Search the Community

This is a project I have been tinkering with on-and-off for quite a while. After playing FM (and CM before it) over many years, I've become more and more interested in the game’s AI – its sophistication and limitations. After several years of creating various edited databases, I decided to create an entirely new set of clubs and their own league to play in, almost entirely divorced from the parameters of the real footballing world. Part of the motivation was to create a new league to play in for a bit of change, but it was also a way of seeing how the game would react to such a situation: would it allow this new league to function in the way that it could (i.e., leverage its wealth and resources to become potentially the leading competition in the sport), or would it maintain the status quo, dominated by UEFA competitions and established European leagues? Moreover, it is an opportunity to see how a league unfolds from the very beginning. None of the clubs have history, staff (apart from some basic backroom staff and owners) or any form of legacy: they all need to establish themselves and either sink or swim in their environment using the resources at their disposal. As a follower of American sports, I took this project down the US ‘franchise’ route: closed leagues, divisional structure, playoffs, vibrant logos and ostentatious team names… I appreciate this is tantamount to heresy to some*, but if you’re interested in something a bit different, read on… *I’ll state at the outset, this isn’t one for the purists: many, many aspects of the game have been dismantled, altered, tweaked and tinkered with; the in-game editor is on and tools like FM genie scout and FMRTE will also be used to ascertain information and data: I’m not an active manager in the game and won’t be claiming any ‘achievement’ on route – this is solely about setting up a fictional scenario and seeing what happens. All the same, I appreciate that many like the game to be played ‘properly’ and will detest the very notion of this. I like to play the game in it’s traditional format too, but also enjoy having a mess about and being a bit creative. Likewise, I'm a bit of a data nerd, and reports will be, at least in part, focused on analysing data from the game - again, I appreciate that some will find this utterly pointless and an absurd way to 'play' FM... Premise: · How will FM’s AI cope under extreme conditions, namely the disruption of the underlying logic and structure of the game ‘world’? This is an experiment to find out, by creating a new league and new teams that will rival the old establishment of world football · Based nominally in Canada, a new ‘closed’ league has been created, populated by 32 franchises, spread across the world (although consolidated primarily in more economically realistic nations and cities as would be the case in a real-life situation) · Every team is extremely well financed via commercial deals and TV revenue (although relatively evenly financed, much like how US sports use collective revenue sharing), and has state-of-the-art facilities and stadiums. They are the football (soccer) equivalent of the NFL, where the ‘closed’ structure ensures their revenue and status are protected. Club reputations have been set high (between 9000 and 6500 on a ratio'd basis) so as to provide the new league with a surge of interest to kick-start it · Teams from the IFF (the Independent Football Federation) do not qualify for any existing continental or world club tournaments. Game Setup: · English, Spanish, Italian, German and French top divisions are running on full detail in addition to Canada, which is running the IFF World Championship and IFF Division II (for B Teams) · The game has 24,500 players active on a 'medium' sized database · All other nations are running as normal at game start-up New League Structure: · The IFF season is structured as follows: August – October: The Divisional Series: teams are regionally divided into 4 leagues of 8 teams – The Pacific Football Conference (PFC); The North American Football Conference (NFC); The European Football Conference (EFC); The Atlantic Football Conference (AFC). Teams play each-other twice, with winners crowned champions Additionally, the Pentland-Meisel Invitational Cup runs during August and September. This is a tournament in which the previous year’s IFF champions take on the winners of the continental cups (European Cup, Libertadores etc) November – May: The IFF World Championship starts with a group phase, in which all 32 teams are randomly drawn in pools of 8, playing each-other twice. The winners and runners-up in each group qualify for the championship playoffs (single-legged seeded knockout rounds played at the home-team stadium, with a final at a neutral venue) Running alongside the World Championship is the Intercontinental Challenge Cup; a 2-legged knockout cup featuring all 32 teams, drawn randomly To keep things interesting in these shorter format leagues, 2 points are awarded for a win, 1 for a draw and none for a loss. Initial Questions/thoughts: · How will this new league interact with the established game world? Will players and managers be attracted to the upstart league by the prospect of the money on offer? Will the AI recognise other factors such as the draw of the cities that teams are based in (Melbourne, New York, San Diego, Tokyo, Los Angeles, Miami….?) or even the relatively low number of matches they are required to play in per season? · Will there be an immediate influx of talent for big money as ambitious owners look to exploit their wealth and grow their empires? How effective will scouting and recruitment be? Will these new clubs, starting from scratch, be to ‘see’ the best players by building a scouting network? How much will this limit their ability to improve quickly? · In time, will the IFF grow its own superstars with the vast facilities and resources available to clubs? · What kind of competitive dynamic will emerge in the league? Will the ‘traditional’ football nations and regions (i.e., Europe) mimic their domination over this new league, or will North America become dominant? Will this affect the quantity and quality of youth prospects clubs can generate? Likewise, will dominance emerge from within specific regional conferences, or will competition be balanced? · Without the restrictions of FFP, will the IFF teams simply be able to outmuscle even the strongest of clubs in the European leagues, or will prestige and tradition ensure the likes of Real Madrid, Barcelona and Bayern always retain their status as the giants? · Over time, will the IFF offer a higher standard of football for the world? Will we see a consolidation of talent, with 32 highly tuned, high quality teams going head-to-head each year in the toughest club challenge on the planet, or will it simply become another retirement home for past-it stars of Europe, where lavish salaries are paid to has-beens to see out their twilight playing years in glamourous surrounds? Let's find out... Update Format: · Each Season I will do a report on the goings-on in this alternative football universe; · I will cover the winners of each tournament and provide some analysis of team strength and development using the in-game editor and Genie Scout to gather background data such as CA, PA, reputation as well as financial information · Initially, I will analysing changes to numbers of players with PA and CA bands in each of the major leagues, changes to club values, using a ‘control’ group of clubs from Europe and tracking the transfer spending of the IFF clubs and the ‘control group’ clubs. As the game evolves, there will be additional sections added and developed

(Starting off unemployed and holidaying through) This is based off a video that @GoldenFM made a while ago. He explains the rules here, but I'll explain them below (I've made a few adjustments, but it's still worth watching the video). Basically, a team takes players from the opposing team based on the amount of goals scored. If a game ends 3-2, the winning team gets the three highest rated players from the opposing team, and the losing team gets the two lowest rated players on the winning team. There is an exception: if the winning team gets four or more goals, they get to choose the players to steal, and which to give up (if applicable). So even if Harry Kane has a disasterclass game and would not get moved based on his ratings, the opposing team can pick him if they so please. If the game is a draw, the players traded are chosen randomly, but the amount of players traded is still based on the score: in a 2-2 draw, each team loses two players and gains two new ones. If it's a 0-0 draw, the teams trade top scorers. If one player scores a Hat Trick, his team can choose an extra player to steal. If a player gets a red card, he is sent to a random team. If a game goes to OT, any goals in OT result in a loan spell to a club rather than a transfer. So if it's 1-1 at the end of regular play, both teams get one player under the rules for a draw. Once it's in overtime, it's treated like a completely seperate game, but instead of 'stealing' players permanently, the teams get players on loan. If it goes into PKs, it has no effect on what happened earlier and the game is treated like a draw (if any goals were scored in overtime, OT rules are still in use: loans) No player can be stolen on their debut for a club. No exceptions. Once a player has been stolen, he is safe for thirty games in all comps. This, however, resets when the season ends. He has a few more rules, but they make sense only because he's managing a team. I won't be managing a team, I'll be unemployed and making edits with the in-game editor. I'll do this for the Championship and the Premier League in England, as well as the FA Cup, Carabao Cup, Community Shield, etc (if the game saves old matches for those like it does for League Football). As for Europe, I edited the UEFA Champions League a bit so that it is basically the 'Top 5 Nations' league. This should make stuff more interesting, for instance, Messi could go to Everton!

Everyone knows that Pelé scored over 1000 goals in all competitions over his career. In this experiment, I am going to create a player using the editor in each of the countries in this mega pack: http://www.mediafire.com/file/7we95zkfpg99rb9/editor+data.rar List of countries: Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, American Samoa, Andorra, Angola, Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Aruba, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Bermuda, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bonaire, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, British Virgin Islands, Brunei, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Cayman Islands, Chile, China, Taiwan, Congo, Cook Islands, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, Curacao, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Timor-Leste, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, England, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Fiji, Finland, France, French Guyana, FYR Macedonia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Gibraltar, Greece, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guam, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Holland, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kiribati, Kosovo, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macau, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Malta, Martinique, Mexico, Micronesia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Montserrat, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Korea, Northern Ireland, Northern Mariana Islands, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Puerto Rico, Qatar, Russia, Saint Barthelemy, Samoa, San Marino, Saudi Arabia, Scotland, Senegal, Serbia, Singapore, Sint Maarten, Slovakia, Solomon Islands, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Martin, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Sudan, Suriname, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Tahiti, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Turks and Caicos, Tuvalu, UAE, Uganda, Ukraine, Uruguay, US Virgin Islands, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Venezuela, Vietnam, Wales, Yemen, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. All the players will be strikers, have a Potential Ability of 200, and have a fairly good Current Ability (probably about 150). I am going to put each of them on a fairly good team in their native country (i.e., in England, maybe Tottenham Hotspur, in Germany RB Leipzig, in Spain Atletico Madrid, etc). I want to see if any of them will equal Pelé’s record (at least 1000 goals in all comps). I’ll start this in a few days, but right now I’m open to suggestions if anyone has any.

Well, I don't know, I stopped at 2518 because the laptop I was running this experiment on was taking forever just to advance a day... But that said, I Inherited a laptop, and I figured why not have some fun with it, so I loaded FM19 onto it, created a coach, and went on Holiday. First, for 100 years, where the 2000's were dominated by...West Ham? Save attached in the details section of the video. Jellico

The Premiss I enjoy playing with limitations, the limitation in this career update will be to make every decision follow the logic of the fictional manager Mario Glorihunter. This post will be dedicated solely to his profile and will act as a reference to future choices. Career Mario was a international footballer for England and can best be described as a “fox in the box”, much like the Italian Luca Toni. He was strong, could finish with both feet and was always at the right spot to tap it in. Unlike most English footballers, Mario didn’t spend much of his career in England. He was adventures by nature and left England for Italy at the age of 17 after being scouted Parma. Mario became a bit of a journeyman in his career, playing for several Italian clubs, two years in Spain playing for Valencia, and ended his career in Argentina for River Plate. Because of his outspoken and controversial personality, Mario was wanted as a pundit for skysports when he hanged up his boots. Mario wanted to return to England, not as a pundit but as a manager. Middlesbrough Tony Pulis achieved promotion trough playoffs with Middlesbrough in 2018/19. Owner Steve Gibson appreciated the work Pulis had done and then made the bold move to fire him. Gibson wanted to raise the profile and marketability of the club, something which would not have been possible under Pulis. Mario managed to sell himself to Gibson and the board with his charisma, high ambitions and self-proclaimed tactical knowledge. Mario demanded to be able to have full control of transfers for the senior team and to hire an assistant manager of his choice. Mario as a manager: Tactics Despite claiming to be an astute tactician, Mario doesn’t have a philosophy or strong tactical knowledge. He believes winning is simply about having the best players, motivating them and giving them the freedom to perform. As far as tactics go, Mario simply copies bits and pieces from other teams and managers. Mario does, however, have a few preferences, like playing with a striker much similar to himself (a strong striker with the intelligence and finishing ability of a poacher), and using lots of technical players as he was accustomed to playing with during his days in Italy, Spain and Argentina. Mario prefers to use his strongest XI whenever possible as they have the highest chance of winning. The XI knows who they are and the rest will have to accept not being among them. Player recruitment One thing Mario does not want is anonymous transfers. He values players that can bring headlines when they arrive, players with international experience, with exotic names. Mario could easily be the type of manager to buy an international player based on his performance in the World Cup, totally disregarding club performances. Eastern European players was a thing to avoid in most cases, they just weren’t fashionable in his eyes. While not being particularly interested in young players, Mario can make exceptions if a young player is often mentioned in the media. Training Development of players isn’t something Mario gets involved with. He is satisfied with leaving it up to his coaching team, Mario is more of a big picture guy. Mario does have his coaching badges, he just has no interest in improving in this area as his past player experience is more than enough to get jobs. Finances The only things Mario cares about when it comes to money is how much he gets to spend. He has no concerns about overspending on transfers or wages, it’s simply not his job. He is there to win football matches, and he needs the right players to do so, no matter the cost. If he doesn't get the resources he thinks he needs, he might leak it to the press. Media Mario enjoys talking to the press, sending sly remarks to other managers and teams. He is very loyal to his own players in the media, often praising them and disregarding criticism that comes their way. Mario will not tolerate anyone that publicly questions his competence, Mario is never the cause of a problem, he is the solution. To not be blamed, Mario can without hesitation throw someone else under the bus. Hierarchy The manager sits at the top and if you challenge him you will regret it. This is how Mario wants to rule his squad, players need to be loyal, otherwise, they have the choice to leave. Likewise, a loyal player can expect to be rewarded with more playing time and new contracts, given that they also perform of course. Ambitions Mario doesn’t have ambitions for the club as much as he has ambitions for himself. He is only interested in short term results to bolster his own achievements. Clubs can change the manager several times per season, so Mario sees no reason to care about long term goals. His own ambition is to manage is favourite club Real Madrid.

Hi all. I'm here to announce my brand new experiment where everyone could participate if they want. What does the experiment hold in? Holiday. A lot. To be precise on what must be done, holiday through the first possible season of your European country of choice except San Marino. Then do it again and again. You'll create a history of a single season, with twists and turns every time you reload. I will keep track in a neat sheet in Excel so you could always take a look and see if any club is the standout champ or always get relegated. Setup Screen -First select the European country you want that someone else is not currently active in. We are excluding San Marino from this experiment for the sole reason that it's the only European league with a significantly different competition structure, having knockouts after a group stage instead of a normal round robin or split league. It's hard to keep track of league position that way, so please pick one of the 54 other leagues. -Only load the top division of said country. Nothing else. -Choose for an advanced player count, select a large database and under the tab, add the country you'll experiment in, and finally tick the 'Players from top division clubs' box for full immersion. -Advanced options are as follows: Adding players to playable teams is crucial for the small countries, where not every team could field a full 11 (or fill the bench for that matter) with no grays. Disabling the first transfer window allows for slightly more consistent results with other people as teams aren't as able to transfer players in or out at the beginning, especially in the big money leagues. -The game start date is the 'Start Of *blank* Season' to keep the transfers even more minimal and gives a swifter experience getting into the nitty gritty of it all. In-Game Setup 1. Add a manager. Totally irrelevant who or what. 2. Make sure the detail level of the top division of your country is set to it's maximum, and everything else to 'None'. 3. Holiday/spacebar to the day before the league starts. 4. Save and exit the game. 5. Backup your save file, give it a name so you could recognize the difference. 6. Re-enter the save. 7. Holiday to the day after the league ends. You can find it under the 'Rules' tab of your competition. 8. Share a picture of the full league table, among other findings you may find interesting to keep the experiment entertaining. 9. Rinse and repeat, remember to specify how many times you have simulated in every post. My Role To make this all worth it, the post below is where all stats will go. Whenever someone updates their season, so will I. What I will write down is the amount of times a club has finished in a surden position, among with a few records including highest/lowest points tally and best/worst goal difference. Rules -Every FM or FMT that can follow these rules with next to no problem is allowed in the case of default leagues. -Only @claassen's Megapack may be used as extra league database. This means that countries only available in the Megapack are only viable options from FM17 onwards. -Please specify whether you are using the Megapack in conjunction with the default leagues or not. Leagues included in it do not have this neccesity. -Only cosmetic changes are allowed otherwise, as long as they allow the league table to be viewed in full at all times. -If one person has already started an experiment in a specific country in a specific FM version, please make sure to pick another one to reduce repetitiveness. -Any suspicion of cheating may mean your part of the experiment has failed and traces will be removed. Feel free to return anytime though if you can keep to the afromentioned! With all that said and done, enjoy the ride and let chaos ensue!

Welcome to this experiment where I will make both a team of players that have become heroes both for saves on Youtube and the SI Forums, I will make this a league where I will get the teams to play 9 games against each other (or however many possible if that's not possible) on the FM 17 editor to see who's heroes were truly better. To do this I will need suggestions from the community, for the YouTube team I will allow players from saves from YouTube as well as players from Twitch/Twitter saves from prominent FM Youtubers such as WorkTheSpace and Cutzy. For the SI Forums I will allow players from any forum in the FM Specific Playing Styles Forums. It would also be preferable if these players have screenshots that are fairly easy to find since that will make it fairly easy to make the teams. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated I will create a strawpoll for each position on Friday the 11th of May to decide the final teams.

Introduction. For a few issues of the game now, my saves have generally been more about the development of a club and individual players within that club rather than about winning this trophy or that trophy, (although a little success along the way is always nice too). I usually play Full Fat FM with a skin that has an Instant Result button, and the only highlights I look at are usually goals that we score, (unless things are going particularly poorly and I need to do something to avoid getting sacked). My goal is just to keep developing the Youth players produced by the club, and hope that their continued development will see the club progress over an extended period of time. Some of you are probably thinking "where on Earth is the fun in that?", but that's just how I like to play and I make absolutely no apologies for it. So I started off playing with San Marino (club), in FM14 and it was in this save that the Youth development bug really bit me. Forget winning the Champions League or the World Cup. The best Day each season was Youth Intake Day and all the others days in the year were only about getting 1 day nearer to Youth Intake Day. Since San Marino, I have played Youth Development saves in Gibraltar, (went very well), Germany, (second season sacking syndrome), Serbia, (Partizan rather than Red Star thank you very much), and I am now managing a little club called HK in Iceland in FM17. Something that I have often wondered is...... what actually determines how good my Youth Players are going to be? We all know that it's something to do with the HoYD, and the Junior Coaching, and the Youth Recruitment, and the Nation you are managing in, but how much do each of the above affect things and in what way? How important are they? Also, does it matter what Country you are managing in and what if you have great Facilities but a poor reputation? Going further than that, how might your Intake be affected if you had great Facilities and a good reputation, (because you were successful), but you were playing in the Footballing back-water of Outer Mongolia, (or Greenland was the analogy that I remember first reading about this)? The truth is I just don't know, and it seems that nobody else really does either. What seems to happen quite a bit in the FM community, is that if something is posted or said in a blog or vlog and is well-presented and articulated, then it is just taken as the gospel truth by loads of readers/viewers, irrespective of the truth behind the statement or claims. Then it is just spouted verbatim as if it is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, (and the only truth at that!) lol and it's a bit of a self-perpetuating myth. It's true because so many people think it's true and the reason that so many people think it's true is because so many people say that it's true. It obviously must be true! The reality is that blogs and vlogs and threads in here are absolutely nothing more than a presentation of an opinion held by one or more people on a particular subject. It could very well be that the opinion is bang on the money and is great, but it could also be that the opinion is a load of old baloney and isn't worth the online paper it isn't written on. (That obviously goes for this thread too by the way). The difference here is that I am going to try and tell you what I think will happen before each mini experiment and then we will actually see the results of the experiment, and then I will offer my own conclusions as to the results of the mini-experiment, but feel free to draw your own conclusions and even disagree with me. If this interests you then just look at the evidence and decide for yourself. I've done relatively well with youth intakes over the last few versions of the game, so FM players that I deem as quite experienced have often come to me and asked, "how do you get such good intakes?" The reality is that I don't think I do really, it's just that they look better in comparison to the rest of my squad because I am never going out and buying the next star. What I have been looking for is a way to do an experiment like this, but at the same time not ruin my own game. I will be honest with you and admit that I'm far too busy, (lazy you say?), to run a blog about FM like so many others do, (I really just can't be bothered), but I love playing the game so I needed something that wouldn't take away from my own HK save in Iceland, because with respect to those of you reading this, if the enjoyment of playing my own save wanes, I'm certainly not likely to be continuing a bloomin FM experiment. The way my mind works though, (and this thread is far more for me than anyone who might read it so apologies for being selfish), while it might be ok for me to do things in the game that manage to generate what I want in terms of end result, I actually want to understand it. I don't mean have a vague notion of little bits and pieces of the game as is the case now. I mean I want to know how every aspect works and how it impacts on the particular way I now like to play the game. (Ok. Maybe not).

Lately I've been reading a lot about Magic Magyars Golden Team and started fantasizing about recreating their formation with a strong team such as Barcelona. I'm just afraid that playing with one centerback and halfback will leave me too exposed in back even with 2 fullbacks that always stay back. My idea of choosing Barcelona would be just to experiment if I can outscore my opponents with my two wingers, two inside forwards and Messi as central false9 or trequartista, Magyar style. Any thoughts on how to faithfully recreate this system? Is WW formation viable in the game?

Doin an experiment, not a save that i acc manage in I will be trying to see what my home country, Northern Ireland can do when everything is maxed out, youth facilities being key, i will also max out all the finances of the top 2 divisions clubs in northern Ireland, can the GAWA win the world cup? I will be providing consistent updates regarding this, I hope you enjoy!!!

Hi everyone I've just uploaded a video to my YouTube channel experimenting with how Coutinho does at Barcelona since his transfer to the club a couple of days ago. It's seriously an interesting one, considering just how much of a superstar he really turned into but there were some absolutely laughable transfers Barca signed beside him and also what Liverpool achieved after selling him I won't spoil anything but it's funny how things turn out sometimes in football! Check it out if you're into this sort of thing; really appreciate the support. Let me know if you enjoyed it and also if you've done the same thing as I did; will be interesting to see what other results people get from this one transfer which truly could shake the football world! Maybe post some videos and screenshots below in the thread? Cheers everyone!

Hi all, I did an experiment like this a few years back with FM12. I never completed it. This time I hope to make a lot more progress. The Experiment My aim is to holiday through the game as an unemployed manager in the Oceania region, to see if Oceanic clubs and nations will ever really challenge on the world stage. To do so, and to give them a fighting chance, I've made a few changes to the database The Database In the interests of my own personal entertainment and progress, I've made some changes to the databases that are half-realistic - i.e. I've added some league structures and created new leagues or teams to add depth to each nation as necessary. As you'll see later with Wallis and Futuna, I had a little bit of fun with the team names (okay, I was on a train with no internet while I was editing the database ). Continental I've restructured the Oceania Champions League (OCL): 60 Teams will enter the OCL: The top three from each nation as well as the Cup Winners. First Phase Group Stage: 10 groups of 6. Top 3 Qualify, plus 2 best 4th placed sides Second Phase Group Stage: 8 groups of 4. Top 2 Qualify Knockout Rounds: Last 16, QFs, SFs, and Final as normal. The winning pot is £2,000,000. There are cash rewards at each level for wins, draws and defeats. Domestic Domestic Prize Money has been distributed on a reputation basis. The highest reputation belongs to the New Zealand Premier League, which has a reputation of 80. The winner receives £1million, 2nd place £900,000 and so on. If a league has a reputation of 40, the winner receives £500,000, 2nd place £450,000 and so on. I used Excel to work out which league needed which money, which should hopefully mean as leagues progress, they'll receive more and more prize money with respect to their reputation. American Samoa FFAS National League Premier Division 10 teams (League with Split) Bottom 2 relegated FFAS National League First Division 13 teams Top 2 promoted American Samoan President's Cup Cook Islands Cook Islands Round Cup 7 teams No relegation Cook Islands Cup Fiji Fijian National Football League 8 teams Bottom 1 relegated Fijian Senior League 15 teams (Three Groups of 5) 1 team promoted via Promotion Playoff between Group Winners Fijian FA Cup Tournament Kiribati Kiribatian National Championship 24 teams (Four Groups of 6) Top 4 in each group enter Championship Playoff Bottom 1 in each group enters Relegation Playoff (1 relegated to Lower Division) Kiribatian National Cup Micronesia Micronesian Football Championship 8 teams Top 4 enter Championship Playoff No relegation Micronesian Football Cup New Caledonia New Caledonian Super League 12 teams Bottom 2 relegated New Caledonian Challenger League 33 teams (Three groups of 11) Top 2 in each group enter Promotion Playoff New Caledonian Cup New Zealand New Zealand Premiership 10 teams Bottom 2 enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff New Zealand Regional Premier Divisions 4 divisions, between 8 and 13 teams per division 4 Division Winners enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff 4 Bottom Teams Relegated 4 Second-Bottom Teams Enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff New Zealand Regional First Divisions 4 divisions, between 8 and 11 teams per division 4 Division Winners Promoted 4 Division Runners-Up enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff 4 Bottom Teams Relegated (to Lower Division) New Zealand Chatham Cup Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinean National Soccer League 12 teams (two groups of 6) Top 2 teams in each group enter Championship Playoff 2 Bottom Teams relegated 2 Second-Bottom Teams enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Papua New Guinean Challenger Division 14 teams (two groups of 7) Group Winners are Promoted Group Runners-Up enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff 2 Bottom Teams enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Papua New Guinean Third Division 30 teams (three groups of 10) Group Winners enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Besta Cup Samoa Samoan Premier Division 12 teams Bottom 2 Relegated Third-bottom team enters Promotion/Relegation Playoff Samoan First Division 15 teams (three groups of 5) Group Winners enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Samoan Cup Solomon Islands Solomon Islands S-League 9 Teams Bottom 2 Relegated Solomon Islands First Division 18 Teams (two groups of 9) Group Winners and Runners-Up enter Promotion Playoff Solomon Islands Knockout Championship Tahiti Tahitian First Division 9 Teams Top 4 Teams Qualify for Championship Playoff Bottom Team Relegated Teams 6th-8th enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Tahitian Second Division 9 Teams Top Team Promoted Runner-Up enters Promotion/Relegation Playoff Tahiti Cup Tonga Tongan National League 8 teams Bottom 2 enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Tongan Regional League 18 teams (two groups of 9) Group Winners enter Promotion/Relegation Playoff Tongan Cup Tuvalu Tuvaluan A-Division 12 Teams Tuvalu Cup Vanuatu Vanuatuan Port Vila Premier Division 8 Teams Top Four enter Championship Playoff Bottom 2 Relegated Vanuatuan Port Vila First Division 8 Teams Champion is Promoted Second- and Third-Place enter Promotion Playoff Bottom 2 Relegated Vanuatuan Port Vila Second Division 15 Teams (two groups of 7 or 8) Group Winners are Promoted Vanuatuan Port Vila FA Shield Wallis and Futuna Wallis and Futuna Premier Division 6 Teams Wallis and Futuna Islands Cup ----------------------------------------------------- The experiment will begin in earnest!

After their fifth Serie A title in a row, the Italian FA have had enough of Juventus winning it all. The dissatisfaction extends to all the top teams, with the majority of recent titles going to the Turin side, or the two Milan teams. With the American model of rewarding the worst teams in mind, drastic measures are introduced to shake things up. From next season, any team that wins the league will have to release all squad players. Could this sight become a rarety? (OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/GettyImages) Ok so I know Juventus don't actually win everything. But with 5 championships in a row, and probably the strongest setup to add more, it's not inconceivable that they'll take 10 in a row. I have no personal issues with Juventus (honest!) I needed some story and some focus with which to do this experiment. So what's actually happening? Well, in short, when a team wins the league, I'll use the in-game editor to remove every player above £1m value, or with 10+ appearances in the league in the winning season. I considered doing the whole squad, but there's way too many players and I have to do them individually. Still, with the important squad members gone, that should be enough to hurt any team. Shall we get into it then? Will the big teams be able to rebuild squads quickly enough to continue the domination? Or will new challengers step up to win the league in the confusion? But most importantly, will Juventus get relegated? Time to find out... 2016/17 League Winner: Juventus Cup Winner: Juventus Juventus' Position: 1st Unsurprisingly Juventus take the first season. Which is exactly the reason why this experiment is happening. It's close though, as AC Milan finish 3 points off in second place. A cup win, also against AC Milan, further makes the statement that the Turin side need to be knocked down a peg. So with that we arrive at first round of departures! Leicester, PSG and Monaco go crazy with free transfers. The Parisian side bring Dybala and Alex Sandro into their midst, whilst their rivals snap up Bonucci and Khedira. Leicester somehow convince Asamoah, Rugani and Pjanic to join, despite only being in the Europa League. What. Kingsley Coman finds himself in Burnley, which I'm sure is not where he'd hope his career would end up. But the saddest news goes to Buffon. The veteran finds no takers for his immense ability and opts to go out with a fizzle, retiring from the game. And who do the Italian giants choose to bring in to replace all that talent? Well... Diafra Sakho, Victor Moses and Andrew Wisdom... It's going to be a tough season ahead, I can say that much. Nothing much to report in Europe. In the Champions League Juventus make it to the semi-finals thanks to a hard-fought win over Leicester. There, they fall to Atletico Madrid. Sassuolo make it the furthest in the Europa League, making it to the second knockout round. The first stripping of a team, alongside their decidedly average recruits. 2017/18 League Winner: Napoli Cup Winner: Inter Milan Juventus' Position: 13th With the current holders gutted, there's space for someone else to step up. That someone is Napoli, who manage to hold of Inter Milan and Roma for the title. I'm sure the parties are plentiful but will be short lived when they remember what's to come. Having had everything they own stolen, Juventus finish a lowly 13th. It's not awful but will kick their reputation a little not being in Europe. Napoli somehow manage to keep hold of Raul Albiol, as he falls under the £1M valuation line. Reina also sits at £450K value, but he still gets the boot thanks to his 34 league appearances this season. None of Napoli's newly freed players particularly go anywhere, with Hysaj taking the only high-profile transfer to Real Madrid. The rest head to middling Premier League teams or head to a cash club to end their career. The signed players prove to be just as disappointing. They spend £10.5M on players, with the biggest signing being Mario Pasalic. Napoli could struggle way more than Juventus did. 2018 also means we get our first World Cup. And Gareth Southgate getting his first chance to prove his worth. Doesn't he do it perfectly, somehow managing to finish behind Slovakia, Slovenia and Scotland in qualifying. Great job Gareth. The shocks continue as Italy lose all group games (including Australia and Ghana), whilst Australia beat Spain in the first knockout round. Argentina make it to the final to try and correct their hurt, but fall short once again at the hands of France. Annnnnndddddd Juventus survive, just fine. 2018/19 League Winner: Roma Cup Winner: Empoli Juventus' Position: 5th Roma are the next on the cursed throne, holding off Inter Milan and Lazio for the title. Empoli winning the cup may be a sign of things slowly falling to the weaker teams, but it's tough to tell at this stage. Juventus have climbed back into Europe with a 5th place, but Napoli fall to a lowly 17th. They escape relegation by 4 points, so I may have killed them. Stoke and West Ham are the two making the most of the free talent available. El Shaarawy, Manolas and Sisto sign up for extra rainy nights, whilst Strootman and Nainggolan opt for the more comfy London Stadium. Further afield, Real Sociedad clinch an impressive 2nd place in La Liga, and Leverkusen stop Bayern winning their 7th league in a row. In the Champions League Atletico take the trophy to claim Spain's 6th win in a row. It's almost unfair. 2019/20 League Winner: AC Milan Cup Winner: Napoli League Ranking: 4th Juventus' Position: 2nd Next up: AC Milan. It's in an incredibly tight season, with the top 10 separated by 8 points. It's also a low points season as Milan earn 68 points on the way to winning. The worrying part though is Juventus in 2nd and Napoli in 4th. It seems to take two seasons for them to recover at this point. Previous champions Roma do an OK job in 13th. West Ham continue their free agent spree, this time taking in talented youngsters Alexander Isak and Marco Asensio, as well as Bonaventura. It's a little surprising they're not doing better in the Premier League. Munir and Diawara head to Watford, with Berardi choosing Schalke. Transfers in seems to be a problem area for most teams, as no one of real note signs. Matarese is the biggest entrant in the £17M spending spree. Euro 2020 and England do significantly better. They make it to the semi-finals before familiar enemy Portugal destroy all English hope again. It's not another title for Portugal though, as they lose out 1-0 to Germany in the final. Italy fall in the first knockout round, so still an under-performance from them. 2020 proved to be the second year that Messi wouldn't win the Ballon d'Or, the first being a shock victory for Mata in 2016. 2020/21 League Winner: Internazionale Cup Winner: Internazionale Juventus' Position: 2nd 5 years, 5 different winners. So far so good. Inter sit in the top spot, walking to an easy 11 point victory. Behind them, it's Juventus once again, so it's only a matter of time before they become the first team to win it twice. Spezia, Chievo and Torino all manage top 7 finishes, whilst Milan sink to 15th. The exodus at Inter sees the usual raiding by mid-table English clubs. There are a few big names though. James Rodriguez goes back to Monaco having signed on a free. England's elite grab Zielinski (Arsenal) and Borja (Man City). They do bring in the best player in the world, Pele. Oh wait no it's a 30-year-old Portuguese guy from Shakhtar. No signings to be excited about then. Koln win the Europa League. Hooray! Big news that. 2021/22 League Winner: Juventus Cup Winner: Sassuolo Juventus' Position: 1st Damn. It. Ok so Juventus aren't broken, not even close as they beat Chievo by 10 points for the crown. But I'm not done there, I'm going to gut them again and see if it has more of a lasting effect. Inter meanwhile come 12th. The outgoings are a little bit weaker than last time. Munir once again finds himself heading to the depths of England, opting for "City of Culture" Hull. Few players are staying in Italy when released, which is why I think this might eventually do something. Unlike every other team before them, Juventus are able to spend £40M rebuilding, bringing in the likes of Markovic and Mosti. Taking them down is just making things equal ok. World Cup time once again, and it's Spain who suffer the most. They end up in a group with Argentina and France, falling as the unlucky loser. That's not even the group of death, as Ivory Coast, Mexico, Colombia and Belgium proves way more equal. The final goes down to Holland and Italy, with the Italians winning 2-1 for yet another title. Who said they were falling apart? West Ham finally profit from their smart recruitment, taking a total of £110M. 2022/23 League Winner: Torino Cup Winner: Sampdoria Juventus' Position: 16th So close yet so far. Juventus finish in a lowly 16th, but it's still 14 points clear of relegation as Udinese, Cagliari and Salernitana have particularly bad seasons. This isn't all out war on Juventus, honest. Up front, Torino take a dominating title, but as a "non-big" team, I'm a little sad to have to empty them of all they have. With a distinct lack of quality compared to the usual departures, the destinations of Torino's players is a bit more varied. Russia, France and China prove to be popular. Investment is a little more than some others, with £20M worth of regen players being brought in. A little later than it'll probably happen in real life, but Real Madrid become the first team ever to retain the Champions League in its modern format. They beat Chelsea 2-1 in the final to set the record. Attempt two at relegating Juventus. Still no dice. 2023/24 League Winner: Napoli Cup Winner: Fiorentina Juventus' Position: 11th Napoli become the second two-time winner in the league, making me seriously doubt if this is actually working. Sampdoria and Chievo have risen to the top though, so perhaps they can mix things up. Juventus have climbed slowly back to 11th, which is a sign of things being tougher for them. Meanwhile Torino were well beaten by losing everyone, coming dead last with 22 points. Some firsts come with Napoli being emptied. Firstly most of the players stay in Italy, which hasn't happen before. Secondly, Napoli invest £4.6M in new players. The lowest since this began. I don't think that's a good thing. In the league coefficient the yoyo-ing of teams has taken its toll. Italy have a few average seasons and all of a sudden they find themselves 5th behind France. It doesn't lose them much, but it's the start of something. Italy build on their World Cup success by going out at the second knockout round of Euro 2024. To be fair they do get beaten by eventual winners Holland, as the Dutch beat England 2-0 in the final. 2024/25 League Winner: Internazionale Cup Winner: Fiorentina Juventus' Position: 6th We're going in some sort of loop, and now it's the turn of Inter to claim their second title. AC Milan and Roma will probably be sometime soon. Interestingly Inter fail to obtain a UEFA license, and as such miss out on the Champions League. Napoli get relegated, so the punishment is becoming more severe as time goes on. Fenerbahce, Besiktas and the general vicinity of Germany are the chosen destinations of the Inter lot. Leandrinho is the biggest name, and he makes his way over to Shanghai SIPG to cash in for a few years. On the incoming side it's £4M spent once again, so a clear underlining of the decline. In Spain, Sevilla win La Liga, which is the first time in a long while either Barcelona, Atletico or Real Madrid hasn't won it. 2025/26 League Winner: Roma Cup Winner: Roma Juventus' Position: 6th Yup called it. Roma it is. AC Milan finish a very close second, so I expect they'll complete the cycle next time round. Juventus seem to be halted, finishing 6th once again. If they're climbing back to the top it's certainly slower. Meanwhile in 20th, Internazionale. Even Pescara finish above them, which has got to hurt. In Serie B Napoli finish a lowly 13th, so they're officially gone. Espanyol and Lazio clearly had some holes in their teams, as they recruit 4 and 3 players respectively. Roma meanwhile set a new record for lowest spent rebuilding their team, at £1.1M. That might well put them last like the two before. Italy get a chance to improve on their Euro performance and defend their thone in the next edition of the World Cup. It falls apart as England take their revenge for Euro 2012, knocking the Italians out in the first knockout round. France take the top spot for the second time in three tournaments, albeit the hard way. They fight their way through Holland, Argentina, Brazil and then Spain in the final to take a well-earned trophy. Interestingly 3 out of those 4 games were won on penalties, including the final after a 4-4 thriller. Inter become the first big team to get relegated, finish bang last. 2026/27 League Winner: Lazio Cup Winner: Fiorentina Juventus' Position: 6th Well I was wrong. Lazio and Fiorentina step up their claim for a first trophy in this, but it's Lazio who come out victorious thanks to the vs record between the pair. Roma finish last, and Juventus claim their customary 6th place. Win god dammit, I want to ruin you more! Mid table French or German sides are the trendy destination this year, whilst a 34-year-old Milik chooses sunny Las Palmas. The biggest surprise though would be Burnley somehow landing a £44M rated winger. I can't imagine Burnley quite compares to Rome. A £5M investment in new players is a decent effort by the Lazio board, so they could well do better than some of the previous attempts. The Italian teams have sunk quite low in reputation terms now. Juventus are on par with Everton, whilst Milan sit at the top with a similar reputation to Freiburg. It's a little off the starting values of 8000+ to say the least. World Cup 2026, including the 8 goal thriller of a final. 2027/28 League Winner: AC Milan Cup Winner: AC Milan Juventus' Position: 14th There we go, that's the winner I was expecting. AC Milan finally take the title that was coming and then brace themselves for a season of heavy relegation. Lazio keep up their end of the deal by getting relegated in last, despite the luxurious £5M squad. Juventus meanwhile drop to 14th. It's safe to say their domination is over, but they may have even dropped away from being a top team. Whilst the outgoings are normal, the biggest surprise is the £29M investment in a new team. No team has invested that in much in a long time, so it's pretty clear Milan are the top Italian team by far. Germany has taken up a spot as the very best in Europe, as an all-German final between Dortmund and Bayern gives Dortmund the Champions League trophy. If you're wondering how the Italians are performing in the continental competitions, they're battling for the occasional knockout round performance. A deep run at this point is a big surprise. France have become the international team to beat, as they cruise to another final, beating Italy along the way. This time it's against unlikely challengers Serbia, and we miss out on a shock winner as France brush them aside 2-0. With the talent they've got, it's not overly surprising. Real Madrid's record-breaking season. 2028/29 League Winner: Internazionale Cup Winner: Bari Juventus' Position: 13th An amazing recovery from Inter sees them become the first team with three Serie A wins. Milan also recover pretty swiftly from their kicking, as they only sink to 9th. Although the amount of money they pumped back in is probably the reason for that. Juventus are still hovering around mid-table, but they're now outclassed by the likes of Bari, who have become European contenders. The Italians seem to have caught on with what's going on (finally), and now the majority of released players are going to teams like Spezia and Chievo. Teams that could mount a challenge in the current circumstances, but don't have enough reputation to get the names in. Like their Milan rivals, Inter also spend £20M recruiting players. Clearly the Milan pair had more cash hidden away than the likes of Juventus. Over in Spain, there's more excitement as Real Madrid smash the record for points in a season. They concede just 21 goals and lose 3 times on the way to 105 points. They might go unbeaten if they're not careful. 2029/30 League Winner: Napoli Cup Winner: Palermo Juventus' Position: 8th Like Inter, Napoli claim the title off the back of an impressive recovery from their relegation. Inter meanwhile drop to 15th, so clearly if you spend over £20M you can build enough to survive. Juventus break back into the top 10, whilst Milan have taken two years to recover up to 3rd. They're looking good for their third next year. Which naturally, I'm super pleased/annoyed about. Napoli are unable to compete with the Milan pair, investing £3.3M in a new squad. PSV are nice enough to provide a couple of loans to help out, but even then they barely scrape a squad together. The chosen flavour this year for those leaving is France with a hint of Greece. World Cup 2030 and it's almost unfair how good France have become. There's no suspense as France claim their second title in a row, only the third nation to do so after Brazil and Italy. Italy do have the joy of beating Australia 7-0 in the first knockout round but lose to the French in the semis. England predictably lose to Germany. So... So it's 2030. Juventus have become a solidly mid-table side. The Italian coefficient has levelled out with the league in 5th place. League winners aren't exactly falling under the "shocking" as category I'd hoped. Let's move things on a little bit quicker to see if anything actually exciting happens. 2030-35 Two first time titles, as Empoli and Palermo top Serie A for the first time ever. Empoli recover incredibly quickly, taking another one in quick succession. The other two go to more seasoned winners Internazionale and Sampdoria. Surprisingly it's the experienced teams that suffer. Sampdoria get relegated immediately and Inter manage to stay up for a season before joining Sampdoria. Empoli and Palermo manage to stay afloat. Napoli also get relegated, off the back of their win in 2029, but recover back to be best 3 in Serie A. Juventus continue their completely average streak. To the point where I'm unsure if I'll be able to affect them again. Spezia have become far more interesting, as they win the Italian cup in the same year as getting relegated. They crash heavily in the Europa League group stages, but the highs of Olympique Lyonnais and the lows of Matera is a real interesting mix. In the rest of Europe, several streaks are broken and records set. Both Manchester United and Real Madrid fall short of an 8th title in a row, as Manchester City and Barcelona step in to stop things getting too boring. In doing so, Manchester City take their fourth Champions League in a row, only losing out on the fifth thanks to Barcelona. The level of domination around is ridiculous. Over in Germany, everyone's favourite club Red... RasenBallsport Leipzig win the Bundesliga for the first time ever and now sit as one of the top 10 clubs in the world. Two surprises for the European teams at the national level. The first comes with England actually winning something at Euro 2032. They topple heavy favourites France on the way to a final, where they hand a 3-0 beating out to the Dutch. But even that pales in comparison to the result of World Cup 2034. Italy cruise through to the final, where they come up against surprise package Switzerland. A tight match sees the Swiss come out on top, and the whole country goes mild with sensibly neutral partying galore. Surprise and confusion galore and Switzerland win the World Cup. 2035-40 Sassuolo become the most dominant team of the era, at least in Italy. Having taken three 2nd places in a row, as well as a couple of cups, they finally win the main prize. They do so in impressive style, with a 17 point win too. From there it's downhill, as they find themselves unable to recover from losing everyone and earn an immediate relegation. Torino and Napoli also win and suffer a similar fate. AC Milan and Empoli (from 2034-35) survive after their wins, but the biggest news is Juventus end the decade as league champions. Another shot at breaking their squad completely. Spezia achieve an impressive 2nd place, so it may not be long before they earn a title of their own. Serie A finally falls down to 6th in the coefficient, as some weak performances see Portugal able to jump ahead of them. At this point it's quite rare to see an Italian side past the first knockout round, and teams falling in qualifying is exceptionally common. A few more shocks in national football, although less noteworthy than a Swiss world title. Norway make a remarkable run to the final of Euro 2036, whilst Ecuador see an impressive World Cup run ended in the semi-finals in 2038. Both fall at the hands of Belgium, although the Belgians are only able to walk away with the Euro trophy. Germany grab a World Cup and then stroll through Euro 2040 to add another trophy to their cabinet. Coefficient ratings in Europe 2040-45 Of the five titles on offer, two go to Internazionale. Milan and Juventus take yet another each, whilst Fiorentina win their first of the experiment. After 2039-40, I'd hoped I could break Juventus, but they easily survive. The same holds true for the rest of the league winners. It seems things have reached a point where the top teams can comfortably survive. The top clubs are still able to spend some £10M on incomings, raiding those flirting with promotion into Serie A. Outgoings also haven't changed much, with the usual destinations of France, England and Germany remaining popular. In terms of reputation, Juventus have settled at around 6500, and don't seem to be shifting either way anymore. In the league coefficient, things get even worse. Belgium and Turkey finally catch up with the Italian league, as I thought they might. In just one season they drop from 2 group stage spots in the Champions League to 2 spots total. To make it worse, things are very tight around that part of the coefficient, so it may not be easy earning those spots back. One World Cup to report of, and it's much more positive as far as the Italians are concerned. Serbia make a surprise run to the final, but are stopped short on penalties as Italy claims a record 6th title. Euro 2044 goes to France, who manage to conquer world beaters Switzerland. The movers and shakers of the Italian reputation. Empoli are by far the biggest winners. 2045-50 Roma grab a title and then manage to recover very quickly to win a second. Fiorentina and Atalanta also take one each, but I'm most pleased about Spezia finally winning the whole thing. It does immediately earn them a relegation with an awful total of 13 points, but silverware is always fun. Juventus don't claim another title but are close, so the end point of this experiment will be their next win. Lazio become the first ex-champion to drop to the Lega Pro. Considering they won the back in 2027 it's fair to say I didn't cause it. But it is a landmark. Sampdoria also get mighty close, having failed to revive themselves after the relegation in 2035. More coefficient action, but this time it's good news. Turkey and Belgium drop off sharply, giving Italy 6th place back. Add to that some consistent 12 point performances, and it seems they started to stabilise themselves around the same place as the Portuguese league. World Cups 2046 and 2050 go back to the routine French domination that we've been seeing through this experiment. They crush English dreams in extra time in the 2046 edition, before getting well beaten 4-1 by Spain in the 2050 version. Still, 1 out of 2 finals isn't bad. Or a title. At all. Since 1966... The league history of Lazio. From their relegation after their title win to being the first team in Serie C. 2050-52 I said I'd run it until their next title, annnnnnd Juventus claim the very next one available. They get the customary clearing out and this time it's make or break. If this doesn't work, experiment over. It's a slow start to the season and they finish... 8th. They even manage to claim the Cup, the first team to do so on the back of winning the league. So I guess it really is experiment over. The final season of the experiment. The result? Well, I'm going to have to say that this failed. I mean the results were more varied than real life, but for the most part the bigger clubs stayed at the top. Empoli, Sassuolo and Spezia made the best of circumstances, but there wasn't the wild variety of winners I'd hoped for. Plus Juventus didn't get relegated once, and neither did AC Milan so there's no way I could class it as anything other than a failure. I guess it's not surprising when you think about it. The difference in finances and reputation between teams like Juventus and Spezia is huge. The stronger teams have enough in the bank to rebuild their squads and continually raid the lower leagues. The weaker teams are never going to climb to the point where they're top of the world because as soon as they get close, they're stripped of everything too. And they don't have the anywhere near the same resources to recover with. So I can't say I'm surprised things turned out as they did. The state of the world England London takes the lead early on, but it's all Manchester after that. From 2019/20 to 2049/50, every single title goes either to Man united or Man City. United dominate the 20's and 40's, with City taking the 30's. Chelsea are the team to finally break that run, having spent the entire time behind the pair. Spain A surprise early domination for Atletico, before Real Madrid win all but three titles between 2023/24 and 2039/40. From there Sevilla dominate the 40's, whilst Barcelona do very little throughout. Real Sociedad manage a reasonable amount of top 3 finishes but never sit in first. Germany Bayern dominate almost completely, including taking 9 titles in a row. From 2044 Dortmund finally step up and take over, winning 6 in a row. RB Leipzig also turn up, pushing Bayern down to 3rd. They even win their first three titles. Schalke are fourth best throughout. France/Portugal It's a tale of two trios as both weren't loaded. France has PSG win in all but one seasons, with Monaco and Lyon fighting for 2nd. Benfica dominate Portugal, leaving Porto and Sporting in 2nd. Europe Real Madrid win three in a row early on, before Man City trump that with 4 in a row just after. From there, it's Man City, Sevilla, Dortmund and RB Leipzig who are top almost every year. No real surprises. Koln grab 2 Europa Leagues, whilst Espanyol and Freiburg take one each. They're the only real surprises though. International I've covered the World Cups and Euro's before so let's look at other news. After Iraq win the the first Asian Cup, every trophy goes to Japan or Australia. Germany are winners of 10 of the first 17 Nations Cups, with Italy attending 7 finals in 9 years. Jamaica perform surprisingly well in the Gold Cup, and Mexico B take a Copa America. Which probably shouldn't happen. Maybe they're banned now. All World Cup winners since the experiment began. As you can see, France do pretty well. Players So I made an album of all the regens here, as I know some like seeing what legendary players a game generates. Those of note include; Ramon Martinez, who won the Ballon d'Or 5 times in a row, Maik Grundmann, who won the Ballon d'Or at 21, and Jan Cabral, who is one of very few 200 CA players to ever crop up. Let's try one more thing... How about we up the stakes. Players won't be released anymore. Instead, they'll be transferred to the playoff winner from Serie B. It doesn't sound like a big change, but it stops the worst team being easily beaten. More importantly, all money is stolen. Let's see if Juventus can rebuild without the funds to do so. Season 1: Surprise surprise, Juventus win. Season 2: Well that was easy. Juventus are relegated at the first try with 28 points. Inter take the title. Season 3: Juventus sneak back into Serie A thanks to a playoff win over Chievo. Inter get relegated in dead last. It's AC Milan with the title. Season 4: Juventus are straight back down, falling with 34 points. Inter fail to get promoted in the playoffs, whilst Milan survive in 15th place. Roma win this time round. Season 5: Inter claim automatic promotion from Serie B, whilst Juventus have to beat Avellino in the playoff to go back up. Roma fall down a league in 18th, as Napoli take the title. Well wasn't that far easier. Juventus have dropped to a yo-yo team, and most teams who win get relegated. I will say, I didn't give Juventus the Serie A players when they won the playoffs. But that wasn't the point of this extra test. None of the clubs that received players won anything, with Verona doing best by getting 2nd in Season 5. The test worked though, I broke the elite! Success! At the first time of asking too. Wasn't even a challenge. The end So that's that. As I said earlier, I swear I have nothing against Juventus. But the longer they avoided relegation, the more I wanted to get them. I've always had a soft spot for AC Milan so I couldn't hold it against them in the same way. Regardless of the failure though, it was still a fun one to test. It did need more maintenance than most, as I could only sim a year at a time. Add life into that and you've got a little bit more work than I expected. Don't get me wrong that, it was still just as interesting as before, with every season mattering. If you didn't notice, I've upgraded to a shiny new FM 2017, complete with the official in-game editor. Having an in-game editor has opened up loads more of ideas, and it's always nice to have the latest version of the game to play with. So expect these to continue. I'm not ignoring the idea's people have suggested, I've noted them down. I have so many things I want to try, that it may be a while for them all to be done. As usual, comments and feedback and suggestions are all welcome. Or general conversation about the weather if you like. I'm not fussed. Thanks for reading!

So after someone found and revived last years thread, it seemed like enough interest to post this again and try and generate some fun. For a bit of background, the threads for the last 3 years. The experiment ran a year before that as well, but was not my creation and i think the very first thread might be MIA after the various forum changes. http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/419757-FM15-The-community-formation-experiment http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/387570-How-important-is-a-quot-formation-quot-A-community-tactical-experiment (Not sure why 2 of the links paste as normal links, and only the last as an insert / preview.......never mind! ) Background / Premise This is really designed as a bit of fun. A change for people to try something different in tactical terms. It is not a "challenge" as such - there are no points award, not league tables or anything like that. It is an experiment around challenging our ideas of how much a "formation" truley matters. There have been various great threads over the last 2 or 3 years specifically challenging that fact, and this is just taking that concept and adding an element of getting users outside their comfort zone and trying something they might never have tried before. Last year we had more interest than ever, including @Rashidi being kind enough to get involved and feature this in an entire series on his popular youtube channel General Principles Everyone has to use the same database (17.2.1 i think we are on now?) - with no database edits Other add ons are fine - its only important that the starting squads are the same for everyone Past experience the same for everyone - "international experience" for everyone and coaching badge the same (highest level) Everyone has to use the same starting team - We would agree in advance, and if it was popular maybe run 2 versions with different teams Inward transfers limited to 2 permanent signings, one loan signing (a bit arbitrary, but its how i vaguely remember the original thread) No limitations on outward transfers / loans The experiment tends to be about what you can achieve in 1 single season, but there is no reason you cannot continue beyond that, including providing tactical updates in here It is preferable to play this on "full fat" FM, rather than FM touch as, i believe, the later has quite a difference in terms of tactical familiarity. Given that this experiment likely involves quite a bit of tactical maneuvering, it would mean we dont compare apples with apples. That said, it is designed to be fun and not competitive, so if for some reason you really refuse to play the full game and must play the "kids version" ( ) Then i wont stop you taking part. I do however reserve the right to mock you. Updates in this thread are highly encouraged - Obviously with a tactical slant given this is TTF, but give as much detail as you like - Telling / showing us how you took your allocated formation and made it work is what it is all about - Share ideas, give feedback to others, all the things this forum does well in general. Tactics Each user who wants to take part gets given one of the default formations - I use a complex machine (e.g, a bit of basic VB code...) to make sure the picks are random, they are not allocated by me. The formation (that is to say the player slots on the pitch), must not be changed in anyway. So if you get 5 - 4 - 1 you must keep a flat back 5, a flat midfield 4 and a single striker in the central slot. Any other tactical options can be customised - This is the essence of the experiment - using roles, duties, team and player instructions, you can try to take a basic shape and make it function in different ways We have tended to exclude the "most popular" default formations. So 442 flat and 4231, and of course 41221 which is probably the most used). It can be a bit subjective, and you can argue to exclude a few others but that sort of limits the number of people we can involve If we get huge interest, like last year, we can easily start to allocate a second round of formations. No huge issue if we eventually end up with 2 people using the same formation If the interest is sustained, we could run a second iteration with a different team (also relies on me not losing interest in organising!) NEW THIS YEAR - You will see the actual process of the formation being allocated, less there be any suggestions that i manipulate things! (I can just tell how excited you are.....) The Team Ah always the hardest part! We will never get a team that everyone will agree on, but as a general guide: Avoid the EPL, as in general we all know that league so well. There is a nice additional aspect to this being a team that a lot of us will not have managed, or come up against quite as often Generally stick to big Euro leagues - So Italy, Spain, Germany are the obvious ones. Holland / Portugal possible but the squads outside the CL Teams there can be a bit patchwwork Avoid teams who are in the Champions League - The challenge of making your formation work is that little bit more fun if you are not a true top tier team If we can pick a team who are in the Europa, that certainly adds an extra aspect Stick to teams who are probably expected to finish outside the CL spots, but also stick to teams likely to be in the top 8 / 10 to give us balance between making the best of the players we have, and not being too hard by having a terrible squad Try to find a team with a relatively balanced squad, since transfers are limited and the formations will vary a lot. I will do second post detailing the suggested teams shortly and we can get going! If you want to be involved, just post saying so and comment on the team if you like, will aim to start drawing teams tomorrow, unless we agree on a team earlier!

What's the experiment about: -A comparison in the attributes "Consistency" and "Important Matches", so to check if they do increase (or decrease) after some years, in both real players and newgens. The comparisons will be performed with the help of Genie Scout. Feel free to make suggestions as to what else could be compared. Requirements: -A long-term save, having being saved in a 5/10/15/20 year period, for example: Save A=2016, Save B=2021, Save C=2026, Save D=2031, etc. (of course it doesn't have to be during a 5-year period, 6-7 years will do. And only a save in 2016 and a save in 2024 will still do) -Changes with the pre-game editor: No (at least not after the first save) -In-game Editor used: No (at least not after the first save) -Other Editors used: No (at least not after the first save) -Please inform me if you added or removed any leagues after setting up your database and what's the deal with the "Detail Level" in your save. Why am I doing this? An experiment was conducted here, which sort of proved that the "Important Matches" attribute doesn't improve as it should be. But, since it wasn't a detailed one, I want to do it again. Could someone share his long-term saves please?

The NFL is growing and the FA is jealous. They decide to mix things up, in the hope of reinvigorating the league and exciting the fans again. As the old saying goes, "if you can't beat them, join them", and England decides to copy the structure of the NFL, Superbowl and all. Will the league flourish? Will new teams get a chance at the top? Or will it be the same old... Could we see the same furore that comes with an NFL season, or will football fans be turned away? So yup, I'm turning the Premier League into the NFL. Now I want to set out some guidelines. I'll just be copying the structure of the NFL rather than trying to replicate all the rules. There will be no draft, no wage cap rules, everything on that side of things will remain the same as the Premier League. League format, continental qualification, prize money and cup competitions have all been changed. Oh and team names, because no American transformation would be complete without weird names. I just want to say a massive thank you to dim13 over at SI Games. I'd be struggling with the setup for this for a while before his work finally pointed me in the right direction! So how does it work? Structure If you don't know the NFL structure, there are 2 conferences. These will be the Southern Premier League, and the Northern Premier League in England. Each conference has 4 divisions of 4 teams. These teams play their own division teams twice, and an assortment of other teams for a total of 16 games. At the end of that, the 4 division winners, plus the two best performing other teams enter a playoff. This is completely seeded with home advantage, so the two best performing division winners get a bye to the semi finals. These playoffs happen separately for each conference, resulting in a winner for the South and a winner for the North. These then match up in a Superbowl. A single, winner takes all match to determine the winner of the Premier League for that season. Simple right? Divisions are split up roughly by location, and division names are given based on the general area. Occasionally I grouped based on rivalries, like putting Crystal Palace and Brighton together, or split teams apart to balance divisions, as with Liverpool and Manchester. I expecting disagreements with some of these but cut me a little slack. Here are the divisions: Obviously the 20 Premier League teams made it in. The other 12 all came from the Championship and were decided using a combination of recent league performance and best suited by location. Teams like Norwich missed out because they're in the middle of nowhere. Team names well... if you don't like it tough. I wasn't exactly keen on "Tottenham Cockerels" but I had no choice! Again, based on nicknames or team mascot, so apologies if any of these are wildly incorrect! Oh and Superbowls use roman numerals. The NFL does it so I have to. Extra bits There are a few little mechanics I should explain. Firstly draws and knockouts. Like the NFL every single game goes to extra time if it's a draw after normal time. From there it's golden goal, first goal scored ends the game, to replicate the first scoring system used American Football. In the regular season, if the game is still a draw after extra time, it ends a draw. The playoffs go to the usual penalties. Points for a golden goal win are given in exactly the same way as a normal result, 3 for a win and 0 for a loss. For European qualification a team HAS to win the division, so we should get a nice mix of teams with 8 fighting for the 6 or 7 slots. From there, the division winners that make it furthest in the playoffs make the Champions League and highest seeds, whilst the lowest 1 or 2 miss out. If two teams make it to the same stage, they are split by regular season (pre-playoff) record. Prize money goes by regular season record with 1st getting £33M, and 32nd getting £2M. Extra bonuses ranging from £500k to £2.5M are paid out for playoff results. There's also two other trophies. The Premier League Shield is given to the team with the best record in the regular season (the divisional 16 game round). It means very little, and gives no prizes whatsoever, but is needed for wild card seeding so it's there. The FA Cup has been reworked into a two-legged knockout between the 32 Premier League teams, with the winner getting a Europa League spot as usual. Anyway that's a hell of a lot of explaining, and not a lot of showing. I'm going to go through this season by season to start with, as that's the best way to capture the format, information, and pure excitement of what happens. So let's get rolling. Season 1 Regular Season SPL The Chelsea Lions and West Brom Baggies take easy division titles, whilst the SPL North London and SPL South are fought a little closer. The Bournemouth Bears and the Tottenham Cockerels win their divisions on the final day. Tottenham score a golden goal to secure the best record of all SPL teams, and home field advantage for the playoffs. In the wild card, the Arsenal Gunners claim their slot easily after pushing Tottenham all the way to final day. The second slot comes down to a tight fight between the Southampton Saints and Brentford Bees. The Saints claim a victory against the Bears, whilst Brentford lose, putting Southampton through to the wild card on the final day. SPL MVP: Hector Bellerin - Arsenal Gunners NPL The only easy division title goes to the Liverpool Liver Birds, as their 14-1-1 record far outstrips Everton in 2nd place, with a 4-2-10. The Stoke Potters open enough of a gap to get the last game day off in NPL Midlands over Leicester. In NPL Pennines, the Citizens lose just once all season. The one team in the way of their undefeated record? The Manchester Devils, who take a golden goal victory on the penultimate weekend. It's enough for the Citizens to win their division and the Supporters Shield, with the Devils earning an easy playoff slot alongside them. NPL East goes down to an incredible final day. With Leicester already having secured the 2nd wild card slot. Hull Tigers sit on 7-1-7, and +2 GD, whilst Newcastle Magpies sit on 6-1-8 with -2 GD. With the two playing each other, things look exceptionally tough for the Magpies to make it to playoffs. That soon changes after one incredible half in Newcastle. After 37 minutes the Magpies are 4-0 up, and a shellshocked Hull never recover. Newcastle make it through by the skin of their teeth. NPL MVP: Luke Shaw - Manchester Devils Playoffs SPL The first wild card match sets up a rematch between the Saints and the Bears. The Saints claim revenge for the division title loss, seriously harming Bournemouth's chance for Europe. Arsenal take an unsurprising victory over the Baggies in the other match. Semi Final 1 falls between Chelsea and Southampton, which again goes to Chelsea. The other semi-final results in a north London derby. It's as close as can be, with the teams going all the way through extra time equal. In penalties, Alexis Sanchez chokes, giving Tottenham a classic victory over their rivals, and a conference final vs Chelsea Lions. Surprisingly the final isn't close. Having signed in the summer for £25M, Lacazette steps up big when needed. And it's for Tottenham. The Cockerels make the most of the home field advantage and put themselves in Superbowl I with a 3-1 victory. NPL Another division duel to sort out, as Leicester and Stoke face off in the wild card. Again, the lower seed wins, as Leicester scrape by to set up a semi-final against Liverpool. The Devils demonstrate that the Magpies are out of their league, not breaking a sweat with a 3-1 victory. Yet more once again's, as the north London derby is countered by a Manchester derby. This one's a little less close, as two early goals from the Citizens puts them through. Liverpool and Leicester chose to ignore defence, and the Liver Birds outscore their opponents 3-2 to join the Citizens in the NPL Final. The Northern final proves that home advantage doesn't always matter. The Citizens score early, but the Liver Birds quickly answer back with two. And from there both teams are unable to hit the back of the net, meaning Liverpool advance to the Superbowl. Superbowl I Superbowl I proves to be the final ever game played at White Hart Lane. The festivities are kicked off when Alli scores 20 minutes in. These are soon silenced, with a quickfire Coutinho double putting the Liver Birds up at the half-time point. Pochettino fires the players up at half time and they come out first. First Harry Kane in the 48th minute, then Lacazette 2 minutes later to put the Cockerels back in the lead. Things get tense as Alli receives a 2nd yellow in the 85th minute, leaving Tottenham with 10 men to hold out for the final minutes... And they do it! TOTTENHAM COCKERELS WIN SUPERBOWL I. It's an incredible feat to top the division, but to win the EPL Superbowl is something else. I might have celebrated a little bit, despite the fact I did nothing to cause it. Final score: Tottenham Cockerels 3 - 2 Liverpool Liver Birds Superbowl MVP: Alexandre Lacazette - Tottenham Cockerels Other notes Over in the FA Cup, a decent run for the Brighton Seagulls sees them make the final. Unfortunately the fairytale is halted there, as the Devils win the final 2-0. An important win for the Manchester club, being the only route into Europe after losing their division to the Citizens. With only division winners qualifying for Europe, the Champions League slots are easily deduced. The 4 Conference final entrants all top their division, so head straight to Europe's top competition. The other 4 division winners all fall at the wild card round, leaving it to regular season record to split them for the 2 Europa League slots. Bournemouth take the first, whilst the Baggies and the Potters end up with a matching record for the second. They end up being split by goals scored, giving Stoke a ticket to Europe. The Devils to make it to the Europa League final, as a last gasp attempt to make the Champions League. Their they get trounced by Leverkusen 3-0, as the Germans ruthlessly crush that hope. Summary Superbowl Winner: Tottenham Cockerels EPL Shield Winner: Manchester Citizens FA Cup Winner: Manchester Devils EPL MVP: Mesut Ozil - Arsenal Gunners Season 2 Regular Season SPL Things prove a little more decided in the second season, as not a single division has its title in doubt on the final day. In fact all 4 divisions even go to the same winners. The Baggies take the biggest win, with a heavy 18 point victory over 2nd place. Chelsea Lions come out the best record with a 13-1-2 to give them home field advantage. The wild card also proves pretty uncontended. SPL Birmingham are nowhere near once again, whilst the Gunners put in a strong performance to claim the 2nd seeded wild slot. The biggest surprise is the marked improvement of the Fulham Badgers, who only lose out by two wins to Chelsea, taking the top wild card place. SPL MVP: Dele Alli - Tottenham Cockerels NPL The NPL tells a similar story to the SPL, with not much up for grabs on the final day. The Newcastle Magpies and the Liverpool Liver Birds win their divisions again, although for Newcastle it's far more convincing with a 12-1-3 record. The Manchester Devils are able to oust their local rivals by 4 points, whilst Leicester Foxes earn an easy victory in the Midlands. Less surprise in the wild cards too, as the two most likely teams take it comfortably. The Citizens grab the best wild card slot to face the Foxes, whilst the Everton Toffees squeeze through to face the Manchester Devils. The most surprising result comes from the Preston Ducks. They manage the first 0 victory season, taking just 3 draws throughout the regular season. NPL MVP: Josh Tymon - Hull Tigers Playoffs SPL Match 1 in the wild card sees the two weaker teams of the wrong. Bournemouth Bears and Fulham Badgers head into extra time, before an on loan Mitrovic scores the golden goal to send the Bears through. The other wild card game sees a rematch of the North London derby. This time the Gunners come out on top in a tight match. The Bears face up to Chelsea in the next round, and once again Mitrovic provides the heroics. After Terry gets sent off in the 81st minute, the Serbian pops up with the goal to send Bournemouth to the SPL Final. The Gunners take a tight win again to set up the final matchup, this time over the Baggies. Unfortunately the final proves a step too far for Bournemouth, as they get outclassed by a strong Gunners side. Mata and Iwobi provide the goals to put the other North London team in the Superbowl. NPL Golden goal comes into play once again in the NPL. Despite being a man down, Mkhitaryan sticks one in the net in the first minute of extra time to knock the Toffees out. The Manchester Devils progress into a semi-final with the Newcastle Magpies. The Citizens easily control the other game, meaning both Manchester teams make it through the wild card. Funnily enough both semi-finals end in 1-0. In the Liver Birds - Citizens game, Liverpool score early with Mane to put them into another conference final. Over in Newcastle, it's a late goal this time from Krejci, putting both Manchester sides out, and a much-improved Magpies team into the final. Newcastle suffer the first half from hell, conceding two goals and seeing Shelvey sent off in just 25 minutes. Gayle gets one back for the Magpies, but the game is over before any more can happen. Again, a little unfortunate as for the "weaker" team it proves a step too far. Superbowl II Anfield plays host to the second ever EPL Superbowl. Things get started even quicker than last time, as Bellerin and Iwobi score a quick double to put the Gunners 2-0 in 11 minutes. From there the Liver Birds look a little shocked as Arsenal pepper their goal. After half time things do pick up for Liverpool, with Sergej Milinkovic Savic firing in in the 65th minute. But it's not enough, and Anfield suffers with watching the Superbowl trophy slip away right under their noses. Final score: Liverpool Liver Birds 1 - 2 Arsenal Gunners Superbowl MVP: Hector Bellerin - Arsenal Gunners Other notes In the cup that's purely for teams that didn't win their divisions to get into Europe (the FA Cup), the West Ham Hammerheads and the Manchester Citizens make it to the final. With the game in extra time, Coutinho and Aguero put two away to put the Citizens back into Europe. With Arsenal not winning their division, the Champions League slot falls to a semi-finalist. The Baggies end up with the 4th best record in the regular season and so join Liverpool, Chelsea and Newcastle in the Champions League. Having failed to qualify the normal way, both the Tottenham Cockerels and Manchester Devils opt for a different route. The pair meet each other in the Europa League final, where an extra time win for the Devils makes them the 5th English team in the Champions League. With 5 slots already taken, only 2 Europa League slots sit available. The Citizens take one with their cup win, leaving one place open for a division winner. With the best record in the regular season, the Cockerels get that spot. Summary Superbowl Winner: Arsenal Gunners EPL Shield Winner: Liverpool Liver Birds FA Cup Winner: Manchester Citizens EPL MVP: Dele Alli - Tottenham Cockerels Season 3 Regular Season SPL Chelsea Lions take their division by some distance, but from there things hit massive changes. In the SPL South, the Brighton Seagulls keep the division winner rotation going, leaving just the Eagles without a title. The SPL North London and Birmingham divisions culminate in a ridiculously tight title and wild card battle. The Watford Hornets and Wolves secure impressive division titles in the penultimate week. From their, Tottenham, Arsenal, West Brom and Birmingham all line up at final week with 2 wild card slots to split between the 4. North London takes it all, as both the Cockerels and the Gunners win their games against the other two division rivals. SPL Midlands is left thinking what could have been. SPL MVP: Andrea Polesano - Tottenham Cockerels NPL North England proves a little less tense. In fact all four division winners turn out the same as last season, with the Foxes, Devils, Liver Birds and Magpies topping the tables. Liverpool spend the entire regular season unbeaten, with the only dropped points being a draw against the Manchester Devils. It seems the Devils are wreckers of any perfect run. The wild card mixes things up. Hull Tigers ease into the playoffs despite a final day defeat. NPL Pennines provides the second wild card, but this time it's not the Citizens. The blue half of Manchester disappoints, allowing the Leeds Roses a chance to enter their first playoffs. NPL MVP: Jesus Vallejo - Everton Toffees Playoffs SPL The SPL wild card rounds seem straight forward, but Wolves chose to mix it up. Facing up against the Gunners, Wolves take it to extra time, before Siem de Jong provides the heroics to knock the North London side out. The other wild card match proves more straightforward, with Tottenham beating Brighton 2-1. Having got through, Tottenham face up against South London rivals Chelsea in a crunch match. Greizmann scores the only goal, putting the Lions into the SPL Final. The other game goes into extra time goalless, before Troy Deeney fires in a golden goal, sending Wolves home and Watford into their first final. From there the fairytale ends though. Things get back to form in the SPL Conference final with De Bruyne and Fabregas scoring the goals to put Chelsea into Superbowl III. NPL The NPL wild card round also proves incredibly close as expected, with both games ending in 2-1. First the Foxes knock out the Tigers, followed by an on loan Sterling scoring the final goal to put Newcastle through and send Leeds home. The Magpies come up against the Manchester Devils in the semi-finals and manage to take the game to a 9-8 penalty shootout. Unfortunately, they find themselves on the wrong side, with Karl Darlow missing the decisive penalty. The Liver Birds - Foxes game sees 4 goals scored in just 6 minutes. Fekir gets one for Liverpool before Juanpi and Klaassen put Leicester 3-1. Liverpool are deflated and fail to reply. Unlike the SPL, the NPL conference final is quite a cagey affair. Mkhitaryan puts the Devils ahead in the 8th minute, but after that there are very few shots. No extra goals come, setting up a Devils - Lions final. Superbowl III An incredible tale of two halves in Superbowl III. In the first half, home advantage pays off as Rashford and Pogba both find the back of the net for the Devils. Jardim fires up the Chelsea Lions at half time and they come out with a bang. First Kante in the 46th minute, then Carvajal in the 71st to take the game to extra time. From that point Manchester are on the back foot. Wedged in their own half, and with no shots on-target other than their two goals, the Devils push for penalties. Their wish is eventually granted, and we get the first shootout in Superbowl history. The Devils continue to demonstrate their shooting flaws though, with Layun and an ex-Chelsea Matic both missing the target. Christensen is the only saved penalty for the Lions, meaning Pogba has to take the penalty to keep Manchester in it. The pressure proves too much, he blazes wide, and Chelsea Lions claim their first Superbowl victory. Final score: Manchester Devils 2 - 2 Chelsea Lions (P) Superbowl MVP:Ruben Neves - Manchester Devils Other notes The Arsenal Gunners make up for their failure to win the division by taking the FA Cup to qualify for Europe. Liverpool fall in another final to Arsenal but have the last laugh by qualifying for the Champions League. The Devils, Magpies, Liver Birds and Lions take the 4 Champions League slots, whilst the Citizens opt for the toughest way in. Once again an English team wins the Europa League, with the Manchester side beating Inter 1-0. Over in German, Leverkusen are able to break the trend of Bayern victories by winning the Bundesliga. It's clearly the season for breaking trends, as Lazio are able to do the same. The Rome team earn a shock Serie A title, beating out Juventus by a single point. Summary Superbowl Winner: Chelsea Lions EPL Shield Winner: Liverpool Liver Birds FA Cup Winner: Arsenal Gunners EPL MVP: Andrea Polesano - Tottenham Cockerels Season 4 Regular Season SPL No particularly close groups once again. Chelsea, West Brom and Arsenal all smash their groups with 39+ points. The Gunners even do so undefeated, with a single solitary draw against the Baggies. SPL South is a little closer, but once again Bournemouth win the title there. The wild card is a tad closer. Wolves take the top wild card slot before the final game, but the second slot comes down to the Tottenham Cockerels and the Fulham Badgers. Tottenham falter against West Ham, allowing the Badgers to sneak in and steal their spot. The first time only one SPL North London team has made it through. SPL MVP: Filippo Melegoni - Arsenal Gunners NPL Most of the NPL groups are straight forward. NPL Midlands is a low points scoring group, as Stoke win with just 26. The Liver Birds and the Magpies top their groups incredibly easily. The NPL Pennines is a different story altogether. With one game left, the Devils sit on 33, the Citizens 32 and Leeds Roses 30. With all three guaranteed a playoff slot, the two Manchester teams matchup on the final day for a wild card bye. The Citizens score a golden goal winner, sending them top, whilst Leeds also win, demoted the Devils from top spot to bottom wild card. A crazy final day. NPL MVP: Danny Simpson - Hull Tigers Playoffs SPL Wolves fail this time in the wild card round, as Lapadula sends Bournemouth through in a back and forth 3-2. Chelsea vs Fulham proves to be as mismatched as the division indicates, as the Lions walk out very comfortable 3-0 winners. Chelsea may well be suffering from an easy division and a little complacency, as two early goals from West Brom seem to shock the Lions and send them crashing out at the semi-finals. Bournemouth push Arsenal a little more but eventually fall to a Maitland-Niles golden goal in another 3-2 finish. The SPL final results in a much closer finish than anticipated. Mata scores twice to put the Gunners 2-0 up and seemingly in control. Rondon opens the game up with a late goal, but it's not enough, and Arsenal head for their 2nd Superbowl. NPL The Manchester Devils recover from their shock on the final day to scrape by Stoke. James Rodriguez scores a final minute goal to break Potters hearts. A similar heartbreak for Leeds happens in Newcastle, as Ritchie nets a golden goal to put the Magpies through. Newcastle rid the form through to a tough matchup against the Citizens, and come out on top. Valencia and Muto score the crucial goals in a 2-0 victory. The Liver Birds have perhaps established themselves as the top NPL team, as the Devils fail to overcome them. A late Fekir goal gives Liverpool a 2-1 win. An almost exact duplicate of the SPL final saw Liverpool score two goals before a late Newcastle goal set up a nervy finish. It wasn't to be for the Magpies though, as the Liver Birds reach yet another Superbowl. Superbowl IV A rematch of Superbowl II and things get off almost identically. Xhaka and Martial put the Gunners up early on, before Fekir levels before half time. The Liver Birds rally and lay siege to the Gunners goal, but a 54th-minute corner gifts a goal to Mustafi and from that point things become hopeless. Arsenal hold in, and in an exact replica of Superbowl II, Arsenal Gunners walk out with the trophy at Anfield. Despite being in 3 out of the 4 finals so far, Liverpool have still failed to take a single trophy. Final score: Liverpool Liver Birds 1 - 3 Arsenal Gunners Superbowl MVP: Granit Xhaka - Arsenal Gunners Other notes With their undefeated 18-1-0 run throughout the season, Arsenal are the top team in England. Their Superbowl rivals Liverpool also qualify for the Champions League, joined by West Brom and Chelsea with their playoff performances. The Manchester Devils and Tottenham Cockerels both fail to win their groups so spend a season without European football. The Citizens and Magpies take a turn in the Europa League, whilst the Bears earn their slot on the back of an FA Cup win for Chelsea. Summary Superbowl Winner: Arsenal Gunners EPL Shield Winner: Arsenal Gunners FA Cup Winner: Chelsea Lions EPL MVP: Hirving Lozano - Liverpool Liver Birds Season 5 Regular Season SPL Both London divisions on the SPL go to plan, with Chelsea and Arsenal taking their respective division titles. Tottenham also restore some normality with a strong season to take top wild card. SPL South deviates a little, with the Eagles winning their first division title, and the Saints taking second wild card. SPL Birmingham however, culminates in an incredible finale. With only the division winner taking a playoff spot, and just 3 points between 1st and 4th, the four teams play each other on the final day in a winner takes all scenario. The Baggies beat the Bulldogs, but it's not enough as the Villains take a 1-0 win over Wolves to grab the division title on win record. Incredibly tight stuff. SPL MVP: Florentino Luis - Tottenham Cockerels NPL NPL ends a little less dramatically. The usual suspects come out with the division titles: Stoke, Manchester Devils, Liverpool and Newcastle. The Liver Birds do so in style, taking the best record in the entire regular season. Some unfamiliar faces enter the wild card round, as both the Citizens and the Roses falter, allowing the Huddersfield Terriers to finish above them. Unfortunately for the Terriers, the Rams and Black Cats come out with better records, leaving the Yorkshire team with no reward for their form. NPL MVP: Niels Leemans - Liverpool Liver Birds Playoffs SPL The wild card round proves a round for the wild cards. It seems daft I know, but a Pulisic goal puts the Cockerels through at the expense of the Villains, whilst Southampton need penalties to beat division rivals Crystal Palace. We get the return of the playoff north London derby in the semi-finals, with Tottenham coming out barely on top thanks to an Alli goal. The other semi proves much less close, as Chelsea Lions brush aside Southampton 3-0 So to the final, which takes forever for either team to get on the scoresheet. Embolo puts the Lions in front in the 75th minute, before Lacazette saves the Cockerels in the dying minutes. The joy is short-lived though, as a Boga golden goal fires Chelsea to the Superbowl. NPL Newcastle chose to make things difficult in their wild card match, as Ceballos gets sent off early. The hold on for a while before a Niang golden goal seals a dream semi-final for the Rams. Stoke show the division dominance, beating Sunderland 2-1. With no Citizens or Toffees to make things interesting, both semi-finals look a little unbalanced. The Rams don't put up much of a fight against the Manchester Devils, losing 2-0. The other game proves far close, with Stoke taking Liverpool to extra time. The favourite wins once again though, as a golden goal puts the Liver Birds into yet another final. A cagey affair between two old rivals results in 9 shots on target all game. As it happens no goals come from open play, with a penalty from Mkhitaryan being enough to split the teams. The Devils head to the final to set up a replay of Superbowl III. Superbowl V The Devils fans are barely in their seats when Rashford wins a penalty in the first minute. The English youngster tucks it away, kicking the party off. Old Trafford is silenced when 8 minutes later Greizmann fires in the equaliser. Just before half time, the Lions win a penalty, which Joao Mario converts, putting Chelsea up 2-1 at half time. From there it gets worse for the Devils. They fail to muster much of an attack with Ziyech and James faltering. Kante seals the deal in the 66th minute, marauding forwards to net himself a Superbowl goal. Manchester fail to answer, and the result ends in the same way as Superbowl III. Chelsea walk out winners at Old Trafford once again. Final score: Manchester Devils 1 - 3 Chelsea Lions Superbowl MVP:Joao Mario - Chelsea Lions Other notes With their runs to the respective conference finals, Liverpool, Manchester Devils and Chelsea qualify easily for the Champions League. The 4th spot goes to the playoff semi-finalists, where Arsenal smash everyone else thanks to their 2nd best regular season record. Manchester Citizens get oh so close to qualifying for the Champions League via the Europa League once again. Dortmund get in their way in the final, scoring an extra-time goal to confine the Citizens to no European football. The Eagles get a nice reward for their first division with Europa League qualification, joined by the Magpies and the Potters. Summary Superbowl Winner: Chelsea Lions EPL Shield Winner: Liverpool Liver Birds FA Cup Winner: Manchester Devils EPL MVP: Florentino Luis - Tottenham Cockerels Well that was interesting... It sure was. At this point though if I want to do many more seasons, I'm going to have to shorten the format to prevent this being a dissertation level piece. How about we speed this up as usual, and look at 5 year segments. Season 6-10 Some surprises in these five seasons, as three new teams enter the playoffs. Middlesbrough Riversiders make it the furthest, getting to a semi final. The Owls and the Terriers both fall at the wild card round on the first attempt. The Burnley Clarets almost make their first playoff appearance with the 6th best regular season record in season 8. Unfortunately 5 of the 6 above them are also NPL teams, meaning they miss out once again. We do get out first ever NPL Superbowl winners. First the Citizens in Superbowl VI, then the Liver Birds in Superbowl IV attempt to show up the SPL. The Badgers were the team to hand Liverpool their first title, as the London team proved unable to cap an incredible run with the Superbowl trophy. Liverpool suffer from a serious amount of pain to win that first title. They attend every Superbowl from VII to X, only taking to single win in 2024. The three defeats come twice at the hands of the Chelsea Lions, and once to the Gunners. The Magpies and the Citizens earn some extra silverware, as both take the Europa League on seperate occasions. The EPL is still chasing a Champions League win however, with the Liver Birds coming close in Season 10. Real Madrid send them home from the final empty handed thanks to a Dybala masterclass. On the international scene things are looking strong. The Coefficient is almost at the same level as Spain, and the national team makes it to both the Euro and World Cup finals. No silverware earned, with Germany and Italy getting in the way, but it's close! Season 11-15 Some more new entrants into the playoff ring, as both the Birmingham Bulldogs and Burnley Clarets win their divisions on seperate occasions. The Hammerheads also make their first appearance, scraping in through the wild card. A NPL Final is the best performance between them, as the Clarets lose out to the Black Cats and fall short of a dream superbowl. At the bottom of the order another record. Season 15 see's Preston become the first ever team to score 0 points with a 0-0-16 record. They now sit as one of three teams never to have qualified to the playoffs, alongside Brentford and QPR. The Devils and the Gunners also falter slightly, as both miss out on the playoffs for the first time in their histories. The Manchester team do so in season 11, with the Gunners failing a season later. Chelsea and Liverpool now sit as the only teams to have qualified for every playoff. But at the top we have 4 different winners in the 5 Superbowls. Fulham and Sunderland make surprise appearances in Superbowl XII and XV respectively, but both come away without a trophy. The Gunners take X and XV, whilst the three in the middle go to the Liver Birds, the Citizens and the Lions. For Liverpool their win in Superbowl XII is their only appearance in the final, so a lot less heartbreak this time round. Over in Europe there's one trophy to mention, as the Tottenham Cockerels win the Europa League in season 13. The EPL coefficient is now top in Europe though, so the league as a whole is strong. The teams seem far more equal now though. Season 16-20 With just three teams never having qualified for the playoffs, new teams are a rareity. There is still one entrant, as the Rangers finally qualify to remove themselves fro that list. Unfortunately, they get instantly put back in place by division owners Chelsea. The biggest surprises come at the hands of Aston Villa, who make a remarkeable run to Superbowl XVIII. They come out with there heads held high, losing just 2-1 to the Citizens. The Saints also appear, in Superbowl XVII, but like Villa end up losers. Still no team outside the top 6 has claimed the title. In Manchester there are parties galore, as the city takes 3 of the 5 Superbowls on offer. The Devils take two of these, which happen to be their first two EPL wins ever. A surprisingly long time for that to happen. The other two go two Arsenal, who are by far the top SPL team now. The EPL manages to accumulate over 20 points of coefficient in all 5 seasons, keeping the league top. This is helped by the fact an English team wins the Europa League every single season. To add to that, the Gunners finally claim an English Champions League title, the first under the new EPL format. Seasons 21-25 Both Preston and Brentford still haven't made it to the playoffs, so no typical "new team" section here. Both the Tigers and Wolves do return to the playoffs after over 10 year absences. Hull make the best stab at it, falling to the Devils in the NPL final in season 21. Other teams are very much creeping into the Superbowls now. This culminates in a Superbowl XXII between the Aston Villains and the Derby Rams. The Villains win 2-1 on their own turf, to become the first non top 6 team to win the EPL. The Rams take a second stab the very next season, but fall to the Gunners this time. The other Superbowl trophies go to the normal teams, with the Liver Birds, Devils and Citizens taking one each. The Saints have also become a top team, taking the Shield one year with a record low 34 points. No Superbowl win to speak of yet though. England continue their domination of the Europa League, taking four out of the five titles once again. Surprisingly Middlesbrough step up to claim two of those four. The Champions League rate is also improving, as the Gunners and the Lions win one each. Season 26-50 Yup I know, this is a bit of a jump. I wanted to reach 50 seasons, but didn't feel I need the 5 year intervals anymore. So here's a summary of the 2nd set of 25 years. Naturally most titles go to the top 6 teams, as 18 of the 25 go to England's elite. We do get a couple of runs, with Tottenham winning 3 in a row from Superbowl XLI to XLIII. They don't manage to beat Chelsea's earlier 4 win run though, going from Superbowl XXX to XXXIII. Those prove to be some of the Lions last wins though, with no Superbowl appearances whatsoever after Season 36. The surprise titles go to Sunderland, Burnley and West Brom, who all take one each. Arsenal winning in season 44 is also a bit of a surprise, having been on a long dry run. They just beat Preston in the Ducks first ever Superbowl appearance. The Villains meanwhile take 4 more titles, all in the last 6 years. It's safe to say they've become a top team. Having made the Superbowl, it's pretty obvious that Preston finally make the playoffs. They do so several times, starting first in season 28. Brentford have still yet to make it, with just one 2nd place in the SPL South London not enough to get them through. Their division rivals Chelsea do eventually falter, losing their title of the only team to qualify for every playoff in season 38. The English league is still competitive in Europe, but only in the Europa League. Teams like Leeds and Brighton contribute to a hefty 12 Europa titles, with 3 Champions League titles earned in the same period. Germany is at the top, and dominating anyone that challenges. The result? Well there's not really a result to be had here, as I wasn't aiming for anything. But the database worked, so I'm going to class it as a personal success. There was a far great mix of winners and potential winners than the usual Premier League format gives. And with the division winners going to Europe, the variants of entrants there was more interesting. 10 different teams won a title in 50 years, whilst a total of 19 entered the Superbowl. Over half the teams one game away from winning. The records from the 50 seasons of the NFL. Some low scoring seasons. The Chelsea Lions come out as the most successful team, with Arsenal just behind. The Manchester pair are a little off in comparison, but incredibly close to each other which made for a fascinating division. Naturally the divisions with those teams ended up the least competitive, with at least one whipping team per group. SPL South, NPL Midlands and NPL East come out the most competitive, with a very similar playoff performance all round. The full playoff results of all 50 seasons. There is a key on the right if you don't understand! The conf and total columns represent rank in conference and overall respectively, based on total points from playoff rankings. The state of the world Spain The usual early closer battles soon give way to Real Madrid dominance. From 2020 to 2050 the white half of Madrid takes 24 titles, including 2 unbeaten seasons and a streak of 77 games without losing. Barcelona and Atletico make a habit of coming 2nd and 3rd respectively. The 50's sees a break in this, with Villarreal rising to the top and eventually taking 9 titles in a row, some shock dominance there. Germany Bayern, Leverkusen and Dortmund battle it out titles until the late 30's. From there Dortmund step up to dominate, before a 50's RB Leipzig teams takes their turn at the top. It's safe to say Bayern are deposed, winning just one title after 2036. Italy A bit more of a mixed bag, and some almost collusion like activity in Italy. Some early scrappiness gives way to teams taking turns at 3-4 titles in a row. This rotates round AC Milan, Inter Milan, Roma and Juventus, with everyone else barely getting a peep into the top 3. Europe Spain and PSG have some good fights for the early Champions League titles, with few other teams getting a look in. In the 50's Germany up their game, with RB Leipzig, Dortmund and the new Spanish superpower Villarreal taking the trophies home. Most of the Europa League surprises come from the weird English entrants, as teams like Middlesbrough, Leeds and Brighton all win. The domination of Germany and France in Europe International Germany, Portugal, Italy, Argentina and Brazil all take a couple of World Cups home, with the other two going to Spain and France. No real surprises there. The Euros also throw up nothing new, with Belgium the "oddest" team taking a title. Paraguay do win a Copa America, but for the most part the International scene stays relatively normal. Players The best regens of the save can be found here! Shoutout to Bastian Liesenfeld as one of the rare 200 CA players to pop up. And also to Joshua Dijkman for 6 Ballon d'Or's in a row despite being active in the same period as Liesenfeld. The end No extra test this time, as there was nothing I felt was small enough to fit, or large enough to be important. Plus I think the experiment as it was was sufficient enough. I loved doing this one as it has quite a creative twist to it and allowed me to try something a little new. I will say though, it took forever to make. The structure is an incredible pain to recreate in FM, so the next one might be something a little easier... I'm always going to be doing more experiments, and if this generates enough interest I'll look at doing the same format for other countries. Or applying other unique formats to the EPL. But I hope you enjoyed it. As I say the format is a little different, so let me know if you want prefer the old style or want to see even more variation in what comes up. If you hated it just say "I hate this". I'll get the message. Thanks for reading! Want to try this database yourself? Well you can download it here! Apologies for the name, by the time I was ready to use it I forget to remove the "test" part!

Having seen the masterclass of Pep's 2-3-5 for Bayern, other managers have started to take note. The world is fascinated by this refreshing take on tactics, and slowly but surely more managers begin to put the same tactic in place. With some subtle encouragement from the FA's, excited by the idea of fast attacking football, soon the whole world is converted. Everyone is using the 2-3-5. But has the footballing scene changed for the better? Will there be the intense matches everyone craves, or will there be a global tactical disaster? The formation to be used. Another simple experiment. The setup for this one is every manager gets the 2-3-5 set as their favourite formation, and the "fits players to favourite formation" characteristic ticked. The idea is that goals will be scored, ideally as many as possible. I've heard many times about how football is dull, and the crazy ideas to resuscitate it. This is my (joke) attempt, lets put the focus on attack, and remove any inclination to defend whatsoever. You may be wondering "why 2-3-5?" or "why not just remove all defenders?". The quick answer is, 2-3-5 is the most attacking formation you can mass-assign managers. Outside of that I'd have to assign each teams formation individually, and that won't work on the scale or time frame I'm looking to do. Plus, I'm halving the number of defenders in a game, is that not enough? Let's crack on. How many goals will be scored? Will teams fall apart? Will strikers become the new president for countries worldwide? There's only one way to find out... 2014/15 Title Winners: Man City Cup Winners: FA - Arsenal, League - Arsenal Average Goals: 97.25 The season opens with Man City battering Everton 4-1, and to be honest, that's weak compared to what's about to come. City top the table thanks to scoring a whopping 139 goals, setting a new record for the Premier League. Sunderland ship to me with 127 to finish last. Despite all the goals, top scorer isn't exactly a high number, with only 29, and the Man City top scorer sitting at 26 (Aguero). We do get a very young goalscorer, which naturally comes from Arsenal, as Michael Palezevic finds the net in a 5-3 extravaganza with Swansea. The biggest positional surprise is Newcastle finishing in 5th, but that's not important. Elsewhere the same effect is being seen. Not much change in the big names of the world, just way more goals in every match. Barcelona match their points record of 100 but do so by scoring 153 goals, averaging just over 4 a game. This obviously leads to Messi being top scorer. Both the goal records in Continental competitions are broken, with Tottenham managing to take the record for both goals scored and conceded at the same time. First every Premier League table where every team uses 2-3-5. It's a sight to behold 2015/16 Title Winners: Chelsea Cup Winners: FA - Liverpool, League - Everton Average Goals: 98.8 The same old ridiculously high scoring comes around again, this time with an ever so slightly higher average per team. Chelsea get close to City's record, but can only manage 135, whilst Falcao does break 30 goals this time round. Leeds somehow manage to concede more than Sunderland, shipping 130 goals to give them a nice -67 goal difference. The biggest striker signings are Mario Gomez and Falcao for United, but as of right now there isn't a flood of strikers going around. Fullbacks, however, are universally unhappy, and we're a short step away from the WBFBU (Wing-Back, Full-Back Union) having an all out revolt. Spurs sell Eriksen and buy Moussa Sissoko... ****. Real Madrid attempt to buy Lacazette to fix their scoring hopes, and it does lead them to 152 goals. Unfortunately, they lose out 8-7 on aggregate to Barcelona, with both teams finishing on 91 points. Liverpool claim the top scorers ever for the Champions league with 61, but then get smashed 9-3 by Man United, to also gain the most conceded title. That's going to hurt for a while. Euro 2016 sees the third title in a row for Spain as they scored 26 goals culminating in a thrilling 4-3 final victory over England. Lukaku also took over Platini's incredible record, scoring 11 goals in 6 games. The tournament gets lauded as the most successful ever. No-one questions whether it's due to the fact that defenders have mysteriously stopped playing. Liverpool on the way to setting the goals scored and goals conceded records in the Champions League. Both were never broken after this. 2016/17 Title Winners: Man United Cup Winners: FA - Chelsea, League - Man City Average Goals: 100.4 Chelsea do manage to beat City's goalscoring record, setting the new bar at 140 goals. Bizarrely Oscar manages more assists (23) than their top scorers, Costa and Benteke (21), so clearly the Chelsea philosophy is to share it around. Spurs get another record to their name, although ideally, they'd be on the other end of the 7-4 goal-fest. It had to be Newcastle they lost too though, didn't it... Middlesbrough find themselves at the bottom of the table despite scoring 83 goals, which has to be some sort of record. The first signs of weird transfers creep in, as City spend £50M to bring in both Pione Sisto and Ayoze Perez. Meanwhile Dorlan Pabon somehow earns himself a £17M price tag on his way to Villa. Don't get me wrong, they're alright but I'm not sure any of them can claim to be worth that. Still, that's better than training Cesar Azpilicueta into an accomplished striker. It's a unique approach from Jose considering Cesar has 5 finishing. Taking a quick look at the Championship, 4 teams have managed to get themselves non 2-3-5 Managers. All 4 teams finish in the bottom 5. I don't want to say I've revolutionised football, but clearly something's going right. The normal tactics can't survive the overload they're facing. The Champions League sees an all English duel between Arsenal and Chelsea. I decided to give this one a watch and well... 4-4 at half time, 8-8 at full time, and then 18-year-old Palezevic scoring the winner in extra time for Arsenal. Classic doesn't quite describe it. The highest scoring Champions League game ever, both before and after this point. Also an absolute classic to watch. 2017/18 Title Winners: Man City Cup Winners: FA - Man City, League - Man United Average Goals: 102.55 Players keep scoring, and for some unknown reason the average goal count keeps gently rising. Maybe managers have committed to the idea, and are now refining how best to use the 2-3-5. West Brom go for a goals galore season, taking the biggest loss before finally breaking the highest scoring game record with an 8-4 over Huddersfield. For a lot of teams, the immediate striker problem has ended, as each team has crammed enough goalscorers into the squad. Transfer focus has now turned to getting the best Wingers, Midfielders and Centrebacks money can buy. City buy Greizmann, United grab Hojbjerg and Villa somehow manage to snap up Tielemans. But no-one buys full backs. Never buy full backs. Think of two teams that would not have a problem using 2-3-5. If you said Real Madrid and Barcelona you'd be right. If you said any other team, shh I'm trying to segue here. With BBR and MSN getting even more chance to shine, both teams net a new record of 158 goals in the league. The further top that, MSN claim the top three top scorer spots, scoring a combined total of 100 league goals. As if Messi needed more ammunition for a Ballon d'Or. World Cup time swings around once again, and there's a nice amount of goals to keep things exciting. The total falls at 335, over double the 2014 edition, at an average of over 10 goals per team or 5.23 per game. Only 6 teams don't use the 2-3-5 thanks to regen managers, those being the African teams and Australia. Their games still end up high scoring affairs, but only Cameroon escape their group before defeat in the first knockout. The tournament culminates in a Brazil - England final which proves to be an epic ding-dong affair, from which Brazil arise 6-4 victors. The weekend with the highest scoring game in Premier League history. 2018/19 Title Winners: Arsenal Cup Winners: FA - Man City, League - Man City Average Goals: 102.55 Arsenal take their turn at the top and do so in spectacular fashion by securing the biggest win ever in Premier League history thanks to an 11-0 victory over Cardiff. The Welsh team suffer throughout the season, and end bottom of the table with 132 conceded. United go crazy in their hunt for new strikers, signing Lukaku, Martial and Fierro all in one go. In the Championship, Leicester join the non-2-3-5 ranks. They scrape 12th thanks to signings like Monreal, Sagna, Montolivo and McGeady. I hate to keep going back to Spain, but that's where all the action is happening. Real Madrid break their own scoring record with an insane 172 goals. That's an average of 4.5 per game... They also only concede 71 throughout the season, meaning they earn a goal difference of 101 to go with their point total of 100. None of their players even managed to get top scorer... Man United's spending spree, bringing in the foundation of their attack for years to come. 2019/20 Title Winners: Liverpool Cup Winners: FA - Liverpool, League - Man United Average Goals: 101.05 Despite their new top 3 netting an impressive combined total of 81, United were way off the pace of Liverpool. The scousers became the fifth team in 5 years to take the English title, in what has been 5 fantastic years of football. Outside of that most things remain the same in this new era of football. The Champions League sees an unprecedented 5 players equal as top scorer. Orjuela, Ronaldo, Aboubakar, Barbosa and Falcao all score 10 goals, with Ronaldo taking the Golden Boot for doing it in only 9 games. England qualify for Euro 2020 with a record of 52 goals in their 10 games and then breeze their way to yet another final. It's defeat again though, as France amend their re-life woes to win the final 5-3. Iceland manage to make their mark on the tournament yet again. This time it's for conceding 17 goals in 3 games as they lose 4-1, 5-1 and 8-0 to Ireland, Germany and France. A bit less of a fairytale. Real Madrid's incredible 172 goal season (from 2018/19, not 2019/20). 2020/21 Title Winners: Man United Cup Winners: FA - West Ham, League - Arsenal Average Goals: 102.7 (Only 2-3-5 teams: 104.1) Liverpool continue their free-scoring, taking the biggest win and highest score of the season on the way to a new record of 147 goals in 38 matches. To compliment that Middlesborough concede 147 goals to earn a GD of -84 and a ticket to the Championship. Hull become the first team in the Premier League to use a formation other than 2-3-5 as an un-brainwashed Rickie Lambert takes charge. Robertson and Jenkinson rejoice as the chosen fullbacks, but a 4-1-2-3 is only enough for 15th. Over in Germany Bayern finally break the scoring record with 132 goals in 34 games as Lewandowski continues to fire them in. Considering the shorter league length, that's actually a better rate than Liverpool's record, but it holds no flame to what's happening in Spain. The title winning Liverpool squad. 2021/22 Title Winners: Arsenal Cup Winners: FA - Middlesbrough, League - Everton Average Goals: 95.8 (Only 2-3-5 teams: 99.2) Crystal Palace bring in Neal Ardley, which brings the total of different formations in the league up to 3, and the average goals in the league down to the lowest point since the change. Hull persist with their crazy 4 defenders and it costs them dearly with relegation and the lowest number of goals scored for a team since 2013/14. Arsenal take back the title, but it's Championship Middlesbrough winning the FA Cup which rustles some feathers. Serie A gets its first new title winner in over 10 years, as Napoli manage to break the Juventus spell. The Italian league is managing to hold up its defensive reputation despite the major shift in tactics. It's averaging 82.9 goals a team even with the non 2-3-5 teams removed. Messi is stopped from earning his 12th Ballon d'Or by Eden Hazard, and with the Argentinian midget getting older, that may be his last shot. Newcastle meanwhile, score 79 goals in the Euro Cup as they win the entire tournament. I mean they score 26 goals in qualifying, but still. World Cup year means more chances for some high scoring international football. Argentina and South Korea set new continent records by scoring 82 goals in their 18 qualifying games, but Italy manages to top them both by scoring 50 from their 10 games. It proves to be a sign of things to come, as the Italians ride all the way to the title, beating Argentina 4-3 in the final. Berardi takes top scorer, scoring 8 to go with his 15 from qualifying. South American World Cup qualifying proved particularly chaotic, with a lot of sides posing a strong goalscoring threat. 2022/23 Title Winners: Man City Cup Winners: FA - Man United, League - Newcastle Average Goals: 93.5 (Only 2-3-5 teams: 98.8) Reading and Swansea join the formation revolt, although it's still stuck to the bottom half of the table. Things seem to have slowed down, with Man City scoring just 125 goals on the way to their title. I don't want to point fingers but the new formations are dragging football back to the dark ages. Things are Spain are returning back to the normal boring days even quicker, with 7 teams now breaking the formation. The highest profile is Atletico, who score a measly 85 goals on their way to 3rd. Breaking things didn't help so they should go back to the new way and stop ruining my experiment. It's not too obvious which season I started this, is it? 2023/24 Title Winners: Man City Cup Winners: FA - Man City, League - Man United Average Goals: 92.9 (Only 2-3-5 teams: 98.7) Man City become the first time in 9 years to retain the title, as all the trophies head to Manchester. The formation revolt is halted briefly as the 3 teams are struggling to keep their heads above relegation, and so find themselves rotated with the Championship sides on a regular basis. The Liga BBVA title finally breaks away from the big 2. An Andrea Belotti led Valencia side is the team to do it, thanks to an impressive 92 points and 130 goals. Atletico fall to 8th, so resort to bringing back a manager from the school of 2-3-5. On the international scene, things are still going up. Both goal records are broken at Euro 2024, one by each of the teams in the final. Croatia bumble their way through by outscoring their opponents, setting a record for goals conceded. France meanwhile smash everyone in their path, including Croatia, to take their second Euros in a row, scoring 29 goals along the way. The Euro 2024 winning squad. Complete with an entirely regen based front three. So what next? Well, it's clear to me where things are going. 2-3-5 has proven a sweeping success, but the ever expanding core of managers that use 3 or more defenders is slowly taking back over. How about we speed things up and see if it ever gets back to "normal" levels? But quickly before that... I noticed some interesting lineups as players got retrained, or lesser known players rose to prominence. Harry Kane takes age in his stride to become a relaxed central midfielder, whilst certain fullbacks like Carvajal and Jonathan Silva chose the centre back route. On a more interesting note, Markovic, Otamendi and Azpilicueta find themselves retrained as strikers, regardless of the fact they can't hit a barn door. In the transfer window I laughed at the Sisto/Perez pair, but they teamed up with underdog Bonazzoli sensationally. Jovic and Vietto far outperform their usual level, but FM legends Berardi and Fierro steal the show with an even more exceptional level of performance. 2024-2030 To be honest the most exciting thing to happen league-wise is QPR finishing 2nd one year. The usual suspects take the league titles, although we do get the first team to win with a formation other than 2-3-5, that being Liverpool in 2029/30. All across Europe scores are falling lower and lower, with teams falling way short of any records. Average goals in the Premier League now sits at 81 per team, with 2-3-5 teams averaging above 90 still. Both figures remain way above the usual average of 58, but the decline is evident. Further afield things remain very much as were. Palermo attempt to take the challenge to Juventus with a title win right at the end of the era, but that's the only power change to make note of. PSG take 3 Champions League titles in 4 years, as Guardiola sets out to prove he can do it with any team. Aston Villa meanwhile take a Euro Cup victory in 2028, despite being in a relegation battle throughout. World Cup 2026 in Mexico sees a massive shock, as the cup stays put somehow. Carlos Fierro leads the Mexicans to a 3-1 victory over Italy in the final, sending Mexico City into raptures. Euro 2028 and Gold Cup 2025 both result in unlikely winners, as Denmark beat Romania, and Trinidad & Tobago beat Guatemala in the respective finals. Several players retire having set international records, including Messi (110 for Argentina), Neymar (122 for Brazil), Muller (120 for Germany) and Berardi (93 for Italy). Messi and Ronaldo also leave behind club records, having set them at 542 and 446 respectively. Dominance in the Champions by PSG, in the 26/27, 28/29 and 29/30 editions. 2030-35 Fulham establish themselves as a top 4 team, but most of the silverware goes to Man United. At this point only 5 teams in the Premier League remain using the 2-3-5, those being Arsenal, Chelsea, Man City, Palace and Millwall. Goal average falls to below 75, signalling that the era will have completely ended in around 5-10 years. The rest of Europe shows similar signs with Germany having 4 2-3-5 teams and Italy just 2. The top 4 of La Liga (Valencia and Athletic as the other 2) have formed some sort of pact. They're all still using the overload formation, and are maintaining a sizeable gap to the rest of the table with it. The two World Cup editions follow a very similar script. Both finals fall between South American giants Brazil and Argentina, with the winner scoring 4 goals each time. Brazil take the 2030 edition 4-3, before Argentina avenge the defeat with a 4-1 victory in 2034. We've reached a point where some surprisingly era-defining players are retiring. Carlos Fierro retires with a world record 147 goals in 162 international caps. Palezevic also retires, having spent his entire career at Arsenal, claiming 302 goals from 449 league games. The career of Palezevic, a legend amongst the regens of his era. 2035-40 Red continues its domination of England, with Arsenal, Liverpool and United as the only title winners since 2027. Chelsea and City spend a couple of years as the only 2-3-5 teams before both lose their managers. Luckily Villas-Boas signs for United, making them the one and only 2-3-5 team from 2038/39 onwards. With no more bottom-half teams using 2-3-5, the goal averages get a little skewed. The overall average drops to 65, whilst the 2-3-5 number rises to 107 with only United to account for. Outside of the Premier League, Shaun Derry (Barcelona), Luca Vigiani (PSG) and Ronny Deila (England) remain the only users of the best formation. Vigiani takes 2 German titles with Wolfsburg before moving to PSG where he takes every trophy France has. Derry leaves from City to Barcelona in 2038 having won a Champions League, whilst Delia manages to continue the mediocrity of England. In 2038, Italy takes it's 6th World Cup title thanks to an assured 3-1 victory over Portugal. Not much else happens, the world seems a very boring place without thousands of goals scored every game. Top scorers of the Euro championship. Things take a notable rise in 2016, before slowly sinking again. 2040-45 The last guardians of the 2-3-5 leave the game. Derry leaves Barcelona for Schalke, where he experiments with the old/new/realistic ways of 4 defenders for a few years before retiring. Vigiani adds a few hundred more trophies to his cabinet before also retiring at PSG. Deila leaves England in Jamie Vardy's hands after an unsuccessful Euro 2040. Meanwhile in the Premier League, Villas-Boas goes out with a bang, taking 1 Champions League and two Premier League titles in his final three years. And with his retirement, an era of football is closed. In terms of actual results, United's run of three trophies in a row is ended by the first blue team win in 20 attempts, as Man City take a title home. Brentford somehow spend some time at the top, finishing in 3rd at one point to earn themselves some Champions League football. Unfortunately their first foray earns them a group with Real Madrid, Porto and Zenit, so they do well to come out 3rd. Villa meanwhile have fully established themselves as a top 6 team. Elsewhere Dortmund, Wolfsburg and Schalke team up to dump Bayern out the top 3. Serie A sees three teams finish on identical points in 2044/45, but results between teams sees the highest GD get 3rd and the lowest 1st. Empoli meanwhile win a Europa League trophy, including an impressive win over Arsenal in the final, and wins over Benevento and Nottingham Forest in knockout rounds. In the World Cup 2046 Portugal edition, the hosts manage to make it all the way to their second final in a row. This time its Argentina in their way with a 3-2 victory. Portugal can't catch a break. The last ever Premier League table with a 2-3-5 team participating (Man United). 2045-50 A final update to see where the dust has settled, but mostly to end things on a round number. The north keeps the battle for the Premier League in house, sharing between both Manchester clubs and Liverpool. Chelsea have fallen to obscurity, replaced by the miraculous recovery of Nottingham Forest. The historic club relive their glory days with a Premier League win and a couple of Champions League appearances. Both attempts provide great runs, ending in a Semi-Final to Juventus and a Quarter-Final to Inter Milan. Schalke and Wolfsburg share the Bundesliga titles, Juventus fight off Empoli and Inter for all 5 Serie A wins, and in La Liga, Mallorca and Espanyol try to establish themselves at the top. Espanyol only manage a top 3 finish, but Mallorca claim a sensational title victory. In the Champions League, Juventus try their best to relieve the glory days with a 9-4 victory over Wolfsburg in 2046/47. I swear both are using "normal" formations too. On the international scene Portugal manage to take their second Euro title in a row, perhaps foreshadowing the real future (although I doubt it, Eder or not). Brazil beat Argentina to prevent their rivals taking a 4th Copa America in a row. World Cup 2050 gives German yet another title to add to their collection. More importantly though, Jamie Vardy brings the World Cup home for England in 2046 with a 2-1 win over Spain. JAMIE VARDY'S HAVIN' A PARTY. Of all the people to do it... it had to be Jamie Vardy didn't it. The stuff of legends. Success or failure? I... don't know? I mean the original aim was to spice up the league with goals so I guess in that regards we can cause it a resounding Success. There was a good 5 seasons or so of glory years which were incredibly entertaining to watch before things started to fall back to normal. 29 seasons with at least 1 attacking team isn't bad going though. Again I've got a nice little graph to show off a few things. Naturally goals scored starts off higher than a usual season, but from their it continues to rise for a little while as teams bring in the right players. From there things start to fall as teams introduce 4 defender formations back again. I noted this in the summary, but around 2035 only top half teams are left using 2-3-5. This shrinks further to top 4 teams around 2038, which explains the sudden rise towards the end of the formations life. The sheer difference in goals scored is exactly what I wanted, so I'm pleased with how this went. The state of the world Spain Very little surprise in the early title winners, with Barcelona and Real Madrid taking it all. The biggest shock is Atletico falling to mid table so quickly. From the mid 20's Valencia join the party taking a large handful of titles to establish themselves at the top. Mallorca attempt to join in the 40's, but a single title is all they get out of it. Italy Juventus dominate as expected, dropping one title between 2015 and 2029. Roma and AC Milan try to provide a consist challenge, whilst Palermo, Empoli and Torino provide a fun rotation of dark horse. Palermo are the only one of the three to ever take a title, once in 2030 and another in 2036. Napoli fall from grace heavily, dropping to Serie C by the late 40's. Germany The first half of the era goes to Bayern, with Dortmund and Leverkusen fighting over what's left. From 2030 onwards things get competitive, with Wolfsburg putting up enough fight to talk half the titles. Schalke replace Leverkusen in the fight for 3rd. The surprise packages are Koln (yay) and Paderborn grabbing one 3rd place each. France With all the money in the world, and the world clearly valuing the ability to purchase attackers, PSG win all but two titles. I can't say as I'm surprised. Monaco and Lyon take a single title each, but content themselves with battling for second. Portugal Admittedly the Portuguese (and the French) league wasn't loaded, which may explain the uncompetitiveness. But still, Benfica and Porto take all but 1 title, that going to Sporting. To make it worse, a team outside those three only appears in the top 3 twice in the entire time, as Braga take a couple of 3rd places. Europe Most of the biggest Europe results and/or shocks were covered previously. With no forced shift in power, the Champions League remains as is. The Europa League harbours a couple of surprises, with Empoli, Hertha, Hamburg, Palermo and Villa all taking titles. Nottingham Forest, QPR, Genoa and Swansea all make a final, but fall at the final hurdle. The result of every Champions League final. Lovingly edited in Google Sheets to include scores. International Again, the big news stories have already been covered. Some lesser covered stories: Zambia take two African Cup of Nations, Costa Rica win as many Gold Cups as the USA, France and Portugal both take 3 Euro trophies and all but 1 Copa America goes to Brazil or Argentina. The last part is the least surprising, with the new found importance of goal scorers. The biggest World Cup shock award goes to Mexico, who manage to surprise their home fans by taking home the top prize. (I forgot to do the regens this time. Sorry to the person who requested that way back. I have a couple from 2035, a load from 2050, and retirement career numbers that I can share if anyone wants to see them) One final test Let's go a little bit further... let's give everyone a 1-1-5-3. I want one defender in their to maintain a tiny grain of realism, after that its 3 strikers, 5 in behind and a lone central midfielder. This actually took a lot of effort to do, because 2-3-5 is the "craziest" formation you can assign to managers. So instead I had to take control of every single Premier League club, set their formation and then holiday through. It better be worth it... ... and it so is. This time the season kicks off with Arsenal beating Man City 8-7, and once again it pales in comparison to results that come later. The records for the biggest win and highest scoring game get set at 17-3 and 15-11 respectively, results which are by no means anomalies. The season the culminates in United, Chelsea and City all sitting on 83 points, with United taking the title thanks to their 97 GD. This comes from their 358 goals scored (the record), through from Falcao (79) and Van Persie (75). Take it all in, big numbers everywhere you look. Apart from clean sheets, with not a single one in the entire season. Both United strikers fall short of top scorer though, which goes to Danny Welbeck. The Arsenal striker notched 84 goals in his 38 league games, to lead his team to 4th with 81 points. 5th place goes to Newcastle on 80 points, support by Riviere setting a new record for assists with 74. One of the greatest seasons I have ever seen on Football Manager, even without the goal frenzy. The top 5 sat within a point of each other with two games to play, leading to an incredible run in. It's a tiny picture I know, but this is the run in I mentioned. As close as can be with 2 games to go. At the other end of the table, Villa, Burnley and Sunderland were the teams to suffer the drop. Burnley took the crown for "most battered", setting the record for goals conceded (373) and lowest GD (-117). As an interesting aside, the goals scored/conceded records page broke very early on, with numbers over 255 being ignored. Europe went about as badly as can be expected, considering all other teams are still playing "sensible" football. In the Europa League Spurs manage a 10-3 victory in qualifying, but fail to advance from their group. Meanwhile Everton suffer a 21-5 defeat in their Europa group to Dynamo Kiev. The Champions League proves even worse, with Liverpool losing every single game, and Man City conceded 47 goals. This includes a 14-2 loss against Feyenoord, and a 19-2 aggregate defeat to Real Madrid. Chelsea are the only team to advance in any way but get stopped short with a 14-8 beaten by Leverkusen in the first knockouts. Group G proves to be an absolute bloodbath. I've never seen so many conceded in a group. The two English cups go to Championship teams, as even Norwich and Watford are able to handily beat every Premier League team that's chucked at them. That's mainly because there are no defenders to stop them, but that's not the point. This is the biggest summary I've ever done for an extra test, but there's so much to talk about its worth it. Broken records galore, interesting results every week, and absolute chaos all round. My only regret is that I can't take this experiment further, or expand it wider. Considering how fun the 2-3-5 was, 1-1-5-3 on the same scale would have been a blast. A mild warning though, this doesn't hold up to usual tactics in the same way the 2-3-5 does. Don't actually try and use it, it'll fail miserably. Final thoughts I'm not going to say I fixed football by doing this but... nah I fixed it. FIFA take note. Encourage or enforce a 2-3-5 system and you'll get cracking matches like a 9-8 Champions League final and 150 goal seasons for some teams. If you think Messi was scoring a lot now... But on a serious note, it's amazing how crazy this made games. Very few deficits were too big to save, goals came from everywhere, and I found myself watching a lot more games than usual in these. Plus the non 2-3-5 teams didn't exactly smash the 2-3-5 teams so it's clearly viable in FM if you do it right. I'd very much consider giving this scenario a go if you want things to have a little more spice in them. Comments, either positive, negative or overly neutral, are always welcome, so shoot them my way. Thank you for reading, hopefully you enjoyed it!

Qatar is hosting the World Cup in 2022. Questions of legitimacy and bribes are being thrown around everywhere, but the big concern for the Qatari FA is performance. The national team is, well to be plain, a bit rubbish, and something needs to be done if the country isn't to embarrass itself on football's biggest stage. So Qatar does what it knows best, it throws money at the problem. Can they attract enough high calibre players to improve the league and national team in time? Yup I'm giving every club in Qatar megabucks in Football Manager 2015 (My favourite version, and most recent version owned). Sugar daddy status, massive sponsorship, heavy league bonuses. With a few promises thrown around, even the rest of the Gulf is in on it, with a £150-200M prize pot being stumped up for every edition of the Gulf Champions League. Now I know a lot of this is wildly unrealistic and that's kind of the point, but there are some limits. Reputation starts at the original levels, you can't sway people's opinion overnight regardless of who you sign. And obviously the league structure remains the same, no real need to move away from old fashioned values, right? For those of you unfamiliar with the Qatari league structure (basically everyone), the main league system only contains 18 teams. 14 in the Stars League, and the other 4 in the second tier, with 14 Reserve teams also in the second tier to pad it out to a full structure. 2 teams move automatically between the leagues through promotion and relegation, whilst 11th from the Stars and 3rd from the second tier battle it out for a place. These are then accompanied by 3 cup competitions: The Princes cup between all 18 teams, the Crown Princes Cup between the top 4 of last season, and the inevitable Super Cup, the Sheikh Jassem Cup. Top slots in the Stars league allow two teams into the Gulf Champions League, and 3/4 teams into the Asian Champions League. And that's the boring explaining part done. You may be thinking that 2022 is a bit soon to see any investment come through in the form of talented Qatari players. You'd be right, so the Qatari government have allowed some flex for this special occasion. 1 Years continuous residence as a professional footballer and you've got yourself a shiny new passport. Let's face it, based on other sports that's not actually that unrealistic? So the stage is set, the stacks of cash are primed. Can Qatar become a global force on the domestic and international front? 2014/15 League Winner: Al-Gharrafa Cup Winners: Al-Arabi, Al-Jaish Continental Performance: Asian CL - Group Stages, Gulf CL - Winner Major Transfer: Abdelhak Nouri - Ajax to Al-Arabi - £3.4M National Team World Ranking: 94th Nothing major this year, Qatari teams slowly begin to hoard money from league results but have yet to open their wallets. Lekhwiya are already in the top 20 of the world financially, but not even megabucks can reel people into the "retirement league". The world has changed very little from the real version. The Qatari national team does about as well as can be expected in the Asian Cup, topping their group before being knocked out by eventual finalists South Korea. The Koreans end up losing to Australia. 2015/16 League Winner: Al-Jaish Cup Winners: Al-Jaish, Al-Arabi Continental Performance: Asian CL - Second Round, Gulf CL - Group Stages Major Transfer: Tiago Silva (Regen) - Marseille to Al Sadd - £9M National Team World Ranking: 80th The world is beginning to see some of that Qatari cash as legends like Jem Karacan and Obi Mikel head to Al-Sadd in a £35M spending spree. The rest of the league sticks to their tight ways, and Al-Jaish somehow manage to keep the big spenders out of the Champions League with a double. Continental performance was still rubbish, so it's clear teams have yet to get out of the QPR phase with their new signings. Elsewhere Hull finished 6th, United won the CL but finished 11th, and Benitez is managing Barcelona. So maybe the world is falling apart. Euro 2016 holds it's realism briefly as England capitulate and exit at the Group Stages. From there on out it turns into wild fantasy, with Holland beating Serbia 4-0 in the final, and Scotland making it to the semi-finals. Like that would ever happen. 2016/17 League: Lekhwiya Cups: Al-Sadd, Al-Jaish Continental: Asian CL - Semi Final, Gulf CL - Semi Final Major Transfer: Divock Origi - Juventus to Lekhwiya - £19.75M World Ranking: 74th Spending continues to escalate as other teams join the cash frenzy. Al-Arabi and Lekhwiya both spend £35M each, but it's the star signing of Origi that brings home the title. The outside world has finally begun to pay attention as 12 of the richest 40 teams in the world now sit in Qatar. The lax nationality laws entice their first convertee, with Imoh Ezekiel proudly taking his place as the best Qatari national player. This seasons versions of things I don't understand: Mancini takes charge of Hoffenheim. 2017/18 League: Al-Shahaniya Cups: Al-Sadd, Al-Sadd Continental: Asian CL - Quarter Final, Gulf CL - Final Major Transfer: Vittorio Parigini - Al-Rayyan to Al-Sailiya - £28.5M World Ranking: 73rd Unsurprisingly the top transfer fee keeps rising, although for the first time ever it's between two Qatari teams as Al-Rayyan make a £22M profit from Parigini. Al-Sadd have become the living definition of a cup team, whilst a surprising league win comes from Al-Shahaniya, a team that only reached the top tier 2 seasons previously. Mancini gets his life back on track by moving to Porto. The World Cup manages to maintain some realism with both Spain finishing bottom in their group, and a final between Argentina and Belgium, the former winning 4-0. Having qualified legitimately (kind of), Qatar win a grand total of 0 points in the group stages. 2018 in transfers, some legendary Qatari names moving around. 2018/19 League: Al-Sadd Cups: Al-Jaish, Lekhwiya Continental: Asian CL - Quarter Final, Gulf CL - Winner World Ranking: 91st Even a title doesn't guarantee safety in the Cash League, as Al-Shahaniya go from celebrating to preparing for life in the second division within a year. Al-Sadd finally shake off the "cup team" name and win, coincidentally the same year Arsenal win the Premier League. Maybe there's something in the air. On the topic of Arsenal, Giroud becomes the first "big name" to take top scorer in the Stars League with 16 goals, having signed for Al-Arabi a few seasons before. Puncheon finds a new lease of life at Al-Rayyan, setting a league record for most assists in a season with 14. Transfers have reached a point where it's constantly £15-25M for regens, so won't be listed anymore. The national team suffer disappointing performances in both the West Asian Championship and the Asian cup, seeing them drop to 91st in the world. The trophies go to Iran and Japan respectively. Belgium beat France to take the first ever Nations League title. 2019/20 League: Al-Sadd Cups: Al-Sailiya, Al-Sadd Continental: Asian CL - Final, Gulf CL - Winner World Ranking: 88th Franco Di Santo leads Al-Sadd to their second title in a row, with Arda Turan and Erick Torres also setting the league alight. Every team is now full of recognisable names and it is beginning to pay off as 2 teams get into the Asian Champions League semi finals. Chico Flores takes over the throne as the top Qatari national player after declaring the country his home and becoming a Sheikh. The turn of the decade breaks the world, with Reading finishing 6th, Sampdoria winning Serie A and Köln cementing a top 4 slot in the league alongside a Europa title. France win Euro "everyone's a host" edition, thanks to a penalty shootout victory over reigning champions Holland. 2020/21 League: Al-Sadd Cups: Al-Shahaniya, Al-Arabi Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 3rd World Ranking: 88th Al-Sadd start to take their domestic success global, claiming both Champions League titles before falling to Corinthians in the Club World Championship. The rest of the world's days are now numbered. For the first time since the start of the experiment the biggest transfer of the season is the wrong way. With the Saudi League also profiting from the Gulf Champions League handing out an entire country's GDP, Al-Hilal fork out a whopping £43M for a promising regen from Al-Shahaniya. Despite converting (paying for) Qatari nationals such as Lestienne, Parigini and Lucas Mendes, the team still manages to completely suck at the Confederations Cup. On the plus side, England manage to get their hands on silverware by winning the Nations League. As it's the off-season for that competition though, I'm not actually sure it counts. 2021/22 League: Al-Sadd Cups: Al-Ahli, Al-Sailiya Continental: Asian CL - Final, Gulf CL - Final, Club World Champs - 3rd World Ranking: 79th The league has become a bit of a routine, with Al-Sadd taking their fourth title in a row. Not even the entrance of Mitrovic, Romeu and countless incredible regens can change the tune. Continental performance reminds strong, albeit with no wins. In the Club World Championship, Al-Arabi somehow manage to sneak in (with a bribe) due to the hosts qualifying as winners of the Asian Champions League and finish an reasonable 3rd. The miracle of the year happens in Köln, with the new German legends somehow stopping Bayern getting a 10th title in a row. And their regen left midfielder wins the Ballon d'Or. An all round amazing year in western Germany. But the MOST important thing, the World Cup in Qatar. Crunch time for the whole country, with countless workers quite literally worked to death to lead up to this moment. And the team did... (drum roll please)... absolutely ****. Despite having a ridiculously easy group of Mexico, Ecuador and Bosnia, they still manage to suck balls and get 0 points. What a waste of time. I guess this whole thing is now just for my entertainment. At least someone is happy, as Portugal managed to 1-up their real life performance to beat France 2-0 in the final. Hooray. The epitome of absolute disappointment. 2022/23 League: Al-Sadd Cups: Lekhwiya, Al-Markhiya Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Final, Club World Champs - 5th World Ranking: 86th The winner is no surprise, Origi leads his team to title number 5. Behind them a £126M spending spree sees Al-Arabi manage to take 2nd, whilst Leighton Baines manages to set a new league record of assists in a season at 15, despite using a zimmer frame. In the Champions League, titles are becoming an expectation as the Qatari League becomes the most reputable in Asia. It won't be long before the global domination starts. Athletic Bilbao run out of Basque children to harvest and get relegated. Asia tries the "maybe if we ignore them they'll go away"and refuses to let Qatar into the Asian Cup. South Korea take the trophy over Australia, in an exact reverse of the result from 8 years ago. Qatar sulks. 2023/24 League: Take a Guess (It's Al-Sadd) Cups: Al-Mesaimeer, Al-Sadd Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 3rd World Ranking: 64th The 10th season of the sugar daddy playpen brings Al-Sadd their 6th title. . They get nothing from the Champions Leagues however as Al-Ahli manage to clinch both titles in the same year, before once again getting 3rd in the Club World Championship. On the shores of not so distant Europe, Köln continue their meteoric rise with a Champions League win. France have their traditional national team break down after doing well for a period and go out of the Euro's at the group stages. Belgium beat their big brothers Germany 1-0 to take a first ever title. 2024/25 League: Al-Arabi! Cups: Qatar SC, Al-Sadd Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 5th World Ranking: 54th AND THEY'VE DONE IT, Köln win the world! Uh-hum I mean... It seems Carlos Fierro was the kryptonite for Al-Sadd all along. A £5M transfer to Al-Arabi brings the end to the Al-Sadd domination, and Al-Arabi cap it off with an Asian CL win. Not even the signing of Anthony Martial can save Al-Sadd's title chain. Köln do in fact win the Club World Championships to become the best EVER, whilst FC Lorient bemuse the world by winning the Europa League and getting relegated from Ligue 1 at the same time. 2025/26 League: Oh... Al-Sadd Cups: Al-Sadd, Al-Arabi Continental: Asian CL - Final, Gulf CL - Winner World Ranking: 26th The world quickly corrects its error from last season and gives the title back to Al-Sadd. Gulf CL wins have paid off and Al-Sadd also become the richest team in the world. Now only reputation is in the way of world domination. In the outside world, Saint-Etienne win Ligue 1, Köln win the German League (Wooooooo) and Real Madrid beat Brighton in the final of the Europa League. That's the future for you folks. 2026 means a World Cup, and Qatar qualifying beating New Zealand in the playoff, giving them another chance to hilariously disappoint. This time they get bested by the mighty Canada in the Group Stages. Holders Portugal don't even qualify, as they get humbled by Scotland in qualification, whilst England beat Denmark in the Final to end 60 years of hurt. This year really was THE year, The Sun called it. 2026/27 League: Al-Sadd Cups: Al-Sadd, Al-Arabi Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 5th World Ranking: 22nd With nobody caring about league performance, clubs start to focus on Continental results. In the Asian Champions League, 4 clubs make it an all-Qatari western half of the Quarter Finals, with Qatar SC coming out on top for the right to face Jeonbuk and eventually take the title. They then get battered by Monterrey in the Club World Champs. Valencia finally stop the big 3 taking all the La Ligas, Catania bizarrely win the Europa, and Spurs absolutely smash Roma 6-1 to take the Champions League. COYS! In the Asian Cup, Qatar pulls out a result that makes me oddly proud. They ride luck and good results all the way to the final, where they stick it to long time bogey-team Oman with a 2-0 win. Qatar has actually won something, albeit not a World Cup and about 5 years too late. It's coming home! 2027/28 League: Al-Sailiya Cups: Qatar SC, Qatar SC Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 3rd World Ranking: 13th Newly promoted Al-Sailiya create a cash loaded fairytale by immediately winning the league. There will probably be a film about their old-ish lead striker soon. Al-Arabi once again take both champions leagues, a performance which improves the reputation of the league up to a similar level as the Serbian and Egyptian leagues. Ok that's not so great actually. Tottenham become the best in the world (naturally). Suck it Gunners. The national team is becoming something of a force, a top 15 ranking followed by a complete shutting out of Japan in the second round of World Cup Qualifying shows that something in this might be working. At least I bloody hope so. Lowly Ukraine beat Holland 2-1 in the Euro Final. 2028/29 League: Al-Mesaimeer Cups: Al-Arabi, Al-Jaish Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 4th World Ranking: 16th Al-Mesaimeer become the newest winners, claiming the title for the first time in their history and show the league is truly out of the clutches of Al-Sadd. They manage to add an Asian CL to their collection, but ultimately make no extra headway in the Club World Champs. No Qatari team has ever made the final. Over in the European CL, Spurs claim their second title in three years. Screw success for Qatar, this is the real story. The national team continues its impressive record, winning the West Asian Championship by winning every game. The confederations cup offers sterner opposition and it's here that Qatar suffer their first defeats since 2027. The team still manages a strong 4th place finish, and keeps every result respectable. This national team is honestly going places. 2029/30 League: Al-Sailiya Cups: Al-Sadd, Al-Jaish Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 2nd World Ranking: 24th The big news comes from the Club World Championship, as Al-Arabi have a delightful run to get themselves into the Final before falling to Tottenham. As it is Tottenham I'll allow it, Brendan Rodgers has done amazing stuff in his 12 years there. For Qatar it's finally a step of progress. In other news, Qatari legend Vittorio Parigini becomes the national team's best ever scorer, and then retires from the game. Another 4 years another World Cup. Qatar finish top of their qualifying group to book their ticket to Spain. The team continues its good form to top a group with Portugal and Turkey, but fall on penalties to Germany in the first knockout round. To be honest, I'll take it especially considering Portugal eventually reclaim their title with a win over Germany. That's a draw with both finalists, solid. 2030/31 League: Al-Sailiya Cups: Al-Sailiya, Al-Arabi Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 5th World Ranking: 15th Al-Sailiya win another title to exert their recent dominance over the Stars League. Al-Mesaimeer take their turn at a double Champions League win, but for the most part Qatar does nothing special this year. Instead the big news (for me) comes from both Tottenham and Köln winning their respective leagues. I swear I'm not actually a fan of Köln, but 2031 is definitely a good year. Qatar face another Asian Cup, and obviously they take home the title once again. I say obviously, but god damn they're exceeding my expectations by so much. A 8-1 smashing of China caps off a brilliant tournament for the Qatari team. A (probably the) high point for Qatar, the 2nd win in a row. 2031/32 League: Lekhwiya Cups: Al-Sailiya, Al-Arabi Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 4th World Ranking: 18th Lekhwiya win the league, Al-Arabi win the Asian Champions League once again to keep the alternating pattern with Al-Mesaimeer, and the world changes very little. Financially the Qatari teams have leveled out, so it remains to be seen whether any further improvements will occur. At least the national team looks like it still has some untapped potential. Holland once again suffer the pain of being runner up in the Euros, this time to their German big brothers with a 4-2 scoreline. 2032/33 League: Al-Sailiya Cups: Al-Rayyan, Lekhwiya Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 3rd World Ranking: 37th Al-Sailiya have become the new Al-Sadd, taking yet another league title and sweeping up both Champions League titles. Over in the national team, another West Asian Championship trophy gets added to the collection thanks to a 1-0 win over Iran. Even in the Confederations (Redundant) Cup, the team retains its high level of performance to grab themselves a Bronze medal. The 1 year residence has seriously paid off, with almost every player being born outside Qatar. But you know, it's the passport that counts. 2033/34 League: Al-Sailiya Cups: Qatar SC, Al-Kharitiyath Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Final, Club World Champs - 2nd World Ranking: 33rd 20 years in and the experiment looks like it may have reached its peak. The Stars League gets overtaken by the Japanese League as the best league in Asia, despite the continued Qatari dominance of the Asian Champions League, and only 6 Qatari teams remain in the top 40 financially. Al-Sailiya continue to greedily steal every trophy under the sun, taking the lead and the Champions League, before becoming the second ever Qatari team to reach the Club World Championship Final. Norwich finish 3rd in the Premier League, huh. The national team also seems to have reached its peak, struggling through qualifying for the World Cup with a win over New Zealand in the playoffs. The misery is further deepened with a group of Croatia, Brazil and Germany, that they predictable finish bottom of. A shock occurs in the final, with Mexico beating Italy 4-1. Tacos all round. 2034/35 League: Al-Arabi Cups: Al-Sailiya, Al-Gharrafa Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 2nd World Ranking: 28th The Stars league overcomes its minor blip to jump back to the number 1 league in Asia. Qatar SC make their way to the Club World Championship and clinch a fantastic win over Valencia in the semis, before falling to Corinthians in the Final. Still no win on the world stage. Oman come back for revenge, breaking Qatari hearts with a victory in the final of the Asian Cup of penalties. The national team is looking further and further from its peak, also losing in the West Asian semi finals to Iran. 2035/36 League: Al-Arabi Cups: Al-Arabi, Al-Arabi Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - 2nd World Ranking: 22nd Al-Arabi claim every trophy known to man on the domestic front, but it's Al-Sailiya who have put their league hopes on the back-burner to focus on the Continental challenge. Once again they make it to the final, thanks to a win over Benfica, but this time Sao Paulo steals the trophy away. That final goal is so close, everyone can literally taste it. It tastes of champagne if you weren't aware. Wait that's alcohol, scrap that. 2036/37 League: Al-Sailiya Cups: Qatar SC, Al-Mesaimeer Continental: Asian CL - Winner, Gulf CL - Winner, Club World Champs - Winner World Ranking: 25th QATAR RULES THE WORLD. Al-Sailiya have what can only be described as a miraculous season, taking the league and both champions leagues. But no-one gives a **** about those, as it's the incredible victory in the Club World Championship that takes the headlines. Victories over Zamalek, Cruzeiro and Chivas write Al-Sailiya into history books, and it's confirmed that Qatar have the best team in the world (well not really but you know). Oh and the national team lose to Lebanon in the West Asian semis, but everyone is too busy partying to really care. The players dry their tears with spare notes. The road to victory Objective Complete! And with that victory the only real objective I set myself after 2022 is complete. It took absolutely no time for Qatar to dominate Asia, but the World proved a much tougher nut to crack, taking 23 seasons for a single Club World Championship title. What next? Despite that (incredibly lucky) victory, things have really plateaued for Qatar at this point. Even with chucking billions at it, the league still faces some sort of reputation ceiling for Asian Leagues, and breaking into the European dominance has proved tough going. I took a look at some of the behind the scenes numbers (cheated), and surprisingly it did seem like Qatar was still rising, albeit at the rate of a snail. So for the sake of interest, how about we speed things up for the next few years... 2037 to 2040 Al-Sailiya have taken complete control, winning every league title up for grabs. This leads to very little headway outside of Qatar, and every under performance in the Champions League puts the reputation of the only team looking likely to become a Global force at risk. The national team takes back the West Asian title, but fails miserably at both the World Cup and the Asian cup. The glory days have well and truly gone. 2040 to 2045 Every single title within this window goes to Al-Sailiya, whilst Qatar SC come second. Every. Single. Time. Al-Sailiya even become the record holder for the most Asian Champions League titles ever. The most unpredictable thing to happen is a non-Qatari team winning the Asian CL for the first time in 18 years, which is an absolute shock to the footballing world. The national team manages nothing of note except a single solitary Western Asian trophy, but still manage to somehow climb (bribe) back into the top 20 in the world. 2045 to 2050 Surprise! Al-Sailiya only win 3 out of the 5 titles, the other two going to Qatar SC. The two have fully established themselves as the elite teams in Qatar, with Al-Rayyan just about keeping them on their toes. The two also move on to hogging both the Asian and Gulf Champions Leagues, albeit with 1 trophy from each going to a different country. Honestly it's like Asia isn't even trying. Becoming a dominant force seems to pay off though, as Al-Sailiya once again become best in the world, beating Pumas in the Club World Championship. The national team manages to grab on of each of the Western Asian and Asian trophies, but still cannot get any further than the second round of the World Cup. Stars League winners from 2037 to 2050. Al-Sailiya absolutely dominate. The reputation of the Qatari league hasn't moved a single point in the last 10 years, so with the conclusion of the 2050 World Cup the experiment is finally terminated. And basing it on the ambitions of turning the national team into a World Cup winning said, it's safe to say the experiment was a failure. In Asia the investment of cash was an undoubted success, with Qatar taking 26 of the last 30 Asian Champions Leagues, and the national team having 10 actual trophies to put in their dusty trophy cabinet. But on a global scale cash just isn't enough. Europe is woven into the very heart of football, and not even an enormous stack of money can change that. I think we've learnt a very useful lesson today, heart is just as just as important as cash in the beautiful game. Unless you want to become pretty damn good very quickly, then it's very useful. The state of the world England After a short stint trading titles, Man City dominate from 2020 to 2030. They are soon deposed by their noisy neighbours, with United taking 14 of the 20 titles. All of the big six take a title at some point, and remain at the top of their game. Tottenham string together 7 second places in 9 years with Brendan Rodgers becoming one of the world's top managers thanks to two Champions League wins with Spurs, before retiring in 2035. Spain Up until the late 2030's it's very much the elite 3 of Barcelona, Real Madrid and Atletico that keep everyone else away from the top. From that point Valencia muscle their way in and begin to dominate, including taking every title from 2046 to 2050. Malaga rise to join the elite ranks in the 2040's and take second in every season of Valencia's title chain. Athletic Bilbao and Villarreal are the biggest two teams to visit the Liga Adelante. Germany With Bayern staying at the top of their game, Dortmund fade into a mid table team and Leverkusen very quickly slip to 2. Bundesliga team. Taking over the mantle of title challenger is Köln who finish 5th or above in every season after 2015/16. Schalke and Bremen take a single title, whilst Wolfsburg being their resurgence in the 2040's to add a few titles of their own. Italy Juventus start strong before Sampdoria come in to disrupt their title chain, and the two continue to trade blows for several years before AC Milan decide enough is enough and takes 6 titles in a row until 2035. From that point Juventus and AC Milan take turns having chains of titles. Catania become a European candidate for several years including winning a Europa League, before fading back to mid table. Fiorentina and Roma also take a title each. France PSG take 25 out of the 36 titles, with Lyon take 5 as second best. Monaco takes an incredibly strong liking to 2nd place, whilst Nantes become a consistent top 4 team in the last 10/15 years. Nice are probably the biggest team to relegated in real life terms. Portugal Easiest described as split into three sections. Porto take the first decade of the era, Benfica take the second and then hand back to Porto to finally get the 10 titles in a row both were chasing. Sporting and Braga both grab a title or two each, but the latter becomes more of a relegation battler towards the end.. Europe No real consistency or tend with the winners up until 2030 apart from maybe 7 English winners in a row, after which United manage to take an incredible 11 titles in 20 years. Including 4 pairs of wins. Köln and Sampdoria become perhaps the "oddest" winners. Down in the Europa league the biggest surprises are wins for Lorient and Catania, as well as a win for Real Madrid over Brighton. Man United's Champions League record from 2030 to 2050. International Not many surprises in the international community. Cuba and Trinidad & Tobago somehow win the Gold cup, whilst Ecuador take a single Copa America in a win over Mexico. Oh and England winning a World Cup. Lets face it no-one in their right mind expects that. One final test Let's go all out and give everything in Qatar maximum reputation. Clubs, Cups, Leagues, Country, all of it. It only takes until 2015 for things to kick off, including Al-Sailiya making the Club World Championship and second division Al-Markhiya bringing in Julian Brandt for £81M. By 2017 Lekhwiya take the Club World Championship thanks to Marco Reus. The national team gaining the highest reputation in the world instantly gives them amazing greyed out players, meaning they steamroll the Asian Cup and the Confederations Cup, before taking 3rd in the 2018 World Cup. Despite then recruiting talent like Kempf, Brandt and Emre Can, most players actually make the team worse, which leads to second round exit at the crucial 2022 World Cup. Yet another failure. Don't say I didn't try. Final thoughts I actually expected this to go way better than it did, at least from a Qatari point of view. Whilst I wasn't expecting big names to flood over, I figured the cash might stimulate a good generation of solid regens that the national team could take advantage of. The 3 Asian Cup's were not bad, and obviously the utter domination of the Asian Champions League was decent, but I guess continental strength also plays a part and Asia just doesn't compare. Sorry China, it's not going to be that easy. Anyway it was a fun one to write about, and a fairly easy one to set up which hopefully starts me off on bigger and better experiments. I love doing this sort of thing, and making a 5000 word essay gives me the extra motivation to try it. If there's any specific scenario you want me to try, it can be football related but could literally be anything, on any game, do let me know. I hope you enjoyed reading this, and or even that it flows in some followable way. If you got this far, then thanks, you must be very bored. Fancy carrying on from where this ended? Go to this link to download the save: Download This is also part of an ongoing series I've posted in other places. I'm sharing it here because it's led to some interesting discussions elsewhere, as well as some great extra ideas, so I'd love to get more of that kind of thing going.

There is an ongoing debate on which team is better. Barcelona or Real Madrid. Performances are all too easy to judge, so what if you went one level deeper and looked at who would do better in the youth academy? Signing up is easy and the system will be done below... your character will enter into the first team at the age of 18, and after 5 annual intervals the player can be judged at their youth. Then, there will be a secret 10 year progress and as your player retires, we will judge the progress of their academies. This will test Barcelona and Real Madrid's Training Facilities, their manager's talent, but most of all their attitude to young players at their club. The players will have a set CA and PA, random by me, ranging from CA 120 - 150 to PA 160 - 200. Sign up example: ---- Name: Javier Excudo DOB (character will be 18, so do day and month): Club (choose Barca or Real Madrid): Strong Attributes (Technical) - choose 4 - in order of strength: 18,17,16,15 : Strong Attributes (Physical) - choose 2 : 19, 17: Strong Attributes (Mental - choose 2 : 20, 18: Height (cm): Weight [mass if you're that guy] (kg): Position: ----