The Ultimate Football Manager Challenge - Silver Age Archive

[Siepe1990]

10 hours ago, numero uno gunner said:

@Siepe1990 - All done, thanks! How's your game going?

Didn't get to play that much yesterday, so not much changed compared to my update from yesterday morning.

Well, nothing... Some oil-rich Russian club wanted Rondón - I decided to ask 3 x face value to scare them off... and they accepted...

So guess I'll be looking for a new first striker tonight .

[Fadedaf]

Lech Poznan Season 2020/21

Yes, believe it or not, i spent another entire season at Lech despite saying that i would only stay on for the supercup...anyways, here's how it went!

Polish Supercup- an easy 4-0 win over Korona Kielce as we claimed the only title in Poland i had not yet won.

 

Ekstraklasa- Very similar to last year, we ran away with the league and finishing with 33 wins, 3 draws and 1 loss. We broke lots of records and so far this was by far the easiest title i have won, the other teams in the league put up very little resistance. I've built this team into a domestic giant and Lech should be dominating Poland for years to come as there is such a gap in class between us and the rest.

 

Polish FA Cup- just like the league/last years FA Cup, it was a pretty straightforward win for us, as even the better teams in the same division as us are way below us in quality now. We clinched the trophy with a surprisingly narrow 2-1 win over Slask Wroclaw in the final but we never really looked like losing as we dominated all the way through.

 

Champions League- An even better performance than last year! We dispatched Kaiju, Shakter Karaganda and Sparta Prague to send us into the group stage. We were drawn into a more reasonable group this year containing Real Madrid, Marseille and Sporting (again). We managed to get a win each against Sporting and Marseille as well as a draw against all three other teams (including Madrid!). our only group stage loss was a narrow 2-1 game away at the Santiago Bernabeu. We qualified in second place for the first knockout round. We drew liverpool and in the home leg we absolutely blew them away, 3-0. Unfortunately, we then managed to lose the away leg 5-1, knocking us out of the competition again.

 

Transfers- Our signing of the season was Spanish striker Joan Aybar (1.4 million from Barcelona B) who was absolutely lethal all season, netting 41 goals as well as 15 assists which i think is a new record for one of my players in this save. We also brought in young fullback Jordi Quintero from Barcelona B who had a great season as well as Javier Eraso, central midfielder on loan from Athletic Club who were our senior affiliate.

 

Best Players- Along with the three new signings mentioned above, our consistently brilliant wide players had another excellent season, with Kamil Grosicki bagging 28 goals and 19 assists at an average rating of 8.01 while also picking up the league player of the season award and Tomas Vlk getting 16 goals and 22 assists at an average rating of 8.04. We scored a particularly high number of goals this season, breaking the League and Cup records as several of our backup players even grabbed 10 goals+! (like for example the absolute champ Mekhi Leacock-MacLeod, with 11 goals, 11 assists and 3 POM awards). I also must say that many of our youth team products had great breakthrough seasons this year, getting plenty of game time, especially Adam Bekas, who at 16 had a run in the first team during a bit of a shortage of midfielders due to injuries and played incredibly well.  

Overall this was a very straightforward season for us domestically, claiming the treble with ease while competing admirably in the Champions League. I applied for jobs throughout the season, mostly in South America and Mexico and narrowly missed out on so many of them. Our performance in the Champions League made me a bit reluctant to leave until we were knocked out, but even once we were i couldn't find a job. Near the end of the season i made a few applications to slightly lower reputation teams and ended up getting two contract offers to choose from, West Ham in England and Hamburg in Germany. I also had a few smaller teams in Brazil and Korea that would have taken me. But the big decision was between West Ham or Hamburg, and it took me a while to decide as i delayed both until the end of the season. Finally, i decided that since they had better facilities, stadium, finances and probably a slightly better squad i chose West Ham. Hamburg have been performing a bit better of late but i believe i can improve this West Ham side significantly in not too much time.  

 

International- won the ACON with Cameroon as i posted before, and we also qualified for next years World Cup. I haven't yet resigned as i said i would as we are still ranked consistently in the top 10 so unless an even better team needs a new manager i might see how we go at the 2022 World Cup!

 

So I have now left my beloved Lech! 21 manager of the month awards, 3 manager of the season and 6 competitive trophies. I'll miss Lech but for now its on to West Ham United!

Season       Team       Position       Champ. League        Notes and Achievements     
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16      Clyde       3rd           -                    Promoted to League 1
2016/17      Clyde       1st           -                    Promoted to Scottish Championship
2017/18      Clyde       1st           -                    Promoted to Scottish Premiership, League Challenge Cup winners
2018/19      Lech        1st           -                    MOTS, Qualified for Champions League
2019/20      Lech        1st           group stage          MOTS, Polish FA Cup winners, Qualified for Champions League
2020/21      Lech        1st           1st knockout rnd     MOTS, FA Cup winners, Supercup winners, Qualified for Champions League



Season          Team              Notes and Achievements     
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2017/18      Poland U19s         Failed to Qualify for U19 Euros, resigned
2018/19      Cameroon            Started ACON qualifying
2019/20      Cameroon            Qualified for ACON, failed to qualify for CHAN
2020/21      Cameroon            ACON winners, Qualified for World Cup

Challenge Progress:

Club

1/10 top domestic leagues (Poland-Lech)

1/10 domestic cups (Poland-Lech)

0/5 club continental championships ()

0/1 club world championship

International

1/5 continental tournaments (ACON 2021-Cameroon)

0/2 world tournaments ()

[sherwinriga]

threelions1goal, I have been wondering if you get the right pick in Italy. Try to manage AS Roma, then you will be in good shape, because it's better when you beat Inter Milan and Lazio, of course. How long will you last in Italy because this is something ridiculous on your bad sackings three times in a row? I hope you get third chance in Italy, this time no sackings for sure! Meanwhile, I suggest on coaching Korea or Indonesia because these giants can be good for a chance to win the 2039 Asian Cup. Good luck in Italy, trying to hunt better than before and also your international coaching career.

One question: Who are the managers of Lazio, Inter, Australia and Iran and how they are doing?

Edited August 2, 2016 by sherwinriga

[ReclaimTheKop]

12 hours ago, threelions1goal said:

When I've been looking to move on from one club to another (if I haven't got the sack first!!) I start applying for jobs, with the philosophy that if my existing employers get the hump and sack me - then I was looking to move anyway.

 

In the end I resigned at the end of the season. I still had 12 months left on my contract. I got the Independiente job within the first few months and the interview didn't ask about resigning this time. I managed to finish 2nd in what was left of the season and won the cup. So a great start!! I need to get some screenshots uploaded and post my seasons code.

Edited August 2, 2016 by RecliamTheKop

[jcricky]

Huaxia Xingfu – 2021

 

Injuries have killed me this season, a number of big players, including my keeper (bearing in mind I only had one first team keeper), Nico Yennaris, Xiao Sheng, Wu Xi, Daniel Sturidge and Zhang Linpéng. Throw in Spiranovic leaving to go home as he was homesick and we had a squad down to bare bones. The worst thing was these all happened toward the back end of the season, including for our big Champions League games. All in all I feel like this season was disappointing, however it has shown me what I need to do for next year and hopefully I can use this as motivation to win it all.

Super Cup

 

Final - Shanggang 1-4 Huaxia Xingfu

Absolutely smashed Shanggang here, goals from Sturridge(2), Linpeng and Chengdong.

FA Cup

 

4^th Round – Tianshan 0-2 Huaxia Xingfu

Quarter Final – Zhongyou 1-3 Huaxia Xingfu

Semi Final 1^st Leg – Huaxia Xingfu 0-1 Hangzhou

Semi Final 2^nd Leg – Hangzhou 0-2 Huaxia Xingfu

Final 1^st Leg – Huaxia Xingfu 2-1 Guangzhou

Final 2^nd Leg – Guangzhou 2-3 Huaxia Xingfu

Another trophy to the cabinet, winning the FA Cup for the second year in a row. A good run through to the final, a slight worry in the Semi against Hangzhou but a second leg victory secured our place in the final.

Asian Champions League

 

Group Stage – Adelaide United 1-2 Huaxia Xingfu

Group Stage – Huaxia Xingfu 2-1 Pohang

Group Stage – Huaxia Xingfu 4-0 Okayama FC

Group Stage – Pohang 3-3 Huaxia Xingfu

Group Stage – Huaxia Xingfu 3-2 Adelaide United

Group Stage – Okayama FC 2-3 Huaxia Xingfu

2^nd Round 1^st Leg – Beijing 4-2 Huaxia Xingfu

2^nd Round 2^nd Leg – Huaxia Xingfu a2-0 Beijing

Quarter Final 1^st Leg – Huaxia Xingfu 1-1 Jeonbuk

Quarter Final 2^nd Leg – Jeonbuk a0-0 Huaxia Xingfu

We smashed the Group Stage, topping the group, and after turning the first leg defeat around in the second leg I thought this could be our tournament. But with almost half the squad out injured we were actually unlucky to lose to Jeonbuk, who went on to win the tournament. I think we can do it next year.

 

Players

 

Top Scorer – Daniel Sturridge (13)

Highest Average Rating - Ali Asghar Alipour (7.83)

Most Assists – Sun Ke (21)

CLUB CAREER
								   Cups
Season	 NAT	Club		Division		League	1st	2nd		Cont.	CWC	Other & Notes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16  WAL	TNS		Welsh Premier League	1st	QF	N/A		N/A	N/A	Arrived with 6 games left of the league season
2016/17	 WAL	TNS		Welsh Premier League	1st	Won	4th Round     2nd Qual	N/A	Double winners, Manager of month 4 times, resigned
2018	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	4th	2nd	N/A		N/A	N/A	Took over with 13 games gone, in 11th place
2019	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	1st	3rd Round Won		N/A	N/A	Won Manager of the season, first League win in clubs history, Won All Star Game
2020	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	1st	Won	Won		Group	N/A	Manager of the season again, treble winners!
2021	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	2nd	Won	Won		QF	N/A	Focused on Champions League and left the league to reserves, mistake.

INTERNATIONAL CAREER

                                 
Year  Nation 	   Competition		Result		Notes        
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2016  AUS U23	   U23 Asian Cup 	Lost in Final	Took over on 19/2/16
2018  Egypt	   AFCON Qualifying	Qualified	Took over on 22/7/18, only one qualifying game to go
2019  Egypt	   AFCON		Lost in 1/4	Resigned after tournament
2019  ENG U21	   EURO U21		Lost in Final	Resigned after tournament, Marcus Rashford won Golden Boot

Challenge Progress

Club

2/10 top domestic leagues – Wales(TNS), China(Huaxia Xingfu)

2/10 Domestic Cups – Wales(TNS- theWord Cup), China(Huaxia Xingfu- Chinese FA Cup)

0/5 Club Continental Championships -

0/1 Club World Championship -

International

0/5 Continental Tournaments –

0/2 World Tournaments -

 

Edited August 2, 2016 by jcricky

[jcricky]

2022 Update

Just a short update, full update will be up later. Following last year’s performance I thought we could improve and go onto win the Champions League in Asia. However three games into the season, before the league had even started, I left the club. In the three games we won the Super Cup 2-1 against Shanggang, and lost two Group games in the Champions League. I left a sinking ship, I think it was a sensible decision. I went the whole of 2022 unemployed, hopefully we can get a new job soon. I had a few job interviews but was never hired.

[jcricky]

COR – 2023

I had to wait almost a year until I got a new job, but this job was worth the wait as I was appointed the COR manager on the 12/1/23. When I took the job I didn’t realise how long the season was, with a State Championship, followed by the actual League, a Brazillian Cup and the Copa Libertadores. My Goalkeeper ended up accumulating 73 appearances in this season.

League

The club finished second in the league in 2022, this season we were predicted to finish 2^nd again. My objective from the board was to fight for the title. In the 38 games this season, we won 23, drew 9 and lost 6, giving us a total of 78 points, this meant we lifted the title, just. ATM finished 2^nd with 77 points and FLA finishing 3^rd, also on 77 points. One of the closest season’s I have ever had on FM and I am so happy that I could win another league title.

São Paulo State Championship

A 15 game league followed by a knockout tournament. In the league we won 12 games and drew 3, which meant that we topped the league table with 39 points, even better that we finished the league unbeaten. The knockouts were even better.

Quarter Final – COR 3-0 OES

Semi Final – COR 2-0 SEP

Final 1^st Leg – SPO 1-2 COR

Final 2^nd Leg – COR 4-0 SPO

We were crowned Champions of the State Championship which was a great start to the season, well deserved after going the whole Championship unbeaten.

Brazilian Cup

4^th Round 1^st Leg – COR 2-2 VDG

4^th Round 2^nd Leg – VDG a1-1 COR

Disappointing is the only way I will describe this, the games came in a poor patch of form and we couldn’t find a way to win.

Copa Libertadores

Group Stage – Barcelona(ECU) 0-3 COR

Group Stage – COR 0-0 Rosario Central

Group Stage – COR 2-0 Olimpia

Group Stage – Olimpia 0-2 COR

Group Stage – Rosario Central 0-2 COR

Group Stage – COR 2-1 Barcelona(ECU)

2^nd Round 1^st Leg – Alianza 1-4 COR

2^nd Round 2^nd Leg – COR 5-2 Alianza

Quarter Final 1^st Leg – COR 3-0 FLA

Quarter Final 2^nd Leg – FLA 0-2 COR

Semi Final 1^st Leg – COR 1-0 ATM

Semi Final 2^nd Leg – ATM 2-1a COR

Final 1^st Leg – San Lorenzo 1-0 COR

Final 2^nd Leg – COR 1-1 San Lorenzo

Absolutely devastated to lose in the final but considering this is my first season I think it has been a great success. This was San Lorenzo’s second Copa Libertadores in a row.

Players

Top Scorer – Toledo (38)

Highest Average Rating – Hector Cabrera (7.73)

Most Assists – Hector Cabrera (28)

Uruguay – 2023

On the 12/11/23 I took over as Uruguay manager, they had already played two games of World Cup Qualifying and had 3 points. I have managed two games so far, beating Chile and losing to Argentina, so we’re 7^th in the Group on 6 points, hopefully we will be able to qualify.

CLUB CAREER
								   Cups
Season	 NAT	Club		Division		League	1st	2nd		Cont.	CWC	Other & Notes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16  WAL	TNS		Welsh Premier League	1st	QF	N/A		N/A	N/A	Arrived with 6 games left of the league season
2016/17	 WAL	TNS		Welsh Premier League	1st	Won	4th Round     2nd Qual	N/A	Double winners, Manager of month 4 times, resigned
2018	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	4th	2nd	N/A		N/A	N/A	Took over with 13 games gone, in 11th place
2019	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	1st	3rd Round Won		N/A	N/A	Won Manager of the season, first League win in clubs history, Won All Star Game
2020	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	1st	Won	Won		Group	N/A	Manager of the season again, treble winners!
2021	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	2nd	Won	Won		QF	N/A	Focused on Champions League and regretted it as league form suffered
2022	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	N/A	N/A	Won		N/A	N/A	Left a sinking ship, won the Super Cup before leaving 
2023	 BRA	COR		First Division		1st	Won	4th Round	Final	N/A	Good season, dissapointing loss in Copa Libatadores final.

INTERNATIONAL CAREER

                                 
Year  Nation 	   Competition		Result		Notes        
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2016  AUS U23	   U23 Asian Cup 	Lost in Final	Took over on 19/2/16
2018  Egypt	   AFCON Qualifying	Qualified	Took over on 22/7/18, only one qualifying game to go
2019  Egypt	   AFCON		Lost in 1/4	Resigned after tournament
2019  ENG U21	   EURO U21		Lost in Final	Resigned after tournament, Marcus Rashford won Golden Boot
2023  Uruguay	   World Cup Qualifying	N/A		Took over on 12/11/23, Played two qualifying games this year, 4 played in total

Challenge Progress

Club

3/10 top domestic leagues – Wales(TNS), China(Huaxia Xingfu), Brazil(COR)

2/10 Domestic Cups – Wales(TNS- theWord Cup), China(Huaxia Xingfu- Chinese FA Cup)

0/5 Club Continental Championships -

0/1 Club World Championship -

International

0/5 Continental Tournaments –

0/2 World Tournaments -

 

[vikeologist]

jcricky- Commiserations on not grabbing the Asian CL at Huaxia. Do you think that when you'll go back to Asia, you'll go to SKorea, or are Chinese clubs dominant in FM (because of the money splahing around) since 16.3?

 

I'm not keen on managing in Brazil because of the never ending seasons, but I guess I must play this game a lot slower(and micro-managerally) than some others. Hopefully you'll nail the Copa Lib next time. If you keep winning the domestic titles but not the Champions League, I might start calling it 'coming a cricky'.

We should have more things named after us.

doing a vike = taking over a club immediately before a major final.

Does anybody have any 'doing a .....' they want to name after themselves?

 

rtc- Congrats on your new job. How many challenge trophies so far?

fadefaf - GL at West Ham, and with Cameroon. I'd say you stand a chance of success at the WC, and you shouldn't forget about the Confed Cup. When will the next one be?

 

siepe - You're clearly much better, and faster, at moving up the managerial ladder than me. Wouldn't want to be up against you for a job vacancy.

[Crowy]

Manager Profile:

 

 

Leagues Loaded:

 

There is an image of my profile and the league's I have loaded (hope you can see them). I had a go at this earlier in the year on another forum, sadly it wasn't that active and I  kind of faded away from the challenge. I'm hoping due to this thread being more active it will motivate me to have a proper go this time, instead of just doing 3 seasons.

 

 

[Fadedaf]

@vikeologist Thanks! yeah we've been drawn a very tough group in the WC but we will see! and we didn't qualify for the 2021 confed cup, not entirely sure if we qualify for the next one or not, since there are so many ACONs. 

also if anything, 'doing a faded' might have to be losing a cup game to lower league opposition, it's happened a few times so far...

[jt8604]

Grindavik 2017 Review

My first full season in the Icelandic top flight is over. We started the season predicted to come 8th out of 12 sides and the board were wanting a mid table finish. To help i added in Hermann Hreiderrssen as a player / assistant manager providing me with experienced cover at left back. A few more new faces came in but the most noticeable was Eidur Gudjohnsen who i snapped up on a free transfer to play an enganche role this year.

The season starts off with the Deildabikar cup (Effectively the league cup). We struggled in this last year but it just clicked this time around as we got through our group stage with ease before going into the Quarter finals against Stjarnan. A penalty shoot-out saw us progress where we played KR who in the pre-season interviewed me for their job before turning me down. A 3-1 win there was sweet revenge and i was onto the final against last year's league winners Valur. A much tighter affair than the semi-final it went all the way into extra time before we finally broke the deadlock and won the cup 1-0.

My 1st trophy towards the challenge and some nice progress. My confidence was high that we could transition the promotion and perhaps pull a few upsets in the league. 

In the end it was a tough slog over the 22 games as we just failed to kill teams off, so often taking the first goal before letting in an equaliser and succumbing to a 1-1 draw. In fact the amount of points lost from winning positions was frightening and i don't even want to start trying to work out in fear of me doing something silly. What i can say is we won just 5 games, lost just 6 and drew an incredible 11 games. At one point we were battling relegation, the next fighting for a potential European spot before slipping into a disappointing but probably deserved 9th spot. In the other Cup competition we were knocked out in the 4th Round.

Cup Results

League Results

League Table

A tougher year and i am keeping my options open and testing the water a little with a few applications for clubs that i didnt really have a shot at but on the off chance they like what they hear i am prepared to jump ship if need be.  Im conscious i am 2 1/2 years in and could get stuck in Iceland if i am not careful. Luckily this also happened.

Costa Rica 2017 Takeover

After a 3rd place showing in the Gold Cup, The Costa Rican manager Ramirez decided to resign and so i thought i would apply and here i am.  The star players shouldn't shock you with Keylor Navas in goal and Joel Campbell being our most recognised attacking player. We do also have this guy as a tasty regen striker who has done a great job for me so far

With just 4 games to go in World Cup qualification my predecessor had done most of the job with Costa Rica sitting top of the table. A 2-0 win over Trinidad and Tobago meant we had at least a play-off spot before a 3-2 win over the USA secured our entry to the 2018 World Cup.  A poor 2-1 defeat to Jamaica in a dead match for us was at least followed up by a spirited 1-1 draw with Mexico. We rounded up the year with friendlies against Peru and Mali, Losing the first 3-1 before smashing Mali 4-1.

Our World Cup group has been drawn and we have to make do with Brazil, Nigeria and Scotland in what could prove to be a group we can get out of.

Costa Rica Results

Season     Team                  Country      League                   Position       Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015       Grindavik             ISL          1. Deild Karla           3rd            Took over with 10 games played
2016       Grindavik             ISL          1. Deild Karla           1st            Promoted and Undefeated until the last day of the season.
2017       Grindavik             ISL          Pepsi Deild Karla	       9th      	  Won the league Cup	




Season                 Team                       Achievements
————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
2017                   Costa Rica                 Qualified for the 2018 World Cup

 

Challenge Progress
Club

0/10 top domestic leagues - 

1/10 domestic cups - Iceland (Grindavik)

0/5 club continental championships

0/1 club world championship

International

0/5 continental tournaments - 

0/2 world tournaments -

[threelions1goal]

welcome @Crowy to the challenge.

Yeah, this thread is very active, so hopefully you'll stick around.

Good luck getting a job with all those leagues -  as @vikeologist says on the first page of this thread, it isn't always beneficial taking the first job you are offered.

But this challenge and this thread is the most enjoyable I've encountered on an FM challenge!!

[Collzy]

Been tempted to do this for a while and I finally folded last night. Set up my game. Managed to complete the Pentagon Challenge back in FM2012 but this looks a lot more appealing now!

 I hope posting updates too will keep my interest levels high. I probably won't be able to complete this, but it'll give me some fun until I get the next installment around Christmas time.

I loaded a DB with about 90k players, with a start date of Feb 2016.

My profile.

Here are the leagues I've loaded so far.

I will try tackle this one continent at a time, and in these sort of things Asia is generally always my starting point. I simmed for around 3 months, got offered a few jobs, but none really appealed so early in the game and I wanted to allow the leagues to play on for a bit for deciding on anything. After 3 months I was offered an interview at Shanghai Shenxin. They had a media prediciton of 9th, but were sitting in 12th place after 12 games. I was surprised however, this wasn't too far from expectation, and they had won 2 league games on the bounce to leave them 3 points from their predicted finish. However, I saw this as a good opportunity, and took the job.

They only have 2 recognised strikers in the squad though, (which 1 started in the reserves) so I know what the first thing on my agenda is.

I already know my continent route (Asia, Africa, USA, South America, Europe) and have told myself should the opportunity arrive later in the career, I can't manage Tottenham either, adding a bit of a 'personal touch' to it.

And so it begins

Edited August 8, 2016 by Collzy
Updated post with more information and screenshots.

[vikeologist]

3 hours ago, Collzy said:

 

Quick question though - OP already stated that the IGE can be used for cosmetic things, what about adding "disliked clubs" to my manager I've created? Is this even an option on the IGE? Think it could help with my game adding 2 or 3 "disliked" clubs to put them off interest in me in the long-run, could easily say no too I appreciate that

 

Must admit I did precisely that with the IGE on FM15. I put 1 disliked team in. Really I shouldn't have. I mean, I can't imagine that it affected the challenge, but once you start, where do you stop?

 

I downloaded the IGE just to change the team colours, but once I had it realised that it can be used to give huge advantages in the challenge. Things like seeing your reputation. Other than the disliked club, I didn't use the editor, but it was a distraction having it constantly looming there.

 

So look, I can't really say that you can't put disliked teams in, because I did it, and it's up to everybody how they do the challenge, but I think the 'pure' approach is to not use the editor for anything except cosmetic changes. I wouldn't do it again.

Edited August 8, 2016 by vikeologist

[Collzy]

9 minutes ago, vikeologist said:

Must admit I did precisely that with the IGE on FM15. I put 1 disliked team in. Really I shouldn't have. I mean, I can't imagine that it affected the challenge, but once you start, where do you stop?

 

I downloaded the IGE just to change the team colours, but once I had it realised that it can be used to give huge advantages in the challenge. Things like seeing your reputation. Other than the disliked club, I didn't use the editor, but it was a distraction having it constantly looming there.

 

So look, I can't really say that you can't put disliked teams in, because I did it, and it's up to everybody how they do the challenge, but I think the 'pure' approach is to not use the editor for anything except cosmetic changes. I wouldn't do it again.

Thanks bud, I'll leave it as it is for now. Should the opportunity arise I can always just outright decline it.

 

Same reason I've kept the IGE in, I hate some of the obscenely bright colour choices for some of the kits I've come across before so I've kept it in to tone them down a bit (bright luminescent Green toned down to a light green that's not so in your face) for example.

[Collzy]

I've updated my earlier post with more detailed info and screenshots and stuff.

[ReclaimTheKop]

See update from Shankly84 account.

 

Edited August 9, 2016 by RecliamTheKop

[Siepe1990]

West Bromwich Albion F.C. (2017/2018)

My first season at WBA was all about finding the right tactic for the team. The quality was there – especially since Rondón decided to stay in spite of the contract offered by Spartak – so now it was up to me to find the right set-up. That deemed more difficult than I thought. I started playing 4-2-2-2 wide with a lot of creative players up front around my clinical striker Rondón. I created at least 15 shots per match, of which at least 7 were on target… Yet we failed to score. Time and time again, we were much, much better, but either ended up with a 0-0 draw or – even worse -  a 1 goal defeat. I started to tinker a bit with my tactics, concluding that I simply left too much room at the back with all the players going forward, thus being very vulnerable for any (counter) attack. Besides that, my players were taking too many shots from wrong positions. I decided to swap one of my strikers for a defensive midfielder (Half Back) and start playing with a 4-1-2-3 wide. That did the trick, and the results improved significantly (with Rondón finally starting to score almost 1 on 1 from then on).

By then, Bristol City (seriously?) had already taken a 10 point lead on me and they put up a really good fight, winning many of their games with big margins. When the winter transfer period came up, my players had attracted a lot of attention from bigger clubs and many started complaining about wanting to leave. Eventually I ended up selling 7 players (of which 3 were regular first-eleven), Rondón being one of them (club top scorer with 12 goals so far at that moment). With Batshuayi coming in for free at the end of the season, I decided to hire Zaza until end of season and invest the 30 mio in other departments of the squad (with focus on future and squad depth). I managed to buy Olivér from Atlético for only 3.5 mio and – surprisingly – Renato Sanches for only 1.5 mio from Benfica. Others to join included Mangala (from Man. City for only a whisper of his real value) and Zeca (deemed ‘not good enough’ by Napoli… fool’s on them ), thus strengthening my squad tremendously.

That showed in the second half of the season, with me taking over the 1st spot 10 games from the end and not letting go until end of the season, finishing with a nice 8 point margin to Huddersfield Town (who topped Bristol City with only one point – and Bristol lost the Play-off to Fulham… Feel sorry for them a little). Ended up with 28 wins, 11 draws and 7 losses, scoring 65 (1.5 / game, not that high for me) but only conceding 25 (0.5 / game, which is ridiculously low for me). Promotion to the Premier League is a fact, the club’s bank account is still very pleasant (transfer budget for next season is set right now at 50 mio….), so I think I’ll be staying around and see how far I can get these boys in the League.

Oh yeah, the FA & League Cup were total embarrassments; I got thrashed 4-1 by Everton in the FA Cup (in Replay, after a 3-3 draw in the first match, having lead 3-0 at half time……..) ; League Cup against Blackburn Rovers, I sent in a B-team, that was a bad idea .

E.o.S. Stats:

With only 2 players scoring below a 7.00 average (my goalie Begovic, since my defense was so insanely strong he could play cards all match, and Darren Fletcher, who I played as a sub mostly in his last season), my averages are quite good. My top players:

Top Goalscorer: Zaza tied with Rondón (both 12 in half a season)

Top Assists: my man Sinkgraven with 17 (!), insane season from him, has been named PotS as well no suprise

Top Avg Rating: Calabria (right back) - 8.14 ; only half a season though, full season it's Sinkgraven with 7.50

Revelation: Korinek, a right-wing regen from Czech Republic. Scouted at 16, already insane mental & physical stats (almost all above 10 already) and quite decent technical. Broke his foot at the start of the season, but turned into one of the stars in the second half, insanly good performance for a now 17-year old. I think I've got the new Messi, very interesting to see how he will develop through the years.

Nigeria

The CHAN… What can I say about the CHAN… I have never heard of the CHAN before this, so I was completely surprised when – upon confirming my squad – the game told me I could only select non-foreign based players! Wow… Well, I lost (and with big margins as well) to Togo, whom I of course should have beaten easily… The board didn’t like it and warned me to improve my results, so I really, really needed some good results, or I could easily end up being fired…

Qualification for the ACON continued then, with saw me winning from Niger but losing to Mali . Luckily, the last qualification match is after the World Cup, so my job’s safe for now, dunno what they’ll do if I don’t manage to qualify (currently 3 points ahead of Mail, who still have one match to play to catch up, so it’ll be a close one!).

Have been assigned a pretty easy group at the WC – Denmark, Mexico and hosts Russia – so I think I stand a good chance of at least reaching the next round .

Club Level
Season		Team		Competition		Position	Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	-		-			-		-
2016/2017	Bury F.C.	League One (ENG)	16th		Took over when 24th in Dec. 2016
2017/2018	West Brom	Championship (ENG)	1st		League Champions, promotion to Premier League!

International
Season		Team		Competition		Position	Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	Argentina U23	Olympics		1st		Quit after winning Olympics
2017/2018	Nigeria		World Cup		-		Qualified for WC, ACON-qualifying ongoing, CHAN eliminated

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

@Fadedaf: nice last season with Lech there and congrats on the ACON win with Cameroon. Good luck at West Ham, sounds like a really nice club to manage!

@jcricky: sad seeing you miss out on that CL (both in Asia – although in an early stage – but especially in South America, you were so close!). Congrats though on the league win and the Uruguay appointment!

@vikeologist: have to say I’m quite surprised that WBA wanted me, same goes for Nigeria, didn’t expect to get such ‘good’ jobs so early on neither…

@jt8604: that’s a really short season in Iceland, only 22 games means no room for mistakes! Congrats on the WC qualification with Costa Rica, watch out for Nigeria though, they’ve got me as their manager now

@Collzy: welcome to the challenge mate, good luck in China!

Edited August 9, 2016 by Siepe1990

[Fadedaf]

West Ham Season 2021/22 (kind of)

As you can see I did not complete this season at West Ham surprisingly. All was going reasonably well until i noticed that the manager of LA Galaxy, one of the best teams in the MLS was retiring, so i applied and took the job there about 2/3 of the way through the season. While i was very happy with the progress i had made at West Ham, we had already been knocked out of the two cups and i didn't really see us winning any titles anytime soon against the giants of English football. LA Galaxy on the other hand, finished 2nd overall in the MLS last season and were already into the NACL quarter finals against Chivas, so lots of potential for trophies! anyways here's an update of the 2/3 of a season at West Ham:

League- we performed very well in the league for a team of our quality. We lost a few games here and there to the bigger clubs but generally held our own, beating most mid and lower clubs in the league. we sat just outside the European qualifying places for most of the season and when i left we sat in 5th. Solid performance all round from the team but we really couldn't challenge the top teams in the long run.

League Cup- absolutely smoked in the first round by WOLVES from the lower leagues... honestly still not sure how i managed this one.

 

FA Cup- knocked out pretty early by Stoke in a narrow game, pretty unlucky really.

 

Europa League- Some great performances as we beat Randers and Hearts to send us into the group stage. We drew a group containing Karlsruhe, Olimpija and Sporting (yes, again). We topped the group to send us into the first knockout round against Hammarby. This is when i left the club, and while i'm sure we would have beaten Hammarby, Bayern Munich were likely waiting for us in the next round and i'm not sure we would've had much chance against them.

 

Transfers- Made quite a lot of transfers to try and bring the squad up to scratch. notable additions include:

former lethal Lech striker Joan Aybar (wish i set his release clause lower)

former Lech wonderkid Sandro Delucchi (by this point a swiss international)

the Legendary super Mario Balotelli (who managed 29 goals and 15 assists before i left!!!)

Barcelona midfielder Sergi Samper (never made it at Barca but was an excellent cheap midfielder for us)

Goalkeeper Loris Karius from Mainz

plus a few others

 

Best Players- good effort from the whole team particularly the new additions. Also, striker Santi Mina and wide player Andre Ayew (props to former West Ham managers for some quality signings) were consistently good.

 

International- I'd already qualified for the World Cup with Cameroon but unfortunately there was another CHAN to deal with before that. Last time out we were thrashed 7-0 in qualifying by Equatorial Guinea so i wasn't exactly keen. The quality of domestic players in Cameroon is honestly terrible and while i had a much better squad this time, the Cameroonian league is ranked 17th in Africa so no real confidence of any kind. anyways here's how we went:

Qualifying

Cameroon 4-1 Gabon

Cameroon 1-0 Gabon

Group Stage

Cameroon 3-2 Benin

Cameroon 2-1 Togo  

Cameroon 1-0 Uganda

Quarter Final

Cameroon 3-2 Mozambique (AET)

Semi Final

Cameroon 1-0 Angola (AET)

Final

Cameroon 1-0 Morocco

 

so... i am baffled but somehow i have won the CHAN. we scraped by in every single game, winning them all by 1 goal.. but we still won? we honestly had a really untalented and horribly unfit squad and this is probably the biggest fluke in my FM career, shame it doesn't count towards the challenge! My striker Ghislain Mogou won the golden boot and player of the tournament too which is nice.

Season       Team       Position       Champ. League        Notes and Achievements     
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16      Clyde       3rd           -                    Promoted to League 1
2016/17      Clyde       1st           -                    Promoted to Scottish Championship
2017/18      Clyde       1st           -                    Promoted to Scottish Premiership, League Challenge Cup winners
2018/19      Lech        1st           -                    MOTS, Qualified for Champions League
2019/20      Lech        1st           group stage          MOTS, Polish FA Cup winners, Qualified for Champions League
2020/21      Lech        1st           1st knockout rnd     MOTS, FA Cup winners, Supercup winners, Qualified for Champions League
2021/22      West Ham    --            --                   Left for LA Galaxy 2/3 of the way through the season


Season          Team              Notes and Achievements     
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2017/18      Poland U19s         Failed to Qualify for U19 Euros, resigned
2018/19      Cameroon            Started ACON qualifying
2019/20      Cameroon            Qualified for ACON, failed to qualify for CHAN
2020/21      Cameroon            ACON winners, Qualified for World Cup
2021/22      Cameroon            CHAN winners

Challenge Progress:

Club

1/10 top domestic leagues (Poland-Lech)

1/10 domestic cups (Poland-Lech)

0/5 club continental championships ()

0/1 club world championship

International

1/5 continental tournaments (ACON 2021-Cameroon)

0/2 world tournaments ()

 

[Fadedaf]

@Siepe1990 Thanks! and yeah West Ham was pretty nice for the short time i was there! good luck with Nigeria, African football is a lot of fun from what i've experienced in this game.

@Collzy and @Crowy welcome and good luck!

@jt8604 good work so far, is the plan to leave Iceland as soon as you win the league?

[Collzy]

@Fadedaf @Siepe1990 Cheers chaps.

 

If I can work out how to do a table later then I have an update already, smashed through that first season (albeit shorter one as I joined the season late).

[Siepe1990]

30 minutes ago, Collzy said:

@Fadedaf @Siepe1990 Cheers chaps.

 

If I can work out how to do a table later then I have an update already, smashed through that first season (albeit shorter one as I joined the season late).

Use the Code-symbol in the message-screen and set up the table in Wordpad / Notepad and simply copy / paste... It'll look like rubbish in the code-box, but once you post it, it'll be perfect

[Collzy]

Shanghai Shenxin 2015/2016

Well, this started off a lot better than I anticipated. This might sound strange, but I'm actually going to put those 2 back to back wins before I took over as a key point in this, I joined a team who's morale was back on the up rather than completely shot to pieces. The team already had a rather good attack, bar being short a striker or two, so I thought I'd use this to my advantage and try put teams on the back foot early on, ala Rodgers' Liverpool with Suarez, rather than scout around an area I have no knowledge of to improve the defence.

 

League

To my own amazement, we won the league on the final day by a single point. Just after me taking over we went on an incredible run of form, crawling our way back up the table. In fairness, the fixture list was quite generous to me after my takeover, which allowed the team to get more morale and wins under their belt, and get used to my fairly demanding style of play. Even then, I thought promotion, let alone a league title, wasn't even on the cards, especially when my first loss came to a heavy 5-1 defeat away to 2nd placed Beijing BG. This left virtually no room for error in the final 8 games, 3 of which contained teams above me also chasing promotion. We won 2 of these, allowing us to close ground and put us up to 3rd, before losing the 3rd game and leaving us needing a stroke of luck and relying on other teams for us to go up. Beijing BG lost their game, we won, we went into second place, 1 point behind first place, but having to be wary of about 3 teams behind us who were all in with a shout of promotion. In the penultimate game of the season, the team above us drew, but we were 2-1 down at half time at home to relegation threatened Yiten. After getting aggressive at half time to tell them to pull their fingers out, we pulled off a great second half performance to win 3-2, moved into 1st place by 1 point with 1 game remaining, just needed to match or better their result and we'd be champions. We ran out comfortable 4-0 winners against a side who went down and we'd secured promotion.

 

Cup

Already exited before my arrival.

 

Next Season

New season, new league, and have been given a respectable wage and transfer budget by the board to improve. (I'd forgotten about the Chinese money until I got promoted and could suddenly offer a LOT higher wages to players). A lot of my team's contracts are about to expire, which may give me a chance to rebuild the defence which was the most disappointing part. 2 of my players were FAR too good for the below league, so I will be doing everything I can to keep them as they singlehandedly got me to where I am. I was also only on a contract to December 2016 (when I was hired in Feb), but the board extended my contract for another year. Hopefully I can make some good signings and get a good position in the league next year, either to get me a better job in China/Korea, or help strengthen the squad further for possibly an unexpected title charge.

 

Season		Team		       Position		Champions League		Additional Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	Shanghai Shenxin          1st			-			Took over after 12 games with the team in 12th place.

Challenge Progress:

Club

0/10 top domestic leagues

0/10 domestic cups

0/5 club continental championships

0/1 club world championship

International

0/5 continental tournaments

0/2 world tournaments

[numero uno gunner]

I do love the fact that I go away for a few days and come back to find I'm miles behind on this thread! Welcome to the new challengers. I hope you're ready for it!

I should have an update shortly. Just the small matter of two cup finals and an international competition to deal with first...

[ReclaimTheKop]

Right I've set up a new account as I was sick of the typo in my display name haha. So I will now be updating from the Shankly84 account.

 

Edited August 9, 2016 by RecliamTheKop

[Shankly84]

Will get some screenshots on soon of the progress I've been making, but for now here is the code of my game so far.

Season     Team             Country	League                   Pos	Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015       KA	            Iceland	1. Deild Karla           N/A	Took over at end of season
2016       KA	            Iceland	1. Deild Karla           1st	Promoted as champions
2017       KA	            Iceland	Pepsi-Deildin            8th	Finished Runners-up in Borgunarbikar
2018       KA	            Iceland	Pepsi-Deildin            1st	League Champions
2019       KA	            Iceland	Pepsi-Deildin            1st	League Champions, Won Icelandic Cup
									Knocked out in CL 2nd Qual Phase
									Won Islenska Frabaer Bikar
2020       KA	            Iceland	Pepsi-Deildin            1st	League Champions, Won Islenska Frabaer Bikar
									Lost in CL 3rd Qual Phase. Reached Europa Lg
									last 32.
2021       KA	            Iceland	Pepsi-Deildin            N/A	Resigned whilst in 1st postion
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2022       Platinum Stars   S.Africa	ABSA Premiership         11th	Took over after 22 games
2023       Platinum Stars   S.Africa	ABSA Premiership         5th	MTN 8 Cup Winners
2024       Platinum Stars   S.Africa	ABSA Premiership         1st	League Champions, Nedbank Cup Winners,
									Telkom Knockout Winners
2025       Platinum Stars   S.Africa	ABSA Premiership         1st	League Champions, Nedbank Cup Winners,
									Telkom Knockout Winners, Orange CAF Champions
									League winners
2026       Platinum Stars   S.Africa	ABSA Premiership         1st	League Champions, Orange CAF Super Cup winners,
									Nedbank Cup Winners, Resigned
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2026       Independiente    Argentina	Primera Division         2nd	Took over after 22 games, Copa Argentina winners
2027       Independiente    Argentina	Primera Division         1st	League Champions, Supercopa Argentina Winners
2028       Independiente    Argentina	Primera Division         1st	League Champions, Copa Libertadores Winners,
									Copa Total Scudamerica Winners, Supercopa
									Argentina Winners, FIFA World Club Cup Winners
2029       Independiente    Argentina	Primera Division         N/A	Resigned before season
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2029       Shandong	    China	Chinese Super League     N/A	Took over at end of season.

 

[threelions1goal]

Juventus - End of Season 2036/37

 

After being sacked by Lazio in the previous campaign, I managed to get the gig at Juventus (to my surprise)

The board expected us to qualify for the Champions League via our position in Serie A and as you can see from the table we duly delivered - as the season took shape, we were never outside the top three places, although we couldn't quite manage to catch Napoli.

 

The board didn't deem the cup as important - obviously they are unaware of my challenge to be the ultimate manager and I deemed it very important!!

We cruised through the early rounds and reached the semi final where we faced one of my former clubs, Inter Milan.

A 3-0 home victory in the first leg and a 3-3 draw away from home, saw us 6-3 winners on aggregate and into the final to face.....Napoli!!

 

We didn't start well and conceded after 2 minutes, but the boys didn't know when they are beaten and I have two world class players - an Argentinian forward called Dybala and a Belgian attacking midfielder called Poirier - who I managed to sign on a free transfer and is now worth £30m.

These two players excelled in the final and we turned it round winning 3-1

 

So a successful season (review) and another cup to my haul...!!  I just need to get some international management going on now!!

 

Season	Team			Country       	Pos	Notes          
15/16	Linfield		N. Ireland		6th	Took over in December, sacked before the end of the season
16/17	Cliftonville    N. Ireland		3rd	Took over in January, Euro Qualification
17/18	Cliftonville    N. Ireland		4th	League Cup Winners
18/19	Cliftonville   	N. Ireland		1st	Champions, Manager Of The Year
19/20	Shanggang		China			1st	Champions, Cup Winners, Manager Of The Year     
20/21	Shanggang		China			N/A	Resigned after being knocked out of Champs League
20/21	Jeonbuk			S. Korea		4th	Cup Winners, Knocked Out 2nd Round Champs League
21/22	Jeonbuk			S. Korea		N/A	SACKED 4th in league, QF of Champs League, SF of FA Cup
22/23	Pohang			S. Korea		6th	Cup Winners, knocked out in SF of Asian Champs League
23/24	Pohang			S. Korea		N/A	SACKED after first match of the new season!!
24/25	Seoul			S. Korea		3rd	Took over with 14 games played, qualified for Champs League
25/26	Seoul			S. Korea		N/A	SACKED - Team finished 2nd & won FA Cup
26/27	Kaizer Chiefs	S. Africa		1st	Champions
27/28	Kaizer Chiefs	S. Africa		1st	Champions, KO Cup Winner, S/F Champs League - Resigned
28/29	Houston			USA				2nd	1st in West Conference, Lost in MLS Shield  Final, SF of NACL
29/30	Tigres			Mexico			4th	Closing Stage, SF of Champions League	
30/31	Tigres			Mexico			3rd 	Opening Stage - Lost in Final to Pumas -  reached SF of Cup
30/31	Tigres			Mexico			1st 	Closing Stage - Won in Final - Champions!!  2nd Rnd Copa Libertadores
31/32	Tigres			Mexico			1st	Opening Stage - Lost in Final to Pumas, Qualified for KO stage of NACL
31/32	Tigres			Mexico			7th	Closing Stage - Lost in SF of Play Offs, Lost in SF of NACL.....SACKED!!
32/33	Pumas			Mexico			1st	Closing Stage, Won in Final - Champions!!, NACL Winners
33/34	Inter Milan		Italy			6th	Qualified for Euro Cup - Boardroom disagreement - SACKED!!
34/35	Lazio			Italy			7th	Took over in December, team in 14th Position
35/36	Lazio			Italy			N/A	Was 14th in December, players all unhappy.....SACKED!!
36/37	Juventus		Italy			2nd	Qualified for Champions League, Italian Cup Winners




International
2026	Camaroon	Africa		Resigned after 2 matches
2026	Morocco		Africa		Eliminated in Group Stage at World Cup, qualified for ACON
2027	Morocco		Africa		ACON Winners - resigned straight after
2029	Australia	Asia		Qualified for World Cup
2030	Australia	Asia		Knocked Out In Group Stages, lost every match - SACKED!!
2033	Jamaica		N. America	Lost in Final of Gold Cup - Resigned
2034	Iran		Asia		Lost in QF of Asian Cup - SACKED!!

EDIT.....What am I doing wrong with my code thing??!!

 

Challenge Progress

Club
4/10 top domestic leagues (N. Ireland, China, S. Africa, Mexico)
5/10 domestic cups (N. Ireland, China, S. Korea, S. Africa, Italy)
1/5 club continental championships (NACL - Pumas)
0/1 club world championship

International
1/5 continental tournaments (ACON - Morocco 2027)
0/2 world tournaments ()
 

Edited August 9, 2016 by threelions1goal
Code thing is rubbish!!

[jt8604]

@Fadedaf I'm currently caught in two minds. Part of me wants to go onto win the league this year (Our media prediction is 5th) so we should have a real shot. I have started applying and testing the water at other clubs to see what i could get. So far not getting any interview offers. If i was to leave it would need to be for a top flight club of one of the smaller leagues i am managing so i can knock off that first league title

[numero uno gunner]

                   

Season Review 2028/29

Everton, Chelsea and Italy

Well, that was a crazy season.

I made the decision to take the Everton post, and the season started fairly well. As the Europa League doesn't count towards the challenge, I was happy enough to see us slide by the wayside in that competition. The squad I inherited was short of quality, but had potential if I could keep the main spine of the team injury free. We started the season well, with our key striker Annsi Ahokas smashing goals in on a regular basis. However, we soon went on a shocking run of only 1 win in 12 games in all competitions. Nothing I worked came off, and the squad became increasingly unhappy. Languishing deep in midtable, our season was effectively ended in the first weekend in January with a third round FA Cup defeat to Man United at Old Trafford, where we were utterly outclassed by a team sat 16th in the league (and who only finished 12th). The board called me in for a meeting to discuss squad happiness, and I began to flirt shamelessly with Chelsea when their manager was coming under increasing pressure. Paco Jemez was eventually sent packing, after five years in charge, and I threw my hat into the ring, and Roman Abramovic came calling for me.

And then the season became interesting...

I thought I could ease my way into the Chelsea job, and get ready for a proper assault on all fronts next season. However, that wasn't how it turned out. My first game in charge? The second leg of the last 16 in the Champions League, facing AS Monaco who were 2-0 up from the first leg. A second minute goal from Nuno Andrade put us back in the tie, but it took a late goal from Jean-Claude Laurent to level the tie and send us into extra time. We were on top, and Laurent scored in the 120th minute to send us into the last 8, a personal best for me in the Champions League after 4 successive seasons of being knocked out in the last 16. But more on that later.

Our league form saw us take 26 points from the last 10 games to finish 4th and qualify for the Champions League next season. To be honest, if we get anywhere near that form for an extended period next season we will be hard pressed not to take the title. We were utterly phenomenal at times. The balance of the squad needs a little bit of work for next season, particularly with regards to the home-grown players situation. Actually, I'm finding that has been a recurring theme on this save. Clubs seem to always leave themselves short of home-grown players. I also need to bring in another striker, as we are definitely light up front.

The second game of my Chelsea reign was an FA Cup quarter final with Spurs, which saw Laurent put us 1-0 with just over 20 minutes to go, before Sandro Bohr doubled our lead in the 85th minute. Spurs pulled one back straight away, and despite a nervy few minutes, we held out and had a semi-final to look forward to, where, despite a lacklustre performance from us, Southampton were defeated 2-0. The final saw us playing Man City, the only team to beat us domestically during my brief reign (they beat us 3-2 after we threw away the lead twice). However, revenge was indeed sweet, as we dominated the match, running out 3-0 winners and giving me my seventh domestic cup win!

So, Europe. Now, I've had my issues with the Champions League, as anyone who has read my updates will know. My Real Madrid team were unbelievably good, played fast, attacking football, yet I never got beyond the round of 16 with them. And so there was a wry smile across my face as the quarter final draw took me back to the Spanish capital to face Real. However, the home leg was first up, and we went at them from the first minute to the last, running away with a 4-0 victory. 2 goals in the last ten minutes put a shine on the result for sure. The return leg was rather different, as we found ourselves 3-0 down within an hour, but the boys dug in and went through 4-3 on aggregate. PSG awaited in the last 4, and a nervy 1-0 home leg win, Laurent scoring yet again, meant the second leg had the potential to be an epic. However, we played really well, beat them 2-1, and marched on to face Sporting Lisbon in the final. 1-0 down to a Franck Guerin goal at half time, a couple of tactical changes saw us come back into the game. The 67th minute saw centre back Alekos Konstantinou prod home an equaliser. We pressed forwards, and Franck Guerin was the unfortunate soul who decided the game, as he scored an own goal from a corner to put us in front with 2 minutes to go. As Sporting poured forward, we hit on the counter attack, Laurent sealing a fantastic win and continental glory!

That wasn't the end of my season, however. My Italy side had reached the last four of the International League, but we lost to Spain 1-0, and to be honest a score of 3 or 4 would still have flattered us as we were truly awful. Thankfully, we got our awful performance out of the way before we went into a competition that actually mattered, the Confederations Cup. A group of Iran, New Zealand and my old nation Colombia was what came next. Comfortable wins over Iran (3-1) and New Zealand (6-0) set up the game against Colombia nicely. I wasn't particularly bothered about topping the group, until I saw that the USA had knocked out Brazil and finished second in the other group. The winners? Spain. All of a sudden, winning the group became important. I needn't have worried, as what followed was possibly the most complete international performance one of my sides has ever produced, with a 6-1 demolition of the World Champions. A last 4 tie with the USA saw us sneak through to the final 2-1, where I was expecting to be given the chance to get revenge over Spain. However, Colombia had other ideas, and it was them who awaited us. Juaquin Cuellar, a certainty in my all time challenge 11, put them ahead in stoppage time in the first half. And they battered us in the second, with Pietro Cerutti providing save after save to keep us in it. The minutes ticked by, until Gian Filippo Felicioli drew us level in the 89th minute, before going one better and grabbing an injury time winner! The Confederations Cup was sealed!

I've said before that Cuellar will be the first name on my team sheet for my all time challenge 11, but Felicioli has given me serious food for thought. A double in the final this time followed him scoring in all four knockout rounds in the Euros last summer. He's going to be mighty close to being in my team.

So what now? I'm staying with Chelsea to try and win the league, and the World Club Championships as well. Internationally, I now need the Asian Nations Cup, which is January 2031, and the North American Gold Cup, which is July 2031. Obviously there is a World Cup in between, and I'm hoping that poor showings from South Korea, Australia, Mexico and USA might see some jobs become available. They're the four nations I'd ideally like to manage now.

 

Club
Season        Team             Position      Notes and Achievements
2015/16      Dungannon     10th          Won Northern Irish FA Cup and kept Dungannon up after taking over with 3 games to go
2016/17      Dungannon     8th            A solid but unspectacular season
2017/18      Yiteng            8th            A settling season in China
2019           Jiangsu          1st            Won Chinese Super League and FA Cup, as well as claiming MOTY.
2020           Jiangsu          1st            Won Chinese Super League and Asian Champions League
2020/21      Aberdeen       9th            Won Scottish League Cup
2021/22      Monterrey      5th/5th      Won Opening Stage, knocked out in semis of closing stage. Won NACL.
2021/22      Salzburg        1st             Won league and cup double
2022           Corinthians    1st             Won league
2023           Corinthians    8th             Won Copa Libertadores
2024/25      Juventus        1st             Won Serie A and Italian Cup
2025/26      Juventus        2nd            Won Italian Cup
2026/27      Real Madrid    1st             Won La Liga and Spanish Cup
2027/28      Real Madrid    1st             Won La Liga and Spanish Cup

2028/29     Everton             10th          Knocked out of both cups and Europa League. Left them in 10th with 10 games to go.

2028/29     Chelsea             4th            Took over with 10 games to go and club in 8th. Won FA Cup and Champions League!

Season        Team              Notes and Achievements
2016/17      Congo              Resigned without playing a game
2016/17      Cameroon       One win away from WC qualification
2017/18      Cameroon       2nd round of 2018 World Cup
2019           Cameroon        African Cup of Nations winner!
2021           Poland              An abject failure!
2022           Ireland              4 wins, 2 draws and promotion to European International League Division B
2023           Ireland              2 wins, 2 defeats from 4 qualifiers before taking Colombia job
2024/25      Colombia        Currently top of WC qualifying and ranked 4th in the world
2026           Colombia         World Cup winners!
2027           Colombia         Copa America winners!
2028           Italy                  European Championship winners!

2029           Italy                  Confederations Cup winners!

 

Challenge Progress

Club

6/10 top domestic leagues - China (Jiangsu), Mexico (Monterrey), Austria (Salzburg), Brazil (Corinthians), Italy (Juventus), Spain (Real Madrid)

7/10 domestic cups - Northern Ireland (Dungannon), China (Jiangsu), Scotland (Aberdeen), Austria (Salzburg), Italy (Juventus x 2), Spain (Real Madrid), England (Chelsea)

4/5 club continental championships - ACL (Jiangsu), NACL (Monterrey), Copa Libertadores (Corinthians), Uefa Champions League (Chelsea)

0/1 club world championship

International

3/5 continental tournaments - ACON (Cameroon 2019), Copa America (Colombia 2027), European Championships (Italy 2028)

2/2 world tournaments - World Cup (Colombia 2026), Confederations Cup (Italy 2029)

[Siepe1990]

11 hours ago, threelions1goal said:

EDIT.....What am I doing wrong with my code thing??!!

It's a bit confusing, I'll admit: simply set up the text in Notepad / Wordpad (with proper layout), copy paste into the code box and completely ignore the way it looks in the code box. If you start making changes, you'll start messing up tabs, that's what's happening with your post I'm guessing. Once you've posted, the layout will be back like you set it up in Wordpad / Notepad .

 

And @numero uno gunner: that has to be one of the best seasons I've ever seen, congrats on the CL (finally!), the FA Cup and the Confed Cup!

Edited August 10, 2016 by Siepe1990

[Collzy]

What I have realised since starting this, I spend SO much more time in the off-season prepping everything than I do in the actual season playing aha, especially as this will be my first full season in charge.

I renewed the contracts of my 'First 11' who did so well last year, managing to keep hold of my 2 star players who I'd convinced to stay for an extra season or two to see how things pan out. Everyone else left on a free bar a couple reserve/fringe players. New signings made, which I have no idea whether they'll be any good, but they fit my system and mostly were better than the players last year, but I've kept my squad small and hoping I'm not destroyed my injuries and relying on reserve players to fill gaps, risky approach but hopefully it pays off. So my NET spend is way down, which is generally against my FM philosophy but, needs must.

Have a media prediction of 9th in the top division after going up, out of 16 teams, which is respectable, and makes me believe we can certainly finish higher.

Of course I could be being too confident, it could all go pear shaped, and I'll get sacked We shall see. Hopefully have an update soon if I can get through this season quickly enough, just finishing the last couple of friendlies.

Edited August 10, 2016 by Collzy

[jcricky]

COR – 2024

I was hoping this year I could break the ‘Cricky’ curse and finally it was broken. However a tradition of bottling did continue, finishing 3^rd in the League and bottling two cup finals, oops. In the league ATM ran away with it on 99 points, followed by FLA on 81 points then us on 71 points. ATM’s signing of Giovanni Simeone fired them to the title.

São Paulo State Championship

Just like last year we reached the final, this time around finishing the league stage on 40 points, with 13 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss.

Quarter Final – COR 3-0 MOR

Semi Final – COR 2-0 SEP

Final 1^st Leg – COR 1-3 SPO

Final 2^nd Leg – SPO 0-0 COR

The first bottle of the season came here, wasn’t too disappointed though as we won this tournament last year.

Brazilian Cup

4^th Round 1^st Leg – INT 1-1 COR

4^th Round 2^nd Leg – COR 1-0 INT

Quarter Final 1^st Leg – SPO 1-1 COR

Quarter Final 2^nd Leg – COR 4-1 SPO

Semi Final 1^st Leg – COR 2-0 FLU

Semi Final 2^nd Leg – FLU 0-2 COR

Final 1^st Leg – COR 0-1 FLA

Final 2^nd Leg – FLA 4-2 COR

Second bottling of the season, we had to go for it in the second leg after going 1-0 down, we got back in to it but unfortunately ended up conceding plenty more. It was disappointing as we hadn’t won this previously, but the career goes on.

Copa Libertadores

Group Stage – Barcelona(ECU) 0-1 COR

Group Stage – COR 1-0 The Strongest

Group Stage – COR 6-0 Millonarios

Group Stage – Millonarios 0-2 COR

Group Stage – The Strongest 0-2 COR

Group Stage – COR 3-0 Barcelona(ECU)

2^nd Round 1^st Leg – Colo Colo 0-1 COR

2^nd Round 2^nd Leg – COR 0-0 Colo Colo

Quarter Final 1^st Leg – Pumas 2-4 COR

Quarter Final 2^nd Leg – COR 3-0 Pumas

Semi Final 1^st Leg – FLA 1-2 COR

Semi Final 2^nd Leg – COR 2-0 FLA

Final 1^st Leg – COR 1-0 San Lorenzo

Final 2^nd Leg – San Lorenzo 2-3 COR

FINALLY, my first Continental competition win, and it was even my first continental competition on this years FM, revenge over San Lorenzo in the final was brilliant, especially as this stopped them winning their 3^rd Copa Libertadores in a row.

Recopa

As San Lorenzo won both the Copa Libertadores and the Copa Sudamerica last year (somehow??) it meant we were entered as their opponents for the Recopa which is similar to the European Super Cup, it’s played over two legs.

Final 1^st Leg – COR 1-0 San Lorenzo

Final 2^nd Leg – San Lorenzo 0-0 COR

We just edged it but another piece of silverware is good to win no matter how I do it.

Club World Cup Championship

Semi Final – Al-Ahli 0-1 COR

Final – Manchester United e2-1 COR

This made it the third final loss of the season, this one was however more expected and to lose to Man Utd is no embarrassment. Following this I decided to leave COR and move on to my next adventure.

Players

Top Scorer – Toledo (37)

Highest Average Rating – Raul (8.02)

Most Assists – Galego (23)

Uruguay – 2024

Still the manager, but not for much longer I don’t think, we’re on course to qualify for the World Cup but when something big comes calling I can’t turn it down.

CLUB CAREER
								   Cups
Season	 NAT	Club		Division		League	1st	2nd		Cont.	CWC	Other & Notes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16  WAL	TNS		Welsh Premier League	1st	QF	N/A		N/A	N/A	Arrived with 6 games left of the league season
2016/17	 WAL	TNS		Welsh Premier League	1st	Won	4th Round     2nd Qual	N/A	Double winners, Manager of month 4 times, resigned
2018	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	4th	2nd	N/A		N/A	N/A	Took over with 13 games gone, in 11th place
2019	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	1st	3rd Round Won		N/A	N/A	Won Manager of the season, first League win in clubs history, Won All Star Game
2020	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	1st	Won	Won		Group	N/A	Manager of the season again, treble winners!
2021	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	2nd	Won	Won		QF	N/A	Focused on Champions League and regretted it as league form suffered
2022	 CHI	Huaxia Xingfu	Chinese Super League	N/A	N/A	Won		N/A	N/A	Left a sinking ship, won the Super Cup before leaving 
2023	 BRA	COR		First Division		1st	Won	4th Round	Final	N/A	Good season, dissapointing loss in Copa Libatadores final.
2024	 BRA	COR		First Division		3rd	2nd	2nd		Won	2nd	COR will forever be in my heart, left after CWC defeat

INTERNATIONAL CAREER

                                 
Year  Nation 	   Competition		Result		Notes        
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2016  AUS U23	   U23 Asian Cup 	Lost in Final	Took over on 19/2/16
2018  Egypt	   AFCON Qualifying	Qualified	Took over on 22/7/18, only one qualifying game to go
2019  Egypt	   AFCON		Lost in 1/4	Resigned after tournament
2019  ENG U21	   EURO U21		Lost in Final	Resigned after tournament, Marcus Rashford won Golden Boot
2023  Uruguay	   World Cup Qualifying	N/A		Took over on 12/11/23, Played two qualifying games this year, 4 played in total
2024  Uruguay	   World Cup Qualifying	N/A		In qualifying positions for the World Cup, 15th in world ranking

Challenge Progress

Club

3/10 top domestic leagues – Wales(TNS), China(Huaxia Xingfu), Brazil(COR)

2/10 Domestic Cups – Wales(TNS- theWord Cup), China(Huaxia Xingfu- Chinese FA Cup)

1/5 Club Continental Championships – South America(COR)

0/1 Club World Championship -

International

0/5 Continental Tournaments –

0/2 World Tournaments -

[Crowy]

On 08/08/2016 at 00:41, threelions1goal said:

welcome @Crowy to the challenge.

Yeah, this thread is very active, so hopefully you'll stick around.

Good luck getting a job with all those leagues -  as @vikeologist says on the first page of this thread, it isn't always beneficial taking the first job you are offered.

But this challenge and this thread is the most enjoyable I've encountered on an FM challenge!!

I've actually never been the kind to take the first jobs in these challenges, I'd always prefer to wait for a manager to be sacked than take over a team that has no manager at the start. Thank you for the welcome.

Thank you for the welcome also @Fadedaf; I'll get up to date on both your updates shortly.

 

Sadly I've not had the time to have a good go at this yet, I'm free all night tonight and all day tomorrow, so will hopefull have some updates for the thread soon.

[vikeologist]

Firstly, I'm aware that the hall of fame table at the start is a mess, given that the new forum seems to not support tables. I'll do something about it eventually.

crowy - welcome to the challenge. Be interesting to see which nation you start with out of all those options.

 

jcricky - Glad the curse has been lifted, if I ever managed to establish one by mentioning it. Maybe having won the Lib, you'll have the option of managing in one of the mandatory Euro nations, if that's the direction you choose to go in.

 

collzy - I also seem to spend longer in the pre-season than some challengers seem to spend on a whole season. Micro-manager alert. Anyway congrats on promotion. Now you just need a big name signing China-style; like Bobby Charlton or Pele.

 

n1g- The Confed Cup is always huge. As I've no doubt said before, we've never had a challenger who just had that trophy to win at the end of the challenge, but when we do this thread will turn into an epic tragedy of Man flailing helplessly against the cruel Gods. Mind you, until reading your post a second time I didn't realise how close you had come to losing out to your old Colombia team. There's almost nothing worse than losing in the final to a team you battered in the group stage, but when that team would have been the one you abandoned, that would qualify.

 

Anyway, gives you a good chance of completing the challenge soon, although aside from the international side, you'll need to win a new league almost every season.  Incidentally, have you or would you apply for a vacant job at Arsenal in this challenge?

 

jt - Like you, I have got 'stuck' at a club, in my case for about the first 9 or 10 seasons of the challenge. I wouldn't say I'm having a real try at completing the challenge on FM16. Frankly I'm ready for FM17 and getting an early start so that I have a whole year to do it (again). I hope if you have stayed you get the league. Winning something and coaching badges seem to be important. Do Costa Rica play in any small international tournaments? I mean, you might win the Gold Cup of course. For me international jobs seem to be more of a hindrance than a help in getting a new job.

 

3L1G - Are you actively looking for a new international job or just concentrating on domestic management? Maybe it will be '38 before lots of jobs come up.

 

Shankly - Got to admit the typo bugged me as well, but I thought it would be rude to mention it. When you get close to having 10 eligible trophies, I hope that you'll add a tally to the end of your code. I'm far too lazy to do the counting myself.

 

fadefaf - congrats on the CHAN. I feel it's one of those annoying international trophies whose primary importance lies in the problems caused by not winning it, but it does boost one's rep.

 

siepe - Yeah, so you discovered the dark side of the CHAN. Qualifying for the WC from Africa is actually quite tough, or at least has been for me. I'm managing Nigeria as well at the moment. At least I think I am. While I've been with Southend from the start, I've managed around, if that's the correct FM term for being a FM playa, quite a bit internationally. Yep it's Nigeria. I nearly failed to qualify for the WC as I was 3-0 down against the bottom nation in the final group, but we ended up winning 4-3 and our main competition went on to lose their match, so that second half dramatically changed our qualification fortunes.

[jt8604]

@vikeologist Thanks. So far i have stayed on as no one seems to be even biting when i apply for other jobs. Even though early on in the season, it doesnt look like i will win the league this time around so i will probably resign at the end of the Icelandic Season which is September time. Hopefully some jobs will have opened up around then. After the world Cup i have the Copa Centroamericana which is a small tournament that we should win followed by the Gold Cup in 2019. We should have a real shot at that tournament with just the USA and Mexico being stern opposition. However, depending on what comes up after the World Cup i could make a jump to a top Asian or African nation to try and win that tournament which is Jan 2019

[Collzy]

Shanghai Shenxin 2016/2017

I won't go into too much details here, I'll leave that for below, but my plan of keeping the first XI of the previous season, concentrating my budget on the defence and using the reserves and youth team to fill any gaps really paid off.

 

League

Heroes. League champions, unbelievably. I wasn't sure how my tactic would hold up as I still wasn't convinced my defence was strong enough, especially against teams who had the likes of Teixera, J. Martinez, Elkeson etc. but the fact my attack was already rather good, it almost became a case of just outscoring the opposition, with some crazy results such as 5-4, 3-3, 2-5, 4-2. We started the season very strongly, but teams quickly gathered that we were the real deal and set up differently against us. Around the 20 game mark we went on a horrendous run, which included getting smashed 5-2 by Jiangsu. I called a team meeting, and managed to remotivate the team to cross the line and win my first top domestic league as a manager. I'll admit, it wasn't as easy it looked, a lot of games I was losing and the team came back, and a lot of the draws and wins could've easily been more dropped points from clinging on in the later stages, or just being more clinical against the better sides.

League Table

Cup

And we did the double! I wasn't too bothered by the cup really, I let my assistant manager pick the team in all the games except the final, but we looked strong throughout and only really struggled in the semi-final when we went through 6-4 on aggregate against rivals Shanghai Greenland. Another trophy ticked off the list.

Shenxin do the Double!

Next Season

Well, can it get better? We've qualified for the Champions League, and I was given a 1 year extension to my contract. This will be my last season at Shenxin. At the beginning of the season I thought that this might be my last and look to move on to a bigger club, however after the success, I've decided to stay for another year and go all out for the Champions League. Again, I'm going to keep faith in my squad, but I think I really need a new goalkeeper, and due to my foreign quota being full, I need a top Chinese striker too. Regardless of how the Champions League goes I will be leaving at the end of the season and hopefully moving to a team with more of a chance (looking at one of the richer Chinese clubs). I really want to get Asia and Africa out the way as quick as possible. I'm also currently studying for my National A License after Shenxin agreed to fund my previous 2 badges.

Season		Team			Position		Cup		Champions League		Additional Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	Shanghai Shenxin	1st			 -			-			Took over after 12 games with the team in 12th place.
2016/2017	Shanghai Shenxin	1st			Winners			-			-

Challenge Progress:

Club

1/10 top domestic leagues - China

1/10 domestic cups - China

0/5 club continental championships

0/1 club world championship

International

0/5 continental tournaments

0/2 world

[numero uno gunner]

@Siepe1990 - Thanks. It was a bit unexpected to say the least! Especially when you consider I was still managing Everton in January, with no prospects of winning a trophy whatsoever!         

@vikeologist - Yeah, I can't repeat the language that was coming out of my mouth as the minutes ticked by and we were still 1-0 down. Still, it was a good win. I've actually stayed on as Italy manager simply because I'm enjoying international management, and nothing has come up in North America or Asia yet. As soon as a decent opportunity does (hopefully post WC 2030) I'll be saying arrivederci to the Azzurri. As for the Arsenal job... I'd jump at the chance! I haven't had the chance to get it yet as the timing hasn't been right. As I'm now at Chelsea, I can't see me moving to the Emirates as part of this challenge.

@Collzy - Congratulations on the double! What I would say is the Chinese clubs are an excellent way of getting your badges done, so keep up on that side of things. Also, its entirely possible to win the Asian Champions League with a Chinese club, but as with any continental competition, you'll need a bit of luck along the way. Making sure you're hovering up the best of the Chinese talent is essential, though.

@jcricky - Congrats on the Libertadores win! I really enjoyed managing Corinthians, so its nice to see someone else managing there as well. Are you looking to move on now? And I'm intrigued to see who has lured you from Uruguay!

@jt8604 - I think having a national job like Costa Rica will stand you in good stead. I've found African and South American national jobs have come up a fair bit in my save, so I'd recommend staying put until you've lifted the Gold Cup. As you say, there are only three nations that can realistically lift the trophy, and as you're at one I'd stay put, unless the jobs at USA or Mexico become available!

 

[jt8604]

Grindavik 2018

My third full season in charge and this time we were predicted to come 5th albeit still a way off from being considered as legitimate title challengers. In Pre-season it was a case of adding some more quality to the side with the main signing being Icelandic International Elmar Bjarnasson on a free transfer. With Heidur Helguson retiring i added a couple of young strikers to the team in the search for finally having a striker to lead the line.

The season started with our defence of the Borgunabikar and we raced through the group stages with 7 wins from 7 to set up a Quarterfinal apperance against IBV. It was 0-0 at full time and so i threw on David Mooney who scored 2 to give us an eventual 2-1 victory. In the Semi-final we had FH who are one of only two professional sides in Iceland and their superior fitness prevailed with a 3-2 victory. In the other cup competition (Deildabilkar) we had our customary 4th round exit this time losing to IA 3-2.

So back to the league and it was a marked improvement from last year as the team just seemed to have more killer instinct than last year where we were blighted from huge amounts of draws. We were still fairly tough to beat as well which was nice. Our season was going on fairly nicely and with 4 games to go we had a real chance of getting into the top 3 and European Football. However, my Chairman decided to sell 2 of my best players (Elmar Bjarnasson and Josef Josefsson) to go with a young player he decided to sell at the beginning of the season and it left me too short to complete that challenge. As expected we slipped down the table a tad but we were able to recover enough to grab 6th position.

Not a bad season in the end and it was an improvement from last season. At the beginning of the season i mentioned it might be time to leave Grindavik in order to progress further with the challenge as realistically it could be another two seasons before i grab the league title. I was still on the edge of making that decision but the Chairmans actions have convinced me that i need to move on. 

League Table

League Results

Cup Results

It has been a good spell here with 1 League Cup and 1 2nd flight title to my name but onto my next challenge and i end with a record of

Played: 110
Won: 52
Drew: 33
Lost: 25
 

Costa Rica 2018

We warmed up to the 2018 World Cup with draws against the Ivory Coast and Ireland and we were picking up niggling injuries through these games. Our first game at the World Cup was Nigeria. It was a back and forward match and we ended up going down to 10 men thanks to Juan Bustos being sent off making it even tougher. We still had our chances to score but a 0-0 draw was probably a fair result. We then went on to Brazil who had just played out a draw with Scotland themselves.  We were terrible as we got pulled apart by Gabriel Barbosa and a 4-1 defeat was handed to us. It meant we needed to beat Scotland in our last game and hope that Brazil beat Nigeria by a clear 2 goals.  We got neither as we battled to a 2-2 draw with Scotland and Nigeria managed to hang on to draw with Brazil.

We finished the group bottom with 2 points and following the tournament i had a think about whether i had enough to win the Gold Cup in 2019. I mentioned that if there were other good jobs available i might make the move and indeed i did make the move as i decided to take on the Ivory Coast role. It was short but sweet here in Central America but onto my next challenge. I finish with a record of

Played: 11
Won: 3
Drew: 5
Lost: 3

Ivory Coast 2018

Having also been knocked out in the Group stages of the World Cup, the Ivory Coast manager was fired leaving me with the chance to lead the Ivory Coast to the African Cup of Nations. Indeed i did just that by wrapping up the Qualifiers with a 2-1 win over South Sudan to top the group and book our place.

 

Season     Team                  Country      League                   Position      Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015       Grindavik             ISL          1. Deild Karla           3rd           Took over with 10 games played
2016       Grindavik             ISL          1. Deild Karla           1st           Promoted and Undefeated until the last day of the season.
2017       Grindavik             ISL          Pepsi Deild Karla	       9th      	 Won the league Cup
2018       Grindavik             ISL          Pepsi Deild Karla        6th           Semi Finals of the League Cup	




Season                 Team                      Achievements
————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
2017                  Costa Rica                 Qualified for the 2018 World Cup
2018	              Costa Rica                 Group Stages of 2018 World Cup. Resigned
2018                  Ivory Coast                Qualified for the 2019 AFCON

Challenge Progress:

Club

0/10 top domestic leagues - 

1/10 domestic cups - Iceland (Grindavik)

0/5 club continental championships

0/1 club world championship

International

0/5 continental tournaments

0/2 world

Edited August 14, 2016 by jt8604

[numero uno gunner]

Argh, decision time. The job at Orlando Pirates has just come up. Its late September, they've offered me the job. The only reason I'm even considering leaving Chelsea, with whom I could have a decent crack at the title (albeit against some excellent teams) is because they're in the semi-finals of the African Champions League, which begin next week. In terms of the challenge, the general consensus is winning the African Champions League is a nuisance because it comes in pre-season. This would mean I wouldn't need to worry about that, but would mean jumping ship again. The top jobs in South Africa just haven't come up frequently at all in my save, but I genuinely think I could win the title with Chelsea (with a bit of luck along the way!)

Should I stay or should I go?

[threelions1goal]

7 hours ago, numero uno gunner said:

Argh, decision time. The job at Orlando Pirates has just come up. Its late September, they've offered me the job. The only reason I'm even considering leaving Chelsea, with whom I could have a decent crack at the title (albeit against some excellent teams) is because they're in the semi-finals of the African Champions League, which begin next week. In terms of the challenge, the general consensus is winning the African Champions League is a nuisance because it comes in pre-season. This would mean I wouldn't need to worry about that, but would mean jumping ship again. The top jobs in South Africa just haven't come up frequently at all in my save, but I genuinely think I could win the title with Chelsea (with a bit of luck along the way!)

Should I stay or should I go?

I'd say go @numero uno gunner 
 

Purely because you've proven you can win titles etc in other countries and as you state, the ACL is a real ballache to win

Jump onboard at Orlando Pirates, secure the ACL and then move on - another trophy (and a hard trophy at that) ticked off and then the potential of another club!!

[vikeologist]

Vikeologist's 2024/25 Southend, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria Report

 

I suppose finishing 8^th could be viewed as good progression, but I was quite disappointed. The season took a long time to finish as I moved job and home, and am currently back in the UK for a few weeks on holiday, so I’ve been playing in different places on different laptops. Crucial matches were lost in the middle of the night in airport terminals while I was staring bleary-eyed at a tiny screen not really fully sentient.

 

So kind of a wasted season. We missed out on Europe by one place but a lot of points. We probably played more FA Cup games than whoever finally won it as every round from the 4^th to the 6th went to a replay, eventually going out on penalties in the 6^th round.

 

We probably need just a couple of new players to contend. I hope so, because I’ve bought a couple of new wing-backs, the most important position in my formation. We missed out on a couple of top players who went to bigger clubs.

 

Anyway, we are about to move into our new 25k capacity ground which has been 2 years in the planning and building. We have a lot of money, so I’m looking forward to the new season.

 

Top Goalscorer – Zack Faour - 28 goals. Zack has been with me for all 9 of my seasons at Southend; the first 4 on loan, and the last 5 belonging to us. This has been his best season, although he only finished ahead of the usual guy, R H-M, because he takes the penalties. The problem is that while our 2 front-men scored 54 goals, the rest of the team only scored 20 between them, so we need more goals from our midfield, and even more so from our wing-backs.

 

Average Rating – Nik Weiss 7.61. As ever our best player.

 

Man of the Match – Zack Faour – 8

 

Internationally I won the West Asian Football Federation Championship with Saudi Arabia, but they weren’t going to win the Asian Cup, or even qualify for the World Cup, so I moved to Nigeria. I had to choose between Nigeria and Tunisia who were neck and neck in their World Cup qualifying group. I was tempted to go with Tunisia because I thought they might be the better squad with lower expectations, but I made the right choice. As mentioned in an above post, it nearly went pear shaped when we were 3-0 down in a group stage match, but we ended up winning 4-3, and finished a country mile above Tunisia to qualify.

 

Nigeria are pretty good, but we don’t have a good goalie, and that may prove fatal when we play against better teams capable of getting the ball anywhere near him.

Season	Team					Position	Notes										Challenge Landmarks

15/16	Unemployed				n/a		I have my standards and I'm sticking to them	
16/17	Southend (England League 1)		13th		Yawn
17/18	Southend				13th		Wake me up when tomorrow comes
18/19 	Southend				8th		Missed out on playoffs in final game of the season
19/20	Southend				1st		English league 1 Champions. League cup semi-finalists
20/21	Southend				4th		Lost Playoff final in extra time. League cup semi-finalists again
21/22	Southend				1st		Won league by a country mile. FA Cup semi-finalists.
22/23	Southend				15th		Lost final 6 matches and achieved safety in final game of the season (if being thrashed by one of the other relegation contenders counts as an achievement).
23/24	Southend				15th		Consistently inconsistent
24/25	Southend				8th		The best team of the bad teams



Year	Team					Achievements	
2019-22	South Africa				2020 CHAN Champions. 
						Eliminated in group stage of 2021 African CoN
						Qualified for 2022 World Cup
						Eliminated in group stage of 2022 World Cup. Quit to manage a better team in Ghana.
2022-23	Ghana					Lost in World Cup 2nd round in my first match in charge
						Sacked after losing in Q/F of ACON - to South Africa!
2023-25	Saudi Arabia				Qualified for Final group Stage of WC Qualifiers and won West Asia Football Federation Championship
2023-	Nigeria					Qualified for World Cup



Challenge Progress

Club
 0/10 top domestic leagues 
 0/10 domestic cups 
 0/5 club continental championships 
 0/1 club world championship

 

Edited August 15, 2016 by vikeologist

[numero uno gunner]

@threelions1goal - Decided to stay at Chelsea after seeing Orlando Pirates had lost the first leg of the semi final and had two fit defenders ahead of the second leg. Of course they went on to win the Champions League. Ugh. I better win the league with Chelsea now...

Edit - Its a good job I stayed at Chelsea. Completely forgot I haven't won the Club World Championship yet!

Edited August 15, 2016 by numero uno gunner

[threelions1goal]

 

Juventus - End of Season 37/38

 

Well, a season to forget after it started so well, when we won the Italian Super Cup - although it doesn't count to the challenge, it's always nice to win a pot!!

We'd qualified for the Champions League and were handed a tough group with PSG, Porto and Borussia Moenchengladbach (I'll be amazed if I've spelt that correctly!!)
We beat PSG at home 2-1, which was a huge win, followed up with a 3-0 away win at Porto then a 1-1 draw with BMG saw us top of the group at the halfway stage.

The biggest downside to the whole campaign was that my board were dead tight and only gave me a transfer kitty of £8m - which for a Champions League team is pretty poor, I think.
I couldn't even generate money by selling players as they would only allow me to retain 20% and despite repeated plea's, they wouldn't change their mind.

So, it all started to go wrong - as you can see by this screenshot of my results we went on a run that I've never experienced in all my years of playing FM.
I tried tweaking tactics, a couple of different formations, team meetings, but nothing could get us out of the slump.

The board gave me an ultimatum of 11 points from 5 matches, but 2 draws either side of a win in the cup and then a defeat to Bologna, sealed my fate and for the umpteenth time in my career, I was SACKED again!!

As I said, I've never encountered a run of form so bad - that many results going against us was unbelievable, especially as I thought we could build on last years success.

So, the job search starts again - I've no idea where to ply my trade next, whether to have another crack in Italy, or move elsewhere.........all I do know is that I'm not looking forward to managing in France as how can anybody topple PSG, who have won the league 26 times in a row!!

Onwards and upwards..........

 

Season	Team		Country       	Pos	Notes          
15/16	Linfield		N. Ireland	6th	Took over in December, sacked before the end of the season
16/17	Cliftonville    	N. Ireland	3rd	Took over in January, Euro Qualification
17/18	Cliftonville    	N. Ireland	4th	League Cup Winners
18/19	Cliftonville   	N. Ireland	1st	Champions, Manager Of The Year
19/20	Shanggang	China		1st	Champions, Cup Winners, Manager Of The Year     
20/21	Shanggang	China		N/A	Resigned after being knocked out of Champs League
20/21	Jeonbuk		S. Korea		4th	Cup Winners, Knocked Out 2nd Round Champs League
21/22	Jeonbuk		S. Korea		N/A	SACKED 4th in league, QF of Champs League, SF of FA Cup
22/23	Pohang		S. Korea		6th	Cup Winners, knocked out in SF of Asian Champs League
23/24	Pohang		S. Korea		N/A	SACKED after first match of the new season!!
24/25	Seoul		S. Korea		3rd	Took over with 14 games played, qualified for Champs League
25/26	Seoul		S. Korea		N/A	SACKED - Team finished 2nd & won FA Cup
26/27	Kaizer Chiefs	S. Africa		1st	Champions
27/28	Kaizer Chiefs	S. Africa		1st	Champions, KO Cup Winner, S/F Champs League - Resigned
28/29	Houston		USA		2nd	1st in West Conference, Lost in MLS Shield  Final, SF of NACL
29/30	Tigres		Mexico		4th	Closing Stage, SF of Champions League	
30/31	Tigres		Mexico		3rd 	Opening Stage - Lost in Final to Pumas -  reached SF of Cup
30/31	Tigres		Mexico		1st 	Closing Stage - Won in Final - Champions!!  2nd Rnd Copa Libertadores
31/32	Tigres		Mexico		1st	Opening Stage - Lost in Final to Pumas, Qualified for KO stage of NACL
31/32	Tigres		Mexico		7th	Closing Stage - Lost in SF of Play Offs, Lost in SF of NACL.....SACKED!!
32/33	Pumas		Mexico		1st	Closing Stage, Won in Final - Champions!!, NACL Winners
33/34	Inter Milan	Italy		6th	Qualified for Euro Cup - Boardroom disagreement - SACKED!!
34/35	Lazio		Italy		7th	Took over in December, team in 14th Position
35/36	Lazio		Italy		N/A	Was 14th in December, players all unhappy.....SACKED!!
36/37	Juventus		Italy		2nd	Qualified for Champions League, Italian Cup Winners
37/38	Juventus		Italy		N/A	Won Super Cup, Went 12 matches without a win....SACKED!!




International
2026	Camaroon	Africa		Resigned after 2 matches
2026	Morocco		Africa		Eliminated in Group Stage at World Cup, qualified for ACON
2027	Morocco		Africa		ACON Winners - resigned straight after
2029	Australia		Asia		Qualified for World Cup
2030	Australia		Asia		Knocked Out In Group Stages, lost every match - SACKED!!
2033	Jamaica		N. America	Lost in Final of Gold Cup - Resigned
2034	Iran		Asia		Lost in QF of Asian Cup - SACKED!!

Challenge Progress

Club
4/10 top domestic leagues (N. Ireland, China, S. Africa, Mexico)
5/10 domestic cups (N. Ireland, China, S. Korea, S. Africa, Italy)
1/5 club continental championships (NACL - Pumas)
0/1 club world championship

International
1/5 continental tournaments (ACON - Morocco 2027)
0/2 world tournaments ()
 

Edited August 17, 2016 by threelions1goal

[Collzy]

Been quite slow progress this week, haven't been able to play as much as I'd like as I've been busy, but got a fairly quiet weekend coming up, should complete the current season tonight as there's only about 4 league games left (and probably the end of my Shenxin career)

 

Quick question on international management, I haven't done it at all this year. I'm presuming at the beginning of the game it's better to take over some of the under23's sides as the main team are unlikely to due to reputation/ability? I'm not in that big a rush to jump into international management yet though, will probably wait for my reputation to be better to get a higher chance of joining the better sides.

[numero uno gunner]

            

Season Review 2029/30

Chelsea and Italy

As you may have read, I had a wobble in September where I almost jumped ship to Orlando Pirates, but decided to stay put. Its a good job I did, because although they won the African Champions League, I had a pretty successful season myself.

We crashed out of both domestic cups early on, but as I had already won the FA Cup last season, I wasn't hugely concerned by this. I had two aims for the season: win the title, and win the Club World Championships, which were being held in, of all places, South Africa. Its like they knew I was destined to end up there this season...

A 2-0 semi final win over Xolos Tijuana, with second half goals from Sandro Bohr and Gabriel Barbosa (in his second spell at the club) put us through to face Internacional in the final. In the end, it was a routine win, 3-0 up before half time, before we took our foot off the gas and allowed them to get a goal back. And that was how it finished. Another trophy in the bag, and one that has been a long time coming due to taking a long time to win the Champions League, and my Corinthians team not being quite good enough to get me over the line previously.

Speaking of the Champions League, after topping a group containing Real Madrid and Roma, my last-16 curse struck again, as we were beaten 4-2 on aggregate by AC Milan. I'm so, so glad I managed to win this competition last season, as I don't think I'm likely to get close again now.

And so we come to what was an incredibly close title race between us and Arsenal. After I clawed my way back to draw 2-2 with them, we were 5 points behind with 7 games to go. By four games to go, we were level pegging, with them one goal up on goal difference. Back-to-back wins against Southampton (1-0) and third-placed Stoke (3-0) were matched by Arsenal, and then disaster struck. A 3-3 draw at Aston Villa, coupled with an Arsenal win, left us needing to beat Burnley by three goals and hope that Arsenal failed to win away at Newcastle, who were chasing the fourth Champions League spot. By just after the hour, we were 3-0 up. Arsenal had taken a lead at Newcastle, but a goal by my old Colombian striker Luis Gil had levelled things up. As it stood, we were winning the title by one goal. Burnley then hit the post, and my heart was in my mouth. If we conceded, the title would be heading to North London. I went ultra defensive. Then there were murmurings in the crowd. A goal had gone in at Newcastle, in the 88th minute, which would ultimately decide the fate of the title race. And Gil had scored again, putting Newcastle 2-1 up and gifting us the title! What is it about North London clubs and bottling it in the North East on the last day of the season?! Wild celebrations began, and I find myself now needing single figures in terms of trophies to complete this challenge!

I resigned as manager of Chelsea before going into the World Cup with Italy. Despite the fact I didn't need to manage in the World Cup, or with Italy at all for that matter, I carried on as manager because I was enjoying managing the Azzurri. I shouldn't have.

We were woeful in the World Cup. A 1-0 win over Venezuela was followed up by a 1-0 defeat to eventual winners Holland. I fully expected Holland to beat Venezuela, but it ended 1-1, and that was enough to knock us out. Why? We failed to beat Australia. Australia, who had lost 4-0 to the Dutch and 6-0 to Venezuela. I was fuming, but did the honourable thing and resigned.

After the World Cup I had a plethora of opportunities, including being headhunted by Holland and France, but I've spurned them to go for a trophy I've yet to win. Mexico, Costa Rica, South Korea and China all needed a new boss, and I've taken on one of them, but you'll have to wait until my next update to see which. As it stands, I've not landed a new club job yet. Leverkusen, who had won the Bundesliga for 6 of the past 8 seasons, finished 5th last year and offered me their job, but the squad was an utter shambles, and I expected better opportunities to come up after the World Cup as nations change their managers. Incidentally, on top of those nations already listed, Spain, England, Brazil and Argentina also now have new men at the helm. 2030 was definitely a year to have landed a top job internationally!

 

Club
Season        Team             Position      Notes and Achievements
2015/16      Dungannon     10th          Won Northern Irish FA Cup and kept Dungannon up after taking over with 3 games to go
2016/17      Dungannon     8th            A solid but unspectacular season
2017/18      Yiteng            8th            A settling season in China
2019           Jiangsu          1st            Won Chinese Super League and FA Cup, as well as claiming MOTY.
2020           Jiangsu          1st            Won Chinese Super League and Asian Champions League
2020/21      Aberdeen       9th            Won Scottish League Cup
2021/22      Monterrey      5th/5th      Won Opening Stage, knocked out in semis of closing stage. Won NACL.
2021/22      Salzburg        1st             Won league and cup double
2022           Corinthians    1st             Won league
2023           Corinthians    8th             Won Copa Libertadores
2024/25      Juventus        1st             Won Serie A and Italian Cup
2025/26      Juventus        2nd            Won Italian Cup
2026/27      Real Madrid    1st             Won La Liga and Spanish Cup
2027/28      Real Madrid    1st             Won La Liga and Spanish Cup

2028/29     Everton             10th          Knocked out of both cups and Europa League. Left them in 10th with 10 games to go.

2028/29     Chelsea             4th            Took over with 10 games to go and club in 8th. Won FA Cup and Champions League!

2029/30     Chelsea             1st           Won the title on the last day of the season!

Season        Team              Notes and Achievements
2016/17      Congo              Resigned without playing a game
2016/17      Cameroon       One win away from WC qualification
2017/18      Cameroon       2nd round of 2018 World Cup
2019           Cameroon        African Cup of Nations winner!
2021           Poland              An abject failure!
2022           Ireland              4 wins, 2 draws and promotion to European International League Division B
2023           Ireland              2 wins, 2 defeats from 4 qualifiers before taking Colombia job
2024/25      Colombia        Currently top of WC qualifying and ranked 4th in the world
2026           Colombia         World Cup winners!
2027           Colombia         Copa America winners!
2028           Italy                  European Championship winners!

2029           Italy                  Confederations Cup winners!

2030          Italy                   Knocked out of World Cup in group stage!

 

Challenge Progress

Club

7/10 top domestic leagues - China (Jiangsu), Mexico (Monterrey), Austria (Salzburg), Brazil (Corinthians), Italy (Juventus), Spain (Real Madrid), England (Chelsea)

7/10 domestic cups - Northern Ireland (Dungannon), China (Jiangsu), Scotland (Aberdeen), Austria (Salzburg), Italy (Juventus x 2), Spain (Real Madrid), England (Chelsea)

4/5 club continental championships - ACL (Jiangsu), NACL (Monterrey), Copa Libertadores (Corinthians), Uefa Champions League (Chelsea)

1/1 club world championship - Chelsea 2029

International

3/5 continental tournaments - ACON (Cameroon 2019), Copa America (Colombia 2027), European Championships (Italy 2028)

2/2 world tournaments - World Cup (Colombia 2026), Confederations Cup (Italy 2029)

 

EDIT - What the hell? My reputation is still at 90%, I won the league title and Club World Cup last season, and yet Dortmund and Schalke don't even shortlist me? Not impressed!

Edited August 19, 2016 by numero uno gunner

[Fadedaf]

LA Galaxy Season 2022

well, i have gone from some of my most enjoyable seasons on fm with Lech to probably my least enjoyed. Not necessarily because of results, it was just a generally irritating season. anyways here's a review!

NACL- we started in the quarter final against Chivas where we lost the away leg 1-0 and could only manage a 1-1 draw in the return leg. A narrow loss but not too disappointing because my team was very unfit and not familiar with the tactic. This however was a bad omen for the season to come. We started the next year's champions league with the group stage later on, where we beat Alajuelense and Tivoli Gardens home and away to send us into the quarter finals for next season. I half-expected somehow i'd draw Sporting in the champions league again but being on another continent seems to have stopped that trend finally!

League- We absolutely dominated all season, i've never been so far ahead for so much of the season before. We won the Supporters shield with 6 matches to play and finished in the lead by 25 points. we then went into the playoffs, where we won our semi final against Colorado easily over two legs, then dispatched Portland Timbers even more clinically to win the Western conference. This sent us into the MLS final against Orlando City. This was an absolute disaster. We took the lead early on and all was going well, until a ridiculous own goal by my keeper, Brad Guzan followed swiftly by a red card for star midfielder Evan Fernandez. They equalised and took the lead and were up 2-1 until the 80th minute. We grabbed an equaliser through Gyasi Zardes and i thought it would propel us to the win. Only Orlando did not agree, and broke the Galaxy hearts with an 87th minute winner. We then had a great chance in the 91st where my striker Giovani dos Santos missed a completely open goal from about 6 yards. We had 10% more possession, 10 more shots and this was with 10 men for most of the game so i was incredibly disappointed.

Cup- believe it or not, i've done it again! lost to an extremely inferior lower league side in the cup. We were heavily affected by the world cup with 7 of my best players called up in the middle of the season as well as having 2 long term injuries. i was forced to field a side with plenty of virtual grey players but i still thought we'd easily beat Sacramento Republic. But no! we managed a 2-2 draw in 120 mins as my strikers missed some absolute sitters over and over and we were beaten on penalties. Honestly we deserved to lose the game on how badly we played, but i'm really not sure how i am so bad at these supposedly easy cup games.

Transfers- was only able to make one this season, Chris Gunter the welsh fullback from Lech. He had a solid season and was reliable as ever. I have yet to really get the hang of how the MLS works overall and especially with transfers.

Best players- our best player was hands down, Joe "the Welsh Xavi" Allen, who ran the centre midfield for us all season. Our wide players Gyasi Zardes (19 goals, 9 assists) and Peter Kayode (21 goals, 18 assists) were very good all season as well. Our centre backs and goalie were our only weak link this season, while a more consistent striker would have been good as well.

 

Overall not a great season, as i have made no progress towards the challenge! i technically won 3 trophies this season but it still feels like a failure. I'm not enjoying the MLS all that much but i may have to give it another season to see if i can win something. A few good transfers and this team could easily be the best in north america, so i'll do my best to bring home some silverware. I'm going to release Giovani dos Santos when his contract runs out which should free up some funds as he was on a ridiculous $120,000 a week at 33 years old! 52% of the clubs wage bill! i have no idea how he managed that but hopefully i can spend that money better.

International: I went into the world cup with Cameroon ranked in 14th but we drew a very tough group, with England (ranked 2nd in the world), Mexico and Czech republic. We lost 3-0 to Mexico then 4-1 to England. We were knocked out pretty quickly so i decided the game against Czech republic would be my last for Cameroon. We played fantastically, winning 2-1 and Vincent Aboubakar scored his 100th international goal, a fitting sendoff. I then resigned and looked for other jobs after the world cup. Several teams fired their managers afterwards and i managed to get the job with Mexico, who beat my Cameroon team 3-0! I'm glad i got the job and look forward to challenging for the next Gold Cup.

Season       Team       Position       Champ. League        Notes and Achievements     
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16      Clyde       3rd           -                    Promoted to League 1
2016/17      Clyde       1st           -                    Promoted to Scottish Championship
2017/18      Clyde       1st           -                    Promoted to Scottish Premiership, League Challenge Cup winners
2018/19      Lech        1st           -                    MOTS, Qualified for Champions League
2019/20      Lech        1st           group stage          MOTS, Polish FA Cup winners, Qualified for Champions League
2020/21      Lech        1st           1st knockout rnd     MOTS, FA Cup winners, Supercup winners, Qualified for Champions League
2021/22      West Ham    --            --                   Left for LA Galaxy 2/3 of the way through the season
2022         LA Galaxy   2nd           quarter final        Won supporters shield, western conference and california clasico

Season          Team              Notes and Achievements     
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2017/18      Poland U19s         Failed to Qualify for U19 Euros, resigned
2018/19      Cameroon            Started ACON qualifying
2019/20      Cameroon            Qualified for ACON, failed to qualify for CHAN
2020/21      Cameroon            ACON winners, Qualified for World Cup
2021/22      Cameroon            CHAN winners
2022         Cameroon            Knocked out of world cup in group stage
2022         Mexico              Took over after world cup

 

Challenge Progress:

Club

1/10 top domestic leagues (Poland-Lech)

1/10 domestic cups (Poland-Lech)

0/5 club continental championships ()

0/1 club world championship

International

1/5 continental tournaments (ACON 2021-Cameroon)

0/2 world tournaments ()

 

[Siepe1990]

Nigeria (2018)

The first match in the WC 2018 was against Denmark. We trashed them – literally. 4-0 after ninety minutes with incredible play from the entire team, with Ahmed Musa standing out as one of the top performers. Second match: Mexico. Well, 2-0 down at half time saw me struggling to contain their strikers, creating tons of chances for them, losing 3-0 at the final whistle. Next up were the hosts, Russia. I looked forward to knocking them out, but things didn’t turn out as planned. A 4-0 defeat saw me knocked out of the WC after the group stage, really didn’t expect that after being handed such an ‘easy’ group.

After the WC 2018, several jobs opened up of course, and I had to make a decision: stay at Nigeria and try to win the ACON or attempt to get another International job. Well, I decided on the latter and Portugal came along: ranked 5^th in the World after winning the EC in 2016 (beating Holland in the final – my Dutch heart bleeds…) but now knocked out in the QF at the WC by Brazil. I took over there and my journey to the next EC started…

West Bromwich Albion F.C. (2018)

Now, over to club management. Season 2018/2019 in the Premier League and also my first season in, got handed a big load of money to make the squad even better than it was. I bought several players, mostly because other clubs bought away players of mine. I always made sure to bring in a better player however, which saw me signing (a.o.) Donnarumma from Milan on goal, Zivkovic from AJAX up front and Saúl from Atlético on midfield. However, things didn’t really work out the way I planned. Somehow, I went on a horrible run with only 2 wins and one draw in 13 matches, finding myself at the bottom end of November with only 7 points from 13. I decided at that point (November 2018) to quit and try and find another job. That was a decision I came to regret – big time.

I went on a no-club run until June 2020. Yes, that’s almost 2 years. I beat myself up at least 6 or 7 times about leaving West Brom. I should never have, not until I found a new job. No-one wanted me. I have to admit, I was only interested in top flight teams, but I even wanted to take the smallest top flight job there was. Well, eventually RCD Espanyol – after finishing 9^th in the Liga BBVA in 2019/2020 – accepted me as their savior. I’m in July 2020 now, having brought the squad up to scratch, especially depth-wise. I had only little money (like 500k) and my wage budget was already maxed out, so that was quite a change from West Brom. I managed to sell some big-earners and bring in some talents, so we’ll see how the season goes. But, being in July 2020, that means the EC 2020 has already been played, so back over the Portugal…

Portugal (2018 – 2020)

 

Well, let’s start by saying the squad is incredible. I was lucky enough to still have CR7 almost at the top of his game. Combine that with the now a little more matured talents of Bernardo Silva, Renato Sanches and Zé Gomes / Rui Pedro and you can see I had an excellent squad to work with (not to mention the great defensive players like Cédric, William Carvalho and Rui Patrício on goal). We started off in the European League – the first one ever – and went on to win it. Beating Germany and Sweden in the group and then Italy and Spain in the SF and Final. The game against Spain was a real nail bitter, with Bruno Fernandes scoring in the 121^st minute, sealing my 2-1 victory.

The qualification for the EC was next, which saw me handed a group of Scotland, Moldova Turkey and Finland. Scotland proved the most difficult, providing stern opposition and only letting me take 2 points from 2. The rest however was pretty straight forward, so I topped the group and went into the EC.

The group there consisted of Turkey (once again), Poland and Croatia. As said, my offensive possibilities were almost unlimited, which showed in the group stage. We started by beating Turkey 2-0 (with at 20+ shots at goal and only 2 against), followed by a 4-1 demolition of Poland (again, 15+ shots on goal, 3 against) and finishing the group in style by beating Croatia 2-1.

The 2^nd round saw me pitted against Serbia. I didn’t expect much resistance, and they didn’t disappoint me: 4-1 after 90 minutes saw me through to the QF. Switzerland awaited there, who beat Belgium in the 2^nd round. They provide really, really tough. I went 1-0 down in the 29^th minute and struggled from then on. In the 91^st minute, they scored an own goal, which saw me scrape out extra time. Bernardo Silva scored there in the 92^nd minute, which saw me through to the semis.

France awaited there in a match which turned out to be none spectacular, finishing 1-0 by a goal from Adrien, thus sending Portugal to their second EC-final in a row. In the final, England waited. Now, it’s worth mentioning that England conceded 0 (zero, nothing, nada) in their first 6 games, scoring 13 in the progress themselves. I was terrified. I had scored 15 so far, leading the team goal charts over them, but conceded four (not much, but still…). Joe Hart was phenomenal, saving one shot after the other. Rui Patrício, however, was from another planet – finishing the game with an 8.4 average. We finished level after ninety minutes, sending me into another extra time in this EC. Ronald was near to death at that time, so I swapped him for Goncalo Guedes – and he netted the winner in the 114^th minute. We did it – Portugal’s second EC in a row and my first real prize (since the Olympics and the Sky Bet don’t count in this case)!

So, it’s onwards to the Confed Cup and the next WC, let’s see how far I can take these guys!

Club Level
Season		Team		Competition		Position	Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	-		-			-		-
2016/2017	Bury F.C.	League One (ENG)	16th		Took over when 24th in Dec. 2016
2017/2018	West Brom	Championship (ENG)	1st		League Champions, promotion to Premier League!
2018/2019	West Brom	Premier League (ENG)	-		Quit after 13 games with only 7 points - disappointing!
2019/2020	-		-			-		Job search - more difficult than I thought!
2020/2021	RCD Espanyol	Liga BBVA (ESP)		-		Just started

International
Season		Team		Competition		Position	Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	Argentina U23	Olympics 2016		1st		Quit after winning Olympics
2017/2018	Nigeria		World Cup 2018 		1st round	Failed miserably in the 1st round, quit to join Portugal
2018/2019	Portugal	European League 2019	1st		Won this one, started qualifying for the EC 2020
2019/2020	Portugal	Europ. Champ. 2020	1st		Won it! My first prize after beating England in the final!

Challenge Progress:

Club

0/10 top domestic leagues

0/10 domestic cups

0/5 club continental championships

0/1 club world championship

International

1/5 continental tournaments (EC 2020-Portugal)

0/2 world tournaments

 

Edited August 20, 2016 by Siepe1990

[JoeLapira]

Have been reading this thread the last couple of days and it's re ignited my interest in this Challenge. It's been ages since I loaded up my save but when i get home from work this evening I'll get straight to it. If i recall I was managing Busan and aiming to win the ACL. Congratulations to all those who've completed the challenge since i was last around, hopefully I can complete it myself over the next few months.

[Collzy]

Shanghai Shenxin 2017/2018

Well, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't expecting this. Dominated the league this year, despite Guangzhou Evergrande's best efforts. A mixture of incredible luck away from home and brilliant attacking performances at home also led us to the Asian Champions League! I was going to resign straight after, but I didn't realise the Club World Championship was so soon after the final, so I stayed for that.

League

Not much to say really. We dominated the league and were worthy league champions. Guangzhou were the main threat but drew just a few too many games and were always comfortably behind. I had signed quite a few players on frees due to the board giving me barely any funds, some of the players really improving my first team and my defence and it showed. We had the best defence and the best attack in the league. We almost managed to go unbeaten but once I'd cemented the league I played my 2nd team to concentrate on the Continental Campaign and got comfortably beaten twice in a row.

League Table

Cup

As I mentioned above, I signed quite a few players to replace the ones who left on frees and to add to the solid team of last year, so I could now fill two teams. I played my second team throughout this tournament, injuries and suspensions allowing, and retained our title. It was relatively comfortable, which surprised me as the reserve teams defence a bit on the leaky side.

Asian Champions League

I went into this tournament fully confident that we could do something - I rated my team a lot better than the press and my own board and fans did! We are a very solid side at home and capable of scoring at least once in every match, so providing we weren't too fraile away and could get a goal or two, we always had a chance. It was very hard though, injuries hit me hard; seemingly always around a key Champions League game, and the refereeing was a lot stricter in this competion. It wasn't rare if I'd come out of a game with 5-6 players booked and suspensions were common - an extra challenge. I think we got farely lucky with our draw though; I'm sure there are better teams in Asia than the ones we played on route to victory.

http://i.imgur.com/9vpsI6C.png

Other Competitions

As I said above; I was ready to leave. My contract was due to expire on 31/12/2018, but I didn't realise there was still the game against the CSL All-Stars and the FIFA Club World Cup. The Club World Cup was a mixture of feelings. We drew Al-Ahli in the Quarter-Final and won 2-1 with the last kick of the game. The Semi-Final drew us against Chelsea; the UEFA Champions League Winners. This was as a disaster. We got smashed 6-0, didn't have a single shot, a player tore his achilles, and we had 2 people sent off, one for conceding a penalty, and the other for complaining about that penalty being given, both were defenders. Ouch. The third placed play-off put us up against Sporting Kansas City. It started well, going 1-0 up in the 5th minute, but then we proceded to shoot everything off target as Kansas equalised from a freekick. It went to penalties and we lost 4-2. 4th place still isn't bad I suppose, but it's the fashion it happened.

We beat the CSL All-Stars so it was officially classed as a "Quadruple" but I'm not sure I'd count that as a significant trophy, but hey.

"Quadruple" Winners

Competition Summary

What Next?

Well, I did resign at the end of my contract, Asia is complete, but I will return one day to win the International Competition here at a later date. I've loaded the South Africa league to go there next, but I need to wait 7 months before it loads - and probably longer to secure a good job there to try complete Africa as soon as possible. Maybe I'll take up Golf whilst I wait..

Season		Team			Position		Cup		Champions League		Additional Notes and Achievements
2015/2016	Shanghai Shenxin	1st			 -			-			Took over after 12 games with the team in 12th place.
2016/2017	Shanghai Shenxin	1st			Winners			-			-
2017/2018	Shanghai Shenxin	1st			Winners		     Winners			Resigned after all competitions finished. Awaiting job in South Africa.

Challenge Progress:

Club

1/10 top domestic leagues - China

1/10 domestic cups - China

1/5 club continental championships - Asia

0/1 club world championship

International

0/5 continental tournaments

0/2 world

[Fadedaf]

@Siepe1990 you've done very well getting the Portugal job and good luck with Espanyol! what do you think your chances of getting some silverware there are?

@Collzy solid season, that Chelsea game sounded terrible though! are you completely set on SA or are you going to apply for jobs elsewhere as well?

also good luck @JoeLapira!