[FM18] The Dynamics of telling you to shove your transfer request up y- a journeyman career

[oriole01]

Hopefully it's Derby and Maribor going through that group! Good luck.

[noikeee]

August 2026

 

(Transfers)

Just one more transfer as we finally sell Ollie Watkins for a discount price of 100K€. But the best news is that we managed to fend off interest in Erwin Spruit and Diego Fratucello for now.

 

It's a good start. I'm happy enough with a 1-1 draw with Liverpool, and two 2-0 victories over two of the weakest sides in the Premier League is what was expected.

The odds of a good cup run have diminished after we immediately drew Man City in the League Cup, but I'm happy enough with the Europa League draw.

 

 

[Rikulec]

// nevermind

[noikeee]

19 minutes ago, oriole01 said:

Hopefully it's Derby and Maribor going through that group! Good luck.

Thanks. I'll root for Maribor too, we want the weakest opponents possible to go through, in case we face them again later on.  

[noikeee]

Just now, Rikulec said:

That CL group looks ridiculously easy compared to what I've been getting.

Probably because it's an Europa League group. 

[Rikulec]

Yeah, realised just after posting. I guess I was thinking too far ahead.

[Adonalsium]

5 hours ago, noikeee said:

What do you mean about Arsenal?

Spruit briefly played for them but he was crap there. In fact he pretty much toured half of Europe already and didn't do anything special anywhere, which is why I was a little apprehensive when I first signed him, I'm shocked he's been this much of a success!

They landed outside of the Top 6, and with a clear points difference too. I think they even beat you quite handily earlier (?), so they must've had some poor form. Or have they regressed as a team in your save? I've seen Liverpool relegated by 2025 in one of my saves for example. 

[noikeee]

7 minutes ago, Adonalsium said:

They landed outside of the Top 6, and with a clear points difference too. I think they even beat you quite handily earlier (?), so they must've had some poor form. Or have they regressed as a team in your save? I've seen Liverpool relegated by 2025 in one of my saves for example. 

Oh, yeah of course we benefited from Arsenal having a poor season. They seem to be on a slow decline, last few seasons have gone 9th - 6th - 10th - 5th - and now 11th, their reputation is still pretty high and they retain 3 or 4 world class players but it's starting to look like a permanent decline rather than 1 bad year.

[noikeee]

 

September 2026 

 

 

 

I'm pretty damn happy with this. Another great month sees us win at Old Trafford and at the Etihad to knock Man City out of the League Cup, and also return to European competition after a decades-long absence with a 5-0 demolishing of Maribor. We were even top of the Premier League, but then we suffered our first defeat to Arsenal - even then we were quite a bit unlucky there.

 

I'm not sure what's weirder, our much improved defensive record (a clean sheet at Old Trafford??!!), or the fact Erwin Spruit is yet to score this season!!

 

 

 

[BoxToBox]

7 minutes ago, noikeee said:

 

I'm not sure what's weirder, our much improved defensive record (a clean sheet at Old Trafford??!!), or the fact Erwin Spruit is yet to score this season!!

Feel you could have a chain of events here, teams perhaps more conservative against you and marking Spruit, meaning your defence is under less pressure, and other players are finding the space to attack since the focus is on Spruit.

[noikeee]

3 minutes ago, BoxToBox said:

Feel you could have a chain of events here, teams perhaps more conservative against you and marking Spruit, meaning your defence is under less pressure, and other players are finding the space to attack since the focus is on Spruit.

Yeah I agree, it's all connected. Other factors to consider are that I'm using a completely different tactic in away matches now, the 4-3-3 (which is much better defensively - I need to do a tactics write-up again one of these days), the rather fearsome-looking new CBs I'm using now which also improved our defence, and regarding Spruit I think he's a little low on confidence after I rejected a few bids in August, and even further now due to the goal drought.

[Fer Fuchs Ake]

Very solid start. I think @BoxToBox might be right about Spruit. There's more defenders marking him out of the game.

[SmileFaceGamer]

On 19/01/2018 at 20:09, noikeee said:

Meanwhile this is the Premier League Goal of the Month for February, by Diego Fratucello away at Southampton:

 

Just  get the f**k out the way Southampton

[SmileFaceGamer]

On 20/01/2018 at 01:06, noikeee said:

I usually don't post awards but I think this gives a good perspective of how good Spruit was this year:

How did Spruit not get into PFA team of the year

[noikeee]

October 2026

 

Some really high highs here, yet some lows as well. The league is going fantastically well, with two huge 5-0 wins over Chelsea (!!!) and away against Villa. We did lose to Southampton, but have climbed back to the very top position in the Premier League! This is great but might not mean much, in a ridiculously tight early table in which there's just 5 points separating 1st (us) and 11th (Man Utd).

Europa League is also going great with 3 wins from 3 so far, after an insane 5-4 win in Turkey. However, we crash out of the League Cup early on yet again - all that work to knock out Man City in the previous round, just to capitulate at the hands of Bournemouth now...

 

[noikeee]

7 hours ago, Fer Fuchs Ake said:

Very solid start. I think @BoxToBox might be right about Spruit. There's more defenders marking him out of the game.

Warren Jenas is scoring a lot in his position though.

1 hour ago, SmileFaceGamer said:

How did Spruit not get into PFA team of the year

Bribes.

[noikeee]

Oh dear. I spent months hoping for the Serbian manager to call him up to speed up his work permit; now he's actually getting them I don't want him to get caps because we're on course to fail FFP for spending too much on wages.

At this rate I'm going start the next Premier League season with 5 docked points.

[noikeee]

Some nice German regens plz?

This is our current list of affiliates, I'm always looking to expand it:

[noikeee]

November 2026

We take good use of a nice calendar to beat smaller teams (yes, I'm now considering the likes of Stoke and West Ham smaller teams). We smash Besiktas to qualify to the Europa knockouts, and then do the same to Maribor just for ***** and giggles. We lose to ****ing Brentford to ruin our perfect month with 5 wins in a row... yet... we're still... top of the Premier League?

 

Mind. Blown. The league is still wide open and we've only played 13 matches, but this is starting to look like we're on a epic campaign here.

 

[Fer Fuchs Ake]

7 hours ago, noikeee said:

but this is starting to look like we're on a epic campaign here.

It certainly is. Smashing the Europa League and you've an early lead in the Premier League albeit a small one.

[Fola]

Bloody hell- YOU'RE GOING TO WIN THE LEAGUE!

[abulezz]

Top of the league - this is great! 

I think the Germans have the best newgens, along with the Brazilians!

[deltablue]

France as well a lot of the time. If you're lucky you can sign world class forwards for just 28k just before their 15th birthday

[noikeee]

14 hours ago, Fer Fuchs Ake said:

It certainly is. Smashing the Europa League and you've an early lead in the Premier League albeit a small one.

Well, the Europa League wasn't against anyone good... @oriole01 might disagree, but...

13 hours ago, Fola said:

Bloody hell- YOU'RE GOING TO WIN THE LEAGUE!

Don't jinx it. 

12 hours ago, abulezz said:

Top of the league - this is great! 

I think the Germans have the best newgens, along with the Brazilians!

I'm being a bit optimistic, not sure we can even have any German kids due to Brexit.

7 hours ago, deltablue said:

France as well a lot of the time. If you're lucky you can sign world class forwards for just 28k just before their 15th birthday

I can't. Brexit.  

[noikeee]

Just another regular day in Derby.

[andychar]

Great progress with Derby (feel dirty just typing that). Will be interesting to see how the FFP plays out.

[noikeee]

A good draw, there were nastier teams to face here.

[noikeee]

15 hours ago, andychar said:

Great progress with Derby (feel dirty just typing that). Will be interesting to see how the FFP plays out.

Badly. I think we're well on course to fail FFP even if we sell a player or two. I'm starting to consider to just take the points deduction and forget it.

[noikeee]

December 2026

 

Holy crap! A perfect month in the league puts us even higher with a 7 points lead at the top! Even if we have an extra match played. This is madness - and nothing will be as mad as that 5-4 win over Man City with a 94th minute winner. 

There's some clouds looming though, the FFP wages thing is having a few repercussions as I scramble to try to solve it, I'm about to sell a backup player I didn't really want to, I can't hire extra backup players, and I'm having to reject any requests for new contracts, which recently pissed off Erwin Spruit and a couple of his team-mates in support. And there's now a lot of green "Wnt" boxes hovering on my players, starting by Spruit himself who has a 83M€ release clause and surely someone will activate it sooner or later, now that he's valued at 56M€... I don't really want to lose our very best player, doubly so when we're midway through a season we're on course to maybe shock everyone and win the Premier League...
 

 

[john1]

Superb month  

[BoxToBox]

How close to the FFP problem are you, usually a club of that level would inject some cash and fix it up.

[noikeee]

19 hours ago, john1 said:

Superb month  

Thanks!

19 hours ago, BoxToBox said:

How close to the FFP problem are you, usually a club of that level would inject some cash and fix it up.

Well I don't think that would solve anything, we are failing not the normal continental FFP, but the Premier League FFP on wage increases over a season. However there's something in the rules that says we can't increase the wage expenditure by more than 7,85M€ .... "unless this is funded by an uplift in revenue". So I dunno, really. Better safe than sorry and try to limit the wages as much as I can.

[noikeee]

Ballon d'Or 2026

 

 

 

Chelsea's classic winger Ashley Kane - unrelated to Harry as far as I know - becomes the first newgen Ballon d'Or. An unquestionably deserved award, as he's having an insanely effective season, and of course won the World Cup with England. Man Utd's striker duo Tetteh and Dybala, after their contributions to last season's incredible success of Premier League title + FA Cup winners + Champions League runners-up, come 2nd and 3rd in an all-Premiership top 3.

[BoxToBox]

Hmmm, probably best to be careful, though a 5 point deduction next season wouldn't be the end of the world if you just went hard for the title this season...

[noikeee]

2 minutes ago, BoxToBox said:

Hmmm, probably best to be careful, though a 5 point deduction next season wouldn't be the end of the world if you just went hard for the title this season...

I'm tempted to just say "**** it" and ignore it, we're way above the limit anyway.  There's little chance of passing FFP as it stands.

[BoxToBox]

To be honest, that's what I'd do, just run with it unless the board complain.

[erik45]

2 hours ago, noikeee said:

I'm tempted to just say "**** it" and ignore it, we're way above the limit anyway.  There's little chance of passing FFP as it stands.

The FFP problem popped up quite often in FM17. It usually solved itself, because either the allowed amount of wages or the projection changed before end of the period end date. At least I didn't get any deductions or fines and I did play something like 10+ seasons in the PL

Maybe it's the same in this version as well..? So probably nothing to worry about!

[noikeee]

4 minutes ago, erik45 said:

The FFP problem popped up quite often in FM17. It usually solved itself, because either the allowed amount of wages or the projection changed before end of the period end date. At least I didn't get any deductions or fines and I did play something like 10+ seasons in the PL

Maybe it's the same in this version as well..? So probably nothing to worry about!

Well, I hope it's the same here. The projection has been going up and up and up as the season goes on so I'm a bit pessimistic, but let's see.

[noikeee]

January 2027

 

(Transfers)

Erm, there were none. I ultimately decided to play it semi-cautiously with the FFP thing and not hire anyone, to not make the whole thing worse; but not sell anyone neither - we're in the middle of a title fight, we can't lose any more talents. Thankfully, we also dodged the danger of any big clubs coming in and activating the release clauses for any of our major stars. The only thing that happened was that we loaned out a kid.

 

We're starting to feel the heat a little with Man Utd and Chelsea catching us, but we're still hanging on at the top. Losing 3-0 to Liverpool was harsh, but otherwise we did well this month. Even if we let Man Utd equalize against us on minute 92, ruining what would've been a very important victory. This was offset by an earlier 90th minute winner by Spruit against Boro in a match we were really struggling once down to 10 men.

However, we again committed a truly massive blunder on the cups. Just like last year in which Mansfield kicked us out of the FA Cup, we got beaten by a team from the lower ranks again, this time Reading who are 20th in the Championship. We really aren't much of a cup side, are we?

 

[BoxToBox]

Not the season to be fussed about the domestic cups. An ease in fixture congestion will do more good.

[noikeee]

9 minutes ago, BoxToBox said:

Not the season to be fussed about the domestic cups. An ease in fixture congestion will do more good.

Well yeah, specially with the short squad I have, but I always want to win EVERYTHING. 

[noikeee]

In 2027, this is how Arsenal lines up against Derby to defend a late 0-0:

[noikeee]

And still in the same match, this is a candidate for goal of the year:

Sorry for the ****** quality, can't be arsed to re-upload it. Should be clear enough it bounces off the defender.

[noikeee]

 

As expected.

 

The draw:

Well nice to see a team I have some knowledge on, after the years I've been in Russia. They're strong, they continue to win most Russian titles, they have my former Amkar keeper Pablo Petruzzi, and a crazy wonderkid striker I've had on my shortlist for a while. Still, not such a bad draw compared to so many other teams we could've crossed paths against here.

[noikeee]

February 2027

 

 

Another great month in which we won everything... except the game we really had to (at least not lose). Against Chelsea, one of our closest challengers, we were powerless, as they lined up inspired and seemed able to score with every sniff of anything barely resembling a chance. In other matches it was fun to beat Arsenal with 88th and 92nd minute goals (including that hilarious goofy owngoal), and to witness the return of proper Erwin Spruit - a hat-trick, man!!! We're 5 points clear, but Chelsea have a game in hand and I'm starting to think they're the real danger, not Man Utd.

In the Europa, as shown above we had no problems with Standard, and are now lined up against my old Russian rivals Krasnodar.
 

 

[noikeee]

 Youth intake 2027

 

 

Hey, I've got Tom Jones.

And he's a decent playmaker, too. Also lolz at "JazZ". Could also be a pretty tidy FB but needs to ramp up that tackling and positioning very very much.

[BoxToBox]

13 flair at 15 for Tom Jones sounds about right.

[noikeee]

 

A poor first leg at home, was saved by a great 2nd half in Russia. We might pay the price for fielding our strongest 11 in these matches though (unlike what I had done in the groups), as we lost both winger Diego Fratucello and keeper Juan Caballero to injuries.

As for the quarter-finals draw...

 

I'm travelling to Portugal! Yay! Honestly I'm quite amused at how great every draw has been on the Europa League so far.  We just keep dodging all the really tough sides.

[kidthekid]

Wow, great job Noikee. I'm amazed you are doing all this with the Europa fixtures

[Northernpilgrim]

Derby winning in Europe? So it's not just Jeremy Corbyn taking the UK back to the 1970s then!