Jump to content

Football Manager 2021


FestiveJack

Recommended Posts

3 hours ago, Liam Mk2 said:

Planning on starting my first real save with Newcastle. 

What do they need apart from a striker? Everything?

I've seen Joelinton actually perform alright as a striker for Newcastle, but apart from him and Saint-Maximin yeah you pretty much wanna start from scratch and hope that a takeover comes sooner rather than later.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Took Spurs to 3rd in the Prem and the semis of the Europa League in my first season without any signings.

Now all my best players are wanted by PSG, Real Madrid, Barca, Man City etc. I don't have the financial power to convince them to stay if they come in with bids :crying:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Finished my 2nd season at Berlin, but I'm going to take a pause on that game for a bit because I did what I always end up doing when I play: starting a new save within the game. Everton were relegated at the end of the 2021/22, so I've decided to have some fun by creating a new manager to jump in on that.

They were underperforming in 2020/21 and in relegation trouble I remember because Carlo got sacked, but ended up finishing 12th (on only 45 points) under Michael O'Neill. Second season saw them finish 19th on only 30 points! Just 7 wins, 4th least goals scored (38), and 2nd most shipped (63!). They sold Digne and DCL in the first off season for €40m and €46 but up to €70m in add ons if goal/appearances are met, and only got to reinvest half of that, and none of it in anyone worthwhile.

Their finances are hard to get a read of, honestly. It says their overall balance is €146m, despite their graph only showing €36m, and the profits have been all over the place. I'm pretty sure their status is only rich right now because we just got our sponsorship money, parachute payment, and player sales money. So needless to say, I'm taking few chances and trying to raise significant cash through player sales. Thankfully, Premier League clubs love to spend silly money.

Bournemouth dropped €40m for James, Burnley €21m for Andre Gomes, West Brom €19.75m for Yerry Mina, and Sheffield United €20m for 31 year old left back Nuno Sequeira, who replaced Digne coming in for only €11m last summer. Allan will be joining PSG for €41.5m and Bernard will leave for around €5m as well. That's around €145 million coming into the club, and even more importantly, every player but Sequeira was on over €100k per week. My goal has been to shred as many of those bad contracts and I can, for obvious reasons.

Now that I'm officially in the Championship (although still at the end of June so haven't done really anything yet), some relegation clauses have kicked in so no one is making over 100k p/w, but Doucoure, Pickford, and Richardson are on over 90k, and Iwobi is on 71k (I'm pretty sure his wages got slashed in half). Doucoure, Iwobi, and Ben Godfrey all also want to leave, while Seamus Coleman and Fabian Delph are moving on as well. So I'm hoping to shed more wages, and I'm also hoping to sell Pickford (fuck T-Rex arms), Michael Keane, and one of the two strikers Everton signed last summer (Santos Borre or Paulinho from Braga).

The great thing is that there's definitely pieces I can build around still. 21 year old Lewis Gibson and 19 year old Jarrad Branthwaite are both two CBs that I can play loads in the Championship, and Mason Holgate will hopefully stick around too. 23 year old LB Faitout Maouassa was signed on the cheap last season and should develop great since I'll play him regularly, Gbamin is happy to stay since I promised him first yeah football, and I've convinced Richarlison, Moise Kean, and 24 year old Victor Tsygankov (RW who actually joined Everton over me at Berlin last summer) to stay so long as we get promoted. There's some other decent youth products I can play, and really, I just need to sign a CM or two to compete with Gbamin and Tom Davies, and probably a RB.

Fulham and Norwich are joining me in the Championship, while Villa and Palace are both there as well after failing to go back up in the Playoffs last season. Imagining us, that 4, Reading, Blackburn, and Brentford will be the best sides, but the Championship is always a crapshoot

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I got raided pretty hard. Kane, Son and Dier all gone. After some transfers in it leaves me looking like this:

A Team:
d.png

B Team:

e.png

Also have Sessegnon, Skipp and Connor Goldson (to replace Tanganga who demanded a loan move) floating around in the reserves. Also Lamela because no one wants him but he won't make my final squad unfortunately for him. Still have £110M to play with but no one is really jumping out as a good option to buy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, RazorsEdge said:

Also Lamela because no one wants him but he won't make my final squad unfortunately for him. Still have £110M to play with but no one is really jumping out as a good option to buy.

I hope you get sacked. 

Edited by Jimmy
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

My free transfer and loan only save has got to the Premier League.

I did an edit on a random bottom tier team and set them to basically be able to get almost anyone.

Players like Demaeri Gray and Max Mayer going on free transfer really helps, haven’t been able to tempt anyone who are still at a club and their contract runs out, only when they actually go on a free.

Luckily my youth academy started to kick in to gear when I got to L2/1 because of the wage restriction but I walked the championship.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Finished first season / first summer window as Arsenal boss as per tradition when playing a new version.

League campaign wasn't exactly stellar, finishing in a disappointing 6th position (hey, should be used to this sort of finish nowadays...). 17 wins, 12 draws and 9 losses, definitely something to improve upon next season - only scoring 55 goals as well whilst shipping 35 at the other end. 

Had an absolute shocker in the Europa League - although I'd argue was a little more difficult than I'd have liked as we were drawn against AC Milan, Celtic and Antwerp. Only managed one win in the group at home to the Belgian side, winning 3-0. But two losses away at both Milan and Celtic and draws in all other games meant we finished bottom of the group. Humiliating.

We had a much better time of it in the domestic cups though, winning both of them (plus the Community Shield - TREBLE WINNERS!!). the FA Cup was kind to us up until the semi-final, dispatching of Swansea (2-1), Southampton (3-0), Luton (5-1) and Nottingham Forest (4-0). Then we were drawn against Manchester City in the semi-final in which we managed to hold out for penalties after drawing 0-0, winning the shootout 5-4 after John Stones missed for them. The final gave us a glamorous tie against league winners Liverpool. Goals from Partey, Bellerin and Willian sealed a comfortable 3-0 win for us.

The EFL Cup was a little trickier, but we managed, beating Derby (2-0), West Ham (1-0), Chelsea (2-2p) before we beat Everton 2-1 in the semi-final to setup a final against Manchester City. Ended up 3-2 winners thanks to Willian, Partey and Gabriel all scoring.

Then it was onto a summer of upheaval, plenty of deadwood to shift and plenty of opportunities to improve our squad for the short-term as well as long-term. Player sales were as follows:

Sead Kolasinac (Bournemouth - 14m)
Granit Xhaka (AS Monaco - 31m)
Calum Chambers (Bournemouth - 21.5m)
Eddie Nketiah (Lille - loan)
Joe Willock (AC Milan - loan)
Runar Runarsson (Young Boys - loan)
Reiss Nelson (Nice - loan)
William Saliba (West Ham - loan)
Matteo Guendouzi (Hertha BSC - loan)
Willian (Leicester - loan)
David Luiz, Shkodran Mustafi, Mesut Ozil (released)

All this meant plenty of available wage and squad space, but we didn't exactly splash the cash but invested fairly wisely:

Memphis Depay (free from Lyon)
Eric Garcia (2.6m from Manchester City)
Gigi Wijnaldum (free from Liverpool)
Michael Olise (18.5m from Reading)
Emiliano Buendia (27m from Norwich)
Greg Taylor (2.5m from Celtic)
David Raya (3.5m from Brentford)
Dani Ceballos (loan from Real Madrid)

Leaves us in decent shape for the upcoming season, squad now looks like:

GK: Leno, Raya, Hein
DR: Maitland-Niles, Bellerin
DL: Tierney, Taylor
DC: Garcia, Holding
DC: Gabriel, Pablo Mari
MC: Wijanldum, Torreira, Elneny
MC: Partey, Ceballos
AMC: Buendia, Smith-Rowe
AML: Aubameyang, Martinelli
AMR: Saka, Pepe
FC: Depay, Lacazette

I think this squad should be able to finish in the top four on the first try. 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, Twist said:

Are the changes from 20 to 21 worth forking out for?

They aren't what I would call groundbreaking but they are definitely positive inclusions (mostly) and I think it is worth it. Besides VAR decisions going against you 99.99% of the time the match engine has gotten really good, too.

I mean you can probably pick it up on Steam and check out the new features over a couple hours and if you decide it isn't worth it for you then just get a refund.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Scrapped the Newcastle idea and decided to do a longer term Southampton save. Pretty sure I have never managed them on any FM before.

Second pre-season friendly at Dundee and Shane Long scores five goals in a 7-0 rout. Going the Ralph route and utilising a similar tactical philosophy with the 4-4-2 / 4-2-2-2 hybrid. Looking forward to this one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, nickhastie2004 said:

Does anyone know a good place to get a team logo and some kits (2D+3D) thrown together? I know kinda what I want but I am utterly abysmal at graphics stuff unless what I need is a poorly done, pixelated MS Paint picture 😅

Probably somewhere like the sortitoutsi forums.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, nickhastie2004 said:

Does anyone know a good place to get a team logo and some kits (2D+3D) thrown together? I know kinda what I want but I am utterly abysmal at graphics stuff unless what I need is a poorly done, pixelated MS Paint picture 😅

I assume you're talking about a set of fictional kits + logo?

I personally made some fictional sets last year for my custom club idea, and the logo/2D was pretty quickly done with some templates. Never tried 3D though, too clunky.

But yeah, as @RazorsEdge mentioned, you can find request threads for fictional stuff to be made by request. You can have some luck with that.

If it's (the logo, mainly) nothing too complicated or too frilly, I could have a stab at it sometime. DM any doodles or ideas and I could see if I can turn it into something decent enough.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The 2022/23 season is weird. There's an international break right before the World Cup break, so after a massive run of 2 games a week from 10/1 to 11/5, there's almost a 2 week break until a home match on 11/22, followed by another two week break for a 12/6 match, and then a 3 week break until Boxing Day, which again kick starts shitty wild run of fixtures.

 

The Boxing Day clash is a big one, away to Norwich why are 1 point ahead of us in the table. Norwich are on 52 points sheet 22 games played, and we're at 51 points. Villa are 3rd in 42, so automatic promotion is pretty much a lock, although my job could honestly be in jeopardy without winning the Championship.

 

Cups will be fun in January. While the FA Cup is away to midtable Peterborough, we have Liverpool home for the derby in the QF of the League Cup (who have a fucking disgusting squad. Lost Salah, but brought in Joao Felix, Lautaro Martinez, Rafael Leo, David Alaba, and Ricardo Pereira). We beat Tottenham and Southampton on penalties to get there, but yeah, don't see us upsetting that Liverpool side.

 

I ended up raising €262 million selling off Yerry Mina, James, Gomes, Nuno Sequeira, Allan, Bernard, Iwobi (my biggest sale at €60m), Doucoure, and Paulinho (somehow made an €8m profit on him too). The only paid transfers I made in the summer were Luca Connell (€2m) and Louie Sibley (€15m rising to 20), although I'm bringing in a 21 year old ST from Flamengo for only €10m. I'm also expecting to sell Rafael Santos Borre in January for more than that (had an offer for €40m accepted but he wouldn't go to Sassuolo, and I won't get that kind of fee again). I'm also hoping to sell Sigurdsson in January because he's old and not playing as well as either one of Sibley or Anthony Gordon, while I'm sure one of Godfrey/Holgate/Keane will go too.

 

It's no surprise that Richarlison (11g 7a) and Victor Tsygankov (9&9) are carrying the attack, with Kean scoring 11 goals as well. Left back Faitout Maouassa is killing it now that he's getting first team football, as is 22 year Lewis Gibson, who has made himself first team CB over Keane and partnering one of Holgate or Godfrey. I also don't want to make Holgate and Godfrey my regular pairing since I don't expect to keep both.

 

I'm loving the homegrowns at the club. Jonjoe Kenny, Tom Davies, Anthony Gordon, Holgate, and Lewis Gibson are all regular starters, and Jarrad Branthwaite is in the side a bit too. Plus trained in nation guys like Ojo, Godfrey, Pickford, Fredricks, Keane, and technically Sigurdsson. I also only have 3 foreign players in my squad because a lot of foreigners have been here enough to gain citizenship like Richarlison. That's going to come in handy when I move up to the Prem.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. To learn more, see our Privacy Policy