Football Manager 2014

[Gazz]

T-shirt weather.

[Plubby]

I'm used to 40, it's closer to freezing than that!

[Hobo]

I am now managing Manchester United (of Gibraltar).

[John Stones' Paint Trophy]

A good centre half would be Rock, of Gibraltar. He's very solid.

[Summers]

Finally, my Valencia side are La Liga Champions!

[Hobo]

Won my first game 3-0.

Take that Gazz!

[Roster Depth Sicko No. 2]

Went back to my Real Madrid save.

Finished the 2019/20 season with the Spanish Super Cup, the European Super Cup, La Liga, and the Club World Championship. United thumped us in the Champions League Semi Finals en route to winning the whole tournament. Lost the Copa Del Rey in the quarter finals after deciding to give some of the youth a run out.

So yeah, quit that. Too easy to win things.

I now manage Hoffenheim, who gave Frank De Boer the sack five games into the season after he only managed 1 point. Should be more of a challenge.

[Whisper]

I had a great game going woth Hoffenheim. Won the cup and finished 3rd behind the big two. Then my save corrupted

Just started a Villa save as my United one has become a touch too easy. Villa at least have the players to play my preferred 352 formation - though can't sign anyone at all with my £0 transfer budget. I did convince the board to go after Matias Fernandez, but he chose Everton instead. Could've done with him too as we are missing a decent AMC. Having to retrain El Ahmadi and Delph to play there, and brought in Jesse Lingard on loan.

Could be a long season ahead, but I'm only tasked with avoiding relegation, which should be pretty straight forward with Benteke's goals.

Edited August 25, 2014 by Whisper in the Wind

[brenchill]

Benteke scored 29 PL goals for me in the first season. Sold him for £28m at the end of the season.

I managed to get Belhanda in on-loan as well in Jan. Might be worth doing the same if you're struggling.

[Whisper]

So I was just using cloud save for my Villa game, in case I wanted to play on the laptop this week and I found my Hoffenheim save in there! A couple of months back from where I was when I lost it, but saved just after the end of the season I don't remember saving it in the cloud ever but I'm now gutted we're going away for a few days as I really want to try and get back into it.

Only issue is I'd just won the cup and come third in the league playing my ridiculously attacking narrow 4-2-3-1. I've now decided that formation doesn't work so will have to mould my squad to suit 3-5-2. Should get some decent funds in from Champions League money and the inevitable sale of Kevin Volland. Now to try and trick Bayern into paying more than his release clause!

5 file rolling autosave here I come!

[Roster Depth Sicko No. 2]

Hoffenheim is not going well. I don't know why, but this team really struggles against teams just around them in the table, but gets good results against 4th-7th (Bayern, Dortmund and Gladbach dominating the table) and dominates the bottom four/five teams. It's bizarre.

The board are pissed I'm not higher up the table and are apparently considering firing me (but my confidence is still stable, primarily due to the 4 year contract they gave me) and certain players are really pissing me off with how underwhelming they've been. Marco Reus being the main culprit, had a great debut and been shit since.

I've apparently been linked with the Norwich job since Chris Hughton might be leaving, so decided to have a look at how the Prem was doing. Brentford are mid-table

If I can find an out into the Championship or Ligue 1 I might leave. This team just isn't good enough and the board don't want to give me more funds based on me not performing well in the league. Bastards.

[brenchill]

I finished 12th in my first season with Villa, and ended up as runners up in the FA Cup Final, losing 4-2 to Man City.

Benteke smashed in 29 PL games, he wanted to go so I sold him to City for £28m. The board only gave me 40% of the fee, tight bastards.

I've brought in Jordan Rhodes as my new number 9 for £6.75m, Sydochuk for £7m from Dynamo, Nathan Dyer on a free and Eric Dier for £1.5m. I also have Jack Grealish back from a loan spell at Notts County who looks promising. Impossible to replace Benteke but my squad is a lot stronger.

[Baddar]

Just beat Man City 2-1 in the FA Cup Quarters, in the same week that they lost the CoC Final to Swansea by the same scoreline.

I've got Southampton in the semi's, while Norwich and Palace contest the other. I'll never get a better chance of winning it. Although Southampton are doing really well, in 5th, a point behind Arsenal in 4th.

[Roster Depth Sicko No. 2]

So due to circumstances I've never before seen come in to play, I've qualified for the Europa League despite finishing 9th. Runners Up Wolfsburg were kicked out of the Champions League for financial reasons, so Stuttgart got moved up and 8th place Frankfurt got their Europa League spot. Then Leverkusen, who finished 7th and had the original last spot, also got kicked out for financial reasons, so their spot went to me in 9th.

Europa League gives me something different and a reason to stay for now. Still want out mind.

[brenchill]

Completely forgot to mention my losing effort in the FA Cup final earned me a spot in the Europa League. I've got little interest in it but it'll give me a good chance to play around with the squad.

[Roster Depth Sicko No. 2]

Only options that came up over the summer were in the Eredivisie, and none of them could afford my compensation

Don't need compensation for an international job though, so I now manage the United States. Hoffenheim can fuck off, my last act was to sanction the sale of their best player.

Had a little browse to see how some former players were getting on as managers. Here's a few of the finds.

Robin van Persie: PEC Zwolle

Dwight Gayle: England U19s (He's only 31, safe to say he never lived up to his potential)

John Terry: Nottingham Forest

Joey Barton: Preston North End

Clarence Seedorf: Everton

Alan Tate: AFC Wimbledon

David Bentley: Grimsby

Alan McGregor: Dundee FC

Shaun Maloney: Dumbarton

Carlos Cuellar: Guadalajara

Tyrone Mears: Wales

Rio Ferdinand had a shit stint as Middlesborogh manager and is a coach at Bristol City.

Matthew Upson got replaced by Gayle as England U19s boss.

Martin Demichelis coached the Argentina U23s to Olympic Gold in 2016.

Demba Ba, Samuel Eto'o, Mohamed Diame, Kevin-Prince Boateng, Andy Carroll, Daniel Sturridge, Ryan Shawcross, Ashley Williams, Ramires, Craig Bellamy, Rene Adler, Darijo Srna, Seb Larsson, Felipe Melo, Burak Yilmaz, Dimitar Berbatov and everyone's favourite Gambian Cherno Samba are amongst the long list of names waiting for their first job.

[Baddar]

Just won an absolute cracker at WHL.

RVP gave us a 9th minute lead, but you know who scored twice in quick succession to put Spurs 2-1 up. Mata equalised just before HT, but Soldado scored a pen on 55mins to put them ahead.

Bringing Welbeck on helped. His shot was saved by Lloris but Mata tapped in the rebound for 3-3. I got a bit more careful then and took RVP off, with Welbeck up top on his own. With about 10mins to go, I had shoot on sight enabled, because we were pushing for a winner. Then in the 91st min, Januzaj robbed Walker, cut it back and Welbeck smashed it in. Lovely.

Robben then capped it off at the end to seal a 5-3 win. Good going as I had injuries and suspensions (a red for Rooney last time out).

Juve in the last eight of the CL coming next, thanks to Robben who scored the winner against Leverkusen after being 1-0 down at HT.

[stokeriño]

Nothing like a 5-0 win at Anfield to brighten an afternoon.

Especially when the fifth comes when I'm down to 10 men (injury, subs already used), yet through a series of farcical cock-ups Emre Can punts the ball into his own net.

[Bobfoc]

Guess he Can't.

[Cheeky Hughes]

I conceded a joke of a goal with Ipswich in the last game of the season. 3-0 up at QPR when Tommy Smith waltzes back to the edge of our own area with the ball and passes it to the keeper. At least it would be a pass to the keeper if he wasn't leaning on the other side of the goalpost, totally oblivious to the ball crossing the line for a Tommy Smith OG.

In better news, I guided Ipswich to 4th in the Championship and a play off semi final against Forest awaits. We beat them comfortably at home a few weeks ago but my squad is being held together by children's prayers at the moment.

Edited August 25, 2014 by Hughes