jt8604
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Posts posted by jt8604
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@vikeologist Thanks. So far i have stayed on as no one seems to be even biting when i apply for other jobs. Even though early on in the season, it doesnt look like i will win the league this time around so i will probably resign at the end of the Icelandic Season which is September time. Hopefully some jobs will have opened up around then. After the world Cup i have the Copa Centroamericana which is a small tournament that we should win followed by the Gold Cup in 2019. We should have a real shot at that tournament with just the USA and Mexico being stern opposition. However, depending on what comes up after the World Cup i could make a jump to a top Asian or African nation to try and win that tournament which is Jan 2019
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@Fadedaf I'm currently caught in two minds. Part of me wants to go onto win the league this year (Our media prediction is 5th) so we should have a real shot. I have started applying and testing the water at other clubs to see what i could get. So far not getting any interview offers. If i was to leave it would need to be for a top flight club of one of the smaller leagues i am managing so i can knock off that first league title
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Grindavik 2017 Review
My first full season in the Icelandic top flight is over. We started the season predicted to come 8th out of 12 sides and the board were wanting a mid table finish. To help i added in Hermann Hreiderrssen as a player / assistant manager providing me with experienced cover at left back. A few more new faces came in but the most noticeable was Eidur Gudjohnsen who i snapped up on a free transfer to play an enganche role this year.
The season starts off with the Deildabikar cup (Effectively the league cup). We struggled in this last year but it just clicked this time around as we got through our group stage with ease before going into the Quarter finals against Stjarnan. A penalty shoot-out saw us progress where we played KR who in the pre-season interviewed me for their job before turning me down. A 3-1 win there was sweet revenge and i was onto the final against last year's league winners Valur. A much tighter affair than the semi-final it went all the way into extra time before we finally broke the deadlock and won the cup 1-0.
My 1st trophy towards the challenge and some nice progress. My confidence was high that we could transition the promotion and perhaps pull a few upsets in the league.
In the end it was a tough slog over the 22 games as we just failed to kill teams off, so often taking the first goal before letting in an equaliser and succumbing to a 1-1 draw. In fact the amount of points lost from winning positions was frightening and i don't even want to start trying to work out in fear of me doing something silly. What i can say is we won just 5 games, lost just 6 and drew an incredible 11 games. At one point we were battling relegation, the next fighting for a potential European spot before slipping into a disappointing but probably deserved 9th spot. In the other Cup competition we were knocked out in the 4th Round.
A tougher year and i am keeping my options open and testing the water a little with a few applications for clubs that i didnt really have a shot at but on the off chance they like what they hear i am prepared to jump ship if need be. Im conscious i am 2 1/2 years in and could get stuck in Iceland if i am not careful. Luckily this also happened.
Costa Rica 2017 Takeover
After a 3rd place showing in the Gold Cup, The Costa Rican manager Ramirez decided to resign and so i thought i would apply and here i am. The star players shouldn't shock you with Keylor Navas in goal and Joel Campbell being our most recognised attacking player. We do also have this guy as a tasty regen striker who has done a great job for me so far
With just 4 games to go in World Cup qualification my predecessor had done most of the job with Costa Rica sitting top of the table. A 2-0 win over Trinidad and Tobago meant we had at least a play-off spot before a 3-2 win over the USA secured our entry to the 2018 World Cup. A poor 2-1 defeat to Jamaica in a dead match for us was at least followed up by a spirited 1-1 draw with Mexico. We rounded up the year with friendlies against Peru and Mali, Losing the first 3-1 before smashing Mali 4-1.
Our World Cup group has been drawn and we have to make do with Brazil, Nigeria and Scotland in what could prove to be a group we can get out of.
Season Team Country League Position Achievements ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2015 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 3rd Took over with 10 games played 2016 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 1st Promoted and Undefeated until the last day of the season. 2017 Grindavik ISL Pepsi Deild Karla 9th Won the league Cup Season Team Achievements ———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— 2017 Costa Rica Qualified for the 2018 World CupChallenge Progress
Club0/10 top domestic leagues -
1/10 domestic cups - Iceland (Grindavik)
0/5 club continental championships
0/1 club world championship
International
0/5 continental tournaments -
0/2 world tournaments -
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2016 Season Review
Grindavik
My first full season in charge of Grindavik and it was a great season. To boost my chances i scoured the market to add new faces. A new centre back pairing consisting of a Gambian International and a travelling American were chosen. A young english Central midfielder to add depth and the veteran Heidur Helguson to lead the line upfront were added to the side.
We started off with the pre-season league cup. Split into 3 groups of 8 you play each team once. It was not a good tournament as we lost the first 3 games by narrow margins before switching to a more traditional 4-3-3 / 4-5-1 and securing 4 draws from the final 4 games. The Icelandic cup saw us get our first victory of the season against Hauker before going all the way to penalties against higher division side Kevlavik before losing 7-6 in the shootout.
The league season saw us at a different level as we beat team after team without conceding. In fact after 19 games we had only conceded 4 times all season. We wrapped up promotion with 3 games to spare and the league title was finally ours with 2 games to spare. We were in fact undefeated until the last day of the season where we basically just gave up safe in the knowledge we were promoted and now a top flight side.
Season Team Country League Position Achievements ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2015 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 3rd Took over with 10 games played 2016 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 1st Promoted and Undefeated until the last day of the season.During the season i also managed to pick up my National B Coaching badges. There is now a long off-season in Iceland and i am keeping my eye out to see if there is a slightly better opportunity out there for me. The main one that is precarious is KR who are the biggest team in Iceland and may allow me to get that first top flight a season or two quicker than if i stayed here in Iceland. I am also looking for an International role (I got rejected for the Iceland top job) to help boost my reputation further
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2015 Season Review
Grindavik
My first season is now over and ultimately we just missed out on promotion to the top flight by 2 points. In my 12 games as manager i picked up 18 points but it was the 3 draws we finished the season on that eventually cost us promotion. In the first game we were leading 1-0 before we let in a 91st minute goal. Our second to last game saw us play 2nd from bottom and we lost a lead 3 times to draw 3-3 and in the final game we were unable to pick off bottom of the table and a 0-0 draw was all we got.
It is clear we need to better our defence so that is one area to look at. Our best keeper was unavailable for the whole season and he is now back and available to pick so that instantly improves that area. We also need a striker as our top scorer came from the right wing with 15 goals with our best out and out striker getting just 5.
I did however manager to pick up my National C coaching badges
Season Team Country League Position Achievements ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2015 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 3rd Took over with 10 games played0 -
Grindavik 2015 Takeover ReportI have been a longtime lurker on this forum and decided to get more involved and saw this challenge and thought i would give it a go.
I started with all leagues from Argentina, Australia, China, England, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Portugal, South Africa, Spain, USA and Urugay loaded. Playing on FM16 fully patched.
Had a few offers (Chelmsford, Fram, Bromley) but decided to go to Icelandic 2nd flight with Grindavik. Have taken over with the team 3rd after 10 games, just 1 point off the top. Hopefully it will be a quick jump to the top flight and the challenge can begin
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The Ultimate Football Manager Challenge - Silver Age Archive
in Challenges, Sign-Ups & Experiments
Posted · Edited by jt8604
Grindavik 2018
My third full season in charge and this time we were predicted to come 5th albeit still a way off from being considered as legitimate title challengers. In Pre-season it was a case of adding some more quality to the side with the main signing being Icelandic International Elmar Bjarnasson on a free transfer. With Heidur Helguson retiring i added a couple of young strikers to the team in the search for finally having a striker to lead the line.
The season started with our defence of the Borgunabikar and we raced through the group stages with 7 wins from 7 to set up a Quarterfinal apperance against IBV. It was 0-0 at full time and so i threw on David Mooney who scored 2 to give us an eventual 2-1 victory. In the Semi-final we had FH who are one of only two professional sides in Iceland and their superior fitness prevailed with a 3-2 victory. In the other cup competition (Deildabilkar) we had our customary 4th round exit this time losing to IA 3-2.
So back to the league and it was a marked improvement from last year as the team just seemed to have more killer instinct than last year where we were blighted from huge amounts of draws. We were still fairly tough to beat as well which was nice. Our season was going on fairly nicely and with 4 games to go we had a real chance of getting into the top 3 and European Football. However, my Chairman decided to sell 2 of my best players (Elmar Bjarnasson and Josef Josefsson) to go with a young player he decided to sell at the beginning of the season and it left me too short to complete that challenge. As expected we slipped down the table a tad but we were able to recover enough to grab 6th position.
Not a bad season in the end and it was an improvement from last season. At the beginning of the season i mentioned it might be time to leave Grindavik in order to progress further with the challenge as realistically it could be another two seasons before i grab the league title. I was still on the edge of making that decision but the Chairmans actions have convinced me that i need to move on.
League Table
League Results
Cup Results
It has been a good spell here with 1 League Cup and 1 2nd flight title to my name but onto my next challenge and i end with a record of
Played: 110
Won: 52
Drew: 33
Lost: 25
Costa Rica 2018
We warmed up to the 2018 World Cup with draws against the Ivory Coast and Ireland and we were picking up niggling injuries through these games. Our first game at the World Cup was Nigeria. It was a back and forward match and we ended up going down to 10 men thanks to Juan Bustos being sent off making it even tougher. We still had our chances to score but a 0-0 draw was probably a fair result. We then went on to Brazil who had just played out a draw with Scotland themselves. We were terrible as we got pulled apart by Gabriel Barbosa and a 4-1 defeat was handed to us. It meant we needed to beat Scotland in our last game and hope that Brazil beat Nigeria by a clear 2 goals. We got neither as we battled to a 2-2 draw with Scotland and Nigeria managed to hang on to draw with Brazil.
We finished the group bottom with 2 points and following the tournament i had a think about whether i had enough to win the Gold Cup in 2019. I mentioned that if there were other good jobs available i might make the move and indeed i did make the move as i decided to take on the Ivory Coast role. It was short but sweet here in Central America but onto my next challenge. I finish with a record of
Played: 11
Won: 3
Drew: 5
Lost: 3
Ivory Coast 2018
Having also been knocked out in the Group stages of the World Cup, the Ivory Coast manager was fired leaving me with the chance to lead the Ivory Coast to the African Cup of Nations. Indeed i did just that by wrapping up the Qualifiers with a 2-1 win over South Sudan to top the group and book our place.
Season Team Country League Position Achievements ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2015 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 3rd Took over with 10 games played 2016 Grindavik ISL 1. Deild Karla 1st Promoted and Undefeated until the last day of the season. 2017 Grindavik ISL Pepsi Deild Karla 9th Won the league Cup 2018 Grindavik ISL Pepsi Deild Karla 6th Semi Finals of the League Cup Season Team Achievements ———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— 2017 Costa Rica Qualified for the 2018 World Cup 2018 Costa Rica Group Stages of 2018 World Cup. Resigned 2018 Ivory Coast Qualified for the 2019 AFCONChallenge Progress:
Club
0/10 top domestic leagues -
1/10 domestic cups - Iceland (Grindavik)
0/5 club continental championships
0/1 club world championship
International
0/5 continental tournaments
0/2 world