Junkhead
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Posts posted by Junkhead
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September 2021
Bet you all thought I'd succumed and started again! No chance - it's now or never, remember?!
I had wanted 3 points from what was going to be a very tough September and, suffice to say, I didn't get them.
The result against Boston was considerably better than the performance, and we were lucky not to get taken to bits. Then we did get taken to bits by Alfreton in a game in which we were completely awful. Up until this point I had been playing a defensive minded 4-4-1-1, but this was limiting my already limited squad too much, with the height of Jason Oswell our only real outlet. I changed things up a bit in the cup game against Romulus and went with a simpler, narrow 4-4-2 diamond. Whilst this felt counter intuitive given the good quality of winger in the squad, Brendon Daniels dropped back from left midfield to left full back allowing him to bomb on, with Elliott Durrell moved into a striker role. This allowed Kyle Bennett to sit just behind a front two and move around the pitch and, with Walker & McHale putting in good performances from midfield as runners, I was suddenly no longer quite so one dimensional.
We were the better side against Brackley in the next game, however I blew it by panicking and reverting to my more defensive formation with 20 minutes to go. Our defence is too poor to sustain prolonged pressure against decent sides, as the Alfreton game showed. But I go into October full of hope with an easier (on paper at least) set of fixtures to come.
October 2021
An absolute horror show of a month congestion wise with 9 games packed into 29 days. Things started well enough with a formality at home to Needham Market in the cup with Jason Oswell earning me a steam achievement with a hatrick. This meant that I had made it into the fourth qualifying round which was the minimum board expectation. A tough game away at Spennymoor followed in which I survived an absolute barrage and nicked it with 20 minutes to go with a penalty. This time the defensive formation was used until half time when I went for it at 0-0 before putting everyone behind the ball for the last 10.
The following week was the stuff of absolute nightmares as we tried the same thing which had worked against Spennymoor. It worked again, with Dominic McHale and Elliott Durrell putting us 2-0 on the 66th minute. Then I tried the same thing which had worked against Spennymoor but had failed against Brackley just a couple of weeks before and threw it away. This meant that I ended up having to play FOUR GAMES IN A WEEK. This was way too much for my tiny squad and I had no option but to rest lots of players against Farsley who were easily the better team on the day.
I decided to go at Brackley from the off in the replay and raced into a 4-1 lead. They almost did it again but couldn't find a fourth, taking me through to the 1st round proper for only the third time in the club's history. Unfortunately, the match was ruined by a long term injury to Brendon Daniels who broke his collar bone putting him out until around New Year. My squad is so threadbare that I have very little outside of the first 11 but, more than that, my new tactic is built around Daniels' ability to bomb it down the left side from deep all game. Gutted.
Then, with my players hanging on by a thread, I almost FM'd FM, with Gloucester only finishing my exhausted team off in the last 10 minutes. The game was not an enjoyable watch
With some of my players clinging on by a thread and desperate to avoid another long term injury, I rested a few again against Guisely and turned things round after going behind with a very comfortable 3-1 win. The final game of the month saw us entertain bottom side Curzon Ashton who almost beat us, we needed an 87th minute equalizer from Oswell (his 14th of the season already!!) to take a point.
This leaves us in 14th position going into what I hope will be a slightly less insane November. I get the feeling that around 14th is where we will end up. We are good enough to give most teams a game at this level, but are rubbish at the back and injuries and suspensions will ruin us if we don't strengthen.
The next couple of months don't look too bad, with our reward in the cup an away tie at Aldershot, who are in the division above. I would quite like to avoid another replay, so I am considering resting what few players I can. Then, aside from the games against Fylde & Gateshead, I should be able to take some points and, you never know, trouble the top half.
On a side note, in a turn of events that us Llama's don't come accross very often, I am MAKING money. Last month I made about £168k. Some of that would have been TV money as the whole nation got to see me chuck away a two goal lead against Brackley in the first cup game (BBC i-Player & BBC website I imagine
) but if this continues once the cup run is over then, coupled with my decent facilities, the future will actually look quite bright at Telford!
Except for the fact that I am the manager.
Steam Achievements
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I have told this story on here before much to people's amusement, but I was playing in Portugal once and had an excellent young right winger and an ageing goalkeeper both called "Bruno". I got them the wrong way round and played them in each others positions for a sustained period. The goalkeeper playing on the wing did ok, but the winger playing in goal did not.
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1 hour ago, Continum said:
Hi guys!
I need some input on my manager carreer. I've been managing Fjölnir in the second tier of Iceland. I'm in my fourth season, we have a decent team and I've been doing OK. Fourth place the first season, third the second season and last season I missed promotion on goal difference. This season I'm also fighting for promotion. The problem is the club finances. It's bad. Which means I won't be able to get my coaching badges. And I'm an ambitious guy, I want to move up the ladder, but I find that hard with no badges. I keep going back and forth whether I should not extend my contract and try my luck elsewhere, but then again, who wants a guy with no badges, or stay and continue to grind.
So the question is, should I stay or should I go? ..."If I go there will be trouble and if I stay it will be double" (sorry couldn't resist).
For me, it would depend on what other leagues I had running. If you're only running the Icelandic league then you might end up at a club in the same division in a worse position than you were initially. However with lots of leagues running, a sideways move to another country, particularly in another Scandinavian country would likely be possible.
What would you do in real life?
Oh, and remember, "if you're out to make honey, don't go killing all the bees"
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44 minutes ago, gggfunk said:
Thanks for the all advice, guys. I plan to start my first journeyman safe ever, maybe this will change my perception of the game!
In order to add realism, I will start as manager of the weakest team in Poland 2nd tier (as I'm Polish). Obviously I will give myself 0 badges and the lowest experience, and my question is - how many years it may take for me to successfully apply for a job like Barcelona, etc?
Good luck, and hope it goes well. Don't get discouraged if it doesn't - it will make the success even sweeter! Keep us updated on your progress!
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@Brother Ben is right - I am a nightmare for this, but have settled on a save now (I think)!
@gggfunk - I have found that having an overall aim which will take some time helps, because it doesn't really matter how you achieve it. I am currently playing a save where I want to earn the job at the club I support having started at the bottom. This means that instead of stressing for days over a club like I might do if I was trying a youth only one club save, I just pick someone and off I go. I have a number of aims in the background, so if I end up failing once I get the job at my club, I can focus on something else.
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August 2021
An ok if far from spectacular start to the season. Although four points isn't a great start, the manner of the defeats makes me feel hopeful for the season ahead. In a pretty even game we lost by a goal from a corner against Darlington before improving against Chorley to beat them quite comfortably in a game where they never really threatened. We dominated Blyth but couldn't score, giving away a late penalty for handball. Hereford had won every game before playing us, so I was pleased to take a point. All of this leaves me comfortably in the lower mid-table, where I honestly expect to finish;
Of the teams below me, I suspect that it is only likely to be Kidderminster who will be away from the struggle come the end of the season. As I said, I would be shocked if I end up seriously worried about relegation come the business end.
September has some tough games in the league, and to be honest I would accept three points from somewhere before a much more paletable (on paper anyway) October fixture list.
Now we are into September I am able to bring free players in, but my scouts are yet to find anyone who will strengthen me. Ideally I would like a left back and a centre half and possibly a right back - of my Defenders, only Theo Streete is dependable whilst everyone else is horribly inconsistent.
Achievements Gained so far;
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Pre-Season
Sorted the backroom out during pre-season, and now the best in the league. I find it very easy to build the best backroom in the division at lower levels even using the job centre - this is certainly something that needs to be made more difficult. There is very rarely a bidding war for coaches or scouts, even those that have the "WNT" icon in their profiles. Still, all we can do is play as realistically as the game allows, and I'm really pleased with the backroom which now looks like this;
For pre-season I had set up a series of friendlies of progressive difficulty to get the lads prepped. As expected, we did generally well against the easier teams, and not so well against the tougher ones. Particularly disappointing was the defeat against Tamworth and draw against Redditch who are each in the division below. An injury to Kyle Bennett in the game against Bridgnorth meant he played more or less no part in pre-season, only making a sub appearance in the Wrexham game. This was not helped by a shorter, less serious injury to Brendon Daniels leaving my left side pretty sparse in the lead up to the season opener.
All in all, I am not 100% what to expect from the season. I need to strengthen the defence, I've no doubt, but I suspect that the fact that there is only one relegation spot this season will mean we will be quite unlikely to go down. We're scoring goals, just need to stop conceding!
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Have you tried holidaying through the date?
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54 minutes ago, Platinum said:
Looking forward to this and following your journey, its great that youve got good facilities as well.
Thanks, and thanks for reminding me why we play this game!
18 minutes ago, Robbles Quin ®™ said:whatever you do dont manage in tir 5 japan cause its a nightmare to get to tier 4. 0-2 out of 86 teams get promoted. yes 0. its fricken hard, but good luck
Haha - thanks for the warning! I only have J1 & J2 active so I won't be tempted - sounds an INSANE challenge.
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The Starting Point
So, here I am, looking slightly pensive and very clueless. Which is accurate. I am 40 years old at the start of the game (and in reality which is quite upsetting) and am a Nottingham born Forest fan. I have no past playing experience and no National C license, so my attributes are rubbish. As well as supporting Forest, I also have a soft spot for Woking (used to go and watch them regularly) and Gimnastic Tarragona (went to Tarragona on holiday once and really liked it).
I have decided to start at the semi-pro English club closest to where I currently live in the West Midlands. Kidderminster Harriers are actually the closest, but being a Professional club, they were off limits. Therefore, I am the proud(ish) new manager of.....
They've given me a year long part timecontract on £625 a week meaning that unfortunately I still have to go to work as well to pay the bills, but hopefully that won't be forever. The media believes that they will come 13th in the league, and I am particularly pleased that both the training & youth facilities are considered "Good" (which is fantastic for this level) and also that their Chairperson is Andy Pryce, a former player who purchased the club. He would like us to play entertaining football (the chances of which are quite slim if we're honest) and in the first season, avoid a relegation battle. Doing so should keep me in work, and allow me to work towards the highly ambitious plan of being a top-half National League North club for the next four years (and possibly forever).
Telford have had an up and down (mostly down) last 20 years, and since relegation from the National Leage 6 years ago, have only finished in the top half once.
We have three affiliated clubs, the most important being senior affiliate West Bromwich Albion from the Championship. Hopefully this link will bear fruit in the form of some decent loan players. The other two clubs are Market Drayton (two divisions below me) and Shawbury (four divisions below me) where I can loan my younger players. Market Drayton would be a good starting point for a younger player's loan journey, however Shawbury are too low down to be of any use. Once I've got a bit more job security, I will be asking the board to terminate that link as it's completely pointless. I don't think it would be realistic to ask them to do so straight away.
My first job is to try and boost up the backroom numbers a bit - it's all well and good having good facilities, but I can't imagine players will develop much under the current regime. I usually use the job centre for this, but might have a bit of a delve myself for a change to see what's available;
And talking of players, this is how things look to start with. Gut tells me it might be a good idea to use wingers and no centre-halves..... can't imagine that would go well. Luckily, at this level, free transfers will be allowed as soon as the summer window shuts, so I am hopeful that this will be a temporary problem. On the flip side, decent wingers and a target forward means that hoofing it up away from my awful defence at every opportunity is likely to be my prime tactic and you can't get much more lower league than that. Not sure that this is the "entertaining football" my chairperson wants but we will see;
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The Set-up
Now, one of the things I get obsessive over is the leagues I run and the leagues I don't, to the point where I sacrifice game speed and run all of them. Then, I realise some are missing, so I start again to add more. Then I realise that some new ones have been released, so I start again to include them. Not this time. I am starting the save with admittedly too many leagues, many added thanks to @davie77 , @Robbles Quin ®™ & @sporadicsmiles. I've no doubt they will soon be bringing out more, but I am determined to ignore them. That being said, it's not as if I don't have enough leagues to manage in during this save - I will be running 145 leagues from 65 Nations (!)
Now I realise that this is alot. And, before anyone asks, no I do NOT have a super computer. But it's a trade off for me - realism & an active and evolving large gameworld vs speed. I am comfortable with this although I appreciate many wouldn't be. The player count obviously includes the required players from the leagues I have active, as well as all current internationals (which means all Nations will be manageable throughout the save), players from clubs in continental competitions (meaning no grey players in continental cups during the first season at least), players from top clubs (which hopefully means very few grey players in continental cups during the entire save), and all players from the inactive league below where I will be starting (which means when I inevitably get sacked, the chances of me having to take over a team with no players is slim).
I will be using the below settings;
Not adding key staff is, in my opinion, important for realism. If I have no Assistant, I have no Assistant. I will go and find one. Another is adding players to playable leagues. Whilst I know it's advised to add players when using many editor files, I don't do this for two reasons. Firstly, the additional leagues I am using are very detailed and there are few issues with teams not having enough players. This is because the creators concerned are great at what they do and go for quality over quantity. Any teams that don't have enough players will fill their squads soon enough, and before I come across any in game issues. Another thing that adding players to playable teams does is populate youth squads with fake players at lower levels. I don't want that to happen. Disabling the first transfer window is also a standard for me. I want to play half the season with the squads that played half a season. I believe this contributes towards having a unique game world as injuries, form etc take their toll and are different from save to save. I will be playing with attribute masking and - for kit updates only - with the IGE enabled.
I will also be using some of @nik33's datapacks, and of course (the majority of) @Daveincid's outstanding Realism Patch. If anyone wants a full list of what I do & don't use, fire me across a DM so I'm not boring people to death on the thread. There is also a couple of self created files to update kit colours & management appointments up until the second patch date to keep things consistent.
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Introduction
My name is Junkhead (Not really, obvs) and I am a restart-a-holic. I haven't always been, but the last 6-7 years or so, I don't think I've gotten beyond 5 seasons in any FM. The grass is constantly greener;
I pick a team on a whim = I haven't thought about it enough.
I really think about things and narrow it down to two teams = I should have chosen the other one.
I start unemployed = I reject an offer that I think I should have accepted & start again.
I use a random team generator = I end up too high up the pyramid.
I watch a single episode of Sunderland 'Til I Die = I need to delete my current save & start as Sunderland.
I start as Sunderland = I wish I hadn't deleted my previous save.
You get the picture. As an example, I started a new save yesterday. And today I will be starting another.
I used to think this was because of limited time. When I was in education, or working nights, I would get loads of time. Now I generally don't get much. However I've recently had lots of time on my hands due to a work break, yet I still haven't been able to settle on a save despite over 400 hours on FM22. The one save I did get into I got relegated and sacked, and had nowhere to logically move to as I had started with the lowest rep team in the lowest rep league in the entire game.
So, I've decided - it is now or never. When I don't have an FM save on the go, I find myself regularly considering which team to be. Reading articles about Lower League Teams to start with. Writing suggestion articles. Browsing @Brother Ben's excellent website (https://www.the9llamas.com/). Then I decide on a team. And eventually start again. But this time is going to be different. A recent conversation with @Platinum reminded me of why I play FM - to have FUN. And repeatedly starting new saves is NOT fun. Now, we all have different ideas of what fun is. For me, fun is about playing (pretty much) in line with LLM rules, and having a realistic career. I also have a list of 10 or so aims that I one day want to achieve on FM. It's been on my phone/computer for 5-6 years. In that time, I've achieved none of them. I'm not going to share them all here, but my aim in this save will be to achieve at least one of them.
I want to win the European Cup (sorry, Champions League - I'm old) for the third time with my beloved Nottingham Forest. I've never done so on FM (or any other game for that matter) having been playing since the original Championship Manager. If I achieve any more of the aims on my list, then great - I will highlight those as they happen. I will also be logging any in game Steam Achievements I get as the save goes on so I can look back at what I've achieved.
Word of warning to any fellow LLaMas - I WILL be posting player names/pictures and tactical screenshots in this thread. If I do so and I am doing something fundementally stupid tactically, please don't tell me. Allow me to fail. Feel free to point and laugh too if you like.
So, I have a plan. It's the same plan I've had for ages and never achieved, but nevertheless, it's still a plan.
Now all I need is a SINGLE starting point........
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Burning the midnight oil I see mate! You must be well into this save!
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Good to see you moving forwards, hope you can bring success to Solitude!
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Personally, I am on the fence as to if I would take it or not. On one hand it is quite a jump club wise, however the NIPL is still very low reputation. Moyola's reputation is very low and you're likely to want to move upwards. I gave up after failing to avoid relegation on my Risca save because there weren't even any sideways moves, let alone one to a lower club after my failure. I kept rejecting jobs that I thought were unrealistic and ended up with nowhere to go really. It would only take a bad season and your stock would drop again, so on balance, I would go for it!
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6: September 2021
The games in Ukraine REALLY come thick & fast. There are 30 games a season at this level and, already, I've played 14 of them. This is because there is a mid-season winter break which is actually LONGER than the summer one. We will play no games in December, January or February, and only one in March. After an up and down August, September was faultless - and I am seeing a bit of a pattern emerging here!
There were some important developments behind the scenes as well, as the proposed takeover collapsed. The Club is still for sale, but I took the opportunity to capitalise on my A+ board rating & asked for a new contract, which I was given - on the same terms for an extra year, until June 2023. This meant that I was comfortable it would be realistic for the board to invest in my future so I asked to be allowed to complete my National C license, which was also authorised by the club.
We look good for at least a play off spot, but with the top two going up automatically, I am quietly hopeful. I can't recall a career where I've ever gone up first season, so to be playing at the top level in a country like Ukraine just a year in would be a fantastic start.
After the win against Alliance, the lads wanted to grab a bite to eat so I took them for some dinner at "Loft Restaurant" in Sumy. It was bloody horrendous. Some of the dishes served are below;
Pizza with fish base instead of bread base
Chicken Kiev with merangue & strawberry sauce
And finally, whatever the Hell this is;
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I don't know for sure how it works underneath the hood, but it's worth remembering that players that appear in your youth intake don't suddenly arrive. The idea is that they have already been at the club as juniors at age levels not shown within the game.
So if you have increased recruitment, etc, it might take a while for that to show results. Then you've got to consider geography.
As an example, you are in season 11. This means that the youth players now showing in your intake have likely been at the club since they were perhaps 10-11 years old. My guess is that they would be reflective of your youth recruitment facilities as at season 6 or 7, therefore their potential is capped by how things were then. Their current abilities would theoretically impacted by training facilities as they would have been being trained at the club for three/four years. Given where Wrexham is geographically, even players born on the same street as the ground would likely be in the catchment area of much bigger clubs, like the Manchester and Liverpool clubs - and reputation-wise, maybe even Tranmere, or Blackburn and Burnley, for example.
I would think you would need to boost your rep to compete with them, however now you are fully upgraded, the potentials should be better.
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The Norwegian third division is only playable if you are relegated into it from the division above, I'm afraid. The French fourth division and Romanian third division are the same.
You might want to download this file if you specifically want to play in this league;
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On 27/01/2022 at 00:06, Phoën1x said:
Hello everyone. I have a problem with loading my game in FM20.I was playing the game in my pc but I had to format it so I kept almost everything from the documents file that FM store saves etc.I only left out the graphics I had put extra(logos badges faces etc).So I formatted the hard drive and bought a new one too.I downloaded the FM20 again in the new driver(not previous that had been formatted),run the game so that it can create a folder in the documents section and then overwrite the older folders there by replacing existing files.My load game isnt launching,I tried to put also only my load game in the games folder by not overwritting it but it seems game isnt loading too.Any idea of how I can fix this and play my load again cause 6-8 seasons will go to trash otherwise and I am not in the mood of starting over again
Apologies if this is obvious from your post and I have misunderstood, but when FM loads to the start screen, are you using the "load game" option and then navigating to the place where your save is? And does the game then say "save game could not be loaded"?
Or is your save just not appearing under the load last game option?
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11 hours ago, Platinum said:
Im on a terrible run of 6 games without a win.
Time for me to update my FM Career thread, I had covid and was very tired for a while after so hadn't updated it in a while
Sorry to hear that, hope you have recovered! (From Covid, I mean - not the poor form. Although that too lol)
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5: August 2021
Came back down to Earth with a bit of a bang in August, although I still have no real worries that we'll be relegated.
The cup game was disappointing, but then I did choose to rest a few players as the games had been coming thick and fast. The board weren't too disappointed with the cup exit, either because we're doing ok in the league standings still, or because the chairman is still desperate to sell. I spent a lot of the month sorting my backroom staff out via the job centre, and I now have a reasonable backroom team.
I have an offer in for a decent physio, and once he is signed I will be changing responsibilities so that the DOF sorts out the staff within the B-team and u19's.
The number of away games meant I could see more of the country, but things were ruined a bit before the defeat at Kryvbas. I was awoken at about 3am to the sound of people trying to be quiet, but not actually being so. The following morning at breakfast I asked the squad if they had broken curfew and been out the night before, which of course they denied. I had my suspicions though, mainly because one of them still had sick down his front. Either way, I gave them benefit of the doubt. Then, whilst doing my half time toilet, I noticed this review, posted under the name of "Kremin midfielder" on Trip Advisor for the local Esenin Karaoke & Club (Translated from Ukrainian) ;
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My favourite part of this is that to celebrate England hosting a world cup, we build stadiums to immortalise Peter Beardsley and Tony Adams rather than, say, Alf Ramsay or Geoff Hurst
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Yes, in my opinion. I play with a file that increases injury frequency because of it.
My BETA save, in which I obviously couldn't use the add on, saw me get to February without a single injury. The achievement for having no injuries in 2 months is always one of the first I get.
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7 minutes ago, MasterKano said:
It's not. It's a company using it to get sales which bugs me. It's like the BBC constantly ramming the point down it's viewers throats to appeal to the current generation.
If you're gay I'm happy for you but why do you need people to know, it doesn't make you different you're exactly like everybody else.
I can't imagine that many people buy the game solely because a newgen MIGHT come out as gay.
There are without doubt thousands of gay real life footballers in the FM database. They don't feel they are able to let people know, quite the opposite of what you've said.
You're right - it is normal. Therefore it should be normalised in the media. Why that would only appeal to the current generation, I've no idea.
Appreciate we are way off topic now though so I will end by saying that it DOES add something to the game. My understanding is that it increases shirt sales for a short period.
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) but if this continues once the cup run is over then, coupled with my decent facilities, the future will actually look quite bright at Telford!
The Realism Thread
in Football Manager General Discussion
Posted
I always try to keep incoming transfers realistic at low levels by considering where a player was born or where he has played before. I know some of you use a 50 or 100 mile radius while managine semi-pro teams. I have just noticed the below on the scouting page though, and I am interested in people's thoughts?
The player in this example was born in London and has been on the books of Fulham and more recently Southampton. I am currently managing AFC Telford - so a fair way away (170 miles from Southampton). I am torn here - it feels unrealistic, but what is actually happening here is that he player has contacted the club directly and asked to join. No interest in signing this particular player, by the way - but I get 2-3 of these a week.