Football Manager 2017

[Benji]

... more points in the last 3 matches than the rest of 2023 combined. We're out of the drop, but the season's not over. Good time to call it a night tho.

[Benji]

Barrow and Wales 2022/23... because every time I insist I will go bed, it never happens...

Spoiler

We did it. We pulled it off. Even despite an 8-0(!!!!!!!!) (my worst loss ever in the entire history of playing CM/FM) drubbing by QPR in between wins and draws.

I'm now going to (genuinely) sleep on whether to see out my last contractual season. 4 (and a bit) seasons with two promotions and saving them from relegation feels like a good end point, especially considering the fact I started by saving the club from relegation last minute, but I'm also concerned that in four years nobody has offered me another job. I suppose I'll still have Wales but I am not a fan of international football.

We'll see.

 

[Lineker]

I think you have to take a chance and move on even if there's nothing lined up.

Spoiler

Well done on survival though!

 

[Meacon Keaton]

Yeah, I agree. I think you've achieved all you'll be able to achieve. Move on and take a chance on what may open up.

[Benji]

Barrow and Wales 2022/23. Yeah, I've slept on it and I'm going to quit next time I play. After two seasons where I was predicted bottom of League Two and League One and still got promotion, I've established them in the Championship for two more seasons on top, but the club just doesn't have the infrastructure to grow how I'd like.

This is the first season in the game I have taken a step backwards in achievement from previous, and it was all down to player morale from 1) the fact I didn't want to sell them for less than worth (which no-one in this game ever offers), but also 2) the fact the board have such tight control over the money, I can't afford to give them the wages they deserve to stay. That's something that will never change, especially with the revenues a 5500 seater stadium brings in. I had eyes and form for a push at the play-offs before the offers came in and decimated morale, and I was helpless to change that until far too late when their unhappiness reasons had gone.

I've got all their facilities up to average level, and I've spent four years preparing the U23s so that about eight players should be able to step up next season and still have growth or at least serve as immediate second stringers, and I've kept the wage budget well under requirement for four seasons in an attempt not to repeat my sole failure at Kidderminster. Like I said at the end of the Harriers run, this is my attempt at a truly career game and 3-5 years per team is about right. There's no point dragging out year 5 and risking ruining my legacy at Barrow, and I'm not going to achieve anything in that final year (especially since my only option in the summer will be "sell everyone who someone comes in for and hope the youth prospects are good enough and gel fast enough").

I had a quick look at Kidderminster last night to see where they are, and my signed and developed youth prospects there came good and are now in the Vanarama National play-offs, hoping to get promotion to League Two, so I feel pretty safe knowing I'm not leaving Barrow in any kind of lurch. Plus with the hard Brexit, Barrow won't have to release anyone on the Bosman, so they will at least be able to be compensated for any players I couldn't get to re-sign.

It's been a fun ride up in the North West. Caolan Lavery and "Big Dom" Dominic Telford were my stars from this run, even though both fell off in the final season, I couldn't have gotten where I did without them (in that second season, they were the two strikers who were basically competing to see who could smash the club goalscoring record by the most - they apparently decided to go halves as Dom took the league goals and Caolan took the overall tally). Ditto my very first signing - tubby goalkeeper "Wideload" Bobby Olejnik (if you can't tell, I like to give my players nicknames ¬_¬ ), who took us to the Championship before an offer too good to refuse game in. Plenty of other great players, but those three have earned a lifetime of mental "CM/FM Hall of Fame" status for me.

It may have been a tumultuous final season, but I'll miss this little town come good

PS: Complimentary "fuck you" for a player called Callum Davis or Davies or something (he's a talented versatile dual full back, he's also such a moaning tit I seem to have erased his name from my memory already, but will name and shame him later) who I'm pretty sure was the one dragging down dressing room morale for the most part.

PSS: Also a complimentary thanks to the Leicester youth system who produced Harry Panayiotou who was here when I arrived and provided solid AMC work for the first three seasons, and "The Dreaded Front" Admiral Muskwe (geddit?) who came in for the last two seasons and looked to be a solid Championship talent and was starting to put away goals in the second half of the final season when barely anyone else seemed to manage it.

[Benji]

I was just Googling stories about people having a weird newly found real-life affinity for clubs they've managed in FM (Telford and Fulham are my big ones), and came across this in one of the articles...

Quote

You'll have worn a suit to a cup final (with tie and pocket handkerchief in club colours, of course) 

There are countless stories of people getting dressed up for big games. They also do interviews with themselves in the mirror.

One person, who’s very well-known but whose identity I don’t have permission to reveal, actually shakes hands with the door knob every time he signs a player to formally agree the deal.

That door knob bit

[Lineker]

He sounds like an absolute door knob.

[Bobfoc]

The best Football Manager-related story I've heard is of a man whose team was playing an away match in the Champions League. In order to add some European flavour to the experience, he set fire to his waste paper bin and pretended it was a flare in the stands.

[DNB]

I've heard a few people talking about having a u23 side that's strong and capable of taking over, how do you go about doing this, I'm so awful at doing this! 

[Benji]

8 minutes ago, DNB said:

I've heard a few people talking about having a u23 side that's strong and capable of taking over, how do you go about doing this, I'm so awful at doing this! 

Do not rely on your youth intake, scout a LOT with good scouts on potential and hire pretty much anyone who has 4* or above potential, loan them out to teams in the leagues for their current level in coach reports with stipulation of first team or key player and let them develop through first team experience. Only about 50% success (and many will drop off if your first team gets success), but gets you some homegrown players and it's some bodies to fill up the depth requests from most coaches and squad members.

Also, the Wales team made my sadness at quitting Barrow a little nicer...

[King Ellis]

7 goals within 31 minutes and you only won 8-0? Where's the ruthlessness?

[Benji]

I always seem to struggle in second halves. Dunno why, I almost always play a low tempo possession game so condition isn't an issue.

[MDK]

45 minutes ago, Benji said:

Do not rely on your youth intake, scout a LOT with good scouts on potential and hire pretty much anyone who has 4* or above potential, loan them out to teams in the leagues for their current level in coach reports with stipulation of first team or key player and let them develop through first team experience. Only about 50% success (and many will drop off if your first team gets success), but gets you some homegrown players and it's some bodies to fill up the depth requests from most coaches and squad members.

Sending them to clubs with good training facilities is important as well.

[Benji]

That's not huge thing from what I understand. First team football will make a much bigger difference than facilities ever can.

[MDK]

Both preferably I would reckon.

[DNB]

So, the season has started well, I went scouting crazy and picked up some decent players and sent them straight out on loan (although I'm not sure how good a season with Hemel Hempstead will be). 

 

We're in third place after 10 games with only a couple of additions. Using @Benji's tactics and they appear to be working. Keeping things very narrow. I do wish I had a better striker!

[Gazz]

4 hours ago, DNB said:

I've heard a few people talking about having a u23 side that's strong and capable of taking over, how do you go about doing this, I'm so awful at doing this! 

Tutoring by tutors with 'Resolute' personalities.

[DNB]

7 minutes ago, Handsome Gazz said:

Tutoring by tutors with 'Resolute' personalities.

Funny you say this, because my tutoring sessions have failed so far!!

[Benji]

Wales 2023/24. I'm top of the group for the 2024 World Cup qualifier, but only by a point, and Belgium (the team behind) have a game in hand. Fortunately that game in hand is against Hungary, who beat Belgium in their first match and took us to a draw in one of our matches. If Belgium win we might struggle at qualifying through second placed teams as we lost to Belgium twice and drew Hungary. We only have one match to go ourselves against Bosnia and Herzegovina, so all we can do is win that and hope Hungary can do the double over Belgium.

Meanwhile on the club side I have had a lot of interviews but no job offers until last thing last night, when I got an intruiging one - Eintracht Braunschweig (commonly referred to as BTSV) in the German Second Division (2. Bundesliga). They were one of the founding members of the Bundesliga in '63, and won the First Division title in 1967 and have been struggling since the 80s, meaning they are something of a sleeping giant, which is something I've always wanted to play with and is definitely a new challenge I am up for (I've applied for Leeds and Notts Forest every time the jobs came up for that reason, and they have both gone through a lot of managers). The club itself is a reputation step up (3*) from where I got Barrow (2½*), but the league is a step down (2½*) from the English Championship (3*) (though getting promotion to 1. Bundesliga (4*) would likely be an easier ask than the crowded field of the English Championship).

The facilities and players seem decent to good and stadium capacity is a not unreasonable 23000 or so, but the staff are awful, and the German staff pool seems to have been seriously forgotten because it only seems to include the shallow end (not bad, just not a whole lot of options, and certainly not at the standard I'd hope for in a league of this level). Plus side is that I already speak fluent German thanks to my time managing the Austrian national side. Decided to sleep on it, as there's a lot of jobs available at the moment, but since this is the first offer I've had and it's a unique new challenge, I think I'll probably go for it. Plus they play in Brazil's colours, which is neat.

Barrow meanwhile have been taken over by Simon Grayson who promptly sold over half my first team for tidy sums (and since almost all were frees, made a tidy profit) and is sitting pretty in 24th in the league as a result of bringing in a load of rubbish players for high fees

Kidderminster did not win their play-off and remain a Vanarama National team, but I'm pleased they've continued to make strides.

[Rocky]

I won Olympic Gold with the Serbian u/23's beating Germany 1-4 in the Final. They gave me a nice shiny golden London 2012 Medal to celebrate my 2032 Morocco victory.