FM16: Serie A / B / and lower - Calcio is here! We have pizza & spaghetti!

[Cas46]

I've just finished my 4th season playing as Savona. In season 3 we finally got promoted into Serie B, we led the table for almost the whole season before throwing away a 7 point lead in the last 5 games. We went into the extremely drawn out playoffs and eventually beat Taranto 3-1 on aggregate in the final, Alessandro Capello was our top scorer with 29.

So finally into Serie B where I had the aim of obviously staying in the league, we had the second lowest wage budget in the division. I managed to get some half decent players in and thought we had a good chance at survival. Anyway as it turns out we are randomly brilliant, very solid at the back and just about good enough up front. We led the table for a long period and risked throwing away promotion at the death again but in a straight automatic promotion playoff against Livorno on the final day we won 2-0 to secure 2nd behind Empoli and go up to Serie A. My budget has exploded to a transfer kitty of £11m which is a huge number for us. Now I have the task of trying to put together a squad that can stay in the top league somehow. I've already got a lot of our loan players back again and need to see who else is available.

[estoniabomba]

Started a Parma save with the Serie D enabled. Amazingly because of their high rep I'm able to get alot of decent players on loan who are too good for the division. Romagna and Audero from Juve, Ivan and Oneto from Sampa and Ferrari from Bologna. The leagues a stroll because they're far better than anyone else in it.

Heh, I loaned some of the same players, didn't turn out to be quite the stroll I imagined, though. Mainly because absolutely eveybody was useless at finishing, had way too many 0-0 games with 10+ shots on target. Scraped promotion by 1 point in the end.

[Shake Appeal]

I'm playing with Pro Vercelli. We got promoted the first season (finished 5th, promoted via playoff), and now my total wage budget for a first season in Serie A is about €95K.

I suspect we're going straight back down.

Yep, we went straight back down.

The start of the season was abysmal. I think we drew one game before November and the rest were defeats. Then after a lot of tactical tweaking and young player development, we went on an insane streak of one defeat in ten games in the second half, including narrow victories over the likes of Milan and Inter. We were a 1-0 and 1-1 counter-attack machine for a while. Ended up with 33 points in 18th place, four points behind Cagliari in 17th, which my board were perfectly happy with. I didn't blow all my money, my wage budget is under tight control, most of my team are under 25, and most contracts have a relegation wage drop clause included, so I'm actually excited about next season in Serie B. Hoping to win it outright this time.

Alessandro Del Piero is finally retiring at the age of 42. He picked up two goals and three assists in his role as an Enganche sub this year, and he's now an U18 Coach who loves the club.

[Bernanke]

The Felipe Anderson-thing is a bit ridiculous. Forever tied to giving half away. I just got an offer from PSG for £91 million, but even that's not worth accepting.

[Bigpapa42]

Have not had time to get properly rolling with Fiorentina but I did some testing / goofing around. Kinda glad I did.

Was whining before about the wage budget with the club. They get a decent amount of money to spend, but very little wage budget. And expectations are set. Cancelling Blaszczykowski's loan frees up 44k and adjusting the transfer budget to put a large chunk of it into wages should allow me to do two things. First is sign the couple of high-ceiling players I've targeted and the second is to resign the club talent on expiring contracts. There are a lot of them. Mati Fernandez, Marcos Alonso, Manuel Pasqual, Joan Verdu, Facundo Roncaglia, and Nenad Tomovic all expire in 2016. Verdu and Roncaglia expendable but the others are all first choice - although Alonso and Pasqual are both primarily the same position. I had previously initiated negotiations with them and all are willing to resign, but all of them asked for Key player status and between 40 and 75k in wages, which doubled or even tripled the current wages for most of them. While messing around last night, I tried to negotiate them down and found most came down a fair bit. The guys currently on 20-25k who wanted 40-50k would settle for somewhere in between, which is a raise of around 10-15k and not as worrying.

Since he starts out with clubs interested, I figured I would see what I can get for Alonso. Offering him out at 10m got multiple offers of 5m straight-up. Which isn't bad, but he's a really solid player who can play at LB or ML, so that versatility is an asset. I don't think 5m allows me to replace him with a player of anywhere near the quality so it doesn't make sense to sell.

So the contracts are probably less of an issue than I thought. I did not try asking for more wage budget but I've found chairman aren't that giving when you first take over a club in 16, at least when I've made requests thus far. The only one that I'm still mulling is Pasqual. Beloved club captain and a really solid player but he's 32, soon to be 33. I see him losing the LB spot to Alonso, but I'm loathe to let him walk away. He's also going to start to decline before long, I'm fairly sure. I figure I'll try to get the rest of the keepers extended as quick as possible and hold off on offering him an extension until a bit into the fall. If he declines a bit, he might accept a slightly lesser squad role - though I doubt it.

[stgahoy]

Buffon just got injured to his knee for 9 months And he decided to retire at 31st March 2017 pity I lose one of my key players mid season, espescially such a legend. He could easily play for the next year.

[Cinnabon09]

Just finished first season with Juve. Won the league, got eliminated in the last 16 in the CL by Valencia on away goals. I gave Morata a new contract in January and thought the release clause (that as far as I see cant be seen anywhere?) would be removed. But no, Real came back in the summer and activated the clause. Lost an irreplaceable player and want to just quit. Tempted to just use the live editor and move him back to the club

[stgahoy]

Yeah there's no way to keep Morata in the club unfortunetly, best is to sell him to Chelsea/PSG for £40M.... At least you can get more then those funny £21.5M, but I also found it the hard way...

[ClemB]

I started a save with Torino, a mid-table team and of course rivals of giants Juventus.

The first season I played in a 5-3-2 formation and finished 5th of Serie A. I made a couple of signings thank to the sale of Nikola Maskimovic to Liverpool for 17M€.

I'm currently in the middle of the second season which is a disaster so far. We started well but we cannot win a single match now. I have changed of tactics several times, tried to adopt a more direct approach, etc, nothing has really worked. The last 3 matchs I used a 4-2-3-1 and there was some signs of improvements.

For the transfers, I had to sell my best player, Bruno Peres to Tottenham for a 34.5M€ fee so my budget was quite high. But the impact of my signings has been really below my expectations. They are mostly young players so patience should be key.

[Carefree_Since_1905]

For people playing as Lazio, how have you found Ravel Morrison? I am playing a 3 in midfield with 1 DM and 2CMs. Morrison is playing CM as AP(A) and putting in some really great performances (7.8-8.5) but he keeps getting sent off for 2nd bookables.

Anyone else found this?

[lfc7]

For people playing as Lazio, how have you found Ravel Morrison? I am playing a 3 in midfield with 1 DM and 2CMs. Morrison is playing CM as AP(A) and putting in some really great performances (7.8-8.5) but he keeps getting sent off for 2nd bookables.

Anyone else found this?

I've done 2 seasons with lazio and put my save on hold for a min but seems to be very common guessing it's a bug maybe. What I tend to do now is if a cm gets a yellow early in game I just sub him otherwise good chance he will get sent off later on

[bestbrother]

Gone Lazio for some fun, not sure if ill stick it long term but lets see.

Had a major rebuild, pretty much everyone has been listed for sale, bar Keita as he looks decent irl.

Pretty much gone to the Premier League to try and sign who I could:

Coutinho 55M, Lukaku 40M, Fernando 22.5M, Remy 20M, Vrsalko 13.5M, Nkoulou 12.5M, Cristico 15M so far.... 48 month deals are not really stretching far for me in this version

[bestbrother]

Not even got a keeper, ended up getting belted 7-3 by Juve in the Supercup

[Kaiserwatman]

In third season with Cagliari who are proving a lot of fun . The first season demands of returning to Serie A were pretty easy as the squad was more than good enough to walk that division. Pre determined deals for Astori and Donsah ensured funding was available on the return to Top Flight . Nicola Murra also demanded to leave which was a shame but returned another 8m .

Following a season of overachievement on my behalf and complete disarray from the top sides , Cagliari finished 5th and earned a EURO Cup spot. Inter , AC , Lazio were no where to be seen and Fiorentina went down. Sampdoria were also pretty shambolic just about keeping their noses just above water. Torino 4 , Cagliari 5 , Empoli 6 was not what i was expecting at the start of the season.

XI for 2017/18 Season

GK Rossbach Free

DR Balzano

DL Tagliafico 4m

DC Rodrigo Ely 1m

DC Del Fabro

DMC Dessena

DMC Besic 5m

AMR Zivkovic Free

AML Galvao

F9 Masic 500k

ST Sau

Colombi , Capuano , Melchiorri , Barella , Caio Rangel , Fossatti , Farias

[calcal]

Liked Lazio from when I was a kid watching serie a on channel 4

Used to be my favorite part of the weekend when I was a kid, None of my mates liked it! Wish channel 4 could have it back with a young James Richardson sitting in a random Cafe! haha

FM16 wise, Literally just started tonight with Roma, I adopted them in the channel 4 era so always end up going them...I'm going for strictly Italian players, Also want to manage Italy at some point.

At work now so can't get stuck in till the morning,

Good to see a Seria A thread anyway, Forza Roma!

[Barkers]

Finished season 1 with Lazio yesterday in a kind of respectable 4th spot. Really wanted 3rd and that champions league qualifier birth.

I cashed in on a few of the aging stars at the beginning of the game like Biglia and Candreva and couldn't turn down the near 40mil offer from Utd for de vrij.

I tend to buy players of the nationality of the country im playing in so splashed the cash on two of the brightest prospects in Italian football in Rugani and Beradi. cost close to 30mil each!! but they will be at the heart of what im going to try and build here.

Am really happy with the core of the squad. Cataldi, Parolo, Onazi and Savic are very good and offer some good combinations in midfield. Then the likes of Keita and Anderson and zivkovic in the wide areas. Basta ended up player of the season rampaging from fullback.

My biggest issue with the save is the quality of play im seeing on the pitch. Have been playing some dire football and losing games I really shouldn't. haven't been able to find a settled shape or strategy.

Ive always tended to role 4 1 2 2 1 but on this version the wingers seem totally ineffective and hardly contribute to a game.

*one crazy thing happened on my save, Napoli got relegated!!

[Carefree_Since_1905]

Finished season 1 with Lazio yesterday in a kind of respectable 4th spot. Really wanted 3rd and that champions league qualifier birth.

I cashed in on a few of the aging stars at the beginning of the game like Biglia and Candreva and couldn't turn down the near 40mil offer from Utd for de vrij.

How much did you get for Biglia & Candreva? Might be keep to shift them as well and player some younger players.

[Barkers]

How much did you get for Biglia & Candreva? Might be keep to shift them as well and player some younger players.

Biglia > PSG for 17mil

Candreva > MUFC for 23mil

[Saesch]

Just finished first season with Juve. Won the league, got eliminated in the last 16 in the CL by Valencia on away goals. I gave Morata a new contract in January and thought the release clause (that as far as I see cant be seen anywhere?) would be removed. But no, Real came back in the summer and activated the clause. Lost an irreplaceable player and want to just quit. Tempted to just use the live editor and move him back to the club

There is nothing you can do, because it is not a minimum fee release clause in Morata's contract. It is because Real Madrid have a player buy back clause

[Wyer]

Just about to finish my 5th season with Udinese.

A really good challenge if you ask me.

Moved into a new ground for the 2019/20 season and it happens to be the season I might clinch my 1st title with.

Wasn't expecting the ground move as the board increased the cap of the old ground in the 2nd season and out of no where I got "Planning Permission Granted".

I normally have a Parma save for my Italian save but this has move than made up for it.

Got some cracking regens all coming into their own, 4-5 wonder kids.

[Prowl]

I started a Juve save as well but I added Berardi's buyout clause in the game. Fair is fair. A little sad about Kingsley Coman's buyout to Bayern but hey let's see what happens. Juve will be a little challenging considering that you have 5 injuries already and that will hurt initially. Disabled windows but looking to add some youth into the squad with the ability to make them homegrown players. I'm looking at goalkeeping prospects as well.

[bestbrother]

I got 20m for Biglia PSG, and 35m Candreva Man Utd. On the flip side, Anderson only got me like 35m and De Vrij I couldnt give away!

The biggest problem I found was the lack of interest in players coming to the club.

[evertonmarc]

I don't know that I'll do much with this game with Fiorentina, as I have a save going with Hull and I'm being tempted by my annual game in The Netherlands. But I didn't realize how much young talent Fiorentina had. I knew about Babacar and Diakhate, but there are at least a half dozen young players who could develop into first teamers, and a couple more out on loan. Many aren't really capable of making significant contribution yet, but it does make me worry less about trying to add some developmental players like I was thinking.

The home-grown player issue does need to be addressed. I could just register a few of the U21 players who count as home grown but don't actually need to be registered. That's really no different than leaving the registration spot empty. I'm going to have to adjust the budgets, move some of the transfer money into wages. That will allow me to extend the contracts of a couple of players who have just a year left, and then sign one or two relatively cheap backup free agents who can count as home grown. That will help with that issue.

Its not an overly deep squad so not really a lot of players I'm looking to move out. Two start as transfer listed - Yakovenko and Valero. Yakovenko has minimal talent, but little value so while I would glad get rid of him for almost nothing, I don't know if anyone will bite. I've taken Valero - he's talented, useful, and a fine tutor.

Still deciding who to target. I would love to add some move quality Italian prospects at positions where I don't have a ton of them. Unfortunately, my scouts keep telling me that any exciting prospects from within Italy won't join at this point. I'm really tempted to go after Andraj Zivokvic - he's tearing up the Championship in my Hull but it feels repetitive. Maybe some of the Serbian prospects? Ajer or Hou Saeter are possible options, though I need a DM prospect more than more CMs. A lot of the most enticing South American prospects will be out of my price range, but Mammana is awfully tempting. Especially as I think Gonzalo (who is much better than I realized) seems likely to decline a bit.

Edit - one possibility that I hadn't thought of would be cancelling the loan of Jakub Błaszczykowski from Dortmund. Especially if I get a quality prospect who can play MRL and AMR. That would free up some wages, I think. Now I really want to get home to the game to see if its possible to cancel his loan.

You tried Thiago Maia (think that's his name) - DM at Santos, can get him for 2-3m although not sure if he will go to Fiorentina

[Wyer]

No offense but I don't get why people play with Juventus.

On my save, they won the title 4 years running and only myself breaking that run.

They have a great team that needs no attention.

[Bigpapa42]

You tried Thiago Maia (think that's his name) - DM at Santos, can get him for 2-3m although not sure if he will go to Fiorentina

Definitely one I was targeting. Looks a fantastic young player and seen him highly recommended. But my scouts thought he would cost significantly more than that. Maybe its because I have Brazil running as a full league....?

[Ozil]

No offense but I don't get why people play with Juventus.

On my save, they won the title 4 years running and only myself breaking that run.

They have a great team that needs no attention.

Because I grew up following them watching Serie A? They're also an aging team and will need some help sooner or later

[aderow]

Randomly selected Fiorentina as the team I'll be using.

As money is tight, decided to pick up a couple guys for free. Signed Ricky Alvarez and Christian Poulson. Managed to get Mauro Zarate on loan from west ham because Rossi is made of paper thin glass. I needed a CB but, by this point, I had used up the little funds that I had so I had to be creative. I found a lad named Loris Damonte. He's a winger. He won't be playing winger for me tho. He'll be my backup CB.

Whoever told this lad he should be a winger should be out of a job

My biggest issue so far has been stamina; my team gets is exhausted by half time and that makes it very difficult to play the high tempo football that I want to play. Only played one league match so far and beat Inter 3-0.

Up next is Juventus. I'm worried my team will get too tired too quickly in the match to stop them from ripping us apart.

[Kaiserwatman]

Now entering season 5 with Cagliari who are still trying to derail the trophy train that is the old lady. Whilst the gap is closing it is yet to be successful barring a win in the Italian Super Cup earlier this season. Juventus have claimed all 4 titles in my save along with 4 Coppa Italia Cups and 3 Super Cups but have not transferred their dominance in terms of Europe. The initial squad has been dismantled now and rebuild , then patched once more as the bigger clubs plucked the best of the bunch . Murru who departed for AC Milan has now returned following 2 unsuccessful seasons , Zivkovic has departed for Man Utd and it will prove difficult to keep hold of Besic and Tagliafico over the summer months.

Cagliari finished the season as Runners Up some 9 points behind the champions to follow up on a third place finish a year earlier after some years of searching in the bargain bucket bin to transform the squad. Stojanovic who flopped at Hoffenheim has been a revelation following his 1m move, Caio Rangel also following his elevation from the reserves to cover Zivkovic's departure claiming Serie A Player of the year. Mitrovic and Sansone have been a bit hit and miss following their 2.5m signings from Newcastle and Napoli respectively

Aims for the new season

Enjoy the champions league , following been knocked out at the playoff stage last season

Try further close the gap to Juve , hopefully win the Coppa Italia following 2 final defeats to Juventus in recent years

[Wyer]

I'm struggling to maintain a healthy bank balance.

Each season, I don't need to sell but chose to sell to maintain staying in the black.

Just finished my 9th season with Udinese, 3rd league title in the bag.

Struggling to get past the 1st knock out stage of the Champions League every season.

I've got a good squad all tho from time to time my better players want to leave but that's going by the by with me choosing to sell them to maintain the cash flow.

My ground is now 61k, planning permission to up it again was rejected.

Time for a new save for me I think.....off to Germany!

[Cas46]

Randomly selected Fiorentina as the team I'll be using.

As money is tight, decided to pick up a couple guys for free. Signed Ricky Alvarez and Christian Poulson. Managed to get Mauro Zarate on loan from west ham because Rossi is made of paper thin glass. I needed a CB but, by this point, I had used up the little funds that I had so I had to be creative. I found a lad named Loris Damonte. He's a winger. He won't be playing winger for me tho. He'll be my backup CB.

Whoever told this lad he should be a winger should be out of a job

My biggest issue so far has been stamina; my team gets is exhausted by half time and that makes it very difficult to play the high tempo football that I want to play. Only played one league match so far and beat Inter 3-0.

Up next is Juventus. I'm worried my team will get too tired too quickly in the match to stop them from ripping us apart.

I had the exact same guy when I was in Serie C. His team were relegated to Serie D and I picked him up to play him at CB, unfortunately he was totally average even at that level and I sold him a couple of season later. In the past I've never found positional ability to make much difference but maybe now it does.

[Barkers]

just finished season 2 of Lazio save.

came 2nd in the league, 7 points off Juve but 10 clear of 3rd.

won the Europa league. beating besiktias (sp) in final.

im now ranked 21 in Europe yet my top players want to leave rulli is off to psg for 30. Timo Horn coming in as replacement. Keita is off to monaco for 30+. He was great for me but wasnt getting the starts over zivkovic and and Anderson as the two starting wide players.

now sitting on a war chest of 75mil and a wage budget gap of about 400k so money to burn for the right player/s

[couttinho]

Just about to start first season with San Marino in Serie D.

Half decent team and Parma to challange for top spot this year.

Hoping to take them all the way up and nurture some local talent along the way.

Does anyone else fancy the challange?

[Guest El Payaso]

Finished second with my first season with AS Roma. Haven't played in Italy since FM 2008. I am playing a Director of Football save with them and this means that the DoF is controlling our transfers, contracts, staff etc. and I only take care of senior training, tactics, team selections and press conferences. Makes it that little bit more challenging and realistic. Also adds some excitement as you never know what he does next.

Tried to create a style of play focusing basically fully on playing through the middle and this proved to be extremely hard. We only scored 54 in Serie A and got knocked out in CL group stage. Seems impossible to create that "pass and move" behavior and even players like Pjanic aren't creating anything special with their passing ability. I have hugely talented midfield and I am playing mostly without a striker as Dzeko didn't score a single goal through whole season, Totti only scored from penalties and Doumbia was no different. In that midfield triangle I have excellent two way midfielders in Nainggolan and Strootman, De Rossi in bottom and Pjanic as a main creator as AM. Gervinho and Salah my main goal scorers as inside forwards... Trying to make the style of play quite Italian with 'structured' shape and using specialists such as Regista. De Rossi was quite effective with his 6 goals in the league from Regista position. Nainggolan scored 8 in first half of the season just to see the tally shut down in second half. Strootman out until January and after that did nothing, Pjanic the biggest disappointment with 4 goals and 5 assists. Should get +10 on both of those but both Strootman and Pjanic are player types that FM doesn't currently appreciate. Gervinho scored 12 and Salah 7 which is too few.

Didn't get any money to spend during the summer and I am badly lacking especially in defense as we are losing our loanees soon. Sabatini did sign us Geronimo Rulli as a starting keeper but I don't currently have any left backs and only two centre backs in first team. Have to hope that some miracle happens and Sabatini sells for example Gervinho out with big money and we can salvage something.

This is tough, have to tell you that.

[jcw163]

Three and a half seasons in with Sampdoria and the record is....mixed.

Season 1 started appallingly and was hovering around the relegation zone in around January, but rallied to finish 11th. Luis Muriel was somehow the division's top scorer with 24, unfortunately he has not replicated this form since! In addition to the bad league performance we crashed out of the Europa League in the groups, but we did make the Coppa Italia semis only to get turned over by Juventus, who were strolling to the league title.

Season 2 had another shaky start, albeit less shaky than the first, we again had an excellent 2nd half of the season, bolstered by a lot of new players settling in (Trippier, Orban, Romero, Darida, de Paul), and eventually finished 5th, missing out on the Champions League by 2 points after losing game 37 to Frosinone, and conceding only 4 goals in the last 13 games in Serie A.

Season 3 started better, we were able to compete throughout, although our only addition after a lot of churn in season 2 was Christian Espinoza to compete with Luciano Narsingh for the right wing. We finished a magnificent 3rd, taking us straight into the CL group stages (and meaning we could keep the key players happy), reached the 2nd knockout round of the EL before going out to Sociedad on away goals and reached the Coppa semis again, before losing out over 2 legs to Lazio. Unfortunately Muriel's stark decline from season 1 continued, he finished as my joint top scorer with de Paul, scoring NINE TIMES in all competitions. Most of these came toward the back end of the season, and are probably the reason he hasn't been sold.

Season 4 is a step back so far. The only addition to the side was Zeca to play left back and after 14 games we sit just inside the top half with a record of 4 wins, 6 draws and 4 losses. I'm happy we haven't lost many but we don't score enough goals. I have three strikers on the books and between them they have scored 4 goals in all competitions, with Muriel scoring 0 in approx 11 games. Also we have crashed out of the CL, despite a marvellous draw avoiding all the big guns (Olympiakos, Sporting and Galatassary), played 5, lost 1 (home to OLY 5-1) and drawn 4. Our next game is Sporting away in a straight fight for 3rd in the group to keep our European season alive.

A slightly transitional period beckons I think, disappointed not to have kicked on from last season, and may seek to alter the squad a little bit in January and the following Summer!

[Nirobob]

looking for a download for Serie D... any help

[Nirobob]

Where did you get Serie D from is it correctly set up?

[5iver]

I just finished a multiplayer game with a friend. He was Genoa and I was Torino. We holidayed the first season and started in Brazil - April 2016. I didn't make massive changes to the team, only making two signings, Sebastian Leto for 3.1 million euros (+ bonuses for appearances) from a Serie C team and Zeca as a Ball Winning midfielder from Panathinaikos. They both proved key signings, with Leto being my top scorer. Big disappointment from both Belotti and Quagliarella up front. Zappacosta and Bruno Peres made a solid duo on the right-wing.

Anyway, my friend as Genoa was sacked in February with Genoa hovering in the relegation zone and a horrible spell of injuries. I wasn't much better being in 13th place and my job being 'Very Insecure' after two unexpected straight home losses against easy opposition. Great game!

[abirdc]

Anybody played with Udinese? Was thinking of doing a 'moneyball' save with them.

[unanonymous7]

For those playing as Juve, there is actually a chance to prevent Madrid and Bayern from signing Morata and Coman when they exercise their options. While the transfer offer itself has to be accepted, you can actually compete with these clubs by offering a new contract to Morata/Coman. If they choose to sign with you, the transfer bid is immediately cancelled.

[DaveMUFC]

For those playing as Juve, there is actually a chance to prevent Madrid and Bayern from signing Morata and Coman when they exercise their options. While the transfer offer itself has to be accepted, you can actually compete with these clubs by offering a new contract to Morata/Coman. If they choose to sign with you, the transfer bid is immediately cancelled.

Do you have to offer it after the clubs have tried to exercise the transfer? Because I heard early on that whatever contract you offer Morata, the buy back clause for Madrid is always there.

[SirManager]

Started a save there with Lecce. I've never tried the Italian league I believe. So will be a challenge from Serie C/C

[Trainspotting90]

Started a save there with Lecce. I've never tried the Italian league I believe. So will be a challenge from Serie C/C

hello, im italian

the problem in the Lega Pro its...no money. its real but its frustating.

in the real life an entire league (the old serie c2) its eliminated because many, many teams they failed

in the game the financial situation its very realistic, sign free agent players from the italian lower leagues and player on loan from affiliated clubs or serie a team (atalanta have the best italian youth!)

[Ivan787]

Is there someone who is trying to recreate Sarri tactic with Napoli? I think they probably are playing the best football in the league.

It could be very challenging to try to recreate some movement of them.

[jcw163]

Season 4 still ongoing (MP game, does take a while), but Sampa have rallied a bit.

We now sit 6th, only 5 points or so behind 2nd place with 6 games to play. Have added a few players, Alberto Masi is coming in as a spare DC since he is club home grown, and Ibrahima Mbaye is coming in to cover at right back as I sold Silvestri and my youth product I wanted to use as cover is, frankly, garbage. Mbaye is also Italy home grown so helps us out there. In addition we've picked up Sebastian Driussi from River to come in at the end of the season for less than 5million to bolster our attacking prowess.

Lastly, Federico Bonazzoli has remembered how to score goals and I now have a club home grown, 22 year old centre forward in double figures. Exciting times at the Luigi Ferraris

Current squad:-

GK Viviano\Berisha

DR Trippier\Ibrahima Mbaye

DC Orban\Masi

DC Balanta\Regini

DL Zeca\Jaume Costa

DM Fernando\Colback

MC Romero\Torreira

MC Maher\Karlo Lulic\David Ivan

AMR Espinoza\Narsingh

AML de Paul\Driussi

ST Bonazzoli\Charlie Austin

Going to sell Costa in the Summer as well as my existing spare DC (Forlin) and MC (Vladimir Darida) and bring in another DC, moving Regini to cover Zeca at left back.

Hopefully we'll manage to hang on to a Europa League place or, if we're very lucky, gatecrash the Champions League places again!

Forza Sampa!

[2calvin]

Why is Coppa Italia always 'not important'? is this realistic? I just wonder what the fans in Italy view is. It's the only domestic cup...

[jcw163]

Season 4 still ongoing (MP game, does take a while), but Sampa have rallied a bit.

We now sit 6th, only 5 points or so behind 2nd place with 6 games to play. Have added a few players, Alberto Masi is coming in as a spare DC since he is club home grown, and Ibrahima Mbaye is coming in to cover at right back as I sold Silvestri and my youth product I wanted to use as cover is, frankly, garbage. Mbaye is also Italy home grown so helps us out there. In addition we've picked up Sebastian Driussi from River to come in at the end of the season for less than 5million to bolster our attacking prowess.

Lastly, Federico Bonazzoli has remembered how to score goals and I now have a club home grown, 22 year old centre forward in double figures. Exciting times at the Luigi Ferraris

Current squad:-

GK Viviano\Berisha

DR Trippier\Ibrahima Mbaye

DC Orban\Masi

DC Balanta\Regini

DL Zeca\Jaume Costa

DM Fernando\Colback

MC Romero\Torreira

MC Maher\Karlo Lulic\David Ivan

AMR Espinoza\Narsingh

AML de Paul\Driussi

ST Bonazzoli\Charlie Austin

Going to sell Costa in the Summer as well as my existing spare DC (Forlin) and MC (Vladimir Darida) and bring in another DC, moving Regini to cover Zeca at left back.

Hopefully we'll manage to hang on to a Europa League place or, if we're very lucky, gatecrash the Champions League places again!

Forza Sampa!

2 more wins, including an absolute destruction of AC Milan at San Siro and with 4 to play we sit 3rd, 2 points (and a head to head record) ahead of Milan and 3 ahead of Napoli in 5th. Tense.

[GunmaN1905]

Why is Coppa Italia always 'not important'? is this realistic? I just wonder what the fans in Italy view is. It's the only domestic cup...

Because nobody cares about it, out of bigger teams that is.

Everyone plays with rotated lineups up until the final. If you get to the final, might aswell win it, if not, no big deal.

[Ivan787]

Why is Coppa Italia always 'not important'? is this realistic? I just wonder what the fans in Italy view is. It's the only domestic cup...

Italians, in general, don't care much about prestige in terms of "honour". It only cares about what has a revenue in money terms. So domestic cup in Italy is not important for teams. Probably with a CL access for the winner the things could change, because in that case there would be the "revenue".

An other reasons is that up to few years ago this competition was organized in manner to be sure that always the big team can have a chance to win it. Also now all pairings are made in advance and in the round of 16, with highest ranked Seriea A team entering, is the team with high positioning the previous year that plays at home.

Semi-finals organization is very crazy with 3 months between the first leg and the second leg.

It seems that everything is organized to favour the highest-ranked team.

I'd like very much a formula similar to England FA Cup but this probably won't give the same results here in Italy because are the fans which are different. And here we could open a discussion of a lot of pages about this.

[Trainspotting90]

The Italian Cup is not important for historical reasons: in other countries before the national cup was created and then the championship

in Italy the opposite, the first edition dates back to 1922 and was a consolation tournament, was then forgotten for years to be resumed

after the WWII, the cup has been forgotten again, to start again from the 57/58 season

de jure is a national cup, but de facto it is a League Cup, the formula has changed many times ... and it is important only to the winner, for all other is an umbrella holder

the suppression of the old cup winners cup has also taken a prize for the one who won.

[2calvin]

Interesting.

It was my view that Juve, Milan and so on are almost built to win silverware, that is what you have to do, very much like Manchester United and Liverpool in England. No matter what the reward, any trophy is important kind of attitude.