FM20 - Athletic Club - Basque in the Bilbao Sunshine

[OlivierL]

i have a question for @dothestrand or anyone else playing with Bilbao.  I'm thinking about starting  with Bilbao like I did a few editions ago .

I played with Paris FC and only signed players born in the region Ile de France. I tagged all the cities from that region in the editor to help me filter them in player search and squad views. 

I know that u can search on Basque  nationality but would tagging all the Basque cities work ? of course it is possible that a guy pops up in Valencia with a Basque  Basque nationality.  

[Mr_Demus]

8 hours ago, OlivierL said:

i have a question for @dothestrand or anyone else playing with Bilbao.  I'm thinking about starting  with Bilbao like I did a few editions ago .

I played with Paris FC and only signed players born in the region Ile de France. I tagged all the cities from that region in the editor to help me filter them in player search and squad views. 

I know that u can search on Basque  nationality but would tagging all the Basque cities work ? of course it is possible that a guy pops up in Valencia with a Basque  Basque nationality.  

Basque Country has a flag, so they show up as having a second nationality. If I read your question correctly, the game already does something similar for you.

[OlivierL]

28 minutes ago, Mr_Demus said:

Basque Country has a flag, so they show up as having a second nationality. If I read your question correctly, the game already does something similar for you.

Yes idd i know, so tagging birth cities wouldn't gave any benefits , and certainly not because players could be basque and not born in one of those cities .

I'll have to use the automatic filter on basque first or second nationality .

[Mr_Demus]

28 minutes ago, OlivierL said:

Yes idd i know, so tagging birth cities wouldn't gave any benefits , and certainly not because players could be basque and not born in one of those cities .

I'll have to use the automatic filter on basque first or second nationality .

It should work fine then. Maybe I am thick, but tagging birth cities would just give you extra work, that is kind of already done for you, right? Or, do you need additional info, that the "search for Basque nationality" filter doesn't give you?

[OlivierL]

1 hour ago, Mr_Demus said:

It should work fine then. Maybe I am thick, but tagging birth cities would just give you extra work, that is kind of already done for you, right? Or, do you need additional info, that the "search for Basque nationality" filter doesn't give you?

No this looks good in squad view like below, but wouldn't give me anything else i suppose

 

https://gyazo.com/d2054cde1d84315471af3fe524394a70

[dothestrand]

Sorry @OlivierL I only use the second nationality filter to search for players. I never do anything sophisticated like tagging. Often I search by birthplace for specific towns or cities e.g. if I wanted a team JUST of players born in Bilbao. I found a great Basque born regen at Sporting Gijon in my save but I was unable/ not permitted to sign him. Not sure how that worked though. He didn't have Basque second nationality despite being born in Pamplona of somewhere clearly in the Basque country. 

[OlivierL]

5 hours ago, dothestrand said:

Sorry @OlivierL I only use the second nationality filter to search for players. I never do anything sophisticated like tagging. Often I search by birthplace for specific towns or cities e.g. if I wanted a team JUST of players born in Bilbao. I found a great Basque born regen at Sporting Gijon in my save but I was unable/ not permitted to sign him. Not sure how that worked though. He didn't have Basque second nationality despite being born in Pamplona of somewhere clearly in the Basque country. 

Thanks, i'm going to decide this evening if i start with Bilbao or something else. I want to do a Dof challenge.. not sure if i can do this with Bilbao (not many players to sign for a DoF so not the biggest risk)

[Jean0987654321]

Season 1
The season was better than I expected. Got 4th place in the league but my God we were far and away from the top 3. I need a goalscorer sooner or later as Adruiz is retired and everybody else has been inconsistant up front
The transfer market went ok. Got Viguera back along with Saborit and Eraso on loan. I have tied Eraso on a permanent deal. And now next season, I have wrapped up the return of Guillermo on a cash + player deal (Viguera will leave).

This is the tactic I settled with in the end. It is De Zerbi-esque

And the results

And now the players

Top goalscorer from midfield

Effective in set pieces

Solid between the sticks

Will be missed

His crosses are crazy good but he just can't get fit

Very good RB

Good CB

Another good CB

Tough to find his best spot in the squad

Best deadball specialist

He was ok

Solid DM

And other notes

Edited August 22, 2020 by Jean0987654321

[Tom Ashley]

I'm thinking about starting an Athletic Bilbao save, and I have a somewhat random question.

It looks like the game does a fairly good job of generating Basque surnames for newgens.  I like that, because it's going to increase the immersion factor considerably.  I've also considered starting a similar save with an earlier edition of FM, with players like Mikel Arteta and Xabi Alonso.

Do any of you know if previous editions of FM do as well with Basque names?  Thanks in advance.

[Jean0987654321]

On 22/08/2020 at 21:43, Tom Ashley said:

I'm thinking about starting an Athletic Bilbao save, and I have a somewhat random question.

It looks like the game does a fairly good job of generating Basque surnames for newgens.  I like that, because it's going to increase the immersion factor considerably.  I've also considered starting a similar save with an earlier edition of FM, with players like Mikel Arteta and Xabi Alonso.

Do any of you know if previous editions of FM do as well with Basque names?  Thanks in advance.

Yes

[markv1]

How can I get the b team to play my 1st team tactics?

 

I can set it for the u19, but not b team. It only plays b team managers 4231

[Jean0987654321]

14 hours ago, markv1 said:

How can I get the b team to play my 1st team tactics?

 

I can set it for the u19, but not b team. It only plays b team managers 4231

It should be in the staff responsibilities tactics under "tactics" 

[markv1]

Do u guys only sign basque staff too? 

[Jean0987654321]

On 28/09/2020 at 04:59, markv1 said:

Do u guys only sign basque staff too? 

I don't. My staff is pretty diverse. It wouldn't make sense to me anyways since one of the greatest coach Athletic ever had was a german

[markv1]

1 hour ago, Jean0987654321 said:

I don't. My staff is pretty diverse. It wouldn't make sense to me anyways since one of the greatest coach Athletic ever had was a german

Thanks

[HibeeRyan]

quick question for all of you Bilbao experts. I'm currently nearly at the end of the second season and over the course of the two seasons I've got 3 affiliate clubs, Hibernian, 1860 Munich and N.E.C, on the link type where they can send academy players and they can come through my youth teams. My question is has anyone done this and can these youngsters actually come through at Bilbao and be signed to professional deals due to them only being able to sign Basque players or 16 year old Spainards? 

[dothestrand]

8 hours ago, HibeeRyan said:

quick question for all of you Bilbao experts. I'm currently nearly at the end of the second season and over the course of the two seasons I've got 3 affiliate clubs, Hibernian, 1860 Munich and N.E.C, on the link type where they can send academy players and they can come through my youth teams. My question is has anyone done this and can these youngsters actually come through at Bilbao and be signed to professional deals due to them only being able to sign Basque players or 16 year old Spainards? 

I don't think I've tried overseas affiliate clubs. I guess you might be offered one in France e.g. Aviron Bayonnais, the largest French Basque club and where Aymeric Laporte started. I'm surprised the board offered you Hibs, say, as an affiliate. I don't think you could get their under 16s and offer them Basque second nationality. Only works with Spanish clubs, I think. 

[dothestrand]

Also, I think I've only ever seen half a dozen French Basques come through as regens in a dozen or so seasons and only one of them has been remotely decent (a crashed save where I found a quality French Basque GK). 

[HibeeRyan]

2 hours ago, dothestrand said:

I don't think I've tried overseas affiliate clubs. I guess you might be offered one in France e.g. Aviron Bayonnais, the largest French Basque club and where Aymeric Laporte started. I'm surprised the board offered you Hibs, say, as an affiliate. I don't think you could get their under 16s and offer them Basque second nationality. Only works with Spanish clubs, I think. 

I asked for this particular affiliate but it was the board who recommended the teams. You can see the link type here and I do know Hibs can produce some very good regens. I will keep them and see if anything comes of it. Mainly doing this save to try and get better at youth development before fm21 comes out so will see what happens. Was mainly curious if I could get Scottish players with second nationality of Basque, was an interesting thought anyway! Just not sure if the game would stop it happening in the background or not!

[dothestrand]

1 hour ago, HibeeRyan said:

I asked for this particular affiliate but it was the board who recommended the teams. You can see the link type here and I do know Hibs can produce some very good regens. I will keep them and see if anything comes of it. Mainly doing this save to try and get better at youth development before fm21 comes out so will see what happens. Was mainly curious if I could get Scottish players with second nationality of Basque, was an interesting thought anyway! Just not sure if the game would stop it happening in the background or not!

I found an English player at Man City in a crashed save, born around Manchester but with Basque second nationality, and was able to sign him, even after he was 16 I think. To sign these guys they would need Basque parentage probably, but even that wouldn't work IRL as it would be a very loose interpretation of the Athletic Club policy.

[dothestrand]

I've fired up the FM21 beta and although I'll wait for the full version before I start a save, the squad looks pretty decent - with some young players getting a good boost too.

Jesus Areso, Oier Zarraga, Youssof Diarra, Juan Artola, the two Nicos (Serrano and Williams), Unai Vencedor and Jon Morcillo look very promising. Oihan Sancet and Peru Nolaskoain are first team ready too pretty much.

Edited November 10, 2020 by dothestrand

[enigmatic]

Think Bilbao in FM21 is harder than most recent years: some iconic players gone, most of the first team squad really are getting on a bit and apart from Sancet and Nolaskoain the youngsters are some way from stepping up, and this time round you'll have to work really hard to get a class player out of Villalibre

[dothestrand]

3 hours ago, enigmatic said:

Think Bilbao in FM21 is harder than most recent years: some iconic players gone, most of the first team squad really are getting on a bit and apart from Sancet and Nolaskoain the youngsters are some way from stepping up, and this time round you'll have to work really hard to get a class player out of Villalibre

I've played a season on the beta and I will probably stop and restart again soon. 

Raul Garcia should be good enough for the first season up front, but he'll decline sharply I assume, as he's done in recent versions of the game.

Berenguer is a funny addition because you don't need him at all really - you have so many options on the left wing as Morcillo is decent this year, so even if you play Muniain in CM, you've still got three options. He isn't good enough defensively to retrain as a LB. Cordoba didn't get much game time and with his contract running out in 2022, I would look to sell him. Serrano is highly touted in this game according to FM Scout so should be in your squad within a couple of seasons, same goes for Mikel Goti, another good youth prospect who can play out there.

You almost certainly won't do any transfer business in the first season. Real Sociedad/Osasuna players won't sign. The best option is raising the 13.5m release fee for Robert Navarro, as he WILL sign. 

[kevbk6222]

Year 1 the only transfer target that makes sense to me is Robin Le Normand. He is undervalued and willing to sign, if you overpay/promise. Only really makes sense to sign him if you want to try 5 at the back, though. 

[dothestrand]

35 minutes ago, kevbk6222 said:

Year 1 the only transfer target that makes sense to me is Robin Le Normand. He is undervalued and willing to sign, if you overpay/promise. Only really makes sense to sign him if you want to try 5 at the back, though. 

Nolaskoain is a natural CB isn't he? He'd be your fourth option seeing as Vivian isn't at all good. Obviously if you lost one or your main CBs, he'd be an adequate backup. It's definitely slim pickings first season though, you're right.