Football Manager 2015

[TCO]

The club is so stupidly rich now they've given me another £32mil to spend. Completed the deal for Wilshere. £3.5mil, 4 year deal at £75k per week and I made sure it wasn't to go through until the end of the season so I keep him on loan paying him only £26k until the end of the season! Signed Luciano Vietto and Ivan from Real Madrid too for a combined £11.75mil. They're always good for a bargain, they just vacuum up young talent, never fit them in and have to flog them when they're unhappy!

Is that Ivan the right back/right wing back? If so he is amazing for my Forest team. My assistant forever rates him as 2/3 stars, but he's had about 5 consecutive seasons of averaging around 7.50.

That's the guy, he looks very good alright and I like the flexibility of being a proper wing back too! He'll give competition for Jon Flanagan at the very least.

Real Madrid's strikeforce is incredible at the moment too. Ronaldo, Vietto, Ayoze Perez, Malcom and Gabriel Barbossa. There's no way they could possibly play them all!

[Whisper]

The club is so stupidly rich now they've given me another £32mil to spend. Completed the deal for Wilshere. £3.5mil, 4 year deal at £75k per week and I made sure it wasn't to go through until the end of the season so I keep him on loan paying him only £26k until the end of the season! Signed Luciano Vietto and Ivan from Real Madrid too for a combined £11.75mil. They're always good for a bargain, they just vacuum up young talent, never fit them in and have to flog them when they're unhappy!

Is that Ivan the right back/right wing back? If so he is amazing for my Forest team. My assistant forever rates him as 2/3 stars, but he's had about 5 consecutive seasons of averaging around 7.50.

That's the guy, he looks very good alright and I like the flexibility of being a proper wing back too! He'll give competition for Jon Flanagan at the very least.

Real Madrid's strikeforce is incredible at the moment too. Ronaldo, Vietto, Ayoze Perez, Malcom and Gabriel Barbossa. There's no way they could possibly play them all!

Malcolm is another one of my Forest side. I'm currently fending off £50m + offers for him every day.

I've also just signed 36 year old Cristiano Ronaldo for £3m. He was top scorer last season as Real won the Champions League - reckon he's got one more season in him!

[Summers]

Chuffed, there's a 23 year old regen called Scott Vincent. English CB (can play DL, DM and CM too), was at Chelsea until three seasons ago, he was on loan at my Bournemouth side in the Championship three years ago. The season after Man City splashed 20m on him. He made 12 appearances for them last year, none so far this year and I just signed him for 7m, rising to 9m.

He's very good, gonna slot him into a starting spot.

[JasonM]

Ok, just went into the Premiership officially, and the club decided to mark the occassion by improving both junior coaching and youth recruitment, whilst also allowing me to scout the entire world now.

This means I have decided to completely revamp my scouting system to maximize as many nations as possible and hopefully find as many gems as I can around Europe and the rest of the footballing bastions across the globe.

I currently have 16 scouts, and I have always seen that they can juggle around 2-3 nations at the same time without losing knowledge of one of the nations. Four or more they tend to lose knowledge of the first nations whilst they're working on the fourth etc.

So lo and behold, the ridiculous list of 48(!) assignments split up between 16 poor scouts that have gotten the hardest tasks in their lives now...

Allan Gemmill 15/15 - Italy, Slovenia, Hungary

Andy Shearer 17/14 - Belarus, Romania, Bulgaria

Anouar Hadouir 17/20 - New Zealand, Australia, China

Bryan Ruiz 15/16 - Costa Rica, Mexico, Canada

Dario Drudi 20/20 - Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay

Iray 14/14 - Spain, Portugal, Morocco

James Smith 5/18 - Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia

Jay Blake 19/15 - England, Ireland, Scotland

Joe McClaren 19/15 - N-Ireland, Wales, Iceland

Kwong-Wah 20/17 - Netherlands, Belgium, Germany

Matthieu Jean 12/12 - Finland, Ukraine, Russia

Morten Nagel 18/17 - Denmark, Sweden, Norway

Nandi 15/13 - Turkey, Greece, Israel

Phillip Hudson 20/16 - France, Austria, Switzerland

Ruud Bruns 17/17 - Czech Rep, Slovakia, Poland

Shane Box 20/19 - USA, Japan, South Korea

So you might be wondering, ''that bloke is an utter madman''... Well you would be right, but I guess you gotta pay a price of sanity if you want to turn your team into the best scouting team ever. Of course, as the board hopefully allows more scouts in the future I will be branching out further into Africa, Asia, and the Americas... of course hopefully also finish off Europe by scouting the former Yugoslavian states too.

This way I have the most possible coverage and the best possible scouting. Because my scouts are only active in 3 nations at a time their knowledge levels stay high, scouts will of course get preference in nations where they have skills at. (See Bryan Ruiz in Costa Rica and Druidi in BraziGentiGuay). But for the ones that don't cover any home territory they will take a bit longer to get up to speed, but because they aren't overstretching that happens in region-scouting, once their knowledge level is high it will stay high and at best dip only lightly...

Hopefully this means I can continue finding gems.

Speaking of gems, as new manager of South Korea I have found a few gems in the squad of South Korea. The team is pretty young and talented (lacks depth tho), and I am inclined in bringing a few kids over to Nottingham.

Namely, this 23 year old left back that has been too good for the Korean leagues.

[Cymbols]

If you're only allowed five subs, do you bother putting a keeper on the bench?

[stokeriño]

Usually yes, even though it irritates the fuck out of me.

[The Lusophone]

I don't even put a keeper on the bench with seven subs.

[Summers]

Man, this season everything is working.

No way are we getting relegated.

I thought, on paper, my side was weaker than what I went down with. The last two years we've lost Sakho, Alli, Williams, Maguire, Ibe, Alberto Cerri, Joe Allen and Jon Williams. All good players for us, but the players we kept on and have brought in are just doing the business.

It's Valentines day, we're on 40 points, in 8th place. Captain Cook is a beast, keeping a quality Uruguayan on the bench. Aaron Kuhl came in, and has worked his ass off in midfield in any of the roles he's played in. Works hard, and has quality about him. Lewis Baker came in from Leicester for 6m mid-way through our Championship season and did okay - but is doing brilliantly this season. Scored four penalties in our last two games. Three against Everton and one against Spurs. 2 wins on the bounce against much more fancied sides.

Wilshere proved me right, and is having a solid season. A really sturdy head in midfield, helping the less experienced mid fielders we have. Lascelles is featuring less than expected, because Scott Vincent was signed and he's going to be my next defensive stalwart after Cook retires. So Lascelles is down the pecking order and will move on in the summer.

Garbutt, Matthews and Berisha are all showing the relegation two years didn't effect them and have been great. Shaun Egan has 10 goals in 20 up front, which is solid for my 24 year old pacey poacher. Morata's 8 in 21 as the other out-and-out striker is okay too. Berahinho, my left sided inside forward has 12 in 23 and is really showing his quality. 12 is his best goal return in the Prem (he scored 12 in both our first and second seasons in the league) - and he's going to beat it this year after notching 24 in our Championship season last year.

Our right winger, Elton Eliseu, a 23 year old Brazilian is brilliant. Signed for 2.4m three years ago from Internacional, he's worth 15m and wanted by Chelsea, Madrid, Benfica, and more. He wont be here next season, he wanted to go in Jan but no one would meet my outrageous asking price - I really wanted him to finish the season because I knew we'd do better keeping him.

In the summer I think I'll be after a new right winger, a younger version of Berahinho to start phasing in and a new right back.

Edited May 16, 2015 by Johnny Summers

[JasonM]

I've been burned enough in the past not to put a goalie on the bench. Like the rest I hate it, but when your goalie is hurt you'll be fucked hard unless you somehow have a Peter Crouch lying around.

[Kyle]

Theres nothing worse than not having a keeper on the bench when your keeper decides to dropkick people and get sent off.

[Benji]

If you're only allowed five subs, do you bother putting a keeper on the bench?

Always. Otherwise the one time I need him he won't be there.

[Bobfoc]

Theres nothing worse than not having a keeper on the bench when your keeper decides to dropkick people and get sent off.

Putting Dolph Ziggler in goal probably wasn't the best idea. It's not as though he'll ever win you matches, anyway.

[fourstarfizzle]

An ok first season for me, finished 3rd in the Premier League, got to the Europa League Final and lost 3-2 to Spurs after they were given a penalty in the last minute from a dive.

Signed Berahino so far for £6m for next season.

[Summers]

Everton are dumb as fuck.

[Gazz]

Good luck to the chairman selling Big Sam to the fans as a replacement to Jose.

[Summers]

Sacking Pep after 213 days is ridiculous too.

Simeone went back to Atletico.

[Summers]

6 - 0 over Norwich at half time. Shaun Egan and Lewis Baker both have hat tricks. Took them both off in the second half, for what must have been one hell of an ovation.

I didn't expect big things from Baker this year, but he's been sensational. 26 games, 11 goals, 10 assists, 7.42 rating.

[Whisper]

I fucking hate this game sometimes.

Just lost 4-1 at home to Huddersfield out of absolutely nowhere. They had, you guessed it, 4 shots at goal (to my 36).

[Cheeky Hughes]

Won the CL five times in a row with Southampton, and I get to keep the trophy! Thinking of cashing in on a couple of the players hitting 30 as I have some decent youth coming through, and Paul Jenkins proved his worth as my test subject.

[Summers]

This season could suck.

Lost Shaun Egan to Everton to Everton for 11m. My great right winger Elton Eliseu to Monaco for 23m. That's two thirds of my successful attack gone. Leaving only Berahino.

Wilshere has gone to... Spurs for 1m. Studge on a free, as did Matthews. And then two regens who were in rotation both left for a combined 7m.

In came an insanely good RB from Brazil to replace Matthews, for 9m. A Brazilian winger, for 7m, to replace the outgoing Elton. He should be a worthy replacement. And a Mexican defensive midfielder from moneybags Dundee who looks very good.

I had a 12m deal lined up for a really great English striker from Bristol City but Arsenal fucking stole him. The bastards. He's so good.

I desperately need a good Egan replacement. I'm just worried the two new replacements for my attacking trio won't settle and do as well as Egan/Elton did.

Edited May 18, 2015 by Johnny Summers