Random Poll: The toughest league in the game

[deknegt1990]

I felt like making a bit of a random poll, and the answers to this one will be mostly subjective to how people themselves have experienced the game. But for the sake of fun and casual discussion, here it is anyways.

What do you think is the toughest league to succeed in? Whether you're a relegation candidate, mid-table team, or a perennial title challenger. Which league makes you work the hardest, where you need the most luck, the most good-breaks to reach your goals or even exceed the goals set for you? What's the league you've managed in for years, and yet have little true success to show for because there's always those one or two teams that are just a little bit better, have more money, or simply have better luck.

[Plachy]

Spain or England domestically as a minnow due to disparity of either a) income or b) quality of starting players.

In Europe though it's Wales, N. Ireland, Iceland or nations along those lines.

Depends what you consider succeeding really. I'm a huge perfectionist, so I feel like I'm failing my Wales challenge because I've played 30 seasons now and I still haven't won the Champions League, I got to the Semis last season and tragically went out to Sheff Utd (who have won 6 x PL titles in a row) after knocking out Bayern in the Quarters. But actually my achievements are far better than my back to back CL titles with Harrogate, Leigh RMI, Margate, Halifax and Barwell in previous iterations of the game, objectively speaking.

FM does get easy on a domestic front after a period of time no matter what league you play in, the players can outfox to AI in squad building. So the long-term answer would be any league that has a lot of tycoon owners, which can be hugely problematic when trying to achieve dominance.

[SideLineBiscuit]

I woul say the Russian Premiership. You cant sign that many foreigners and the Russian players demand crazy wages. IT`s a real challenge in europe for sure!

[ianscousemac]

Got to be the EPL. Yes you have decent budgets and can bring in many players but you play quality opposition every week.

[Guest]

EPL is too easy because human managers are better at spending money that AI managers. Toughest time I had was managing in Indonesia, no money & very little playing talent really does test your tactical acumen.

[deknegt1990]

Personally I gotta say the Scottish Premiership has always been my stumbling block when it comes to winning the league. If you're not Rangers or Celtic, it's going to be very very hard to break the deadlock as the Old Firm have a gigantic wage advantage over every other club in the league... Four years in the Premiership with Hibernian, and the highest I ever got was a second place with Rangers an easy first. And despite having a lot of great youth and great cheap players, they could just outspend me every year with no issues.

Additionally you're forced to play everyone four times, which means you also have to face the Old Firm clubs four times each, and that means you can easily lose 4-12 points against either team.

Needless to say, after six years with Hibernian I gave up on the grind and went to a different club, my successor (assistant) also being unable to break that deadlock and eventually bailing to Sunderland... So yeah, the Championship is a chore to get established in.

[Earnie is God!]

I've always found the Brazilian league tough.

When you start, you don't know where to begin because you have about 100 players to manage, most of them almost completely worthless. Nobody wants to buy them and your club generally can't afford to release many of them.

Transfer funds are usually low so improving the squad takes a long time.

Tactics are difficult to implement and opponents can be tricky because almost everyone plays 4-2-2-2

[Mrlee.1986]

Vanarama prem for me, that can be a b**ch of a league to get out of, usually one loss can send you 5 places down the table and a league where there only seems to be between 10 and 15 points between finishing 1st or 14th.

[rywilson]

Got to be one of the conference divisions in England, only top goes up automatically in any of them iirc. Been done in the playoffs many a time!

[oneronaldo]

La Liga, because Barca and Real are so overpowering financially, sometimes I wonder why do the other clubs don't just let those 2 play each other 38 times instead and see which nutjob will watch that. Level playing field it certainly isn't.

EPL and Bundesliga are easy, EPL due to the massive TV money and AI's questionable transfer habits. The Bundesliga because of its massive prize money and Bayern's habits of hoarding up players, not playing them and then allowing you to pick them off for cheap fees.

[ssoup]

Vanarama national league conference alot of the teams are evenly matched games every 2 days only 5 subs max.

[chestermike]

If expansion packs count, serie d is very tough. If not then the toughest game I have had is in Germany div 3.

[Jakarooney]

I'd sat Ligue 1 due to the fact that PSG are so hard to topple.

[nico_france]

I'd sat Ligue 1 due to the fact that PSG are so hard to topple.

Being a Ligue 1 player with other team than PSG, the challenge is not that tough in fact

According me Spain is the real deal, la Liga is really tough to get as a mid-low team, no money coming from TV rights and 2 top sides with loads of cash to burn

[leonavich]

I found some of the smaller leagues difficult, especially some of the created ones. I struggled a fair bit within the Jamaican League and even in the A-League due to the Salary Cap, which kept things fairly even and having a playoff every year meant even winning the league was never guaranteed to win the Final.

[s1111]

England is easy. The number of people who win the league within 2 or 3 years of promotion from the Championship is crazy, the TV money allows you to put together a great squad very quickly. It's quite possible to win it first season with teams like Southampton and Newcastle because there's no one dominant team that gets 80-90 points.

Spain is the most difficult of the big leagues. Taking the a team up from the second division and winning the league within 2 seasons I think would be impossible, unlike England.

[louissiscool]

The premier league is my bogey league i find it harder to win then any other, bare in mind i never start with one of the main clubs.

[Conardo]

Vanarama leagues - Club depending ...

[Luizinho]

I woul say the Russian Premiership. You cant sign that many foreigners and the Russian players demand crazy wages. IT`s a real challenge in europe for sure!

This. I think you have to field a minimum of 4 Russian players in your starting line-up, so If you want to challenge the likes of CSKA and Zenit then you have to spend a lot of money on the better Russian players. Also there's only 2 Champions league spots which are usually dominated by Zenit and CSKA.

[shirajzl]

I've always found the Brazilian league tough.

I've read that elsewhere before and it always baffles me. The player pool of good Brazilian players is absolutely ENORMOUS so outsmarting the AI is really easy even without any money. You can pick and choose even when playing as minnows.

On top of that, with loads of games to be played, the AI's inability to rotate the squad properly makes it even easier for a human player to win.

[Big Geordie]

For me, trying to get out of the bottom leagues in Spain was very tough. I manged Marbella and always failed in the playoff round, when I came up against the likes of Real Madrid C and Barcelona C. I jumped ship in the end and bailed for Bradford in League One.,

[GylfiAsCharged]

Any league with only one promotion spot. Mainly because I've finished 2nd and bottled the play-offs for 3 years running in my save, and am about to do it a 4th time.

[SlightlyAwkward]

Slovak 2 Liga West. Almost impossible to get promoted from because there's typically only one good team at a time in the Eastern group that builds an insurmountable lead before the league split while there are so many good teams knocking chunks out of each other in the West. Also very little money to improve your squad with unless you sell your best players who will then not be replaceable.