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On 21/06/2020 at 10:06, raymondafc said:

Oh dear lol. Onwards and upwards I guess...

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You must be having trouble getting the ball forward... your defenders are defending for their lives and doing decently and well! From the ratings you probably need better midfielders (MC's) to make the new system work.

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Racing Club de Lens

On y va, as they say au Francais. Yesterday I knew two things about Lens - former Newcastle player Massadio Haidara plays for them, and they have a big stadium (courtesy of the 2016 Euro championship) of 37,700 seats. In FM they're predicted to finish in 3rd place in L2 and - according to the incumbent AssMan - the squad is god's gift to football. On opening my team report for the first time the weaknesses barely fill a screen and basically boil down to a) a lack of squad depth; b) a lack of money; and c) we're not the best at long-range shooting. In contrast, the strengths require a lot of scrolling - great players in all positions, great leadership, great technicals including crossing, dribbling, finishing, top-class mentals including decisions, off the ball and anticipation. The list goes on, and on, and on...

So I might be forgiven for thinking this save is going to be a stroll, at least until we march into L1. Unfortunately, pre-season friendlies reveal the sorry truth: my AssMan is an ass. His stats for judging player ability are poor, his tactical knowledge even worse. And even on his own rating, the squad is awash with 2- and 2.5-star players. There are a handful who look like quality - one AMR, two DMs, two DCs, one GK and the aforementioned Haidara are rated 3.5 stars. But, of the 7 players so rated, 5 are the wrong side of 32 years old. One of my urgent decisions is whether to fire this imbecile - he's on £2.6k a week for another two years and we can ill-afford the cost but I fear he has to go (he's a mediocre coach into the bargain).

Other problems on my desk include the fact that we have little quality in central midfield beyond the ageing DMs, and only two natural strikers, the 'best' of whom is Corentin Jean, on loan from Toulouse, who has scored just 23 goals in his 169 professional appearances. To remedy these shortcomings I have no available wage budget and £1.7m for transfers. Or more accurately (let me just move this slider), I have no transfer budget and £33k a week available for wages. A further complication is that either my scouts simply don't know any French footballers or the players have absolutely no interest in moving to Lens.

I knew this was going to be different, but I had no idea... Merde, as I believe the French put it.

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@warlock A brilliant intro! With all the good things the club has, it's only fair you have some player issues to test you out! There is so much talent in France and Africa, you'll soon go from saying merde to magnifique! I'm keen to hear how you plan to tackle it anyway. Bon chance mon ami.

I've also had a bit of a nightmare. I'm currently at my lowest point in the table during my reign at Lorient so far. You can read about it on FMCU if you're really bored :lol:

 

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1 hour ago, Jogo Bonito said:

it's only fair you have some player issues to test you out!

Well, of course. Wouldn't want it to be too easy :D.

But with regards to the staffing problem... is French football so short of decent scouts/coaches/medics or is it just an L2/Lens thing!?

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4 hours ago, warlock said:

Well, of course. Wouldn't want it to be too easy :D.

But with regards to the staffing problem... is French football so short of decent scouts/coaches/medics or is it just an L2/Lens thing!?

I had an issue with the lesser jobs like Data Analysts and Sports Scientists (and possibly it wasn't easy to get great Scouts). Otherwise, I have always been able to get very decent staff at Lorient.

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Monaco Season 1 Review

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I had a good first season with Monaco finishing 3rd and only 3 points behind 2nd place Nice. PSG won the title as expected.

21 point gap between me and PSG. PSG only lost once all season. They are going to be tough to topple but I done it with FC Metz and Monaco in theory should be an easier challenge to topple PSG.

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As you can see in this photo Ben Yedder was top scorer with 30 league goals. Danilo Cataldi had the best average rating in the league and was 2nd in having the most assists in the league by 1 assist to winner Memphis Depay.

I might sell Ben Yedder as he is nearly 29 years old and his resell value will only go down in a year or 2. Man City are lurking. I got Pellegri, Rutter, Almada, Greubbels and various others that can play in that role.

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Wissam Ben Yedder

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Danilo Cataldi

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Axel Disasi

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Benoit Badiashile

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Gelson Martins

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Viktor Fischer

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Danilo Cataldi won the Teams Player Of The Year award with 68% vote.

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Ben Yedder's 37 goals is a new team record

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Cataldi's 15 assists is a new team record

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Ben Yedder's 11 Player Of The Match's is a new team record

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Danilo Cataldi won the French Ligue 1 Player Of The Season and rightly so.

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Cataldi, Ben Yedder and Fischer made the Ligue 1 Team Of The Season.

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1 minute ago, Ronaldo Beckham said:

Yeah I don't mind a few seasons of building.

I just had Arsenal make a hell of a deal for Ben Yedder so he will be going. 

£62m in total with clauses for for a 29 year old.

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I agree totally, that's a massive fee for a moderately good 29 year old striker.

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Just now, Jogo Bonito said:

I agree totally, that's a massive fee for a moderately good 29 year old striker.

Yeah I also want to give Pellegri, Rutter and Almada more game time and I have Matias Arezo joining in January 2021. Yes I have signed him for the 3rd club in a row that I have managed now lol.

I just signed James Rodriguez on a free transfers. his value is already £42m. I am hoping he has a good season and I can sell him for profit.

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Lens: Season 1, October

A bit of a stuttering start in L2, for reasons I shall explain. But we have picked up the pace a little as the squad settles in:

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And just noticed that I've missed the opening game of the season because we played it in July :idiot:. However, you didn't really miss it because it was rubbish. At home to newly-promoted Chambly we barely managed to scrape a 1-0 victory. We then compounded our misery by travelling to Niort and losing by the same scoreline. A cup win against non-league opposition and a valuable league win against Troyes were followed by mirror-image results - a league loss to FCSM and an early exit from the cup. But then things steadied, producing 5 wins from our most recent 7 games, and only one loss. It's early days in my French career but Aveyron have already made it onto the "Clubs I Reallly Hate" list! Those results saw us rapidly climb the table to 3rd, but we remain some distance behind the leaders.

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A glance at the right of that screenie will reveal at least one of our problems - we're a one-man band. Tony Mauricio playing as an IF on the right is our leading scorer and leading provider. When he's missing we simply don't turn up, and he's already had two injuries (cursed with a fragile groin, I fear). But there are many other problems.

First, the club saw fit to bring in no less than 19 new players in the summer before my arrival, 13 of them first-teamers; not suprisingly, team cohesion was abysmal and after 10 games is still in the red.

Second, their spending of £4.5m was not invested wisely - nearly half of the total went on two players, LW Jules Keita and RW Florian Sotoca, who have so far been utter pants.

Third, although we didn't spend on any money on him, Corentin Jean on loan from Toulouse, has been even worse than I expected. His natural role is pressing forward but at 5'7" and a strength attribute of 9 he doesn't strike me as ideally suited. He bagged two goals in a pre-season friendly against an amateur Belgian outfit and has done nothing since. It goes without saying that his loan cannot be terminated :seagull:.

In an attempt to improve our chances up front I turned to another loan signing, Stoke's Julien Ngoy. Given our team cohesion issue, I decided I would only sign players who were fully fluent in the language and the young Belgian fitted the bill. In similar vein, I brought in another loan signing, Aaron Tshibola - English, once of Aston Villa, but a fluent French-speaker. Both have done well, providing several assists, and Ngoy already has 2 goals in 5 starts. Tshibola gives us some much-needed energy in an ageing central midfield.

So not a great start, but it could have been much worse. I expect team performance to improve as we get better cohesion and tactical fluidity. Pre-season predictions of a playoff place look to be about right, but things could go either way.

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@warlock That was a difficult start for you. It seems you don't have much quality in your ranks for a club of that size and stature, but things are starting to turn recently. i dislike loans of players like Corentin Jean that you don't want (and you're very right not to want him). if you do still need a striker, Diafro Sakho might still be free? And Younousse Sankhare is a Ligue 1 standard midfielder who starts the game unattached (but not for long).

Don't forget to consider plundering Cameroon and their folk for some reinforcements if money is tight. Or, I can wholeheartedly recommend scouring RC Abidjan and Ivory Coast generally. 

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55 minutes ago, Jogo Bonito said:

It seems you don't have much quality in your ranks for a club of that size and stature

Mm. Tricky to decide at the moment - there are quite a few players that my coaches rate highly but so far I'm not seeing it on the pitch. Too early to tell if that's the team cohesion issue, or bad staff judgement. Similarly, Keita and Sotoca look pretty good on paper but haven't yet produced the goods. I guess by the time we get to Christmas and cohesion has improved substantially I'll get a better idea. 

And thanks for the suggestions but Sankhare was snapped up by Nimes, and poor old Sakho is currently shivering in Ukraine. I've just appointed a decent scout with strong knowledge of north and west Africa so we'll see what he can suggest.

I know we both say this almost every save, but another season in L2 wouldn't be the worst outcome, as long as I do enough to keep the board happy :onmehead:

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4 minutes ago, warlock said:

Mm. Tricky to decide at the moment - there are quite a few players that my coaches rate highly but so far I'm not seeing it on the pitch. Too early to tell if that's the team cohesion issue, or bad staff judgement. Similarly, Keita and Sotoca look pretty good on paper but haven't yet produced the goods. I guess by the time we get to Christmas and cohesion has improved substantially I'll get a better idea. 

And thanks for the suggestions but Sankhare was snapped up by Nimes, and poor old Sakho is currently shivering in Ukraine. I've just appointed a decent scout with strong knowledge of north and west Africa so we'll see what he can suggest.

I know we both say this almost every save, but another season in L2 wouldn't be the worst outcome, as long as I do enough to keep the board happy :onmehead:

I'm sure it will turn out alright when you get on a roll. The signs are there already, and i'd still expect you to be promoted or play-off achievers at worst.

I agree though, a second season there wouldn't be harmful at all if the board tolerate it.

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12 minutes ago, Jogo Bonito said:

a second season there wouldn't be harmful at all if the board tolerate it

Yup - making the playoffs is the required achievement; promotion required next season :thup:

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9 minutes ago, Jogo Bonito said:

A minor update from FC Lorient (November 2022) is now on FMCU forum.

@warlock Good luck keeping Lens in contact with the leading group.

@Ronaldo Beckham With David & Camavinga in your team, overhauling PSG should come much quicker than it did with Metz.

Yeah I have been very smart and lucky with my transfer business. I just need a really good goalkeeper and I think I will be onto the league title.

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January 2023 at FC Lorient

Turning down this £18.25 million offer for Mendes was easy and the player wasn't keen to move to Wuhan for some reason...

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 A couple of days later this came in, with the player keen on the move. Just look at the size of Le Fee folks, it's over £71 million...

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Edited by Jogo Bonito
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16 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

@warlock RC Lens is a team capable of becoming great you just need a little luck...

@Ronaldo Beckham Who are you eyeing for your GK job? Since you have THE BEST MIDFIELDER on your team.

A French Keeper like Lafont ideally as I got quite a few foreign players in my squad. I got Burki from Dortmund and Predrag Rajkovic as first team keepers but I want someone young and French or African as my main keeper.

Anyone got any suggestions @Hootieleece @Jogo Bonito @warlock

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4 minutes ago, Ronaldo Beckham said:

A French Keeper like Lafont ideally as I got quite a few foreign players in my squad. I got Burki from Dortmund and Predrag Rajkovic as first team keepers but I want someone young and French or African as my main keeper.

Anyone got any suggestions @Hootieleece @Jogo Bonito @warlock

Why not use Loïc Badiashile? Lafont is an obvious one, but you wouldn't go far wrong with your own youngster. Alternatively, perhaps Meslier or Maignan.

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1 minute ago, Jogo Bonito said:

Why not use Loïc Badiashile? Lafont is an obvious one, but you wouldn't go far wrong with your own youngster. Alternatively, perhaps Meslier or Maignan.

None on my young keepers including Loic were good enough. I will look at Meslier and Maignan though, Cheers Jogo.

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Just to prove I'm still playing! We're still having an OK season but I'm really struggling away from home. I simply can't seem to win consistently so am working on an away tactic to try and resolve the problem.

In terms of our progress, we're still very much in the mix for Europe as you'll see below and we still await the League Cup Final. We were embarrassingly knocked out of the French Cup by 2nd division Auxerre in yet another poor away performance. It's looking good for progress in the Europa League but the second leg is away so I'm expecting a capitulation!

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4 days until the cup final and a spate of injuries mysteriously sweeps the squad. Palencia, Silva, Honorat, Youssouf & Diony have dropped. M'Vila picked up a perfectly timed 1 match ban. To be fair, Silva & Honorat would have been on the bench at best but we'll still be missing our main striker and best DM going in to this one.

Time for some people to step up to the plate!

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13 hours ago, raymondafc said:

Is it possible to win an away match on FM20? 

I often do better away. When I'm at home the AI will come and pack the defence and it's sometimes a struggle to break them down. When the AI is at home they'll sometimes open up a bit. 

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Cup Final Day! The bookies give us no chance somewhat unsurprisingly...

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I tend to avoid team meetings like the plague but for some reason I opted to hold one, I told the lads that they can win the trophy even though they aren't favourites and it actually went down well so hopefully that's a provided a small morale boost going into the game!

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The teams are lined up and ready for Kick Off!

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Its a fairly even first half in terms of chances created, 4 of ours were free kicks from wide areas which were all headed over or wide. PSG get a similar free kick wide on the left just before half time and, unlike us, theirs is converted by an unmarked Morelos at the far post! 1-0 PSG bang  on half time. We were doing so well!

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The second half starts poorly as PSG break from the half way line and Icardi easily slots past Ruffier to double PSG's advantage. It feels like this one has gone already. We change our style from our new Counter Attacking away tactic to our home Gegenpressing system to see if we can press our way back into the game, but our season-long issue of actually testing the opposition keeper rears it's ugly head again as efforts fly wide or over with annoying regularity.

Eventually it would cost us the game as PSG were quite happy to observe us being unable to hit a cows backside with a banjo whilst pressing Ruffier into several saves in order to try and keep us in it....

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Alas, our profligacy in front of goal, as so often is the case, has cost us the game, and the cup. As you can see, 11 attempts with just 2 on target compared to PSG's 12/7 split. We've done well to reach the final but it's disappointing to see those stats because overall we were more than a match for them but they have players who know where the goal is.

Never mind... 

 

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4 hours ago, warlock said:

I often do better away. When I'm at home the AI will come and pack the defence and it's sometimes a struggle to break them down. When the AI is at home they'll sometimes open up a bit. 

I wish I could find a solution to my issue! Its soul destroying knowing that you've probably lost before the game even starts when its away from home.

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1 hour ago, raymondafc said:

I wish I could find a solution to my issue! Its soul destroying knowing that you've probably lost before the game even starts when its away from home.

Is it harder to win away? Sure.

Is it impossible? Absolutely not.

I've just gone through an undefeated season with Ajax in season 3. They're a bigger and better team, I know, so not the best comparison :) Just wanted to let you know that it's not impossible :) 

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As I move into the final stretch of the season, I thought I would do an update! We continue to be inconsistent in the league, our away form costing us dearly as we still sit agonisingly close to the European places:

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Our results at home have been frustrating as we have only picked up one point from the last 2. Our European dream finally came to an end at the hands of Arsenal in the Quarter Final after a brilliant performance against Napoli over the 2 legs. We even drew the away leg! Arsenal proved too strong though as, despite winning the first leg at home, a costly error by Macon allowed Lacazette to grab an away goal which ultimately proved decisive. We did manage to take them to extra time but their class told as they ran away with it in the end.

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Overall, we've done OK in the cups, losing to Auxerre was the obvious downer but a final and a Europa League Quarter Final is pretty good in my opinion.

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13 minutes ago, Gungner said:

Is it harder to win away? Sure.

Is it impossible? Absolutely not.

I've just gone through an undefeated season with Ajax in season 3. They're a bigger and better team, I know, so not the best comparison :) Just wanted to let you know that it's not impossible :) 

I'm just having a hissy fit lol. I need to properly analyse my away games and watch the fixtures properly I think. I'm not very good at spotting issues so it will take some time.

I'm just going to complain annoyingly often about it until I figure it out :lol:

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2 minutes ago, raymondafc said:

I'm just having a hissy fit lol. I need to properly analyse my away games and watch the fixtures properly I think. I'm not very good at spotting issues so it will take some time.

I'm just going to complain annoyingly often about it until I figure it out :lol:

Hey, that's the way I often do it! 😁

So keep on doing it! 

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Monaco Season 2 Review

Another 3rd place for me, I started the season strong but faltered during the Winter period and was too late to bounce back.

PSG again dominated the league with them only losing 1 game in the league all season. They also got 101 points total.

I am hoping Neymar or and Mbappe buggers off at some point soon so I can hopefully close the gap.

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Jonathan David was top scorer with 17 goals. I would like him to get a few more next year especially as Wissam Ben Yedder got 37 goals last season.

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Danilo Cataldi was also a star player with most assists and best average rating.

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Benoit Badiashile was ever present and solid at the back. He just gets better and better. He even got 5 goals and 5 assists. 

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Timoue Babayako has been a ball of energy in midfield with excellent passing and tackling completion.

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Eduardo Camavinga continues to mature and get better at a rapid pace. He has improved a lot in training and the experience playing in the Champions League has helped his progress.

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Thiago Almada was a massive success so far with 16 goals, 4 assists and 5 Man Of The Matchs. 10 of his goals were from the penalty spot.

He also massively improved his attributes.

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Gelson Martins banged in a few goals with 14 goals scored, 6 assists and 5 Man Of The Match awards. 

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Viktor Fischer also got his fair share of goals, he scored 14 goals, got 9 assists and 4 Man Of The Match awards. 

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Danilo Cataldi got the clubs Player Of The Season award followed by Thiago Almada and then Benoit Badashille.

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@Ronaldo Beckham solid season overall :thup:

 

My first season has finally come to an end, a 7th place finish was about right as that's basically where we sat for the majority of it. I will be having a good look at the squad and seeing which of the younger B Team players could come through. My biggest priority is to land a new striker, even if only on loan.

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I was surprised that Aholou won the PotY to be honest, don't get me wrong, he's definitely been a consistent performer but still surprising nonetheless.

I'm going to have a long hard look at my tactics over the summer hopefully come back with something that will help to push us on next season.

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