warlock

That's a lot of goals on the opening day.. hopefully you can respond in the appropriate manner

Not quite. Man Utd are probably not a clear example because the debt is so enormous. But here's the budgets in 'original' mode: And here's the budgets in 'your world' mode: Summer transfers haven't/don't happen so there's a bigger transfer budget. But it looks as though the board have snaffled the extra cash. Or to put it a more realistic way, in real life the board backed Ten Hag and put up the money for Mason Mount; in FM they keep most of the money to service the debt. I'd guess that every club is treated differently.

Yes... the transfer doesn't happen so you have the money available to spend as you want.

Nope. As per the in-game description:

February 2027 Transfer window January turned out to be quiet with little of the reported interest in our players amounting to much. No-one bid for Larsen, which was a relief, and the only minor issue was a Liverpool bid for CB Rafa Marin - he wanted to go, I said I'd agree when someone met his £66m release clause, he said that was fair... then immediately put in a transfer request. However, he seems happy enough to wait for the big money bid. I did have a number of backup players I felt had reached the end of the road with Vigo and we managed to move most of them on. Disappointing striker Joveljic joined Al-Wehda for £7.5m, a small profit; AML Luca De La Torre had been declining rapidly and was sold to Leicester for £7.5m; and AMR Miguel Rodriguez was loaned to Vitoria de Guimaraes who are paying £130k a month with an optional £3.8m future fee. Finally, we were forced to sell CB Taylor Harwood-Bellis after he complained about a lack of game time and couldn't be persuaded. He went to Lazio in a deal that should reach £10.75m. With the existing squad depth we had adequate replacements for most of these, but I brought in reinforcements for two positions. At CB I found what I think will be a major upgrade on THB: Mane joins for £11.25m from Dortmund. He needs some development but at 21 he has plenty of time to improve. He's already made 5 first-team appearances and proved himself to be a capable backup to Marin. I was uncertain about a replacement for Rodriguez at AMR but when the scouting team flagged a player who had done extremely well in my Southampton save, I decided to renew our acquaintance: He's not quite the same player in this universe but he's not at all bad, and he's just the kind of small, tricky, elbows-out winger I like - fast, agile, good with the ball and a decent finisher. For just £3.1m from Uruguayan outfit Penarol he was also an absolute bargain, as shown by the immediate uptick in his value. He already has two goals and 6 assists in his short time here. Results The defeat to Barca in the Supercopa was irrelevant, although we did well to push them all the way. But a week later we went one better and beat them in the league. An honourable draw at Old Trafford in the Champions League was another good result but we finished the month with the players pretty much dead on their feet... a narrow defeat to Leverkusen meant we would have to play the Champions League knockout round, and a disappointing draw at lowly Osasuna was a major disappointment after we grabbed the lead after just 3 minutes. If we were struggling at the end of January, we flew through February, racking up some seriously impressive performances - beating arch-rivals Sociedad in the Copa del Rey, home and away victories against Fiorentina in Europe and a remarkable thumping - again! - of Real Madrid. Strand Larsen has been on fire, finding the net four times against Madrid and adding another 5 strikes this month. When he needed resting, youngster Marc Guiu has been an excellent deputy with 4G/3A in 5 starts and 13 sub appearances. Larsen now has 32 goals from 35 appearances in all competitions and his radical improvement is, at least in part, due to a tactical switch. I started experimenting with a 433dm towards the end of last year. The double-pivot in the previous 4231 was excellent defensively but - since I don't have anyone capable of playing a progressive role like a volante - it lacked support in attack. Paradoxically, the 4231 also crowded out Larsen as the front four jammed the opposition area in attack. I hoped the 433 would give us a better balance but I didn't anticipate Larsen's incredible response to the extra space. Since New Year, we've been playing the new system exclusively: It's largely based on the 'control possession' preset with much simplified TIs - shorter passing, work ball, counter-press and a compressed defence with a higher defensive line and a mid-block. I'll usually start on 'balanced' or 'positive' and switch according to the game state. We go into March fighting on multiple fronts. The league is a close two-horse race between us and Real Madrid: Incredibly, we remain the only unbeaten team in the league. March will also see us play Spurs in the Champions League R16 and the second leg of the Copa del Rey semi-final against Madrid.

Original - the way FM has always worked in the past. All transfer business done during the window IRL is in place at the start of the save. Real world - all transfer business happens on the appropriate date during the window in game. Your world - no transfers made during the real-life window are done. You start with a blank slate. The problem with 'original' is that a player who joined your club in September IRL will be in the squad in July. Becomes even more noticeable with the January window - when you started a new save with the winter update, players who joined in January are in the squad the previous July. 'Real world' is arguably more realistic but you need to remember who's joining and leaving up to transfer deadline day. 'Your world' gives you the chance to avoid transfers your club made IRL if you don't agree with the business. Some Man Utd fans, for example, like this because they can swerve the Mason Mount signing and spend the money on players they think are better in terms of squad building. I may be missing some of the finer detail, but I think that covers the broad strokes.

Looking forward to it

Still Ancelotti, still playing the diamond Marco Rose is now at Barcelona, playing the infuriating Brazilian box system. Lots of other managerial changes in this world... Luis Enrique is at Man City, Guardiola now at PSG, Zinedine Zidane at Liverpool, Tuchel at Man Utd, Xabi Alonso went to Inter, Klopp retired at the end of season 1 and hasn't worked since.

Good luck . I have something similar in mind for my next challenge and toppling PSG is a worthy goal.

That's a dramatic increase in workload . My youngest celebrates her 25th birthday next week - don't know where the time went

December 2026 A tricky month but we came through with one major high, and one minor disappointment: We entertained RB Salzburg in the latest round of Champions League fixtures and did well. A goal in each half gave us the victory without too much drama. And the same was true when we returned to LaLiga action with a straightforward win over Valencia. Then came the surprise... away at Real Madrid we not only won but won in style with a dominating performance: AML Rego got us off to a flying start with a goal inside 2 minutes and we were 3-0 up before Madrid got a foothold in the game. But if they harbored hopes of a fightback we quickly snuffed that out with an early goal in the second half as Larsen completed a fantastic hat-trick. From there we restricted their chances and GK Hedl was equal to every opportunity. However, the disappointment soon followed. Sociedad have been our closest rivals to the title of "Best of the Rest" throughout the save and they're hot on our heels again this season. But at home I feel we should have been good enough to claim another victory. We went behind inside 20 minutes but battled back to take the lead with goals either side of the interval. I was confident we could hold on to take the points but they went to an all-out attack late in the second half and we couldn't keep them out. Instead of opening up a gap over Madrid we have to settle for a slender 2pt lead: With the transfer window about to open we have one big cloud on the horizon - major interest in Strand Larsen from Chelsea, and the media reporting that the interest is mutual. The only thing in our favour is - for once! - his minimum fee release clause, which stands at £87m and quite a bit above his quoted value of £65-70m. He won't be leaving for a penny less. Inevitably, there is reported interest in our other leading players - Bayer Leverkusen are looking at RB Mendy; Swedberg is a target for Liverpool, who are also watching first-choice CB Rafa Marin; while the Saudis are circling for LCB Aldarete. We'll see what happens.

Cheers, mate. Hope you had a good time in Scotland I doubt you've been in Scotland so assume you've had real-life issues - the curse of the FM manager

November 2026 Another month in the books and - by and large - another good one. But I highlighted our game against RB Leipzig as a potential obstacle and I wasn't wrong: The Germans opened a 2-0 lead in the opening half hour but we responded well to level the game before halftime. Unfortunately, Leipzig scored again within 10 minutes of the restart and we couldn't find another equaliser. Not a terrible result, but it underlined the fact that we're still some way short of Europe's best. The remainder of the month was pretty straightforward with three league victories and a resounding hammering of Anderlecht away. It was also another good month offensively, with Larsen picking up another 6 goals to take his tally for the season to 14 in all competitions. This could be his most prolific season of the save so far. December will be true test of our credentials as we face Real Madrid, Valencia and Real Sociedad in LaLiga. We're still 4pts ahead of Madrid but they have a game in hand, while Valencia and Sociedad are fighting it out in 5th and 6th positions. If we do well we could open a definite gap at the top of the table; if we struggle we could slip to third below Real and Barcelona.

October 2026 Our excellent season continues and we actually managed to improve in October with a set of results that has me dreaming of things that we have no business dreaming of at this stage of the save: That's a great set of results, although we need to bear in mind that we faced no top class opponents this month. Also, while the results were impressive, performances were no quite so clear cut. We needed three goals in the final 15 minutes to see off Betis, and more late goals to secure the wins against a tricky Las Palmas side and Villareal. Other things of note include an immediate return to form by Bartesaghi after a long injury layoff, Strand Larsen putting together a good run to score 6 goals this month, and young striker Marc Guiu bagging his first senior goal. And where does that leave us? We're one of only two unbeaten teams alongside Barcelona, but they have failed to win 5 of their games while we have dropped points in just two. We boast the best offence in the league, and the fourth best defence: Hedl leads the league with 6 clean sheets, and our scoring performance is bolstered by the fact that we get goals from a variety of sources: We begin November with a trip to Leipzig in the Champions League, which may give us a bit of a reality check. Otherwise, we continue to dream...

September 2026 A good start to the season means little if we can't keep the momentum going. Happily, we did that (with one notable exception): A convincing victory against Cadiz opened the month, quickly followed by a visit from Benfica to get our Champions League campaign underway. Benfica gave us a severe spanking in the competition last season so I was keen to extract revenge and we managed to secure the win with two first-half goals. The game against Atletico couldn't have been more even: We took the lead inside 5 minutes but couldn't add to it. Within 5 minutes of the second half, Atleti equalised and only a supersub appearance by Rodriguez scoring inside the last 10 minutes gave us the points. If that game was a struggle, our next Champions League fixture against Spurs was nothing of the sort - we simply capitulated: The media called it a humiliation and I couldn't argue with that. For out final game of the month against Athletic I challenged the players to produce a better performance, and they did but only just: We got off to the worst possible start as the visitors scored within three minutes, and we didn't get our own game going until the second half after the hairdryer was applied during the interval. Only a superb display of goalkeeping from Hedl saved us from another embarrassment. To be fair, we were severely hampered by injuries this month as we lost three of four fullbacks - on the right we lost Mendy with a dislocated shoulder and he's been out since the end of August, while we also lost both leftbacks - Bartesaghi with a month-long ankle injury, and new boy Lelo with a twisted knee that meant he missed the second half of the month. Having to play two centrebacks out wide meant we were stretched defensively but also lost much of our attacking thrust out wide. On balance, and the Spurs match aside, we did well enough and that's reflected in our league position:

In my Vigo save European football has been critical. Over three seasons, my salary cap went from £500k, to £700k, to nearly £1m most recently. A ground expansion helped, increasing season ticket sales by about 50%. We're now the third most profitable club in Spain, behind you-know-who but ahead of the likes of Atletico Madrid, Athletic Club, Villareal and the other more-established candidates. So it can be done, but it isn't easy.

Tapping the 'space' bar should pause the game.

If you haven't already read it, this thread is worth studying for alternatives to the usual 'meta' tactic approach: There's some 433 discussion in there, too.

In Spain? Surely not

August 2026 Transfer window This was probably the most difficult window of the save so far and it confirmed my dislike of transfer release clauses. Even before the window opened, Benfica came out of nowhere with a bid for LWB Fredrik Bjorkan. Yes, it was for £25.5m and represents a huge profit on the £3m we paid for him, but it presented us with a particular problem as good LBs are hard to find and the better ones tend to be very expensive (which is probably why Benfica were interested). And the same thing happened with star CB Igoh Ugbu and a bid from Real Madrid... again, £30m is a big profit on the £10.75m we paid but he wasn't easy to find and would be hard to replace. Of the business I wanted to do, we moved on DM Hugo Sotelo. He had looked great at the start of the save but didn't develop and I was glad to accept £4.7m from Valencia. We also shifted wantaway RB Sergio Carrera, who joins Stuttgart for £10.25m. Altogether, we raised £70m to add to the £40m provided by the board. In return we brought in five new signings for a total of £67m. Our replacement for Carrera cost us £24m from Portugal's Sporting: Fresnada is a good backup, decent defensively even if he lacks a little going forward. On the other side, a replacement for Bjorkan was much harder to find. I set up an urgent recruitment focus and threw our best scouts at it and eventually we settled for another player from Sporting: I wasn't entirely convinced by Lelo but he was the best available (other targets would have smashed our wage structure or just weren't interested), but he's impressed me since he arrived and looked good in pre-season friendlies. Sotelo's departure left a backup-shaped hole in defensive midfield, which was filled by a signing from Osasuna: Munoz cost us £6.75m and on paper looked very much a backup, but he was a key player in his first pre-season friendly as he scored one and setup another. He's also looked good in his first two competitive games, earning a 7.5 average rating. When faced with the prospect of replacing Ugbu it quickly became obvious that a like-for-like replacement was going be both difficult and expensive. I decided on a different route. We had Taylor Harwood-Bellis coming back from a season-long loan and I thought he could do a job as backup to Rafa Marin. So with Starfelt declining with age at LCB I went back to Sporting again for a long-term prospect on the left: I agree with the coaches that he's not far off first-team level, and he has plenty of time to develop. I'll be trying to give him game time to help him along whenever possible. I had two lesser problems in the squad: backup AMR Rodriguez is another whose development has stalled after a bright start to his Vigo career, and backup striker Dejan Loveljic has failed to impress in his year at the club. With money available I decided to bring in a long-term prospect to help out up front: A graduate of the Barcelona academy, Guiu comes in for £15m and we'll be giving him a lot of substitute appearances to try to drive his development. Our squad for the season looks like this: We've generally looked good in the opening games of the season: An early away day to Barcelona provided the highlight - they were by far the better team but we frustrated them, and a PoM performance by GK Hedl secured a point. Less impressive was an identical result away at Valladolid, but three clean sheets can't be bad and eight different scorers in two games also bodes well for our attacking threat. Aims for this season: the board require us to gain Champions League qualification again, and the media prediction is for us to finish 5th. I'd like us to win our first silverware of the save and the Copa del Rey is probably our best chance.

Here's my TV income in La Liga over the three years of the save: The three big spikes come in August each year, but it doesn't look like a simple positional payment. We finished 2nd in the first season, then consecutive 3rd place finishes but we got less for finishing runners-up and more for our most recent finish in 3rd

Yeah, at the start of the save there's a big ground expansion, and now they're already talking about building a new stadium. Boards doing board things

I think prize money is a share of the TV revenue - teams finishing higher get a bigger share. But I don't know that for certain.

Welcome (back) to Spain. A good start

Me too! Champions League football has completely transformed the club: