Football Manager 2015

[Baddar]

Memphis is a little bit naughty on the game.

[FestiveJack]

He's incredible. I didn't really use him properly in the first half of last season, but second half he was insane, whether left wing, up front on his own, in a front two, front three, whatever. 14 goals in the League after Christmas (19 in total), 11 assists, average rating of 7.61. Even better in the cups, 7 in 6 domestically, and 14 in 14 in the Europa League.

So far this season, including his hatrick against Ajax, he's 4 goals, three assists, two POTM in three league games, average rating of 8.8. Scored and assisted in my 4-0 win over Ajax in the Super Cup as well.

[Benji]

So the game called my Euro group the group of death, and Sporting were the biggest threat...

... not so sure any more.

We already qualified for the next round, so I told the lads to just go out and have fun in the rematch...

... and they did.

[Benji]

We are in the Euro Cup semis. This is a miracle run.

[Benji]

Despite a god damned tense second half and final 10 minutes where we came close to throwing away our 2 goal first leg lead AND a two goal match lead in one foul swoop.

[stokeriño]

This is probably in the 'suit-wearing' range of FM silliness, but if I reach a Champions League or Europa League final I play the competition's theme music before the match to get in the mood. You should do that too, at the very least so that I'm not the only one.

https://youtu.be/LucsBFb-mXU

[Franklin_1]

Despite a god damned tense second half and final 10 minutes where we came close to throwing away our 2 goal first leg lead AND a two goal match lead in one foul swoop.

Had a similar run with my Barnet and ended up taking on Real Madrid in the final. I imagined that a club like that would probably be disappointed to be in the Europa League and maybe not super motivated for the match and I turned out to be right because I won with one of the easiest 3-0 results I've ever had.

[Benji]

I squeaked it 1-0. First major international trophy I've won on FM in years.

[Bobfoc]

That's Champions League football for the following season, isn't it?

[Baddar]

It would be now, yes. Not sure if SI implemented that rule for the game in time though.

[Benji]

They did, and I didn't know

[JasonM]

So I've reached the October International break, and well... I haven't expected this kind of success early on, with this aged squad.

7 league games, 6 wins and 1 draw (draw happened when I accidentally fielded my League Cup side)

2 CL Group Games (Trabzonspor, Roma), 2 wins 2-0 at Trabzon and 3-1 against Roma.

3-0 win against Stoke in the League Cup with a secondary squad.

Next game after the break will be against my old team Forest, and i'm fully going into that game wanting to destroy them. The new manager (Garry Monk) has ruined the side by selling the likes of Macias and wasting huge amounts of money on useless signings. So I have no love lost for that team again.

Being undefeated in the league puts me on top, but City is right behind me and their defense has been disgustingly good.

My team itself is still doing well, lots of goalscorers but Azzaoui is not producing as well as last year in my system. I've made changes, but no bueno as of yet, but hopefully he'll change his fortunes around soon and turn the team scoring into overdrive.

Edited June 14, 2015 by Jasonmufc

[FestiveJack]

This game sometimes. Chelsea? No problem, 6-2. Arsenal? Easy peasy, 5-1.

But can I get a win against any team from the North East? Not on your fucking life.

[JTB]

I've qualified for both the Europa League and DFB Pokal finals with Gladbach, where I'll play Atletico and Bayern respectively. Ideally I'll win both but if I can pick up even just one of the trophies I'll be pleased considering 2nd place is guaranteed for me if I beat Hamburg in my next match. Then I've just got a final day clash with Hannover to get through, in which I could end up relegating them. Bayern ran away with the league in the end, they stormed it second half of the season with January signing Franco di Santo scoring some massive goals by the looks of things - meanwhile, my defence regularly fell to shit which means I've turned a lot of winning positions into draws. Pretty sure I have the second highest amount of draws in the league, with the team with the most being one of the sides fighting a relegation battle. That'll be addressed in the summer with a good centre half coming in as well as a tweak of my tactics.

Got a few transfer targets lined up for the summer already. I've managed to seriously unsettle Carlos Fierro at Chivas, so I should be able to get him cheaper than I would've done previously, and he'll replace Hrgota who despite having a 40-plus goal season, I don't feel he can lead the team's attack for years to come. Stoke are interested in him, and I'm tempted to cash in should they come in with the right offer because I don't feel right giving Hrgota the contract he wants.

I'm also going after Balanta, Drogba on a free (mostly for tutoring reasons, but his stats are still decent enough for him to become a back-up striker seeing as I don't really have an out-and-out striker for back-up), Fuchs on a free (again, not a first team regular but will be decent cover at LB with Daems leaving) and a couple of decent regens. I might dip into the loan market too if I'm unhappy with the squad depth by the end of the transfer window, because I'll need more quality throughout to challenge for the Bundesliga (I'll admit though, I'd happily take qualifying for CL football next season to stabilise finances even more so I can eventually go out and get that big game-changing signing that leads me to un-seating Bayern and winning the Bundesliga).

EDIT: Beat HSV 2-0 so 2nd place is now guaranteed. Hrogta got 2 more goals taking him to 42 for the season in all competitions, and 23 in the league. Juan Bernat might become available from Bayern which would negate the need to sign Fuchs but I can't see him coming cheap and LB isn't my priority.

Edited June 14, 2015 by JTB

[brenchill]

So I'm in 2032, I had a quick look at the SPL to find Celtic have won every league title from 2012 - 2032...

[TCO]

It genuinely wouldn't surprise me if that actually happened.

In my Brentford game Real Madrid have won 5 La Liga titles on the bounce and Luis Enrique is still Barcelona for some reason.

[Benji]

Jores Okore is a moron. He asked to leave if an offer came in from Chelsea as he's "always wanted to play for them", which is fine by me as I have the spare first team defence, and it'll give me a chance to introduce some hot prospects from the U21s easier. I want what he's worth though, which to me is probably about 10m (his game estimate is 6.5m, but he was 8.5m when I got him, and he's improved since then so I'm not letting him go for less than at least what I got him for), and tell him he can go so long as Chelsea match our asking price. Chelsea offer well below the estimate, let alone what we asked for, and won't budge, so naturally I reject.

Next thing, Okore is whining and moaning about me breaking promises. Nu-uh, dickwad, Chelsea didn't offer anywhere near your worth and wouldn't budge, so quityerbitchin'. I got no issue with him leaving, but I am not losing money on a player I've actively pulled up and improved from Premier League relegation loser into a Champions League player, especially not as he's just hitting his prime.

[JasonM]

Transfer ai come in 2 shitty forms...

1: Insanely high fees for average players who proceed to rot as reserve... aka, the moneybag teams...

2: Lowball the human player relentlessly until every player hates human manager or manager gets annoyed enough to accept the shit offer...

[stokeriño]

The unreasonableness of players can be handy at some times, just to save a little bit of cash...

I've just had a player who asked to leave, and I said okay and offered him out with a requested fee of R500k. Three offers came in, two of which were R500k and the other was at about R170k. Naturally I accept two and reject the latter.

The player throws a hissy fit about me rejecting one of the offers. He is absent from training, allowing me to fine him two weeks' wages. Cha-ching!

And of course he then signed for one of the R500k clubs without any fuss. Cheers, fella.

[Benji]

I'm always reluctant to fine for anything other than aggressively poor single performance or missing training. I should start fining for talking to the press. This management is a fascist dictatorship!