Oh Canada

[Brucehum]

inspired by: Pitalo and Mikal

OH CANADA

Career objectives:

a-Coach one of the Canadian teams in MLS: Montreal, Toronto or Vancouver (as of 2012).

b-Coach the national selection

c-Become the best Canadian coach ever (easy)

The setting:

Nations:

• Australia
  
• Austria
  
• Canada [adding edit to have it]
  
• Denmark
  
• Finland
  
• Iceland
  
• Ireland
  
• Mexico
  
• N.Ireland
  
• Norway
  
• Russia
  
• Scotland
  
• South Africa
  
• Sweden
  
• Switzerland
  
• U.S.A
  
• Wales
  
• South Korea [new add for 2013]
  
• China [new add for 2013]
  
• Spain [new add for 2013]
  

Nationality: Canadian, Spanish

Start: Unemployed

Past experience: Automatic

Clubs:

[spoiler]
Season              Country     League                      Team	             Position    Achievements
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2012-IV/2012-X      Canada      Canadian Soccer League      Brantford	             12th        ---
2012-XI/            Russia      Russian First Division	    Rotor Volgograd	     3rd         promoted to premier
2013-2014           Russia      Russian Premier Division    Rotor Volgograd          1st         cup semifinals
2014/2015-VI        Russia      Russian Premier Division    Rotor Volgograd          1st         supercup and cup winner. Champions semi finals.

[/spoiler]


International:

[spoiler]
Year     Team           Achievements                                               
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2012     Canada u20     got it as jobless. No competitions this year
[b]2013     Canada u20     North American u20 cup: 1st[/b]
2014     Canada u20     World Cup u20: got to eighths. 
2014     Cameroon       Qualified for African Nations Cup
[b]2015     Cameroon       Winner of African Nations Cup[/b]
2015     Canada

[/spoiler]

[Brucehum]

Work starts early in Canada, February 14th, Valentine's Day. This could be the beginning of a love hate relationship.

Humphrey applies to all the Canadian teams which have openings plus Newry.

Checking his national team he sees there is an offer for Under 20 manager. Who better than a manager without any experience to coach them kids? He applies. Pundits believe "Humphrey is the ideal candidate for Canada under 20".

Canadian season starts in less than one month, May 10th, so he hopes quick answers from the Canadian teams.

The next day the phone rings, it is Stephen Hart, national coach, offering him the under 20 job.

Not used to national management, he rushes to job the next day, and sets some friendlies, creates a new offensive tactic for the boys (a possession and offence based 4-2MC-3AM-1ST). Their old 4-5-1 stays, but it is too defensive.

The friendlies:

Now to wait for the job offer that is surely coming from one of those teams.

Newry phones first... sorry, but no sorry.

May 8th, 2 days before CSL starts, half of the teams are managerless and no one has phoned yet.

[Brucehum]

BRANTFORD GALAXY

April 4th, 2012

They only took 2 months, and one month competing managerless, to offer the job.

Humphrey accepted, starting on his way to backstab his boss Stephen Hart and take his job some day in the future.

The city

Brantford, 'The Telephone City', is a city in Ontario, Canada. It has a population of 93.650.

The club

History

Founded February 24, 2010. The club will be playing its home games at Lions Park.

On October 31, 2010 Brantford Galaxy SC won their first championship in their inaugural season with a 3-0 win overHamilton Croatia in the 2010 CSL Championship Final at the Centennial Park Stadium in Etobicoke. The team had finished 7th of the 13 teams in the regular season.

FM2013 stats

Wage Budget: €1.52K

Transfer Budget: 0

Objective: Consolidate existing position

Semi-professional team founded in 2010.

Stadium: Lions Park, 2200 capacity, grass.

Facilities: fairly basic training, minimal youth and minimal junior coaching, limited youth recruitment.

Staff: chief scout, head physio and assistant manager. Can have 2 coaches and 1 other scout.

Team:

-3 leading players, ST, AM and AM (not bad for my attacking philosophy).

-The rest abysmal bad... 1/2 star or less. 3 of them with good potential at least.

Results:

April 2012 fixtures:

My expectatives, seeing the team, and how it has fared so far, is to finish the league in playoff position (1-8). It is going to be very strange to play without promotion or relegation.

[Brucehum]

BRANTFORD GALAXY

May 1st, 2012

First a small graphic to show how the month went:

Transfers

Staff: I added a scout.

Coaches... none. Only 2 coaches in affordable range (lies, one of them two asks 4 more times I can pay).

Players: 6 additions. Record low for me. Almost no players to be bought.

Only another team did transfer. That shows the lack of players around.

Seems there is a problem playing these 'unactivated' competitions: there is no staff get, there are very few players except for regens.

Anyway, my 6 players one would expect them to have improved the squad enough, but nope, they haven't. It would need many more players. The other few average defenders I tried to contract did not want to come due to salary (my board allows 10€, they want 15€, and not even the standard clauses to get them go down work). I probably should change the coin to canadian dollar to be more realistic.

Here they are:

Giorgi,Bob          GK       16   *      **·
Vukovik, Stefan     ST       19   *****  *****
Milward, Evan       MC       27   *****  *****
Beishuizen, Roy     D        23   ·      **·
McIntosh, Marco     D        16   *·     ****
Ushedo, Curtis      D        23   ****·  *****

The Games

Not to brilliant. Actually, my worst results ever.

Windsor Stars vs Brantford: 3-2

Played much better than opponent. Own goal.

poss 47%-53%

shots 5-10

on trgt 2-4

North York vs Brantford: 3-1

Completely dominated by North York. Tried change of tactics to 4-2-4, got 3 shots in second half.

54%-46%

9-3

5-1

St Catherine's - Brantford: 2-0

fairly good game.

43%-57%

7-9

4-1

Brantford vs Serbian Eagles: 2-4

decent game against 1st

43%-57%

7-12

4-6

Brentford vs London City 1-3

not as bad as result makes it. We had 3 balls strike wood.

42%-58%

10-16

2-4

Brentford vs SC Waterloo 3-2

Beat the worst team in league. They had 2 on target, 2 goals.

54%-46%

14-5

5-2

Tactics

I've decided to go even more offensive. Changed one defense for one striker. That was during London City game.

Now I'm playing: 3D-2M-3AM-2ST Attack-Balanced

Conclusion

Once this season is over, I'm out of CSL for sure. I've even changed the replay from my usual comprehensive to key.

The board doesn't seem to want to kick me out, as any result works for them. I even have gone slightly over the wage limit. And the team is losing around 10.000€ a month (we get into red in 6 months)

Very difficult to improve teams in these inactivated leagues. As said, they don't seem to have a working staff, neither too many players floating around.

[Brucehum]

BRANTFORD GALAXY

June 1st, 2012

The Team

This is my best team, my default starting 11. You can see why I need a better goalie.

Club situation

The club is financially going to enter red numbers. Anyhow, the board gives all its support to current manager Humphrey, whose job is secure.

League standing

Before seeing my boys in action, I was expecting to be able to enter playoff. Now their play is better, but the results are still shaky. Difficult.

The Games

Better playing than last month (it was difficult for the results to be worse!).

TFC Academy vs Brantford 3-1

Good game. Definitively I need a better goalie. So far haven't been able to buy one. Only kids on sale.

51%-49%

6-16

3-8

Brantford vs Mississauga Eagles. 1-0

Good game. Minute 30 saw an opponent of for 2 yellow cards.

63%-37%

14-5

6-2

Gotteborg sacked its coach… temptation to try and get a job there big, but unless I get a direct offer, I'll stay here until end of season.

Two CSL teams still have no manager. This seems to further prove my theory that unchecked leagues are understaffed too.

Niagara Utd vs Brantford 1-3

Playing better. Two young brothers as goalies. Penalty for Niagara.

Lowest attendance I've seen so far, in this CSL games. Today att. 2, at another field 1. Do they play so badly that even the player's girlfriends don't want to go see 'em?

54%-46%

4-10

3-5

Brantford vs Brampton United 2-5

Decent game. I do need a goalie, but, only kids for sale. WIll have to check all my opposition to see if anyone is willing to help a fellow CSL team…

50%-50%

13-9

6-5

Coming next

CANADA Under 20

The friendly against Cape Verde was very even, the main difference was the quality of finishing. Cape Verde strikers had a better targeting system than our kids.

This was the worst game so far for Brantford star Vukovik, the pressure overcame him

48%-54%

11-9

2-6

[olivermain83]

Good luck.

p.s. that's the most attacking tactic I think i've seen.

[deltablue]

Well, good to see things starting to improve.

[Dave.]

Nice start - something a bit different to the usual careers on here, which is definitely a big plus for me. Looks like you're gonna be seeing a lot of goals with that tactic!

[Brucehum]

Thanks.

@olivermain: for a moment I toyed with going down to 2 defenders and having 3 strikers... but... not enough strikers on my team

@deltablue: playing wise they improved, yes. You could see the team playing better. Results didn't.

@Dave: yes, i like small teams and a bit different to the norm. I have seen lots of goals, yes, but even more has seen my own goal!

[Brucehum]

BRANTFORD GALAXY

October 1st, 2012

The end is nigh!

End of season for my regular league team, still some games to come for national under 20s.

As it was quite clear I was not going to improve the team due to lack of pool of staff and players, I just went onto 'auto cruise' mode and didn't bother updating every month.

The League

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So, didn't manage my own objective of getting into playoffs. I thought that most teams would be as mine, full of 1/2 star players. Wrong... only 3 other teams had most of their team grayed and with such weaker players as mine (but they all had decent goalies). Try to guess which ones in the league table...

I'm quite happy with the play of my team, anyway. We where underdogs in almost all games. We gave good attacking football and the fans enjoyed it. The board is very happy with me, Very Secure job position, Very Good competitions. In fact, every single confidence bar has gone up! Club stature the one that went up the less.

The Evolution

We where quite regular, indeed. 12th for most of the league, too far from 13th to be scared, too far from 11th to be a real menace. In the end we did catch up with 11th, who where are a much better team. (every team except for last 3 was)

The Long and Windy Road

Many goals where to be found when Brantford played.

Players will be Players

16 players scored in my team, even the 1/2 star defenders have 1 goal.

Best players in the team where:

-Vukovic, 19 year old Striker brought in. 7.37 avg. 23 games. 15 goals (3rd top scorer in league)

-Majstrovic, 21 year old defender brought at the end. 2 star ability, 4.5 potential. 7 games played. 1 goal.

-Olujic, 26 year old AM, star of the team when I started. 25 games. 7 goals.

Olujic had wanted out of the team already then. He asked to be transfer listed. I agreed. During second transfer window he asked to be removed of the list.

Food for Thought

I chose a very attacking tactic as I thought if I had one good defender and the rest where crap, and my offence was good, better have all my good players on the field.

With my attacking tactic I had a very good number of shots at goal The only problem was that opponents would score almost always due to my very bad goalies (no realistic possibility to upgrade them) and weak defenders. Main problem was playing vs 4-1-2-2-1. There my chances went down.

When two of my star attackers where injured at the same time, during june, my scoring went down.

Ironically enough, once my scouts where allowed to scout Mexico, they where finding nothing until the very end of the league, where they found a hot prospect goalie with the potential to become a leading CSL goalkeeper. I bought him for the club, he just signed after the last game.

So, in short, even very attacking formations need at least decent goalies and defence.

I renewed all the good players, getting the salary of the team down 10% and renewed all staff (in a league with almost no staff to buy, you keep what you have!)

Two of the teams never got a manager for the whole season.

This is the main problem with this league (and I expect most of the inactive ones), that there is no staff pool. In realistic transfer range there are (all of them at clubs already):

-1 director of football.

-6 managers (including me). One of them teamless.

-4 assistant manager (including mine)

-6 coaches

-0 physio

-7 scout (including mine)

And player pool is also very short, for example no goalies out of contract unless they are kids. Second transfer window showed that, only the 2 weakest teams did any transfer effort, and they brought kids galore (better than their 1/2 star players).

One option would be to play a long career in this league, getting regens who with time would populate the player pool, and converting retiring players into staff. But that means quite a long time, as for example my oldest player is 29. With FM2014 so near, this would be a project for that game better than for this.

With more teams than managers, it will be easy to hop back to this league in the future.

With the new future leading CSL goalkeeper and the way the team is shaping I'm almost tempted to go on. But, as said, that will be better left to FM2014.

I should probably quit my team and use this 1-2 months left of contract to try and get in a new team, but I'll just let it run to the end. Want to see what the board offers me, etc. I'll probably be regretting these 5-10 games missed in the new team at the end of next season.

[Brucehum]

Mother Russia

Jobless for a whole 4 days.

Got this amazing offer from Rostov Volgograd:

Accepted. Not sure it is too big for me. Biggest team I've ever managed (Girona, Gimnastic, Oxford City & Brantford)

The board want attacking football... well, they came to the right place!

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

November 4th, 2012

History

The team name is a reference to the Dzherzinsky Tractor Works, once a major producer of tractors, and the scene of heavy fighting during the Battle of Stalingrad during World War II.

Rotor was the last champion of the old USSR Second Division, in 1991, thus forming the new Russian Top Division after the USSR collapsed.

In mid-1990s, Rotor was one of the strongest clubs in Russia, rivalling with Spartak Moscow for the championship, yet never winning it. Rotor became the league runners-up in 1993 and 1997. They also enjoyed some success at the European stage, having eliminated Manchester United from the UEFA Cup in 1995.

In 2000s, Rotor's results came into a decline, and in 2004, the team finished last in the Russian Premier League. The following winter Rotor was denied professional licence, and chose not to participate in the amateur competitions.

However, Rotor's former B-team, Rotor-2 Volgograd, spent 2005 season in the Russian Second Division. On January 12, 2006, Rotor-2 was renamed Rotor.

In early 2009, there were fears that Rotor can go bankrupt very soon, and another club was founded that was originally supposed to be called FC Rotor. However, Rotor survived at that moment, and that new club had to rename itself to FC Volgograd.

FC Rotor Volgograd were excluded from the Russian Second Division on August 4, 2009 due to financial problems. They have played 18 games and were in the 13th position with 21 points.

On February 8, 2010, it was announced that FC Volgograd, will be renamed to FC Rotor Volgograd for 2010 and, pending licensing, will play in the Russian First Division. The club was relegated back to the third-level Second Division after the 2010 season. In 2011/12 season, it won their Second Division zone and was promoted to the second level once again.

Volgograd

Formerly Stalingrad

Situated on the western bank of the Volga river. Important industrial city and the seat of Volgograd Oblast. A proper communist red collar city.

Population: 1,021,215

Stadium: "Pobeda" (Russian: Победа).

Built: 1964

Renovated: 2002

Capacity: 18000

Staff:

It is quite understaffed, has no assistant manager and no coaches for first team.

Finances

I'm used to much smaller finances, so not sure.

The trodden path

The board's objective is mid table. At this moment, with 12 games left to go, the team is as far from promotion playoff as it is from relegation (7 points)

League Rules

32 games

no more than 3 foreign players in first 11

match squad must have at least 1 russian under 21 player

7 subs named, maximum 4 used

top two teams win promotion to Premium League

teams 3-4 qualify for Promotion Playoff

Bottom two teams relegated

Maximun of 5 players on loan

I like leagues with limitations to players. Also, I'll have to remember I have 4 subs, not the usual 3.

The Players

Tactics

Will respect what the team is playing so far, but with attacking mentality, direct play, etc. It is a 4-5-1 V (so a 4-1-2-2-1)

Will have the top heavy Brantford tactic for fun.

Objective

Adapt to the new team and the league philosophy. Get used to these bigger budgets.

After last season's misjudgement of possibilities, I'll be conservative and think that I can be 8th or better. But playing promotion would be so cool...

[Pitalo]

All the best wishes and luck to you and Rotor!!!!

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

November 13th, 2012

The Games

1st half: 4-5V-1
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg  
Rotor      0   58%   2    0   
Torpedo    2   42%   3    3

2nd half: 3-2-3-2, Brantford top heavy
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg  
Rotor      2   58%   9    2   
Torpedo    3   42%   8    5

We lost… but team shows lots of promise. Pity to lose against team in promotion places, as it is one I would have liked to close in. Will need to tinker that 4-5V-1 attack a lot.

After match, general team talk for moral and… very bad, a lot of red! My striker went to abyssal…

Salyut-Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Salyut     2   48%   7    5
Rotor      0   52%   4    1

Another very early goal against. Again, not generating shots. So attack with direct play not working that well. When down 2-0, change to top heavy.

Anyway, my goalie was named player of the week.

The board seems to trust me, as between games I got this good news:

I have played with 4th and 1st team in league, and the home game against Torpedo I was quite unlucky. But, still feels like I should have done better.

During this two weeks I got me a new staff. Now at least the players can train!

Winter rest is here. Time to scout for new players, play some friendlies (unless team is on holiday) and tinker with tactics.

[Brucehum]

Canada U20

2012

The kids played quite well this year. The results are not that great, to be honest, but they are getting the formations slowly and improving.

All the games are friendlies. All of them, except for the last one, played with standard balanced 4-4-2. Played in view key highlights.

The kids where very green. Cape Verde dominated and outplayed us. There where 2 or 3 nice plays by Canada.

Jamaica played very happy football, attacking and not defending. We where also attacking. Good game and good result.

We dominated the game with a balanced standard 4-4-2 play. As usual, the opponent that has almost no shots scores with the only good chance he gets, from a corner.

This was a boring draw. Almost no key moments in the game, probably Venezuela had a ver conservative way of playing.

Here we changed style to a more ambitious control fluid 4-3-2-1, trying to emulate Spain's tiki taka. Did not work at all. We where outshot by a lot by El Salvador, and they had 51% possession to add insult to injury.

[deltablue]

Good luck in Russia.

[Brucehum]

As I'm playing friendlies during the cold Russian winter (my players love me for that) I wonder if I should have stayed at Brantford. The main reason for leaving was the utter lack of staff to be acquired, so the team could not improve much. And the lack of a player pool helped too.

Is it common to wonder if you should have stayed when you change clubs? I feel I'll be back in Canada in a few seasons.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

February 26th, 2013

winter friendlies
Rotor - Energia Volzhskly
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      0   61%   13   4
Energia    0   39%   5    2


VATI - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
VATI       0   41%   1    0
Rotor      1   59%   18   5
7 saves by VATI goalie! 1 wood


Rotor - Metallurg Volzhskiy
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      4   61%   16   8
Energia    1   39%   6    4


Torpedo 2 Volzhskiy - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Torpedo1   0   35%   2    0
Rotor      2   65%   21   6


Luch Tula - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Luch       0   42%   7    2
Rotor      0   58%   21   7


Rotor - CSKA Moscow
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      1   52%   5    2
Energia    2   48%   8    3


Rotor - Akademia (D)
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      3   57%   16   4
Energia    0   43%   4    3


Rotor - Rotor Reserves
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      3   62%   14   8
Reserves   0   38%   6    1


Dos Nauka - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Dos Nauka  0   39%   5    3
Rotor      0   61%   17   10


Textilschik Kamysi¡hin - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Textil     0   39%   2    0
Rotor      0   61%   16   6
Rotor 10 men whole 2nd half.


Rotor - Sukhona
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      3   60%   12   4
Reserves   0   40%   4    0


Rotor - Vybor Kurbatovo
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      3   61%   17   8
Vybor      0   39%   0    0


Yelnikovo - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Yelnikovo  1   41%   4    1
Rotor      4   59%   12   8

I've played more winter friendlies than games I have left in the regular league. All where against weaker teams, except for CSKA Moscow. That game CSKA was better than us, but we fought hard.

They all have been played with 4-2-2AM-2 formation, attacking balanced. Some games, once I was 2 or more goals ahead, I changed to counter or to control, to try.

It can be seen that the latest matches have a better shots on target, that's because the tactic is better known, true, but I think also because I gave individual orders to my strikers to not try long shots.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

February 1st, 2013

Youth

Movement this winter. New youth intake (I forgot to capture at the right moment, so here I show only the best)

Very good prospect: Oleg Titov. At 15 he is already as good as the other DMs I have.

Also, youth related. Soon improved youth facilities.

And, when I went to watch the Rotor u18 vs Rotor Youth intake, the press was puzzled about what was Canada U20s national manager doing watching that game.

Transfers:

Sekret, Anton 21 ST 170k.

Zotov, Andrey 19 DM, DC/DR 95k

My DM department was quite weak

Zelenka, Lukas 33 AMC / M(LC), AML Free

Veteran.

Gudiev, Vitaly 17 GK 450k

for the future

Kaglyuk, Alexandr 19 DR 45k

So, no revolution here, but something to work with, specially for the future. Nothing special, save for future star Gudiev (he's been already called once for Russia under 20s). Just strengthening the squad.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

April 1st, 2012

The Games

The winter training seems to have improved this team. Still not enough goals.

Rotor - Metallurg Kuzbass
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      1   57%   11   6
Metallurg  0   43%   4    1
goal by newcomer Sekret in his debut.
Penalty against my team second half, stopped by goalie! (1st penalty I see the computer not score in 180+ hours of playing this game)

10 corners. Need to train them.


Neftekhimic - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Yelnikovo  2   46%   12   2
Rotor      2   54%   9    4


Rotor - Volgar
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      1   57%   17   11
Volgar     0   43%   2    1

Complete domination. Should have been whipeout. Opponent usual one attack one goal.  opponent goalie 8 saves. 4 wood. 1 disallowed goal. 1 penalty. 9 corners. 

Interestingly enough, my goalie got his second award. This time after the disheartening 2-2 draw against bottom feeder Neftekhimik, he won goalie of the week. His previous award had been goalie of the month back when we lost those 2 first matches!! I'm not sure if this is not a bad sign.

International affairs

There was an opening to manage the main Cameroon squad. Managing Canada u20 is good to get experience for the main Canada team, yes, but I thought Cameroon was even better. So I phoned them. Their laughs almost gave me otitis.

There was an opening for a Canadian CSL team. The only team with coaches! all 4 of them u19, ok, but... Tempted. But I finish my contracts.

The friendlies where more of the usual. The Honduras game was bad luck, it seems maybe my players have a concentration problem. The Guatemala game I played twice. I had my first crash at minute 88 when the game was 1-1. Played again and karma was there, 1-1. Although this time it was much tougher.

The next month

April is when Volgograd stops being frozen, we get 1ºC to 7ºC minimum, so not cold at all. Lets hope my players keep on the good play they've shown of late.

Going to be the most important month in this career so far. The Rotor fixtures will show if there is a real possibility of reaching prom... I mean 8th position. And Canada u20 plays its first competition, and we are underdogs. My captain has been on the news saying that we do have chances, even if the press thinks badly of us.

edit: just saw that the board is not happy with me in one thing, promises! I'm not playing 'very attacking' football. Not sure if this means more goals expected or what, as the philosophy of my team IS attacking.

[Brucehum]

OH CANADA

April 14th, 2013

North American u20

So, the Canadian kids played the North American U20s championship.

The tactic used all tournament was 4-5V-1, or 4-DM-2M-2AM-ST. Attacking, balanced. Short passes. Zonal marking. Press more.

The regular group we where expected to draw both games. The 2 top teams (out of 3) qualify to the quarter finals.

Easy game. Almost already qualified.

Panama after the game said they where lucky to have survived. They where. 2-1 for Canada would have been a normal result.

So, this is how groups went:

Quarter Finals vs Haiti.

This game was epic. We where losing 0-1, and we go a man under due to 2 yellow cards. All attack. Haiti gets a penalty... saved!! We score. It seems we'll go to extra time when I get an injury at m85. Uh oh... Then we score again! We are through to the semi finals.

By qualifying to the semis, we manage to qualify to World Cup u20!! Didn't know that until I got the message:

This is how the quarter finals went:

Semi Finals vs USA.

The rivalry is here. Also, it is almost personal, as USA told me twice they where not interested in friendlies against my team because they felt they would win nothing from them.

This game was not as good. USA was playing a bit better than us. Even so, they scored, we scored back fast, they took the lead again even faster. Second half we score. Game is now even. We have been playing very hard, and we injury two opponents in minute 72 and 74. USA have no reserves left. We use our numerical superiority and score in minute 82. We can't relax, so we keep our hard game... too hard... we get a penalty against us at minute 87. And... saved again!!!! We are playing the final!

This is how the semifinals went:

Finals vs Costa Rica

The team is quite tired, but they play on. We play much better than Costa Rica, they are tired too. Once we get the 1-0 lead, I tell my kids to go deep, counter attack. They score soon afterwards.

Game for third:

We won the North American u20 cup!!!! This team has made a whole nation happy, and their boss very proud!!

Pity that Vukovik is 20 already, so he won't be able to play in the World Cup.

World Cup won't be like this. Depending on the group draws, we may not even go through to the next phase. Qualifying out of the group will already be a success. USA and Mexico are better than us, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, Italy, France etc are much better. But, with good play, who knows how far we will go?

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

May 7th, 2013

"Achilles' Last Stand"

It was an April morning when they told us we should go

As I turn to you, you smiled at me

How could we say no?

With all the fun to have, to live the dreams we always had

Oh, the songs to sing, when we at last return again

The Games

Incredible April month for both the Rotor and the Canadian u20 teams.

Petrotest - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Petrotest  1   47%   9    3
Rotor      4   53%   14   8
this time their goalie only stopped half of 'em.


Baltika - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Baltika    1   49%   12   5
Rotor      4   51%   11   7
good match by my goalie with good saves


Rotor - Ural
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      2   56%   8    5
Ural       0   44%   12   4
Good professional game.


Rotor - Yenisey
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg   
Rotor      3   57%   11   5
Ural       0   43%   2    0


Sibir - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Baltika    1   48%   11   3
Rotor      1   52%   9    3
Very even game.

Our main goalie Denis Pchelintsev, solid goalie, keeps winning player of the week and month awards. Our defenders, usually one of them is there always, different ones.

Classification

Actually I'm 5th, as Torpedo and Ural have a match less, and it is between themselves. All results make me 5th, but I'm hoping for a draw.

The next month

That first game when I got to Rotor and we lost against Torpedo, even playing better than them, could cost us the promotion in the end.

These next two games will be a real Achilles' Last Stand for us. We need to win both to get promotion. Winning 1 and drawing 1 could also work, depending on opposition.

Rotor(4rd) plays Khimki(11th) and SKA Khabarovsk(9th)

Baltika(3rd) plays Shinnik(2nd) and Torpedo(5th)

Torpedo(5th) plays Ural(6th), Petrotest(14th) and Baltika(3rd)

Ural(6th) plays Torpedo(5th), Spartak Nalchik(12th) and Salyut (1st)

edit: there is one combination where we win 2 games and don't qualify for promotion: Baltika wins both games and Ural wins its three. But that is quite difficult, that the 3 teams win all games left.

[deltablue]

Well done on the U20 international win.

[Brucehum]

Thanks delta. I must admit I was quite lucky with the matches I got. I only got USA stronger than us, and we intimidated them with many tackles.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

June 2013

Back in the US... back in the US... back in the USSR

The games

Khimki - Rotor 0-6

Great game. Full control and good finishing. One step closer to promotion!

Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Khimki     0   45%   5    1
Rotor      6   55%   16   9
Sekret: 4 goals.

This game set a few records:

... and two records for Sekret

Team of the week:

Other games that can directly affect our team's final position:

Ural 2-0 Torpedo Moscow

Shinnik 2-0 Baltika yes!

Spartak Nalchik 1-1 Ural yes!

Torpedo 0-1 Petrotest

Still not done, but nearer.

Last game: Rotor - SKA Khabarovsk 3-1

A record crowd of 16,491 fills up the field to give their support to their team. Game starts with goal for SKA... But then we score 3. Promotion here we go!

Rotor - SKA Khabarovsk
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Rotor      3   53%   14   5
Khabarovsk 1   47%   6    3

Promotion games

We are playing against Kuban, the team from whom we bought Sekret. Yes, they are a first division team, but they'll be on low moral, so we should have it easy as well as we are playing.

That was more or less my thought process, but reality was much harsher. Kuban completely dominated the first game, but we had a good result:

Kuban - Rotor
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Kuban      2   62%   19   5
Rotor      2   38%   9    5
Sekret played well and scored against his old team. 
Completely dominated by Kuban, we made our few opportunities count. Changed to counterattack after their 2nd goal, as it seemed we where going to be completely massacred.

Saved by the bell in the first game, second game was in our turf. We had chances, but with the difference in play in the first game we went for a super defensive 4-5-1.

17,300 fans where by our side, so I told the boys to go out and give their all for them.

Rotor - Kuban
Team      Sco  Pos  Sht  Otg 
Rotor      0   43%   5    2
Kuban      0   57%   9    1
A  bit of luck helps. Kuban had 1 wood, and one possible penalty at m85 denied.

Promoted!!!

Season recap

finished 3rd and promoted. Great!

Our road to heaven (I got the team after round 20)

I got the team with 20 goals for, 18 against (average result:1-1). In 12 games, we scored 31 goals, and got 12 against (average result almost 3-1), and the board still insists I'm not playing attacking football!

The players:

I don't know why Sekret is not there, even if on reserves. He scored 12 goals in 12 games, had 5 assists, was pom 2 times, and had a 7,67 avg rating.

Vladimir Rzhevskhiy was a real rock in the center of defence.

The next season:

Interesting, 2017.1.1 we are moving to a bigger stadium (actually that's the stadium I have in the photo in the first post)

Seems a fair budget. In this division we can have 7 foreigners playing in the 11.

Objectives:

• Strengthen the team (I had some guys already signed to come in at the transfer window, buy they where contracted when I thought I would be at least another season at first division, so some of them are just filler). Probably need a good backbone: 1 good DC and 1 good MC. Goalie not too sure.
  
• Stay in premier division
  

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

July 20th, 2013

New Players

Danilo Spasojevic, ST / AM©, Serbian, 18

Miro Varvodic, GK, Croatian, 24

Andrey Karpovich, DM / M®, Kazakh / Russian, 32

Hristo Ivanov, GK, Bulgarian, 32

Vladimir Bozovic, D(L)/WB/M(L), Montenegrin / Serbian, 31

Juan Carlos Espinoza, D®/D(L),WB(RL), Chilean, 22

Russian premier division allows a maximum of 7 foreigners in first 11.

Of the ones leaving, Lukas Zelenka was a disastrous addition last year. After 1 game he got homesick, I allowed him to go back to his country, then he came back, played 2 more games and did not want to renew the contract. Now he is clubless.

And why 2 goalies? Because I forgot I had bought one for this transfer window, and before he got here I bought another one...

Still searching for a good MC.

Finances

This is the current status (after transfers) of Rotor's finances.

The 78k general sponsorship is new.

Friendlies

I let my assistant manager direct the friendlies for the first 3. I then took charge, not because of the poor results, but because I like to make all players play in friendlies, all 12 reserves, to get match fitness, and he wasn't using them all.

What's to come

This will be the first fixtures, a good mixture of the strong and the not so strong in Premier Division. It will be a very good pointer to see the real possibilities this year.

[Brucehum]

Toronto FC's manager is in a very insecure situation. I wonder if he is sacked should I try to already accomplish my objective a - play in one of 3 Canadian teams in MSL, or better wait some time and go on with Rotor, as this squad can in one or two years do interesting things. Even do a bit of a journeyman career (Australia, South Korea, South Africa seem interesting)

[elbilly]

That was quite a turn around you performed on Rotor's fortunes as well as a fine U20s cup win. I would go with staying at Rotor to see out a full season in the top division. Surely opportunities in the MSL will come around again.

[Brucehum]

OH CANADA

August, 2013

The Turkish World Championship U20 is here. Just before we play it, we have a friendly against a team of the calibre of our opposition in the group phase.

Chile 2-1 Canada

They played better. Oh well, W Ch is going to be tough.

World Championship U20, Group C

Sweden

South Korea

Paraguay

Canada

It is recognised as a though group, as all nations save us are in the top 30.

Canada 1-0 Paraguay

Even game. Main difference shots on target, we had more.

Sweden 0-0 Canada

Sweden played better, but we held the score to zero, even if we where playing attacking soccer.

Canada 2-1 South Korea

South Korea started the game with a wonderful control soccer, but our goal forced them to attack, and that evened the field.

This means we qualify 1st! Not bad, considering we where the underdogs of the group.

We get Uruguay. Strong team.

Canada 2-2p Uruguay

Uruguay qualify on penalties. They where quite better than us, but when the score was 0-2 we went overload full attack with no worries, and scored twice. After our second goal we got a defender injured. Oh well, we'll play overtime with 10... nope! Start of overtime striker injured. Play with 9 against better team. We manage to hold the score, and enter penalties. Our goalie stops 1, but theirs stops the last 2.

Anyway, better than expected! We played mano a mano vs 4 stronger teams. We can be proud of the kids.

This was the full championship:

groups

eighths

quarters

semi finals

Germany 2e-1 Brazil

Argentina 1-1p Turkey

finals

Turkey 1-3e Germany

So Germany win u20 championship. With Turkey, playing at home, a surprise 2nd and Argentina 3rd.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

September 1st, 2013

Playing in premier russian division is tough...

The games

All games had attacking soccer from us.

• Dinamo played better than us, but we managed to hold to a draw.
  
• Alania should have been a massacre for us, but they had 4 good shots, they scored all of them.
  
• Krasnodar played better than us, but we had better finishing.
  
• Shinnik was a close match, but we had an edge. They drew us.
  
• Lokomotiv, 2nd in the league, was much better than us, it was as if a train had ran us over. We could be happy with only losing by 1. It meant the end of 16 undefeated games.
  
• CSKA, 1st in the league, was better than us, but we used our chances well and won (making them lose their perch on top to Lokomotiv). Full house, 18,000 fans, to see this game against our traditional enemies.
  

So not bad at all.

Classification

so far, so good, we are at mid table. So early in the season, we are as near to the play down spots as we are to 2nd qualified.

For the next months we hope to advance in the cup and keep getting points to avoid relegation, which means getting 30 points in 30 games. If we keep our current form, we'll do it, finishing comfortably mid table.

[Dave.]

Good effort with the national team, you won a pretty tough group and losing to Uruguay is no shame!

[elbilly]

Cracking start you've made to life in the RPD

[Brucehum]

@Dave: indeed, they did well. Against Uruguay they lost with 9 and in penalties!

@elbilly: yes, quite good start. The 2 games I drew that I should have won make you feel 'bad', but then you tend to forget there where other 2 games I drew that I could have easily lost.

One very nice thing for Rotor, if I stay some time, is that in 2017 they move to a 42.000 stadium.

[deltablue]

Promising start to the season in Russia, unlucky about the penalties against Uruguay.

[Brucehum]

@deltablue: indeed, I would have liked to play against Argentina u20.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

November 10th, 2013

Mid Season

Classification

Wonderful and unexpected. Our 5th position is great, and it would give us European football next year.

Our current 28 points should be enough to keep out of relegation, so I can already say we have accomplished our objective.

The games

We play attacking 4-2-2AM-2 football against normal teams.

Against the top teams the Moscow's (save CSKA), rich Zenit and powerful Anji, we played ultradefensive 4-5-1. Against Anji, even with those ugly tactics, we could have easily lost 5-0 if it wasn't for our goalie Varvodic. Rzhevskiy did great too, as always. He is the 3rd best player in the league at this moment. Both of them where in the Team of the month 5 times. So, probably this would explain our good undefeated run: even with attacking football, our back is great. It also helps being lucky.

Last game so far, against Krylja Sovetov, was a completely undeserved and surprising last minute victory. After being dominated 80 minutes, we got a penalty in minute 85 and also scored in minute 90+2.

As can be seen, we have been regularly holding 4th-5th spot.

We are the second top scoring team at the moment, and the 5th with less goals conceded.

Checking stats, we are the worst team of the league in Decisions (will work on that during winter break). We are very low in the rest of the All Positions stats (13th in most of them).

Our goalkeepers are interesting, they have the worst Aerial Ability and Command of Area of all, but they are the best in handling and agility. We are also the worst in Heading, Creativity, Jumping and Anticipation. Even so, we are doing quite well!

Other

I could have taken Trinidad & Tobago national team coaching (was accepted, instead of the usual laugh, which can be understood in all languages). If it was a playable league, I might have, getting a team there too. But then, there would be no Canada left from Oh Canada.

Toronto manager was sacked, but even if one of my objectives, there is always time for coaching a Canadian team in MLS, as Elbilly reminded me.

Coming next

So hoping to keep that 5th spot, or go a bit up. That would give us both European football and a good injection of cash.

During the winter market we have to slightly strengthen the team, but only if I find good players with good price. And only Russians.

[Brucehum]

First job offer ever for me (not me going after a job), and it comes from the first team I chose in this game, FM2013!!!

Gimnàstic is a third tier spanish team.

Temptation... if it wasn't for the possibility of european football next season, I would probably take it. So far I have chosen delay, but I'll most surely keep on Rotoring the free world.

Curiously enough, F.C. Barcelona is managerless at this moment too.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

October 4th, 2014

Classification

So far so good! Still hoping to keep this position by end of league. Improving it will be difficult, as the top teams are really strong. One of the things of playing in Russia is that there are many rich teams (not mine).

The games

Same story as the previous games... drawing the tough teams, and winning against the not so tough. My goalie and central defender doing wonderful.

Evolution

Winter Friendlies

Assistant Manager took care of the friendlies. They are a must not to lose form.

Winter Transfers

in: out:

Sergey Bendz', Rus, 30, D©/L.

Petr Ten, Rus, 21, D(L)/D©. Bought to replace my star player Bodovic who is leaving, as I can not pay the new wage he wants, it is quite higher than maximum allowed by board.

Borys Taschy, Ukr, 20, M©/DM. Should be my new star. At last, a good midfielder I like, creative and with flair.

One problem I could have is that two of the players come from enemy teams, so the fans have not received them too well. But considering we have so many enemies in premier division, it would be difficult to avoid that.

I said I would buy Russian and cheap... and did the opposite. I bought my most expensive player so far (€900.000), and Taschy is a 20 year old foreigner midfielder... but when I saw his creativity and flair... I had to have him. Also, I have 3 foreigners leaving at season end.

Then, you think how much you are spending (almost half my transfer budget) and see the rich teams spend €9M and €7.5M.

Youth Intake

Three interesting young ones.

Finances

After transfers our finances have taken a hit. When I got the opportunity to change season objective, I did, to finish top half. I got bigger transfer and wage limit. I used the bigger transfer and now board is asking me to sell players. Now we do need to finish 4th-5th, to get a good cash prize and get out of the red!!

Thoughts

My opinion on winter breaks, even if I owe a lot to last year's, is that I don't like them... they make the league seem much longer (probably it feels this way as I'm having a very good season, if I was in a relegation battle I would feel the opposite).

My objective now, more than ever due to bad finances, is to finish 4th to 5th, at least. As said, better than that I see it very difficult. Our play against the biggest teams has been better this second leg than first one, but they are keeping a very good pace.

[elbilly]

That's a great first half of the season, if you could turn half of those draws into wins you'd be running away with the title. Taschy sure looks a fine player in the making.

[deltablue]

Barcelona is a bit optimistic right now.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

June 2nd, 2014

"You can't win with kids". Who said so?

The Games

As can be seen in the fixture list, playing against the best teams we did beat CSKA and Anji, and drew Spartak and Zenit.

After the comment by Elbilly about draws and won games, I thought I had to improve even more my tactics. Sometimes when things go well, you don't bother to make them better. Being in 5th position was good, an incredible result. Against the big rich teams we where playing ultradefensive 4-5-1 hoping not to lose. We had almost no scoring chances.

Against CSKA we played our standard 4-2-2-2 but with counter instead of attack. CSKA completely dominated, true, but instead of no good chances, this time we had 3 opportunities, 3 throw ins by Vaganov that Rzhevskiy heads into goal. The 3 the same play! This combo Vaganov - Rzhevskiy would work 5 more times.

Against Spartak we where losing 2-0 very fast, then 3-1. We changed to an offensive 4-3-3. I found that against teams that play through the middle, my 4-2-2AM-2 does not work so well. We managed to draw.

We lost a game against Terek... well, you can't win them all!

Against Anji in the cup we where massacred. They use 4-1-3-1-1, middle play. We tried our three tactics, 4-2-2-2 counter, generated no attacking chances and got 2 goals from Eto'o (he alone gets paid in a week twice what I pay my whole team!) in 30 minutes. We changed to the offensive 4-3-3, but we got another goal by minute 47. So change to ultra defensive 4-5-1 (we needed to beat Anji in the league game against them 4 days later, and being 3 goals down I saw no real chances to save this game, so I used it as an experiment). No more goals against, but almost no chances.

So, what to do if you need to win (we have 2 games left, and are 3 points behind Anji in 3rd position, same points as Lokomotiv) against a team that outplays you? I decided to tweak the 4-5-1. That was my most 'successful' against them, having a 0-0 result in the first game and in the minutes we played it. So, instead of having 9 players defending and one attacking, I put two midfielders to work attacking too. Just that small tweak made wonders. In that league game we had the approximate same number of shots and good shots on goal as powerful Anji.

We end the regular season tied with Lokomotiv Moscow. Russian league classification is based on games won, then results between teams, then goal difference. Lokomotiv where better than us at that. But, there is also the rule that if two teams finish top with even points, they play a match to decide the champion. We had no good results against Lokomotiv, so I used the new 'more attacking' 4-5-1, and won easily.

Classification

Champions! That got us €4,8M, saving us from our bad finances.

We where 5th in average most of the league, until the small improvements in tactics after round 20, so we improved converting some of our old draws into wins.

+9=10-1 first 20 games, +7=2-1 the 10 last games. We went from 61% to 76.6%, or 1.83 points per game to 2.23

We had an average attendance of 16264, with 8 sellouts (half of the games!). By 2017 Rotor is moving to a 45.000 seat stadium.

Our average result was 2.2 - 1.3

Cup

Awards

Most goals scored:

We had two players with 15 goals, Ortiz and Sekret, 4th best scores.

Most assists in league, Vaganov, with 15.

Best average, Rzhevskiy:

3 players in team of the year, and a 4th, my other DC, very near. My defensive line was what brought us this championship. Yes, we scored more than anybody, but you need a good defense to stop the bigger teams from scoring more than you.

Board

I got a contract renewal offer around week 22... 3 years, same salary (3,500€). I accepted but with only 1 year.

Thoughts

Due to having so many rich teams (6-7) Russian Premier Division is quite fun. After 26 games, we were 5 teams on top with just 2 points of difference.

So, next season, my objectives are to finish in European positions (1-5th or cup winner), and do a decent Euro Champions. It will probably be my last season with Rotor. If I win anything, I think I'll be top Canadian manager.

Not sure why, but managing a Danish lowest tier amateur team seems interesting after managing a premier division team (I hope they do sack amateur coaches). But, we'll see, a year is a very long time!

[Brucehum]

Become Best Canadian Coach (easy):

This is the current standing after my premier championship. I appear twice in the list, my other apparition was winning a tier 3 canadian amateur league in a different save (with same profile, will have to remember to make new one every time!), which gave me 0 points then.

1. Yallop

2. Me!

3. Limniatis

[EvilDave]

Winning the RPL with Rotor in your first season up is a ridiculous achievement, well played! Very impressive campaign, good luck keeping your team together and in Europe next year, all looks very promising!

[deltablue]

Well done snatching the title!

[olivermain83]

Fantastic work in Russia!

[elbilly]

very well done sir a fine title win

[Brucehum]

@EvilDave: Completely agree! We where lucky.

@deltablue: thanks! I was quite surprised.

@olivermain83: indeed... can't believe it yet.

@elbilly: thanks! I worked harder on my tactics thanks to your comment on making draws victories.

I see almost all our games are draws or 3-2, 2-1, etc. So we where indeed a bit lucky. It helps that Russia has 7 rich teams (teams 2-8 in the classification). so they keep killing each other and there is no overt domination by 2 teams as in Spanish league, for example.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

July 16th, 2014

Transfers

-Anton Kobyalko, Rus, 28, ST. To deepen the squad.

-Alexei Fedorov, Rus, 20, GK. I had no goalie for the reserves team. Very bad. Shouldn't have gotten him, actually.

-Josan Nicolae, Rom, 30, M(L)/AM(L). Need to cover for gone Carlos Diego.

-Ilja Abaev, Rus, 32, GK. Needed a second goalie as my second goalie had retired.

-Alexei Aravin, Rus, 28, D®/D(L). Substitute for Bozovic.

-Georgi Kitanov, Bul, 19. GK. This is a very good keeper. When he came out, he had 21 clubs that wanted him, amongst them (one of many) our enemies Dinamo, so I just had to have him. Language barrier.

Of our outs, 2 of them I tried to retain, Bozovic and Diego Carlos, but I could not pay what they wanted, not allowed by board. So my star left (DL, AML) side is gone.

Friendlies

Friendlies by my Assistant Manager.

The supercup I didn't know we had one, so it came as a surprise. We managed to win! So far, it didn't add any points to my manager score, but maybe that is counted at the end of the year (nothing in the Other Club Trophies yet)

Expectations & past season best

We are expected to finish 7th. I hope not, that would be so near an european spot that it would be painful.

No surprises here. Rzhevskiy and I are team favourite people now. The first 2.

Good news.

World Cup 2014

I think many of you will like this result:

Strangely enough, Norway did quite well but the manager left. Spain, Russia, Brazil are also managerless, as it was to be expected.

In Russia, clubs such as Spartak and Anji got managerless due to their contracts running out... it was tempting to run Anji, a rich powerful team, but in Russia I am a Rotor man.

I'm not too happy with my transfers... that's probably one of my weakest points, buying new players, and even worse, I can't seem to be able to sell almost no one.

[Brucehum]

ROTOR VOLGOGRAD

September 1st, 2014

It begins

I'm up there, true, but I'm not happy with some of my games. Specifically, the 3 first home games where very bad. We had almost no shots on target and what I was expecting to be 7-9 points became 2. Against the bigger teams we did well.

We once again beat CSKA being the weaker side. Even with the 7 lost points home, as there have been many draws, we see ourselves high in the table.

Against Anji this time we where better, at last. We suffered 3 possible penalties, of which referee only gave us one, which was our goal. Anji scored in a very stupid play where my DR passed the ball to a DC and was intercepted. To make matters worse, for some reason, my young goalie went rushing out of his area to try and get the ball before the attacker interception, but attacker got there first and a quick pass to Eto'o (once again!) allowed him to score easily.

The cup game against Torpedo Moscow was quite sad. How has that team fallen! That was the first team I played in Russia. They competed with us for promotion in First Division. Then the next year, whilst we where winning premier they where relegated. Now they are a shadow of themselves, with just 6 players. I am now know as a tinkerer. After my lost game against Amkar, I have been changing formations according to opposition, from defending 4-1-4-1 against Anji, to attacking 4-2-2-2 vs Torpedo Moscow to controlling 4-3-3 against Rubin.

I rotate my goalies, as them two are quite good. Good thing about almost always getting goals against is that we don't have to pay them the clean sheet bonus.

Just at the last moment, before the Anji game, I bought 26 year old Brazilian AML/ML Mazinho. My most expensive buy so far. I was looking at teams in premier and saw we are the slowest team of them all... and Mazinho is fast. Also, we had just been given the Euro Cup Group money. I contracted him until 2018, don't want a surprise like at the end of last season.

Euro Cup Groups

Nice cash injection!:

But a tough group.

Had lots of trouble getting the team registered for Euro Cup. The 4 players home grown in your team clause. I had only 2 in main squad, none in reserves. Had to get two 17 year olds.

[elbilly]

Crazy home form! Your players clearly like being on the road though. You'll do well to get through that Euro group, very tough draw indeed.

[Brucehum]

Indeed tough... the odds just came out... they give us 200-1 to win Euro Cup.

Even better, 9 players unavailable to play Stuttgart (injuries, depression)

My 2 best goalies out (one with depression, youngster Kitanov, went back to his country one month, the other injured, Varvodic.) So now I'm glad I bought extra goalies (I loaned Gudiev!), I don't have to put a 16 year old.

*note: just found out that of course my other goalies are not registered for euro cup... so grey goalie here we go!!!

So, the ideal circumstance to pull an epic match and get something away in Germany!