Football Manager 2021

[Meacon Keaton]

How difficult would it be to get an EWB fantasy draft and league together? I’ve not done an online league on FM before the videos I see of it seem like a good time.

[Bobfoc]

I'm quite sure some people on here did it not so long ago.

[Meacon Keaton]

Oh that’s right! I even think Baddar or somebody had a Cube diary sharing the results. I’m gonna go look for that now.

[Adam]

We did for a little while but it fizzled out, was good fun though. Getting everyone together at the same time to play is the big obstacle to overcome!

[METALMAN]

I love the idea of playing FM multiplayer in theory but I tried it with a friend during lockdown #1 and it was just a whole load of waiting around for the sake of playing each other twice a season. Maybe it gets better with more people but then logistics becomes a problem.

[Naitch]

Spoiler

Had a go at making a custom San Marino Calcio logo and wasn't sure where else to get feedback. Thoughts? The original is below for reference.

Spoiler

 

[The Lusophone]

I like it, and it's definitely a relatively modern Italian club logo design.

[Hobo]

Because I seem to only ever play Football Manager (2016) in order to see what happens if I give Irish clubs more money than they should. I'm doing it again.

But first, I've run some simulations just to test a few things and also just to see what the computer does.

The level at which the clubs sign players of note changes wildly between games. They always pick up a few younger/experienced Irish internationals and endlessly trade them back and fourth between each other. Although very non Irish high profile signings occur.

Cork City always sign Kevin Doyle. Someone signs John Egan. Occasionally Jeff Hendrick gets signed.

I'm sad to see that these tests have not resulted in what happened in an older game where Limerick basically turned into Harry Redknapp's Spurs side and Fernando Morienties managed Shamrock Rovers. I wonder if it's because I'm not playing and purposefully trying to sign high profile players?

In one test run, Parkvilla (who I traditionally edit in as the highest ranked local team to me as far as I can see) basically blew everyone away for 4 years. In the next, they could only manage to establish themselves as title challenger. Although they never got close (seemingly always being at least 7-10 points off.

 My favorite thing to happen is that Jurgen Klinsmann became manager of Dundalk for 2 years.

I might actually start a game I intend to play soon. Although I might still sim for a couple of years just for fun.

[Lineker]

FM Streamer Showdown again this weekend. Production values have gone up again - and the fact that they're taking it entirely not too seriously is just what we need right now stuck in lockdown.

[Hobo]

22 hours ago, Hobo said:

 My favorite thing to happen is that Jurgen Klinsmann became manager of Dundalk for 2 years.

I might actually start a game I intend to play soon. Although I might still sim for a couple of years just for fun.

the next test has seen Mick McCarthy become Shamrock Rovers manager. Which is almost as good as Jurgen Klinsmann appearing in Dundalk.

Parkvilla (managed by Roy Keane) only missed out on getting into the knockout stages of the Europa League on a head-to-head results. Won their first 2 group matches against AZ and Napoli. 

EDIT: Ok, Limerick FC hired Paolo DiCanio and were relegated.

[Lineker]

Spoiler

Kevvy 5 times!

 

[Lineker]

Confirmation of what we already knew in reality - no immediate sign of the post-January patch. 

[Hobo]

couldn't get in to playing a game after simming 5 years. It felt more like playing FM properly and I'm not in the mood for that ever anymore.

[Gorka]

Alright, in my last three games I have lost 2-1 on two separate occasions (goals in the 93rd and 94th minute for 1st match, 92nd minute red card, 93rd minute goal for 2nd match) and have drawn 2-2 after a 2-0 lead (the 92nd minute equaliser being a 25 yard free kick).

Is FM fucking with me? 

Edit: first team keeper now out for 4 weeks with a bad ankle. Yep, definitely being fucked with...

Edited February 6, 2021 by Gorka

[FLiam]

New save alert.

Been struggling to really get into a save this year, I decided most recently to take up a short-term challenge with Dortmund to try and knock Bayern off their perch. 

Upon loading up the game, I realised why Dortmund are struggling in real life right now, the squad is a bit of a mess, fairly unbalanced and some players on way too high a wage without the ability to match (looking at you Schulz). Defence is thread-bare with Akanji, Zagadou and Hummels the only natural CB's. I knew I had a good rebuild to look forward to. 

So I'll go straight into how our season progressed. 

Bundesliga:
As you will see from the results below we had a fairly inconsistent season. A strong start followed up with five losses out of six immediately followed up with a twelve game winning streak brought to a six game winless streak. Predictably, Erling Haaland was the star of the show - banging in 31 goals from only 26 starts. Machine. A few others were notable too, Brandt playing in the middle of a midfield three as an advanced playmaker chipped in with 4 goals and 9 assists from 24 starts. Gio Reyna also stepped up with 5 goals and 7 assists from 14 starts. All in all, left us finishing 3rd behind Bayern (winners) and Monchengladbach. I'll take that in my first season - for a while I thought I might pull a league win out the bag at the first time of asking but those late season struggles really counted against us.

Results:

Spoiler

Final Table:

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Then there was the Champion's League. We were handed a fairly kind draw with Liverpool, Basaksehir and Dinamo competing for two spots in the Knockout Rounds. We ended up making it slightly difficult for ourselves but ended up qualifying in second behind Liverpool. Not really any great highlights to speak of...

Results:

Spoiler

Final group table:

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Our prize for coming second was a two-legged tie with Lazio who were storming Serie A. The first tie was at home in which we held Lazio to a goalless draw which I was satisfied with as we didn't play well and didn't let them get an all important away goal. That was critical for the second-leg as we trailed from the first-half but Emre Can headed home from a corner for his first goal of the season in the 86th minute to send us to the quarter-finals.

The quarter-finals pitted us against Manchester United. Joy. The first leg, we played very well taking a 13th minute lead through Marco Reus' free-kick, from that point on we frustrated them, limited them to only a handful of chances before Daniel James scored a quite decent solo goal in the 88th minute, leaving the second tie being more tricky than I'd hoped. Tricky it was, we lost 3-0 thanks to a brace from Martial and a late kick in the teeth from Scott McTominay. The board wanted first KO round, I gave them the quarter finals. Something to build on for sure. 

CL KO Results:

Spoiler

The last competition was the good old fashioned German cup - the DFB-Pokal. I really fancied our chances of getting to the final in this competition and we started well dispatching of lower league Furstenwalde 5-1. Our first real challenge came in the second round away at Bochum and it took us extra-time to get through 3-2. The third round presented us with RB Leipzig at home but the players weren't up for the task, losing 1-0 despite playing against ten-men for 60 minutes. Oh well...

DFB-Pokal results:

Spoiler

That leaves us with the most exciting part - summer rebuild time! I was busy with scouts all through the season as I already knew where I needed to strengthen. I needed another centre-half, a new right-back, a new playmaker, a new wide forward and a reliable backup for Haaland so he can be rested in those games before the bigger CL ties. Those were my must-buy's, then some extra competition in other areas. Left my summer business looking pretty decent:

Spoiler

Now, Pepe was a bit of a wildcard signing. Sancho was insistent on leaving so I thought I needed to be pro-active and saw that Pepe was available for a reasonable sum, so went ahead with it. After all that, no clubs came up with an offer even close to what I'd accept for Sancho so as of now, he's staying put. Patson Daka is my Haaland backup and he looks to be a shrewd piece of business, he scored 27 in 44 for Salzburg last season and his profile fits, he's fairly strong, pacey and great off the ball. 

That leaves us with a much more balance squad for this season:

GK: Burki, Ryan, Hitz
DR: Mazraoui, Meunier
DL: Guerreiro, Sessegnon
DC: Zagadou, Akanji
DC: Hummels, Garcia
DM: Witsel, Delaney, Ampadu
MC: Brandt, Szoboszlai
MC: Emre Can, Bellingham
AMR: Sancho, Pepe
AML: Reyna, Reus
FC: Haaland, Daka, Reinier

Very happy with that squad and think it should serve us much better to challenge Bayern at the top as well as pushing further on in the Champion's League. As of writing we have played our first game in the DFB-Pokal against Todesfeld and ran out 6-0 winners including a hat-trick from Daka. Great start!

 

[Lineker]

Amazing.

[FLiam]

Winter update out.

 

[Lineker]

Time to buy the game!

[JasonM]

[Gazz]

1 hour ago, Lineker said:

Time to buy the game!

Calm down Lemmy.