[FM23] Nur der RWE - Bringing Rot-Weiss Essen back to glory

[AM23]

Introduction

Okay, so after strolling around the forum for some time now, I have finally decided to do a documented save of my own. Especially because during my last save, which was a build a nation in Indonesia, I already regretted not documenting it. That save was actually supposed to last for this whole FM cycle (and on it's way to do so, as I really enjoyed it), but sadly came to a screeching halt when I found a save-breaking problem in the database I was using, which would seriously affect the challenge in the long run. After having not touched the game for about a month, I am really keen on starting a new save again. I had a thought about trying the same thing again, but was not totally into the idea in the end, as I did not feel like starting all over. It is possible that I try it again next year though.

Having had some time to think about what would be next for me then, I came to the conclusion I needed to try managing in Germany, as I have not actually done so before, even though I am very intrigued by German football. Wanting this to be a one club and long term save, I came to the simple conclusion of managing Bayern München in the 3. Liga (3rd tier). And because I really like German fan tradition, I wanted to manage a so-called 'traditionsverein' with a good fanbase. In the end, I narrowed my list down to 3 clubs: 1860 München, Dynamo Dresden and RW Essen. Those three are, not totally coincidentally, the clubs with the highest average attendance in the current league season. However, this is not the only reason I chose them. For 1860 München the reasons are probably clearest, as they have a very long history, and reside in the same city as 'Die Rekordmeister'. Dynamo Dresden is appealing for it's amazing fanbase, as well as them having been one of the best teams in East-Germany, which is still underrepresented in the Bundesliga. Finally, RW Essen are a club from the Ruhr area, close to the likes of Schalke and Dortmund, and has had some great successes in the past, but has not been close to the Bundesliga for a very long time.

In the end, I chose not to go with 1860 München, as I have already seen some others on the forum manage them in the past. I also decided against Dynamo Dresden, mostly for the reason that I have another save idea for the future which would probably see me manage them eventually. So RW Essen it is. Not only for the reasons mentioned before, but also as there is still some more to build within the 3. Liga with this club. While the other 2 clubs have recently played in the 2. Bundesliga and are top teams in the 3. Liga at the moment, RW Essen have just been promoted after a 14 season spell in the amateur leagues. 

                   

What to expect

I do not yet know exactly what my style of writing will be. However, I do have the intention to show a little bit more then just the results. I am also planning on playing a little bit slower than I usually do, since I would like to do some micro-managing in this save, and am very keen on using the data center and available statistics to my advantage. This will probably result in monthly updates, with me giving my take on something I find interesting in the save every now and then.

Next update will be an introduction to the club, after which I will dive into the save for what will hopefully be a good time!

[anagain]

Welcome to the Career Updates forum and a lovely start.

When I were young - many, many moons ago - I was into Subbuteo. I had a team chart/book thing and I remembering seeing a team call Rot Weis Erfurt (with that German B I don't know how to do on mobile).

Long story, short, I didnt know there was a Rot-Weiss from the Rurh. Always a great start to like the name. Good luck. 

[AM23]

4 hours ago, anagain said:

Welcome to the Career Updates forum and a lovely start.

When I were young - many, many moons ago - I was into Subbuteo. I had a team chart/book thing and I remembering seeing a team call Rot Weis Erfurt (with that German B I don't know how to do on mobile).

Long story, short, I didnt know there was a Rot-Weiss from the Rurh. Always a great start to like the name. Good luck. 

Thanks. While searching for some info about the club, I actually found out the Ruhr region even contains another Rot-Weiß club in Oberhausen, with them also being one of the rivals of RW Essen.

[AM23]

The Club

Founded in 1907 as SV Vogelsheim, the club eventually got its current name after some mergers. Not surprisingly, the club colours are red and white. 

In its first years, RW Essen led a pretty anonymous life in German football. Short before the second world war, they managed to break into the top-flight, which consisted of 16 regional leagues at that time. After this, RW Essen quickly became one of the best teams in their regional league (Gauliga Niederrhein), although they never won it. 

After the war, RW Essen managed to get to the top-flight quickly again, getting to play in the Oberliga West, which was one of 5 top leagues. This started the most successful period in the club's history to date. In 1951 RW Essen acquired Helmut Rahn, who went on to become a German football legend after scoring 2 goals to help Germany come back from 2-0 behind in the 1954 World Cup final (The Miracle of Bern). With him in the side, they managed to win the Oberliga West for the first time in 1952. The following season, RW Essen won their first major trophy, beating Alemannia Aachen 2-1 in the DFB-Pokal final. The club reached its pinnacle in 1955, after winning the Oberliga West for the second time, they even went on to become national champions this time around. Because of this championship, RW Essen became the first German team to play in the European Cup, which had its inaugural season in 1955/56.

The European Cup saw RW Essen get easily beaten by Scottish side Hibernian, and in the league the heights of the championship season were not reached again. They even got relegated from the Oberliga West in 1961. This also meant they were not one of the founding members of the Bundesliga, which was established in 1963. However, eventually RW Essen did manage to get promoted, and in total had 3 spells in the Bundesliga of 1, 2 and 4 years respectively. In the 1976/77 season they got relegated from the Bundesliga for the third and up to date final time.

Succeeding their last Bundesliga relegation, Rot-Weiss Essen spent most of their time in the following 20 years in the 2. Bundesliga, though they also played some seasons at the third tier. A highlight during this time was reaching their second DFB-Pokal final, which they lost to Werder Bremen. At the end of the century, however, RW Essen fell to a new low, getting relegated to the fourth tier for the first time in its history. The club did suffer from financial problems during a big part of this period.

Luckily RW Essen managed to get promoted in its first season at the fourth tier, and some better times followed on the field. The club even got to play in the 2. Bundesliga again in 2004/05 and 2006/07, though they could not survive relegation in either season. After the last relegation things went downwards again really fast, with RW Essen dropping down to the fourth tier within a season, although partly due to a league restructuring. In 2010 the all time low was reached, as the club went down to the fifth level due to insolvency.

After getting promoted back to the fourth level within a season, RW Essen spent 11 years in the Regionalliga West. With only the team ending in first getting promoted, as there are five leagues at this level, it is extremely hard to get out of. Last season, RW Essen finally overcame the struggles, finishing in front of Preußen Münster on goal difference. Currently, they are getting along nicely in the 3. Liga, being 7 points clear of the drop in 13th place.

                    

The City

Unsurprisingly, RW Essen is based in the city of Essen. Essen is the 9th biggest city of Germany, not far behind the likes of Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Dortmund with a population of around 580,000. The city lies in the west of Germany and is part of the densely populated Ruhr area. The Ruhr area is known for its industries, most notably the production of steel and coal mining. The area has around 5 million inhabitants, and besides Essen, contains other big cities with traditional football clubs like Dortmund, Gelsenkirchen, Bochum (all Bundesliga), Duisburg (3. Liga) and Oberhausen (4th tier). Zooming out to the metropolitan Rhine-Ruhr area, which is the third biggest in Europe, we can see that other big cities like Düsseldorf, Cologne, Mönchengladbach, Wuppertal, Leverkusen and Bonn are also not far away.

                    

The Stadium

RW Essen play in the 'Stadion an der Hafenstraße'. The stadium is still pretty new, as it was officialy opened in 2012, and it has a capacity of 20,650. It is not your traditional arena as it has open corners. This does however mean that there is a lot of room to expand the capacity, apparently to around 35,000. As is usual in Germany, the hard core supporters stand on a big terrace behind one of the goals.

The Fans

Rot-Weiss Essen has a very loyal fanbase. Despite playing at the 4th tier for the last 10 seasons, they always averaged an attendance of above 7,000 per game. Last season even of above 9,000 per game. Notable is that giants like Schalke 04 and Borussia Dortmund are less than a 40 minute drive away.

The Rivals

 Being located in such a populated area, RW Essen has a lot of rivalries, though some are bigger than others of course. Historically they have had a city rivalry with Schwarz-Weiß Essen, but this has died down due to the decline of the latter club.

Their biggest rivals are actually Schalke 04, even though they have not played a competitive game against each other since the 1992/93 season. This means that more recently the rivalry has actually carried to matches between RW Essen and Schalke's second team, which is active in the Regionalliga West. The rivalry with Schalke is not only born out of the fact that the two cities are directly next to each other, but also due to the 1971 Bundesliga scandal, in which RW Essen was the victim and got relegated, after among others Schalke players were bought to lose a match.

Another big rival is MSV Duisburg, also from a neighbouring city, and playing more in the same league as each other. This season they also play in the 3. Liga. Other rivals include mostly teams from the region like Rot-Weiß Oberhausen, Alemannia Aachen, Preußen Münster, Fortuna Düsseldorf and Wuppertaler SV.

Edited January 21, 2023 by AM23

[AM23]

Game setup

Besides having Germany, of course, loaded to the 3. Liga, I have also loaded 6 of the biggest European top leagues. I hope this will keep the in-game world realistic if I would ever have the joy to qualify for European football. All other European top-flights are on view-only. For the same reasons of keeping the game realistic, I have also selected a custom database with all players in continental competitions loaded. I hope these settings will keep the game running smoothly on my laptop.

For the rest it's important to mention that I have disabled transfer activity in the first transfer window. This is partly because I like to get a bit of feel for the real life players at the start of a save, and being able to realisticly compare with real life in the first season. Another reason is that once I start a save, I am always very eager to get to the competitive games, so not having to worry about transfers yet makes pre-season go by a lot faster.

I did think about using a custom database to add the Verbandspokalen (Regional cups), which in real life serve the purpose of qualifying for the DFB-Pokal for teams not in the first two tiers. I eventually decided against it though, as my last save stopped because of an error in a custom database, and I did not want to risk that happening again.

                    

Manager

As for the manager, I like to implement a little bit of my past saves into my new ones. For this save I have chosen the character of Bojan Dobaj, who was an amazing Slovenian regen striker in one of my FM22 saves. I have sort of taken over the recommended coaching licence and experience level, apart from tweaking it a little bit to suit Bojan Dobaj's character.

                    

So that is that, all is set and I am ready and raring to go. It may take 2 or 3 days until I come with the pre season update, but that remains to be seen. First I have to get a good feel of all the players and set my tactics up.

 

[AM23]

Pre-Season

This won't be a very long post, firstly because, as said before, I have the first transfer window turned off, and secondly because I just haven't got a whole lot to tell yet. This is for a big part as I usually don't really like the first pre-season, due to the fact that I really need the competitive games to get into a save. Anyways, here are our friendly results:

All in all, the results look okay, but do not tell the whole story. All matches came against German teams from tier 4 and below, except for Beerschot, who play in the Belgian second tier. Losing against Velbert is already not a good sign, but the fact that we were actually outplayed in this match quite worries me. Our best performance came against Beerschot, which was also the only match we started (and kept playing) with the first XI I have in mind. Most notable thing is our disappointing defensive performance, conceding so many goals against lower league sides, but also giving away a lot of chances. The conclusion is that I am not totally sure about the tactic yet, but we'll go with it for the start of the season and tweak/change it if necessary.

                    

Tactic

We will start the season with a pretty basic 4-3-3. I normally like to use less common tactics, and actually had 5-3-2 in mind for this save. However, that did not turn out to be a great idea for this first season, as we lack depth at center back, and on top of that it would mean we would not use our abundance of wingers. For the rest I will not go into a lot of detail yet. Big chance that the instructions will look very different in a few months, so I plan on doing a more detailled tactical post when I feel like we have actually gotten to a good tactic. It may take some time though, as I am not really a tactical genius in this game. 

                    

Squad

I am planning on introducing the individual players to a more detailled degree as the season goes on, so for now just a small summary of every position.

Between the posts we have two young goalkeepers to choose from, with more experience as a third choice. Jakop Golz will start the season as our first choice, although some bad performances may lead to Felix Wienand getting a chance, seeing he has a lot of potential.

In defense we have a lot of options. In the center we have more experienced players as well as some talents. Daniel Heber, being our captain, will start the season on the right side of the center, whereas veteran Felix Bastians will do the job on the left side. At right back we have an attacking option in Wiegel, while Plechaty and Sponsel are pretty similar players with a more defensive mindset. As Sponsel is in on loan, we will give the nod to Sandro Plechaty. On the left side Felix Herzenbruch is the obvious first choice, because Niemeyer will be out injured for the whole duration of the season.

Not that many midfielders to choose from, although we have wingers like Harenbrock, Holzweiler and Eisfeld that can also do a good job here. We will actually start the season with Felix Götze, who is naturally a center back, as our half back. Björn Rother as our ball winning midfielder and Clemens Fandrich as our advanced playmaker finish of the midfield

We do have more choice on the flanks, where we will probably also see the most changes between players during the season. For now first choices are Isaiah Young on the right and Thomas Eisfeld on the left, but especially Lawrence Ennali is already very close to my first team aswell.

It will be Simon Engelmann to start the season up front, although Ron Berlinski in particular is a very good back-up. The other two might not get as much game time, although injuries may change things there.

                    

Season Preview

Not a lot to say about this. We definitely should not be caught in a relegation battle, and for anything higher than 9th we would need luck to go our way. Freiburg and Dortmund Second team's are not in here.

                    

Board Expectation

3. Liga will be the only competition we play in this year, as RW Essen did not win their regional cup (which is not in FM) last year. Top half finish should be doable. 

Edited February 2, 2023 by AM23

[SixPointer]

Top half right after promotion I love the ambition of you and the board!

[AM23]

July/August 2022

I have still not managed the time to play the game a lot in the past weeks, but I did finally manage to get through the first few games. We have a mixed start to the season in terms of opposition, playing against two other newly promoted sides (Elversberg and Bayreuth), as well as a relegated side in Ingolstadt. For the rest we also play Duisburg, which is our biggest rival after Schalke, so that will be quite an important fixture for our fans. All in all I definitely see some chances to get points on the board early, so let's hope we can start the season positively.

                    

RW Essen - SV Elversberg

A really disappointing start this is, given the fact we played against a fellow promoted side, and even more so as it was in front of our own fans. We did have a good start to the game, creating the best chances. It was unfortunate that our attacking playmaker Clemens Fandrich had to leave the pitch after only 15 minutes due to an injury, and after that our chances in front of goal dried down. Elversberg got one past us just before halftime and we never recovered from that with our only real chance being squandered.

Although we managed a higher xG, we never really managed to get close to the goal, which is shown by our shot map. Most of our shots came from outside the box, and only one of our 13 shots was on target, opposing their 3 of 7. 

Enough to think about going into our next match against Duisburg, who are expected to fight for promotion.

                    

MSV Duisburg - RW Essen

Goalscorers: Götze (45'), Fandrich (63'), Heber (83'), Berlinski (90')

Well, that was quite the match. We got absolutely dominated by Duisburg in the first 30 minutes, after which one of their CB's got sent off with a second yellow. This completely changed the game of course, as we suddenly had way more room. We exploited this by stretching the field, which worked out excellent as we scored all our 4 goals from a cross, albeit 2 of those came from set-pieces. The game was however closer than the scoreline suggested, and we only managed to pull away from them at the end.

This really was the game of our wingers, with Thomas Eisfeld getting the first two assists, after which Isaiah Young took over and also got two, even though he only came on in the 75th minute.

Our shot map looks quite the opposite from last game, with the vast majority of our shots coming inside off the penalty area this time around (9 out of 12).

The fans can be quite pleased with this, getting our first three points away from home against our biggest rivals in the league. I suspect the 20 minute bus ride back was pretty nice for the over 4000 travelling fans. 

                     

RW Essen - FC Viktoria Köln

Goalscorers: Fandrich (20'), Engelmann (79', 90+3')

Quite similarly to the next match, we won by a good margin, but had it a lot harder than shown by the scoreline, with us only pulling away late once again. 

After his first two matches I already started having some doubts about Simon Engelmann, who barely appeared in the play in those. Those doubts were silenced by his masterclass today. After giving a selfless assist early on, he got his first goal of the season in the second half and topped off his performance by scoring a penalty.

Our defensive showing was very solid, and resulted in our first clean sheet of the season. We managed to keep our opponents away from our goal for most of the match, which prevented them from getting a lot of good chances.

                     

Borussia Dortmund II - RW Essen

Goalscorers: Berlinski (75')

The league planners have kept us from travelling a lot to start the season, as we played another very close away game. This time against Dortmund II, who had shown to be hard to beat in their 5-2-3 formation, with scorelines of 0-0 (2x) and 1-1. For a long time it looked like another 0-0 was coming, but luckily for us, we managed to break the deadlock.

After the midweek game against Viktoria Köln we had to make some changes due to fatigue, with most notably 31- and 33-year old Fandrich and Engelmann not able to play 3 games in a week. Fandrich got replaced by Oguzhan Kefkir, which saw Eisfeld move to midfield, and Engelmann's place was taken over by Ron Berlinski. For both of them this meant their first place in the starting XI of the season, and incidentally (or not), it was exactly those 2 who linked up for the only goal of the game, with Kefkir giving a nice through ball to Berlinski who slotted it home.

In the end, we probably were deserved winners of the match, having been the more dangerous team for a big part of it. Once again a rock solid defensive performance.

                     

RW Essen - FC Ingolstadt 04

Goalscorers: Engelmann (5', 71'), Kefkir (50')

This was probably our best game yet. Putting on such a dominant performance against a team predicted as one of the most likely to be promoted really gives me high hopes for the future. We came blazing out of the starting blocks in both halves, and were not fazed when they scored the 2-1, immediately getting back control over the game.

Simon Engelmann scored his second brace which got him his second MOTM-award early in the season, really showing why he is our first choice striker. After his good performance last match, we gave Oguzhan Kefkir the nod ahead of Eisfeld, which paid off as he scored a brilliant free-kick.

Our dominance in this match is best shown by the average position maps. Seeing almost all of Ingolstadt's team on their own half, and our striker nearly halfway their half shows how much we really pushed them back.

                     

SpVgg Bayreuth - RW Essen

Goalscorers: Engelmann (27')

This is turning into an amazing early season run of form. We were probably a bit lucky to come out on top in this one, but we could care less. A big chance 20 seconds into the game did not initiate a lot more, with our only other first half shot being the only goal of the match. Bayreuth actually was the better team in this first half, but did not convert their chances. During the break I decided to let the team play a little deeper, and this resulted in a boring second half, with us taking the 3 points back to Essen.

I did experiment a bit in this match, with second choice striker Ron Berlinski getting game time on the right wing, a role he can fill in, but did not today. 

                     

Results have been above all expectations these first months, and this means we are topping the table! I could not have asked for a better start to the season really. We should not get too carried away though, as we came out on top in some very close games, and probably do have some more points than we should have. We will certainly enjoy our position for now.

                     

Highlighted Player

I am planning on going into some more detail about one of my players every month to show my squad a little bit. For this first month I have chosen to go with the 34-year old veteran Felix Bastians, who is the oldest player in our squad. He has been absolutely rock solid for us as our left central defender, and is one of the main reasons we have conceded such a low amount of goals. He is also our outfield player with the most minutes, missing just 35 minutes due to fatigue in the week with two matches. 

Bastians can play at either left back or center back, but will play mainly in the center for us. His tall appearance and strength make him an imposing figure. Defensively he is very adequate for our level, and mentally he is great overall. Especially the combination of high bravery and aggression can be very important to nip opponents' attacks in the bud.

I made this overview of defensive stats, although it is not great yet due to a lack of data from center backs other than Bastians and Heber, which makes it that I am comparing with fullbacks and defensive midfielders as well. What does immediately stand out, is that Bastians is very strong in the air, winning 88% of his headers, while also going into a whopping total of 22.46 aerial challenges per 90 minutes. For the rest he wins more possession than all of our other defensive minded players, and has the highest rating out of the five.

Taking the comparison onto a league basis, we can see that Bastians is really one of the dominant defenders in the air, having a relatively high winning percentage of headers, while also having a lot of them. On the front of winning possesion he has also been a standout player in the league.

Let's hope he can continue his form throughout the season and help us keep up our current pace.

[SixPointer]

Very solid start!! Promising for promotion.