FM22 Global (Less England) Small Club to Big Club Challenge

[Britrock]

17 hours ago, jmarchand said:

Catching up on the progress of the saves, after a couple of weeks away... Some great progress all around! 

@The Art of Drowning Great job on the championship and a pretty good European performance. Great wins against RB Leipzig! 

@Britrock Congrats on getting out of the National! That was a tough one to get out of! Now, for better days! 

 @_JHTB_ Guppy looks like a beast. Hoping that you'll be able to keep him for a while. Great performance with Donegal Celtic! 

 

Thanks, I still haven't finished the season (i got promoted with 4 games to go) but there's a possibility to win the title of I can get the last few games right.

Congrats on your season in Turkey, good luck pushing on next season. Europe is just round the corner and then you're flying. 

[aldojags]

4 hours ago, _JHTB_ said:

What a disappointment, I was on track for a perfect season, that's to say unbeaten and winning all of our games domestically. Incidentally, the 58 game unbeaten run was indeed a 58 match winning run. 

Sack him!!!

[Britrock]

Hyeres 83 FC - 2026/27 season review

Just a fantastic season from the off. We were unbeaten through our first 13 games, had a bit of a wobble through December and early January, but then we went on a 16 game unbeaten run (which started with 6 consecutive wins) and by the end of that we were promoted! We couldn't quite catch Bastia in the end with a bumpy end to the season once we'd confirmed promotion, but it doesn't really matter as we're going to Ligue 2!

Spoiler

There were various stand out players, but Louis Carnot has to be the pick of the bunch. An average of 7.59 over the season, with 22 assists (9 more than anyone else in the league) and 5 goals for good measure. He was incredible in centre midfield, and his set piece delivery was on point all year as well.

Alexandre Parsemain came in to play up front, along with Romeo Vermant, and Parsemain finished with 20 goals and 4 assists while Vermant chipped in with 15 goals and 9 assists. Sangare had been a good servant, but Parsemain has Ligue 2 potential so he'll be able to improve with us at the next level. We were top scorers in the league with 19 more goals than last season, so my main goal of improving the attack was achieved.

At the back, Aaron Kamardin was able to get over me not playing him as a central defender and performed brilliantly as my ball playing defender, while Fouad El Maach returned to the back three alongside Cyriaque Mayounga to give me a stable defence. Tounkara rated really highly, but I always felt he was a bit of a liability and we seemed to defend better when he wasn't on the pitch.

Krasniqi was my new LB as Traore was getting up there in age, while Nadir was the new attacking central midfielder. Krasniqi was excellent, Nadir wasn't quite so good. Leon Delpech was bought in to play DM, but he wasn't as good as Phliponeau so he spent most of the season on the bench

Spoiler

In the Coupe de France we made it to round 9 again, but ran into Strasbourg. I was way more concerned with the promotion push to care at that point, so a team of backups tried their best but fell to a 1-0 defeat.

Spoiler

Obviously the only aim for next season is to survive. We're now fully professional, which is a good start, so fingers crossed I can find some new players to improve the squad's quality and we can avoid the drop and then push on for Ligue 1!

[Thebaker]

@Britrockgood promotion. How are your finances, can you afford to get good players in on pro terms.

[Britrock]

3 hours ago, Thebaker said:

@Britrockgood promotion. How are your finances, can you afford to get good players in on pro terms.

On the balance sheet it's not great, but the board have almost doubled our wage budget and given us an £800k transfer budget so there is some room to maneuver. The first job is getting the current players onto full-time contracts and then working out where we can improve most easily.

[Britrock]

Well, apparently finances aren't too bad as we're getting a new stadium. We don't have money to expand the current one (or it's too old) so we're building one from scratch. Only an 8,000 capacity might limit things if we make the leap to Ligue 1 in the near future but hopefully its got plenty of expansion room!

[jmarchand]

Fun: We'll be playing against Batman Petrol Spor in the Turkish Cup this year. 

I kinda wish they would have been promoted from the 3.League when setting up the save, it's an awesome team name. 

[_JHTB_]

 

Donegal Celtic

Season 12 – Danske Bank Premier League – 1st

Transfers – Best XI – Squad – Key Player – Hot Prospect

 

Overview

Transfer Window:

Incomings: In general we had a much quieter transfer window in terms of new incoming players. Erich Leonardo came on loan to give us another option in central midfield, and Fausto San Juan came to take up our first choice right back spot. All other summer incomings were just back up or future prospects. We did agree a pre-contract agreement with Otalvaro who joined on his 18^th birthday in January who looks like a very good prospect. We did also sign Gabriel Barbosa, just because he was available and willing to join, but he never actually played for us and retired midway through the season, altogether, a bit of a waste of the £7k p/w we were paying him, but I'm hoping at least it helped to improve our reputation.

Outgoings: We did have a few outgoings this season, but unlike those of the season prior all of them were on my terms (although that’s because one player turned down a move away after the board accepted an offer). Somogyi was the major out, he’d been a good player for us for the previous three seasons, but his wage demands were too high to what we wanted to give him so I decided to cash in.  We did also get decent sums for more fringe players Kaue and Jedvaj, the former we were unlikely to get a new work permit even if we had negotiated a new contract.

Europe: We quite easily managed to reach the playoff for the Champions League but were given a relatively tough draw in Shakhtar Donetsk which I wasn’t too upset with, as we’d almost certainly be better off in the Europa League. So, when we found ourselves down by 2 goals with 6 minutes to go in the second leg I was not that disappointed. My players had other ideas however as we scored 3 to qualify for the Champions League group stage.

Feyenoord, Lyon and Manchester United were our reward. Both ties against Lyon we were arguably unlucky to lose, the home tie was pretty even and they scored a late winner, the away tie we went down to 10 before going from 1-0 down to 2-1 up. However, we then were reduced to 9 and then 8 eventually losing 4-2. Feyenoord and Manchester United were too strong for us so we did end up bottom of the group which is disappointing even if expected.

League: In a huge surprise we won the league again. It was again not a close run thing even if we technically did worse than last season, we dropped 5 points to last seasons 3 – dreadful, I know. We were better both offensively and defensively this season though, only 12 goals conceded but 159 goals scored.

Cup: We ended up winning all the cups again this season. Our 6^th instance of County Antrim Shield, 3^rd for each of the League Cup, Irish Champions League and the Irish Cup.  

Next Season

We’re still very much in the plugging away stage, so we’ve got to again look to win everything domestically hopefully we can start building up a little bit more in terms of young prospects so I can start to sell on players more readily I want to without the board selling who I don’t want to sell.

We should have finalised the upgrade of our training facilities to State of the Art over the summer and hopefully we can keep our Youth Facilities not too far behind them. We’ll also be moving into our new stadium for next season which will hopefully improve our overall home support. We finally managed to get to 2.5 stars in reputation now as well which could see us be a more attractive prospect in general.

Players of note

Rhys Guppy – Guppy is too good for our league (most of our player are really but Guppy is another level). He started the season with ridiculous form but it died down slightly towards the end, but still very good. He ended up with 39 goals and 26 assists from 31 league games – granted he was our penalty taker which accounted for 14 goals, but 51 non-penalty goal contributions in 31 games is still incredible. He’s got a contract offer on the table, but also about 23 teams from European top flights interested in him so we may yet lose him this summer.

Ciaran Quinn – We signed him last season but sent him on loan, this season he got a lot more first team involvement. 27 league goals looks weak compared to Guppy but he was sharing game time with another striker who got 30 league goals, a potent attack. Quinn is probably going to be sold this summer though, when he returned from his loan he declared he was considering his end of contract options which will be next year, so hopefully I can cash in on his promising season.

Barry O’Connor – Another great season from O’Connor though less goal output than last season but given he’s a defender that’s not his primary goal. The board did jump on a £1.1m offer for him, but he turned them down, still it’s concerning the board is still accepting offers for our players when we’ve brought in Champions League money.

Youth Watch

Matthew Mulligan – I had previously written off Mulligan as someone who wouldn’t make the grade here, but I think he could act as a useful fringe player, but I am trying to convert him to a defensive midfield for increased versatility.

Ross Kavanagh – Kavanagh was a player I made a back up in the latter part of the season, he offers cover across the back line so will continue to provide support next season too. Hopefully he’ll continue to progress and maybe break into the squad as a regular starter as the season goes on.

Ryan Power – Power is one of the reasons I’m ok with selling Quinn this summer. Whilst he’s not quite as good just yet, he’s looking like a solid prospect so I’m hoping to blood him into the team next season.

Thomas Elwood -  I don't think Elwood is a realistic long term prospect in goal for us. However, he spent this season as our primary back up, though only made one appearance - the Irish cup final. A clean sheet for him on debut is a nice thing for him. 

Overview

[aldojags]

Fantastic season @_JHTB_hope you get the European breakthrough soon, whats the finances looking like? Just keep plugging away with the young players and you'll break the glass ceiling im sure.

[aldojags]

I'm getting fed up of my team this season! Third season in Bundesliga and still averaging 2 goals a game conceded, despite on paper me having what I think is a better team than last season.

 

None of the signings have worked out, and I'm a point above relegation zone at Christmas with unhappy board and unhappy dressing room!

 

Haven't had a clean sheet all year, not 1, and most games I am 1-0 down within 3-5 mins, torture!

[_JHTB_]

15 hours ago, aldojags said:

Fantastic season @_JHTB_hope you get the European breakthrough soon, whats the finances looking like? Just keep plugging away with the young players and you'll break the glass ceiling im sure.

Finances are relatively stable, though I'd suggest technically we would be losing money in general, however, winning everything domestically probably offsets that. Of course, we are consistently reaching group stages in Europe which would have increased our overall balance quite significantly by now if we weren't using that income to improve our facilities. I think I'm 2 upgrades from max on Youth Facilities and on the last for Training Facilities. As we continue to improve the league reputation we should start receiving better TV revenue for just competing in the league (though think it's like £70k presently) as well as increased prize money. This season first place got us 950k (about half our wage bill) but when I was first promoted, 1st would have got about £300k. So really, there's not that much sense in the board accepting offers - this summer although I managed to protest they accepted a lower offer for a player than one I'd negotiated for another team, there is no logic,

 

15 hours ago, aldojags said:

None of the signings have worked out, and I'm a point above relegation zone at Christmas with unhappy board and unhappy dressing room!

 

Haven't had a clean sheet all year, not 1, and most games I am 1-0 down within 3-5 mins, torture!

Hopefully you can turn around the fortunes in the second half of the campaign, when it's not going your way it certainly tends to spiral, so hopefully you can scrape a few victories to instil some belief in your players.

[aldojags]

Well it comes down to this for my fight for survival, had a dreadful season, played 29 games, 1 clean sheet, I don't know what's happened after our comfortable 9th placed finish last year, but we've had a dreadful season. We play some teams around us in the run in, but we're so out of form I don't know what to do to keep us up. Wish me luck! If we go down I reckon I could be sacked, it wasn't a "battle bravely against relegation", it was "avoid relegation", so I'm pretty sure despite my great few years here, that I'd be let go, which would be hugely disappointing!

 

[The Art of Drowning]

Russia have just offered me the national team job, I'm not allowed to take it am I?

 

Edit:  Just seen I am, excellent

Edited January 9, 2022 by The Art of Drowning

[Britrock]

1 hour ago, aldojags said:

Well it comes down to this for my fight for survival, had a dreadful season, played 29 games, 1 clean sheet, I don't know what's happened after our comfortable 9th placed finish last year, but we've had a dreadful season. We play some teams around us in the run in, but we're so out of form I don't know what to do to keep us up. Wish me luck! If we go down I reckon I could be sacked, it wasn't a "battle bravely against relegation", it was "avoid relegation", so I'm pretty sure despite my great few years here, that I'd be let go, which would be hugely disappointing!

 

Huge 6 pointer against Hannover in there. Good luck!

[_JHTB_]

We've managed to get a point in the Champions League, our 15th Champions League group stage game, the first we haven't lost! Would have maybe had the chance to win if we weren't with 10 men for 70 minutes too.

[_JHTB_]

3 hours ago, _JHTB_ said:

We've managed to get a point in the Champions League, our 15th Champions League group stage game, the first we haven't lost! Would have maybe had the chance to win if we weren't with 10 men for 70 minutes too.

Here I was happy drawing to Porto, I'm lost for words.

[aldojags]

2 hours ago, _JHTB_ said:

Here I was happy drawing to Porto, I'm lost for words.

bloody hell!! amazing!!!

[aldojags]

We stayed up...just. Awful season, just awful. Don't know what happened. Has put me off continuing the save, like I have no idea how to fix this. 34 league games played, 1 clean sheet - 1!!!! 26 points from 34 games, would have been enough for relegation any other season of the save, but I scraped it by a point. Deserved to go down. Genuinely at times during my 5-0 defeat last day of season to Bremen thinking I don't know how to play this game anymore!

 

And I spent money and brought in decent players this summer, or so I thought. And completely fell flat on my face.

 

Will do a full season review either later tonight or tomorrow.

 

Will of course carry on, but a massive step backward, and the worst season I've had in FM for many years, we won't get away with a year like that again...And I can't fix it as I've got the usual pennies to spend in the summer and no-one interested in coming to me who scouts anything close to a Bundesliga player.

 

 

 

[Thebaker]

@aldojagsi've had seasons like that.

Maybe signed too many players which affected the team dynamic, with another season things may improve with the same players. I often find myself relying on worse players who still turn in good performances rather than better players who for no obvious reason just will not do it.

[_JHTB_]

17 hours ago, aldojags said:

Will of course carry on, but a massive step backward, and the worst season I've had in FM for many years, we won't get away with a year like that again...And I can't fix it as I've got the usual pennies to spend in the summer and no-one interested in coming to me who scouts anything close to a Bundesliga player. 

Hopefully you'll be able to improve morale significantly in the offseason which could put you on a stronger footing going into the new year - even without new additions as @Thebaker mentioned. I'm predicting a comfortable mid table season next time out for you so don't let me down 

[aldojags]

13 hours ago, Thebaker said:

@aldojagsi've had seasons like that.

Maybe signed too many players which affected the team dynamic, with another season things may improve with the same players. I often find myself relying on worse players who still turn in good performances rather than better players who for no obvious reason just will not do it.

having had time to reflect on it today, this is what I arrived at! I let go of 3 steady German midfielders in the summer, all Bundesliga 2 level players, but solid pros, been with me a few years, all late 20's early 30s. But i wanted to go younger and fancier in the summer, and signed some younger guys, most of which didnt speak German, and then constantly changed formation and starting 11 all season, in real life, that would be enough to cause some problems, so it could be that! GOing to try to pick a starting 11ish, and go with it. I look at my squad and signings and to me i should have enough for mid table but that season just has me spooked!

6 hours ago, _JHTB_ said:

Hopefully you'll be able to improve morale significantly in the offseason which could put you on a stronger footing going into the new year - even without new additions as @Thebaker mentioned. I'm predicting a comfortable mid table season next time out for you so don't let me down 

I hope so mate! I'd kill a man for mid table next year!

[aldojags]

Season Review 2027/28

Table | Fixtures 1 & 2 | Manager Profile | Facilities | Finances | Club Vision

A huge step backward as I came within a whisker of being relegated, falling from 9th last year and touching distance of Europe, to this shambles of a season. Don't know what happened, as discussed above, possibly ruined dynamics and brought in too many young guys who didn't speak the language, we'll see this year coming as they're all coming back! 26 points from 34 games is pitiful, and 1 clean sheet all season tells you all you need to know...Although the media correctly predicted my fall from grace! I remember being offended by the media prediction at the start of the season, they were nearly right! Got myself out the relegation zone on 2nd last day of season with a win over Eintracht Frankfurt, leaving me with an away game to Bremen, with my fate in my own hands to stay up. 3-0 down after 18 minutes, 5-0 at full time, but thankfully the teams below me could not capitalise and I survived.

Team

Player of the season, and I think only player with above 7 average rating - Mattias Vuksanic, on loan from Inter for his third year in a row. Been incredible player for us, way too good for us, we would have been dead and buried without his goals, and we cannot replace him for next year. Inter looking to play him in first team so I doubt we'll see him again...

 

The 3 seasons I've been in Bundesliga I've conceded a crazy amount of goals, even in our good years, but our keeper has never let us down, had another good year this year, saved 3 pens, and in the summer got his first cap for Poland. That said, I've just signed a new young keeper who I'm really excited about, so Beilica will need to keep it up as I am so tempted to get the kid in, but not that soon as I need stability!

 

Hernandez was a new signing for the left wing, attributes wise, looks incredible! Flattered to deceive though, with a few performances like 5.9 5.7 at times! Both our full backs had shocking seasons, trying to retrain this guy to play left back I think he looks like a great full back to bomb on for me, he did nothing as a left winger. But he looks the part I'm sure you'll agree!

 

Valderama was brought in on a free - like Hernandez, looks incredible, got a few goals, but I guess they are both young foreigners and will need time before they start to play up to their attributes. I've had offers from half the Bundesliga dfor this guy, all insulting £2m etc so all rejected, he has a release clause for £9m they will have to pay that if they want him.

 

Iwo Kaczmarski in midfield was ok, I like him.

Yanming was a new free transfer from China - going to retrain him as a right back but I like the mentals and physicals, plus he's a big shirt seller apparently!

 

 

 

Youth Intake

Preview | Intake | Squad List View

Pleased with this intake, got a few here who I think could make it, have screenshotted the best ones...

Sascha Wagner

Ron Berndoff - looks really good, but strength...oops!

Sebastien Bothe

Kevin Huke

 

There's a couple more, including a cracking looking keeper - but Imgur has stopped working and it's late so I will hopefully show you him in a few years when he's first choice!

Next season

 

 Usual playing with my hands tied behind my back, so much so that a phenomenal looking 17 year old would rather stay at Dresden (15th in league below last year) rather than come to me, a club now entering 4th consecutive year in Bundesliga, plus I offered a wee bit more money! I mean, look at him!

 

Signed a few decent players for next year, but as said above, Imgur is playing up tonight so strugggling with these links. We'll see what happens next year, board just want to finish in relegation playoff so they have lowered expectations based on my horror show last year! Need a good start hopefully and a nice boring midtable season.

 

I have a feeling I'll get pumped all season again!

 

Season	Div	Pos	Cup	Ave Att	Europe	WC/Euros	ECC	EC	EC2	Ballon D’Or	Highest world transfer
2022/23	3. Liga	1st	N/A	9087	N/A	WC - France	Liverpool	Inter	Atalanta	Mo Salah L'pool	Youri Tielemans PSG (£82m)
2023/24	Bundesliga 2	8th	1st rd	13,108	N/A	Euros - England	PSG	Milan	Sevilla	Mo Salah L'pool	Lautaro Martinez PSG (£102m)
2024/25	Bundesliga 2	2nd	2nd rd	14,433	N/A		Liverpool	Inter	Lille	Mo Salah L’pool	Joao Felix PSG (£124m)
2025/26	Bundesliga	12th	2nd rd	18,452	N/A	WC Brazil	Liverpool	Arsenal	Dortmund	Erling Haaland Man City	Jeremy Doku AC Milan (87m)
2026/27	Bundesliga	9th	2nd rd	17,639 (new stadium)	N/A		Real Madrid	Atletico Madrid	Milan	Kyllian Mbappe Real Madrid	Yusuf Demir Chelsea (£103m)
2027/28	Bundesliga	15th	2nd rd	21,857	N/A		Liverpool	Borrusia Mgladbach	Arsenal	Kyllian Mbappe Real Madrid	Jadon Sancho Real Madrid (£128m)

Edited January 10, 2022 by aldojags

[_JHTB_]

Away at Atletico Madrid, no way we win right? Wrong, 3-0 victory. I don't get it, I don't think my team is anywhere near good enough for that kind of result and yet we've pulled it off. A good second leg and we're into the Semi-Final of the Europa League many years earlier than I'd have thought it possible for us.

[corinthiano]

That's an awesome result! Do you think these results could be down to the opposition underestimating you?

[Britrock]

Absolute scenes @_JHTB_ They'll be dancing in the streets of Donegal tonight!

I've just been offered my first interview, with Nantes feeling like I've impressed them enough to try and tempt me to Ligue 1. Obviously I rejected it...

We're currently in the relegation playoffs of Ligue 2 after 16 games which is much better than I feared. In our first 7 games we lost 6 of them and only won one, scoring 3 goals in total and conceding 12! I made a few tactical tweaks, generally making us more defensive to try and prevent us getting ripped apart quite so easily. Things have picked up a bit since then, including a 5-1 thumping of Toulouse which I couldn't quite believe as I was watching it. We're still in touch with the rest of the league (one win could jump us up to 14th), so if we can put together a half decent run there might be a chance that we can somehow escape relegation. Considering we're 450-1 to win the league, with 19th place only at 50-1, I think we're doing quite well!

[_JHTB_]

On 12/01/2022 at 00:24, corinthiano said:

That's an awesome result! Do you think these results could be down to the opposition underestimating you?

Perhaps, combined with us riding on momentum as we win pretty much everything domestically. On the flip side, I don't actually know how good my team is in the grand scheme of things nor how good my tactic is. 

 

19 hours ago, Britrock said:

Absolute scenes @_JHTB_ They'll be dancing in the streets of Donegal tonight!

I'm guessing they got drunk to end up in Donegal rather than Belfast. (Donegal Celtic is actually a Belfast based team)

 Not too many dancing though, we still have an extremely low core support and would probably be rivals with the other Belfast teams (currently the teams occupying 2nd to 5th in the league for an all Belfast top 5) who wouldn't want to be celebrating our successes I'm sure!

[Britrock]

3 hours ago, _JHTB_ said:

I'm guessing they got drunk to end up in Donegal rather than Belfast. (Donegal Celtic is actually a Belfast based team)

 Not too many dancing though, we still have an extremely low core support and would probably be rivals with the other Belfast teams (currently the teams occupying 2nd to 5th in the league for an all Belfast top 5) who wouldn't want to be celebrating our successes I'm sure!

Well that's just confusing! 😂

I imagine your support is much better than mine, my average attendance in Ligue 2 so far is 618! I've set the record for lowest ever attendance in the division multiple times! 😂 we've only gained 250 people since promotion and not even doubled our first season attendance when they were in National 2!

[aldojags]

2 minutes ago, Britrock said:

Well that's just confusing! 😂

I imagine your support is much better than mine, my average attendance in Ligue 2 so far is 618! I've set the record for lowest ever attendance in the division multiple times! 😂 we've only gained 250 people since promotion and not even doubled our first season attendance when they were in National 2!

618 in 2nd tier France!? That's a little bit low!!

[Britrock]

3 minutes ago, aldojags said:

618 in 2nd tier France!? That's a little bit low!!

Yep, look at the state of this

[_JHTB_]

1 hour ago, Britrock said:

I imagine your support is much better than mine, my average attendance in Ligue 2 so far is 618

My average attendance is generally bloated by away supporters in honesty. Actual home fans for regular would be about 370 people, just when half the games are local derbies we get about 500 home fans. Only when we play Linfield do we have 1500 home fans. My average attendance column in my updates is a bit false as it includes European escapades which we inevitably get more people at. 

[_JHTB_]

 

Donegal Celtic

Season 13 – Danske Bank Premier League – 1st

Transfers – Best XI – Squad – Key Player – Hot Prospect

 

Overview

Transfer Window:

Incomings: A very quiet for incomings for the first team. The main incoming was signing Smith on loan from Manchester City. I also didn’t learn from signing Barbosa last season and signed another real player in Joao Pedro though, unlike Barbosa he did make a couple appearances for us.

Outgoings: The summer only saw a few loans out of the club however, we did make a major sale in January. I sold my first-choice keeper Gemma, I wasn’t planning to sell him, especially with the £200k offers that were flooding in for him so I changed his asking price to £2.5m which Brescia duly bit at. What surprised me here was that the board didn’t just accept the bid, as they have with every other 7 figure bid for our players, so I was able to negotiate the transfer and managed to squeeze £4.9m for him. We’ll miss him (23 clean sheets in 26 league games this season) but that’s a good price for him. We again sold a few fringe players

Europe: At this stage we’re seeming pretty consistent at reaching the group stage of the Champions League each qualifying tie having a game which we won at least 4-0 so it was never in doubt.

PSG, Barcelona and Porto were in our group, I thought maybe we’d have an outside shot of making 3^rd place battling with Porto, but we had yet to get even a point in our previous Champions League campaigns. I’ve already covered this mostly, we drew home and away against Porto before an incredible home victory against PSG to get 3^rd place and into the Europa League knockouts.

In the Europa League we got fairly kind draws for the first and second knockout rounds to Sampdoria and Genk both of whom were really struggling domestically. We did draw the first leg against Sampdoria but the other 3 legs we won without conceding which set up the Quarter final against Atletico Madrid. Away in Madrid we picked up an incredible victory 3-0 effectively nullifying the tie for the second leg. Not that it mattered as we won that too 1-0. Celtic actually knocked out Roma to set up a ‘Battle of the Celtics’, turns out Celtic are a tougher opposition than Atletico, they beat us 1-0 at home (though they had 16k of an 18k attendance) before a battling performance at Celtic Park only saw us draw 2-2 on the night and lose out on aggregate. A shame we couldn’t do the unthinkable and reach a European final, but we did way better than I’d have thought so I can’t really have any complaints.

League: We beat both our offensive and defensive records this season, scoring 162 and conceding just 7. Those 7 goals came in 5 games so 33 of 38 games we didn’t even concede a goal. Needless to say, we retained the title to make it 6 in a row. On the final day, we actually beat second place Linfield 8-0 which just goes to show how far ahead of everyone domestically we are.

Cup: Domestic dominance all round. No scares in the Irish Cup, Irish Champions League or the League Cup. The County Antrim Shield was the closest to a scare as we were drawing with 15 minutes left in the Semi-Final but won easily enough in the end.

Next Season

In the off season we should be finalising our youth facilities which means we don’t have any more outlays required for infrastructure. This combined with our European exploits netting us a lot of cash could see me go a bit more spend happy this summer. Previously I’ve been tentative to spend decent money on players because I didn’t want to give the board the opportunity to sell players for not much more than I bought them for, but I need to start improving on the player trading front to gradually improve the overall quality of the players at all levels of the club. I do want to try and convert some of my loan signings to permanent if I can as well.

Hopefully we will get a good reputation boost due to our European form which again will help in player recruitment and I’m hoping I can secure another 3^rd place in the Champions League next time out so I can improve the countries competition coefficient and hopefully secure easier passage into Europe for the other teams in the league which will only help long term.

Players of note

Rhys Guppy – I’d suggest every season I manage to keep Guppy will see him feature at the top of this list. Slightly worse in overall output (37 goals 22 assists) to last season, but a higher average rating. He’s now considered a club legend and I can understand why.

Josh Jones – In spite of Guppy being so good, he didn’t end up our top scorer this season. That was instead Jones, on loan from Manchester City. Jones did play more games than Guppy, but 39 goals is still a very good goal return. I did have a bid agreed to sign him permanently, but unfortunately, I couldn’t afford his wage demands.

Paulo Jose – He’s been on loan with us for several seasons now, but this was his best to date. 15 goals and 12 assists from central midfield is a strong showing for the young Brazilian.

Youth Watch

Matthew Mulligan – Featured a few more times for us this season. He’s not the long-term solution for us, but still a useful fringe/back up player.

Ross Kavanagh – Kavanagh provided back up for both fullback positions. He didn’t do fantastically all told but he was a decent enough option for us there.

Ryan Power – Power might have got some more games but for the form of Jones. He still got a good chunk of games both at striker and in central midfield though. 13 goals and 6 assists is not too bad going for a squad player.

Overview

[aldojags]

@_JHTB_love your updates mate - amazing save you have there, must be a lot of fun!

 

I've had saves where I'm ridiculously dominant domestically and you think you're getting bored, but every time the wee trophy animation comes up and you win something it's all worth it! Imagine you held onto Rhys Guppy his whole career, you could get close to 1000 goals from him!

 

 

[aldojags]

Well, after my disasterous season last year where I avoided relegation by a point, things have started well following season.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

Haven't really changed much asides from 1 or 2 new faces but nothing major, went to a 4-4-2 and just keeping it simple, already kept 4 clean sheets in 9 league games, when last season I kept 1 all year from 34 games!

 

So it's a great start, can already see im in no danger at all, and I've got couple of youth products starting every week too who are coming along nicely, still think European qualification will be a bridge too far, but I'll be happy just for boring mid table after last years shambles!

 

Thinking Kevin Meissner may be reading as a wonderkid soon surely? Look at that value too, I have nobody remotely near that in my squad.

 

Spoiler

 

[jmarchand]

Oooh yeah!

Full report coming somewhere likely tomorrow or over the weekend. 

[Britrock]

12 hours ago, Britrock said:

Yep, look at the state of this

I forgot to include this table to show just how pathetic my attendance is compared to the rest of the league. I'm below a third of the attendance of Dunkerque, the next lowest attended team! The top team, Angers, averages over 15,000 a game!

[jmarchand]

@_JHTB_ Great updates and good progress in Europe. A semi-final is already a great achievement, but I believe you can push that even further! 

@aldojags I have faith that you'll bounce back and that your team will deliver this year. 

@Britrock Brutal attendances, I would think that a town on the mediterranean coast and the proximity to Toulon would draw a bit more people as you progress. Or maybe everyone is just busy at the beach during your matches... 

 

[Britrock]

@jmarchand I think they've all gone to Le Levant Island, the naturist island off the south coast of Hyeres 😂

https://www.hyeres-tourism.co.uk/the-golden-isles/le-levant/

Edited January 14, 2022 by Britrock

[jmarchand]

  

Season 7 | 2028-2029 | Challenging for European places

After a good season in the SuperLeague, our focus turned away from the places in red in the standing and towards the ones in green at the top of the table. I know that we're not yet at the level of the big 4 in Turkey (Galatasaray, Besiktas, Fenerbahçe and Trabzonspor), but my quiet hope was to squeeze in as the best of the rest. Conveniently, there was a 5th European qualification spot available in the league...

 

Transfers

Since we were already quite squeezed and getting out of foreign spots in our lineup, most of our attention turned to scouting Turkish players, as I had confidence in the guys that were already filling these spots, but there was still quite a bit of interesting movement. 

Révélation

 

In

As you can see, most of these guys are locals, and some of the names are already familiar. Yunus Kefeli rejoins us after being on loan for a few seasons where he became our leading assist-maker on the left wing. His story is interesting: I had to sell him to then-SuperLeague-Altay in 2024/25 for 40k€, but got him back again on loan after a half-season of him not playing. He's been on loan with us ever since and this year I made the loan a permanent re-transfer as he proved that he could play at this level, recouping our 30% of the transfer costs... 

Burak Ince was signed in the creative midfielder role, coming in with us after Samsunspor got relegated to the 1.League. Got him for 1.3M€ which was a bit higher than his relegation release clause (I don't understand whiy this was not triggered at 800k€), but he contributed well to the team with 7 assists (and not holding a Foreign spot). 

Jeredy Hilterman got in with usas an experienced striker, offering a good rotation option for our young guys and a bit more stability. I was hoping that his 20 long shots and his 15 in Free Kicks would get him to score a few bangers, but that really didn't happen, but he contributed well with 12 goals in 13(10) appearances. 

 

Out

With the signing of Hilterman, we came with an overload of foreign forwards (of course, it's a disease of signing more strikers). I have decided to put both Denis Abdallah and Sebastian Ramirez up for sale. Abdallah has been underperforming with us, but still had loads of potential and is Tanzania's all-time highest scorer with 24 goals in 47 caps and had a 2.2M€ release clause. He immediately attracted a bid matching the release clause from Valencia, but the board challenged my acceptation of that offer (!!). Since I needed the board cooperation to help me improve the facilities, I let them have their say this time, they tried to up the value to 2.4M€ and Valencia withdrew their bid. Tables were flipped, but I had to settle for a 1.8M€ bid from APOEL Nicosia... I'm still a bit mad at the board for losing 400k€, but that'll teach me to trust them... He's been playing quite well form them since then, so we might cross paths in European competitions in the future. 

Also out the door was Damion Probodziak, who started to complain about his usage and wanted to be used as a striker, but was never able to finish anything, not even the lunch his mom made for him at school. I had initially signed him as a winger, but there is no way I'll have a striker with 5 finishing on my roster. And off to a 1.League team he went, where he started rotting on the bench. Good riddance. 

 

After surviving in the Super League last season, I was looking for consolidation and to start pushing up the league ladder. The media was still betting that we'd be relegated and were tipped at finishing 15th, with a 450-1 odd of winning the league. While this wasn't our expectation, a mid-table finish was in my mind. The board and everybody else was tipping us to fight bravely against relegation, we were in a nice spot in which we were in position to crush everyone's expectations and do much better. 

The Foreign spots were not shrunk like I had thought last year and still have these 10 foreign spots (with 6 max on the field at all times). Foreign players are like <insert your favorite thing to collect here>, you always want N+1. They have so much appeal, I always find a better one that what I had previously... Which leads to registration nightmares twice a year, to the point where I've been specifically looking for Turkish players in the last part of the year (without too much success, though), as I have confidence in my current foreign players to continue to lead the club and develop well. 

 

League Performance

We started the season on a very bad note, a 4-0 thumping away at a distinctly average Giresunspor. I whipped the team and they recovered quickly, showing that this unfortunate defeat was just a hiccup. Among the impressive performances is a 1-0 steal at Besiktas, which was the performance of the year from our new keeper. 

We then saw that over the course of the year, we were still significantly below the big 4, but at the same time, significantly above most of the other teams in the division. We thus finished in 5th place, which was a very good campaign for us. Impressively, there was a 3-way tie for 2nd to 4th place and Galatasaray winning the title this year. 

Révélation

 

Over the course of the year, we've had a few pretty significant injuries, which forced our hand in the transfer market. Antoine Semenyo, our starting right winger and which I foreseen as a our main creative force damaged cruciate ligaments and was out 7-9 months. Our other winger, Yunus Kefeli, broke his lower leg in a training and was out for 6 months. This left us very depleted on the wings, which jolted the new signings in the first team right away. Fortunately, they delivered quite well. 

 

Turkish Cup

Once I saw that we were getting a good positioning in the league, I decided to do the minimum to please the board in the Turkish cup and played a heavily rotated team in the 6th round, which we lost to Kayserispor. The real drama came in the final, between Fenerbahçe and Hatayspor, who had a surprise run. It was played after the last match of the season and if Hatayspor won it, they would clinch the last European place (instead of us in the 5th place in the league table...)

Fortunately, Fenerbahçe came out strong and did just enough to secure a 1-0 victory, sending us in Europe for the first time! 

 

The Team

Small tinkering on the tactics, mostly running with the 4-3-1-2 asymmetric formation, but sometimes changing to a 3-5-2 or a 4-2-3-1, depending on how injuries went. There was lots of squad rotation also due to the injuries and surviving our foreign spot congestion... 

Révélation

 

Individual highlights

Niko Lippold - DC, DM, MC - 3 goals, 3 PoM, 7.27 avg. rating

Lippold grew from strength to strength this year, emerging as a really our leader in the defence. He's on a 14m€ release clause now, but has come to me at the end of the season stating that he wanted to move on to win titles. I could not tell him that it's going to happen with us, so he's waiting for someone to bid for that release clause. He's still has 3 years left on that contract, so fingers crossed he gets to change his mind or I'll get 14M€. But I will need to plan for a rather short term replacement.  

Révélation

 

John Rivera - GK - 29 apps, 13 clean sheets, 31 conceeded, 7.28 avg. rating

This guy is the main reason why our defence was so much upgraded this year and could be credited with a few wins entirely to himself. He holds a foreign spot AND forces us to suit a Turkish keeper on the bench, but he's worth it. At the tender age of 20 years old, he has so much going for him and will be a star as long as I can keep him along with us. 

Révélation

 

Zain Al-Din Salman - ST - 14 goals, 1 assists, 2 PoM, 6.96 rating

Salman was not as dominating in our team as last year, but still ended up as our top scorer for the year with 14 goals. He didn't hit as much stride as he did last year and might not reach the potential I thought he had, but he might still be worth a fair amount of money once we get a good replacement at some point on the medium term. 

Révélation

 

Walter Tolosa - DM,MC,AMC - 26(4) apps, 1 goal, 5 assists, 6.95 avg. rating

He has been attracting a bit of interest this year, Tottenham actually asked us if he could go on trial with them. My answer was: "lol. no." He has been firm in the midfield, holding the line and distributing the ball well. The Colombian connection is strong.  

Révélation

Ismail Olgun - AMR, ST - 26(5) apps, 2 goals, 8 assists, 7.01 avg. rating

Signed at 19-year old as an emergency replacement from Besiktas for a whooping 1.7M€, he has featured extensively in the team especially because he is Turkish. He also is featuring in the U21 Turkish team, scoring two goals. I think he's going to be great for the future. 

Révélation

 

For the future

Our first player which came through our academy started to feature in the side at the end of the season. Özgür Berke came with us in 2027 and dominated the 2.League in the first half of the season, with 3 goals and a 7.41 average rating. He was pretty good has already improved a bit (don't be fooled by the down arrows here, I've already talked to him about that...)

Révélation

Ender Ak also has been progressing pretty well in a loan and already looks pretty good at 16 years old. He feels a bit on the slow side and will likely go out on loan next year, hopefully to a 1.League side. 

Révélation

 

Youth Intake

Prompted at a golden generation, there are a few guys that seems to have the potential in making it to our team at some point in the future. Sinan Sahin and Furkan Atmaca look especially promising. 

Révélation

 

 

 

Other News

- Finances are increasing steadily, now with 14M€ in the bank. We still have the 16th largest payroll (out of 18). Spending 6.6M€ per year and the top 4 are anywhere between 33 and 52M€, so we still have lots of ways to go. 

- Infrastructure is building up quite steadily, even though I have to argue with the board when it comes to the youth setup. 

 

Looking Back: 

- Comfortable mid-table finish: Qualified for Europe, that's a resounding success! 

- Be more responsible defensively: Success through a keeper, but he still had to save us a few times. 

- Transfer in a Turkish first team player: Burak Ince and Ismail Olgun both filled in this box. SUCCESS! 

 

Looking Forward: 

- Qualify for the ECII group stage

- Ease one youth prospect in the first team

 

Summary

Year

Season

League

Position

Points

Goal Diff

Cup

Europe

Europe Ranking

Avg. Attendance

Top Scorer

Top Assist

Training

Youth

Junior

Youth Rec

1

2022/2023

2L

11

51

-4

3rd Round

NA

NA

-

4013

Serhat Mutlu (10)

Sezer Yildim (9)

Basic

Basic

Fairly Basic

Limited

2

2023/2024

2L

1

75

32

4th Round

NA

NA

-

4257

Onur Demir (12)

Yunus Kefeli (10)

Basic

Basic

Fairly Basic

Limited

3

2024/2025

1L

7

57

17

5th Round

NA

NA

-

5765

Damion Probodziak (17)

Yunus Kefeli (10)

Basic

Basic

Fairly Basic

Limited

4

2025/2026

1L

2

69

39

5th Round

NA

NA

-

5973

Eren Aydin (19)

Mohammed Sabah (9)

Basic

Basic

Fairly Basic

Limited

5

2026/2027

SL

13

36

-5

6th Round

NA

NA

-

7642

Zain Al-Din Salman (16)

Yunus Kefeli (7)

Basic

Basic

Fairly Basic

Basic

6

2027/2028

SL

7

53

-4

Qtr Final

NA

NA

-

7533

Zain Al-Din Salman (20)

Antoine Semenyo, Yunus Kefeli (9)

Adequate

Basic

Adequate

Fairly Basic

7

2028/2029

SL

5

63

16

6th Round

NA

NA

--

8148

Zain Al-Din Salman (14)

Ismail Olgun (8)

Average

Below Average

Good

Average

[Tyer]

I'm starting this challenge over.  Looks like my Brora Rangers save won't get fixed.

[Tyer]

 

 

I picked this team because they randomly have a 15500 capacity stadium in the 4th tier of sweden??? lol should be fun.  (Also having 2 gray stars in youth recruitment should at least mean it doesn't get bugged on lvl 1)

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 15, 2022 by Tyer

[jmarchand]

Il y a 2 heures, Tyer a dit :

I'm starting this challenge over.  Looks like my Brora Rangers save won't get fixed.

It’s a shame that you had to lay to rest a save in which you have invested so much and which was very very well started. Wishing you the best of luck and great regens in Sweden. 

[Thebaker]

@Tyer Halmia have among the best facilities for any club at that level as they used to be a much bigger team. They share a ground with Allsvensken Halmstads which is why its so big, Sleipner are the same.

@jmarchand Looks like you are making up ground on the top 4, interesting formation you have going there.

[_JHTB_]

On 13/01/2022 at 22:59, aldojags said:

I've had saves where I'm ridiculously dominant domestically and you think you're getting bored, but every time the wee trophy animation comes up and you win something it's all worth it! Imagine you held onto Rhys Guppy his whole career, you could get close to 1000 goals from him!

I don't mind it that much, though, there's nothing I'd like more than a bit more of a challenge for the title as it'll mean the league as a whole is stronger and has more pulling power. All it means is league games I can play the game very passively, not much I need to tweak so can play them pretty quickly without doing much. I have thought about getting an instant result skin though, but I'd be annoyed if I lost a game using instant result not knowing if I could have tweaked things to spur us onto a win.

I don't see Guppy getting to 1000 goals, even if that would be really cool to see, he's only on 178 from 311 appearances so probably under the ratio he'd require. Goal contributions I could see him reaching though 119 assists takes the total to 297 from 311 appearances. 

23 hours ago, jmarchand said:

Great updates and good progress in Europe. A semi-final is already a great achievement, but I believe you can push that even further! 

I don't think we'll emulate the same this season to be honest, we were blessed with a bit of draw luck at times - I think we are more than good enough to win the Conference League, but not quite there for the Europa League and nowhere near for the Champions League. Unfortunately, whilst we have managed to get some good players, the league and team reputation isn't good enough to attract the top talents to the club just yet.

A nice steady year on year improvement for you in Turkey though. I like the look of Rivera, goalkeeper is one position I struggle to find the correct player for I can certainly see him attracting unwanted attention from bigger clubs. Hopefully you maintain your upwards trajectory in the league and have a good European campaign next season.

On 14/01/2022 at 00:04, aldojags said:

Well, after my disasterous season last year where I avoided relegation by a point, things have started well following season.

I knew my faith in you to get a comfortable mid table finish wasn't misplaced - 10 more points and you've already surpassed last years total. Meissner looks very good, hopefully you can tie him down to a nice long term contract.

14 hours ago, Tyer said:

I'm starting this challenge over.  Looks like my Brora Rangers save won't get fixed.

Sorry to hear it won't get fixed, but hopefully Sweden will treat you right! Look forward to reading about your new journey.

 

[Tyer]

Thanks everyone!

I do agree after playing half a season this might be an easier challenge than my previous one.  The 4th tier seems pretty easy once I brought in some decent players. We will see how it goes once I get to 3rd or maybe 2nd tier if it gets alot harder for me.

[_JHTB_]

On 13/01/2022 at 22:05, _JHTB_ said:

Europe: At this stage we’re seeming pretty consistent at reaching the group stage of the Champions League

Hmmm.....

[Britrock]

5 games left and I don't think we're going to survive We've lost at least 5 points due to goals conceded after the 90th minute and our form against Orleans, Bastia and Dunkerque will be our downfall  (2W, 2D, 2L)

[Britrock]

Hyeres 83 FC 2027/28 Season Review

As expected we didn't quite make it and were relegated back to the National. We put up a much better fight than I expected and we weren't relegated until 2 games left but in the end we didn't quite have the quality needed. We spent most of the season in the relegation playoff, but couldn't quite hold on to that at the end of the year and fell into the automatic relegation spots. As a sign of just how small the club is, our objectives for next season are still only to avoid relegation from the National!   Hopefully we can bounce straight back up, but the board has dropped us back to semi-pro and the budgets have been slashed again. It's going to take a while to challenge PSG at this rate!

We conceded less than Orleans in 17th, but we just couldn't score enough only bagging 33 goals all season. Annoyingly our xG was 37.63 so we were 5 goals worse off, 5 goals which would have made a huge difference. The worst xG loss was to Quevilly-Rouen near the end of the season where we won the xG battle 2.04 - 1.15 but they won 1-0 with a penalty that was their only shot on target. That means we lost a game that we effectively won 2-0 on xG

Spoiler

No players really stood out this year, there was just a lot of bad/average performances all over the place. We bought in Abdourahim Aïdara on loan from Lens, the first time I'd got anything out of our affiliation. Carnot was as good as ever, although at a slightly lower level than last season. We made a lot of signings in the hope of it making a difference but it never did. Renzo Tytens was bought in for £200k and was pretty rubbish all year, Zahui was the biggest xG criminal of the year (1 goal from 3.93 xG) and Boutsingkham got sent off in his first 2 games! What a spectacular disaster all round.

Spoiler

I really want to get promoted straight back up next season, I think I can work the tactics out a bit earlier to have a better shot at staying up.

[Thebaker]

@Britrocki suppose it was always going to be tough as your club is so much smaller than the others. What are the finances like with the new stadium?

[Thebaker]

2031

Table | Squad | Transfers

Started the season in reasonable form where the team was in most matches or on top but just kept losing by the odd goal or drawing. With an 8 match winless run the team became established near the bottom of the league although always with 2 teams below them. As the season went on the games became more one-sided with more heavy defeats and only a few wins.  The team performances were not helped by 9 reds and 135 yellows which led to me never putting out my strongest team.

Thanks to the the 2 bottom teams being so poor (i got 8 points from them) the team finished in the relegation playoffs. In the 1st leg away against Atvidabergs the team was 2nd best until they had a player sent off allowing me to draw 1-1. In the home leg the team was again under pressure until they again got a player sent off and i won the game 2-0 to stay up.

In the swedish cup the team made the group stages for the 1st time. Against superettan Taby and Norrby the team were comfortable winners but narrowly lost 2-3 to Allsvenskan Hammerby although they had 38 shots on goal.

Finances increased considerably due to the prize money (16th got 700k compared to 0 in the leagues below). As a result i was able to convince with difficulty the board to increase the youth recruitment and junior coaching at the end of the season.

Player performance was ok in most cases although the FB's and wingers were poor. The best player was Cakaric although Noori also stepped up well.

Season

League

Position

Swedish Cup

Europe

Top Scorer

Top Assists

Attendance

Training

Youth

Junior

Youth Rec

Notes

2027

D1 N

11th

Not entered

N/A

Noori (11)

Kruger (9)

330

Poor

Poor

Fairly Basic

Basic

2028

D1 N

3rd

1st Rd

N/A

Noori (9)

Kruger (15)

336

Poor

Poor

Average

Basic

2029

D1 N

5th

2nd Rd

N/A

Noori (18)

Nordfeldt (10)

337

Poor

Poor

Average

Basic

2030

D1 N

2nd

2nd Rd

N/A

Wood(16)

Wood (9)

461

Poor

Poor

Average

Basic

Promoted

2031

Superettan

14th

Group stage

N/A

Noori (14)

Cakaric (7)

513

Poor

Poor

Adequate

Fairly Basic

 

[aldojags]

@Tyerwelcome back! Sorry way things ended for you with Brora after such an amazing save but good to have you back.

 

@jmarchandgreat season, can't remember exactly but weren't Galatarasay like 9th last year? I remember seeing a screenshot of someone doing a Turkish save and being stunned at how far they had fallen off, was it your save? Great keeper and that first youth prospect - get him in the team soon he'll be a starting quality player before long!