[FM24] Saul Journeyman - A Freaking Bad manager

[Troops]

First of all, a little bit about me. I'm new to the forum, so why should you follow my career updates.

I first encountered Championship Manager in '93. This was a time of loading disks into an Atari ST. I fell in love and we stayed together for a number of years. However, by early 2000's I had met somebody else. I was destined to be married and have children so I drifted apart from Championship Manager. Life was hectic then. Around 5years or so ago though, I decided to look Championship Manager up. Turns out they'd gone through a few changes too, including a name change to Football Manager. Football Manager was more complex than I remembered and I fell in love all over again. We've been together ever since.

For the last 2 or 3 years I have run an account on a social media platform. The intention was to engage with other Football Managers, who like me, were trying to improve their skills and this platform didn't have many accounts of that nature. That particular platform is much less popular now so I've brought myself here.

My FM philosophy.

I'm a journeyman. This is what gives me the most enjoyment. I like to start out unemployed, with no badges and no reputation. For every Graham Potter or Ange Postecoglu there's thousands of failed Football Managers. But can a nobody make it to the top? In FM, yes they can. Will I? Probably not. Personally, I don't think it's realistic to take a team from obscurity to glory, and it's certainly not realistic for me to be able to do that, so....

Realism is a big factor for me when playing FM. Of course some degree of reality has to be suspended. My total lack of experience and qualifications means I'd never actually be able to get a job in the lower tiers of some far off European league where I can't even speak the language, nor would I take such a job on £250/week. In pursuit of this realism though, this is what you can expect from me;

Tactics - I don't download tactics. The days of the super tactic are gone but nevertheless downloading a "plug-in" tactic isn't for me. In addition, I don't think the 'tactic tester' type services actually help, I believe the match day engine when playing a game is very different from the one used when 'simulating' a game/season. I'm no master tactician, but I like to construct my own tactics, usually in a way I feel is best suited to the players at my disposal. Inevitably tactics get tweaked along the way. Expect musings on tactics.

Attribute Masking - Switched on. If I'm managing in the Romanian 3rd tier what am I realistically likely to know about the Peru U17's squad? As such I don't think I should be able to navigate there and look through all the players for wonderkids....

Wonderkids - Everyone likes a wonderkid right? Wrong. I don't actually like the fact that the game is telling me this player is going to be great and I don't have to do anything to make this assessment for myself. For every Wayne Rooney there's a Francis Jeffers. I won't be hunting for wonderkids so I can turn out a team of 18yo future world beaters, because as we all know 'you cannae win anything wi kids'. That's not to say that I won't sign young players though....

Player Recruitment - I'll be using data and statistics to drive player recruitment. I will be doing this in conjunction with attributes and utilising my scouts. I'm not yet ready to abandon attributes altogether but I do think it's a sensible and realistic approach to use data & statistics to identify potential targets and focus scouting, especially at a small club. Expect musings on recruitment. I have my own methods but I'm also paying close attention to work being done by FMStag - 'what does good look like in FM24'.

Finances - I'm a bit of an anorak when it comes to club finances (yes I know it's sad) and improvements in FM24 in this area are for me one of the most exciting aspects of the game. I like to be very hands on, manage finances tightly and run a club in the black. One of the first pieces of business at a new club for me is to assess the finances and get them on an even keel. Player recruitment and player sales are heavily influenced by value. You can expect me to the sell the crown jewels if the price is right. This may or may not reflect my real life nature of being a bit tight?

Visuals

I like the game to look nice. As such I'll be using a stadium/logo pack, a real names fix & an alternative skin.

Performance

I've got a decent PC and will be running almost all European leagues as low down the pyramid as the game will allow. One or two European leagues won't be active for obvious reasons. I'll will be making fairly early decisions to 'turn off' some of the less reputable leagues as a means of maintaining game speed.

Ability

I'm probably a very average football manager, I might fail, I might get sacked, but I can't help but feel there's a place for this amongst the sea of success stories that I can't hope to emulate. In some respects I make the game harder for myself but don't expect me to be winning the Champions League inside 10 seasons. As an example, my last journeyman save on FM23 saw me end up at Lazio after about 15 seasons. This should probably be considered a success story given my unemployed, no badges, no reputation starting point. However, I finished my career with only a single trophy to my name (the Belgian league title with Union St.Gilloise a few seasons earlier). The purpose of doing this is not to boast about success but to learn, to engage with other players, especially those struggling for success, hopefully for mutual benefit. It's for science.......also, I can't play FM at work so I have to have something to get my FM fix.

Finally, I just want to stress that I am merely highlighting what you can expect from me if you follow my career updates, I make no judgement on how anyone else plays the game. If you like to search for wonderkids in the Peru U17's squad and max out the finances then go for it, play the game however it gives you the most enjoyment, this is just what works for me.

I've held back on starting this until full release, just in case there are any major changes before I commit to a long term save.

I'll update as regularly as I can whilst holding down a full time job, if views are limited and interest is low I will probably hang up my keyboard.

If you're still reading - Thanks. Updates coming soon.

[Troops]

I have my first job.

I had a few interviews along the way. I do wonder what factors go into deciding whether you get offered a job or not. Clearly reputation is very important, that goes without saying. For those that like to start unemployed with no badges or reputation then there has to come a point where you are offered a job, otherwise there would be no point in having this as an option. Job interview questions remain much the same as they did in previous versions and so do the responses. But do the responses actually matter? Is there a right and a wrong answer? Is the right answer to a question different depending on the club/chairman/philosophy etc, or maybe the right answer is randomised to some degree.

Anyway, I'm the new manager at Vianense in the Portuguese 3rd tier. If you've read my introduction it will come as no surprise that one of the key factors in choosing this job over the other couple of jobs I was offered is that the finances are in a good state. The club is in the black, within the wage budget and as an added bonus there is no debt. Debt is the factor that often takes me by surprise when I take up my post at a new club as it's something you can't see beforehand, I'd love to be able to ask the board in interviews whether the club has any debt commitments.

The clubs obscurity is such that it's ground doesn't even feature in my stadium pack so I've manually added an image of the ground.

Whilst managerless the club has been doing pretty well and finds itself 2nd (of 10) in the league, having won 3 of it's last 4 league games. There's every chance I could come in and make the situation worse than that! Luckily, expectations are low and I have to avoid finishing in the bottom 3. Inevitably, all the players hate me. I find the first challenge is often to build a bit of support and cohesion, so starting off with some points on the board is a bonus, even though we are only 7 games into the season.

First day at the club, exciting times, so I'm off to assess the squad, design a tactic, have a look at the backroom team and set them to work.

 

[Troops]

Squad assessment has been interesting. So where are we (the team) strong and where are we weak? If I navigate around the league and look at other squads it could be argued that the information available is limited given my lack of knowledge of the league, I also know very little about the players in the third tier of Portugal so there's not much to be gained by looking at individuals. Yet if I look at my squad planner and navigate into the comparison report I can see how my squad as a whole compares to other squads in the league. We are certainly technically inferior across the board, even mentally we don't seem to stack up against the league average apart from in a few key areas. Those key areas are Aggression, Anticipation, Bravery, Decision Making & Teamwork. Physically we look superior to most other teams. Coupled with those key mental statistics I think we do need to try and take advantage of our Physical superiority, not give opposition teams time to play, be direct when we win possession & get the ball to our physical forward players. For me, those mental attributes all lend themselves to closing down quickly & hopefully making good decisions when we win the ball and look to counter. We will also be playing for set pieces, again with a view to taking advantage of our physical superiority. We've not got any great set pieces takers but I'm hopeful they are just about good enough & something I've never done before is I've started training a player to take a long flat throw. He's got a long throws of 12 and is 29yo so I'm not hopeful but I want to see how he gets on.

So here's the tactic. The formation & a few of the roles have been selected to suit the players, instructions have been kept fairly simple. The wide players have individual instructions to cross more often, I've left the passing directness at the middle setting but the GK, back four and the DM given individual instructions to be slightly more direct, hopefully with counter attacking on we can make use of that decision making rather than just blindly hitting it long. At first glance I am concerned that with a high line, high press & step up more all selected we might ourselves be vulnerable to quick counters in behind to pacey forwards (especially given our lack of pace) but I'll have to assess that as I go as I think those settings do complement our style and our strengths.  

I've also offered contracts to a few staff members, we needed a scout, a recruitment analyst and a sports scientist. There's a few other vacancies I don't intend to fill but those feel like essentials to me as we had nobody in those roles. There's a few whose services I'd like to dispose of but I want to see where we are financially before I start terminating contracts and it'll be a full month before I can make that assessment. If we can keep the monthly losses to around £20k-£40k I'll be happy. There doesn't seem to be any prize many in the league & we are already out of the cup so hopefully we can play well and get fans through the turnstiles. I can't see us selling any players either as all our players are on 12month deals.

I've also spent a bit of time setting up training schedules and individual training.

It might be time to click continue for the first time.
 

[Hootieleece]

Good Luck! With your Squad assessment your team might be good for bringing the gengen press to Portugal and playing "Bully Ball" as I call it.

 

[Troops]

19 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

Good Luck! With your Squad assessment your team might be good for bringing the gengen press to Portugal and playing "Bully Ball" as I call it.

 

Thanks. That's pretty much the plan.

[Troops]

Well I didn't expect to be reporting on just my first game in charge for this next post but on the back of a 5-1 win I just can't help myself. We were at home against a team below us in the league so we probably should have won the game but it's the manner of the victory which prompts the post. The players carried out my instructions exactly as I had hoped. I thought it might take a while for the players to get used to the tactic but not a bit of it. Check out the analytics from the game. 

 

A significant concentration of aerial challenges in the opponents area and as a result five key headers inside the six yard box, just at a glance there is an obvious superiority in set pieces, crosses and aerial challenges in the box. It's early days but it's a great sign that the tactics employed, especially the cross more often, hit early crosses and play for set pieces instructions are paying dividends. Two of our goals were headers from crosses, one was a header from a recycled ball following a corner and another was a close range finish following a headed knock down. Only one of our five goals didn't really result from a header of some type. This is all despite being out-possessed 45%-55% & attempting nearly 100 less passes, so those analytics are certainly not being skewed as a result of us dominating the game.

Our opponents goal actually came from a low xg shot from outside the area but they did have one great chance at 1-1 after a through ball to a pacey striker. The exact type of goal I was worried about conceding but luckily he could only hit the post in a 1-on-1 with the keeper.

I'm expecting the AI to 'work out' my tactic fairly quickly as it's not rocket science but hopefully the task of actually doing something about it might be tricky as we are clearly playing to our strengths.

 

[Troops]

Thus far it's a season of positives and negatives. Luckily, I had a positive start to my time in charge and it was 7 games before I tasted defeat for the first time. The first stage of the season has now come to a close & we find ourselves comfortably in the championship group after finishing in 3rd place in the league, had we not lost 3 of our last 4 games we would have finished top. All of that would have stood for nothing though as the first stage points tallies are reset for the championship group and a league of 8 teams battle it out for two promotion spots and one playoff spot. Financially we remain in the black, albeit only just, as we are losing around £30k/month. I'm delighted we have avoided the relegation group as points tallies have also been reset there and given the fact there is a 16point difference between the best and worst teams going into the group that feels a little bit unfair. I think the second half of the season is going to be be pretty tough & promotion seems unlikely so planning for next season starts early.

 

 

On the negative side I'm struggling with squad dynamics. Despite the good form both team cohesion and managerial support have remained low, in fact I've had a handful of players come to me complaining that they think I have lost the dressing room. Luckily this has happened in the transfer window & with the exception of one player, I've been able to offload those players. The remaining player is sat in the U19's, transfer listed & surplus to requirements. I suspect I'll be able to get rid before deadline and he's out of contract at the end of the season anyway. It's a bit of a tightrope though as I still don't really have any support and more may have to go. This is the key factor in our downturn in form as a few of those players were important first team players but I don't think I can tolerate them making the situation worse & I'm better off getting rid. All this means the first team is weaker than earlier in the season and performances reflect that. It's another reason I'm glad to have qualified for the championship group as I think we may have had a battle on our hands in the relegation group!

Team cohesion and managerial support is something I struggled with in FM23 too & often took me a long time to turn round, in fact I think I may have even had to resign from a job at one stage as the situation had spiralled out of control. I would have been hopeful the positive start would have done the trick but it seems to have had little or no effect.  It's a dynamic I can't really work out at the moment.

[Hootieleece]

put some team bonding sessions in your practice plans. Community Relations also helps team cohesion.

Biggest thing for team cohesion is picking a formation and roles and NOT tinkering too much.

 

Also try to get the Captain and Vice-Captain on your side. Discuss the Locker room atmosphere with them and ask if they have any advice.

[Troops]

1 hour ago, Hootieleece said:

put some team bonding sessions in your practice plans. Community Relations also helps team cohesion.

Biggest thing for team cohesion is picking a formation and roles and NOT tinkering too much.

 

Also try to get the Captain and Vice-Captain on your side. Discuss the Locker room atmosphere with them and ask if they have any advice.

Thanks. I'll definitely give that a try. (although I've hardly tinkered at all with formation/roles).

 

[Troops]

Performance

As far as this is concerned we performed as I expected us to do in the Championship Group and found ourselves short of the required quality to really challenge for promotion. It was hampered by another managerial support crisis early in the stage as we'd started off okay taking 7 points from our opening three games but this caused us to lose 4 on the bounce, there was a mini recovery towards the end but we were only able to take 6 points from those last 7 games so it was too little too late. Board expectations have been exceeded and then some but as far as my own expectations are concerned I could only describe the season as 'expected'.

Cohesion/Managerial Support

After a concerted effort this did improve. There was only minor improvements to cohesion, even though tactics remained pretty much the same throughout the season and I made sure every single training session (since I mentioned the problem) offered at least some benefit to cohesion. Manager support went well initially and I eventually got to the stage where no player opposed me. I had no support but I felt the corner had perhaps been turned. All my hard work was undone though when I had the audacity to tell the players I wasn't happy with their performance following a 3-1 home reverse to the team bottom of the league. Every single player immediately opposed me. It was another battle to turn around and some players were sacked (released on a free), including the captain who was becoming a nuisance and this enabled me to appoint a captain who seemed a little more sympathetic to my cause and this got me through to the end of the season.

Player Development & Contracts 

Early in the season one of my most important players was the Goalkeeper and I thought it a real coup when I got him to sign a contract extension with no wage rise. From that point on he was appalling, to the point I ended up dropping him & luckily his deputy did a decent job. They are 2 of only 6 players who signed contract extensions. There was one or two others I would have liked to keep but they either had wage demands I couldn't/wasn't prepared to meet or had caused me 'support' problems during the season and had to go. One of the players retained is the guy I was training 'long flat throw'. This was successful and it has certainly given us a small set piece bonus over the course of the season. He's actually not a great player though so I have to carefully consider whether his long throw abilities outweigh the fact there are better options in his position. At the moment, he plays when fit. We only conceded 16 goals in 18 games in the first stage and this doubled to exactly 32 in only 14 games in the Championship Group. So I'll be keeping an eye on this trend as it may be that the AI has started to work us out. Alternatively it could just be that we were actually, in terms of personnel, a weaker team in the Championship Stage as well as the fact that these were overall better teams than we faced in the first stage.

Finances

This proved worse than initially suspected. I overlooked the end of season bonuses which took our debt from around £60k to £170k. This is significant in as much as the sponsorship and TV money we are about to receive will only take us back to about even. Over the course of the season we lost around £200k total. We will be making savings on staff this season as all U19 staff have been jettisoned as has the DoF, HoYD & TD. This won't be enough to reduce those losses significantly though. The transfer budget is £0 but the wage budget has been inexplicably increased by nearly 200% from about £6k/week to about £23k/week. I cannot fathom why the board have done this? Spending £20k/week will absolutely bankrupt this club. I'd planned to reduce the playing staff to around 20 first team players this season with perhaps about 4/5 of those hopefully being loanees on 0% wage contributions. This would enable me to expand the wage structure up to maybe £500/week max for our best players and stay within our £6k/week wage restrictions, I was even preparing myself for a wage budget reduction. I've also signed three of the youth prospects as emergency cover as I don't intend to have an U19 set up but I felt they were just good enough for very limited first team cover in extreme circumstances & on an absolute pittance.

Recruitment

We are shopping in the free transfer market. There is a limit of a minimium of 14 HG players in the match day squad of 20 so I have to look primarily at players that fulfil this requirement. Obviously our scouting is limited so I don't really have knowledge of any players outside Portugal anyway but this feels realistic. There is a lot of players available who fit the bill so I've spent a lot of time trying to reduce the list of potential signings by assessing there performance statistics. I'll hopefully be taking the one's that appear to stand out on trial before I commit to signing them. Depending on how successful that is I'll work my way down the list. I have a shortlist for each position as well as an additional shortlist for each position for players that don't qualify as HG & an additional shortlist for what appear to be statistically the best players. This enables me to filter out the players who don't meet the criteria on a position by position basis in there own shortlist. So 18 shortlists in total. I plan to promote to the 'statistically best' shortlist if I reject or can't afford those already on it. A lot to get through & I don't yet know how successful this approach is going to be!

 

[Troops]

I've ended up with a squad of 24 players. This includes the 3 youth prospects and 3 loanees on 0% wages, so 21 first team players. All the 3 loanees are wingers, this wasn't deliberate, it just seemed to fall that way as there seemed to be less wingers available that fitted my requirements and a a couple of my top targets ended up going elsewhere. I wanted wingers with decent aerial ability so that they provide an aerial threat in the box from crosses when the ball is coming in from the opposite flank. In fairness, given the low numbers of players retained I could have changed tactics for this season but I'd already prepared my shortlists and headers won/90 was an important metric at the time given there was a few more players I perhaps would have kept had circumstances been different. Crosses completed/90 was another important metric for wingers and full backs so another reason perhaps the options on the wing were limited given they need to be able to cross & head.

As I intended I've stayed well within the wage budget. I'm spending just over £8k/week, this is more than last season but nearly a third of the available budget. As the debt creeps towards £300k I think spending more would be irresponsible. I suspect if I spent the budget that the board may 'inject funds to help with running costs' but I want to avoid this if I can as it feels a bit unrealistic. There is a couple of players I could sell but I would only get small amounts, maybe £50k, and these are (obviously) our best players so I think we should hang on to them for now as the dent in the debt would be negligible. If I don't make the championship group this season I might consider cashing in.

On that topic though it's been a decent start to the season as we sit comfortably in a championship group qualification place. It's half way through the stage so if we maintain anything like decent form we should be able to qualify.

I wanted to sign a player with good free kick taking ability to improve our set piece/aerial threat and I managed to do just that. I was also hoping to pick up a player that either had a 'long flat throw' or could be trained that trait. There's a couple of candidates but I'm less confident as their long throws/strength stat is lower than the player we trained last season. He's still with us but given squad improvements he really is a rotation option now and I can't justify picking him every week given how inferior he is to the first choice options. The improved free kicks along with prioritising heading/crossing in my metrics I think has contributed to our good form.

 

These graphics include both first stage groups so shows us in comparison to 19 other teams in total. Headers won a particularly pleasing graphic as we have won nearly 20% more headers than any other team and more than double the team that sits bottom of this graphic.

 

[Troops]

My overconfidence about qualifying for the Championship Group nearly came back to bite me. Immediately before my last post we had won 4 on the spin, I'd just picked up my first manager of the month and we looked to be going along quite nicely thankyou. Of course we then proceeded to lose the next 4 and suddenly my confidence of qualification was in the dim and distant past. I did manage to steady the ship on the run in and we headed into our last game of the season at home to the team that sat just below us in the table and could snatch the last qualification place away from us with a win. We played out a nervous 0-0 draw and we scrape through.

 

Once again the most pleasing aspect of this is that we are safe from relegation! We are actually 6 points worse off than we were last season so I don't hold out much hope of challenging for promotion as we head into the final stage. I'm delighted with our defensive record again, as for the second season running we concede less than a goal a game in the opening stage, that all went downhill quickly last season but I do think we are better placed to stay solid defensively this time around, the concern is that we are struggling in front of goal & an obvious downside to running a small squad size is that options are limited.

I was pleased when I managed to sign Soares as he looked very decent for this level but he simply hasn't delivered. He's trained well and improved over the course of the season but a return of only 3 goals isn't enough. Admittedly his xg is only 4.80 & there is an argument he isn't getting the service, which is true to an extent (as our wingers have also been poor) but I feel that I need more from him. His understudy is 35 and set to retire in the summer, he's had a few injuries and not much game time but he also has struggled to make an impact when he has played.

[Hootieleece]

Strikers in Gegen press systems seem to lose goals to the midfielders (attacking and Central) from what I can tell, but also if your wingers can't pass and cross that doesn't help.

My team in Wales uses the Gegen press but it is mostly to put the other team on the back foot so we can possess the ball and create Set-Piece Opportunities. (My player's aren't as good as yours)

[Troops]

1 hour ago, Hootieleece said:

Strikers in Gegen press systems seem to lose goals to the midfielders (attacking and Central) from what I can tell, but also if your wingers can't pass and cross that doesn't help.

The wingers I signed aren't good enough that's for sure. I may have news on that soon.

 

1 hour ago, Hootieleece said:

My team in Wales uses the Gegen press but it is mostly to put the other team on the back foot so we can possess the ball and create Set-Piece Opportunities. (My player's aren't as good as yours)

That's pretty much my approach too. I think partly the problem may be his low positioning, as whilst he looks decent in the air, most centre backs will be fairly decent in the air too and if he finds himself poorly positioned for crosses his aerial ability is not quite good enough to make up for it? He's around for another season and assuming we don't get promoted I'll probably stick with him. At the end of the season I need to take a closer look at his metrics around his pressing when we are out of possession. Whilst on the face of it defensive metrics if he's performing well in tackles/pressures/interceptions then he's doing the job I'm asking of him perhaps?

[Troops]

Half way through the Championship stage and, remarkably, we find ourselves in with a shout. I still think promotion for us is unlikely but we have been playing well and a couple of things have contributed to this I think. When we qualified for this stage there was about 5 days of the transfer window left, finances didn't really allow me to look at actual permanent signings but I decided to act on the wingers problem. A couple of the loanees had loan termination options so I thought I'd have a look at whether I could replace them. Time was short and given our lack of scouting generally I didn't have much of an insight into the options available. I decided to set three criteria. Players listed for loan who are in the youth set up of a top tier Portuguese club that are willing to accept a 0% wage contribution. I sorted the options by height and signed the tallest RW & tallest LW, both 6'5" as it happens. Both these players have made an impact, they aren't really any better than the two I returned to their clubs but their physique/attributes are better aligned to our style of play. In addition to that, for the first time since I arrived at the club, some 18 months ago, I have some player support!

 

Our two defeats came against Varzim & Benfica B. We played for an hour with ten men against Varzim and were unlucky not to grab an equaliser towards the end. To be fair to Benfica B they outplayed us and ran out comfortable winners. Being up against the B teams of three of the four top Portuguese clubs feels tough, I feel that they should have at least 2/3 players that are a lot better than what we have at our disposal. Once again it's our defensive solidity that underpins our decent form. 

[Troops]

Does anybody have any idea whether a player who has decided to 'explore his options' can be persuaded to change his mind?

Vilas Boas here decided to do that way back in the summer. He doesn't look much but he has, without doubt, been our most consistent performer over the last two seasons. He very rarely puts in a poor performance and is our Mr. Reliable in central midfield.

[Troops]

Blimey. This just got interesting. 3 points separate the top 4 teams going into the last day of the season. All 4 teams could finish in any of the top 4 places. Promotion/playoff/heartbreak.

 

[Hootieleece]

Basically, wait him out and do well as a team. He will rejoin if you are promoted and or your offer is better than the others he receives. (That is based on past FM's). It basically means you won't be able to re-sign early.

 

[Troops]

Very surprised to say the least.

[Troops]

Season Review 24/25

Performance

I think it's fair to say we massively exceeded my own expectations. I also have to confess we rode our luck this season, apart from one team every other team that entered the Championship Group this season had accumulated at least 9 more points than us in the first stage of the season. We finished that first stage in poor form and scraped in with a 0-0 draw on the final game day. Remarkably, our opponents that day, ended up getting relegated! I think that suggests there isn't much difference in quality at this level. If I were managing one of the other teams in the Championship Group I would feel a little bit cheated that the title was won by us. 

Cohesion/Managerial Support

In the most part this has been on an even keel all season with all those dynamics sitting around average, albeit I do think that little boost in manager support I got towards the end of the season definitely contributed to our title charge, winning 5 of our last 6 games. There will be a smaller turnaround in both staff and players I think this season so hopefully I can maintain this going into next season.

Player Development & Contracts 

I'm currently negotiating a couple of contract extensions with the two players who had originally decided to explore their options at the end of the season. Promotion has done the trick and I think both will stay, including Vilas Boas. I signed only two of the youth intake prospects as once again I don't intend to run a U19 team so they have to be good enough to provide emergency cover. The loan players will leave as will a couple who are out of contract. There's maybe a couple more I would have let go had I known we would get promoted but I never even considered promotion a possibility this season and they were players who provided good squad cover and I didn't want to lose them. I do need to strengthen and probably need to recruit around 7 players for first team duties.

Finances

Again, this proved worse than initially suspected. The Championship Group teams play less games than the relegation group and also this season had four B teams in a group of 8. I think perhaps this has had a negative effect on match day income. Nevertheless our total losses were £428,127k over the season and given I operated will within the wage budget the figures don't look good. Our weekly wage spend is £8,354/week. As such over 52 weeks the total cost for the season in wages alone could be £434,408. This is a worst case scenario figure though as (obviously) some of this budget includes things like appearance fees, win bonuses, clean sheet bonuses etc.. so the actual cost to us in wages was £314,630. As such, even if I operated with a wage budget of £0, the club would still lose around £100k/season. Not sustainable. Staff have been cut to the bone and there isn't really any savings to be made anywhere else. I really don't know how this would have translated to wage budget next season had we not been promoted as the club was just gradually going to the wall. There isn't even really any value in players at this level so getting that one time player sale that solves a debt problem is extremely unlikely. But we did get promoted, so how does this impact on us going forward? The board have set the wage budget at £30k/week. Again, I don't think it would be prudent to spend this kind of money and I'm hoping to come in around the £10k-£12k/week mark. We should hopefully get much bigger match day incomes and there is also £300k participation money. Our actual wage budget costs (currently) are about 28% less than the headline figure, taking that into next season if my headline cost is around £12k/week the actual cost will work out about £450k over the course of the season, if I take the participation money from that I'm hopeful that the increased match day income will cover the other £150k and we can at least break even next season.

Recruitment

We are, of course, still shopping in the free transfer market. The HG players rule seems much less stringent in Liga 2 so I can afford to look further afield for players. Our scouting is still very limited so, again, I don't really have much knowledge of any players outside Portugal, I'll be using performance metrics again to identify what appear to be the best options and take the one's that stand out on trial before I commit to signing them. I'll be using the same system as last season but it shouldn't be quite as much of a rush this season as there are less places to fill.

Career

Despite repeatedly mithering the board for coaching courses I have only managed to secure one course, a National C licence. Apparently the board are concerned I might move to a bigger club. And so they should be, because that's exactly what I intend to do. My reputation has seen a boost to 1.5 stars following promotion. I am though, likely to stay at Vianense for one more season and see how we fare in Liga 2. My experiences in previous FM's is that it can be tempting to move on too early and find yourself back dealing with player unrest and moaning just at a slightly bigger club that actually has an inferior squad to the one you just left. I am keeping my eye on the job market though for any tempting opportunities.

[Hootieleece]

Career wise I think it might be hard to get a "Better" (Professional) Job with only a National C License that is one reason I haven't left Conwy in my updates. Team that are professional seem to be a bit pickier than in the past fm's.

[Troops]

It's been a very tricky close season. Attracting players of sufficient quality to the team whilst remaining within the wage budget I've set for myself proved, and is still proving, to be a tough ask.

A lot of effort has gone into using the data metrics available to identify potential targets & then trying to obtain as much info as possible through scouts/trials. This has been a very successful method in identifying and prioritising a large number of quality players. There's been the usual FM recruitment saga when it comes to negotiating contracts when players I have been tracking for weeks & months and are never wanted by an AI club suddenly get a competing offer just after I offer a contract, usually resulting in them signing for the other club and usually on inferior terms to what I was offering. One player even signed for a club in the league below me. There's also a handful players that I just couldn't agree terms with due to their wage demands who ended up going elsewhere for way less than I would have offered them.

I've struggled to stay within the self imposed wage budget and I'm currently spending just over £14k/week. I'm also still looking for a couple more players so chances are £15k/week will be where I end up. Remains to be seen how this impacts on the finances but in our first game of the season the away team only brought 195 fans. Hopefully this picks up.

The bookies think we are a dead cert for relegation. I agree staying up will be a tough task but I think we can pull it off. The squad comparison shows us below average in all but five attribute areas, these are Bravery, Teamwork, Jumping Reach, Strength & Natural Fitness. No surprises then that our tactic remains the same; Get into their faces, try to win the ball early, play for set pieces, be direct and get crosses in early. It's also no surprise that this team is below average in most attribute areas, we are the worst team in the league in five attribute areas but we only have to finish above three other teams.

Our first game of the season was against Leixões and we ran out 2-1 winners, we rode our luck but I think we shaded it. Looking at that season preview again it was against a thoroughly decent side, so I'm delighted, as it looks like we can be competitive at this level. Just to make it even sweeter, after winning promotion and persuading him to stay, it was (surely soon to be club icon) Leandro Vilas Boas who cropped up with a 90th minute winner as he smashed a header from a corner in off the crossbar. 

  

[Troops]

We got off to a fantastic start in the league as we won 5 of our first 7 games, we were quickly brought back down to earth though losing 5 of the following 7 games and I was looking nervous as we slid down the table. We have arrested the slide though by winning 3 of the last 4 and we reach the half way stage in the season handily placed in 3rd. Truth is it's very close though and once again I don't think there is too much between the sides in this league. The xg table suggests we are 4 points better off than we should be, placing us as the 8th best team so far this season. That feels about right to me. What is pleasing though is that we haven't been drawn into a relegation battle. There's no room for complacency but we are probably only about 4 wins away from securing Liga 2 football next season.

I have refused the boards repeated offers of a new contract, just as they have refused my repeated requests for a coaching course. I have browsed the job market and applied for a few interesting jobs but thus far haven't had so much as an invite to an interview.

If I stay at Vianense there will be a lot of work to do in preparation for next season, 5x first team players have already decided they will be exploring their options, there's 1x retirement and a further 8x out of contract. Those out of contract are mostly squad players, 3 of them could perhaps earn an extension depending on their performances between now & the end of the season and their contract demands.

Finances go from bad to worse and it looks like the club will be over £1million in debt by the end of the season, this is all despite the fact I am spending under 50% of the wage budget for the 2nd season running and have recruited entirely on free transfers. I've no idea how this will impact next seasons budgets but I suspect there must come a point where this has to be addressed & budget restrictions are the only viable way to do this. That said, a 50% reduction would actually have no effect at present as we are under that anyway.

 

[Troops]

I don't claim to be a maths genius but by my calculations that's not a 100% win rate, that's an 80% win rate.

A little frustrating given that I did have a 100% win rate, admittedly we played a game less but I still feel a bit cheated.

It's obviously been a fantastic month for us, picking up 12 points from 4 games and ensuring our status as a Liga 2 side for next season. It was just in time too as we had only taken a single point from our 3 games in February and were on a run of taking only 5 points from 8 games. I was starting to look at bit nervously at the league table as we gradually slipped down but we are right back in it now. In fact as we approach the business end of the season we are in a group of 10 teams separated by only 8 points in what looks like a battle for a playoff spot as the two leaders have a bit of a cushion. Admittedly those 4 wins were all against struggling teams and I suspect our form is likely to be patchy in our last 6 games. We do have 4 of the 6 games at home but there isn't much to choose between our home form and our away form really.

 

We are now on the verge of the £1million mark in terms of debt. We don't have any loans or repayments to furnish but I have had the first indication that somebody other than me might be concerned about the financial state of the club as my last player contract status notification lists 'financial position not strong enough' as a recommendation. That's the first time this has happened and might just be an early warning that budgets are going to be cut for next season.

[Troops]

In our typical style for this season we follow up 5 straight wins by failing to win a single one of our 5 last games. We were certainly nothing if not unpredictable this season. This leaves us though in what I consider to be a very creditable 8th place. I'd have been content with 15th so that's a positive season.

[Troops]

I'm torn about what I should do now. I find myself out of contract in a month. I have been unable to secure any further coaching qualifications and my reputation is still 1.5 stars, therefore it seems unlikely I will get a better job than the job I have. There's a lot of work to be done this close season given the amount of first team players who have decided to leave & I think replacing them with players of at least equal quality will be difficult given our budget.

That's right, as I suspected, the board have slashed my wage budget by half. Our budget is currently, with the exception of one other team, half the next lowest in the league and a fraction of most of the other teams.

I wouldn't mind if there was a light at the end of the tunnel as far as finances go but there really isn't, it's only going to get worse.

Currently, I feel as though I should leave Vianense, even if this results in me getting a job that initially appears inferior to the one I have. There are of course plenty of reasons to stay, not least the fact the job hunt will be difficult, there are a couple of decent young players here I'd like to see develop but I've been here two and a half years now & I feel a journeyman would move on at this point.....

 

[Troops]

It's certainly been a period of unexpected developments.

As we approached the end of the season with Vianense all the players who had initially expressed intentions to consider their options decided to stay at the club, all except one of them even took a pay cut to do so. Given all the factors that I have mentioned previously, I decided to extend my stay at Vianense, I felt with those players staying and some decent recruitment I could have another good season here. As the summer progressed I felt recruitment was going okay, however there were also some negative developments.

There was a board takeover. The new board didn't invest in the club, there was a loan taken out and the debts were paid off. The transfer budget remained at £0 and the wage bill was cut again albeit by a small amount. As a result I was unable to sign any of my backroom team to extended contracts and had to replace them all with inferior alternatives. They were recruited on the cheap as it was, so you can imagine the quality of the replacements. Basically, if you were prepared to work for peanuts you had a job offer. My final signing of the season was about to take us over the wage budget restrictions by about £200/week and the board intervened and cancelled the transfer. There had actually been a bit of interest in one or two of our players so I was confident I could balance the books by the end of the window but the board didn't even discuss the matter with me.

And finally, I approached the board for a coaching course. This was refused, we had a discussion about the matter and I tried every chat option to convince them, they didn't budge & I tried the final option of threatening to leave. My bluff was called, except it wasn't a bluff & I was on the next flight home.

Luckily, I was destined not to be out of work for long as I took the managerial position at Seinäjoen Jalkapallokerho (SJK) in the Finnish 2nd tier. This is a club actually in the promotion picture as it's a summer season in Finland & there is only 3 games to go before the end of the season and playoffs. We are mathematically certain of a playoff place & extremely unlikely to secure automatic promotion. One thing I insisted on in the interview was a coaching course! This could be considered a step backwards but I think this team has more potential than Vianense, they are previous champions of Finland with a decent ground and facilities. Finances are in an okay state, there is no debt but I think we need to get back to the top tier either this season or next if they are to remain that way long term. Also, I don't recall managing in Finland before. Squad dynamics start positive with good cohesion and dressing room atmosphere, only a few players oppose me too so I'm hopeful of making a quick positive start and maybe even get promoted at the first time of asking. 

A quick look at the team comparison and we are superior to the other teams in the league in 21 attribute areas! It's a change of tactical approach from me then as two of the areas we aren't superior in are crossing and heading. There will be similarities, I want to press high up the pitch & win the ball back early but we will be looking to dominate possession, play attacking football & work the ball into the box.

[HugoManager14]

4 horas atrás, Troops disse:

It's certainly been a period of unexpected developments.

As we approached the end of the season with Vianense all the players who had initially expressed intentions to consider their options decided to stay at the club, all except one of them even took a pay cut to do so. Given all the factors that I have mentioned previously, I decided to extend my stay at Vianense, I felt with those players staying and some decent recruitment I could have another good season here. As the summer progressed I felt recruitment was going okay, however there were also some negative developments.

There was a board takeover. The new board didn't invest in the club, there was a loan taken out and the debts were paid off. The transfer budget remained at £0 and the wage bill was cut again albeit by a small amount. As a result I was unable to sign any of my backroom team to extended contracts and had to replace them all with inferior alternatives. They were recruited on the cheap as it was, so you can imagine the quality of the replacements. Basically, if you were prepared to work for peanuts you had a job offer. My final signing of the season was about to take us over the wage budget restrictions by about £200/week and the board intervened and cancelled the transfer. There had actually been a bit of interest in one or two of our players so I was confident I could balance the books by the end of the window but the board didn't even discuss the matter with me.

And finally, I approached the board for a coaching course. This was refused, we had a discussion about the matter and I tried every chat option to convince them, they didn't budge & I tried the final option of threatening to leave. My bluff was called, except it wasn't a bluff & I was on the next flight home.

Luckily, I was destined not to be out of work for long as I took the managerial position at Seinäjoen Jalkapallokerho (SJK) in the Finnish 2nd tier. This is a club actually in the promotion picture as it's a summer season in Finland & there is only 3 games to go before the end of the season and playoffs. We are mathematically certain of a playoff place & extremely unlikely to secure automatic promotion. One thing I insisted on in the interview was a coaching course! This could be considered a step backwards but I think this team has more potential than Vianense, they are previous champions of Finland with a decent ground and facilities. Finances are in an okay state, there is no debt but I think we need to get back to the top tier either this season or next if they are to remain that way long term. Also, I don't recall managing in Finland before. Squad dynamics start positive with good cohesion and dressing room atmosphere, only a few players oppose me too so I'm hopeful of making a quick positive start and maybe even get promoted at the first time of asking. 

A quick look at the team comparison and we are superior to the other teams in the league in 21 attribute areas! It's a change of tactical approach from me then as two of the areas we aren't superior in are crossing and heading. There will be similarities, I want to press high up the pitch & win the ball back early but we will be looking to dominate possession, play attacking football & work the ball into the box.

well manging vianense is my destination for my ruben amorim challenge in fm 24

[Troops]

Good luck. I'm sure a manager with more ability than myself can make a success out of it.

[Troops]

Not once but twice did I manage to blow our promotion chances. Had we beaten HIFK Fotboll in the Promotion Group Stage we would have been promoted as champions, as it turned out we had to settle for a playoff spot where we managed to get eliminated by SalPa Salo 4-3, this was despite being 2-0 & 3-2 up. Therefore, it's another season in the Ykkönen & I think we should be aiming to secure promotion by winning the league next season.

There's another close season to navigate where I will be shopping again in the free transfer market, I do have a transfer budget of £1.5million but spending this is not an option as the club only has a balance of just under £0.5million and most of this will be swallowed up over the course of the season with the wage budget. The wage budget is a little bit misleading as there seems to be a first team, a reserve team, an U20's team & a 3rd team. Any players in the 3rd team squad don't have there wage considered as part of the 1st team squad budget. It's a good place to store those surplus to requirements players but it feels a bit cheesy, albeit this is what the previous manager was doing!

I have and will no doubt continue to tweak the tactic as I think we were way too open at the back with the existing tactic, the GK put in a solid 6.1 in that 4-3 defeat saving only 1 of 5 shots on target. That said we had an inferior xg to them so I can't bemoan the result too much and therefore I think we need to be a bit more responsible defensively. Our key player is the AM who now wants to leave due to the club being relegated (not sure how that happened given we weren't relegated), if he does leave there is no ready replacement so this will probably dictate how we adjust tactically for next season.

[Troops]

We are a month away from the season opener but pre-season for us involves competing in the First Division Cup, as it says on the tin this is a cup restricted to teams in our division. As you can see it's been a good start for us and hopefully this is a good sign for the season ahead as despite a bit of a scare in the group stage we go on and lift the trophy, securing the second silverware of the save to add the the Portuguese Liga 3 title all the way back in 24/25. Notice in there a deserved 1-0 win in a friendly against current champions of Finland HJK.

I did tweak the tactic, although I'm not totally happy with it as yet. As you can see I have dropped the BWM into the DM position. I'm hoping to see us defend mostly in a 4-2-3-1 shape with the BBM dropping in alongside the BWM to make up the 2 in the DM position but when we are attacking I'm hoping to see us in a kind of 2-3-4-1 shape with the BWM moving central as the CWB's move up either side of him and the BBM joins the attack in an AM position. I'm not sure this is working quite how I would like at the moment but it probably needs time for the players to adjust. The main problem is we do look asymmetrical in our build up as the BWM tends to stay towards the left hand side of the pitch, my concern is that not only do we build up with a bias to the left hand side as a result but it also makes me think we might be vulnerable down our right when we lose possession, as such I will be keeping an eye on where we concede goals/chances to see if this materialises. I'm reluctant to move the BWM central in case he then interferes with the BBM.

Finances remain problematic in the short term as half of our £500k balance has been depleted in the first three months, hopefully as the season gets going we will get a bit more match day revenue to slow down the losses. Players have a little bit more value here than in Portugal so there is always the possibility of a sale or two along the way to keep the balance topped up. We do have one player in particular who looks like he could soon become way too good for us if he continues to improve as he is doing. Young Muslim Ryzhov who is currently training and playing in that BWM role could have a bright future.

 

[Troops]

It's fair to say the bookies had us down as favourites for the title this season. Given every other team in this league is Semi-Professional it would be a failure of epic proportions not to get this team promoted at what is really the first time of asking. I'm still slightly disappointed I wasn't able to pull it off last season but realistically it's more of an indictment of the previous manager that he had got the team into a position where 6/7 straight wins at the end of the season was required.

And as expected we have absolutely dominated the league. Twenty games into the season and we are a massive 19 points clear of our closest rivals, having dropped only 4 points all season and averaging over 3 goals/game. The league splits after 22 games and the top 6 fight it out for promotion by playing each other again once more. As such there is 7 games to go this season and we are on the verge of securing promotion before the split even takes place.

 

One or two of our better players have wanted to move to a bigger club and as long as the price was right I haven't stood in their way, obviously I'm hoping to strengthen for next season and I feel I can replace them with better players once we are a top flight club again. Also, our dominance in the league is such that I can let them go without replacing them in the short term as we are so much better than our closest rivals that even if it did result in a dip in form the points cushion is sufficient that we would still cruise to the title. It also helps with the finances as those sales have enabled me to keep the club in the black. Hopefully we will be in a much stronger position financially next season.

We also had a little bit of a run in the cup and when we went in 1-0 up at half time in the quarter final against HJK (the current champions of Finland we beat 1-0 in pre-season) I was dreaming of cup glory. In addition it would have given us a back door entry into Europe which would have been a key achievement. Unfortunately we couldn't hold on and they eventually ran out fairly comfortable 3-1 winners. Given the summer season in Finland, Europe feels an extra season away as even is we qualify next season (2028) we won't actually enter the competition until the 29/30 season. 

[Troops]

There has been quite a lot of significant developments. As far as my experience of Football Manager goes over the last few years I'd say unexpected developments too.

There I was doggedly preparing for a top flight campaign in Finland with SJK when out of the blue I was approached by Kristiansund in Norway. Apparently they were very impressed with my performance at SJK and wanted to interview me for the vacant managers position. I was fairly happy to stay at SJK as I felt the close season was going well and that we could challenge for the top 3 or 4 places in the league in the coming season. The Kristiansund board told me they had reservations but I attended the interview and had a nosey round the club. They are a top flight outfit that actually played European football this season albeit they failed to qualify this season for next seasons European competitions, they looked to have solid finances and all in all seemed a well run club, The interview was one of those where most of the questions seemed to be focussed on the negative i.e. previous failure to control players/previous dressing room atmosphere etc.. & this just reinforced my belief that I wouldn't really be in the running.

Of course you guessed it they offered me the job. I really did think long and hard about this one as it feels a fairly small step up and leaving a squad I know well that had a really good atmosphere felt risky. In the end I decided to take the job though as I felt this team has more potential in the long term. First impressions are good, the players here are better than I expected in comparison to SJK albeit there is some imbalance positionally which I am in the process of addressing. It's close season here and once again Norway is a summer season so there is a bit of time to get things straightened out.

When I looked at the finances though I was in for a shock. The £3.2million balance that was part of what persuaded me to move was mainly due to a recent £10million loan that the club has taken out. There was a couple of older players on big contracts that I felt needed offloading and for the first time I used an intermediary to try and offload said players, within a couple of weeks they were gone and straight away the wage structure feels better, there was no inroads made into the debt, that was to come later.

There is one or two good young players here, one in particular looks very decent. Man City made a derisory offer for him which I rejected. He was upset and wanted to discuss the matter so I agreed I would let him go if they came in with an offer of £6.5million. No sooner had he left my office & Pep was on the phone with a £6.5million offer along with a season long loan with a 0% wage contribution. I don't think a club has ever met a player valuation I've agreed with the player before, never mind do so straight away. Admittedly the game now values him at £36m-£56m and this implies I let him go too cheaply but I'm happy with this deal, we keep his services for a season & any debt worries have been postponed for years.

      

[Troops]

It's been a really enjoyable first half of the season at Kristiansund. It's nice not to have financial struggles to contend with for the first time in this save & despite that outstanding loan I'm confident of turning a profit in the transfer market both in the short term as well as in the long term. As is almost always going to be the case when managing all but the elite clubs we are a selling club, therefore identifying talent that ultimately we sell on for a profit will be something that I will always have to consider when recruiting. That said, all the players I recruited for this season were fairly experienced, with only one exception. The main reason for this is my limited knowledge of Norwegian players, I needed to sign players I knew were capable of doing a job in the first team and therefore it was players I had a good knowledge of. There is fairly stringent rules around foreign players in Norway with a maximum of 9 non-homegrown players allowed in the squad. One of my first jobs then is to get as many scouts on board as possible and start identifying homegrown talent.

Obviously an enjoyable season thus far is partly due to the results and with the exception of a 4-0 reverse to Viking early in the season where we thoroughly outplayed we have been competitive in every game so far this season. We currently lie 4th in the league, only 3 points off top but it's very tight as only 12 points separate the top 10 clubs.

We have also negotiated our way to the semi final of the cup. This has been no mean feat as 4 of our 5 games have been away from home, we've beaten 2 fellow top division teams along the way including Odds away from home and haven't really had an 'easy' draw at any stage as all our other games have been against 2nd tier sides. It's no easier from here on in as I suppose is bound to be the case in the semi-final but we have drawn 3rd placed Strømsgodset (away from home of course).

Whilst technically we are in the title race my realistic aims are European qualification, this requires us to finish top 3 or win the cup unless we finish 4th and the cup winner finishes above us in the league. It's still a tough ask but as long as I keep Morale up and don't have to deal with any player unrest I think it is very achievable.

[Troops]

We were unable to overcome Strømsgodset in the cup semi final. Despite being the better side in general play we wasted a lot of chances with wayward shooting. Our first choice striker was injured for the game and this perhaps made the difference. They took a lot of long range shots and both goals came via deflections from a shot outside the box, the first was a free kick that wrong footed the keeper after the deflection and the second took a couple of deflections through a crowd of players after a clearance from a corner. We did get a consolation and put them under heavy pressure at the end but we couldn't find the equalizer.

We continued our great form in the league though and incredibly went on to win the title! I think we are far from the best team in Norway but I do think we are one of a number of teams at a similar level & it was our consistent form all season that enabled us to come out on top. Despite a few draws we only lost one league game in the second half of the season and the inconsistency of the teams around us enabled us to get over the line. Despite being 7 points clear in the end we still finished the season with 7 points less than last years title winners.

It great to finally qualify for Europe albeit we will have an uphill task to reach the league phase of the Champions League. Obviously the financial reward of reaching the league phase is massive for a club of this stature but we enter the competition in the second qualifying round and therefore would have to make it through 3 qualifying rounds against other league champions from around Europe. The reality is that this seems unlikely, last years champions of Norway Vålerenga were eliminated at the first time of asking against the Hungarian Champions this season. Given that they have been pretty poor in the league this season though and they still managed to qualify for the league phase of the Europa league I'd hope to emulate that kind of performance level in Europe. There's an 8 month wait now though as it's (obviously) next seasons competition we have qualified for and the preliminary rounds don't kick off until mid June. The upside is there is a bit of time to strengthen the squad!

   

[Troops]

For some time now I have had a niggling thought in the back of my mind about player happiness/interactions. Every now and again when things are going quite well and have been doing for some time the game seems to throw a curve ball at you. The kind of thing that doesn't really make a lot of sense and almost seems designed to test you in some way and potentially cause a bit of unrest.

My first choice striker just came to me. He played 26 times last season scoring 16 goals at an average rating of 7.23. As far as I am concerned he is a guaranteed starter when fit and unlikely to be replaced anytime soon. His information page suggests we are 'very close', he 'holds me in the highest regard as a manager' and I am one of his favoured personnel. He is currently injured and likely to be out for 3 months. For some reason he now thinks we lack depth in the goalkeeper department and wants to talk to me about it. I explain to him I'm happy with my squad and we don't need another goalkeeper. He goes on to say that he thinks I might not be the right manager for the job. He is now unhappy.

Which is it mate? Do you hold me in the highest regard or am I not the right man for the job? I know I'm going beyond the scope of the chat options here but surely it can't be both.

For context;

1. We have exactly the same goalkeepers in the squad as all of last season. 

2. Our first choice goalkeeper didn't pick up a single injury last season, he played all 30 league games, conceding only 31 goals at an average rating of 6.97. He's a solid keeper and he had a solid season.

3. We haven't even kicked a ball since we won the title.

4. There is only a 25 man first team squad. How many keepers does he think we need. Including reserves and youth players we have 7 keepers across the whole squad. If anything that might be too many for a team with our budget constraints.

One thing that my usual player interaction style results in, is a high level of discipline attribute. My level of discipline is currently 19. What does he expect is going to happen. Very limited knowledge of how I usually deal with this kind of issue would answer the question for him in no uncertain terms (isn't this what a high level of discipline attribute indicates).

So he is of course no longer in that 25 man first team squad, he is transfer listed and in the reserve squad. He's dead to me now.

There's two other players supporting him, needless to say they both are very close and hold me in the highest regard too. I can't see them lasting long whilst they support him.

The weird thing is that at the time we only had one LWB in the first team squad, if he'd have complained about that I would have agreed with him and reassured him I was in the process of recruiting another. Because that's exactly what I was doing.

 

[Troops]

Another thing I have stumbled across recently is the inability of AI managers to, well, manage. It's always been the case that the AI concentrates it's efforts on the league that you are managing in and to a certain degree neglects the other leagues you have loaded. To some extent I understand this but I was under the impression that AI managers were going to be better in this version of FM but I'm just not seeing it. It's maybe something for another post but I think a move to a new league sometimes catches the AI by surprise and enables overperformance (relatively).

Here's an example. I noticed Molde signing a lot of players in the last window, players whose names were vaguely familiar like Bielik, and players I would have thought unlikely to sign for Molde, so I took at their squad. They are one of the strongest teams in Norway and were our closest challengers for the title last season. We can see here that they have 10 players unregistered! The reason they are selected here is that Molde have just played a cup game. But those ten players are ineligible for league games! Not only that they are paying them about £120k/week in total. That's twice our total wage budget on players that can't play. Not one of them is unhappy about it. Martin, the guy on loan, not only are they paying him £12,500/week to not play, they are paying £40k/week loan fee. It's a massively bloated squad for a 30 game season and this can only be described as gross mismanagement.

For comparison purposes, here's the Blackpool squad. They have just signed one of my players (he will join them in the next transfer window) and when I looked at their squad I couldn't believe what I was seeing. The squad consists of only 18 players. Two of them can't play as they don't have a work permit. The guy they have signed from me is Norwegian, so he needs a work permit, his work permit was refused but they signed him anyway, the message stated they would allocate him one of their 2 ESC work permit places. Since they agreed to sign him though they have signed Molina and allocated him that place, so when he joins them in June he can't play because he won't have a work permit. They have 16 players for a 46 game season. I can only describe this as, you guessed it, gross mismanagement.

 

The AI has to manage hundreds of squads, therefore it's clear that this creates a headache in terms of managing them effectively. I haven't looked around at squads and picked out the worst examples. These are just two squads I happened to glance at and therefore if this is replicated across the database it causes me a few concerns. My main concern would be that it makes my life easier or perhaps even too easy? Even if AI managers in game tactics and changes are improved they are potentially still massively hamstrung by a squad totally unfit for purpose.

  
 

[Troops]

Our title defence is well underway and things are going pretty much as I expected them too this season. We did strengthen a little bit in the window but it wasn't wholesale change, there was a handful of new signings and a further one or two have stepped up from the youth/reserve squad. We only took 2 points from our opening 3 games but since then we have recovered by winning 5 of the next 7, that leaves us in 4th place only 2 points off the top. Once again it's a tight league, despite having what I consider to be a slightly better squad than last season I expect it to be harder to win this season. I think a few of our rivals have spent big to strengthen and we will also have those early European rounds to negotiate which fall for us in the later stages of the season, this will put big pressure on a small squad.

We can certainly make an argument that we are massively overperforming given our budget restrictions. Molde with a wage budget 13x bigger than ours!

One of our new signings is a familiar face from my time at SJK as Mulsim Ryzhov joins us in a club record transfer fee of £475k, despite the fee I think we got a bargain as he can still improve considerably and there is a strong likelihood the club can make a profit on him if and when he moves on. He's already a full international and I'm surprised bigger clubs weren't interested in his services.

[Troops]

European football has proved to be a tough ask for this squad. There isn't huge depth to the squad and the increase in games obviously requires squad players to be able to come in and cover for any injuries or fitness issues. That said, we have had a brave Champions League run, we battled hard to get to the point where we were one result away from the Champions League proper, unfortunately we fell at the final hurdle. We could have been in for some real hammerings had we made it but the pay day makes it worthwhile.

As a result of those early qualifying round wins though it means we fall straight into the Europa League and this looks like a particularly hard set of fixtures.

We have suffered a bit domestically as well, if anything we have probably been a bit lucky in the league and find ourselves with a +9 points difference in the xg table.

Defeat at home to Brann last time out though probably ends our title challenge for this season. 5 points adrift with 10 games to go isn't insurmountable but with those European fixtures thrown in we will inevitably have to rotate and again, we just don't have the depth for that. I'll be delighted with a top four finish and European football again next season although having attracted a few job interview offers (which I have declined) there is increasing interest in my services and once our European run for this season is over it might be the right time to think about moving on.

[Troops]

Our European campaign can only be described as disastrous. We lost all six league phase games, we were unlucky in probably every game, but even if we had got what we deserved in those games, the reality is we are a long way from being good enough to compete in this competition & having 2 or 3 points would probably be about as much as we could realistically have hoped for. There is two games left and we can consider ourselves eliminated.

The European campaign in truth was disastrous in more ways than one. Getting beaten in Europe every couple of weeks put a big strain on our league form as one defeat in the league either side of a European defeat and suddenly it's three defeats on the bounce. A 5 game winless streak in September cost us any chance of defending our title, we were a little bit unlucky with injuries but once again this is a side effect of playing twice a week. So we ended up in 3rd place, which I'm more than happy with, we actually only lost 3 league games all season and Viking took 26/30 points available in their last ten games. We would have had to win our last ten straight to have won the title.

As the season drew to a close the job offers/interviews came thick and fast. I probably attended over a dozen interviews, obviously some jobs were more appealing than others and I was able to experiment a bit in some of the interviews that I felt were less likely to result in me taking the job. I demanded coaching badges or youth recruitment improvements just to see how the board reacted. Sadly I can't report any patterns, some agreed to my demands & some didn't.

I haven't really played this journeyman with any narrative in mind, although I have considered what seems 'realistic' here. I went to interviews at teams in the lower reaches of Serie A, Bundesliga and Ligue 1 as well as interviews at a couple of 2nd tier teams in Germany, France & Portugal. In truth I'm not sure my record warrants the amount of interest in my services that was being shown. My reputation is currently 3 stars and in terms of overperformance I can point to the promotion with Vianense at the start of the save and certainly the title with Kristiansund in the previous season but after that the promotion/championship with SJK and 3rd place with Kristiansund this season I could only describe as 'expected', whereas this seasons Europa league campaign was abject.

So I have decided to accept the FC Nordsjælland job, it feels realistic to me that a fellow Scandanavian country/club would recognise my work at Kristiansund and give me an opportunity to step up to a slightly bigger club/league rather than find myself making a big jump to the likes of Werder Bremen or Nantes who had approached me.

I also like the idea that my reputation is such that when I walk through the door in FC Nordsjælland the players won't immediately hate me. Updates may have made changes to the squad dynamics but the early times at Vianense felt like hard work at times and I flirted with totally losing the dressing room more than I would have liked so this feels like a sensible step forward in my career. The previous manager moved on to AZ Alkmaar, so I'm not stepping into a crisis, we are well placed in the league and expectations seem reasonable.

 

The other thing I considered was the finances. If you've been following the updates you know it's something I like to keep an eye on and whilst it's hard to know what kind of debt clubs have before you take the reigns in a new role, there is a few indicators to provide a guide. The clubs has a healthy £10million balance albeit some outstanding debt which currently amounts to about £8million. There is a slight overspend on the wage budget but I can absolutely work with these figures.

 

[keri-johnrlovell]

Mate, I am not even playing the game right now, but I read all of this and it's ridiculously enjoyable! Love it, more!