[FM24] Malaga - Ten Years After

[warlock]

2 hours ago, Jogo Bonito said:

the sheer volume of goals

It's an interesting one. In L3 we scored a boat-load, but we were the best team in the division, odds-on favourites to win the title, and we lived up to our billing. This season so far, in a 22-team league there are 5 teams averaging 2 goals-per-game or slightly better (we're top scorers with 2.5 gpg). Looking back over a few recent matchdays there's nothing that jumps out as being particularly unrealistic - a couple of teams scoring 5, one or two 4-3 type results. Overall, there probably are too many goals being scored but I don't envy SI trying to tweak that to ultra-realistic levels. From what I read in the feedback thread (before I retreated ahead of the avalanche of drivel) it seems to be a bit random - some people are seeing a big problem, some not so much, and some recognise the issue but are enjoying the ME anyway.

So far, FM24 passes my own personal eye-test - it all looks about right and I'm enjoying it. Still hoping that AI transfers and player development can be improved, though - looking at some of my top talents from the Benfica save, Schjelderup is at Liverpool and they're not playing him, Leonardo is at Brighton and they're not playing him .

Fingers crossed for the next update, and I hope you can get some enjoyment out of it.

[Henke90]

Ah Malaga, I very nearly went with them myself this year!  This is great Warlock. Results are fantastic, hopefully you can keep building better sides and rise to the business end of La Liga nice and quickly, keep it up! 

[warlock]

1 hour ago, Henke90 said:

Ah Malaga, I very nearly went with them myself

Plenty of time . Thanks very much for the support - much appreciated!

[warlock]

October 2024

A routine month with just four fixtures, two at home and two away. And we - largely - kept up our good form:

The Mallorca game was an oddity - we scored in the opening minute and then neither side did much for the remaining 89. A snoozefest for the fans. And we weren't much better away at Burgos:

We should have been much better but our forwards had a bad day and the home side were probably deserving of a point. Weird to see Fer Nino - a hero of my FM23 Brentford save - playing for Burgos, and not on loan either.

The remaining two games of the month were much more convincing, especially away at Valladolid who were - on paper - the toughest opponents of the month. Points of note include the continuing emergence of Haitam Abaida, back-to-back goals for on-loan LB Cristo Romero, and a first senior goal for young AM Antonio Cordero.

You might remember my first update for this season when I talked about wanting to bring a couple of youngsters into the first-team squad. Cordero was the one who got my vote of confidence:

I've just noticed he's still a couple of weeks shy of his 18th birthday, but he's been getting minutes off the bench and not embarrassing himself. I'm looking forward to seeing him develop.

The other point of note is the absence of Roberto Fernandez from the list of scorers this month. It might be that continued media speculation about his future here is getting to him - he was very poor against Mallorca and Burgos before picking up an injury against Andorra. The odd thing is that the only club actively interested are Deportivo, who are currently just above the relegation zone in our division so I don't understand why he's bothered about that move.

In the meantime, we retain first place ahead of Oviedo, although only by a point and they have a game in hand. We play them next in our first game of November. Should be interesting!

[Jogo Bonito]

On 25/11/2023 at 22:34, warlock said:

It's an interesting one. In L3 we scored a boat-load, but we were the best team in the division, odds-on favourites to win the title, and we lived up to our billing. This season so far, in a 22-team league there are 5 teams averaging 2 goals-per-game or slightly better (we're top scorers with 2.5 gpg). Looking back over a few recent matchdays there's nothing that jumps out as being particularly unrealistic - a couple of teams scoring 5, one or two 4-3 type results. Overall, there probably are too many goals being scored but I don't envy SI trying to tweak that to ultra-realistic levels. From what I read in the feedback thread (before I retreated ahead of the avalanche of drivel) it seems to be a bit random - some people are seeing a big problem, some not so much, and some recognise the issue but are enjoying the ME anyway.

So far, FM24 passes my own personal eye-test - it all looks about right and I'm enjoying it. Still hoping that AI transfers and player development can be improved, though - looking at some of my top talents from the Benfica save, Schjelderup is at Liverpool and they're not playing him, Leonardo is at Brighton and they're not playing him .

Fingers crossed for the next update, and I hope you can get some enjoyment out of it.

Interesting to hear how it's been for you, thanks for your feedback.

More importantly, you're staying very strong there and it looks like little or nothing will stop you making a return to the top flight. Keep up the good work mate!

[warlock]

November 2024 - injury crisis

I've been quite lucky so far with injuries in this save, but in October the numbers began to mount, and November hasn't been any better:

We only have two natural strikers in the squad - Fernandez and Zuniga - so losing the latter for 5 weeks with sprained knee ligaments was a concern. Which quickly became a crisis when Fernandez suffered an ankle ligament injury that would keep him out for two weeks. On the day he returned to training, he suffered the same injury and was out for another two weeks. Fortunately, several of our AMs are capable of filling in up top and AMR Juan Hernandez got the nod. But the crisis intensified at the end of November when most of our AMs went down like dominoes - first Abaida, then youngster Cordero, and most recently Villodres.

Luckily, Fernandez is now recovered, allowing Hernandez to return to AMR but we'll have to play most of December with just the one fit AM. Summer signing Chema Nunez is a capable AML but that leaves us very light in central midfield with Galilea, Sangalli and Molina also out or just recovering. It will take some careful management to get through the next month while praying for no further injuries.

Happily, a very makeshift First 11 has managed to continue our good form:

We ended October top of the league by a single point over Oviedo, who had a game in hand. By the time they arrived at La Rosaleda for the opening game of the month they were two points ahead. So a narrow win was important in returning us to the top:

On the balance of play we surely deserved the victory, but we required a slice of luck to secure the points. A penalty and an own-goal accounted for our halftime lead, but Oviedo threw everything at us in the second-half and we were hanging on at the final whistle. The game marked Hernandez's first run-out as striker and he struggled, but was bang in form for the next match where he found the net twice, including a late, late winner in stoppage time.

Against Racing Santander a new aspect of our play became clear - a team-wide switching off at the interval:

We raced out to a seemingly-comfortable 3-0 lead inside 25 minutes... and then simply stopped playing. A goal within a minute of the restart should have been a warning but we didn't respond and if Racing had been better at finishing the result could have been very different.

It was a similar story against Huesca, who are pushing hard for a playoff spot. Two penalties saw us 2-0 up midway through the first half; two goals conceded in the final 10 minutes saw us scuttle away with the draw. And it was deja-vu again when we entertained Zaragoza. The scoreline looks impressive - but it looked better in the 79th minute when we were leading 6-0. Another two late goals conceded were exasperating.

Nevertheless, we're in good shape heading towards Christmas:

December itself doesn't look too challenging, with just two league games - against lowly Lugo and mid-table Villareal B - plus the opening tie of the Copa del Rey. Our football business will be done a week before Christmas and then we return to action on January 12 - a good opportunity for rest and recovery, and almost certainly a couple of friendlies to maintain match sharpness.

Looking ahead to the transfer window, league registration rules mean it will be a one-in/one-out process and I'm hoping to move on Zuniga, who has been very poor as Fernandez's backup, and Manu Molina, our ageing CM who is increasingly injury-prone. The aim is to bring in a replacement backup striker, and to improve at DM where we currently have to play CMs out of position for cover.

In the meantime Santa, all I want for Christmas is no more injuries!

[Jogo Bonito]

A heavy injury list indeed. But on the pitch, superbly handled! Hope Santa delivers a productive transfer window.

[warlock]

6 hours ago, Jogo Bonito said:

Hope Santa delivers a productive transfer window

Yup, and I've been such a good boy this year 

[AlfieLucas]

Been doing well so far, didn't realise Malaga had slipped so far down. Always enjoy your careers, keep up the great work.

[warlock]

16 hours ago, AlfieLucas said:

Always enjoy your careers

Cheers mate! I'm enjoying too 

[warlock]

January 2025

At the end of the last update, we were looking forward to our Christmas and New Year break with 3 games to play before the end of the year. Despite continuing injury woes, we managed to complete all three in some style:

We were without Abaida for the first two weeks of the month with a hamstring injury, and he repeated the injury before New Year's Eve. I asked Santa for an injury-free January but the old boy apparently mislaid my letter because backup 'keeper Carlos Lopez tore his knee ligaments and will miss 2-3 months, then AML Yassin Fekir suffered a broken toe and will be out for around 7 weeks, before we ended January with third-choice CB Nelson Monte incurring a hernia in the weightroom that will keep him out for the whole of February.

Whether it was the injuries, general fatigue - or the update to the FM match engine - January turned out to be the worst month of my time at Malaga:

The win against Lugo was expected, the defeat to Cartagena was not. We took the lead midway through the first half but conceded to go in level at the break. But the second half was all Cartagena and they deserved their victory. The defeat to L1 outfit Girona in the Copa del Rey was somewhat unlucky - we led until the 86th minute but a late equalizer sent the game to penalties and ultimate defeat.

Happily, we bounced back from those two losses to record two important victories in the league. The game against Elche was a top-of-the-table clash with the visitors in second place and defeat would have seen them leapfrog us. As it is, we start the new year in good shape:

Transfer window

The other matter of importance this month. My to-do list had three items on it. First, to retain the services of Roberto Fernandez if possible. This one was out of my hands since we had agreed he could leave if someone offered us £2.3m. In the event, not a single bid arrived, despite constant media gossip about his impending departure.

Second on the list was to find an upgrade at DM. It took some searching but eventually we found a solution:

Alberto joined us from Valladolid and should do the job we need from him- I like his mentals, even if his technical and physical attributes could do with a boost.

Third item on the list was an improved backup to Fernandez in the striker role. We couldn't find anyone willing to join permanently but did find a loan solution:

Alex made 15 starts for Villareal B in our division this season, scoring 5 times, and represents a significant upgrade on Loren Zuniga, who we managed to offload to Hellas Verona for £300k.

If I can figure out what needs to change tactically since the ME update, we'll see what we can do in the rest of the season.

[Dong21]

Form a little rockier than before but one league loss in a month is by no means a disaster! Still a nice buffer at the top. Hope the injuries stop soon and you find your tactical groove. 

[Stuniverse]

Just caught up, @warlock

Going well so far.

Good luck 🍀⚽️🤞

[warlock]

February 2025

And the injuries just keep coming... At the end of January new signing Alberto Quintana pulled a back muscle and was out for two weeks. Moussa Diara twisted an ankle and would miss three weeks - he's our 4th choice CB but since we're already without 3rd choice CB Nelson Monte the injury left us with just two fit CBs and no cover. And midway through February Haitam Abaida found a new way to injure himself after back-to-back hamstring injuries, this time out for 2-3 weeks with pulled knee ligaments.

On the pitch, however, we were back to business as usual:

Ferrol are the league's whipping boys and we duly delivered the spanking with Chema Nunez - playing in a more advanced role as AMC - bagging a hat-trick, aided by two second-half penalties. We followed that with a routine home win against Deportivo.

The game away at Tenerife was anything but routine:

We took the lead, they equalised, we scored again to go ahead before the break, and then again soon after the restart. Job done? Not hardly - Tenerife just refused to stay down and two quickfire goals from PoM Mazzocchi meant the islanders secured a share of the points. We could feel hard done-by given the match stats but at the finish it was hard to deny that Tenerife deserved the draw.

Back at La Rosaleda we managed to secure a win that was more comfortable than the scoreline suggests. Only a 93rd minute goal allowed Alaves a glimmer of respectability.

Elsewhere this month, Elche lost to both Valladolid and Oviedo, allowing us to extend our lead at the top of the league to 10pts. Still a long way to go but I'm happy with things at the moment. If we could stop those injuries!

[warlock]

March 2025

Another update from Malaga A&E... I mentioned last time that CB Diarra was out for three weeks with a twisted ankle; on his first day back in training he repeated the injury and will miss another three weeks. Late in March, backup striker Fores suffered a tight achillles, minor but enough to ensure he would miss the next match. On the same day, first-choice striker Fernandez twisted an ankle and will miss 3-4 weeks. So for our last match of the month we had no strikers. Also ahead of that match, backup RB Gabilondo pulled a hamstring and will also miss 2-3 weeks.

Regardless, we continue our season with makeshift squads and limited subs, but we continue:

After our knockdown drag'em out 3-3 draw with Tenerife in February, we put on a similar show away at Albacete:

Yes, we managed to score 4 goals from 3 shots on target, and yet again we fought our way to a winning position... only to give up a late equaliser. I'm sure it's entertaining for the neutrals but it's really hard on a manager's nerves. It was another undefeated month, but we failed to keep a clean sheet and gave up 9 goals in 4 games. Miraculously, we have the 4th best defensive record in the league.

We received notice this month that we are guaranteed a playoff place, but with 10 games to play - and a game in hand over Elche - I'm certainly hoping we can claim the title and avoid the playoffs. Being able to play our best 11 together would help, but that seems unlikely in the circumstances. Whatever else happens, you can be sure I'll be upgrading our medical team in the summer!

[Dong21]

Impressive to keep up that form, given all the injuries 

8 minutes ago, warlock said:

Whatever else happens, you can be sure I'll be upgrading our medical team in the summer!

Sounds like a wise plan!

[Jogo Bonito]

It seems like the worse your injuries get, the better the team respond! Tremendous work in the circumstances 

[Stuniverse]

19 hours ago, warlock said:

We received notice this month that we are guaranteed a playoff place, but with 10 games to play - and a game in hand over Elche - I'm certainly hoping we can claim the title and avoid the playoffs. Being able to play our best 11 together would help, but that seems unlikely in the circumstances. Whatever else happens, you can be sure I'll be upgrading our medical team in the summer!

You can do better than playoffs, @warlock!

[warlock]

End of season, 2025

As we arrived at the business end of the season - 10 games to go - we were masters of our destiny. With a 10pt lead and a game in hand over rivals Elche, we only had to keep our nerve. But our nerve showed disturbing signs of crumbling:

We began April with an unconvincing draw away at Mallorca. The home side set out to keep the ball away from us and succeeded beyond their wildest dreams; we had just 35% possession in this one and we were reduced to hopelessly optimistic shots from range. And things took a turn for the worse against a mid-table Andorra:

We conceded an early penalty, but managed to make an immediate reply when the steadily-improving Pelayo converted a corner. Then we conceded another penalty just before the break to go in 1-2 down. Andorra seemed happy to defend their lead in the second half until Villodres put us back on level terms with 20 minutes to go. After that we were under the cosh but seemed to have done enough to hang on to a point until the pressure told and we gave up the winning goal late in added time.

Those were the two "easy" games of the month; two of the three remaining three fixtures were against promotion-chasing rivals. Thankfully, we steadied the ship with a narrow win at home to Valladolid and a nervous 1-1 draw away at Oviedo. But he final game of the month was a narrow escape as we snatched all three points with a Fernandez goal deep into added time. 

Eight points from a possible 15 did not look like title-winning form but Elche had also dropped points. We headed into the final 5 games of the season with everything still to play for. Nevertheless, I was somewhat depressed by the draw away at Racing Santander:

Only to be delighted after the Huesca game when this arrived in my in-box:

Really, it was all a bit of anti-climax - no trophy presentation, everything came to us via emails. But we celebrated nonetheless: Malaga are back in La Liga!

 

Edited December 6, 2023 by warlock

[Dong21]

Congratulations, @warlock! 
Malaga back where they belong.

[TheJanitor]

Finally had the chance to catch up. Amazing job on the first two seasons!

[warlock]

2 hours ago, Dong21 said:

Malaga back where they belong

2 hours ago, TheJanitor said:

Amazing job

Cheers, fellas! In a normal save I'd have been delighted with our form after New Year, but we had been so dominant for a season and a half that recent form - coupled with the ME update - had me questioning everything. All came good in the end, though. Now to see what we can do to prepare for life back in the top flight. There are a couple of first-team regulars on expiring contracts who don't merit new deals, and a few backups who need upgrading for next year. Lots to do 

[Stuniverse]

3 hours ago, warlock said:

Really, it was all a bit of anti-climax - no trophy presentation, everything came to us via emails. But we celebrated nonetheless: Malaga are back in La Liga!

Congratulations, @warlock.

Malaga back in the Big Time!

Now the challenge really starts in La Liga!

Good luck 🍀⚽️🤞

Edited December 6, 2023 by Stuniverse

[warlock]

Um... I may have a problem. My D: (data) drive has 'disappeared'... not literally, I'm pretty sure it's still inside my laptop. But the OS can't see it. And said drive holds all of my FM content - game, saves, everything 

I'm hoping it's just a dodgy connection, but if the drive has failed, well... I'm doomed! It's too late tonight to take a screwdriver and get the rear case off the laptop but tomorrow could be a very bad day.

[Stuniverse]

5 minutes ago, warlock said:

Um... I may have a problem. My D: (data) drive has 'disappeared'... not literally, I'm pretty sure it's still inside my laptop. But the OS can't see it. And said drive holds all of my FM content - game, saves, everything 

I'm hoping it's just a dodgy connection, but if the drive has failed, well... I'm doomed! It's too late tonight to take a screwdriver and get the rear case off the laptop but tomorrow could be a very bad day.

🤞

[patrikholm]

7 hours ago, warlock said:

Um... I may have a problem. My D: (data) drive has 'disappeared'... not literally, I'm pretty sure it's still inside my laptop. But the OS can't see it. And said drive holds all of my FM content - game, saves, everything 

I'm hoping it's just a dodgy connection, but if the drive has failed, well... I'm doomed! It's too late tonight to take a screwdriver and get the rear case off the laptop but tomorrow could be a very bad day.

Right click windows flag -> disk management. Can you see the disk there? You can choose action -> rescan disks from within disk management if you don't. Might also be that you need to assign the disk a drive letter again from within disk management. But that's if you can see it at all from there ofc.

[warlock]

2 hours ago, patrikholm said:

Right click windows flag

Thanks for the suggestion, but Windows can't see the drive at all. I'm pretty sure it will be a dodgy cable connection, but I won't have time to take the laptop apart until later today.

Fingers crossed!

[warlock]

Bad news! Opened up the laptop and the cable connections were all fine. Removed the offending drive, installed it in an external drive cage and connected it via USB. After Windows ummed and ahed a bit, the drive is readable, but only for seconds before it disappears again. I've tried copying nothing but the Malaga save file and the drive isn't readable for long enough.

Also noted that the drive itself gets very hot, very quickly. All in all, I think it's a goner. As is the save 

[Stuniverse]

Oh no ☹️

[Jogo Bonito]

1 hour ago, warlock said:

Bad news! Opened up the laptop and the cable connections were all fine. Removed the offending drive, installed it in an external drive cage and connected it via USB. After Windows ummed and ahed a bit, the drive is readable, but only for seconds before it disappears again. I've tried copying nothing but the Malaga save file and the drive isn't readable for long enough.

Also noted that the drive itself gets very hot, very quickly. All in all, I think it's a goner. As is the save 

Disaster! Very sorry to hear this mate. These things cannot be recovered via Steam if you fix or purchase the laptop?

At least you ended on a high, if that really is 'game over'. Hope to see you back soon.

[TheJanitor]

I jinxed it! Hope you will find another save to write about, I enjoyed reading this

[warlock]

7 hours ago, Stuniverse said:

Oh no ☹️

6 hours ago, Jogo Bonito said:

Disaster!

2 hours ago, TheJanitor said:

I jinxed it!

Thank you all. I've never enabled 'cloud' saves but I might have to after this.

It was an older mechanical drive; I've ordered a new solid-state drive which should arrive tomorrow so I'll be back up and running. The question is where... Malaga was the save I was excited about this year but I don't think I can face re-doing the first two seasons (at least for now).

Might be time for my annual attempt to get Darlington back to their rightful place in the EFL (League 2 that is ) while I figure out what the next adventure will be.

Your support is much appreciated 

[Stuniverse]

6 hours ago, warlock said:

It was an older mechanical drive; I've ordered a new solid-state drive which should arrive tomorrow so I'll be back up and running.

You should find things will run much quicker with a SSD as well.

[Alejandro_FM]

Shame about the save file. Sorry to hear! 

Hopefully another adventure gets you hyped again... This was an impressive quick climb to La Liga 

[warlock]

New drive is installed, FM24 downloaded and set up on the new drive. Amazing how quick it is to load . Now installing the various additions for the complete experience.

Still thinking about another long-term career save...

[Stuniverse]

2 minutes ago, warlock said:

New drive is installed, FM24 downloaded and set up on the new drive. Amazing how quick it is to load . Now installing the various additions for the complete experience.

👍

2 minutes ago, warlock said:

Still thinking about another long-term career save...

Any front runners you’re considering?

[warlock]

4 minutes ago, Stuniverse said:

Any front runners you’re considering?

Not sure... I was enjoying Spain; the salary cap adds an extra challenge there, but I don't think my heart's in it right now.

Maybe a L2 side in France, Germany or Italy. No rush 

[Alejandro_FM]

FCSM is in the third tier in France at as they almost went to administration but the youth setup and facilities are great. I think they'd have been my pick ... 

[Jogo Bonito]

Hope to see you back soon mate. I can understand why you don't fancy repeating what you did with Malaga. And another Spanish team probably isn't varied enough right now.

Germany and Italy are tempting me too, as I'm not convinced my first FM24 dabble outside of England (at AIK in Sweden) is going to hold my interest. But then I've also been looking around European leagues that run 'traditional' season dates and got 'slightly' interested in AZ Alkmaar, LKS Lodz, Silkeborg IF and FK Austria too. As always, so many choices, so little time!

In Italy, it would probably be Internazionale (with some philosophies to make the task interesting) and in Germany, I am sure to get back to VfB at some point. There's one other lower-ranked Bundesliga side emerging as a hot contender - but if you're looking in 2. Bundesliga, I have to say I really like the squad at Hannover (my suggestion if you're interested).