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anyone signed Scottish starlet striker Michael Ruth from Aberdeen? I've had a few saves in FM2020 and never really noticed him, but he's absolutely killing it in my journeyman save at Hearts! Signed in 2022 for only £525K and now worth £10million.

I've started a save and it's been quite enjoyable so far. I think the fact that you can assemble the entire squad from scratch in a decent amount of time makes them a good choice for a 'Moneyball'-style save - the domestic pool is so limited that I'm buying players based on selected attribute values and stats that will hopefully fit the formation. Decent amount of money in the bank though, but the wage budget is of course quite restrictive I might post some career updates if the save sticks!

seriously thinking about starting a save with Macarthur FC. Probably be a real struggle in the short-term but could be a fun one!

Nice one. I'm not getting many good prospects with Parma - their youth facilities are pretty average so I'll need to spend some $$$ on that!

@Stu_UBJ has the new intake arrived yet? Looks intriguing! Congrats on the promotion too. A truly historic club and the kits are wicked! Things are starting to get a bit troubled in what was starting to look like a potential Parma paradise.... After a great start to the season form has dipped and we're on a run of straight defeats. We're clinging on desperately to a narrow lead and a lot of clubs are showing a serious upturn in form. To make matters worse, Palacios is playing out his skin but is now attracting a lot of attention of big clubs. It's the January 2022 window, Bayern have just made a 56million quid bid for him and I just realised he's got a 64million release clause. ****!

Yeah, I was happy I started this save before March I'd never really heard of Guimarães until I stumbled upon him in this save. Palacios is away to Leverkusen as well, so that's him off the menu after the DB update too. Bummer! @Ronaldo Beckham that's a good point as well.

Keep the faith for sure - he's been an absolute hero for Parma and Crespo's constantly bigging him up in the press I think he's probably my favourite FM/CM striker since Cherno Samba. He's started moving into channels a lot more and creating goals, there's definitely a winger-esque quality about him at times. I'm trying to rebuild Parma to be similar to that Football Italia-era team. Cortés is certainly the Crespo equivalent. I'll be on the lookout for an Italian wonderkid goalie and a tricky Colombian forward for sure Here are my Season 3 first window transfers - squad building went well with ￡25M to spend. As with the last 2 seasons, most of these transfer fees were half up front and half in instalments. I'll most likely be relatively skint next season but hopefully won't have to bring many new players in. Bruno Guimarães looks great and will partner Exequiel Palacios in central midfield - they complement each other perfectly. Aáron Martin is the new first-team left-back and Sebastiano Luperto will play alongside Luis Abram in central defence with promising youngster Lukas Mai providing cover. Bruno Zapelli is being retrained as a left inverted winger so it will be a while before he gets a regular game. Sebastiano Esposito returns on loan to provide competition for the ageing Inglese alongside young Liverpool loanee Rhian Brewster. I wish I could have cancelled Cornelius's pre-arranged transfer - he's a carthorse! I hope to sell him in the January window. We're currently top of Serie A after winning all six of the opening fixtures - the recent acquisitions have definitely added a new level of quality compared with last season. Here's hoping they keep it up.

Nope, he's served his time in the trenches so I let him retire peacefully Parma Season 2 Update (2020-21) Serie A: 3rd Coppa Italia: Semi-final (beaten 7-3 on aggregate by Juventus) Europa League: Final (beaten 5-2 by Chelsea) Players In: Exequiel Palacios (River Plate,￡5.25M), Filip Stevanovic (Partizan Belgrade, ￡2.7M), Sondre Rossbach (Odd, ￡1M), Jessim Pellisard (FCSM, ￡600K), Sebastiano Esposito (Inter, loan) Marquee signing Exequiel Palacios joined us for a modest fee and soon established himself as the focal point of the team in centre midfield. Rossbach was originally signed as cover but eventually usurped Sepe as first-choice goalkeeper. Stevanovic and Pellisard are ones for the future, only featuring in a handful of games over the season. Season 2 went really well, despite some absolute floggings here and there. Results went our way on the final day of the season meaning we finished 3rd, a considerable distance behind Juventus and Napoli who were unsurmountable up the top of the league. Napoli beat us every single game in Serie A this season, but we dispatched them 5-4 on aggregate in the Europa League to reach the final - only to be hammered by Chelsea. Overall though, a great performance from the squad but we really struggled depth-wise from the extra European fixtures. League form dipped considerably as the European run continued - we were actually top of the league at one point but a run of terrible form saw us drop right down. Brandon Cortés continued to flourish, finishing as top scorer with 34 goals from 47 appearances in all competitions. Obando proved to be a solid replacement for Kulesevski on the right, notching 18 assists. Palacios was the best player overall with an average rating of 7.71 and he's now valued at ￡40M! Squad and Transfers:

Yeah I decided against flogging off the older players this time around. Instalments are great when you've got limited funds but are pretty dangerous in the long term as you can totally cripple your next season's transfer budget! Best performers in the first season were Kulusevksi for sure, Bruno Alves (played really well right up to retirement), Pezzella, Inglese and Gervinho. Cortés was also impressive despite a slow start. My plan for the second season was to bring in some more under-19 players and continue to develop Cortés and Obando. Obando is the replacement for Kulusevski so he's got some big boots to fill. Hernani didn't really feature much in the first season so he went back to his parent club - Brugman, Grassi and Kucka performed better. A really good centre mid was a top priority for season two, particularly with Kucka getting on a bit age-wise. I've finished the second season now - update coming soon

Nice one mate! Kulusevksi was amazing in the first season, no chance of me signing him permanently at this stage though. Yup, Luis Abram has an Italian passport. I'm now almost finished the second season and don't think I have a screenshot of the first season stats unfortunately. I'll post the second season stats for sure though. Here's the transfer history for season one though. All players were signed for around￡1.2 million plus decent instalment add-ons, to get around the limited first season budget.

Hello folks, @quee encouraged me to get in on this thread! Currently managing my favourite Italian club Parma, trying to build them back up to the force they were in the mid-90s. I'm focusing on youth development, investing in younger players that will develop into Serie A quality over a few seasons rather than signing more established older players. I'm currently almost finished season 2, but here's a quick retrospective on the first. Season 1 Update (2019-20) Serie A: 5th Coppa Italia: 4th Qualifying Round (knocked out by Perugia) First season went much better than expected, with us just scraping it into Europe on the last day of the season and claiming the final Europa League qualifying slot. Only three players were signed - one for the first team in Luis Abram (solid, left-footed Chilean centre back) and two promising Argentinians in Brandon Cortés (striker) and Agustin Obando (inverted winger). Neither of the two youngsters was expected to stake a claim for a first-team place but Cortés was outplaying Cornelius by the end of the season and became a regular in the side, scoring an impressive 12 Serie A goals in 24 appearances. Roberto Inglese, as expected, was the club's top scorer with 22 goals in 36 Serie A appearances. Biggest signing of the season was possibly Head of Youth Development Bernhard Peters, who will be integral in bringing through talent once I've improved youth facilities up to a competitive standard. Peters' stats are amazing, and he is a Model Professional. Europe next season and a bit more money to spend means the squad can be upgraded, but I plan to do this steadily and build success around the current side.

Will do mate!

@Stu_UBJ - Thanks for the heads up on Cortés! He's a very intriguing player, in my game he was "dubbed the next Batistuta" and then "the next Ramon Diaz". Some of his starting stats seem to be random and start off fairly low but he develops very quickly with exposure to first team football. I signed him for Parma and although his first few performances were poor, he's become an integral part of the first team and has formed a great partnership with Inglese. Here's a screenshot of him 9 games into his second season. He ended up scoring 12 league goals in 24 appearances in his first season - very solid indeed. Dare I say it: he reminds me quite a lot of 2001-era Cherno Samba!

Hickey and Banks develop into really good players after training and game time... Must buys for lower teams imo!

I love the mid-season youth intake preview - a simple but very effective addition