FM17 Youth Academy Challenge

[darren1983]

Urgh

The ;last game was a killer - We were 2-0 up at half time vs the bottom side and their winner came in the 91st  minute  

[Braumiller]

Welcome onboard @MackieStaggie !

[The_Gato_In_Goal]

 

SV Spakenburg - 2022/23

 

Jupiler League | League Table | Dutch Cup | Transfers | Squad | Facilities | Finances | Best 11 

Finally I think we've started the ascent. Our training facilities are at the point where I can actually notice players improving during the year, so that's great. Additionally, our junior coaching is at a point where we can throw youth straight into the first team, which helps their development even more. We have another training facility upgrade due for next fall so that can only get better. We ended up finishing 16th in the league, so better than normal, and we avoided relegation with 3 games to go which we haven't done for a few years. Finances are still the same, cup runs are continuously mediocre, and hopefully next year we can start to improve even more and challenge for promotion in the next 3 or 4 years.

 

Class of 2023

Erik van Hoof (06a) - Probably could be a replacement for Jamal Chihab (01c), but he'll be in the first team next year regardless.

Rob Bergkamp (06b) - Will be retrained as a CM, but he looks like he could be good in the AP(A) role.

Gijsbert Loukili (06c) - Nice personality, decent stats, has some potential.

Toine Ruijmgaart (06d) - Looks like a fairly decent potential B2B midfielder.

 

Class of 2022

Daan Janssen (05a) - I'll try to throw him into the first team again next year.

Brian Spaan (05b) - Injured for a lot of the year, but he's an unimportant GK anyways.

 

Class of 2021

Mitchel de Koning (04a) - Still behind van Berlo (02a) and van der Veen (04c).

Erdem Yiğat (04b) - Played pretty well in the U19s and maybe he could play some RWB for us if he develops.

Remco van der Veen (04c) - Took van Berlo (02a)'s spot and never looked back. He's improved a lot defensively and is good going forward as well.

Koos van Halst (04d) - Not really too good.

Mike Kuijpers (04e) - Improved a lot this year and played pretty well in the first team.

 

Class of 2020

Emre Taylan (03a) - Still hasn't improved at all which is a shame since he looked really promising.

Dennis van der Wal (03b) - Another good year for the DM who I believe is now captain.

Anouar Scholten (03c) - I think he's almost first team quality, but will struggle to play over the more recent youth.

Sebastão Ntyamba (03d) - He's gone after his contract runs out.

Antonio Werleman (03e) - Let him go cause he wasn't good enough.

 

Class of 2019

Kees van Berlo (02a) - Didn't play so well and lost his starting spot a LWB.

Achraf Rahmani (02b) - Probably gone at his contract expiry.

Nathan Felomina (02c) - Hopefully he'll stay around for potential tutoring.

Hüseyin Boşnak (02d) - Still backs up Ed van den Beld (01a), who backs up an original GK.

 

 

Class of 2018

Ed van den Beld (01a) - Unimportant.

Andy de Jong (01b) - Wouldn't sign a new deal.

Jamal Chihab (01c) - Still a starter, still plays bad.

Jan van der Heijden (01e) - Very, very solid player for us now. Probably the most successful youth so far.

 

2nd Nationality Watch

Morocco x6

Suriname x4

Turkey x4

Angola x2

Indonesia x2

Aruba x1

Curaçao x1

Greece x1
 

 

Career Overview

Season    League            Position    Dutch Cup      Training Facilities    Youth Facilities     Junior Coaching     Youth Recruitment   Achievements/Notes     Top Scorer                  Most Assists          Highest Avg Rating 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2017/18   Jupiler League    19th        2nd Round      Poor                   Basic                Basic               Fairly Basic        N/A                    Tol/van der Meiracker (16)  Tol (7)               Tol (7.07) 
2018/19   Jupiler League    19th        4th Round      Basic                  Poor                 Basic               Fairly Basic        N/A                    Tol (17)                    van der Meiracker (7) van der Meiracker (6.97)   
2019/20   Jupiler League    18th        2nd Round      Below Average          Below Average        Adequate            Fairly Basic        N/A                    Tol (13)                    Oostinjen (10)        Custovic (7.09)  
2020/21   Jupiler League    19th        2nd Round      Below Average          Below Average        Average             Fairly Basic        N/A                    Tol (14)                    Tol (7)               van der Heijden (01e) (6.98)  
2021/22   Jupiler League    19th        3rd Round      Adequate               Below Average        Average             Fairly Basic        N/A                    van der Heijden (01e) (9)   van Berlo (02a) (5)   Veerman (7.06)  
2022/23   Jupiler League    16th        3rd Round      Average                Below Average        Good                Fairly Basic        N/A                    Tol (16)                    Oostinjen (8)         Oostinjen/van der Wal (03b) (6.91)  

  

[Braumiller]

Season 08 - 2024-25

The Season As It Happened.....

Preseason
Professional status, but not for us.....  Cefn Druids and Haverfordwest (interestingly both of the newly promoted clubs) have now joined the ranks of the professional clubs, making it 5 in total...  I hate my chairman.
July 2024 and we make a little bit of Port Talbot history, our first win in the Europa League!  We drew part time Cliftonville in the First Qualifying Round and we won both legs!  2-1 away and then 4-0 at home!  The Second Qualifying Round saw us paired with SC Heerenveen from Holland and they were obviously far better than us.  A 1-4 away defeat before reputable 1-1 home draw.  Out again before we start our preseason friendlies, but we won a round!

August 24th 2024
First game of the season and it is a biggie, TNS at home.  A 2-2 draw after leading 2-0....  Time to start pulling back a little when I lead against TNS.  No need to do this against others as it stands (for the most part), but this was frustrating.  Granted they are fitter than us and that probably played a part, but Grrrr.

November 2nd 2024
The TNS away game and we are both still unbeaten domestically.  Again we take a 2-0 lead and again they come on strong late in the game, a dodgy penalty pulls it back to 2-1, but we stand tall this time and win!  This moves us top by 1 point.

November 5th 2024
While checking through my on loan players, I check in on Leigh Taylor 2022-A in more detail due to him scoring 10 in 14 games at Aberystwyth.  And his Determination is improving....  Why have I not been loaning my poor Determination kids (who I do not currently have any tutors for) out to clubs and see if there positive squad rubs off on them.....

December 14th 2024
We walked into a home game against bottom of the table Airbus UK on the backs of a record equaling 11 wins in a row and the press were making a big deal of it.  What could go wrong?  Almost everything....  We played poorly in the 1st half and went in 0-0.  We nicked a goal in the second half, but still played poorly.  They then equalized in the 79th minute with their first shot on target.  We continued to play poorly, but then undeservedly bundled in a corner in the 90th minute to keep the streak alive!....  
Gave me a good chance to tear into them, which they hadn't had in a while

December 26th 2024
After another 1-0 win, our streak was finally snapped by 3rd placed Aberystwyth when we drew 2-2 at their place.  We had taken a 2-0 lead, but we were always vulnerable as both of our left backs are out.  A horrible GK mistake let them back in it and then they equalized halfway through the 2nd half.  No further goals, but a rocket from me at full time.  TNS drew as well, so no points lost, but we blew a chance to extend our lead.
Apparently the draw just set a new Port Talbot unbeaten record at 24 games, but still a little down on the result.
We need to hit our stride again soon, to get the good vibes flowing.

January 18th 2025
The last league game before the split and it was a doozy!  We raced to a 2-0 lead and looked comfortable and then Bala hit us for 3 goals in 5 minutes before half time!  We leveled midway through the 2nd half from the penalty spot, before a 77th minute winner sealed it!  Our unbeaten start to the season survives!  P22 W19 D3 L0 and an 8 point gap on TNS....  We play them at home first in the new set of  games after the split, just 3 days after our mickey mouse cup final.

January 26th 2025
A half rotated side took care of business against Connah's Quay 3-0 in the final!

January 29th 2025
We suffered a hangover from the cup final win, but as a measure to the progress the kids have made this year, that equaled a rather dull 0-0 draw against TNS.  Past years, a below par performance against them led to a whooping, but we may have reached parity with them.

February 16th 2025
A random check of my General Club page shows my Owner Status as "Happy to stay", this is a change from 'Enjoying his time at the club" (or similar, I forget the actual text).  Fingers crossed this means his time at the club is entering his twilight phase.  I cannot state how much I dislike this guy!

February 21st 2025
A big pair of results, even though both we and TNS won, we are 10 points ahead with 5 games to go.  We play TNS at their place in two weeks time in the next league game (we also play their next week in the quarter finals of the cup) and if we win the league game, we would win the league for the first time at the enemies ground.....

March 2nd 2025
Youth Candidates 2025!
Luke Gray 2025-A - A professional but aggressive left winger.  Not a position we have a need for at the moment, but you never know!
Pat Barlow 2025-B - We have started to get a run on central defenders with potential and Pat is another one.  Will probably see a lot of u19s or loan action.
Chris John 2025-C - Very similar to Pat, another central defender although temperamental!

March 8th 2025
Oof.  A tight 0-1 loss to TNS in the league.  Champagne put back on ice.  The lead is 7 points with 4 games to go.  The chase for an unbeaten league campaign dies at the 28th games.

April 6th 2025
Champions!!!!  A 3-0 win at home to Carmarthen gave us the points we needed and after 8 years and 4 consecutive 2nd place finished we have finally toppled the giants

May 11th 2025
Welsh Cup final time and a very professional performance secures the treble with a 4-1 win!  After so many years of frustration this season has been such a release of joy.

Random Notes / Thoughts
YES!  We have been gradually clawing our way up to TNS over the course of 7 years and this year was the year we bested them!  Now we have to cement this and prove it to not be a one off year.
The squad has nicely evolved over the course of the past 12 months.  Barry Lewis 2022-D has grown into our leading goal threat, Matty Jones 2024-B delivered on his promising potential and made the attacking right back slot his own.  We had 11 kids out on loan this year and a couple shone very brightly.  Leigh Taylor 2022-A scored 22 goals in 32 appearances for Aberystwyth and will be straight into the match day squad for us next year.  Liam Price 2023-G scored a hatful for First Division Rhyl, although he still lacks the pace we need.
Our first taste of Champions League action will come next season, and we should be able to start our preseason 2 weeks later as I think we will start in the Second Qualifying Round.
We are now worse off financially than ever, with the Junior Coaching costs outstripping anything we can bring in currently.  Two cash injections totaling ~200k helped, but cannot fix.
Our training facilities have had their categorization downgraded due to technological advancements, now only Below Average.
I think this close season will see a landmark occasion for the club, as we let our last non youth product leave the club.  Club captain Thomas Silva is 32 and not featuring much anymore.  Time to let go and be officially fully youth only
It has been one hell of a season, starting off with our first European tie win and finishing with our first league title and the domestic treble!

End of Season Screenshots
League Table
Results - League / Cups
Transfers
End of Season Awards
* Player of The Year 1st Place - Jordan Martin 2018-D (42%)
* Player of The Year 2nd Place - Mark Heyes 2020-B (32%)
* Player of The Year 3rd Place - Barry Lewis 2022-D (16%)

Season 09 Targets
* Try to retain the title
* Enjoy our first Champions League action
 

[GloryFan2002]

Atlantis FC Season 1 2017

 

So to start of, we survived!!! it took to the final day of the season but we did it. Overall it was a hard season with our best 2 players away on international duty with Curacao for about half of the season but we managed to hang on to to survival with a 3-3 draw with KTP on the final day of the season to keep us up in the Ykkonen.

 

Youth Intake- http://imgur.com/a/do4yG

Pretty Good Youth Intake. Ari Hiltunen 17A (http://imgur.com/a/ReMXb) is a player who already is becoming a first team player and I am currently retraining him to be a CM as he is currently a LM. He also scored the final day off the season with the goal to give us a 1 goal lead which meant their 90th minute equalizer didn't send us down. The other notable player from this intake is Mattie Tilvitie 17B (http://imgur.com/a/p2uI1) a GK who will hopefully become a starter soon. No second nationalities surprisingly but a youth facility upgrade should make next years even better

Table- http://imgur.com/a/uxbRb

SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST. We outdid KTP by a point as our final day draw ended sending them down. We were apparently overachievers of the year as we surpassed pre-season expectations of 10th. Again spent most of the season with a small amount of players the reserve goalkeeper had to play 3 games in the outfield so we have done outstandingly well in staying up. We also reached the second round in the Suommen Cup as we only lost to HJK (the best team in Finland) in the group stage

 

Season XI- http://imgur.com/a/MlRdp

[Pippadoc]

@Braumiller Congratulations on finally getting that title! Hopefully the cash from the Champions League will help get your finances sorted out.

 

We've had a great start to the season, picking up 13 points in the opening 5 games. We just got hit with a major injury though, Yassin Mohamed, our star left wing back has just gone down with a damaged Achilles Tendon and will miss 4 to 5 months. Our back up retired in the summer so we will be forced to play some of our youngsters, and our best prospect at the position is out for the next 2 weeks as well.

The next few weeks are going to be interesting, we need someone to step up massively if we want have a good chance at promotion. 

[The_Gato_In_Goal]

@Braumiller - Nice job on ousting TNS while still not being pro!

@GloryFan2002 - Congrats on staying up, it looks like a hard league to do so.

[MCPlay]

@Braumiller Congrats! Great to see you get your first of what I'm certain will be many league titles. Also cool to see Haverfordwest being promoted and turning pro, hopefully they can establish themselves as a good welsh team in the years to come. Good luck in the CL-qualifiers, its possible to get some lucky draws and quickly get into the third round. And anything can happen from there on in, I should know

[Shankly84]

So in the second season our luck ran out. Despite starting with 5 straight wins (I thought we'd be going up haha) we were relegated with one game to go and I was sacked the following day. So I'll be back to the drawing board. Going to start again tonight. Not sure what country to go for yet.

[AliG]

Hi all,

Decided to give this challenge a try for the first time. Can somebody please direct me to the screen where I can view the promoted teams? Also, having gone on holiday until 5th June in Austria, I didn't get a league reset until 16th June, is this just a typo in the first post?

[The_Gato_In_Goal]

2 minutes ago, AliG said:

Hi all,

Decided to give this challenge a try for the first time. Can somebody please direct me to the screen where I can view the promoted teams? Also, having gone on holiday until 5th June in Austria, I didn't get a league reset until 16th June, is this just a typo in the first post?

Could be a typo, but you can search "Austria" and then click on the nation, then mouse over "overview" in the top left, and then click on "season summary"

It should be somewhere in their under "Promoted teams" from whatever the lower division is.

[AliG]

1 hour ago, The_Gato_In_Goal said:

Could be a typo, but you can search "Austria" and then click on the nation, then mouse over "overview" in the top left, and then click on "season summary"

It should be somewhere in their under "Promoted teams" from whatever the lower division is.

Thanks, found it now!

[MackieStaggie]

Thanks for the welcome @Braumiller and congrats on the first of undoubtedly many titles in Wales.

Dalbeattie Star

Season 2 - 2018/2019
 

Senior Squad

Goalkeepers - Keeping Willie MacLeod as my first choice and Frank Polworth as the reserve keeper.  Halfway through the season Frank starts making demands to play but is not near the standard (nor is Willie but he's the better choice) and starts throwing his toys out of the pram.  Needless to say Frank will not be getting a contract extension by the end of the year.

Defenders - Added 3 players for the youth set up into the senior squad to make up the numbers, our captain Fabio Capuano who was a standout last season had a poor season by his standard leading him to being replaced after Jan with one of out youth players Grant Loy (2018) for a few weeks in a bit to give him a rest.  It worked and Fabio picked up his form in the vital run in to the end of the season.  All defenders will be given a contract extension.

Midfielders - Gary Johnstone 2018 was brought into the senior team to provide a little depth into the team.  James Batty proved to be a bit injury prone with a few non-serious injuries but was a key player when he did play.  Again all players will be getting a contract extension.

Strikers - The goals from Higgens and Wood from last season ran dry this season, not sure why and it took a fair number of tweks to the 4-4-2 formation to get it back rolling again.  Due to a decent find in the Youth Intake which I'll come to latter Greg Wood will not be returning, he suffered a number of serious injuries this season and sadly has seen his stats drop quite a bit.

Season Review

Scottish League Cup - No major big team for a bumper away day fund, but some tough teams to play and it shows.  Only one point gained after losing the penalty shootout for the extra point.  Still was not expecting much here.

Challenge Cup - This was rather embarrassing.  A game in which we were next to useless, the 1-0 defeat to Hamilton Accies U20's flatters us.  This should have been a warning for the season ahead tbh.

Scottish Cup - This was where I was hoping to get a decent run into the 4th round to gain some money and we got that.....kind of.  Narrowly beating Clachnacuddin and Stirling Albion in the 2nd and 3rd rounds sets up a home tie to St Johnstone.  Unfortunately the game was postponed on the Saturday and was rescheduled for the following Wednesday which may explain the rather poor attendance.  Still decent prize money at this level to getting this far in.

League 2  - Aim once again was survival and this was a brutally tough season to go through.  Spending most our time sitting in 10th but never far off it looked as if it was a relegation playoff for survival.  However the fixtures gave me a fighting chance going into the last game of the season.  I was only 1 point behind Peterhead where I had a home game against 4th place Elgin while Peterhead travel to League champions Arbroth.  Could the Star survive, could we get lucky.......oh yes we did.  A 2-1 win against Elgin and a 4-2 defeat for Peterhead means that once again we escape the relegation playoff.  Peterhead would then go on to lose that playoff 4-2 to Gretna 2008.  I seem to be a jinx at the moment.

Finances  - A bit better due to a semi decent cup run, still not enough for the chairman to develop our facilities however.

Youth Intake 2019

After filling up in last season intake, it's time to be more selective.  I decided anyone showing at least 3 star potential was going to have that chance to show their worth on a youth contract, so what did we get?  

Lewis McLean (2019) - The gem in the dirt, a striker with a current ability of 3 star puts him as our 2nd best striker at the moment.  He'll be going straight into the senior team but not necessary the starting 11, want to be careful with him.

Frank Paterson (2019) and Alex Gray (2019) - since we are losing our reserve keeper signed both to play in the U20's while the current U20 keeper gets brought into the 1st team.

Simon Wedge (2019) - Needing a DL so brought in, decent potential but sadly low determination, will see if I can tutor with a senior play to buck that up.

Peter Reid (2019) - Central defender with decent potential, will give him a chance in the U20 and look to see if i can loan him out at some stage.

Kyle Ballantyne (2019) - the U20 team is lacking in CM and 1st team is not exactly swimming in talent in that area either, another one will do no harm

Ronnie Carmichael (2019) - An attacking midfielder I plan to train as a CM if not an AML or AMR, will see how my tactic develops.

Season developments

At the end of the season, I got the message through that my chairman was looking to step aside.  It's still in the early stages so may not come to anything but fingers crossed I get one of those rich Saudi Sheikhs whose love of Scotland turns him towards The Star.......more likely I'll get a dodgy local businessman.

Season 3 preview - Like an episode of Pinky and The Brain, it's the same thing we do every night.  Try to take over th.......I mean avoid relegation and get a decent cup run.

Season     League    Postion   Challenge Cup   League Cup   Scottish Cup   Traning Facilites   Youth Facilites   Junior Coaching   Youth Recruitment   Avg Attendance  
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2017/18    League 2  9th       1st Round       Group Stage  3rd Round      Poor                Basic             Adequate          Basic               185 (5% Full)   
2018/19    League 2  9th       1st Round       Group Stage  4th Round      Poor                Basic             Adequate          Basic               142 (4% Full)  

 

[MCPlay]

Season 24

2040/2041

League Table | Transfers | Season Review

Dafabet Welsh Premier League

19 in a row. Lost a game

Cup runs

2 of 2.

Champions League

Amazing performance in the CL groupstage this year. Beat Anderlecht in the first game, and then drew against Juve and Arsenal while massively dominating both games. Then we played Juventus out of the park at home, and ran out 4-1 winners before Arsenal brought us back to earth in a 5-0 loss. We qualified for the knock-out stages of the CL for the first time! The draw was pretty kind to us and we fancied our chances against Sporting.  A good home game petered out in a kind of disappointing 0-0 draw, before we totally collapsed in Portugal. We lost 4-1 as our goalie had a very poor game, we conceded in the first minute thanks to him deflecting a cross into his own net. And he screwed up on 2 of the other goals aswell.

Incredibly disappointing end to an amazing european campaign. Dave Owen 14B will remember that game in Portugal for a long time, and hopefully it inspires him to improve.

Youth Setup:

Youth Intake

A pretty meh intake by the looks of it. The best player is a 4-star rated left back. But only time can tell what will become of this bunch.

Big Fat Goalie Challenge:

Dave Owen 14B - 70 Goals. 8 this season, 2 free kicks. A bounce-back season scoring-wise. 8 Goals is very acceptable.

 

Danny Roberts Challenge

The aim in this Challenge is to get a player to score 1000 goals during his career, national team goals count.

Most goals:

Huw Price 4A - 447 goals in 669 games. The legend has retired.

Jacob Davies 10D - 391 goals in 354 games. Has left the club, so wont add to this. Is currently playing week-in and week out for the elevator team that is Burnley.

Matthew Rees 18A - Club: 286 goals in 264 games. 45 goals in  50 games this season. International: 9 Goals in 27 caps. 5 goals in 10 caps this year.

Total:  295 Goals

A pretty disappointing scoring season, that saw him come in at a paltry third place in the league top scorer race. 5 international goals was very nice though. Hopefully he will bounce back next year, we need him to grab 60+.

 

Semi-Interesting stuff

The amazing striker Bangor City bought before the season was crowned the Welsh Premier League top scorer with 25 goals in 30 games. He teared up the cup competitions aswell, adding 14 in 6 games there. The other teams keep adding decent players from Ireland and N. Ireland, great to see.

Jordan Jones 22B is starting to look insanely good, I might have screwed up not going for the Danny Roberts with him, but I am trying to mould him into a supporting striker. His development has been phenomenal no matter how you look at it.

I also for the first time have gotten some affiliated clubs from abroad. We have managed to negotiate a youth setup affiliation with three clubs, which should see us get more youngsters from abroad. Hopefully a scottish or irish star will turn up!

[QSF25]

On 27/11/2016 at 20:38, Shakes said:

@QSF25 - The problem is Gibraltar has no promotion to the lowest playable league, so it doesn't meet the criteria of taking a previously unplayable team for the same reason that eg Republic of Ireland doesn't.

Wait... could I only make the top division playable and holiday a year and wait for a team to get up?

[Shakes]

1 minute ago, QSF25 said:

Wait... could I only make the top division playable and holiday a year and wait for a team to get up?

You could do that, and Gibraltar would no doubt be quite a challenge to play that way, it just wouldn't be this challenge.

[QSF25]

2 minutes ago, Shakes said:

You could do that, and Gibraltar would no doubt be quite a challenge to play that way, it just wouldn't be this challenge.

Oh well, I wanted to to kill three birds with one stone. 

• Academy Youth Challenge
• Low league to Top League Challenge
• Gibraltar Challenge.

I might need to look for wales then? Is wales rep lower than Gibraltar?

 

[Kazushi80]

Eléctrico F.C. 

Season 1 – 2017/2018

Squad // League Table First Phase // League Table Relegation Stage // Transfers

My first season in this years challenge and it was solid. But 2 days in i feared the worst. My very good goalkeeper got an offer from a professional club in the 2nd division and accepted and declined my offer i already made on my first day. Since he was – like the whole team at the beginning only on an amateur contract – there was not much i could do. All my other goalkeepers have really bad ratings and no potential. So this key position will be a challenge. Because my best striker got an heavy injury and my best midfielder refused to sign a contract because he wants to retire, i sensed bad days ahead for us. But that wasn't the case.

With Joao Gomes another striker stepped up and made the goals for us. And Rui Costa is far from retiring. Yes, he doesn't want to sign contracts anymore, but as an amateur he plays and he plays great. Solid stats overall and he can help us in a few positions. With this two players leading the pack we had never any fear to get relegated. At the end i experimented a little bit, otherwise we even could have finished 2nd instead of 4th in the relegation stage.

The Youth Intake: A lot of promising youngsters. Unfortunately the only goalkeeper is far from first team ready. Some highlights are:

- Luis Paulinho (YP01a): Promising left back and maybe future captain. Gets straight in the first team and will be a regular starter in my 2nd season.
- Leonardo Lobato (YP01b): low determation (like a lot of players in my squad, which leads to the rest declincing shockingly rapid) and i didn't play defensive mids in my first season. But will maybe change that in the future. For now he stays in the youth team, gets  retrained as a central mid, so he has more versatility.
- Francisco Funenga (YP01c) + Wilson Funenga (YP01d) alias The Funenga Cousins: We've so many talented central defenders (there were already 4 youngsters with 5-star-potential at the club). Here are two more. Will both stay in the youth team for now. Wilson will be retrained as a right defender, which should make him to a perfect rotation player for the defense.
- Jose Joao (YP01e): see Lobato
- José Trindade (YP01f): very much needed player for the left midfield. But far from first team ready yet
- Marius Toader (YP 01g): A very good finisher. And since our best striker Luizinho is again injured for 4 months, he will maybe make a few appearences in the first team.

Next season i will mostly rely on the players already at the club, especially 18 year old youngster Rodolfo Machado who developed in a first team central defender and who decided to stay at the club and extend his contracts despite a lot of offers from professionals teams in the 2nd division. The goal is to get more points than last year in the first stage. And maybe, maybe. Since we have no professional club in the first stage this year (last year: 2 pro clubs) and no team which looks really that impressive, maybe we have a shot of making it into the Promotion Stage.

Something else: We had good finances at the beginning, which helped me getting my first two coaching licences. But now the money is gone and it's going downhill. At the end of the 2nd season we could be 300k in debt. Only income at the moment is: my coaches are poached from other clubs and 3 of them are now managers...
 

[Kazushi80]

@darren1983: Thanks for the welcome.

@Braumiller: Congrats to the first title.

 

[Sanno11]

@darren1983 Sorry your season was such a let down after the success of last year, I am rooting for you as a fellow player in England. I am really struggling in league 2 so far.

@MackieStaggie Another solid season under your belt and Lewis McLean looks like a very good player, hopefully he can make the difference for you next season.

@Braumiller Well done! Amazing to have overcome TNS, fingers crossed it's the platform for Port Talbot to become professional.

[AliG]

I have just two goalkeepers on my books in my first season and now one of them has picked up a 6-7 week injury. What are the rules on selecting a grey GK on the bench as cover or do I just have to bite the bullet and play an outfield player in goal if it comes to it?

[Shakes]

1 hour ago, AliG said:

I have just two goalkeepers on my books in my first season and now one of them has picked up a 6-7 week injury. What are the rules on selecting a grey GK on the bench as cover or do I just have to bite the bullet and play an outfield player in goal if it comes to it?

The way I've played it: Grey players only allowed to take the pitch when you have fewer than 11 real players. That means grey players can sit on the bench to meet league rules but can't play unless they absolutely have to. So no grey keepers unless you have no fit real outfielders to play in goal.

[darren1983]

@Sanno11 cheers man, this season is proving to be just as hard (only 5 wins by middle of Jan) league two is tough, I thought the national league was hard but this is something else. Good luck in your season.

[Muttley84]

Greek Youth Adventure - Season 9

Another season in our adventure, with some minor advancement, but the first season we played entirely youth products. We had three older player but I kept them in the Reserves all season to help tutor some of the youngsters. In this circumstance we did our usual selves, finishing 5th in the League and being eliminated in the Quarter-Finals of the Cup after a thriller match with Panathinaikos. So we qualified for the European Playoff where we performed poorly and finished dead last, but still qualified for Europe as Pan. the champions also won the cup. In the Europa League we entered the group stage with Tottenham, Braga and Dnipr, and a scrappy win in Portugal was enough to see us get through the knockout rounds, where we lost against Munchengladbach in a shameful manner. Still, the first time we progressed from the groups.

Our Finances are looking stronger than ever, at some point (although I don't exactly know why) we were the number one ranked team in all of Greece. Maybe it has something to do with the Takeover we went through the middle of the season. This also came with Upgrades to the Youth and Training Facilities and the Youth Development budget. Things are really looking great there, with our sources of financing increasing pretty much and we made a profit of 6.5 million last financial year.

An intense Transfer activity this season, but all of them going out, and I expect more of it to come next season as we are beginning to offload players not reaching their potential.  Performers of the season are: D Korouthianakis 24a - top scoarer and most MoM, T Andreadakis 19a - highest average rating, C Ntoupis 17a - most assists. Good performance for two of the prospects from last year's intake, as G Stergiopoulos 25e and S Vasilakakis 25b managed to get straight into the first team. Pretty large Youth Intake this season, as beginning with this season for the first time I didn't take all the player for long-term, but released the 4 worst prospects. Excited about this player as we lacked some depth in MC.

Our objectives for next season are simple: qualify for Champions League!

[wicksyFM]

@darren1983 good choice of club. Im enjoying your progress. it's probably the only team I would do this challenge with.

[darren1983]

3 hours ago, wicksyFM said:

@darren1983 good choice of club. Im enjoying your progress. it's probably the only team I would do this challenge with.

Cheers, glad my pain and suffering makes good reading  

[darren1983]

Dulwich Hamlet - EFL2 - Season 2025/26

 

League - a season of 2 halves to say the least! Our biggest issue since promotion has been scoring goals (once again our top scorer only got 11 league goals), so I started this season trying a tactic with 2 up top, the trouble with it was that it while we did seem to score a few more we were wide open at the back, in the first 7 games we had 4 different players score hat tricks against us. By Jan 1st we had 18 points and were 23rd and in trouble. So I went back to the formation that I used when we ended 4th, so I sat down and tweaked a few player roles and away we went. From the 1st of Jan till the end of the season we only lost 5 games and amassed 38 points from 23 games. We won 6 of our last 7 to move clear of the relegation zone. God I do hope this tactic doesn't fall apart over the summer again.

League Cup - for the 3rd time in 4 years we drew a Championship clubs away (the other was a league 1 club away) and so another first round defeat for us.

EFL Cup - also followed the same formula of 1 win and 2 losses to see us fail to get to the group.

FA Cup - League One Peterborough we too strong but happy we took them to a replay

Transfers - loaning out guys who probably won't make it.

Squad - Lot's of CBs, could do with a good GK tbh

Finances - we're usually in the black at this stage but tend to be 300K or so in the red but the end of each season.

Youth Intake - one of our weaker ones really, only 3 players tagged and even then not sure they'll amount to much.

Scott Hall (YP09A) - Wide man with nice physicals but that's about it
Angel Weaver (YP09B) - striker with decent finishing and off the ball, needs work
Paul Fraser (YP09C) - another striker, not much to him, solid allrounder with nothing really standing out

Career Overview 

Season		League		Position	Achievements

2017/18		VNS		1st		Champions
2018/19		VNL		7th		
2019/20		VNL		14th 
2020/21		VNL		15th
2021/22		VNL		4th		Promotion via playoffs
2022/23		EFL2		22nd 
2023/24		EFL2		4th		Lost Playoff Semi Final	
2024/25		EFL2		22nd 	
2025/26		EFL2		19th 	

Next Season

Pray the tactic doesn't fall apart and we can keep up this form.

[darren1983]

Lots of progress in here over the weekend, well done to all but a special well done to @Braumiller for the league win! 

[The_Gato_In_Goal]

8 hours ago, Shakes said:

The way I've played it: Grey players only allowed to take the pitch when you have fewer than 11 real players. That means grey players can sit on the bench to meet league rules but can't play unless they absolutely have to. So no grey keepers unless you have no fit real outfielders to play in goal.

I second that.

[AliG]

10 minutes ago, The_Gato_In_Goal said:

I second that.

@The_Gato_In_Goal and @Shakes thank you both. I had the grey GK on the bench for one game although having checked league rules he wasn't required. From then on I had 7 outfield players on the bench.

[Braumiller]

13 hours ago, Shakes said:

The way I've played it: Grey players only allowed to take the pitch when you have fewer than 11 real players. That means grey players can sit on the bench to meet league rules but can't play unless they absolutely have to. So no grey keepers unless you have no fit real outfielders to play in goal.

Ditto - Back in my season 01 I had to play 4-6 games with an outfield player in goal.  A grey has never played a minute for us.

[Sanno11]

Ilkeston F.C Season 6

Sky Bet League 2

League| Squad |Transfers|Youth Intake |Fixtures 1 | Fixtures 2

Season Overview

June 30th: The day Mullarkey (YP18e) and Hope (YP18b) broke Ilkeston hearts. They both left on free transfers and quickly get picked up by league clubs Walsall and Forest Green respectively. We begin the season and we missed those two badly, we looked tame going forward and vulnerable at the back. We managed 1 win in the first 16 games. After some adjustments we recorded 3 wins in a row, however it was a false dawn as these were the weakest teams in the division and the bad form quickly set back in, winning only once in our next 13 games. We were fixed in 24th place, but never more than 5 point from safety. In February we managed our one good patch of form, winning 5 games from 9, getting us to 40 points and amazingly into 22nd place. However, this also coincided with teams above me finally picking up some wins, so it remained very close. Two draws, saw us go into the final game of the season on 44 points, 1 point clear of 23rd placed Northampton. If we win we would be safe, if they lose we would be safe, if I don't win it gets messy. I set up my team to keep it tight and stay in the game, after 2 minutes my left back made a horrible mistake and we were 1-0 down. Score update pops up Northampton are 1-0 up away at Shrewsbury. Our game was over by half time with Cheltenham going 3-0 up, so I just focused all my attention on the live score updates. 70 min: Shrewsbury 1 - 1 Northampton, we are still going down, but maybe just maybe. 78 min, Shrewsbury 2-1 Northampton, we move up to 22nd and safety. 90 + 1 min, Shrewsbury 2 - 2 Northampton. Relegated. Heartbreaking.

We were not often outplayed, but we were always outclassed, opposition teams needing half the chances we did. I knew it would be hard to stay up but it's devastating to be so close.

 

Honourable mention

No stand out performers this year, some players held their own better than others. The only one I will highlight is last years youth product.

Peter Havern (YP22a): Was really solid all year, rarely looking out of place and scored a few goals. Has an ambitious personality and as I type this he is currently unhappy and wants to leave for a bigger club. One season, that was all it took for him to become a diva. At least his contract runs for 2 more years

 

Youth Intake

A really strong intake for us this year, determination aside we got good players in useful positions and with personalities

Dennis Doherty (YP23a) Exactly the type of midfielder we like at Ilkeston, has enough about him to be given a chance

Nick Jordan (YP23b) Although he is still a bit rough around the edges, he looks like he could be a good forward in time

Steven Phillips (YP23c) Good mental stats but weak in other areas, versatile though and has a chance

Brian James (YP23d) Another versatile player, will most likely be trained as a centre back.

 

Club overview

Well, I am yet to see how the relegation affects us, but I hope we remain as a professional club. We didn't upgrade anything this year, I just got a couple of coaching badges.

 

Summary

A disappointing season and one that hopefully quickly fades from my memory if we can bounce back. We have a lot more talent now and in a years time may be better equipped if we get promoted again.

[Braumiller]

@Sanno11 oh man that is soul destroying   Hoping that your squad and infrastructure stay intact during the summer and you are a force to be reckoned with next year

[darren1983]

Oh @Sanno11 that is gutting. 91st minute goal to send you down on GD, think I'd have thrown the laptop across the room at that point. 

[Velodromè]

5 hours ago, Sanno11 said:

We were not often outplayed, but we were always outclassed, opposition teams needing half the chances we did. I knew it would be hard to stay up but it's devastating to be so close.

I know the feeling. You have pretty much summed up my two attempts in the Premier Division right there. 

[Sanno11]

@darren1983 Haha yeah, there was a moment or two when I was sure that was the only rational thing to do. I just couldn't believe it.

 

[darren1983]

@Duroliponte Haha, cheers, when these mythical "good times" come I feel like they will be well earned  

@Sanno11 Have no idea how you felt, been close to tears of frustration this save but that may have broken me (as well as my laptop) 

[The_Gato_In_Goal]

@Sanno11 Tough relegation, but at least Jordan looks a good striker replacement.

[bdavies26]

I am in with Die Kleeblätter (The Clovers) - Rot-Weiß Oberhausen in the 3.Bundesliga. First true challenge I'm taking on.

The club was founded in 1904 and plays in a 21,318 seat stadium with under soil heating. They have spent the better part of the last 25 years bouncing between the second and fourth tiers, and were in the 2.Bundesliga in 2010-2011.

Adequate corporate, training, and youth facilities, adequate junior coaching, fairly basic youth recruitment.

Link to profile. Board already approved my first coaching badge so I'd consider that a win.

[MCPlay]

Season 25

2041/2042

League Table | Transfers | Player Stats

Dafabet Welsh Premier League

20 in a row. Lost a game

Cup runs

2 of 2. In the Welsh cup final I decided to start Gwion Price 5A as he had declared his intentions to retire after the season. He had only played in 4 games all season, but

Champions League

For the first time we had a pretty lucky draw. Monaco, Zenit and Ajax were our opponents, by far the easiest group we've ever had in the CL. Unfortunately we were destroyd in the first 2 games, getting outclassed by both Monaco and Ajax, before we picked up a draw against Zenit. I was furious, I was so sure we would perform better in this group. Thankfully we turned it around in the second half of the stage, and won the next two games. This saw us needing only a point against Zenit in the last game to advance. We pushed Zenit for much of the game, even missing a penalty, and it felt like an unfair sucker punch when they took the lead in the 72nd minute. I was desperate and in the 87th minute I made a move I dare say few other would have made. I subbed out our star and goal machine Matthew Rees 18A for young up-and-comer Andy Jones 23C. He repayed my trust only three minutes later, euqalising to 1-1 and sending us through to the knock-out stages in the dying seconds of the game!

 

We drew Man City in the first knock-out stage. We played very well at home, earning a 0-0 draw which could have easily been a win for us. The game in manchester however was a sad affair, we stood firm untill Dave Owen 14B scored an own goal at this stage for the second year in a row. After that costly mistake we fell apart, and it ended up being an embarrising 5-0 shellacking.

Youth Setup:

Youth Intake

Blah. Nothing good here, from the looks of it. Will be very surprised if any of this lot make it here. We got our first youngster from an affiliate, unfortunatly the lad from Dungannon was pretty poor.

Big Fat Goalie Challenge:

Dave Owen 14B - 79 Goals. 9 this season, 2 free kicks. Closing in on 100 goals, pretty nice!

 

Danny Roberts Challenge

The aim in this Challenge is to get a player to score 1000 goals during his career, national team goals count.

Most goals:

Huw Price 4A - 447 goals in 669 games. The legend has retired.

Jacob Davies 10D - 391 goals in 354 games. Has left the club, so wont add to this. Is currently playing week-in and week out for the elevator team that is Burnley.

Matthew Rees 18A - Club: 320 goals in 302 games. 36 goals in  38 games this season. International: 10 Goals in 32 caps. 1 goal in 5 caps this year.

Total:  330 Goals

Very disappointing from Matthew, who just doesn't seem as lethal anymore. He isn't unhappy or wanting to move away, but his performances just aren't the same as they used to be. At 23 years old he should still be improving, but it seems he is regressing. Hopefully he can bounce back and regain his hunger for goals, because 37 goals in a season just wont cut it. Maybe Jordan Jones 22B is taking away his thunder, and that playing next to such a great player is actually hindering his goal scoring?

 

Semi-interesting stuff

With our recent CL-success we are now nearing getting two teams into the CL-qualification which would be cool. The Welsh Premier League is ranked as the 18th best top division. We have now moved into the top 40 teams in europe, and is ranked at 37. Hopefully we could be a third seed in next years CL-draw.

[MackieStaggie]

Offt @Sanno11 that's the kind of game that has me quitting the save for a while...tough, very tough break.  Fingers crossed that the infrastructure remains untouched and a bounce back season is ahead.

[MCPlay]

Season 25

Legends Retiring

After a long season Haverfordwest legends  Dafydd Davies 7A and Gwion Price 5A have decided to retire. They are the two leading appearance-makers in Haverfordwest history, with 769 and 629 games.  Gwion told me early in the season that it would be his last season, which allowed me to give him a very nice last game. He had only played in 4 games this year when the seasons last game came around. The Welsh Cup Final against Airbus. I decided to reward him for his amazing service and started him.

 

And it was crazy, something like Zidane in the 2006 World Cup(minus the headbutt), he totally bossed the game and got man of the match with an 8.5 rating and an assist. No other player had over 7.3, it was like he had channeled all his talent into this one game. To see a legend go out like that made me a little misty eyed. He played 21 seasons for the club, and apart from the first one, where he only came in through the intake in March, we won the league in every season.

 

A legend who didn't get to go out in that fashion was Dafydd Davies 7A. Our captain of 15+ years didn't give me any warning that he was going to retire, so he wasn't in the squad for the cup final. I tried to talk him out of it, but he was adamant that the time had come to hang them up. He did feature a lot more than Gwion this season appearing in 39 games. His career stats are unbelievable, he played 19 seasons for us, and we won the league in every single one. He scored in 18 straight Welsh PL seasons and had 9 seasons of over 7.50 rating and a couple very close ones. That he only got 2 Caps for Wales is a joke, whatever he may have lacked in ability he surely made up for in character. Dafydd was named Welsh Premier League player of the year 4 times, and Welsh Premier of the league twice. Our great leader and captain had started taking coaching badges, and was promtply made Manager of the reserve team after his retirement.

 

The in-game news item following their retirement was eye-popping stuff:

Gwion Price 5A | Dafydd Davies 7A

[darren1983]

This is going to be the season where my luck finally runs out. In 21 league games we've score 9 goals. Our top scorer from last few seasons hasn't scored since the opening day and his back has 1 goal in the cup to his name, nothing I do is helping. 

[Sanno11]

@darren1983 I am keeping my fingers crossed for you mate. How different are you playing now compared to the season where you reached the playoffs?

[darren1983]

@Sanno11 cheers, though in the 8 games since my last post we've won 6 drawn 1 and lost 1 (away to the league leaders) with both strikers ending their long runs without scoring so maybe I should complain more often?!  In regards to how we're playing it's very similar, despite being 20th we have the best defensive record in the league with only 26 conceded in 29 games, it's just scoring is our problem, our finishing is the issue (we have the worst short on % in the league) as the forwards we have aren't as good as the ones I had before and the goals from midfield have dried up as the guys coming through aren't as good in that aspect as the older guys.

 

 

[wicksyFM]

13 hours ago, MCPlay said:

Season 25

2041/2042

League Table | Transfers | Player Stats

Dafabet Welsh Premier League

20 in a row. Lost a game

Cup runs

2 of 2. In the Welsh cup final I decided to start Gwion Price 5A as he had declared his intentions to retire after the season. He had only played in 4 games all season, but

Champions League

For the first time we had a pretty lucky draw. Monaco, Zenit and Ajax were our opponents, by far the easiest group we've ever had in the CL. Unfortunately we were destroyd in the first 2 games, getting outclassed by both Monaco and Ajax, before we picked up a draw against Zenit. I was furious, I was so sure we would perform better in this group. Thankfully we turned it around in the second half of the stage, and won the next two games. This saw us needing only a point against Zenit in the last game to advance. We pushed Zenit for much of the game, even missing a penalty, and it felt like an unfair sucker punch when they took the lead in the 72nd minute. I was desperate and in the 87th minute I made a move I dare say few other would have made. I subbed out our star and goal machine Matthew Rees 18A for young up-and-comer Andy Jones 23C. He repayed my trust only three minutes later, euqalising to 1-1 and sending us through to the knock-out stages in the dying seconds of the game!

 

We drew Man City in the first knock-out stage. We played very well at home, earning a 0-0 draw which could have easily been a win for us. The game in manchester however was a sad affair, we stood firm untill Dave Owen 14B scored an own goal at this stage for the second year in a row. After that costly mistake we fell apart, and it ended up being an embarrising 5-0 shellacking.

Youth Setup:

Youth Intake

Blah. Nothing good here, from the looks of it. Will be very surprised if any of this lot make it here. We got our first youngster from an affiliate, unfortunatly the lad from Dungannon was pretty poor.

Big Fat Goalie Challenge:

Dave Owen 14B - 79 Goals. 9 this season, 2 free kicks. Closing in on 100 goals, pretty nice!

 

Danny Roberts Challenge

The aim in this Challenge is to get a player to score 1000 goals during his career, national team goals count.

Most goals:

Huw Price 4A - 447 goals in 669 games. The legend has retired.

Jacob Davies 10D - 391 goals in 354 games. Has left the club, so wont add to this. Is currently playing week-in and week out for the elevator team that is Burnley.

Matthew Rees 18A - Club: 320 goals in 302 games. 36 goals in  38 games this season. International: 10 Goals in 32 caps. 1 goal in 5 caps this year.

Total:  330 Goals

Very disappointing from Matthew, who just doesn't seem as lethal anymore. He isn't unhappy or wanting to move away, but his performances just aren't the same as they used to be. At 23 years old he should still be improving, but it seems he is regressing. Hopefully he can bounce back and regain his hunger for goals, because 37 goals in a season just wont cut it. Maybe Jordan Jones 22B is taking away his thunder, and that playing next to such a great player is actually hindering his goal scoring?

 

Semi-interesting stuff

With our recent CL-success we are now nearing getting two teams into the CL-qualification which would be cool. The Welsh Premier League is ranked as the 18th best top division. We have now moved into the top 40 teams in europe, and is ranked at 37. Hopefully we could be a third seed in next years CL-draw.

what are the average attendances like. I know last year they did not scale very well as the league and clubs rep grew. same with tv money. somebody had a save where the welsh prem was in the top 10 leagues and clubs were only getting a few hundred attendance

 

[MCPlay]

@wicksyFM I don't have the game open as I am at work, but i average about 1400 in the league. No other teams average over 1000. In the big CL matches we usually sell out stadium we are loaning, which holds 14.500. The tv-money and sponsormoney has grown, but not by enough to compensate for the growth of the league IMO. Will get you some numbers when I get home later

[Muttley84]

FM 17 - Youth Academy Challenge Update

So after 15 pages (that would be 750 post to my counting - not great at math though so if I made some mistakes in adding up results, please be kind with me), the situation of the challenge looks at seen bellow:

- We received a total number of 58 subscriptions to the challenge, with several users having more than one ( @darren1983 and @Shakes both with 3 so far). Of this 58 challenges, 15 haven't gone past the first season (with no updates presented, game crashes, fired or relegated). 

- 10 people have reached the first league in their country, and three of them won the national league: @smp20 in Bulgaria in 2022 (which has also completed the challenge by winning Champions League in 2025) and @MCPlay and @Braumiller in Wales (2022 and 2025). I also think @MCPlay has the longest career so far (i stopped counting around 15 seasons i think).

- The most popular country to play is of course England (with 7 careers there), Germany has 6, Scotland 5.

-  FC Sakhalin from Russia is the only club selected by two users, but neither have progressed far with them.

- Other users who have played at least 5 seasons, showing great commitment to the challenge: @Bartrcm with RC Mechelen in Belgium, @Sanno11 with Ilkeston and darren1983 with Dulwich Hamlet in England, @The_Gato_In_Goal with SV Spakenburg in Holland (finishing 19, 19, 18, 19, 19, 16), @Velodromè with Forde in Norway, @XaV with Imortal In Portugal and @Dan BHTFC with Selkirk in Scotland (finishing 10, 9, 8, 10, 9, 9).

- And of course, @Muttley84's career with Ergotelis from Greece is the most beautiful of all

[darren1983]

Excellent work @Muttley84 

[Muttley84]

10 minutes ago, Duroliponte said:

@Muttley84 Sorry, should I have posted 20 minutes later? 

 

That's ok, I stopped at the end of page 15 anyway

 

7 minutes ago, darren1983 said:

Excellent work @Muttley84 

Thanks, it will get more interesting as seasons progress. Hope you can get read of that most teams so far trophy