represent San Marino at a later date. Of course, that might never happen...

[_Ben_]

August/September 2031

Arguably, we haven't had the most difficult of starts to our season but we have made a fantastic start to it. Firstly, we have qualified again for the Fourth Qualifying round of the Coppa Italia but, for the first time, have been given a relatively easy draw in Serie D side Triestina. Opening up with five wins from six is great and we have shown that we can score reasonably freely, too - seven goals coming in two away ties. 

The biggest success of these months, however, must be the ability that I have had to rotate the side when possible: 

Strangely, it is new full back Jacopo Valentini who has appeared in the second highest amount of game minutes this season but below him, we have been able to rotate - with some good competition forming in the striker role, as well as our wider attackers. We are still very short on depth and Ciavatta, Muccioli and Angelini aren't good enough at this point but giving them minutes in a winning team always seems to work well.

[kidthekid]

This was a great season, but the ending was so unfortunate. You seem to be positive about the ordeal though

[_Ben_]

19 hours ago, kidthekid said:

This was a great season, but the ending was so unfortunate. You seem to be positive about the ordeal though

Realistically, I don't want us 'going up too early.' I know there is going to be a windfall of money and my players will develop even better playing at the highest level but coming back down again will more than likely see us lose the core of my (now Serie A quality) team. I've not 'thrown the game' as such but was certainly not too angry, to the level of rage quitting, when we didn't go through on aggregate.

[_Ben_]

October/November 2031

We have had early season form like this before but have never been able to carry it on into the following months of the season. The foundation behind this great form is surely down to the fact that we have only conceded three league goals this season and would have been further ahead had Torino not edged a tight game where I feel we had the better chances. I, obviously, expect a turn in form at some point in the season - there is a reason we were predicted tenth and not first, but I am riding on the wave of this fantastic form for as long as I can.

Another team who are in fantastic form in the San Marinese national team. Somehow, particularly when considering the real life game, they have managed to qualify for a major competition in the space of 12 years:

Now ranked 97th in the world, they will be heading to Sweden 2032 with a squad made up, literally, of my players. Below is the side they put out in their last game - a 3-0 away trouncing of Montenegro.

I fully expect them to fade under the pressure but to see a starting XI with nine of my own players and two that I have developed is a great sight for how far both sides have come. For the benefit of the club team, however, in the future I would like to see more of a spread - it just means that we are moving on talent for money and/or other clubs might be developing their own Sammarinese players.

[_Ben_]

Windfall

A comfortable Coppa Italia win over Triestina has given us our first shot at some money in this game (there is minimal end/pre season money for Serie B). We have been drawn against Juventus in the First Round:

This fixture causes all sorts of congestion with league games and such like but does give us a shot at some money:

We will net nearly half a million regardless of the result. Juve are still in their 41k seater stadium and appear to be pretty much selling it out every week. However, they only seem to be up to about 800 away fans, which is a shame. In fact, in their First Round tie last year, at home to Palermo - only 223 away fans turned up. I don't know if we get an even split of gate receipts from this game but it'd be nice to pick up some extra money and get as many fans to make the six hour flight as possible, even though we are incredibly likely to lose and lose heavily.

 

[Fosse]

3 minutes ago, _Ben_ said:

Windfall

A comfortable Coppa Italia win over Triestina has given us our first shot at some money in this game (there is minimal end/pre season money for Serie B). We have been drawn against Juventus in the First Round:

This fixture causes all sorts of congestion with league games and such like but does give us a shot at some money:

We will net nearly half a million regardless of the result. Juve are still in their 41k seater stadium and appear to be pretty much selling it out every week. However, they only seem to be up to about 800 away fans, which is a shame. In fact, in their First Round tie last year, at home to Palermo - only 223 away fans turned up. I don't know if we get an even split of gate receipts from this game but it'd be nice to pick up some extra money and get as many fans to make the six hour flight as possible, even though we are incredibly likely to lose and lose heavily.

 

It can't be a direct 6 hour flight surely?

[_Ben_]

4 minutes ago, Fosse said:

It can't be a direct 6 hour flight surely?

It won't let me expand on the connecting bit but I now presume not...

I just did a quick sky scanner and the quickest flight I can find next week is 19 hours - and goes via St Petersburg and Rome. I can't see why anybody would do that!

It's about a 480km journey so would take about 5 hours by car, which is still further than I initially though it would be.

Edited July 7, 2019 by _Ben_

[Fosse]

Just now, _Ben_ said:

I now presume not...

I just did a quick sky scanner and the quickest flight I can find next week is 19 hours - and goes via St Petersburg and Rome. I can't see why anybody would do that!

It's about a 480km journey so would take about 5 hours by car, which is still further than I initially though it would be.

The Italian rail network is supposedly pretty good, maybe that's what he hundreds of fictional San Marino fans will do 

[Lucas]

Really enjoyed reading this thread. KUTGW!  

[_Ben_]

19 minutes ago, Lucas said:

Really enjoyed reading this thread. KUTGW!  

Many thanks Lucas!

[_Ben_]

Milestone

[_Ben_]

December 2031/January 2032

We are really putting ourselves into a strong position with a succession of great performances, clean sheets and solid offensive work. Just six goals conceded to this point and eleven different scorers from within the first team looks positive. We do face a tough run of fixtures, having dropped the most of our points in that period of reverse fixtures, but from here - I must be confident? I can't say for sure.

[kidthekid]

Impressive result against Juventus

[_Ben_]

2032 Youth Intake

This intake is all about my new French friends. I've always been reluctant to sign French player when not playing in France due to their values making them largely unable to tempt. However, having three in my intake is fantastic news, and what is more, they are all really good. They have entered my academy a year or so older than the others but that is probably evened out by a better current ability than the others.

Here is the pick of the bunch:

18 in July, Vadivelou is a half Reunionese attacking midfielder who's maturity is shown with his good physical frame, except for maybe some strength. His good work rate, vision and technique, combined with his aforementioned physicality lend themselves to him playing centrally - considering his dribbling and crossing is only average. He'll need to work on his passing but his player traits should also mean he can work up and down off the ball rather than on it.

Tall, solid defensively but also far better on the ball than my other potential candidates for a BPD role. Bastien, like David, is also considerably older than the rest but I don't feel is too far from first team material, already. Bastien is an accomplished passer, has a good first touch and his vision will allow him to dictate play from the back. I also really like him due to the fact he is two footed and, unlike so many defenders before him, can both jump and head. I have high hopes for this lad.

I am still not quite at the point, financially, of being able to keep the entire intake but I've kept six or seven of these lot and I'll track their progress.

[_Ben_]

42 minutes ago, kidthekid said:

Impressive result against Juventus

Thanks - I kind of skipped over it as I'd forgotten about it somewhat, playing it last night.

It was very much their second string but we didn't embarrass ourselves. Holding them at 1-1 for nearly fifty minutes was a great time to be a fictional San Marino fan!

[john1]

Not bad losing result to Juventus   

[_Ben_]

February/March 2032

We march on and, despite a couple of poor results, are looking set to win promotion to Serie A. Both ties against Empoli and Torino were tight and I feel that, on another day, we could have ran out winners in both, further cementing our spot at the top of the league. Goals, aside from the Latina game, seemed a bit of an issue but some rotation for the Cittadella game has seen us return to free scoring ways. Just the seven games to go...

[kidthekid]

That affiliate really paid instant dividends. Lachaud may be the Bpd you've been craving for.

[_Ben_]

2031/32 U18 Squad Training

Below is the breakdown from this season - a season where we focused more on technical development and took away a little bit from the physical side of the game. I must say that I am disappointed with the level of development from this group of players. We have made progress across all three areas but this rate is significantly lower than last season. A thought for the future is to break this down into progress made by players based on their personalities.

Over the summer, I am going to set up a full player progression path from a 15 year old upon entering the youth team until he is 25 and has reached his peak in the first team.

[_Ben_]

21 hours ago, kidthekid said:

That affiliate really paid instant dividends. Lachaud may be the Bpd you've been craving for.

Let's hope so! He's retrained pretty quickly to accomplished and is getting some minutes, partly due to the fact he's already 18.

[_Ben_]

2031/32 End of Season Update

Well that certainly went down to the wire with ourselves and Lecce on 76 points and Torino on 75 points heading into the last game on the season, knowing that any two of the three could go up. Torino wilted at home to Virtus and even with Lecce's five nil thumping of Latina, we did our bit and successfully won the league on head to head performances. Following our poor run of form, I seriously worried that we wouldn't go up but, at the end of the day, I must applaud our consistency - 25 clean sheets in 38 games in a fantastic reward and we are, probably, the best team in the league right now. 

Player wise, here is how they fared:

Two players in double figures for goals but we do lack a really prolific figure up top who I think could get us the 10/15 goals we will need to survive. However - I am most impressed that all but two (Lachaud doesn't really count as he came in March) made over 1000 minutes on the pitch. This shows that the squad is deeper and I can rotate and still perform well. Jacopo Valentini is clearly the standout here - second highest number of minutes and leading the average rating in his first season. Makes the £9m I got for Bianchi seem, once again, like a great deal. Armando Maiolo is also an under-appreciated cog in the side in a role I've never really utilised before - the DLP(d) in the defensive midfield strata. 95% pass completion, 97% of his tackles complete and a key pass pretty much every two games shows that we are really building from the back through him yet making the most of another defensive body.

I am under no illusions of how hard next season will be. Staying in the league is the only goal here.

[_Ben_]

Money!

I get the feeling I won't be scraping around for every penny by the end oft his season...

[_Ben_]

Youth Training Update

The above graphic, now updated after some thinking from last season, shows a comparison between my current crop of U18s and the younger players from my first team squad. I am trying to look at trends here to work out what needs to happen for the current crop of youngsters to reach the levels that the senior players have. 

Firstly, my comparison of their technical attributes says a lot - they are nearly three points worse off across the board. Did the first team players enter being this good? No. Probably not. Has first team football been a massive boost? Yes. More than likely. However - the current crop, despite not prioritising it all over their time here are significantly better at set pieces, corners (3.7), throw ins (2.4), free kicks (2.6) and penalties (1.1). Mentally, these youngsters aren't too bad. We have a squad-wide issue with Determination - 11 is the number currently that all players revert to due to this attribute level being present for all of the influential players. Physically, they are somewhat weaker but not hugely so - strength being the major factor but I feel that will naturally grow.

Therefore - the big difference between my youth players and my first team players (and probably my first team players and good players in Serie A) is their lack of technical ability. I believe that this is imperative at a really young age and will look to re-address this accordingly. I also need to take into consideration the longer development period of players who just aren't as good. If there is potential there, it could take three or seven years to be achieved (for example) so I need to give them enough time to do this.

My plans for development are looking promising as I am learning about what is needed to develop as many youngsters as I can. This process may chance and become incredibly specific to one player/one role if and when I reach a point whereby that could significantly change an already great side.

[kidthekid]

Congrats on promotion. The 95% pass completion by two of your players is insane. 

As an aside, in Europe's top leagues, Soumaoro of Lille has the highest pass completion percentage this season with 94.3. Xavi did average 95 2 or 3 times over a season. Britton got to 93 in Swansea's first season in the EPL. I like passing statistics, I'm weird.

Edited July 10, 2019 by kidthekid

[_Ben_]

3 minutes ago, kidthekid said:

Congrats on promotion. The 95% pass completions by two of your players is insane. 

As an aside, Soumaoro of Lille has the highest pass completion percentage this season with 94.. but Xavi did average 95 a while back. Britton got to 93 in Swansea's first season in the EPL

 

He's good! His traits really compliment the game I want him to play. I do wonder how he'll fair moving up a level but I would say that there are no 'holes' in the game I want him to play.

[_Ben_]

Facilities

I purposely held off so that I missed the threshold for this season meaning they'll be done post-TV money coming in!

[_Ben_]

Squad number OCD

Something I wanted to explore was squad numbers - as I mentioned in my opening post, they were all over the shop in my old save so wanted to adopt a numbering system to work throughout the team. As my in game manager, Teles, is a Brazilian - I thought I'd go with that approach. Here is some information on it below:

The system is slightly different to what I am entirely used to as an English person - particularly with the #5 not in the defence and the #6 being part of the defence. This shape is also more of the 4-2-2-2 that Brazil used at the 2014 World Cup but I feel it can be adapted with my highly attacking winger kind of making the above shape happen. Thinking back to that World Cup - the two full backs of Dani Alves #2 and Marcelo #6 were key players - something that mine are a way away from. In the middle was Tiago Silva #3 and David Luiz #4 with holding midfielder Fernandinho given the #5. I will give that to my player deepest in the midfield trio. Next up was Paulinho in the #8 and Neymar in the #10. I think that the graphic does depict him much deeper than he actually did start but I don't play with an AMC at this point so that'll go to my most offensive midfielder. #7 is Hulk and #11 is Oscar (I think they are the wrong way round on the graphic) but I will give #11 to my more offensive of the two. #9 was Fred and that, as expected, goes to my main striker.

Here is how that looks with my strongest XI:

[_Ben_]

National Team Success

This summer saw San Marino make their debut in the European Championships, facing Croatia (14th in the world), Wales (36th) and France (1st). All of these teams are considerably better than little San Marino, now ranked 95th, but they haven't embarrassed themselves at all.

Hopefully the first tournament of many.

[_Ben_]

Small fish, big pond

Our highest earner takes over 53 times less a month than Inter Milan's highest earner. If that doesn't show the gulf, I don't know what will.

[_Ben_]

Youth Training - What is influencing things?

Once again, I present my crop of youngsters in the U18 team this season:

Probably the weakest cohort, to date, and a mixed bag of personalities, to match. Overall, they are very weak technically but are, I would say, good, physically. Therefore - this is the training system I am proposing for them for the next year:

The plan here is to reduce physical training to a minimum, allowing for focus elsewhere. I have moved around the sessions to front load the week with physical work as they then start to ease of in preparation for the Saturday fixture. I've added Distribution, a goalkeeping focus, to allow an extra session whereby my players can focus on their own role development - as everything else is pretty attribute focused in units. Similarly, Delivery is in there to get them working on set pieces as they are, on the whole, awful at them. 

My main interest this year was to look at why they are so poor technically. Have I had a poor intake or, being as the data for the last three years suggests so, are my intakes generally coming in weaker than I would expect technically? I obviously have no comparative data but each year there has been a significant difference between their physical attributes (of which I'd expect to be lower at a younger age) and their technical attributes (which can pretty much develop at any age). I've added the coaches into their own data sheet - as seen below:

The breakdown would suggest that, of the people coaching the youth players, their technical coaching skills are the best, with their tactical being the worst. When I look at what the tooltips say about the coaching styles, it gets a bit confusing:

Technical coaching score appears to be linked with how the coach can teach the player to work on the ball, whereas tactical (and this is copied from the tip in the coaching section and not the 'Tactical Knowledge' one) appears to be about how tactically-astute they are - i.e. knowing how to play the game and giving advice on it. I don't know if this is a mis-worded tip or not. But, from that, my HoYD, the one figure that is has been confirmed having an impact on the intake is a 'Tactical' coach and not a mental one (despite being excellent at that) but his playing style involves 'Passing' - the one area that I am concerned about coming through low (average of 5.8 on my current U18 team).

The mode of the data suggests that, if, as a collective group of staff they have an influence over the youth intake, I should be able to produce attacking players who are able to pass and fit into a 4-1-4-1 DM Wide shape. That currently isn't happening. I wonder whether I need to find a truly excellent technical coach, who might not fit in with the recruitment process of focusing on WWY and personalities whilst developing coaching skills and progressing through the club, could have an impact on the intakes.

All part of the magic of this game.

Edited July 13, 2019 by _Ben_

[_Ben_]

Small fish, big pond (part 2)

But...

Look at the spike since we were promoted to Serie A in June 2032...

[kingjericho]

Is your option for using IWB because you don't have good left-footers or something else?

[_Ben_]

32 minutes ago, kingjericho said:

Is your option for using IWB because you don't have good left-footers or something else?

Whilst I do like an IWB on support, with the PI of 'Dribble Less' as a means of possession retention, yes, at this point it is because I don't have a left footer who is better.

Here is my squad depth for the left back role:

Guidi has been converted-ish from a centre mid so has flaws, Lazzari is right footed and Santi is nowhere near first team quality at the moment. It might change over time or (hopefully) I'll just get a wonderful either footed full back who is fantastic on the ball and I can utilise that!

[_Ben_]

August/September 2032

It's not been easy, at all, but a win over Juventus is clearly the most significant three points this club has ever earned. We sit at around 64% possession a game, by far the highest in the league, and also get fouled the most but are, as you'd expect, struggling at the business end with only two goals scored. It is a strange one though as we've never really been 'out' of any games and could easily have beaten Milan, Foggia and should have got something from the Lecce game.

I'm hoping that yo-yo club Udinese and Foggia are two teams worse than us and we can find at least one more to keep us afloat this season.

[_Ben_]

New Affiliate

As I continue to focus on shaping this club from top to bottom, I have just succeeded in getting myself, hopefully, another top feeder club.

I added the obligatory 'youth player' option.

This is great. SMS Lodz are a youth team playing in the depths of Polish football. I know about them from a game with Cracovia from several years back where they produced some great amateur players that other teams stole. Here are their facilities:

My aim here is to create a chain of successful academy sides that feed in to my own youth side. I have, in the past, picked the highest reputation team with decent facilities but I'm really drawn here to finding the obscure academies and using their players in my intakes. The below screen is a good indication of what I want - a team that has no 'first' team but only youth teams.

I've found several so far, with INF Clairefontaine obviously being the highest rated. I don't know if it possible to get them as an affiliate though.