Moneyballing My Way To A Champions League Title in Every European Nation Part X: The FM23 Experiment

[shaunvamos]

January 2033

 

 

 

 

 

We've righted the ship to start 2033, but PSG are breathing down our necks, and Lyon have gone completely unnoticed by me all season but they're right there too. 

 

 

 

Transfers (Out)

 

 

 

Some big money departures this January. Ilic only had 2 seasons with us, but he had a massive impact with 13 goals and 13 assists in 46 league games. We make 18m profit on him, which we've stored for a big recruitment drive next season. Other players leaving us include Oristanio, who made 152 apps over 7 seasons, and netting us a 4.5m profit; Jobello, who only made 1 app but still generated 600k profit; Pere, with 33 apps over 2 seasons made us 400k; and finally Aitor Aizpura, who only made 12 appearances for us but Bilbao see something in him and offered us ridiculous money. I had to take it. We made 33m profit on that transfer! We now have a whopping 73.4m as a transfer budget, so we're going to hit the preseason hard next season. The only problem is we lost 3 our starting CM and then the next 2 in line to replace him. But our depth is such that we are unlikely to struggle without them.

 

 

 

 

 

Meanwhile, Everton realised what bad business they made buying Beraud for as much as they did. You won't see us complain though!

[shaunvamos]

February 2033

 

 

 

 

 

A busy month, and we've finally been knocked off top spot, albeit on goal difference. On a more positive note we made a great start in the Champions League round of 16 in Leipzig.

[shaunvamos]

4 hours ago, ManUtd1 said:

I didn't help...

If I bottle this I may have to go into exile far, far away....

You've got a spot on the coaching team for me in Georgia, right?

Right?

[shaunvamos]

2033 Youth Intake

 

 

 

Rodrigue Cipriano 12A*  -  Christian Vidal 12B  -  Valerio Vespa 12C*

 

 

A strong intake, and I really like the look of our top prospect, as quality academy keepers are few and far between for us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shaunvamos]

March 2033

 

 

 

 

 

We scrape a couple of results, and we've kept pace with PSG. Lyon appear to have fallen away, so it's a 2 horse race.

 

 

 

 

 

Our Champions League campaign is likely over as I don't think we can stop the Haaland hurricane.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

 

 

An unbeaten start in a group we should qualify comfortably from.

[shaunvamos]

April 2033

 

 

 

 

 

Don't ask me how we beat PSG in between beating Bayern Munich in both legs. I have no idea how that happened, only that it did. We sit top by 1 point, with only Troyes away and Bordeaux at home to go. PSG have Rennais away and Lorient at home. It's going to be tight. The last 4 looks like the end for us in the Champions League, as a 33 year old Mbappe put us to the sword. 

 

On another note, quick shout out to the first youth academy prospect to break into the first team, Brahim Cabrol. He's been on the cusp for the last season or two, dominating the U19s, and sitting on the bench in a few games. He was initially coming off the bench to start the season but has quickly risen to being first choice striker. He's repaid the faith with 12 goals in 27 league games, and 18 in 40 overall. What a journey.

 

 

 

Oh, and he's a wonderkid! That's just popped up 

[ucdark]

This is the season!!! you can do it !!

[shaunvamos]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Knocked out of the Champions League semis, destroyed in the French Cup final after resting our entire first team to focus on the league, and boy what a good decision that was! 

We did it 

 

It took us until the final day, and a nervous 75+ minutes of waiting, but we did it. We become the first team in 10 seasons to take the title away from PSG. This is also the first time in 52 league seasons in this thread that I've won the top division in a nation. It's been a long wait 

 

 

 

Best XI

 

 

 

Blas Gil  -  Axel Galindo  -  Andrea Basile

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Record Breakers

 

 

 

 

 

Award Winners

 

 

 

 

 

Progress

 

 

[shaunvamos]

3 hours ago, ucdark said:

This is the season!!! you can do it !!

You were right  

[ManUtd1]

PS-***ing-WHO?!

[shaunvamos]

2033 Preseason

 

 

 

A very, very expensive preseason as we look to bolster our squad to retain the Ligue 1 title and push for the Champions League semis and beyond. In what seems like the first time in an age we have some legitimate first team players among them. Let's take a look.

 

 

 

Centre Back

 

 

 

Til will probably end up being a steal as he becomes our first choice CB for the season.

 

 

 

Central Midfielders

 

 

 

Ermek might be the best 16 year old in the game that I've seen so far. He was only on a youth contract at Zulte Waregem and was more than happy to sign for us. He instantly becomes the best CM we have and with all that room to go looks set to have a huge season.

 

 

 

 

 

Paolo was a late signing designed to boost our striker department, but he's capable as a CM too, and he'll partner Ermek until at least January.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Club World Cup doubled as a preseason tournament, and we did really well, finishing 3rd with good wins over Man United, PSG and Juventus. That bodes really well for the future if we can beat those guys, especially with our team being stronger now.

 

 

 

 

Predicted 4th, but we know we're good enough and that's what we're aiming for.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

We win the Nations League in my first piece of silverware for France.

[shaunvamos]

August 2033

 

 

 

 

 

A perfect start to the league, but we weren't the only ones. Nice and PSG also haven't conceded yet, which is impressive.

 

 

 

Transfers (Out)

 

 

 

Posavec leaves for 900k profit after 16 appearances for us.

 

 

 

 

A nightmare group, possibly the toughest one bar Group H. Nevertheless, we're going to have to beat teams of similar calibre if we want to win the whole thing, so this will be a good test.

[3maldini3]

On 31/03/2022 at 15:34, shaunvamos said:

Thanks for your kind words

I have shared it throughout this thread, but for convenience I'll add the most recently saved one here.

The generated faces have been replaced using a program called NewGAN. It's a massive database full of fake faces that you can use to replace newgen faces. For me the SI faces become a bit homogenous after a while, and this just adds to realism I think. Here's the link for it: https://fm-base.co.uk/resources/newgan-facepack.1266/

FMCU.xlsx 174.07 kB · 0 downloads

Please tell me you have a way to fill up all the attributes without typing them one be one?

[shaunvamos]

September 2033

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We've lost some ground on PSG, who still haven't conceded.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

 

 

We were unlucky to draw with Ireland as they scored in stoppage time, but we were out xG'd 3-1 so can't be too disappointed. We made up for it by smashing Liechtenstein though.

[shaunvamos]

16 hours ago, turgi said:

Please tell me you have a way to fill up all the attributes without typing them one be one?

Yes there is a way  

You create the custom view in game, and then save it as a web page (hit Ctrl+P on the keyboard to bring it up). Then you find the file in the FM game files (Documents/Sports Interactive/Football Manager 22), open it, and then copy the contents and paste it into the Excel file.

[shaunvamos]

October 2033

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A worrying slump in form, but we've been on heavy rotation balancing out the players fatigue levels which will only benefit us in the long run.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

 

 

Dominant, but it will come down to our game against Ireland to secure automatic qualification.

[shaunvamos]

November 2033

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another loss in the league, and we'll need a large stroke of luck to qualify for the Champions League knockouts.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

 

 

World Cup qualification secure, but Ireland gave us a real scare again. They're going to be trouble in the tournament I think.

[shaunvamos]

December 2033

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We fall further down the table in the league, but completed an absolute miracle in the Champions League, flogging Plzen while Barcelona did the same to Milan, and we're through to the last 16 of the Champions League once more.

 

 

 

 

 

We draw Real Madrid, but we drew both of our games with them last season. I have an okay feeling about this. Good to see Lyon and PSG through too, but Lyon have a better chance of progressing I think.

 

 

 

 

 

Yet another excellent preview.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

 

We get a highly favourable group, drawing Morocco and Paraguay. Nice to see India, Syria and Thailand qualifying, as well as Jamaica, Trinidad, Angola and El Salvador.

[shaunvamos]

January 2034

 

 

 

 

 

We start 2034 with a vengeance, going undefeated and conceding 0 goals. 

 

 

 

Transfers (Out)

 

 

 

A few backups leave, with the highlight being the move to Gent by Joselu. He made 106 appearances over 3.5 seasons, but was beginning to slide down the pecking order. We make nearly 6m profit off this sale. 

[shaunvamos]

February 2034

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah, we aren't winning the league this season. At least we have a very slim lead in the Champions League.

[shaunvamos]

2034 Youth Intake

 

 

 

Bartosz Zalewski 13A  -  Nasser Roy 13B  -  Vivian Martin 13C

 

A good but not great intake. We get 2 promising players, but their personalities aren't great.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shaunvamos]

March 2034

 

 

 

 

 

We are in serious danger of not even qualifying for the Champions League automatically at this stage. France has picked up the 4th spot, but the Europa League winner has to have qualified automatically as well. But hey, we're through to the last 8 of the Champions League.

 

 

 

 

 

We face Bayern, headed by a 33 year old Haaland still at the peak of his powers. We did beat them at the same stage last year though, so fingers crossed.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

Two comfortable friendly wins as we look towards the World Cup fixtures.

[shaunvamos]

April 2034

 

 

 

 

 

The Champions League spot is still not sealed, and we blow a 3-1 lead in Leipzig to head into the home leg all square. The winner of that game plays either Arsenal or Hertha. Hertha are up 2-1 heading to the Emirates.

 

 

 

 

 

A very impressive effort from the U19s, comfortably winning the Youth Champions League. Hopefully we can follow suit soon.

[shaunvamos]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Holy crap, we've won the Champions League! How fitting that the only player to really feature in the first team that came from the academy was the one that scored the winning (and only) goal. We kept up with Arsenal for most of the match too, and then Bilal McNamara got a straight red in the 85th minute. Despite that, we earned a penalty in the 92nd that could've sealed the win. I nominated our keeper to take it that could've been interpreted as a moment of arrogance, but I just thought it would be special. But it was not to be, as the penalty was saved. But we held out, and now the France part of the journey is complete!

 

I'll finish the World Cup with France, give a quick review, and then onto the next nation.

 

 

 

Best XI

 

 

 

Blas Gil  -  Axel Galindo  -  Andrea Basile

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Record Breakers

 

 

 

 

Award Winners
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Progress

 

 

[shaunvamos]

Just a quick recap of the save so far while playing through the World Cup:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The ranking of the teams at their peak:

 

 

 

 

And finally, the Best XI and 2nd XI of players I've found over the course of each save:

 

 

 

[zethani]

Interesting that Curzon Ashton had the best overall squad but no player is making the first team of the Best XI.

Next stop is Portugal?

[shaunvamos]

World Cup 2034 Review

 

Here's a quick overview of our squad, and the ideal lineup:

 

 

 

 

 

It is a very, very old squad (the oldest in the competition in fact), which can probably be attributed to the FM mechanics of newgens not developing quickly and older players retaining their attributes for far too long. Seriously though, only 7 players in the squad are newgens, which is less than 1/3, and this is 14 seasons in. It definitely needs a revamp next FM after the overcorrection they made for this FM. But they're the best men for the job, so I'll keep picking them. 

 

 

 

 

 

Our group stage games came and went without too much fuss, especially concerning the win over Paraguay, where we wore them down to score 5 goals in the last 20 minutes of the game, and Palo Diaby scoring a hattrick in 8 minutes. The win over Morocco was dominant too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nothing super controversial happened in the group stage, with the most noteworthy results including Mali beating Portugal and Algeria beating Belgium to top their respective groups. Some big scores though, with Holland smashing South Korea 11-1, Uruguay over Egypt 7-0.

 

 

2nd Round

 

 

 

The scoreline was close, but the xG was not (1.28-0.08).

 

 

 

 

Not really any upsets here, everything happened that was meant to.

 

 

 

Third Round

 

 

 

A Theo Hernandez double sees us overcome Argentina in a early gut check. 

 

 

A few tough games here, as Holland beat Brazil on penalties, England smash Belgium, Portugal beat Spain, and the dangerous Ireland are eliminated on penalties by Germany. It's an all European quarter final field. How boring.

 

 

 

Quarter Finals

 

 

 

Well, no one saw this one coming! I expected a win, but to score 8 goals in a World Cup quarter final is pretty impressive, even if the 3 conceded are not.

 

 

 

 

 

Our game wasn't the only goal fest, as Germany needed 5 to put Holland away, and England dispose of Turkey with little trouble. Italy also knock out Portugal, but we have our eyes set on England, who beat France in the Euro 2032 final on penalties. We've already bettered the effort in the last World Cup, where France exited in the 3rd round, but a win is expected by the powers that be higher up the food chain.

 

 

 

Semi Finals

 

 

 

Ugh, this hurts so much. We had 2 disallowed goals and 3 players ruled out of the tournament with injury. We ran out of gas, and still nearly beat the English. Camavinga missed the only penalty of the shootout, and we play for bronze.

 

 

 

 

We lost to Germany in the 3rd place playoff, meaning my time as French manager was probably done regardless of the save finishing anyway. 

 

 

Who won the World Cup?

 

Who cares.

 

 

I'm off to Portugal  

 

 

 

 

[shaunvamos]

9 minutes ago, zethani said:

Interesting that Curzon Ashton had the best overall squad but no player is making the first team of the Best XI.

Next stop is Portugal?

Yeah I think they were just a more balanced squad throughout the XI, but I also used wingers in that formation and they were probably the best players in the side.

 

Correct, next is Portugal

[corinthiano]

Congrats on finishing off France! Look forward to seeing who you get in Portugal!

[ucdark]

Portugal is it, it's gonna be the last part of the story?

[3maldini3]

4 hours ago, ucdark said:

Portugal is it, it's gonna be the last part of the story?

 

According to the rumours here in Melbourne he is keeping Israel for last.

Edited April 4, 2022 by turgi

[shaunvamos]

Part VI: First Journey Outside the Big Five

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Welcome to Santa Marta, a small town in Northern Portugal, home to around 8,000 people. The predictions for the Portuguese are all weird, so I just went for the team with the lowest reputation. They've got a pretty cool looking kit, and the town has also produced a Portuguese international, Eurico, who played for all 3 of Porto, Benfica and Sporting Lisbon with 38 Portuguese caps. Let's hope he won't be the only player from there to play for Portugal.

 

 

 

 

 

We have a very small squad, but some room in the wage budget, but this team looks okay to start off with, 3 points lower than what we started with in France. We also have 3 Nigerians and 3 Brazilians in the first team which is interesting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The set up for Portugal. Portugal has a land border with Spain and a maritime border with Morocco, so they go on the list as nationalities we can sign. Due to the historical ties with Brazil, controversial or not, they've also been made playable and we can sign players of Brazilian nationality. The rest of the Big 5 have been added to simulate some realism and also so they can offer big money for our players when the time comes. That won't be for a while though! 

[shaunvamos]

On 05/04/2022 at 05:14, ucdark said:

Portugal is it, it's gonna be the last part of the story?

 

On 05/04/2022 at 09:43, turgi said:

 

According to the rumours here in Melbourne he is keeping Israel for last.

 

Portugal definitely won't be last, and Israel won't be either  I'm going in order of the UEFA club coefficients, but will skip Russia because I don't think they're in European competitions in game anymore.

[zethani]

It could have been interesting to add also Angola and Capo Verde, that have similar cultural and football ties with Portugal, but the setup looks nice.

Good luck

[shaunvamos]

8 minutes ago, zethani said:

It could have been interesting to add also Angola and Capo Verde, that have similar cultural and football ties with Portugal, but the setup looks nice.

Good luck

You know what, you're right! I have those leagues loaded too, so I'll definitely add them  

[corinthiano]

You could throw in Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique whilst you are at it, maybe even São Tomé e Príncipe

 

[zethani]

Let's not forget about Timor-Leste, since we are at it... 

[Makoto Nakamura]

Might as well add Macau into the mix as well!

[shaunvamos]

14 hours ago, corinthiano said:

You could throw in Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique whilst you are at it, maybe even São Tomé e Príncipe

 

 

13 hours ago, zethani said:

Let's not forget about Timor-Leste, since we are at it... 

 

9 hours ago, Makoto Nakamura said:

Might as well add Macau into the mix as well!

 

 

Done, done and done 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm glad I didn't do this for France, England or Spain, it would've taken ages for anything to process! But this will be pretty cool to try, I'll also make myself available to manage any of those former Portuguese territories national teams should the opportunity arise

[shaunvamos]

Preseason 2021

 

Transfers (In)

 

 

 

A massive influx of talent here, as loan restrictions don't seem to exist in the lower divisions, and every single loan has been for free. I also went and signed a whole bunch of youngsters for free to fill our youth team, but some may feature as subs in the first team this season.

 

 

 

Centre Backs

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right Wing Back

 

 

 

 

 

Central Midfielder

 

 

 

 

 

Strikers

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An excellent preseason, but we played mostly non-league teams. That being said most of them had a higher reputation than us, so I'm pretty happy so far.

 

 

 

 

 

The influx of signings shoots us up the predictions table, predicted 17th out of 60, or 3rd in our group of 10. The top 2 qualify for the Promotion Stage after 18 games, so we'll see what happens if we get to that stage.

[shaunvamos]

August/September 2021

 

 

 

 

 

A nice undefeated start to things here, including two cup wins.

Edited April 8, 2022 by shaunvamos

[shaunvamos]

October 2021

 

 

 

 

 

We suffer our first loss and are out of the cup, but we've moved into 2nd.

[shaunvamos]

November 2021

 

 

 

 

 

Just the two games in November, but we make a statement by beating the top team.

 

[shaunvamos]

December 2021

 

 

 

 

 

Perfect to end the year, and we've hit top spot with Vila Real breathing down our necks.

 

 

 

 

 

Poor, but that's okay. We just need more warm bodies in our youth setup.

 

 

 

In other news, the East Timorese manager was offered the Japanese position, which he took. As East Timor is a former Portuguese colony I'm eligible in this save to apply for the job, so I did, thinking nothing would happen.

 

 

Something happened.

 

 

 

 

I wasn't expecting international management to happen this early, but I don't think I'll complain. Ranked 191st in the world, there is almost zero expectations to succeed here, it's a nice change, as one loss in my previous international management exploits were essentially a mandatory death sentence. I look forward to not having to have an average age in the squad of over 32 as well for once 

Edited April 8, 2022 by shaunvamos

[shaunvamos]

January 2022

 

 

 

 

 

We avenged our only loss in the league so far in a big way against Sao Martinho, and face Vila Real for the chance to go 3 points clear in our group.

Edited April 8, 2022 by shaunvamos

[shaunvamos]

February 2022

 

 

 

 

 

A playoff spot and winning the group secured

[shaunvamos]

March 2022

 

 

 

 

 

We won our initial group despite the loss, but then were smashed to open our account in the Promotion Group.

 

 

 

National Team

 

 

 

 

 

Two really good results, as Jordan are 87th and Yemen are 151st. We don't qualify for the Asian Cup, but were expected to get flogged so this is a huge bonus.

 

 

 

 

[zethani]

Great start of the save.

East Timor FA must be flushed with cash if they can pay you all those intercontinental flights ehehe

[shaunvamos]

2022 Youth Intake

 

 

 

André Kamga 1A  -  Kelvin Nascimento 1B

 

 

 

Oof, what a horrible intake. Oh well, as I said, they're just warm bodies to keep the U19s going.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shaunvamos]

26 minutes ago, zethani said:

Great start of the save.

East Timor FA must be flushed with cash if they can pay you all those intercontinental flights ehehe

In today's COVID climate I would say I'm just watching the games via Zoom