Kanegetshighbysmellinhisarmpits

Quoted so people can read what I said before...... Well it was an interesting summer.... Transfers in: Barry Robson (Free from Rangers) Mikeal Silvestre (Free from Arsenal) Ben Foster (Free from Chelsea) Paul Codrea (Free from Genoa) Nicky Hunt (Free from Bolton) Maxi Lopez (Free from FC Moscow) Mark van Bommel (Free from Bayern Munich) Jack Hobbs (Free from Liverpool) Simon McAuley (£90,000 from Motherwell) Charlie Mulgrew (£425,000 from Rangers) So 10 players in for just over £500,000, which I was happy with, especially van Bommel and Ben Foster. I wanted to add a couple more but this is already pushing my wage budget to the extreme - I may tinker with my budgets come January.... Transfers out: Lauren (£350,000 to Doncaster) Sun Jihai (£250,000 to Watford) Jordan Robertson (£1,000,000 to Cardiff) George Pilkington (£1,500,000 to Watford) Gary Naysmith (£775,000 to Plymouth) Ryan Stevenson (£550,000 to Cardiff) Diego Leon (£2,000,000 to Nottingham Forest) So 7 players sold for around £6,500,000 million. Not bad really. There were a couple of other players I wanted to sell, but clubs either didn't meet the valuation, or the player shunned the move. I also released a few more players. So now here I am on the first day of the season. Looking over my first three fixtures I can see I've got...... Chelsea at home, Man United away, Liverpool at home. George Pilkington? Christ, did you have some lewd photos of the Watford manager that you blackmailed him with to get £1.5mill? And muchos respect on getting Luton all the way up in consecutive seasons, that's some achievement, especially considering you managed to win the league in the first season...you must have won practically all your games to win the league. Hope you stay up, your team doesn't seem too bad (considering who you've brought in at least) so you'll at least have a fighting chance of surviving.

You should play him over the rest of your (*looking back at your end of season 2 post on the last page*) rather insanely awesome team as a kind of stereotypical, crazy Dad 'You're going to be the greatest footballer in the world so that I can be the greatest footballer in the world's Dad' kinda way. Either that or just release him to show him tough love.

Possebon is an absolute god in the Championship, I loaned him for QPR once and he scored 20 goals, most of them long range piledrivers!

I'm currently in the midst of a Man City game, and I'm realistically having trouble purchasing the world's best players. For example, Liverpool came 7th in the first season, and as I came 4th and was challenging for the title for most of the season, I had a go at purchasing Gerrard and Torres; the prices I got quoted were deals worth £96million and £118million respectively. I didn't buy either of them, but it got me wondering...what is the most you have spent on a player? Mine would have to be £83million on Lionel Messi on FM08 - I was Arsenal in about 2013, and as per usual on that game they were absolutely loaded, worth over a £billion, an annual transfer budget of £150million (which was obviously capped because they never let me go any higher), and as I needed a left winger, and Messi was in his prime...deal kinda made sense, although I did have to take a brief rest after clicking 'confirm transfer', as I'm very much a wheeler-dealer by nature, so spending any kind of fortune on one man is very, very foreign to me.

Welcome to the glass ceiling. The big two keeping you down!

I love bargain shopping on this game. I've just spent around 200k on about 12 players, all under 20, and all heading for my (already crowded) reserve team (I've developed a tendency to build huge reserve squads, as my first team squads at a team like Forest are usually quite small). 10 of these 12 players came from Scandanavia, and are all extremely promising. I've found that Scandanavia has always been a promising place, on all the Football Manager games, for talented youth players, along with South America. I think it's one of the better features of the game that you can send your scouts to find such gems for next to nothing.

This was the impression I was getting as well. Maybe a feature or two sprinkled in, but other than that largely just a data update.

I play a diamond formation (i.e. dmc, mr, ml, amc in midfield), lumping long balls up to a tall, lanky bloke up front, with a smaller, nippier ally.

Crouch in Spain lol

Finished 8th with Lewes, and I've kept my job! My finances are going firmly and rapidly downhill though, losing 35k per month, which is millions to a conference south side. I finished with the best defensive record in the league (42 goals conceded in 42 games) but only the 14th best goals scored record (51 in 42), which is probably high I was no higher than 8th (although moving from 19th to 8th over 6 months isn't a bad achievement). I drew 21 games and only lost 8, and most of the draws were due to last minute equalisers from the opposition, which really gets quite tiresome after a while. Hopefully I can bring in a host of freebies in the summer so that I can build a team around a more attacking formation than 5-4-1.

Vanden Borre at right back? Although, one season in, he'll probably be at a better club that anderlecht by now. EDIT: Sorry, wing back.

Managing in the Conference South is soooooooooooooooo hard! I started unemployed, and got offered the job at Lewes in mid-September. They were predicted to finish 2nd at the beginning of the season, and I joined them when they were 19th. With only 6k in transfer funds, which rapidly went on a physio, I'm literally haemorraging (sp?) money, even though I'm more than 1k under my wage budget. I'm got them to 15th by Christmas, although the league table is very tight at this stage. I've drawn too many games, and no semi-decent player wants to come to me. If I'm in the job at the start of next season, I'll be shocked.

How successful are you at selling your players for either somewhere near, or more than their estimated value? Myself, I'm absolutely terrible, I can't seem to sell anyone on more than a free.

Doesn't matter in my case anyway now, because I stayed up!!! I've kept a mid-table Championship-quality side in the Premiership! Now to go buy some Premiership quality players...

Staind - Outside (live - unfortunately, it features Fred Durst, but it's still seriously awesome.)

I don't see what's so special about that Salazar guy? Sure, he's some athlete, but he's just above average at crossing, which I would think is a must for an attacking winger. The striker seems much better to me.

This was an AWESOME film. Went to see it last night, and all my mates moaned about the length, but I thought that they filled all 3 hours really well, and kept the film interesting throughout. Johnny Depp continued to be absolute quality as Jack, and Keira was smoking hot (in my opinion anyway, I have grown to understand that she's now an acquired taste, so to speak.) Better than the first two (although they were both really good as well.)

In 5-10 years time, I hope to make Forest a top 4 side, possibly with a cup or two in the bag. I've already tried managing England, failed, and resigned. My ultimate goal (as always) is to get to the top of the Hall of Fame on the game...highest I've ever got was third.

This happens to everyone. It's called form. The game doesn't hate you.

Mikel will have quite a big current reputation and a sizable potential ability which combined with the fact that he'll probably tear that league apart means theres a chance he might get a work permit after one year. Maybe not this time since it's only half a seaon but after another full one he might get it. Actually, hold the phone. Mikel? John Obi Mikel? Of Chelsea? How the hell doesn't he have a work permit? Are you like years into the game and he's done nothing but sit in the reserves?