The Ultimate Football Manager Challenge

[changingman]

Looking for any recommended European nations (and levels) to make a start in with this challenge. I usually start in Sweden and work my way up from there but looking to change it up this time. Thanks! 

[vikeologist]

23 minutes ago, changingman said:

Looking for any recommended European nations (and levels) to make a start in with this challenge. I usually start in Sweden and work my way up from there but looking to change it up this time. Thanks! 

What are you after; progressing in the challenge quickly, or an interesting challenge?

(As a preliminary piece of advice, if you're going to start outside the Big European 5, choose a nation with 2 domestic cups, since people usually fall behind on the cups).

Edited April 17 by vikeologist

[changingman]

1 hour ago, vikeologist said:

What are you after; progressing in the challenge quickly, or an interesting challenge?

(As a preliminary piece of advice, if you're going to start outside the Big European 5, choose a nation with 2 domestic cups, since people usually fall behind on the cups).

Bit of both really (appreciate that doesn't really help! haha) 

Beauty of Sweden was ability to progress relatively quickly (short seasons) but also easy to get appointed at the start of the game. Ideally a "second-tier" nation outside the big five but with enough levels that you can get a job easily, if that makes sense? 

[vikeologist]

8 minutes ago, changingman said:

Bit of both really (appreciate that doesn't really help! haha) 

Beauty of Sweden was ability to progress relatively quickly (short seasons) but also easy to get appointed at the start of the game. Ideally a "second-tier" nation outside the big five but with enough levels that you can get a job easily, if that makes sense? 

Nation with 2 cups advice still stands then.

However, there are 2 usual / easiest ways to start this challenge.

A) start in China / S Africa and finish in Europe

B) Start in English lower leagues (or i guess any of the Big 5 lower leagues you can get a job in, but for some reason the other 4 tend to be quite tough), shoot up the english league as soon as poss, (probably changing jobs a couple of times), do Europe then the rest of the world.

Which is the best approach kind of depends how good you are. 

But people have started elsewhere recently like Hungary or S America, (I think partly to do something different)

 

[changingman]

Cool, ended up loading a handful of European leagues and eventually took the reigns at second division FAC Wien in Austria 

[JamLUFC]

Season 2032/33 - Liverpool / Mexico

Been a while since I played this save for a while but I haven't been able to get into anything else so thought I'd give this a go, and after winning the league with Liverpool I decided to stay for another year with the bonus of getting the Mexico job at the start of the season ahead of the 2033 Gold Cup. I had three goals at the start of this season - a) a domestic cup, b) the Club World Cup and c) the Gold Cup. Winning 2/3 would be ideal but all three would get me to 10/32 for the Challenge.

The season didn't start well as I lost in the League Cup 3rd round to Man United, but we did go on to win the FA Cup getting revenge on Man United in the final 3-1. We did also reach the semi finals of the Champions League which would have been a nice bonus at this stage but fell short thanks to a defeat against PSG. In the Club World Cup it was a similar story as we got a semi final against old rivals Man United but came up short in a 2-1 defeat.

The final leg of my trophy target was the Gold Cup with Mexico, which we predictably coasted to the final of and met a USA side who we had already beaten twice within the past 12 months. In typical FM fashion though in the game which mattered the most we went to a 2-2 draw and ended up losing on penalties. Only one target ticked off but it did allow me to get out of England and look for other jobs. I loaded some new leagues up as there was nothing available in the English, Spanish or German leagues, and got lucky with the Juventus job coming up and managed to make the jump to Turin for the next club for me in the attempt to reach 10 trophies

 

 

[Cheekybananafm]

Decided to give this a go, I completed it a good few years ago now and my attempts since have ended quickly! Managed to get a very good job as my first port of call, heading to Canada with Valour FC

The 2024 season has just ended and they finished in 8th place, a big job to start with so hopefully my rep will improve quickly

[jrobertgordon13]

I'm heading to Japan with FC Gifu.

[jrobertgordon13]

I ended up restarting on FM24 Console. I joined Marumo Gallants in South Africa.

[jrobertgordon13]

Season 1 - Marumo Gallants FC - Ultimate Challenge

 

League:

We had a terrible run of form near the end that knocked us out of promotion contention.

 

Cup:

I wasn't expecting much here

 

Transfers:

I couldn't bring in many players because the finances were terrible, so it was really about accepting whatever offers came our way.

 

Best Player and best Youth Intake Player:

2023/24    Marumo Gallants    9th
 
Challenge Progress

Club

0/10 top domestic leagues (Insert nations)

0/10 domestic cups ()

0/5 club continental championships ()

0/1 club world championship

International

0/5 continental tournaments ()

0/1 world tournaments ()

 

[PukkiParty]

Fukushima United - 2023

So, I start my Ultimate Challenge journey in the third tier of Japan, at Fukushima United FC. 

Straight away there are a few very positive and notable things with this particular move. 

They are doing well in the league and could be promoted if we have a great second half of the season. 

 

 

The squad isn't amazing, but there is a bit of depth, which I think is pretty key at this level, as you can get by with a few average players. 

 

They're also pretty well off with a £1 million in the bank so hoping I can get a few coaching badges courses out of them from the very off. 

I look forward to updating you when the season is over and (hopefully) we're promoted to the J2 league. 

[PukkiParty]

2023 Season - Fukushima United FC - J3 League - 2nd (Promoted)

 

I'm chuffed to say that I've got Fukushima United promoted in the first season. As I mentioned in my previous post, they were not in bad shape when I took over so knew it was possible and a storming second half of the season sealed promotion. 

 

The best players this season were Kota Mori and Yuta Nobe. Yuta Nobe was the top scorer from the right wing with 16 goals and Mori had the highest average rating this season at 7.27. Unfortunately, they're both not interested in signing new deals so it may be the last that we see of them with the Fukushima Dream Junkers.

Also been given a transfer budget of £2 million + for J2 league so hoping with some good signings and the momentum of promotion we can have a strong campaign and perhaps make the play-offs! 

Thanks @JamLUFC - I've stolen your spreadsheet idea with the career summary at the footer

 

 

 

Edited May 24 by PukkiParty