RPM13 Posted November 12, 2017 Share Posted November 12, 2017 Now that FM18 is out, I can begin my main save, a journeyman save following the (fictional) career of Kimmo Kari. He is from the relatively small town of Mikkeli (population of around 34 000) and despite never being very good at the sport, has always loved football. For the past 4 years, he's been a season ticket holder at his local club, Mikkelin Palloilijat (also referred to as MP) and has also watched HJK and FC Barcelona on TV, in addition to picking up tactical tips from watching Pep Guardiola's Bayern and Manchester City teams. He has now made the decision to step into football management despite not having any coaching badges or playing experience.Will he achieve his dream of becoming manager of FC Barcelona? Not even he knows, but we will find out. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 12, 2017 Author Share Posted November 12, 2017 June 15, 2017 Today, I just had my first interview with a professional football club about a managerial position. It was with RoPS, who are currently in 11th out of 12 in the Veikkausliiga and sitting in a relegation playoff place. I still can't believe that a Veikkausliiga team even considered me for a job! I found it strange, but the interview was on Skype, not in person. I guess the 7 hour journey is a bit long, but I would've at least gotten to do the entire interview. I accidentally ended the call just after the RoPS chairman asked his first question! I won't be making that mistake again. He didn't even try to call me back after, I hope this doesn't affect my chances of getting the job too badly. I'll be back with an update when I get more information. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 12, 2017 Author Share Posted November 12, 2017 June 21, 2017 Well, today, RoPS appointed their new manager. Unfortunately for me, it was Keith Armstrong, not me. To be fair though, he is far more qualified that I am, having even managed HJK for 5 years in the past! On the bright side, the Kemi Kings job has now opened up and Keith was favourite for that job as well, so it gives me a slightly better chance of getting that job. Unfortunately, they are bottom of the Veikkausliiga. I won't worry about that too much yet, though, as they haven't even given me an interview. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 12, 2017 Author Share Posted November 12, 2017 July 1, 2017 I had another interview today, this time with Kemi Kings who are bottom of the Veikkausliiga. The interview went much better this time as it was in-person, so I couldn't accidentally end the conversation. I'm unsure who else is in the running for this job, so I have no idea if I will get the job or not, but I'm not getting ahead of myself just in case. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 12, 2017 Author Share Posted November 12, 2017 July 7, 2017 Another day, another unsuccessful job interview. Pepe Murcia beating me out this time. As with Keith Armstrong, he is far more qualified than I am with a Continental Pro coaching license and experience managing the likes of Atletico Madrid and Celta Vigo. I'm starting to wonder if I should start getting my coaching badges, it seems that all the other managers who are applying for these jobs have their's. My only other option may be to go abroad to a smaller league. I feel like my last hope within Finland is the FC Haka job which opened up with Keith Armstrong's appointment as RoPS manager as he was previously managing Haka. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 12, 2017 Author Share Posted November 12, 2017 July 18, 2017 Apparently I was wrong. On July 13th, I had an interview with KuPS that I didn't even bother writing about because I didn't really think I'd have a chance at getting the job. This morning, at 10:55, I received this e-mail stating that they were offering me the job! I can't believe this, they're in 7th in the Veikkausliiga! I'm in no position to reject an offer like this, so it looks like I'm moving 2 hours north to the city of Kuopio, which is about 3 times the size of Mikkeli. It shouldn't take too long to get used to it. I'm off to look at house listings now, I can't wait! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 13, 2017 Author Share Posted November 13, 2017 July 18, 2017 I've now introduced myself to the squad and although I acknowledge that it will take a while to gain their respect, they seem to be very willing to give me a chance to prove myself. Fortunately for me, we have the youngest squad in the league, so I should get treated with more respect than I would have at another team. After analyzing the squad, I think I'll play with a 4-4-2 with both central midfielders playing as defensive midfielders as two of the best players in the team are defensive midfielders. I'd like for one of them to join in with the attack, though. I don't want to be too defensive, we are a mid-table team after all. After seeing how we play, I may make some adjustments to how the team plays, but for now I don't want to over-complicate things. We are now ready for my first game in charge on the 23rd against 4th place SJK, but we're missing two of our better midfielders, one through suspension and one through injury. Defensive midfield is, however one of our strongest positions in terms of depth, so we should be fine. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 13, 2017 Author Share Posted November 13, 2017 July 23, 2017 Best. Day. Of. My. Life. Today was the first match of my managerial career and, as you may have guessed, it went well. We had a good turnout of 2357, over 2200 of those being home fans. As the players walked on the pitch, I heard a few comments from the stands that I shouldn't be managing KuPS. This made me more determined than I've ever been to win this game. Apparently that came through in the team as we scored only 39 seconds into the game. That changed the sarcastic cheers from the crowd to genuine cheers, although that was probably directed toward the players, not me. The game ended 5-1 with top scorer (in the league) Gbolahan Salami (I still can't get over his name) getting 2 goals and 2 assists. What a hero! If this doesn't get the fan's support, I don't know what will. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
deltablue Posted November 14, 2017 Share Posted November 14, 2017 Excellent, another manager in Finland Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 14, 2017 Author Share Posted November 14, 2017 54 minutes ago, deltablue said: Excellent, another manager in Finland I don't recall having managed here yet, so far I'm enjoying it, but I may be biased because of results. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 14, 2017 Author Share Posted November 14, 2017 July 29, 2017 I'm now being faced with a bit of a dilemma. My second match, this being our first away match in charge, has just ended and we beat Kemi Kings 2-0 with another goal from prolific goalscorer, Salami (ha ha). This result sent us up to 4th in the table and potentially up into a European qualification position. Despite these 2 great results bringing us up 3 spots in the table, we have been lacking in terms of possession. We only managed 40% possession in the last game and as a fan of Pep Guardiola and how his teams play, this is not good enough. I won't change things after only one game because we did have 48% possession in our first game. My dilemma becomes greater when I look at my team and see that the team is suited toward a more counter-attacking style because of our abundance of defensive midfielders and complete lack of more attack- minded central midfielders. I may just leave the team and style the way the are for the rest of the season as there are only 8 matches left in the season and then make signings in the off-season that can bring the team to play more the style that I am looking for. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 18, 2017 Author Share Posted November 18, 2017 August 21, 2017 These last three weeks haven't seen an improvement in my predicament. We are playing much better, however the results have been far from ideal. The first was a 2-1 loss against IFK Mariehamn. This result saw me switch to a 4-4-2 diamond with wingers, basically, I made one of the defensive midfielders much more attacking. Following this game, we lost 3-0 against HIFK Fotboll in a game which we were the better team, we created better chances than them and dominated possession. This gave me hope going into the game today against rivals, JJK Jyvaskyla. This was my first experience with a derby match and it was unlike anything I have ever experienced as a manager. The atmosphere was definitely helped by the incredible match that was played out between the two rivals. At the end of the first half, it was already 3-1 for Jyvaskya with Sasa Jovovic getting a first half hattrick. Within the first 10 minutes of the second half, I went through more emotions than I knew existed. First, in the 48th minute, the ref awarded them a penalty. I was absolutely livid, this was the second penalty that we conceded in 2 games! Then, hope when Salami scored in the 50th minute and elation when he finished his hat-trick in the 54th minute. Unfortunately, that was it for the rest of the match and it ended 4-3. This was by far the most exciting, entertaining and stressful match of my (short) managerial career. So now I'm left with a big question: which do I prioritize, results or performances? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted November 23, 2017 Author Share Posted November 23, 2017 September 24, 2017 Our inconsistency is ridiculous. In our first game since I last wrote, we were losing 2-0 after only 27 minutes and I thought I had the answer to the aforementioned 'big question', but then , as if someone had flipped a switch,we scored two to equalize and drew the match 2-2. We left the switch flipped up in our next match against FC Lahti as we absolutely dominated the match, creating over a dozen high-quality chances and keeping 56% possession. We got a 3-1 win in that match, but it could and should have been much more. Salami in particular missed quite a few chances which would have given him his hat-trick. Then, a week later against 2nd place Inter Turku, the switch was flipped again. We actually weren't that bad, but we suffered a convincing 4-1 loss. I'm really not sure what went wrong, but we're now in 8th in the league with only 2 matches left in the season. European qualification is looking very unlikely now with us having to climb above 4 teams to sneak into 4th position. Luckily, I'll have the summer winter to get some new signings in and get the squad playing a style that's more along the lines of what I'm looking for. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 7, 2018 Author Share Posted January 7, 2018 October 23, 2017 Our inconsistency hasn't stopped since I last wrote. In our last two games of the season, we played 1st place HJK and 11th place RoPS. In the first of these two matches, we actually played quite well, creating several chances, but we could only finish one in the 93rd minute with Salami getting another goal. I would've been more excited, but we had already conceded 4 so it was only a consolation as we lost 4-1. In our next game, though, everything went differently, except for Salami getting his goal. We scored 3 and didn't allow any, winning 3-0 and moving up to 6th in the league table. Gbolahan Salami played very well in his last game in a KuPS shirt, netting a goal and an assist. Now the rebuild starts, we're losing the league's top scorer in Salami, and our best attacking midfielder because he believes I've lost the dressing room. Fortunately, though, this will clear up some wage budget room and will allow me to bring some new players in. I have my eye on a few defenders which would massively improve our team because we had the third worst defense in the league. Looks like I have some work to do. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 7, 2018 Author Share Posted January 7, 2018 November 17, 2017 I've just completed the first signing of my career, Matias Ojala. I was really excited to announce him because I thought he was a great young player who would have a bright future at the club, but it seems that the supporters don't show the same enthusiasm. Maybe my next signing will go over better with them. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 7, 2018 Author Share Posted January 7, 2018 December 1, 2017 I was really confident that the club's supporters would be ecstatic about the signing of our new center back, Erik Widen, but they're only marginally more supportive about him than the were about Ojala. I guess I have some work to do before I make a world class signing in my career. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 7, 2018 Author Share Posted January 7, 2018 December 3, 2017 Tomorrow is our first friendly of preseason and I'm way more nervous than I should be for a friendly. My reasoning is, it's against my childhood team and the team I still support currently, MP Mikkeli, who also happen to be rivals of KuPS. Fortunately it's at home because if it was at Mikkeli, I'm not sure how well I'd be received by the home fans. Nevertheless, I am still very nervous about the game. They have recently been promoted to the Finnish second tier, the Ykkonen, and for some reason are without a manager. I seriously considered applying for the job, but it's likely that we would be fighting against relegation and the wage budget is only about 1/12 of the wage budget that I have here, so I decided against it. Anyway, I really want to win this match as it is my first derby (sort of). Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timetxu Posted January 8, 2018 Share Posted January 8, 2018 I like the way you're writing and the intervals in dates between the updates are very interesting. Which leagues did you selected before you started this save? Were you planning to go to Finland right away? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 8, 2018 Author Share Posted January 8, 2018 12 hours ago, Timetxu said: I like the way you're writing and the intervals in dates between the updates are very interesting. Which leagues did you selected before you started this save? Were you planning to go to Finland right away? First of all, thanks, I'm glad you're enjoying it. I'm trying to give an update whenever something important happens. These are the leagues I have loaded and yes, I was hoping to start in Finland, but I was starting to believe that I would have to go to a smaller league like Indonesia for my first job. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 8, 2018 Author Share Posted January 8, 2018 December 25, 2017 I got an unexpected Christmas present yesterday. After over two weeks of having to delay his transfer due to a lack of funds, the board have finally allowed me to complete the signing of Mamut Saine. The supporters finally seem to be excited about a new signing! He will come in as either a starter or a rotational option at central midfield. I also need not have worried about the match against MK Mikkeli as we ran out 5-0 winners. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RPM13 Posted January 13, 2018 Author Share Posted January 13, 2018 January 7, 2018 Today we got some bad news. In our fourth pre-season game, we played against 3rd tier amateur side, PK-37. Despite scoring 3 in the first 10 minutes, we only managed one more to win 4-0. Unfortunately, in this win, we lost Cristian Guzman for 6-7 months with a broken ankle. I think the worst part about this is that it happened in a pre-season game and we were already 3-0 ahead at that point. To make matters worse, he plays at striker, a position we were light in to begin with after losing Salami because he wanted astronomical wages. We also have no room in the wage budget so I'll have to promote one of our 2nd team players. This will be a massive downgrade. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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