DaneBramage

GKS Katowice - 2025 Youth Intake Yeah, not an impressive group here. They lost the trial match 3-0 to our under 18s. I left it to my AssMan to decide who to sign, and he picked up about half of them. But the terrible personalities and dodgy facilities make me doubt that any of these no-hopers will ever amount to much.

GKS Katowice - February + March 2025 We've had a bit of a dodgy start to 2025, struggling along to picking up just 8 points from 8 games. It would have been even worse if Hubert Podolski hadn't almost single-handedly earned us back-to-back wins in February. In fairness to his strike partner Nikodem Zajac, he also played an important part in the other games we stole a point from, with the equalising goal in both. They're both in double-figures for the season now. During March we hosted LKS Lodz twice. In the league we lost, but the silver lining was that when we faced off again a few days later we won to make it through to the cup semi-final. ------------------------------------------ We've slipped a few places down the table, but that's not a surprise. We were clearly overperforming earlier on and we're probably heading back to a more expected level. We have down enough to clinch a top-half finish though. There's only two games left before the league split, and we're guaranteed a place in the Championship Group. ------------------------------------------

GKS Katowice - November + December 2024 With things going well I decided it was time to ask for a couple of upgrades. Youth recruitment and junior coaching have both been improved to an adequate standard. ------------------------------------------ November went really well as our good form continued with three more wins. But hopefully we won't be looking back at December as the month where it all went wrong. We started the month with three games in a week, and I don't think I got my team selections and rotation right. We lost both league games without scoring, but the silver lining was progression to the next round of the cup after Hubert Podolski grabbed an extra-time hat-trick. We avoided defeat against our rivals Gornik Zabrze (even with four players missing due to suspension), but ended the year with a miserable loss. ------------------------------------------ Despite the poor December we're still 2nd in the table. Legia Warzsawa are still undefeated and pretty much out of sight at the top, but in reality we're looking downwards. After the winter break there are 10 more games before the league split, I'd like to think we've put ourselves in a good spot to qualify for the Championship group. ------------------------------------------ Three wins in a row have seen Winterthur climb up to 7th in the Swiss Super League. ------------------------------------------

GKS Katowice - September + October 2024 The good times continued as we picked up four more league wins, including a big victory over Lech Poznan. They've won the last four titles but are having a stinker of a season. We did suffer the one loss though, away at Legia Warszawa. Incredibly, if we'd won this tie we'd have gone top, but instead they pulled out a small lead over us. It says a lot about how well the season has started that we've already won more games so far than I did in the entirety of last season at Winterthur. One player making waves is 17 year old striker Hubert Podolski. Despite having never played a single minute of first-team football my DoF signed him for just over £100k from Piast Gliwice, and he's scored 4 goals in his first 4 games. ------------------------------------------ Lovely stuff. I don't know how this is happening, or how long it will last, but I'll enjoy it while I can. ------------------------------------------ Winterthur lie 9th in the Swiss Super League, with just one win from 13 games. ------------------------------------------

GKS Katowice - July + August 2024 We're going with a positive 4-4-2 formation. It had mixed results in my time at Winterthur, but it's worked nicely for me elsewhere so it's worth another go. ------------------------------------------ We'd barely scraped together a coaching team by the start of the season, so an opening day draw was a fine result. But the follow-up to this was amazing and much better than I could have hoped for with four straight wins. This included an away victory at Gornik Zabrze, giving our fans a boost by beating our rivals on their patch. We then suffered a heavy loss to Slask Wroclaw, which was probably my fault. Our goalie had been kicking up a fuss about wanting to leave, so I played the back-up for this game to teach him a lesson. It backfired badly. Lukasz Konefal was swiftly re-instated back into the team, and we subsequently won again next time out. Impressing early on at the other end of the pitch was Tiago Alves, with 3 goals and 2 assists so far. ------------------------------------------ Well, this is certainly unexpected. I think we can call these first few weeks a success. ------------------------------------------

@Hanys Thanks for the info. Certainly sounds like a club that's been down in the doldrums for a while. Ruch Chorzow aren't in an active league, so Gornik Zabrze will have to be my main rivals.

GKS Katowice - 2024/25 Pre-Season GKS Katowice had their most successful period in the late 80s/early 90s, which three Polish cup wins and a string of top three finishes. Those glory days are a long time behind them though, and by 2005/06 they were demoted to the fourth tier as punishment for financial and legal issues. Two straight promotions took them back up to the second level, where they stayed until relegation in 2018/19. Which brings us to the start of this save. In this universe they've had much better fortunes over the last few years. Promotions in 2019/20 and 2021/22 have brought GKS Katowice back up to the Ekstraklasa, and they've now survived for two years at this level. ------------------------------------------ The finances are pretty good, though with less than two weeks between my appointment and the start of the season I won't be using any money on transfers yet. I'll see how things are going then act in January (though hopefully nothing too drastic will be needed. One place where we will need urgent re-inforcements is the coaching team, and the recruitment team, and the medical team. There are very few backroom staff at the club, so working on changing that is my first priority. ------------------------------------------ As expected. The Ekstraklasa has 16 teams, which play each other twice before splitting the top and bottom eight teams into the Championship and Relegation Groups. There's seven more games at that stage, and the bottom three go down. So I'm assuming we'll end up in the Relegation Group, and then it's a case of making sure we're stronger than at least three others. ------------------------------------------ This is my squad. I can't tell you if they're any good or not yet, but I do know that the best rated player (Lukasz Konefal, goalkeeper, 4.5 star CA) wants to leave, so that can't be a good sign. ------------------------------------------

Summer 2024 There weren't many jobs available at first, and those free were generally in the Hungarian and Romanian second tiers. I didn't want to to drop down a division so I ignored those, keeping an eye out for a top division opening instead. Sure enough, one emerged pretty quickly, and when I declared my interest the fans were happy to install me as their favourite for the job. One successful interview later, and I was buying my plane ticket. I'm off to Poland!

Summer 2024 Sod Winterthur, I've had enough of them.

Winterthur - April + May 2024 Never mind, back to being crap. In the first half of the season we earned 21 points, and had a goal difference of -1. In the second half of the season we managed just 14 more points, with a goal difference of -19. We were 10 points ahead of Zurich when I turned down the job interview. Under Vincent Kompany, they closed the gap to just one point. A dismal collapse... ...but at least we're not Thun.

Winterthur - February + March 2024 Any hopes we had of pushing on in the new year disappeared pretty quickly. as our defence disintegrated in February and we went on a horrible run of form. The low point was a 6-2 home thrashing by Young Boys, but at least we got our act together after this and rebounded with eight points from the next four games. We're somehow still in the mix for a European place (depending on the cup winners), as it turns out Switzerland has an extra spot allocated this year.

Winterthur - October + November + December 2023 Patrick Vieira's time in charge of Zurich didn't last long, as he got the boot after little more than four months. His only wins came in the Swiss Cup and Conference League qualifiers (which ultimately they lost), and he picked up just eight points in 15 league games. Zurich approached me again, but this time it wasn't so appealing (and the earlier rejection still stung) so I rejected their offer. Our form over the last few months has been much improved, earning 16 points from 10 games and jumping up to just outside the European places. We are quite a few points off though. Something's clicked up front and our attacking players are actually scoring goals, which is always nice. Summer signing Marvin Spielmann is paid much more than anyone else in the squad, but he's justifying that with 11 goals so far. We've made it through the Swiss Cup, but needing extra-time to get past Cham after dominating them was annoying.

Winterthur - July + August + September 2023 On the eve of the season starting I was approached by Zurich. They finished 3rd last year and are playing in the Conference League, so it would have been tempting to move on. Ultimately, they went with Patrick Vieira instead. And lo and behold, we then faced Zurich on the opening day. I wanted to show them they'd made a mistake, but a draw was probably a fair result. Next time out we thrashed Thun, and went top of the league. It didn't last. Five consecutive losses wasn't the ideal follow-up and we ended September in the bottom two. At least we had some joy in the Swiss Cup. There was no risk of embarrassment here, nearly full-strength teams were put out to ensure we didn't suffer another early exit.

Winterthur - Pre-Season 2023/24 Same expectations as ever, just don't get relegated. ---------------------------------- The only big departure was Roberto Alves. He'd been a regular in the first couple of years, before turning into a squad player. Last year he complained about not playing enough, so I gave him more gametime, but he was rubbish so I decided to get rid. ---------------------------------- Most of these are loanees to give us options for the bench. Giuseppe D'Agostino was on loan with us last year and we've now paid it permanent. Pablo Moreno on a free from Juventus is the big signing. He had a good record for their under 23s, so hopefully he can solve our goalscoring problems. Marvin Spielmann was available on a free after being released by Young Boys. He had a good 2021/22, but barely played last year, so he'll have something to prove. ---------------------------------- I'm not convinced by this squad. Unless some sort of miracle happens and I can find a tactic which gets the strikers scoring, I think it'll be another miserable year. ----------------------------------

Winterthur - 2022/23 Season Review We conceded 11 fewer goals than last year, and Elmedin Fazlic was a key part in that. He was voted the fan's player of the season. We've already agreed with Borussia Dortmund to bring him back again next year. The next two players in the voting were also loanees, as our reliance on other team's players is probably a bit too high. Kristian Abazi (from Basel) finished as top scorer with 8 goals from the left-wing, and with a further 6 assists was also our second most creative player. Again, we've extended his loan to cover another season. On the opposite side Giuseppe D'Agostino was the top creator with 7 assists, while also scoring 5 times. He will also be back next year, but on a permanent basis. In February I noticed that Zurich were interested in him, and this led to seeing that his Internazionale contract was expiring shortly, so I pounced to snap him up. Up front our strikers continued to underwhelm, with a combined 10 goals between them. Though all 4 of the goals scored by Sebastian Musiolik came in April and May, so perhaps there is still some hope for him. A better league finish than last year, despite how poor things felt at times. We really need a proper sponsorship deal though to sort out our finances and give us a better chance of competing. Also, a decent cup run again would be nice. No more getting knocked out by sides several divisions below us.

Winterthur - April + May 2023 We finally found a bit of form to end the season with a flourish, four wins in our final eight games, including a last day victory over Basel. This game saw (what I think is) our first goal from an academy graduate, as 20a Nicolas Archier came off the bench to nick himself a debut strike. At the other end of the experience scale the Winterthur career of Ousmane Doumbia came to an ignominious end. Two missed penalties against Thun cost us a point, and he was very quickly booted out the door afterwards. These 14 points helped us climb a couple of places and secure a comfortable midtable position, something which had looked out of reach in recent months. This does now create a dilemma about my future. In the last update I threw a little hissy fit had concerns about the future, now I'm wondering if perhaps I was a bit hasty and it is worth sticking around here a bit longer.

Winterthur - February + March 2023 Just awful. Six games in a row without even a single goal. We somehow then managed to pull off an upset over Basel, but the form table shows that they're having a shocker and are even worse than us at the moment. And immediately after that we of course went straight back to being terrible, and got thumped by St Gallen. I hate this team, I hate these players, if I make it to the end of the season I think it's very unlikely that I'm going to stick around for another year.

Winterthur - 2023 Youth Intake There's a potential gem in the youth intake, as 23a Alessio D'Agostino already looks pretty decent. Given how few goals we're scoring (just wait until the March update) it's tempting to throw him straight in. That being said, he was upstaged in the youth candidates v under 21 game. He managed a couple of assists, but 23c Cedric Gashi was the star of the show with all five goals in a 5-3 win.

Winterthur - December 2022 + January 2023 I started the year being offered a couple of job interviews. St. Gallen were in 9th place at the time so that was an easy decline, but Lausanne-Sport was a more tempting proposition. In the first year of the save they were promoted with us (as champions), and since then they've finished above us both years, making Europe each time. But it just didn't feel right to go for it at this time. Three wins, two draws, three losses. Not too shabby. Especially when you consider that the losses came only against the top two. On the other hand, only managing draws against the two sides in the relegation spots is disappointing. But it was during a busy spell of six games in 18 days, so I can't judge them too harshly on this.

Winterthur - December 2022 + January 2023 One of our top prospects from the last youth intake was flogged by the board over the winter break. I did try protesting it but was overruled. 22b Valon Korri hadn't yet played for the senior team but has considerable potential, but the need for money was judged greater. Which in fairness, is probably accurate. Our finances are going the wrong way in a pretty rapid manner, but even this sale doesn't make much of a dent in it. The main problem is the lack of sponsorship money we're bringing in. We're at the bottom of this table by a long way, not just dwarfed by the teams at the top but even the sides just ahead of us are earning three times more. The board have slightly redeemed themselves by linking up with Porto. They'll (hopefully) send us a couple of loanees each year, and pay us £110k for the privilege. I've activated the Portuguese leagues now, so with any luck they'll start filling out their squads and have players available to send us over the next few seasons.

Winterthur - September + October 2022 Two wins, two draws, two losses. An okay couple of months, and better than July and August, but it was only a few minutes away from being a lot more triumphant. Against Luzern we were 3-0 up after half an hour, but gradually lost grip of the game and eventually conceded the equaliser in the 94th minute. And against Basel we did well to keep them at bay in a very even game, until we conceded in the 91st minute. We go into a two month break now because of the winter World Cup, sitting three points below the European places, and three points above the relegation play-off spot.

Winterthur - July + August 2022 Well, at least we had an opening day win. We were 2-0 up, got pulled back to 2-2, then rallied to score two more and get the win. All downhill from there of course. Just conceding goals by the bucketload, with a humiliating cup exit for good measure. We played the second-string against Sursee, but there's no excuse for not smashing a fourth division team. Instead we required a 90th minute equaliser to even take it to extra-time, then conceded a 119th minute own goal to lose the tie.

Winterthur - 2022/23 Pre-Season Everyone thinks we're going to be crap again this year. They're probably right. ------------------------------ Kristian Abazi is back on loan again after impressing in the second half of last season. Our approach to just raiding Basel's cast-offs has continued, with Luis Encarnacao retuning on loan for a third season, and a couple of other players coming in to fill out the squad. With our scouting network now covering Europe we made a few loan signings from bigger clubs as well. Dave Dodd, a striker from Stoke, has very little experience, but does have one Championship goal, as well as scoring as the recent Under 19 Euros. Giuseppe D'Agostino has just one Serie A sub appearance, but Inter spent £1.7 million to sign him from Napoli so impressing for us could help him stake a claim for more time there. Elmedin Fazlic has been playing very well for Borussia Dortmund's reserves and has 11 Under 21 caps. Most of our signings have generally been younger players, so I think Francois Moubandje is the first experienced addition we've made. Available on a free after a good spell at Dinamo Zagreb. Lavdim Zumberi can play anywhere across midfield. He looks decent, but his career had stalled a bit at Zurich so we're taking a bit of a punt. ------------------------------ ------------------------------

Yeah, it's been coming for a while. When we were in the Challenge League we had their number, and they've only gotten worse since. In Europe they haven't impressed, and Liechtenstein have lost their Europa League spot, so they spent last year in the Conference League instead. But the disastrous 2021/22 season was capped off by not even winning the Liechtenstein Cup. So next year they'll be languishing in the third tier, without even any European football to look forward to.

Winterthur - 2021/22 Season Review Rubbish season, rubbish players. Luka Sliskovic was voted our player of the season and top scored with eight goals. This was one ahead of Sebastian Musiolik, who got all our hopes up when he found the back of the net six times in his first six games, then followed this up with just one more over the rest of the season. Hugely underwhelming. Kristian Abazi came in on loan in January (part of our Basel loan army) and was probably the best player of the second half of the season with six goals, including one in each leg of the play-offs. Our big signing in defence, Omar Beckles, was pretty terrible and another massive disappointment. -------------------------- This is annoying. The work had been ongoing for nearly a year, was only a few months away from completion. --------------------------