Island Football - Atlantic Europe

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CLUBE DESPORTIVO SANTA CLARA

 

CD Santa Clara are the primary club of the Azores, an island archipelago 850 miles off the coast of mainland Portugal. Established in 1921, Os Açoreanos have spent most of their existence in the lower reaches of Portuguese football, with just 3 seasons in the top flight to their name. After relegation in 2003, the islanders have just gained promotion once again, making them the western-most top tier club in Europe.

 

We play in the picturesque 12,500 capacity Estádio de São Miguel in the Azorean capital of Ponta Delgada, home to 68,000 of the 245,000 population of the islands.

 

I've started the save with a data update, so the team are freshly promoted to the Liga NOS. My main aim is to bring native islanders through the youth ranks to represent the Azores against the biggest and best in Europe, as Santa Clara are treated as the de facto Azorean national team. However I won't be limiting myself to islanders as the pool is just too small to begin with, and our facilities are shocking. Further on in the save I will perhaps start narrowing down the pool of players I can sign from to promote Azorean players, but we're a long way away from that yet.

 

I've almost played the first 6 months of the season, so a club overview and progress review will be coming shortly.

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Meet Cristovao Melgueiro, born on the northern island of Graciosa and min-maxed absolutely to the limit of his qualifications.

 

Spoiler

 

The club aren't in a fantastic state to begin with. Not much money, very poor facilities and apparently no U23 team. A small club when compared to the biggest Portugal has to offer, but very much on a par with the rest. The disparity between Porto, Benfica, Sporting and, to a lesser extent, Braga is massive, so it'll take some real effort to outmanoeuvre the big teams and eventually gatecrash the European places.

 

Facilities:

 

Spoiler

As I said, very poor. We'll be relying on cast-offs from other teams for the time being.

 

Now, on to the important stuff...

 

Transfer wise, the data update has lumbered me with a number of players I have no use for but I can't yet get rid of permanently. The two worst of those were Sanusi and Fernandes (who actually shouldn't be here at all, the data update has transferred the wrong player and this particular Fernandes is beyond useless), luckily there were teams willing to take them on loan and pay all of their wages, which frees up over £2k p/w. This is pretty significant when my whole wage allowance is £59k p/w. The only other out is a youngster I signed on a free, who has since been recalled after he broke his foot.

 

Outs:

Spoiler

 

More important were the transfers I managed to bring into the club. With no money and a pretty poor rep, we had to focus on free transfers and loans, and will probably have to do that for the foreseeable future.

 

Ins:

Spoiler

Ivanildo Fernandes is a quality young player in a position we definitely needed to strengthen, given that one of my best players there attribute-wise is a 37 year old who can barely move. There were a few teams in for him and I was delighted he chose us as he's probably near the ceiling of attainable loanees.

Paulo Lima is nothing too special, but Samu, released from Boavista after some unspectacular loan spells, looks as if he could definitely play a part. He'll add a spark of creativity to the attack, and is a relatively low risk move for small wages.

Danilo Boza comes in on loan from a lower league Brazilian team, initially as a backup right back as the squad only had one. He looks like a bit of a gem and he'll be a rotation option on the right, and is able to fill in as an emergency CB if called upon.

Callum Gribbin most of us will be familiar with, another low risk transfer for a player I've had a lot of success with in the past. If nothing else, I should be able to make a decent profit on him.

 

Pre-season

 

A pretty solid preseason all in all, with our two big tests being the Spanish teams, which we came through respectably. The cup game was far from a thriller, with the team still getting used to the tactics (and each other), it was a very dull game against second tier Estoril which we eventually won on penalties.

 

Speaking of tactics, we're running a fairly standard 4-2-3-1, perhaps more adventurous than you'd expect for a newly promoted side, but I just wanted to focus on playing our best players - Ukra, Rashid and Carlos - in their best positions/roles, and building the rest around them.

 

 

Next up I'll cover the season so far (once I've played the final two games of the calendar year), then I'm all caught up and the rest of the updates should be a little more orderly. 

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The season so far:

We started the season absolutely on fire, teams playing high lines constantly fell victim to Evouna's top class movement as he performed way above what his attributes suggest he's capable of. The Porto game was heartbreaking, with Evouna scoring a screamer after half an hour, the score stayed like that until an Aboubakar equaliser in the 68th minute, followed by a 94th minute winner for Porto. We immediately picked ourselves back up, but international breaks in September interfered with our rhythm, and after a promising start to October we fell away a little. The two October losses were both extremely poor, first going out of the cup to semi-pro Espinho, then losing at home to bottom dwellers Gil Vicente really hurt. Evouna had stopped scoring totally after his blistering start and we were looking very disjointed.

November started with what should've been two pretty simple fixtures to get ourselves back on track, but we just scraped past Tondela and then got a very disappointing point against Famalicao. Once again international breaks broke up the fixtures, in an effort to keep us going I organised a couple of friendlies against nearby teams to keep fitness and morale up. This seemed to work, as good results against Portimonense and Sporting kept us in the top half, before an unfortunate loss against Benfica. This doesn't bother me too much as we're nowhere near their level yet, and the target for this season is just to survive. The last league game of the year saw us go 1-0 down early, before pulling it back to a 2-1 lead, but conceding in the 88th and 95th minute to lose against shock high flyers Vitoria Guimaraes, who topped the league going into the game. That's twice already we've lost to injury time goals, we seem to have trouble keeping concentration right up until the final whistle.

We rounded out the year with our final cup group game against second tier Varzim. With a win and a draw already under our belts, we knew that 3 points would send us through to the semi final. We were cruising at 2-0, before two back post crosses in two minutes levelled it up, and then a 30 yard free kick after a penalty had put us 3-2 up. Great game for neutrals, infuriating for a manager. It was a very worrying performance against a lower league team, and that's 3 games in a row that we've conceded 3 goals. Something isn't right defensively. A draw leaves us 2nd in the group, after Sporting lost to Nacional de Madeira, so we're out of this cup too. Thanks, Sporting.

Injuries started piling up in December, including damaged cruciate ligaments for my first choice right back Patrick, meaning that loanee Boza is now my only fit senior player in that position. The only other option is the fantastically named Jorge Borges, who has been promoted from the youth team. I hope I don't have to use him.

 

All that leaves the table looking like this at the end of the year:

 

Despite some hiccups and our very lacklustre end the year, I'm absolutely delighted with that. We've got a great points cushion going into the new year and relegation looks a long way off. I'd like to bring in some loans in the transfer window, but unless I can get them for free it probably won't happen due to the financial situation. We're £1.2m in the red and losing money every month. As far as I remember, Portuguese prize money is nothing to shout about either so we'll be feeding off scraps for now.

Now I'm all caught up, future updates will probably be more split up and less text heavy.

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CD SANTA CLARA

 

January brought with it the opportunity to strengthen somewhat in the transfer window. I scoured the loan market for free/cheap options, and came up with three players who will all play a big part in the second half of the season.

In

 

Brenner will be a name familiar to a lot of players, as he often seems to end up at one of the massive clubs. We needed competition for the inconsistent Evouna and Brenner offers great pace and movement. With his arrival, I terminated the loan of a striker from Benfica who had contributed very little and didn't really fit in with the style of play, being more of a static target man type. Unfortunately Brenner was away until early February with the Brazilian U20 team, so his debut was delayed for a few weeks.

Gelson Dala is a versatile attacking option, comfortable in 4 positions and again offering good pace and movement. I signed him mostly to play on the left, but he will feature up front too until Brenner returns.

Klebinho looks a good attacking full back in a position I was desperate for bodies in. 3 or 4 others turned down a loan before I found him. I'm not overjoyed with his positioning and strength, but he will definitely have a role to play as a rotation option.

 

We're not paying any fees for any of them, just a wage percentage, which I was able to fund with a few departures.

 

 

None of these really played a part, so to get money for two of them and Penafiel paying 100% of Pineda's wages is very helpful.

 

 

January was a mixed month. not only were we without Brenner for the entirety of it, but our best player Rashid was away with the Iraqi national team at the Asian Cup. We missed his metronome-like passing in the midfield and things were a little disjointed, but we managed to scratch out a couple of wins. The Setubal game was one we should and probably would have won with him in the side.

 

February saw the return of Rashid and the introduction of Brenner, who got a debut goal late on against Aves, after having an early one ruled out. We came close to our first big team scalp against Porto but it wasn't to be. The Rio Ave game was a lot like the tie against Setubal last month - we dominated, had plenty of chances but couldn't find that final touch, this time until Rashid had a 30 yard shot hit the bar and go in off the keeper's back.

 

A solid couple of months sees us still flying high, and relegation looking further and further away. Finances are getting worse, but if I don't look at the finances page that means it's not happening.

 

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CD SANTA CLARA

 

March brings with it the best day of any save, youth intake day!

It was terrible. I didn't even bother taking a screenshot. I signed nobody.

 

 

March also saw the return of Osama Rashid, and it's no coincidence that we looked a much better unit with him in the side. Another big win over strugglers Pacos Ferreira seemed to bode well, however...the Moreirense game I can't really explain, two direct free kicks and a back post tap in put us 3-0 down at half time and we never looked like getting back into it. A last minute strike from Evouna gave us a win over Gil Vicente in a tightly contested game, after they were reduced to ten men with half an hour to go. A friendly was organised to maintain fitness and morale in the international break.

 

I knew that a win against Tondela would mathematically secure our place in the top flight for another season, and we managed it after an early goal put us a little on edge. The following game was a bit of a hangover it seems, a below par performance now that relegation is no longer a possibility (though we've never actually looked in danger all season). We were back to form against Portimonense, before giving Sporting a really good game and coming close many times to drawing level and maybe even winning. Then, we finally got our first real scalp! I changed Brenner from an AF to a DLF-A as he was struggling to get involved in the game and it paid dividends. Him and Dala assisted each others goals in a dominant performance which saw Benfica soundly beaten with barely a chance on goal. Really great game and we've shown that we're capable of taking the game to our opponents rather than having to sit back and rely on counter attacking.

 

There wasn't too much to play for in the final month; no chance of relegation and not much chance at all of sneaking into the top 5, barring a complete capitulation from Sporting. Vitoria are still flying high, and though we outplayed them in every area, it was just one of those typical FM games. They scored from every shot and we hit the woodwork twice. Two unfortunate injuries saw key players Ukra and Joao Afonso out for the remainder of the season, and it only took Braga 30 seconds to take advantage of this and go 1-0 up. They hammered us for the next 20 minutes and were unlucky on several occasions to not double their lead, but Brenner got us back into it, and from then on we were in complete control and very unlucky not to win. Brenner was completely unplayable, creating a multitude of chances that his teammates just couldn't take. He's really flourished in the DLF role, and I'll probably be trying to bring him back on loan next season.

As a whole, May was a bit limp. It's probably to be expected after a season of intense training and matches, with a couple of injuries in key areas leaving us without important players for the run in. Our position in the league was sealed after the Braga match, so there wasn't anything at all to play for after that. It's been a massively successful season, far better than I ever imagined, and I just hope that the board don't get too lofty with their expectations for next year.

 

As you can see, Osama Rashid was integral to our success this season, creating 7 goals and scoring 6 more, as well as having the best pass completion and most key passes in the team. Evouna finished as top scorer, but that was mainly due to his excellent start which he never really replicated, and he didn't get much of a look in after Brenner found his feet.

Young keeper Andre Ferreira also had a very good season, starting every game and keeping 17 clean sheets, 15 of those in the league and helping us to a very respectable 31 goals conceded in 34 matches.

Finally a mention for loanee Ivanildo Fernandes, who was an absolute rock at the back and started 32 of 34 league games (the only ones he missed were against his parent club, Sporting). Getting him back for another year is a major priority.

Full team stats HERE.

 

Concerns

Money is the big one. After our measly sponsorship payment came in, we're still £2.3m in the red, the wage budget for next season has been cut by £7k and our finances are listed as insecure. However we did get a new TV deal, up to £2.5m from £900k, so that will hopefully make a dent in the deficit. Osama Rashid's contract is expiring next summer, he's already our 2nd highest earner on £5k and he obviously wants a raise after the season he's just had. There was some interest in him in January, if I can't get him to re-sign for a more reasonable wage I may have to take advantage of that.

We currently have 3 team leaders with a combined age of 107, they will all be departing which leaves us with a void. I'm hoping the liked of Rashid, Afonso and Ukra step up in pre-season to fill that.

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Well, as much as I'm enjoying this, it's probably broken. It's late July and the league seems to be bugged, no new league fixtures have been generated for the new season. I'm really, truly gutted.