Climb The Ladder 3 (ENDED)

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2107

Milestone

Suomen Cup

Veikkausliiga

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Champions League

Squad & Transfers

The first thing that is the most clear from this season when it came to transfers was that we were raided by some of the biggest clubs in Europe for our best players. This was to be expected, but we made over £200m from it. In terms of the players that remained, Lazar Mladenovic who signed this season stepped up in a big way and averaged an 8.00 this season and scored 47 goals. Riccobono has also stepped up for us. I have not used the money we made, and instead leave it for next season to be used.

Manager Thoughts

Another league and cup double, but the points are dwindling fast, so this is why I have taken the decision that this would be our final season at the club. We were never really going to win the Champions League, we look just a little unable to really beat the big sides and I just think we would be wasting our time thinking that a miracle might happen in the coming seasons in Europe. It does leave us in an awkward position because really I don't fancy going somewhere else in Finland and trying to compete with HJK because they are so much better than everyone else, so we may have to take a very close look at Latvia and see if any enticing jobs come up. Either way we are leaving and awaiting our next job in management. Points-wise we are exactly half way in this leg.

Manager Profile

Summary

Edited December 24, 2022 by TerminalPortugal

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2109

After leaving HJK, were out of football a season before a very good job came up in Latvia. The Valmiera job was one of the jobs that I was hopeful would someday come up because they are one of the better sides in the country. They are not the best side in the country that honour is reserved for RFS, but they are probably the second best team in the country. The board were pretty lax on targets and just wanted a top half finish. We wanted to win the title and the cup if possible.

Latvijas Kauss

Virsliga

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

We arrived at the club in pre-season so we had plenty of time to plan what changes we needed to make, and while the team was competitive in Latvia, I wanted to reinforce the team hard. Strangely we had a lot of money to spend and a lot of wages space, so we opted to go on a bit of spree, buying up any players I felt would improve the team. In the end this really helped as Bartha for example scored 51 goals this season as the Hungarian hit the ground running for us. Homsi was also very prolific, another new signing. Tenev was an assist machine for the left wing another new signing, and that was really the story this season, we brought in new players and completely transformed the side.

Manager Thoughts

It is was very close between us and RFS until we hit the latter end of the season and then we just started to move away from them. We ended the domestic season undefeated as we only drew twice to RFS this season and every other game we won. We complete a Latvian double that really helps us advance further this leg.

Another point I would like to raise is that since I arrived in Ireland I have consistently referred to the previous leg as UEFA18 and this one as 17 and that is wrong, since there are 21 legs in Europe so we are actually in UEFA20 now and completed UEFA21 in Ireland. Just thought I would state this now before people got confused with this challenge.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2110

Stadium Expansion

Latvijas Kauss

Virsliga

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

We scaled back our transfer expenditure this year as there was not really the targets available for us. Still the team is still good enough to challenge across Latvia. This year while Bartha dropped off a bit and was in and out of the team Homsi continued his fine form and Kohler came into the side and performed well enough as well. Tenev continues to be the best player for us with 22 goals and 29 assists.

Manager Thoughts

I was disappointed about the cup exit, but we did win the league so at least we continued to make progress. It does mean that if we can win the double next year, then we would have enough points to move on to the next leg, or in the unlikely scenario where we would win the Europa Conference League again we would have enough points. It is certainly our target for next year, so we will see if we can indeed accomplish that. This year we were good enough to stave off the challenge of RFS, and we did lose for the first time in the league after two years in charge of the club. We got knocked from the Champions League to the Conference League, which in someways is a blessing as we have a much better chance of doing something in the Conference League however remote that chance is.

Manager Profile

Summary

 

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2111

Latvijas Kauss

Virsliga

UEFA Europa Conference League

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

This year we managed to take advantage of a few agent offers which brought in Vitor and Jose Antonio whom we would have never found without help to identify them. They have a lot of potential and improve us, but the lad who had an immediate impact was Milenov, the Bulgarian smashed in 45 goals to be the top goalscorer this season. Tenev and Jimenez, where the best players this season with bags of goals and assists for us.

Manager Thoughts

The league and cup double is enough to see us through this leg, and I am happy that we have finally been able to get through the Finnish and Latvian leg, as it was not an easy one when you have no prospect of winning European honours and only a couple of competitions to fight for and very dominant teams in the league. We now move on to UEFA19 which has both Iceland and Norway and once again is a normal leg requiring 500 points to complete.

UEFA20 COMPLETE

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2112

We waited until the latter stages of the Norweigan league season before the first job came up and this job was immediately pretty acceptable to me, in the form of the Valerenga job. Valerenga were having a horrible season just above the relegation places and the board wanted me to guide us back to the mid-table. Valerenga are predicted to finish in 5th place, so they are one of the better teams in Norway without being expected to challenge for the league title. Norway itself has some quite annoying registration rules that rely on players to have been home-grown apart from a very select number of players in the squad so it can be immensely restrictive, so I know that Norway is always a little bit more difficult than it might look.

Eliteserien

Squad

The team is kind of fine, the main issue is the gap in defensive midfield and the few players we have of decent quality who play central midfield/attacking midfield not a position we play in our formations and as such it leaves us really needing to get rid of these players and replace them with defensive midfielders. There are other areas that are an issue, we have one goalkeeper and he is actually pretty injury prone which causes us issues, so we will need to see what we can do about that. In terms of individual performances this year, I will reserve judgement as we took over towards the end of the season and we did not really have the impact I would have liked so we will see what becomes of this team.

Manager Thoughts

It is was an inauspicious start really as well barely improved from where we started with the club, fundamentally I think if we have the full strength team out, we can beat anyone as the final day defeat of Rosenborg showed, but there are so many gaps in the team, that doesn't happen very often. The other thing I noticed was that we could dominate games and still lose 2-0, which shows that it seems we are not putting away the chances we get. There is plenty to resolve, but the transfer market will have to be approached with a mind of who we let go of, because as mentioned Norway is arguably one of the most annoying countries to manage in with the home-grown rule they have. So I guess we should try and buy Norweigan if possible.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2113

Stadium Expansion

Norwegian Cupen

Eliteserien

Squad & Transfers

As is clear the transfer windows were pretty packed and we had to plan when players left how we would replace them and also how we would rebalance the whole squad since last season that was one of the main problem. Sanchez was replaced by Maurstad and Dreyer, who being Norweigan gave us scope to add foreign talent elsewhere. Cruz came in mid season as a real top quality keeper for our level and he added a lot to our defensive abilities. In the end we sold over £50m worth of player and brought in almost £30m worth of players and I would say while the team is not really better, it is better balanced in all areas.

In terms of performances I have to highlight Dreyer who scored 43 goals this season in his maiden season and he is getting rave reviews in the Norwegian press, and Maurstad has also been a brilliant foil for him up front.

Manager Thoughts

The first thing to say is it ended up being a great season for us, as we managed to accomplish a league and cup double. Bodo/Glimt were right on us all season and actually spent the majority of the season on top of the league and then they absolutely crumbled at the end of the season as they lost the deciding game 7-1 at home to Kristiansund, and that handed us the title. Molde and Rosenborg have both underperformed, and when we beat Rosenborg in the cup final it meant they sacked their manager so they are an option for us for a move. Strangely we had a chance to move earlier in the season. Molde sacked their manager earlier in the season and they poached Bodo/Glimt's manager whom we were having a battle with for the title. I would have taken the job had we been able to take it at the end of the season, but since that wasn't an option and we were in both the league and the cup hunt and they were only in the league hunt, I decided to stay put.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2114

As previously mentioned, the Rosenborg job became available after we had defeated them with Valerenga in the cup final and Rosenborg were a club with more resources and arguably a better side that just needed to be managed properly. We took an interview and got the job. The board wanted us to win the league and the cup so that was what we set out to do. The club were also still in the Europa League for that current season.

Norwegian Cupen

Eliteserien

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Super Cup

UEFA Champions League

Squad & Transfers

When we arrived at the club, we looked over the team and there was undoubted quality, but they had way too many foreigners to register them all in the league. So we decided the best way forward would be to simply keep the team as it was and have a team that could player in the cup competitions and another for the league and that way we could hopefully keep mostly everyone happy. Obviously we knew that there would be some who would question why they had not been registered in particular competitions but we would manage each scenario. I though that attempting to try and sell a load of players which would make our team worse, would be a worse option overall. In the end Yahir Whiteley would be the player with the most goals and best stats, but that likely came more from the fact that he was registered for the league so had more opportunity to score against weaker opponents, whereas the likes of Ourdy Tshongo was facing Europa League opponents. So it is difficult to say who did best this season.

Manager Thoughts

When we jumped ship to Rosenborg I never considered that it was remotely likely that it would be a solitary season at Rosenborg before we managed to get our points target, but when we won the Europa League which caught me by surprise, it was imminently possible, but then we lost in the league and again it looked like it wouldn't happen this season, but I had forgot about the Super Cup. So when we narrowly won that in extra time, we were back on for a single season finish, and we accomplished that when we finally won the Eliteserien with plenty of games to spare. That spells the end of UEFA19, and next time we will be in one of Wales or Scotland for UEFA18.

UEFA19 COMPLETE

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2120/2121

We would be waiting for quite a while, almost 5 and half years before we would get another job. Nothing really interesting had come up in this time. The most interesting job was probably the Motherwell and Inverness Caledonian Thistle jobs, but they had been in compromised positions. The ICT job had come up again at the start of the season, but I just felt something better would come along. So we waited and then all at the same time lots of the top Welsh club jobs became available apart from The New Saints job. So we took our pick and I liked the look of Connah's Quay Nomads best. The board simply wanted to finish in the top half, I guess because TNS are so dominant you can't really expect to beat them, but we would certainly try.

Nathaniel MG Cup

Welsh Cup

JD Cymru Premier

Squad & Transfers

The squad is massive because we don't have a reserve team. In terms of transfers there was no real method, just try and buy as good a players as possible. In the case of some of them, I looked at the expected best team in the season preview and looked at which I could buy and it turned out it was the non-TNS players. So I was able to raid the rest of the teams for as good a player as I could find and it worked out. The strikeforce were very good for us this year, with Swattridge, Mooney and Brown banging home goal after goal with Swattridge being the best this season. Morgan Jones also deserves as shout for his 31 assists this season.

Manager Thoughts

After such a long time out of managing, I was happy to find myself and Connah's Quay and it was a tough task to try and dethrone TNS, as they did not lose a league game for almost the whole of the regular season, losing only to Cefn Druids a few fixtures before the end and then to us in the final fixture, this allowed us to go one point ahead of them into the Championship Round, and from there they lost consistency and we were as consistent as ever as we picked up the title. The League Cup, we picked up earlier in the season when TNS were brutally efficient and we were lucky to get away with a penalties win, in the Welsh Cup, we beat them fair and square, red cards for them saw to it that we would have a field day and a 4-0 win. A good start in Wales and I hope we can continue.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2121/22

Nathaniel MG Cup

Welsh Cup

Scottish Challenge Cup

JD Cymru Premier

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

In the summer we picked up Ashton Jarvis, who was superior goalie for us from Cardiff Met Uni, and we then picked up anyone we felt could add some additional fortitude to the team and that came in the form of Bradley and Roberts from TNS. We did lose Cole Print-Gowshall to Hearts, but had him back on loan this season. He will be missed next season, although we may attempt to see if we can secure his services for the coming year, as I don't believe Hearts will have much use for him in the first team. This season was a breakout season for Jordan Brown as he scored 54 goals, but Gareth Swattridge continued to be key as he scored 47 himself and put on 26 goals for stellar year.

Manager Thoughts

It was a great year as we picked up four trophies, including the Scottish Challenge Cup. The Challenge Cup is essentially a competition for the lower league Scottish sides and the Welsh champions appears to be invited to participate in the competition. It has never been won by a Welsh side looking at its history so it was a pretty big achievement. I did consider whether because it was a multi-country competition whether it should be counted a continental, but quickly I decided that it is just another domestic competition, so it is only worth 30 points and depreciates with each subsequent win as per the rules. A great season all in all, but we are now at the point, where we need to think about leaving because the points are going to dwindle. The Celtic job in Scotland actually came up as the manager retired from football, but we were late in noticing and they had already appointed the manager of Benfica as the replacement, which was a little annoying. We would have foregone the points on offer this season as it was right at the start of the season, but it would have been the perfect job. Apart from that nothing much else has come up, so we will proceed with the season keep vigilance, but failing getting a move it will be our final season with the Nomads. It is also worth noting that we have now been in the game for about 100 years, although obviously we have spent a portion of that time looking for jobs, so that is an interesting milestone to cross.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2122/23

Nathaniel MG Cup

Welsh Cup

Scottish Challenge Cup

JD Cymru Premier

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

We only made one transfer this season and that was to bring in Jonathan Davies from TNS who I felt was an upgrade in defensive midfield. In terms of the team, Swattridge, came back as the top goalscorer again this season and Jordan Brown this time became scorer and provider as again we did a great job at the top end of the field, with Mooney and Harris also deputising and getting plenty of goals this season.

Manager Thoughts

Another domestic treble is a very nice return, but it only got us an addition 44 points and it is now time to leave the Nomads as we look for pastures anew. We have made a lot of progress and generally speaking we have done amazingly here at Connah's Quay as we have now denied TNS a domestic trophy in three years, which is impressive. They don't seem to be anywhere near sacking their manager, which would have been a job that I would immediately look to take so we will be leaving and at the moment there is nowhere particular that looks available to join that tells me points are close. We will wait it out and see what comes our way and I am sure soon we will resurface either in Wales again or in Scotland.

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[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2123/24

Upon leaving Connah's Quay Nomads, we were almost immediately able to find new work as the manager of Heart of Midlothian (Hearts). They had had a poor season and the manager had got the chop and the board wanted to get us back into Europe again. As is known Scotland has essentially forever more been dominated by two club; Celtic and Rangers, and at this time in history, it had been very dominated by Celtic; they had won every single league title since 2043/44, so essentially had won every title for 80 years straight. Rangers more recently had been finishing second but for a time they even stuggled to do that regularly. The last time a team that was not Rangers or Celtic had won the league was Aberdeen in 2032/33. So you could say Scotland was more or less one horse race. Hearts were probably the fourth best side in the country, but a long way behind Celtic in particular.

Scottish League Cup

Scottish Cup

cinch Premiership

Squad & Transfers

When I arrived at the club, I liked the players, but they were obviously mostly a cut below Celtic's players, and we made only one signing who I felt would add something significant to us and that was Liverpool striker James McCorry. The Northern Irishman had barely played at Liverpool but he had superb qualities for the Scottish league and I thought that he could smash the goals in, and I would be proven right as he finished up top goalscorer for us with 47 goals. This season was really a team effort where almost everyone was averaging a 7.00 or above as pretty much we banded together to pull off something special.

Manager Thoughts

When I took the job at Hearts, I did not expect to win the league. I hoped that we may be able to pick off the Scottish Cup and get some points on the table and again perhaps the right job might come up, or qualifying for Europe might allow us to radically overhaul the team with players that might be able to challenge Celtic, but we seemed to be competitive from the get-go and we seemed to be kryptonite to Celtic, as they found it really hard to get any kind of results against us as we would beat them in the league three times and draw another, and we would beat them in the League Cup Final. More extraordinary was that we managed to go the entire season unbeaten, Rangers actually gave us more issues more often and we were lucky against them a few times. In the end we walk away with the League Cup and League title, which brings us to the brink of putting this leg to bed. Next season we just need a league title or Scottish Cup. I honestly expect a backlash and I severely doubt we can repeat our heroics but if we can just win the Scottish Cup next season I would take that to the bank.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2124/25

Scottish League Cup

Scottish Cup

cinch Premiership

UEFA Champions League

Squad & Transfers

With European football this year, there was a need to expand the squad but we did not have much of a transfer budget, so we had to rely on free transfers to make that happen and we managed to make some smart acquisitions with the likes of Malyon, Savrese, James, Davis and Miokovic, who all added depth and first depth fortitude to the team. In the end McCorry continued to be the main man with his 48 goals this season but Malyon was not far behind as they became a deadly partnership this season. We probably relied a bit more on individual performances from the front guys and wingers this season than last seasons all out team performance that so impressed me.

Manager Thoughts

It was almost a very disappointing season as we struggled in the league, I think primarily because of our more congested fixture list in Europe, and it was pretty soon clear that it was very unlikely that we could catch Celtic, when we started faultering. We had already exited the league cup, which would not have been enough anyway and while we were very spirited in Europe knocking out Inter Milan from the Champions League we would narrowly exit to Benfica in the the Round of 16, fortunately we had managed to keep going in the Scottish Cup. Celtic had been knocked out penalties by Dundee, and we would get past Rangers, Dundee and finally Hibernian at the end of the season, but only just to get the points that we finally needed to advance from this leg. Next up we will be in either Sweden or Denmark in UEFA17

UEFA18 COMPLETE

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2128

On leaving Scotland, we would be out of work for a few years. No real jobs of any great note came up but eventually at the end of the Swedish season the Djurgardens job would become available and we decided to take that one. Djurgardens at this point were the second best team in Sweden behind Malmo, but AIK and Hammarby were also pretty good and the previous season Malmo had won the league and AIK had finished 3rd behind Djurgardens. The goal was to qualify for Europe from the board, but a title challenge was what we expected.

Svenska Cupen

Svenska Cupen

Allsvenskan

UEFA Europa League

Squad & Transfers

On initially looking at the squad I was very impressed with the overall quality of the team. I felt we could challenge on multiple fronts with the team we had, but we would periodically lose players, so we would need to replace them. The likes of Tesic, Aksaray, Carlsson, Colin and Wihlborg, became pretty key components of the team. The two standouts this season were very much Franz, who seemingly is a target for all the big clubs in Europe and Tesic our new signing who performed brilliantly in his maiden season.

Manager Thoughts

It has been a great first season in Sweden as we captured the league and cup, and we look great value at the moment in the Europa League, having won every game up until now and looking like we will make the next phase of the competition. The goal next season is to go as deep as possible in the Europa League and hopefully continue our domestic dominance.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2129

Svenska Cupen

Allsvenskan

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Super Cup

UEFA Champions League

Squad & Transfers

The transfer window again was a busy one, as we lost Franz to Manchester United, when they activated his release clause for £106m. The positive side was that we had plenty of money to spend for the coming season we made reinforcements. Rafinha is probably the only one who really cemented his place in the team out of them, but still they were all good players we brought in. Jefferson Spicer and Aksaray took the vacant spot of Franz and got themselves plenty of goals this season to make up for his loss and Tesic continued his great form for the team in a creative capacity. Pretty much the whole team performed brilliantly this season.

Manager Thoughts

It has been a great season as we captured a domestic double and managed to conquer the Europa League and the Super Cup, and now we sit just 25 points from completing this leg. I always felt that we had a real shot at winning the Europa League by virtue of our performance in the league phase of the competition and that turned out to be right as we turned over the likes of Sevilla and Arsenal to win the competition. Next season we are looking for another league title which will cement our passage to the next leg of our journey.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2130

New Stadium

Svenska Cupen

Allsvenskan

UEFA Champions League

Squad & Transfers

We did not bring anyone in this season as I did not feel we needed it as we did not lose anyone of great note. This year Languaneri got more game time and certainly got amongst the goals this season and Aksaray who is now committed to leaving the club at end of his contract to Newcastle United, was the top goalscorer and quite frankly had insane form, averaging at 8.29.

Manager Thoughts

We went out of the Svenska Cupen, but I was not worried as this year, the main concern was winning the league and from very early on it looked like that would happen and indeed four fixtures before the end that would come to pass. We went out in the Champions League to Chelsea, where I felt perhaps we could have done more but the London club were much the better. So in the end it was just a season waiting for when we would win the league and now that we have we can close a chapter on this leg of the journey as we leave Djurgardens and Sweden. Next up is UEFA16 and Turkey or Israel. So that should be interesting.

UEFA18 COMPLETE

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[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2132/33

We missed one season in the Israel and Turkish leagues before a job we wanted became available at the end of the season and that was Maccabi Haifa. They are one of the big clubs in Israel, and were according to the media the 2nd best team in the country behind Hapoel Tel Aviv. Debatably Maccabi Tel Aviv and Hapoel Be'er Sheva were also pretty much on the same level. The board wanted us to qualify for European football. Israel has two cup competitions the Gvia HaMedina and the Gvia HaToto Al. The Hamedina is the main cup competition for our purposes.

Gvia HaToto Al

Gvia HaMedina

Ligat One ZERO

UEFA Europa League

Squad & Transfers

When we arrived at the club, we noticed again a very large first team, this happens when the club has no reserve team and only a youth team. The rules in Israel only allow for 5 foreigners in the first 11 and 6 overall to be registered and we had way more than that at the club, and actually subsequently we have had some foreigners this season gain Israeli citizenship. For this reason we decided not to actually bring anyone in, since Israeli players were quite expensive, especially the ones that were half decent and it made no sense to bring in even more foreigners. We did decide to sell Christian Nagy for a little bit of money as we tried to slightly reduce the amount of players we had.

In the end the key players for us ended up being Jankovic, who scored a boatload of goals and Kitsos who got both goals and assists for us.

Manager Thoughts

It was a superb season for us at the head of Maccabi Haifa as we won a domestic treble and the UEFA Europa League as well, for a boatload of points. We actually almost move to Trabzonspor, although we insisted that they wait until the end of the season with Maccabi Haifa and they opted to go elsewhere. I was thinking that Trabzonspor would have been a perfect second season, but with the Europa League in the bag and the points from that, we are probably now fine to just remain at Maccabi Haifa and hopefully win more next season. Weirdly despite the fact we won everything, I felt we were battled all the way by the top clubs in Israel and it was only at the end where they capitulated and we kept in mostly on the straight and narrow to get to where we wanted to be. A great season and something that will be difficult to replicate next season.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2133/34

Aluf Haalufim

Gvia HaToto

Gvia HaMedina

Ligat One ZERO

UEFA Super Cup

UEFA Champions League

Squad & Transfers

We decided to buy Le, Doni and Hen who all has Israeli citizenship and that would help us in the league where there were restriction. We would lose Leyton to Man Utd for an exhorbitant fee and replaced him with fellow Chilean Godoy. Jankovic remained the main man with his 46 goals this season and new signing Le was also brilliant from the wing this season.

Manager Thoughts

Despite going out of the domestic cups early on we did manage to win the Super Cup against surprise Champions League winners Celtic and after winning the Israeli Super Cup we just needed the league and we managed to canter our way to the title. That ends our time in Israel and UEFA16 as we now move on to Poland or Hungary for the next leg.

UEFA16 COMPLETE

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2135/36

We would be out of football for a little while before we got the Puskas Akademia job. There had been other potential moves, but the clubs were always near relegation and a much bigger rebuild. Puskas Akademia, found themselves in 7th, and with board wanting a mid-table finish as we came in without half the season or so to go.

Magyar Kupa

OTP Bank Liga

Squad

We did not make any transfers and the team was worse than we had for a while in management, and I felt it might be a little difficult to improve it despite there being money available. As we only had the team for half a season I am reserving judgement at this time.

Manager Thoughts

We came in and results were a little inconsistent before we managed to turn that around and go on a run that led us to 3rd place and to win the cup. So things have turned out positive and something we can build on.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2136/37

Magyar Kupa

OTP Bank Liga

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

We were only responsible for some of the transfers from the first screenshot of the transfers, but we managed to get in some great targets. Liam Peiffer, was a youngster at Beveren in Belgium with a lot of potential and he showed that as he smashed in 47 goals and he has improved immensely over the year, to the point where I now expect him to get a big move. Julian de Nas came in from Dutch football and has been a stalwart at the fullback position. Liu Tao, was a Chinese keeper plying his trade in Australian football with Central Coast Mariners and we paid a record fee for him, but he has been worth every penny in net. Others have had a more peripheral impact. Maicon came in from Brazil and has played plenty but probably still needs a season or two to improve further. Gorgovski also came in from Australia and he has mostly be utilised from the bench and has had a more limited impact on the team. Shaun Evans came in on loan from Chelsea and again has been used sparingly from the bench. Trinborg was the other major signing whom we got for free from Inter Milan and he has been pretty brilliant along with Peiffer up front and the two have built up quite the connection. Worth highlighting as well is Adamovic, who was at the club already and has kept Gorgovski out of the side and he has some very impressive numbers this year as well.

Manager Thoughts

A really good season for us as we got the domestic double, pretty easily in the end and picked up European silverware in the form of the Europa Conference League. We were a little unlucky to fall into the Conference League losing out to Legia Warsaw on penalties in the qualifiers for the Europa League. Then we were perhaps fortunate to reach the Europa Conference League after losing to first leg to Silkeborg of Denmark away, but we stormed back with a 7-2 win, that would put us in the league phase and we never looked back qualifying high up from the league phase and then dispatching Arges of Romania, Randers of Denmark, Young Boys of Switzerland before narrowly beating Maccabi Tel Aviv in the final on penalties. It is only worth 50 points, but they are a nice addition to our total. Our plans remain to stay at Puskas at least for next season and then perhaps start thinking about whether it would be a good idea to move on, obviously dependent on what happens next season. I don't see too much hope of being that competitive in the Europa League or Champions League so I doubt we can really expect points from that avenue. Another Conference League run would actually be nice.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2137/38

Stadium Expansion

Magyar Kupa

OTP Bank Liga

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Europa League

Squad & Transfers

We would lose our main goalkeeper Liu Tao to Fehervar for a very decent sum and would have to replace him with Lopez from Argentina, who was not as good but could possibly grow to his level. Surprisingly despite the fact that multiple clubs activated Peiffer's release fee, he decided to stay with us, but then downed tools because a promise relating to strengthening defensive midfield we were not able to do for him, and he scored way less goals in the second half of the season. Domenec came in from Barcelona as a striker off the bench for us and he did very well this season with 23 goals this season. Ucharico came in from Peru and he has anchored the midfield quite nicely for us. Worth highlighting also is Triniborg who has been brilliant especially after Peiffer decided to down tools as mentioned. Adamovic again had great season with 20 goals and 29 assists for us.

Manager Thoughts

It was no doubt a good season but it ended on a bitter note, and it is one that I would have to accept. We have been so good in cup finals that it has almost become second nature that when we get to the finals we have found ways to win. This year in the Europa League we had a fairytale run to the final and the draw seemed to open up as the likes of Barcelona and Arsenal were dumped out of the competition leaving the more unfancied sides. We made it all the way to the final but could not find a way past Besiktas and in the end we were not able to secure the points for the Europa League. Sometimes you win them and sometimes you lose them. I think that brings our time at Pukas Akademia to an end, fundamentally, the points for domestic trophies are dwindling and if we were going to win the Europa League, this year was the time to do it. So we will leave the club and see where we land next, whether it remains in Hungary or whether it will be in Poland.

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2139/40

Upon leaving Puskas Akademia we would be out of work for a while until a job in Poland, was close enough to what I was looking for. The club in question was Zaglebie from Lubin, and they were one of the better sides in Poland, albeit certainly not expected to challenge for the title. They were sitting in 11th place and we were about halfway through the season, so the board wanted us to get the club to mid-table and keep us there. We were already out of the cup so it was only going to be a case of focussing on the league.

PKO Bank Polski Ekstraklasa

Squad & Transfers

As can be seen there was a lot of business this year, but most of it was not ours, our business into the club starts with Ruben Munoz downwards. Really the signings this year were just players I felt could add a little something but we were not able to radically improve the side by any means. Since we were only at the club for half a season we will reserve judgement on performances until next season.

Manager Thoughts

We did about everything we could and eventually we were able to get some performances out of the club and we did very well to get up to 4th spot, which qualifies us for the Conference League. Obviously to win this league we would have to do much better, but with a bit of luck we may be able to challenge next season.

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Summary

[KibworthBull]

I love the amount of languages the manager can speak!

[TerminalPortugal]

3 hours ago, KibworthBull said:

I love the amount of languages the manager can speak!

Yeah, think it's 19 fluent languages and 2 basic and counting.

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2140/41

Fortuna Puchar Polski

PKO Bank Polski Ekstraklasa

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

It was a window where plenty left the club and plenty came in. The big names were Meler who came in from German football and did very well for us with 31 goals and 21 assists. Rudy Flores came in form Alianza in Peru and was a man mountain at the back for us, and was a total threat from set pieces all season with 9 goals this season. Chris Powell came in and replaced departing goalkeeper Jose, and again he did a good job for us in net. Alessandro came in a bit later but eventually secured the right wing spot, before injury ended his season early. Bohnenblust, came in from Benfica and has been a pretty permenant fixture in the team.

In terms of performances, Liam Preston whom we got from TNS last season has been brilliant with 55 goals. Munoz who came in from Uruguayan football has been sensational with 18 goals and 28 assists for us just to name two who have done us proud this season.

Manager Thoughts

A pretty perfect season for us as we pick up a domestic double and the added bonus of the Conference League. At first it looked like it might be difficult with a big loss away to Legia, but we just hit a groove eventually and after that we were difficult to stop. The Conference League came pretty naturally as we took each knockout round as it came and progressed all the way to the final where we beat Turkish outfit Adana in the final. We are now very close to finishing this leg of our journey, with just 13 points needed. I would hope we can get the job done next season at Zaglebie.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2141/42

Superpuchar Polski

Squad & Transfers

In the transfer market which is still open so far, we brought in Amara, Sarini and Urban who should improve our defence no doubt. There is not much to say about the squad performance since it only took one game.

Manager Thoughts

Our first opportunity to get the remaining 13 points we needed of this leg was the Super Cup against LKS Lodz and it was not much of contest as we smashed them 6-0 to win the cup and end this leg. We now leave Poland and UEFA15 behind and we will be heading to UEFA14 next and Czechia and Slovakia. We will see where we land once we get there.

UEFA15 COMPLETE

Manager Profile

Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2143/44

We waited a while for a job and not many came up. The Spartak Trnava job came up twice, we rejected it narrowly the first time, the team were in a worse position, but this time around they were doing badly but it seemed salvageable to me. The board wanted a mid-table finish, which does not mean much since the league splits, so my target on myself was to make into the Championship Round in Slovakia. We were already out of the Slovakian Cup when we arrived so there was only the league to worry about.

Milestone

Fortuna Liga

Squad & Transfers

The team has a few good pieces in it, but generally need overhauling and I did not want to waste time as were very close to a transfer window. We got rid of Huerta who was being a pain in the posterior, and we started to get a few guys in. O'Shea was an interesting signing because he can play left back and striker, and has been good for us mostly as a striker since he came in. Oliver Jonsson came in as an upgrade at striker and he has shown that for us. Sander ten Have came in from Dutch football, and again he is just a better winger than we currently had at the club. Croskery also came in from Northern Irish football and again has been very good. The issue we currently have is we need to improve the defence and that will be the mission next transfer window.

Manager Thoughts

We were very good as soon as I arrived and we won every game until the league split and this put us in the Championship phase. We would then go on to lose game to the likes of Slovan Bratislava et al, but I think we are pretty competitive. It actually remains to be seen whether we will be at Spartak Trnava next season as Sparta Prague are looking for a new manager and we have applied for that role since it is a much bigger role and looks more likely to give us points quicker than Trnava. So we will see if that comes to pass. If were to leave Trnava without a point, it will be the first time since we were the manager of South African side Polokwane City whom we took from the second division of South African football to the top division.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2144/45

Slovnaft Cup

Fortuna Liga

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

We made some further signings this year. Kristof, Kowalczyk and Handoko being the really key signings this season as they improved the defence and defensive midfield areas which we really needed. Jonsson was absolutely amazing this year with 62 goals and 23 assists. Madeira and ten Have also produced some great results, as O'Shea was mostly deployed at left back for us. Peter Hancko also is developing and I think he has quite a high ceiling as he keeps improving, and featured plenty this season.

Manager Thoughts

The move to Sparta Prague never happened as they didn't even interview deeming that the list of candidates was too strong, so we remained at Spartak Trnava and the season went pretty perfectly although it was tough. The league was only won on the final day. I was not sure what result we needed because it relied on results between teams and we had beat Streda twice and drawn once. Another draw was enough for us to become champions. We narrowly beat Slovan Bratislava in the cup final needing a late penalty and the Conference League again was not easy as we needed pens against Fiorentina to get through and then a narrow win against our former club Maccabi Haifa to seal the cup. All in all a great season, but we were a whisker away from ending up with nothing this season. So the margins were very fine.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2145/46

Cesko-Slovensky Superpohar

Slovnaft Cup

Fortuna Liga

UEFA Champions League

UEFA Europa League

Squad & Transfers

Not too many transfers this year, as we brought in Mohamed Sanogo in defensive midfield and Julien Lejuene up front, and they both produced results for us. Jonsson once again hit 60 goals in a season, the guy is a goal machine for us. ten Have continued his excellent form from the wing with 26 assists this season. We let a fair few players leave but no one that I felt we would miss much.

Manager Thoughts

Another good season as we captured three trophies, including the Czechoslovak Super Cup, which counts as just another domestic trophy. Again it was pretty close, we only won the league on the penultimate fixture as Streda lost surprisingly to Trencin handing us the title, but we would have beaten Slovan Bratislava final day anyway so it would not have mattered anyway. Again the cup final was very tight as we narrowly beat Streda 2-1 in the final. We would get as far as the Quarter Final in the Europa League but Newcastle United were able to come back at home against us and knock us out. I am considering moving on from Spartak Trnava at this stage since I think a major European victory is very remote and the dwindling points for domestic success is going to make each season worth less. Currently the Slovan Bratislava and Zilina managers are under pressure so it is possible that one of those jobs become available, but very likely I will resign and see where we resurface next time around.

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Summary

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2146/47

We would indeed leave Spartak Trnava and that very summer two jobs that were very interesting became available. They were Slovan Bratislava, and Viktoria Plzen in Czechia. We were close to choosing Plzen, because they came back first but we hung on for a week and eventually Slovan would come in for us and they just seemed like a slightly better prospect and it was a league we were well versed in. The board obviously wanted us to get back to winning league titles and that was also our prime objective.

Slovnaft Cup

Fortuna Liga

UEFA Europa League

UEFA Europa Conference League

Squad & Transfers

When we arrived we could see that the team looked pretty great without too many weaknesses. We would however be required to replace people in winter transfer window as £100m would come in over that period and some of the key players would be sold to larger clubs around Europe. I would say that none of the transfers have done too amazingly apart from Jung Dae-Hee; the South Korean has really come in and added something to the team. The likes of Utera has also come in and done some great things for us up front. The others are probably still finding their feet. In terms of performances, in terms of goals the veteran striker Najafi was the man with 45 goals and mostly because he found himself promoted to the top man after Linder left. Although realistically the numbers that Freiberger has produced this season have been amazing, 20 goals and 43 assists, is an incredible return from left wing.

Manager Thoughts

It really was a lot easier being manager of Slovan Bratislava than Spartak Trnava, the team was so much better overall and we cruised to a league title although the points total was a little diminished for the chasing pack. The cup was a walkover as we won the final 7-0. In Europe we were very disappointing in the UEFA Europa League when we suffered a bit of problem early on with registrations and injuries, and we would find ourselves dumped out by Randers, but finding ourselves in the Conference League we never looked back and it was smooth sailing all the way as we made our home ground a fortress. We did enough this season to just end the leg, the Conference League win the necessary climax to the finale. We will not be moving on from Slovakia and onto UEFA13, where last time we never ever made it out of as the game crashed and would never be playable again. Hopefully we have better luck in UEFA13 where we will either be in Bulgaria or Romania.

UEFA14 COMPLETE

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Summary

[KibworthBull]

How do you play so quick?

[TerminalPortugal]

1 hour ago, KibworthBull said:

How do you play so quick?

Instant Result for most of the less important games, and have a lot of tasks delegated to staff.

[KibworthBull]

32 minutes ago, TerminalPortugal said:

Instant Result for most of the less important games, and have a lot of tasks delegated to staff.

I'm the same - you must have a hell of a processor on your computer.

[TerminalPortugal]

24 minutes ago, KibworthBull said:

I'm the same - you must have a hell of a processor on your computer.

Not a bad one, but I think the other reason why it is so quick is that I normally only have the single or two active leagues loaded.

[TerminalPortugal]

Season 2148/49

It would be a little while; around a season or so before we found a job. A few jobs had come up but they were not suitable, and then suddenly there were two viable jobs. The first was in Bulgaria at Botev Plovdiv, one of the better sides in the country, and the second job was at CFR Cluj, the best team in Romania at this time. We opted for Cluj. They had had a bad season last season finishing outside of Europe, and the board wanted us back in Europe and challenge for the Romanian title.

Cupa Romaniei

Superliga

Squad & Transfers

There would be plenty of business in our maiden season. We would lose probably the two best players at the club in right back Dinu to Manchester United and Alexandru Roman to Paris Saint Germain. We would also lose a few peripheral pieces that I was happy to allow to go and replace. The general strategy was to where possible buy Romanian and make sure that we had plenty of homegrown options in most position. Naftanaila came in because we needed to field and Under 22 and I did not want to rely on many of the other Under 22s at the club who did not feel were ready, but this guy was ready and would improve. Monnier was a big signing for us, a striker at PSG, with a lot of potential but not many opportunities, we brought him in and he showed us what he could do with 40 goals this season and also completing the trifecta of most goals, assists and highest average rating, a rare feat. Celea was another striker we brought in as a direct replacement for Roman, he got his fair share of game time at 20 goals was a nice return. As mentioned youngster Naftanaila, did really well this season grabbing 31 goals himself. Radeka was a late signing in the winter window and he improves us a lot. In  a short time he got himself 7 assists which is great going. All the other signings were solid Romanian players, many for the defence who could play a role in the team and reinforce us going forward

Manager Thoughts

It was really easy this season, not had a season this easy for a while. We walked the league seemingly twice, firstly in the regular season the in the Champions Playoff. We won every game of the Playoffs, which is a pretty great feat all told. The cup was very easy, we coasted past FCSB and then Arges gave us a little more of a challenge but ultimately we were never really in trouble. We will be in Europe next year. I would fancy us to go far in the Europa League but the Champions League is a different beast altogether. We will see if we can repeat domestic dominance next season, and hopefully we can pull off a few surprises in Europe.

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Summary

Edited January 2, 2023 by TerminalPortugal

[TerminalPortugal]

IT HAPPENED AGAIN

Well, I am amazed, but it happened again, at the exact same step in the journey. The save game broke again and once again it stopped me from loading or even creating a new game in FM23. I have somehow managed to get FM23 working again, something I was unable to do in FM22, when it broke at the same spot and then I was unable to play FM22 ever again.

It is such a bizarre thing that I really cannot even speculate as to why the game breaks like this at this exact spot. It seemingly does not have anything to do with adding or removing leagues since it does not happen immediately into the new leg, it happens after a year or two have passed and it happens mid season, and normally on save of the game, or a reload of the game. It does not appear to be time related since last time in happened in 2140 and this time we got to 2150. It does not seem to be related to the countries themselves since last time I went from the Czech Republic to Bulgaria and this time I went from Slovakia to Romania. It is just bewildering. I am just glad I managed to get FM23 back working again, at least provisionally unlike last time.

The long and short of it is, this save game ends here...the same way it ended last time, at the same step on the ladder. This challenge will allow no man to ever conquer it....

Thanks very much to all those who commented, supported, read and were enjoying the story. Sorry I couldn't finish this, but alas some things are never meant to be witnessed.

[KibworthBull]

I've only recently discovered this thread - but I enjoyed the journey.

[TerminalPortugal]

3 hours ago, KibworthBull said:

I've only recently discovered this thread - but I enjoyed the journey.

Thanks very much. It's a shame it ended when it did.

[Vakama2619]

I'm really sorry mate, but if you don't mind me asking, how'd you get it working again?

[phnompenhandy]

17 hours ago, TerminalPortugal said:

Well, I am amazed, but it happened again, at the exact same step in the journey. The save game broke again and once again it stopped me from loading or even creating a new game in FM23

Damn, that's horrible. After all those hundreds of hours

Is it too soon to think forward? Are you going to create a new challenge that doesn't last for more than a century?

[TerminalPortugal]

11 hours ago, Vakama2619 said:

I'm really sorry mate, but if you don't mind me asking, how'd you get it working again?

The last time around in FM22, as nothing worked I had an open ticket with SI, and despite doing what they asked me to do nothing fixed it. So what I did was I did everything I had done before, with the game uninstalled, like deleting cache and preferences, but then I also searched for any folder that had SI as the name or FM23 and then deleted that then reinstalled and that seemed to fix it. The break seems to literally break something at all levels of the game for some reason, it ends up not just being a broken save game, it breaks the game, and you kind of need to wipe the games existence to get it back working. So that means deleting the game folder from steam, from documents, from AppData, both the user one and the one that is in public and then it worked again after reinstalling. I noticed the verification was quite long and that seemed to be the signal that it had worked.

9 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

Damn, that's horrible. After all those hundreds of hours

Is it too soon to think forward? Are you going to create a new challenge that doesn't last for more than a century?

Yep, they were kind of wasted, but not really the journey is mostly what mattered. I have got a new challenge in mind, as for whether it would last a century not sure yet but it lasts a while.

[ucdark]

So bad it happened again, it's the best challenge a player can do, so sad... wish the best on the next step