[FM16] San Giovanni - A Sammarinese youth only challenge

[Jimbokav1971]

So basically, get the old Chairman back and get him to sell some of the other carp players that you thought were good and were actually holding you back!

Is that about the crux of it?

[Bedese]

So basically, get the old Chairman back and get him to sell some of the other carp players that you thought were good and were actually holding you back!

Is that about the crux of it?

That sounds about right

Who needs talent when your players can be fuelled by a burning hatred, eh?

[Bedese]

Europe was pretty fun this year...

[Bedese]

Youth Intake Day!

He's the highest potential player we've had through in a while, but I can't work out if that's because he's genuinely that good or because the rest of our squad has gotten so much weaker. We'll see.

Welcome 'average GK who probably won't ever get a game #281.' Unless we're getting through a great one, we really don't need any more keepers.

[Bedese]

Season Review

Campionato Sammarinese:

Table

Schedule

We lost the streak, but we won the league.

Coppa Titano:

Table

Schedule

Yay.

Squad

Key Players:

Highest Average Rating:

Federico Berardi (YP135) - 7.88

I think he's leaving us.

Top Goalscorer:

Federico Berardi (YP135) - 34

But if he is, what a way to go out. He singlehandedly sent us into the groups, and then went on to score away at Chelsea. If he does leave, I really hope he gets his dream move to a big club.

Manager's Player of the Year:

Diego Peralta (YP141)

He's actually pretty good.

Aims for next season:

Well, this year was very unexpected. I don't think we'll be able to repeat it, though.

Other teams:

League Winners:

Cup Winners:

How the team in CL qualifying did: We made the groups - and BEAT BAYERN F***ING MUNICH!

How the teams in Europa qualifying did: Folgore lost 2-0 to Neftci from Azerbaijan, Fiorentino lost 3-0 to Norwegians Molde and Libertas lost 3-0 to Anorthosi from Cyprus.

San Marino National team:

2124 Results -- 2125 Results

If we hadn't blown games against Gibraltar and Malta (losing 3-0 to Malta is unacceptable) we would have won the group. Sigh.

I'm feeling like the NT is at a stage where we might be able to start making some noise - I know as a manager I'll only have 8 years to work my magic, but it'd be unbelievable to see San Marino make it to a major tournament, so I think when the next Nations League group is drawn, if it looks like a group we might have a chance in, I'll be making a new manager to free up the NT job and applying for it. Hopefully being fired about 90 years ago won't be held against me...

[Bedese]

I'm surprised the league barely went up, but we're back in the top 100 European clubs.

[Bedese]

He's not the best striker we've ever had, but he's up there with them. He scored so many crucial goals for us and on his day looked unstoppable, and at the age of 29 he's leaving to try and realise his dream of playing in a top league. He leaves us after 224 games for us (and 3 on loan for Maritimo), 234 goals, 64 assists, 50 MOTMs and a 7.94 average rating. Unbelievable.

He's not the only one, either...

One of the best wingers in our history, Cervellini retires with 357 games played, 64 goals, 213 assists (!) and 87 MOTMs. His average rating? Only an 8.23. He was so, so good for us.

If we're looking for the silver lining though - it was these two's contracts that got us in a financial hole in the first place. Berardi had a 10% yearly wage rise and Cervellini had a match highest earner clause, so by the end they were both earning 28.5k a week - apart from Michele Tini (YP132) who was on 12k, no-one else was even over 10k. They absolutely smashed our wage structure, and losing them both means we'll save about 2.7 million a year, so our financial worries should be over.

[Bedese]

20 isn't enough to be seeded this year. Sigh. Red Star are the only ones I think we'll beat.

Nope.

[Bedese]

[Jimbokav1971]

I know it's different for you because you simply HAVE to get the players to re-sign, but there are a few little tricks that I have developed with regards to agents.

1. Pay them more. I don't mean loads more, but I do mean paying them a few quid up front with a view to it saving you money later on down the line. As well as savings elsewhere, what you are actually trying to do is get them to like you.

2. I always set 1 clause I want in stone per round of negotiations, (by making it non-negotiable). It is usually, "3 year option", but that's just my personal preference, You pick what clause you deem most important for this particular player and you make it non-negotiable immediately. Remember to only do 1 per round though, (and one the next round and so on). If you do 2 in 1 round you risk backing the agent into a corner and it will be counter-productive.

3. I always remove and exclude 1 clause I don't want in the deal. This can change depending on the deal, but the one's I really don't want are "highest earner clause", any "yearly increase" at all, "Percentage of next sale". "minimum fee release clause", etc etc etc.

4. Even if it means paying a larger loyalty payment to keep a player happy, I will remove and exclude 1 option per round of negotiations, while also just removing the one;s that I also don't like. If you think about it, a difficult negotiation which starts with a yearly wage ruse, a min fee release clause and a a highest earner clause can be completely altered in just 3 rounds, just as long as you sweeten the deal elsewhere. If you want to know how much yiou can afford to sweeten the deal, then simoky work out how much the clause would cost you. Suddenly an extra £10,000 to player or agent doesn;t seem so bad when you realise that's what the difference will be each month.

I can't remember the last time I agreed a feal gthat had a minimum fee release clause in. I don't pay yearly rises and in fact I don't even pay players to sit on the bench.

Would love to see your finances page.

[Bedese]

1. Pay them more. I don't mean loads more, but I do mean paying them a few quid up front with a view to it saving you money later on down the line. As well as savings elsewhere, what you are actually trying to do is get them to like you.

This is something I used to do, and I actually don't know why I stopped doing it. Thanks for reminding me

2. I always set 1 clause I want in stone per round of negotiations, (by making it non-negotiable). It is usually, "3 year option", but that's just my personal preference, You pick what clause you deem most important for this particular player and you make it non-negotiable immediately. Remember to only do 1 per round though, (and one the next round and so on). If you do 2 in 1 round you risk backing the agent into a corner and it will be counter-productive.

I do this now. Usually the only one I want is the three year option, but if there is anything else I'll wait until the next round to add it on.

3. I always remove and exclude 1 clause I don't want in the deal. This can change depending on the deal, but the one's I really don't want are "highest earner clause", any "yearly increase" at all, "Percentage of next sale". "minimum fee release clause", etc etc etc.

I do this too. If they've got a load of clauses in there like some of the bigger players do I'll remove two at once and make it up by bumping up the basic wage, but usually it's a case of removing one each time.

4. Even if it means paying a larger loyalty payment to keep a player happy, I will remove and exclude 1 option per round of negotiations, while also just removing the one;s that I also don't like. If you think about it, a difficult negotiation which starts with a yearly wage ruse, a min fee release clause and a a highest earner clause can be completely altered in just 3 rounds, just as long as you sweeten the deal elsewhere. If you want to know how much yiou can afford to sweeten the deal, then simoky work out how much the clause would cost you. Suddenly an extra £10,000 to player or agent doesn;t seem so bad when you realise that's what the difference will be each month.

Completely agreed. I'd rather pay someone 20k in loyalty bonus and a 20k agent fee than have them include a wage rise that will be a lot more costly in the long run. I won't sign a contract at all if it has a release clause because I can't afford to lose anyone, and I'll only include a yearly wage rise in the most extreme circumstances.

Would love to see your finances page.

Here you go (note that it'll be bumped up by a lot if/when we make European Groups for this season):

[Bedese]

The late goal was disappointing, but in truth this should have been 6 or 7-1.

[Bedese]

They were just way too strong for us. Without Berardi, Tini and the players our chairman decided to sell, this is the weakest our squad has been for a very long time.

[Bedese]

Just avoid Plzen.

Thank you.

[Bedese]

Well, that didn't go to plan. He's gone to Romania on a 1/5th of the wage he was on here.

[Bedese]

Europa Groups it is.

[Bedese]

Ouch.

[Bedese]

[Bedese]

The NT job came up, and I applied, confident I'd get it.

Nope. Instantly rejected. I'm by far the most qualified candidate for the job, but because I got fired 90 years ago, they won't have me back. Superb.

Does anyone know if the in game editor lets you assign your manager to a new job? If it doesn't, I'm going to need to create a new character to manage the NT, and do that each time they fire me.

[oneronaldo]

WHAT.

[Bedese]

That's about what I was expecting.

[Bedese]

Youth Intake Day!

I want to make the point that this is the weakest our squad has been in a while, so it's only natural that the star ratings will be higher. With that said...

I'm excited about him. He comes in with fairly decent stats, but there's a lot of development left to be done. He needs a lot of tutoring to get him away from that terrible personality, but we can work on that. If he's 1/2 a star CA now (and that'll probably change into silver stars when he signs), 4* potential means he could be an absolute gem for us on the wing.

Wow. Wow, wow, wow. Spinozzi looks superb! He's already 1.5* CA, which means that he might not develop a load more, but there's still a fair bit of untapped potential, and I think he could be special.

[Bedese]

Season Review

Campionato Sammarinese:

Table

Schedule

Another title win.

Coppa Titano:

Table

Schedule

I was wondering when we'd slip up in this.

Squad

Key Players:

Highest Average Rating:

Claudio Muccioli (YP144) - 7.91

I mean, he's not bad - he's just nothing special. We've had so many better midfielders over the years.

Top Goalscorer:

Mirko Masotti (YP147) - 33

We're missing that amazing striker that we've often had. Masotti is probably the best of the bunch right now.

Manager's Player of the Year:

Diego Peralta (YP141)

He's a less talented Cervellini.

Aims for next season:

I don't think our squad is much good, so I'm just hoping for a good youth intake so we can start building it back up.

Other teams:

League Winners:

Cup Winners: Folgore beat Domagnano 1-0 in the final.

How the team in CL qualifying did: We lost to Red Bull Salzburg in the Third Round.

How the teams in Europa qualifying did: We got 3 points in the group. Pennarossa lost on penalties to Neftci from Azerbaijan, Juvenes Dogana lost 5-2 to Derry City and La Florita lost 3-0 to Rabotnicki from Macedonia.

San Marino National team:

2125 Results -- 2126 Results

That was a superb WC Qualifying campaign - we came fourth in our group with 10 points.

The Nations League is just around the corner, and it's clear that the bug means they'll never take me back as San Marino manager. So, I'll have to make a new manager (giving him my details) and use him as San Marino manager, which I'm going to do now. It's far from ideal, but it's the best we've got.

[Bedese]

There we go. I've got slightly different stats to my club profile (I'm a little worse in the training side of things), but it's the closest I could get.

Now I just need to give every single player a nickname to give them their YP tag back...

[Bedese]

Damnit. Wales are going to walk this group, so we're going to have to hope for second place and that Wales do well enough in Euro Qualifiers to give us their place in the Playoffs.

[Bedese]

Woooo, sideways!

[Bedese]

Most capped player in San Marino history, best player in San Marino history, and I actually kind of feel a little bad for holding his career back. He made it to Belgium, but I really think he could have been a Premiership player.

[HeyyImRyan]

Congrats on the massive win over Bayern!

And both Selva & Spinozzi look brilliant.

I can't remember the last time I agreed a feal gthat had a minimum fee release clause in. I don't pay yearly rises and in fact I don't even pay players to sit on the bench.

Could not agree more with this. Hate even the thought of wage rises 'just because' and being paid extra just to sit and watch a game from the subs bench instead of the stands.

[Bedese]

Congrats on the massive win over Bayern!

And both Selva & Spinozzi look brilliant.

Could not agree more with this. Hate even the thought of wage rises 'just because' and being paid extra just to sit and watch a game from the subs bench instead of the stands.

Thank you

I agree, I think Selva and Spinozzi can be huge for us.

I've never really had a problem with unused substitute fees - they're about £150 a game, and I'm happy to pay that out to our depth players. Probably helps that our league season is short though, so we're paying for less games than you would be in a 38 game season.

[Bedese]

Thankfully we were seeded this time round, and we should be able to see off Zalgiris.

[Bedese]

Our backups were disappointing (two ridiculous long range goals didn't help in fairness), but it doesn't matter. We're into the Playoff.

[Bedese]

I think we can beat the Scandinavians.

[Bedese]

That's better than I thought we'd do.

[Bedese]

We might be able to get some points against Midtjylland.

[Bedese]

How did they know?

[Bedese]

What a start to our second coming as an international manager. We battered Malta all game, and 4-0 is a pretty fair result. Wales hammered Gibraltar for 90 minutes, but could only win 2-1. Results between teams is the tiebreaker before goal difference, but every little helps.

Next up? It's only a trip to Wales.

[Bedese]

3-1 against a team made up of almost all Premiership/SPL players? Good stuff, guys.

[Bedese]

I could get used to this.

[Bedese]

A great game, but if we hadn't hit the crossbar three times from close range we could have gotten something from it. We've just got Malta and Gibraltar left to play, so it looks like we'll be a comfortable second, and we just have to hope that Wales go on to qualify through their own Euro Qualifying Group.

[Bedese]

Here's how Europa is going:

We're in a great position. Midtjylland just beat Athletic 1-0 in a complete shocker, and that's given us a huge advantage. Athletic and Midtjylland have to play us and PSV - I don't see either of them beating PSV, which just leaves us. I'd hope we can beat Midtjylland (although it's not a given), meaning that the crucial game is Bilbao. Avoid a loss, and we're in good shape. Losing to them will knock us out, but a draw means all we need to do is get a better result than they do in our last game.

[Bedese]

We recovered from a terrible start, but I'm very disappointed we've dropped points against Malta. Even though it shouldn't matter in terms of where we finish, wins in these games are going to help out our world ranking, which is then going to hopefully put us in higher pots and give us easier draws for tournaments. (That's also why I'm trying to schedule friendlies against poorer teams that have made it high up in the world rankings, because a win over them would give us a big boost).

[Bedese]

Well, that was fun. Our starting CBs were both suspended for this one, and it showed. Here's the final table:

I'm annoyed we drew with Malta, but we still got the second place finish I was hoping for, so it's a decent start to life as an international manager (for the second time). Now we just need Wales to do the business in their Euro Qualifying Group (whenever they get drawn and start).

[Bedese]

A loss eliminated us, so there was no difference between 1-0 or 5-0. This just hurts a bit more.

[Bedese]

We shouldn't have even lost this one, let alone 4-0. Learn to shoot/defend/goalkeep please, guys.

[Bedese]

We might have an outside chance at getting a draw against Cyprus, but that's a tough group.

[sherwinriga]

Not a good way to end the run in the Europa League. So, let's see how these teams (PSV, Athletic Bilbao and Red Bull Salburg) going well at the end of the tournament. Then, are any small nation proved to be qualified in the international tournaments (i.e. FIFA World Cup, UEFA Euro, AFC Asian Cup, etc.)? On the other hand, what is "under administration" in the club? Now, that the Gibraltar and Kosovo are finally competing at the UEFA tournaments and World Cup qualifiers in real life, will your San Marino challenge will be more challenging in the next FM edition soon?

[Bedese]

Not a good way to end the run in the Europa League. So, let's see how these teams (PSV, Athletic Bilbao and Red Bull Salburg) going well at the end of the tournament. Then, are any small nation proved to be qualified in the international tournaments (i.e. FIFA World Cup, UEFA Euro, AFC Asian Cup, etc.)? On the other hand, what is "under administration" in the club? Now, that the Gibraltar and Kosovo are finally competing at the UEFA tournaments and World Cup qualifiers in real life, will your San Marino challenge will be more challenging in the next FM edition soon?

They both went out in the First Knockout Round. PSV lost 3-1 to Red Star and Athletic lost 3-2 to Zenit.

Egypt have made a fair few WCs but they haven't made it out the groups yet as far as I can tell. Guinea-Bissau made it in 2118 and came third in their group. Gabon made it in 2110, coming last in their group.

Estonia made the Euros in 2124, Belarus in 2120, Lichtenstein in 2116, Georgia in 2112 - but they all came bottom with no points.

I'm not sure what counts as a small nation in the Asian Nations Cup, because there's a load of small teams in it every year.

Under administration was our financial state, but we're fine again now.

Have Gibraltar been made members? I know Kosovo have, but I'm not sure about Gibraltar. Regardless, they won't affect the challenge this year, and there's no reason they'll make it harder in future editions of FM if I decide to do this challenge on FM 17.

[Bedese]

Youth Intake Day!

Really trying to reign in my excitement here, but it's not working... please be good.

:D :D :D :D :D

He's the best prospect I've seen come through our academy in a long, long time. He looks amazing. Good technicals in the necessary areas, fantastic mentals and good physicals for his age. I think we've found our new Michele Tini (YP132).

FM, I love you. I said I didn't want any more keepers unless they were great - and he is. I think he might be our best keeper at the club, and he's only 16. Fantastic handling (which I love in a keeper), good one on ones (finally!) and no stat that's a massive hindrance. I really don't want to get ahead of myself, but he has the tools to be one of the best keepers in our history.

I see him as being a very good defensive LB. He's useless going forward, but he's got decent speed and good tackling and marking, so I'm very happy to have him here.

I'm so, so happy with this intake. It's the best we've had in maybe 50 years.

[Bedese]

Remember how we're relying on Wales doing well in Euro Qualifying? Here's their group:

Malta and Montenegro shouldn't be a problem, but Croatia and Poland are tough opposition. I'm hoping that Wales can be one of the best second placed teams, but it won't be easy.

[Rikulec]

Finally a good intake.