[FM20] Santástico - The hunt for the Next Neymar

[Mikaelinho]

Hi everyone! First time poster, long time lurker on these forums. I thought I'd try a bit of shameless self-promotion of my current series Santástico. Let's start off with a quote!

"Ginga, it’s in our blood, it’s a gift given by God especially to Brazilians who play football and learn to dance from an early age. I think Brazilians are given Ginga when they’re born and continue to improve it through childhood." 
-Ronaldo

This series revolves around Ginga. Perhaps you're familiar with the term, but more likely you are like me, looking like a question mark. Ginga? What?

Ginga is originally the fundamental footwork of the capoeira, the Afro-Brazilian martial art, combining elements of acrobatics, dance and music. The term Ginga has also been transferred to the field of football and was early on used to describe the acrobatic, free-flowing type of footballing art, displayed by Pélé and his likes (if there were any!?)

In this series I'll try to create a player oozing with Ginga, to walk in the footsteps of former Santos FC legends Pélé and Neymar, becoming the third great Santos/Brazil superstar. This won't be easy in any shape or form, but how much fun is an easy challenge? If you still haven't figured out what this save is about I'll spell it out for you.

Aim
Create (identify, sign, nurture, develop and eventually sell) the third great Brazilian player after Pélé and Neymar (I know this is a serious stretch of reality, but the narrative works much better if I simply ignore all the great non-Santos Brazilians...Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Garrincha etc)

Rules - for a player to be considered equal to Neymar and Pélé he MUST:
-Join Santos at age 18 at the latest
-Score 100 goals for Santos before moving on to another club
-Play 90 caps for Brazil, score at least 50 goals AND win the World Cup
-Win at least one domestic title abroad
-Reach a Ginga rating (Dribbling + Technique + Flair + Acceleration + Agility) of at least 90

I'm already four posts into the series that I blog about on my WordPress page.

Episode 0 - The hunt for the next Neymar

Episode 1 - A six step strategy

Episode 2 - Baby steps

Episode 3 - Do the Ma-Ka-Re-Ta

Interaction and tips on how to improve my youth development is greatly appreciated!

[DazRTaylor]

12 minutes ago, Mikaelinho said:

Rules - for a player to be considered equal to Neymar and Pélé he MUST:
-Join Santos at age 18 at the latest
-Score 100 goals for Santos before moving on to another club
-Play 90 caps for Brazil, score at least 50 goals AND win the World Cup
-Win at least one domestic title abroad
-Reach a Ginga rating (Dribbling + Technique + Flair + Acceleration + Agility) of at least 90

All the best though would be keen to know when Neymar won the World Cup.  

[Mikaelinho]

Just now, DazRTaylor said:

All the best though would be keen to know when Neymar won the World Cup.  

Cheers! I'm not trying to copy the careers of Neymar and/or Pélé. I wanted to give myself tough rules that would make my player's career equal to the careers of Neymar and Pélé while at the same keeping interest in my player's career even after he leaves my Santos FC team. I hope to do that with the national team and domestic title rules.

[ManUtd1]

Welcome to FMCU, brother! The legend!

[SRL88]

Welcome brother Good luck with this 

[Mikaelinho]

2 hours ago, ManUtd1 said:

Welcome to FMCU, brother! The legend!

 

25 minutes ago, SRL88 said:

Welcome brother Good luck with this 

Thank you guys!

[Mikaelinho]

After the second season (2020), these are my top three prospects:

3. Talles Magno

 

He came in for £15M from a Brazilian competitor, the highest transfer fee Santos has ever paid for a player. Expectations are naturally going to be high. Talles Magno hasn't made anyone disappointed after scoring 15 goals from his right wing position. This was the start that everyone had hoped for when he signed. Now he needs to replicate this, and preferably a little better, for several years to come. No biggie, right!?

2. Kaio Jorge

No, 49 goals won't put you on top of this list. At least not when your biggest competitor looks more or less like a reincarnation of Neymar. It does put you in the front of the pack in the race for Europe though! If Kaio Jorge can keep this up I'm certain he'll reach 100 goals within the next two seasons, perhaps even in one! Whether he'll develop his technical skills enough to pass off as a heir to the throne of Neymar is another issue...

1. Marcos Leonardo

Eleven goals in two season means that there's 89 goals left to reach 100, I know. And if Marcos Leonardo keeps this pace he'll reach Europe by the year 2037. I know that he can't go on like this forever, but look at his attributes! He's "only" 11 Ginga points away from that illusive 90 point mark, making it at least slightly possible to get there. As soon as Kaio Jorge reaches 100 goals I'll move him to the Attacking Forward position, which will probably get him to Europe in less than 16 seasons...I have high hopes!

 

[_Ben_]

I was reading this on Twitter the other day and I'm so glad you have made the decision to post this on a forum. It's a fantastic read and I love your focus on developing players to play the way you want them. I also am enjoying the realism that you know it'll be hard to keep world class players in Brazil so allowing them to follow a natural pathway to Europe.

I will keep following!

[Mikaelinho]

2 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

I was reading this on Twitter the other day and I'm so glad you have made the decision to post this on a forum. It's a fantastic read and I love your focus on developing players to play the way you want them. I also am enjoying the realism that you know it'll be hard to keep world class players in Brazil so allowing them to follow a natural pathway to Europe.

I will keep following!

I'm glad you like it! I'm having so much fun playing this save!

[oskumustatuli]

From where are the regen faces? Looks really nice..and the narrative too!

[Mikaelinho]

4 hours ago, oskumustatuli said:

From where are the regen faces? Looks really nice..and the narrative too!

I'm glad you like it. The regen faces come from the brilliant Laura/ChilledMoose. I can't describe enough the impact they have on my gaming experience!

[Mikaelinho]

On Friday the next episode covering the 2021 season will be out. I'll give you one sneak peek though of an unpresedented player development!

Meu Deus! A 68 attribute point increase over the course of one season! Truly astounding! Could this be the Next Neymar!?

[Benjoe]

Great to see you in here too, @Mikaelinho!

Recently read your blog and love the concept! 

Cesinha and his progression 

[Mikaelinho]

One hundred goals!

Welcome to the third season review episode! After the 2020 season we had Kaio Jorge halfway towards the 100 goal aim with Marcos Leonardo leading the group in Ginga Rating. When I allowed myself to close my eyes and dream going into the 2021 season, I saw Kaio Jorge reach that 100 goal mark after a splendid season and Marcos Leonardo improve on the training pitch each and every day, turning him more and more into the Next Neymar. These two were the top two prospects last season, and of course I wouldn't mind if we picked up another gem or two in the transfer market as well this season!

Here you can read episode 4 in full!

 

[Mikaelinho]

Our best performer on the training pitch in 2021 was Cesinha. By far. He improved by a total of 68 attribute points!

Oh my god. Meu. Deus. Cesinha improved basically everything, sky rocketing his Ginga Rating from 57 to 68, while improving every other aspect of his game at the same time. At 16 years of age he's gone from decent prospect to mouth watering Neymar wannabe!
Training focus next season: His Acceleration still needs a lot of work, so Quickness will be the primary focus.

[Mikaelinho]

Lesson learned by playing with numbers!

In the end of the 4th episode I wrote that I wanted to mix things up a bit by looking at lessons learned after three seasons. 

Since I track basically everything in my Santos FC spreadsheet I've started playing around with the training stats and I've come to a few conclusions. One disclaimer though, the data sample is really small, which makes statistical conclusions a bit shaky to draw. Anyway, let's play with numbers! Yay!

First of all, let's take a look at how much Ginga Rating (dark blue line) and the individual Ginga skills increase as players get older.

The biggest development comes from age 15 to 16, which hardly comes as a surprise. On average, players increased their Ginga Rating by 7.57 in the year going from age 15 to 16. The individual skill increase had a pretty even distribution (1.43-2.29) except for Flair that only increased by 0.43 on average. This is a pattern that is reproduced as players get older. All skills increase fairly equally except for Flair.

This leads to the first statistical conclusion, which might be an obvious one to you. Flair is by far the hardest Ginga skill to increase.

The second, also fairly obvious conclusion is that Ginga Rating improvement decreases with age. The decline from the "15 to 16" year's 7.57 increase is steep, while the "16 to 17" and "17 to 18" years show similar average increases (4.45 and 4.57). Then we have another sharp decline in the "18 to 19" year, which shows a pretty similar Ginga Rating increase to the "19 to 20" year (2.11 and 2.00).

That's all for now. I'm not really sure what this will lead to, but at least I enjoy doing it! There will be a full episode on this as soon as I'm done playing with the numbers. Perhaps this weekend!?

Edited April 9, 2020 by Mikaelinho

[_Ben_]

@Mikaelinho - lovely analysis there!

I have to agree with you, and it's one of the reasons that I'm looking into it in more detail - the first year is by far the most important. I'm yet to have a single 'late bloomer' who hasn't done much until 19/20 and then blown up.

I tend to see flair as almost a trait rather than an attribute - in the mould of 'you've got it or you haven't'  because I've never actually been able to improve it.

Interested to see where you take the analysis from here.

[john1]

Fantastic to see your players making huge progress with their development  Interesting objectives you have set out

[Mikaelinho]

11 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

@Mikaelinho - lovely analysis there!

I have to agree with you, and it's one of the reasons that I'm looking into it in more detail - the first year is by far the most important. I'm yet to have a single 'late bloomer' who hasn't done much until 19/20 and then blown up.

I tend to see flair as almost a trait rather than an attribute - in the mould of 'you've got it or you haven't'  because I've never actually been able to improve it.

Interested to see where you take the analysis from here.

Cheers! I've really enjoyed doing a bit of statistical analysis and what's even more important I learned a few lessons that made me make a few new strategic choices. Time well invested!

[Mikaelinho]

10 hours ago, john1 said:

Fantastic to see your players making huge progress with their development  Interesting objectives you have set out

Yeah, the huge development bursts have been nice, but the plateaus without development have been very frustrating on the other hand...

[Mikaelinho]

Episode 5 is here!

I’ve now done three seasons of this Santástico series, where the aim is to turn a Brazilian boy into the new Neymar or Pélé. I feel that the posts have become a bit repetitive and I’m not making enough progress in the actual save, which is a bit frustrating. I think the two go hand in hand, since my lack of progress means that I just keep going through the new players signed and how the players progressed in training in each season review. Last season Kaio Jorge finally reached that 100 goals aim, making him eligible for a move to Europe. If/when I manage to sell him (and hopefully others in coming years), the episodes will become more dynamic with players to follow in Europe as well as my own.

The episodes themselves are not the biggest issue though. The biggest issue is the lack of progress in my save. Sure, I’ve guided a record young Santos FC to two league titles and one Copa Libertadores title in three seasons, which is good. It would even have been considered excellent if that was what the series was about, creating an exceptional Santos FC team. Now, as you know, that’s not the aim of the series at all. The aim is to create the next Neymar or Pélé, and so far I’m not even close.

Therefore I’ve spent quite some time after the 2021 season analysing what’s been working and what hasn’t, in an attempt to improve things going into the 2022 season. I’ll go through my thoughts through different areas and summarise them in the end.

You can read the whole episode here.

[_Ben_]

23 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

Episode 5 is here!

I’ve now done three seasons of this Santástico series, where the aim is to turn a Brazilian boy into the new Neymar or Pélé. I feel that the posts have become a bit repetitive and I’m not making enough progress in the actual save, which is a bit frustrating. I think the two go hand in hand, since my lack of progress means that I just keep going through the new players signed and how the players progressed in training in each season review. Last season Kaio Jorge finally reached that 100 goals aim, making him eligible for a move to Europe. If/when I manage to sell him (and hopefully others in coming years), the episodes will become more dynamic with players to follow in Europe as well as my own.

The episodes themselves are not the biggest issue though. The biggest issue is the lack of progress in my save. Sure, I’ve guided a record young Santos FC to two league titles and one Copa Libertadores title in three seasons, which is good. It would even have been considered excellent if that was what the series was about, creating an exceptional Santos FC team. Now, as you know, that’s not the aim of the series at all. The aim is to create the next Neymar or Pélé, and so far I’m not even close.

Therefore I’ve spent quite some time after the 2021 season analysing what’s been working and what hasn’t, in an attempt to improve things going into the 2022 season. I’ll go through my thoughts through different areas and summarise them in the end.

You can read the whole episode here.

Wonderfully written, once again!

I'm glad to see you using the of the save - rather than losing sight of what you initially set out to do! 

Looking forward to seeing the development of the players in the next update.

[Mikaelinho]

1 minute ago, _Ben_ said:

Wonderfully written, once again!

I'm glad to see you using the of the save - rather than losing sight of what you initially set out to do! 

Looking forward to seeing the development of the players in the next update.

Thanks for the kind words! Now in my 4th season the verdict is that I was right on a couple of subjects and awfully wrong on others. The "Let everyone play" approach has already been scrapped, as an example!

[_Ben_]

2 minutes ago, Mikaelinho said:

Thanks for the kind words! Now in my 4th season the verdict is that I was right on a couple of subjects and awfully wrong on others. The "Let everyone play" approach has already been scrapped, as an example!

You know what - I actually loved the idea of playing your best striker prospect at wing back! I'm in the process of converting a winger who can't dribble or score into a full back and love these kind of experiments!

Any luck of moving Kaio Jorge on yet? He's had a fairly non-descript career in my game - moving for Everton for €17m and then Fener for €10m:

Who are you best 'real' prospects? I will have a look at how they've progressed in my game.

[Mikaelinho]

 

17 minutes ago, _Ben_ said:

You know what - I actually loved the idea of playing your best striker prospect at wing back! I'm in the process of converting a winger who can't dribble or score into a full back and love these kind of experiments!

This might sound really strange coming from someone who absolutely loves the developmental part of FM to such an extent that almost every save I do turn into a youth development save, but...here it goes...I'm scared shitless by the training module. There, I said it. I actually haven't touched training at all previously this year and therefore haven't really bothered to learn the mechanics behind it. It wasn't until I wrote my previous post that I started dabbling with training and all I did was to add one or two technical training sessions to premade schedules. It sparked enough interest in training to make me want to learn more about it though, and since @Rashidi et al have done such amazing work on it I got completely hooked.

It turns out that actual rating in games is a factor, which in combination with us losing games, made me come to the conclusion that playing a 17-year-old striker as wing back, getting sub7 ratings and losing games was bad both for manager and player. Since my new scouting filter limits the number of potential signings I'm toying with the idea to go really in-depth on training from now on instead, since I'll most likely have fewer prospects to develop and write about in posts.

 

23 minutes ago, _Ben_ said:

Any luck of moving Kaio Jorge on yet? He's had a fairly non-descript career in my game - moving for Everton for €17m and then Fener for €10m:

Who are you best 'real' prospects? I will have a look at how they've progressed in my game.

Kaio Jorge is drumming up exactly ZERO interest from European clubs. Chinese clubs on the other hand, they want him like a child wants candy, but I don't want to move him to China...He's not exactly progressing atm either so he's not increasing his chances of reaching Europe. I've actually put him on the bench on more than a couple of occasions so far this season...

Marcos Leonardo and Renyer are the two original Santos FC players that are doing best right now, together with Talles Magno who is the best player I've signed so far they are my best non-newgen performers in season 4.

[_Ben_]

6 minutes ago, Mikaelinho said:

This might sound really strange coming from someone who absolutely loves the developmental part of FM to such an extent that almost every save I do turn into a youth development save, but...here it goes...I'm scared shitless by the training module. There, I said it. I actually haven't touched training at all previously this year and therefore haven't really bothered to learn the mechanics behind it. It wasn't until I wrote my previous post that I started dabbling with training and all I did was to add one or two technical training sessions to premade schedules. It sparked enough interest in training to make me want to learn more about it though, and since @Rashidi et al have done such amazing work on it I got completely hooked.

It turns out that actual rating in games is a factor, which in combination with us losing games, made me come to the conclusion that playing a 17-year-old striker as wing back, getting sub7 ratings and losing games was bad both for manager and player. Since my new scouting filter limits the number of potential signings I'm toying with the idea to go really in-depth on training from now on instead, since I'll most likely have fewer prospects to develop and write about in posts.

Yep - scared me too! I've only taken it on this season and I'm a little sceptical as it's not a numerical kind of thing! So far I've looked at it and I don't really feel it can be done wrong - only less optimally. I've enjoyed looking through the blocks to find out what would really help my team and also thinking about us on the pitch and what we need to work on. I've seen some in-match feedback saying something about the extra work on this area has paid off, which is 50% of my battle won!

I am also really worried about that magical 7.0 rating and it really stops me from throwing players in and worries me when I see them play poorly. I guess it's all about finding the right time to play them!

9 minutes ago, Mikaelinho said:

Kaio Jorge is drumming up exactly ZERO interest from European clubs. Chinese clubs on the other hand, they want him like a child wants candy, but I don't want to move him to China...He's not exactly progressing atm either so he's not increasing his chances of reaching Europe. I've actually put him on the bench on more than a couple of occasions so far this season...

Marcos Leonardo and Renyer are the two original Santos FC players that are doing best right now, together with Talles Magno who is the best player I've signed so far they are my best non-newgen performers in season 4.

I imagine you'd normally bite the hands off a Chinese club, given their finances but that doesn't follow the Neymar Route so I understand why you'd be annoyed.

Here are those three players - who've all managed very average careers, unfortunately:

Renyer

Marcos Leonardo

Talles Magno

---

I'm positive you'll be able to develop them better!

[Mikaelinho]

22 minutes ago, _Ben_ said:

Here are those three players - who've all managed very average careers, unfortunately:

Renyer

Marcos Leonardo

Talles Magno

---

I'm positive you'll be able to develop them better!

Two things make me happy here. 1. They all made it to Europe. 2. I can safely say that they are all on their way to better careers than that on my save!

Oh wait, three things make me happy. I really enjoy this interaction with you!

[Mikaelinho]

Later today I'll release the 2022 season review post, following the changes made in the Lessons learned episode from earlier this week.

I'll throw in a teaser right now, inspired by @_Ben_.

It's a table of development both in Ginga skills and in general. Most of the older players' development were disappointing, but LOOK AT BRANDÃO!

[Mikaelinho]

He started the season at a lowly Ginga Rating of 59, but look at this development!

 

[ShaunG95]

Wow, technique up by 4, how on earth?!

[_Ben_]

10 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

Later today I'll release the 2022 season review post, following the changes made in the Lessons learned episode from earlier this week.

I'll throw in a teaser right now, inspired by @_Ben_.

It's a table of development both in Ginga skills and in general. Most of the older players' development were disappointing, but LOOK AT BRANDÃO!

I, obviously, love this. It really raises some good questions:

- What happened to Telles Magno? An injury? Is he key or would he be sold for poor training performance?

- What is Alecio's personality? Seems to me, even though he was a strong starter with a high Ginga rating, he's not going anywhere fast. Although I'd like to see what he could do in a few years - e.g. is he a late bloomer?

[_Ben_]

3 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

He started the season at a lowly Ginga Rating of 59, but look at this development!

 

 

Just ran this through my own calculation system, to see how he compared, given that I can see his attributes:

So, in my money, that's a 17% growth in one year and not even with an amazing personality. He looks great!

 

[Mikaelinho]

3 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

 

Just ran this through my own calculation system, to see how he compared, given that I can see his attributes:

So, in my money, that's a 17% growth in one year and not even with an amazing personality. He looks great!

 

Wow! That is really awesome! Thanks for doing that. Now I'm just crossing my fingers that he'll keep improving next season. So far my feeling is that after an incredible season development wise you usually see a plateau, but I pray that that won't be the case for Brandão. When it came to training overall, no real surprises showed up.

I bet the only reason why 16to17 performed better than 15to16 was Alécio's atrocious season. Besides that, things follow the same pattern as last year. I'm hoping to have the actual post out before midnight, putting the finishing touches on it now!

[_Ben_]

7 minutes ago, Mikaelinho said:

Wow! That is really awesome! Thanks for doing that. Now I'm just crossing my fingers that he'll keep improving next season. So far my feeling is that after an incredible season development wise you usually see a plateau, but I pray that that won't be the case for Brandão. When it came to training overall, no real surprises showed up.

I bet the only reason why 16to17 performed better than 15to16 was Alécio's atrocious season. Besides that, things follow the same pattern as last year. I'm hoping to have the actual post out before midnight, putting the finishing touches on it now!

This is exactly why I built the long term monitoring view in Excel. I don't monitor the specific attributes as you do, even though I have those in my 'DNA' (read: this is definitely what I'm going to be building as soon as I've made this post!) but I am going to try and collect yearly progress data:

Everything that I've seen so far would indicate that the progress rate slows - look at Abel Gonzalez, who made 1.9 points (19%) in year one but only 1.0 points (9%) in year two. I have yet to find anyone who has not performed, largely because I got rid of a few after their first season who developed awfully!

I am really interested to see Alecio's screenshot and personality/MH please as well as his longer term career, if you decide to keep him!

[Mikaelinho]

Episode 6 is here!

https://mikaelinhofm.com/2020/04/18/santastico-ep-6-2022-highs-and-lows/

Edited April 17, 2020 by Mikaelinho

[ManUtd1]

6 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

 

Just ran this through my own calculation system, to see how he compared, given that I can see his attributes:

So, in my money, that's a 17% growth in one year and not even with an amazing personality. He looks great!

 

Was thinking the same thing, he's has one heck of a year, developmentally. 

[ManUtd1]

9 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

He started the season at a lowly Ginga Rating of 59, but look at this development!

 

The consistency from his hairstylist is everything. Got to be good for an extra point or two.

[Mikaelinho]

6 hours ago, ManUtd1 said:

The consistency from his hairstylist is everything. Got to be good for an extra point or two.

That hair comes naturally when you've got a Flair of 17

[Mikaelinho]

2023 season

Unfortunately the 2023 youth intake was a huge disappointment, with only one player worth keeping, João Arroz. With a Ginga Rating of 52 he's useless for this challenge though...

[_Ben_]

2 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

2023 season

Unfortunately the 2023 youth intake was a huge disappointment, with only one player worth keeping, João Arroz. With a Ginga Rating of 52 he's useless for this challenge though...

It seems that you're constantly being dealt tough hands with this save - yet your commitment towards achieving the goals remain hugely commendable!

[Mikaelinho]

3 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

It seems that you're constantly being dealt tough hands with this save - yet your commitment towards achieving the goals remain hugely commendable!

I have the same feeling. When managing European clubs on other saves the feeling is that the Brazilian and Argentinian wonderkids are abundant. I always think that managing in Brazil would mean dozens and more dozens of potential world class players just hanging around. That has not been the feeling during this Santos save, at least not yet. I think I've set my standards pretty high with what I bring in though. I'm not looking to create the next half decent Brazilian export to Europe, I'm looking for the next Neymar/Pélé, which most likely means a top 10 Brazilian player of all times, both in the minds of the people/fans and also regarding achievements on the pitch. I'm currently writing a blog post where I tackle my frustration about this and put things into perspective...

[Mikaelinho]

Considering our poor youth intake, yet again we needed to hit the transfer market to find new prospects. With our new scouting filter things seemed really tough to bring in anyone, but with slight tweaks we found five new players.

Daniel is the youngest player in and actually fits the tougher scouting filter with a Flair of 15+ and the rest of the Ginga skills at 10+!

Pirulito is the best player Ginga wise with a Ginga Rating of 71. Already 17 years old though, but he looks promising!

[Mikaelinho]

So, I'll just leave this here...

Tomorrow I'll publish the 2023 season review. It's a happy one. It's titled "Help me God". Everything is just great...

[Mikaelinho]

Episode 7 is here!

Welcome to the fifth season review episode, covering the 2023 seaon! My hopes for this season was to reach three players with 100+ goals and that we'd finally drum up enough attention for one of them to secure a move to Europe. So far interest from European clubs has been non-existent and it means that I'm having troubles moving the series forward.

Along the lines of the last episode I'll keep this one on the shorter side, looking at training in more general terms. We'll only go in-depth with the outstanding players, in an attempt to keep the post shorter. As usual, we'll start off with our youth intake. Which was a disappointment. As usual.

You can read "Episode 7 - Help me God" here

[_Ben_]

19 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

I have the same feeling. When managing European clubs on other saves the feeling is that the Brazilian and Argentinian wonderkids are abundant. I always think that managing in Brazil would mean dozens and more dozens of potential world class players just hanging around. That has not been the feeling during this Santos save, at least not yet. I think I've set my standards pretty high with what I bring in though. I'm not looking to create the next half decent Brazilian export to Europe, I'm looking for the next Neymar/Pélé, which most likely means a top 10 Brazilian player of all times, both in the minds of the people/fans and also regarding achievements on the pitch. I'm currently writing a blog post where I tackle my frustration about this and put things into perspective...

I read this, formulated my response and then read your latest blog post, which kind of answered what I was going to say.

Two things:

You are really limiting the pool of players and, as such, you're going to struggle. It's one of the reasons I don't sign many players because there simply aren't many two footed, versatile model citizens who excel in Anticipation, Concentration and Decisions and who hold a Spanish passport!

If you look at the Brazilians in my team:

• A goalkeeper - think Taffarel or Ederson
• Two full backs - think Cafu and Roberto Carlos
• A ball playing centre back - maybe of the David Luiz mould.
• Two wingers
• An inside forward - maybe closest to the Neymar style
• A pacey forward who was linked to Ronaldo (and is called Ronaldo).

Out of that, Neyveson is probably the only one who'd fit into your style for development yet there are several really good players. I see you have addressed that somewhat with your signings of 'other' types of player.

2 hours ago, Mikaelinho said:

Episode 7 is here!

Welcome to the fifth season review episode, covering the 2023 seaon! My hopes for this season was to reach three players with 100+ goals and that we'd finally drum up enough attention for one of them to secure a move to Europe. So far interest from European clubs has been non-existent and it means that I'm having troubles moving the series forward.

 

Along the lines of the last episode I'll keep this one on the shorter side, looking at training in more general terms. We'll only go in-depth with the outstanding players, in an attempt to keep the post shorter. As usual, we'll start off with our youth intake. Which was a disappointment. As usual.

You can read "Episode 7 - Help me God" here

 

This is once again, great!

My main question - do you have any European leagues loaded?

I really like Gilberto and I think he's a perfect 'last shoulder' striker but that concentration is a concern! I have found youngsters to, as a rule, be terrible in that area! Is he from your academy? I also think you've got an absolute star in Elzio Mello, even if he's playing a bit deeper than you'd want the #10 you seek.

[Mikaelinho]

21 minutes ago, _Ben_ said:

This is once again, great!

My main question - do you have any European leagues loaded?

I really like Gilberto and I think he's a perfect 'last shoulder' striker but that concentration is a concern! I have found youngsters to, as a rule, be terrible in that area! Is he from your academy? I also think you've got an absolute star in Elzio Mello, even if he's playing a bit deeper than you'd want the #10 you seek.

I appreciate your kind words!

To answer your question - Yes, I have Italy, Spain, England, Germany, Portugal, Holland and France loaded! I didn't at first but added them going into season 3. I have a problem that I think has to do with reputation though. My top players are not even remotely interested in discussing contracts with mid-level teams in the top leagues or any of the teams in Holland or Portugal. Not even Ajax or FC Porto. This limits the potential targets quite significantly.

Regarding my talents in general, I really enjoy having a smaller group of players to develop. It means that I can spend a little more detail on each player, trying to strengthen their strength further or fix weaknesses while at the same time raising their Ginga. Next up is my training post where I try to figure out the training module...

Gilberto is not from my academy, I signed him for the ridiculous sum of £200K in 2021. Starting Ginga Rating 70 at age 16.

Edited April 21, 2020 by Mikaelinho

[Mikaelinho]

I've decided to take the plunge into the bottomless pit that is the FM training module. I'm immediately punished and run into problems. Specifically the problem of the neverending Brazilian season...

Games are in red, and as you can see I wasn't kidding when I said it's a neverending season. This will pose several difficulties when constructing my training plan.

[Mikaelinho]

Later this week I plan to release a post where I go through my plunge into the training module and the resulting revamped training, but I'll give you what I've come up with so far:

To construct a training schedule (or multiple) we need to consider what we want to achieve in training. "Create the best possible players" and/or "win games" are usually the immediate answers to this, which is of course what we're all aiming for. But what is the actual best player for you? By looking at your playing style and club DNA you can easily determine what sort of player you want to create, and when I do this, the answer to what I want to do is simple; I want to maximise my players' Ginga Rating.

Considering the congested Brazilian schedule this poses a real challenge. If our main/only goal was to win games, a schedule based on recovery and team prep work would probably have been our best option, but for me winning games is secondary to player development. Therefore my aim is to fit enough and correct training into this congested schedule to maximise player development.

With a Wed/Sun match day schedule this is the template we start with.

Many weeks will look like this. A game on Wednesday and then another game on Sunday. Game days are not training days, so we immediately lose two training days (6 training sessions) out of the 7 days (21 training sessions) of the week. We also need to do a bit of prep work (Match Preview Sessions) ahead of the games.

The Match Preview session gives us a chance to analyse the upcoming opposition and improve our Tactical Familiarity without getting tired or injured. It also increases Team Cohesion, making the team gel together and slightly increases the team's Sharpness.

[john1]

Absolutely loving your writing depth and how deep your analyst is too!  players making great progress too! Surprised to see you brought Gabriel Jesus back to Brazil.

[Mikaelinho]

7 hours ago, john1 said:

Absolutely loving your writing depth and how deep your analyst is too!  players making great progress too! Surprised to see you brought Gabriel Jesus back to Brazil.

Thanks for your kind words! I'm loving it so far! I was a bit surprised myself as well by the Gabriel Jesus transfer, but I simply couldn't help myself when he became available on a free transfer...I might have had a beer or two as well that evening...