[FM20] I'm a Slavia For You

[wynter]

Welcome to my 5th Version of this career on the forums... Full release and the HotFix came out and with that I figured it was time.

No idea what originally got me into Slavia. I think at the time I was looking for a new country to run a save in and on a whim I picked Bulgaria. Four FMs later and it's the save I always come back to.

The board just want us to do well this year, and long-term slowly progress upwards.

How will we do this? Off the back of a solid Youth Base and through the further development of Bulgarian Talent.

Save Restriction

Bulgarian Players Only

That being said I did load a fair few leagues. France and Germany under View Only but the rest are playable. The goal is to slowly develop talent and create a new golden generation of Bulgarian Players largely distributed by my own hand.

(Will still update Australia) 

Edited November 22, 2019 by wynter

[wynter]

This Man... I want to build a dynasty around this man (Was already at the club so I didn't break the rules! )

Anyways

Thoroughly average Pre-Season had me doubting our ability to do damage this year, that being said we did have some quality attacking talent in Kirilov and Ivanov

Luckily for me they decided to fire and we've romped away to a cracking start.

Because I forgot to actually put up Playable Leagues

[wynter]

September

First sign of struggle. Kirilov started to slump and before where he'd scored 7 goals for us, no goals this month left us limited and we crashed out of the Cup to a 2nd Division team. 3 losses in a row is less than ideal, but the wins against 3rd Placed Cherno More and winning the Oldest Derby vs Levski were amazing results, just a little undercut by a crap run.

2nd Place is still fine, this season was about just beating expectations so anything from 1st-6th and making the Champions Playoff would be a bonus.

Edited November 25, 2019 by wynter

[john1]

Good luck  

[ManUtd1]

[wynter]

On 26/11/2019 at 05:51, john1 said:

Good luck  

Thank you my good sir. 

On 26/11/2019 at 13:27, ManUtd1 said:

 

[wynter]

October

A mediocre month filled with last second goals that both saved and destroyed us. An 87th minute equaliser from Kirilov saved us against embarrasement by Botev Plovdiv, but an unfortunate own goal by Stergiakis in stoppage time cost us against Ludogorets. The one bright spot is our continual manhandling of any Sofia side that we play. Levski and CSKA have both stepped up and both have been utterly pummeled in glorious fashion. The fans are quite pleased. With the winter break and some players having been injured at the back end of September we booked a friendly to raise Match Fitness levels before the Ludo/CSKA Gauntlet.

Turning into a weird 4 man race for the title. I say weird because Levski and CSKA being that far below is just... Bizzare. Cherno have got some great players though so seeing them in the race isn't surprising at all. Quite excited actually because we might have some major players this edition that didn't do much in previous saves.

[wynter]

November

Little bit better, we got absolutely ****ed by Beroe. No red card or anything of the sort, we just didn't show up and were punished accordingly. The Etar result being at home to a team in 11th and near the bottom of the ladder was also a disappointment. On the plus-side, we're still in the hunt but we do need to hope for Ludogorets to play awfully in the near future.

[wynter]

Winter Break

5 Games over three months... May as well combine them all into one.

We went through January without any incidents, no players out and none in. No budget for the latter and no desire to really offload anyone with the former. Also a bonus in no changes led to no upheaval in team chemistry and everything is piecing together. Another demolishing of Levski sent us into the winter break and we've come out of it with three straight wins, all by a single goal but all we need right now is points. The league sorts positions by results vs teams and currently Ludogorets and I have played one of four matches.

 Youth Intake Preview

Interesting... Shame I don't use right wingers at all 

Spoiler

 

 

[Kingofcm03]

The Sofia giants are failing under the pressure of having you in their city

[noikeee]

Big upturn in form there. Shame CSKA seem that poor, but fingers crossed you take the title to the capital, anything but Ludogorets. 

[ManUtd1]

Just now, noikeee said:

Big upturn in form there. Shame CSKA seem that poor, but fingers crossed you take the title to the capital, anything but Ludogorets. 

You just made the list.

[SRL88]

Fantastic work so far 

[wynter]

On 06/12/2019 at 05:13, noikeee said:

Big upturn in form there. Shame CSKA seem that poor, but fingers crossed you take the title to the capital, anything but Ludogorets. 

Yeah it's a little disappointing, was hoping for a super tight few seasons between CSKA and Levski as well but I'll take anything I can get hahaha

 

On 05/12/2019 at 12:59, Kingofcm03 said:

The Sofia giants are failing under the pressure of having you in their city

Crumbling to a fine powder 

 

On 06/12/2019 at 06:10, SRL88 said:

Fantastic work so far 

Cheers man  

[wynter]

March

All that optimism unravelled a month later. We should not have lost to Botev Vrasta, under any circumstance really. Beating Ludogrets evened results up to 1-1 and then we went and lost 4-0 so we're going to need to win on outright points this year for the title. Minorly reducing our margin for error.

The regular season finished like this. So now we move to the Championship Round

Championship Round Rules

- Teams 1-6 qualify

- Teams play each other twice, home and away

- European Places scale from 1st to 3rd (Cup Winner as always matters)

Nine games left for the crown...

Youth Intake

As I said before... He looks good. I don't use right wingers though so I'll probably move him to a better club with Sell-On.

 

[wynter]

April

 

7-1 Chef's Kiss 

One of those days where you show up and everything turns to gold. If Botev hadn't turned into a spoiler it would have been a perfect month. Hopefully though we can ride this momentum over the last 5 games of the season.

In awful news though, we're losing two of our star players for free at the end of this season.

Hristov our BPD propsect and Karabelyov, the all-round midfield  dynamo are heading to 'supposedly' better clubs... We'll see about that.

The league has basically become a two horse race as Cherno temporarily forgot how to play football. One game left vs Ludogorets and it could be pivotal

Edited December 7, 2019 by wynter

[HugoLazgo12]

Oh Well Cherno Bottle It Up

[wynter]

End Of Season

We won the biggest match of the season, with a 3-1 win over Ludogorets but overall we only picked up 8/15 points...

Somehow it was enough.

I don't think you'll find anyone more surprised that that we won the league this year than me. We scored goals for sure, playing stupidly attacking football but throughout there were mini-purple patches marked by inconsistency throughout the whole year. Somehow we were just slightly less mediocre.

That being said...

Losing my best CB and my Best Midfielder for free is gutting because we have no way of replacing that quality in our current squad, and I have minimal spend to make acquisitions. So next season is going to be much harder, with the option of a run in Europe our only hope to inject some measure of funds into the club. Few weeks off (In-Game) and then we'll have to hit Europe as hard as we can.

 

Edited December 9, 2019 by wynter

[deltablue]

Well you got there in the end

[wynter]

Pre-Season 2020/2021

A lot of movement out, just removing all the players that quite simply aren't good enough from the club. Hristo Apostolov was a regen that CSKA spirited away, Krastev was a calculated choice as I didn't really have the desire to play him, but as a 5* prospect he could definitely make the grade for other clubs so I let Ludogorets take him for the sake of his future development.

Our biggest move in is Baurenski

4 Dribbling is less than ideal, but otherwise he's a competent playmaker from the back with a natural DM ability and I'll be positioning him as our Regista, re-distributing the ball from deep to replace Karabelyov.

Meanwhile Petko Hristov is just a replacement for his twin brother. Not as developed but still a decent prospect.

Champions League

We cruised until the 3rd round where we drew Dinamo... Losing at home to a late goal and complete inability to create. Only to somehow fix it all and roar back with an extra time winner to squeeze through 2-0.

[wynter]

Champions Playoff

Ouch... 

Actually just straight up outclassed and our run comes to a halt. In good news though, playoff defeat equals a Euro Cup berth and some much needed income  

The group we drew actually isn't that bad. Villareal are of course difficult, but Sparta and Rapid aren't that big a step-up from Dinamo or even a step up at all, so we have a slim chance of grabbing some decent results.

And in the League

We aren't losing... But constantly rotating and resting sides for Europe meant we played a lot of 50/50 squads and our team doesn't really have depth to pull off consistent wins when we're not playing our best players. Outside the First XI most of the squad is decent/leading Second Div quality and aren't liable to perform as expected.

No big deal though, as all the board wants is a Top 6 finish and we're hanging near the top end of the table.

[ManUtd1]

That Europa League group! 

[wynter]

1 hour ago, ManUtd1 said:

That Europa League group! 

[wynter]

That's more like it!

Good run of form off the back of some pretty easy league fixtures, Lokomotiv, 1948 and Pirin all hover near the bottom of the table so we were rewarded with a relatively easy spell this month and were able to focus solely on Europe.

Villareal was surprising

Two players sent off towards the end and we defended doggedly to escape with a win, Ivanov the star with a beautiful free kick launched into the top corner from 25 yards out. Rewarded by individual brilliance and sheer refusal to lose.

CSKA with a nice lead though if they win their game in hand.

 

[wynter]

Rest of the month... Not as impressive. In good news we progressed in the Bulgarian Cup after our first round exit last year. Otherwise defeats and our first loss in Europe saw us drop down the ladder and others catch up.

Finances have led to investment in our facilities... Bulgarian Only means we'll be using a lot of our developmental players and those who come to our club will likely come early. So facilities are vital.

Edited December 16, 2019 by wynter

[wynter]

Winter Break

We exist.

Probably the only conclusion I can really come too over the last few months. 5-2-3 results wise and two of those wins came in Cup Competitions. A closer look shows we absolutely shredded CSKA Sofia, important because if they'd beat us both time's they'd be 11 points in the lead and probably way too far gone to hunt down. 

In Europe, we got absolutely eviscerated by Villareal in our re-match and come Day 5 we needed a win to qualify for the Knockouts and results to go in our favor.

They didn't.

If things hold up the CHampions Playoff will be a very legitimate Champions Playoff because the table is tight enough all six teams could feasibly win.

Due to our improved finances though we got given an extra 700k to our TB and I splurged immediately.

Eyad Hammoud

He looks intriguing. Very well-rounded attacking midfielder with pace to burn. Could be vital as the season comes to a close.

[wynter]

February

Better. Three wins and comfortable ones too.

Ludogorets absolutely dominated us though and the result while close, was humbling. Comfortable wins over sides at the lower end of the table meant we emerged from February feeling pretty confident as to the last few months. Over the winter break I decided to hold my cards as it were. We had money to spend but I decided to hold on for another six months with our current squad. An eye instead turned to a heavy summer window where we'll really look into overhauling this team with an eye to the future.

(Also, the Bulgarian League has no registration window over January despite having a transfer window, bug was raised with SI but I'm not restarting the game since I'm already in this deep. All my transfer business will be in June/July except for U20 players who in Bulgaria you don't need to register. January is basically a youth only signing window... Something I'm not too stressed by because most of the talent worth signing in this save is U18 anyways.

Vrasta have slipped, everyone else looks threatening.

And Hammoud, was an inspired choice based off recent performances

Was interested in him last year, but being at Sheffield Wednesday they either wanted high fees or he was never too keen until he was 22/23 and his prime development years were done. This year he was in Lebanon for some reason and more than happy to come home (Bulgaria not Sofia).

[andychar]

Good going in season 2. Smashed the board expectation. Unlucky in Europe, sometimes 9 points is enough, sometimes its not.

[wynter]

There's hope in the air at The Slavia… 

 

Boasting one of the best attendance records in the league the football club is marching towards domestic success off the back of an incredible First Division Title win last year. 

 

The mastermind behind it all, or at least that's what the fans will tell you is Jason Price. An unheralded Australian Manager who joined the club with no previous coaching experience. 

 

Insanity or Brilliance? Either way the Slavia board is reaping the benefits of their shrewd signing. 

 

"Hail the King, the King in the East." The fans chant as Slavia Sofia notch up yet another win. 

 

Clubs in Bulgaria, take notice. Slavia are here to stay...

[wynter]

March

A month of absolutely no progress. We finished the Prelimary Phase and entered the Champions Play-Off, losing our first match to contenders Cherno More. We played a full-strength team and just got caught on the break by a more clinical side. Not much too be done, but we'll need to be better in the rematch.

Things are looking bleak.

Youth Intake

Onto brighter news...

Investments into youth paid off. Albeit we once again got a Right Winger 5* propsect and it's like the game is forcing me to change...

Golovdov is a pacey all-round quality talent who will never excel at a single aspect but my usual philosophy for 5* Regens is to expect every technical/mental attribute to raise by 4/5 and if he manages that... He'd be very, very serviceable.

I'm actually more interested in Grilic though.

I think with some mentoring he could slot into the BWM slot in our side. Solid passing stats, but woeful flair and while Baurenski is similar (6 Flair Regista) Baurenski is also a much more developed player at this point.

[wynter]

April

So I gave Botev Vrasta **** for just existing in a previous post... and they came back to bite us in the *** in our very first game. In terms of positives we breezed into the Bulgarian Cup Final with a match against 10th placed Arda that we SHOULD win. Otherwise the actual Championship Phase itself has been a disappointment as we've gone 1-2-2 and at halfway we're choking out of a very winnable title.

In good news, it may also be a case of everyone being too well matched because we have 2 games in hand  on first place and we're 7 points off the pace. 2 wins... and the final 3 matches will be tasty.

 

[wynter]

May

Galin Ivanov you absolute manimal <3

A late equaliser looked like an extra time duel and the man said no. What a curler.

Which also helped us deal with the fact we've lost the First League.

As I've said before the league sorts by results between teams...

So while we can finish on 67 points

Cherno absolutely bodied us across the season. Take it on the chin an improve... Meanwhile the Euro Cup II looks like an awesome competition to check out.

[wynter]

I think I might hate Cherno More...

 

(On the plus side, a new team that isn't Ludogorets winning the title is actually pretty spectacular. So new blood and competition in the league.

However... It's time to spend.

And our first look is at defence (2 CBs for an entire season was a bad idea).

[wynter]

Hey Team, getting back to updating this again. In the meantime I've also pumped out an article covering the tactic we've used for this save with @ManUtd1 so if you're interested go have a peek.

Raumpress

[wynter]

The Slavic Trials

It takes place under the cover of moonlight, a bag placed over the man’s head as he is brought onto the grounds by horse-drawn carriage. Their hooves sink deep into the grass and Simeon the groundskeeper glares as if it’s an offence punishable by death. It’s fine… There’s at least 6 weeks before the season starts.

The carriage comes to a halt and a pair of large hands seize the man before he is thrown to the ground. The bag is ripped off his head and he finds himself in a line with 6 other players, all kneeling at the bottom of stairs, leading up to a podium from which Jason Price sits upon his throne, a golden crown upon his head from which the flames that illuminate the pitch are reflected.

However, the Slavia Sofia manager’s eyes were not on him. Instead they are on the man to his left. Martin Minchev, one of the best attackers in the league a bead of sweat dripping down the side of his head.

Price stands… And Clicks.

A bag is thrown back on Martin’s head, his muffled screams echo through the stadium as he is dragged into the darkness.

And silence.

“Have no fear my good men.” Price says. “He was… Unworthy to wear our fabled colours. As for the rest of you, it remains to be seen.”

Price returns to his throne, lifting a goblet made of the finest crystal and swirling the dark liquid within as he takes a sip.

Having grown at Botev Plovdiv his entire life, Kristian had been told that transfers were funny affairs. Now he was starting to think that everything he had ever heard was little more than an understatement.

"Kristian Dimitrov." Price says as he leans forward. Throwing Kristian’s scout report to his feet. "Promising centre back who I can offer first team football and Europe. Tonight though, it is not what I offer you, instead I have one simple question. What do you bring to this Kingdom?"

Was the player not meant to be chased? To be lured with tithes and offerings?

“My liege!” Georgi Yomov runs over amidst Kristian’s inner contemplation. “Kristian is merely awed by your presence, do not take his silence for dishonor!”

Georgi and Kristian had once shared a locker room for Bulgaria’s U19’s and U21’s, the two of them though had never been more than mere acquaintances. To see his fellow countryman on bended knee before his manager was… Strange to say the least.

Price nodded at Yomov’s words. “It is ok Georgi, I am if nothing else a merciful leader. Find your words Kristian, I can wait.”

The Transfer Window is a funny little thing…

Transfers Next Update

[ManUtd1]

Kristian knows the truth.

[noikeee]

You might explain me a trillion times why but I always feel uncomfortable looking at a back 4 with WBs pushed up.  

That league campaign was so, so tight.