[FM20] - Disappointment and defeat and good times in the Ukraine.

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

May 2030

Just now, DaneBramage said:

We now go into some European qualification play-offs with 5th-8th apparently, but on this kind of form we may as well not bother.

Yep, called it. Terrible end to the season.

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

2029/2030 Season Review

Olexander Pikhalyonok went home from awards night with a bag full of trophies, but this is a pretty underwhelming set of winners. A top scorer of just 7 and the strikers nowhere to be seen? Embarrassing.

I don't believe that so many of these personalities are fairly determined, when the attitude and commitment over the final two months was so poor. Only two players ended up with a good average rating of over 7.0.

Good riddance to him. A striker who can't score goals is worthless so I was happy to take the money. Would have liked a sell on fee but this will do. Not getting much back into my transfer budget, so hopefully I can improve the facilities instead.

 

Edited December 2, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

[DaneBramage]

Ukraine

2029/30 Competition Winners 

Shakhtar also won the cup to make it a double, and have now equalled Dynamo on 19 league titles.

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

Pre-season 2030

Outgoing

A bit of a clearout was needed, to free up some room for some fresh faces in the squad and to get rid of a couple of players who had annoyed me. The most important transfer out was of course Dmitry Kuznetsov. In our promotion year he was the star man with his goals, but he flopped in the Premier League and I decided to get rid. We got good money for him, and importantly he went out of the country rather than to a rival. Also leaving was our other striker, Andriy Tkachuk, who was equally bad.

Maxym Tratyakov and Tymofiy Sukhar were also big players in our promotion year, but on the wrong side of 30 it was time for their spells at the club to come to an end. 

Sergiy Smertin, Yuriy Dyachenko, and Mykola Loktionov were all backup players who got very little gametime. Olexandr Gerasymenko, Olexandr Kostenko, and Rostyslav Zhelizko were all youngsters who were never going to make it.

Incoming

Starting from the back, first up is Yuriy Skotarenko on loan to be our backup keeper. Next up are a paid of centre backs, at 22 Artur Pylavskyi will play a lot this season, while at 19 Mario Augusto won't be involved at much. He's more one for the future, but with my personal transfer record smashed at £250k he'll get a few chances this year to bed him in. He's also the third Brazilian in our backline, scouting down there is starting to pay off.

Valery Sedov is back on loan for a second year and will slot straight back into midfield. Sergey Sokolov will also provide competition in midfield, while Olexiy Budnik will do the same on the right wing.

Lastly, we come to the strikers. With the two first choice forwards leaving we needed a couple of replacements, and hopefully these two will manage more than the 5 each those clowns got. Ruslan Rodin scored goals for fun for the Skakhtar reserve side, and could become a really important player for us. Edinho was a late addition, suggested by a scout in Brazil, and looks a real talent.

Key Signing

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

Pre-season 2030

Finances + Facilities

With the money from the Dmitry Kuznetsov sale burning a hole in our pocket I asked for a few upgrades. Youth recruitment has been improved with immediate effect, training and youth facilities are being improved over the next few months.

Expectations

  

Exactly the same as last year. Given that we only just missed out on Europe I'd say these are a bit low, but at least it gives me some room to breathe if last year was an anomaly and things don't start as strongly this time.

Tactic

Scoring goals was a problem last year. So to try and improve on that I've adjusted the tactic, taking out the defensive midfielder and adding another striker instead. The worry then of course is how much will this weaken us defensively, so we'll have to wait and see. 

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

July + August 2030

Results

A cracking result on the first day of the season, the highlight being a brace from debutant Ruslan Rodin. We then got a bit of a whooping from Shakhtar, although the performance wasn't as bad as it looks. We were leading 1-0 at half-time, but Danylo Koval got sent off just after the break and they exploited the man advantage.

September was more relaxed with fewer goals at each end, but still a good month with two wins and two draws. Ruslan Rodin scored a couple more, but then suffered a muscle strain that ruled him out for a month. The backline also impressed with three consecutive clean sheets.

Premier League Table

We were top after the opening day! Obviously that didn't last, but we're still going well.

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

September + October + November 2030

Results

A lot of red and green here. We don't draw games, we either win or lose them. And generally when we lose, we lose big.

I wasn't too bothered by the loss to Illichivets, but was infuriated by the following defeat against Karpaty. They were bottom of the league at the time and destroyed us at home. I threw a bit of a hissy fit and dropped the entire starting XI for the next game, which led to an even bigger defeat against Dynamo.

Luckily there was a cup game against a First Division side up next, so a comfortable win gave the first choice team their confidence back, and they carried this over to give Cherkaschyna a good thrashing. This also coincided with Ruslan Rodin returning from injury and getting back in the goals.

October was a better month, three clean sheets giving us three wins (including progression in the cup), and we picked up another win in November, Mykola Musolitin on a bit of a goalscoring run. The last game before the winter break was a tough one though, and we ended the year with a loss.

Premier League Table

This'll do. It's not as spectacular as last year (7 points fewer and 4 places lower than at the same stage of the season), but it feels more stable and it's good to see that it wasn't a flash in the pan. After the horrendous ending to last season I was worried we'd spiral and be fighting down the bottom this year, so I'm happy with a solid midtable spot at the moment.

Finances and Facilities

All of our money has disappeared again. We're a long way under the wage budget, there's just no way of making money. It will be a case of hoping the sale of Dmitry Kuznetsov can be replicated, that we can develop a player someone else wants to sign for a good amount.

The cash running out didn't affect the upgrades that were already in place though, and the improvements to the training and youth facilities have been completed.

Interview Offer

Turned the interview down, didn't even entertain the idea. Lviv were 13th at the time and now they're in the relegation area, so not an appealing proposition. At best a sideways move, at worst I'd be setting myself up for a relegation.

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

March 2031

Youth Intake

A better intake this year. We were told there was one promising centre back coming through, turns out that there's actually a pair of them, both with up to 5 star PA. The top prospect in central midfield also showed up, with up to 4.5 PA. 

We might have started to see the effect of the improved youth recruitment, as we also had a couple of decent prospects from abroad, with a Dutch keeper and a Slovakian winger also worth signing. In all we signed the top seven players.

Personalities aren't great, we're not really in a position at the moment where we can hold out for quality staff with good personalities. It's basically one or the other, and while we're not yet an established Premier League side I'm going with skill until that happens.

New Contract

Looks like I missed taking a screenshot of this, but my contract has been extended to June 2033. 

Edited December 4, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

February + March + April + May 2031

Results

Ouch. To put it bluntly, this sucked. We returned from the winter break with just 1 point from 4 games. We had a two week break until the next game so I organised a couple of friendlies against non-league opposition to smash a few goals past them and get the winning mentality back.

This had an immediate, but short-lived effect. We smashed Illichivets in the league and carried over that momentum to get through the cup quarter-final. At that point I decided to prioritise the cup, and sent out a rotated side in the league to earn a point at Karpaty. But in the semi-final we went out on penalties to Obolon-Brewer, and that was essentially our season over. We picked up just 4 points from the final 8 games, as it seemed like we were already on the beach.

Premier League Table

Somehow, our league position didn't suffer too much. We entered the winter break in 8th place and with a 7 point gap over 9th, and this buffer stopped us from plummeting down the table. There wasn't much quality going on below us, only one team managed to make up the distance and jump above us.

It's still a good result, I'd have been more than happy with 9th at the start of the season, and we were never in any danger of relegation. But the post-winter run was awful, which does leave a bit of a dark cloud over the season.

Compared to last year we've fallen 4 places and picked up 14 fewer points. We did score 14 more goals, having a proper quality striker made the difference there, but conceded an alarming 33 more.

Board confidence

Edited December 4, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

2030/31 Season Review

Awards Night

Ruslan Rodin had a great first season at the club. He was brought in to score goals and he did just that. 16 goals in 26 games is a very good return and he was far and away our best player. Olexandr Pikhalyonok continued to impress as well, though at 34 he probably doesn't have long left in him.

Player Stats

Igor Davydenko and Mario Augusto both spent the second half of the season out on loan to give them more gametime, but no one in defence had a good year with the sheer amount of goals we conceded. 

Danylo Koval and Olexiy Budnik both chipped in with a fair amount of goals from the wings, but there was a lack of creativity in midfield without many assists to be seen.

Up front, the role of second striker was clearly a difficult position to fill, as Denys Zubko and Edinho both failed miserably in attempting to do so, managing just 4 league goals between them.

[DaneBramage]

Edited December 4, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Ukraine

2030/31 Competition Winners

With the league title win Dynamo pull one clear of Shakhtar to go top of the all-time rankings again, but there was a surprise in the cup as the big two were both eliminated early, and Obolon-Brewer capitalised to make their mark on the leaderboard.

Edited December 2, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

July 2031

Interview Offer

This is unexpected, not sure that what I've done so far warrants this. Normally the Shakhtar job is one you'd jump at (£67 million transfer budget!), but with the purpose of this save being to win something from a club outside of the established elite, I'd turn it down. I'm going to go to the job interview anyway, just to see how it goes.

They understandably went in a different direction, but good to know I must be doing something right to be in the running.

[Polski97]

On 16/10/2020 at 22:46, DaneBramage said:

VPK-Agro Magdalynivka

June-August 2024

A bunch of contracts were up so anyone without much potential was allowed to leave. After only a few months in charge here I'm not yet attached to anyone so none of the names really stand out. Letting so many people go should help keep the wage budget down, and as you can see with a couple of players retiring, also give the squad a younger look.

No permanent deals in, just five loans. No wage contribution needed for any of them so that prevents the financial situation getting any worse.

I'm not used to seeing quite so much green, but I like it.

I confess, since moving on to FM20 I've had a lot of trouble trying to create a tactic that worked, not just in this save but also in several others too. So I did download a tactic from the forum to try and get my head round it, to try and see what actually works. And it turns out this particular tactic works incredibly well, which doesn't necessarily feel like I've earned it. So I'm currently trying to tone the tactic down, remove choices I wouldn't make, to try and make it more 'me' and seem like I'm doing more than just pressing continue and waiting to see the win. 

We're running away with it at the top, an almost flawless run so far. Of course, we now wait and look out for what happens in September after my changes come into play. I don't want to go on a losing run of course, but I would like it more competitive.

Also, the most important thing is that we beat Tavriya, and they're not doing well at all.

You sold your soul here ... would of enjoyed the struggle more than another success story ... big let down to download the tactic

[Polski97]

I'll be doing a Tavria-Simferopol save on the back of this. Gave me motivation to succeed. Will also limit myself with amount of loans to make it as realistic as possible

[DaneBramage]

5 hours ago, Polski97 said:

You sold your soul here ... would of enjoyed the struggle more than another success story ... big let down to download the tactic

I'm fine with that, but good for you and your holier-than-thou attitude. I'll freely admit I find tactics boring and I'm not very good at them, so after four years of things not working and being fired, it was time to try something new. This is my first game on FM20 after a long time with FM07, I needed some help finding out how to make a tactic that worked, so I went out and found it. The way I've changed and evolved the tactic now means it's a long way off where it started from anyway.

3 hours ago, Polski97 said:

I'll be doing a Tavria-Simferopol save on the back of this. Gave me motivation to succeed. Will also limit myself with amount of loans to make it as realistic as possible

Good luck with them, hope you do better than I did. The lack of money anywhere really is a big obstacle to try and overcome.

[DaneBramage]

Rukh Lviv

Pre-season 2031

Outgoing

Not many people leaving this summer. Lytvyn's playing time had reduced and he was no longer a regular so isn't a big loss. Shokov and Pedchenko had both been youngsters on the outskirts of the first-team without ever really breaking in.

Incoming

Sergiy Sklyar is a 22 year old goalkeeper who'd been released by Dynamo Kyiv without ever playing for them. He's probably ready to go into the team, but won't straight away due to the lack of experience. 

Danylo Kardash provides competition on the right wing, while Andrej Spacek and Adrian Olah both play central midfield. This year will be about phasing them into the first-team, ready to take over when a couple of the older players leave the club at the end of the season.

Juninho is a Brazilian striker on loan, to provide another option upfront and hopefully manage more goals than last year's second and third choice strikers did.

Finances

Not a particularly healthy financial situation, but it's not my doing at all. We were way under the wage budget, and even that's been massively reduced this season. The only likely way out of this mess would be to sell Ruslan Rodin (who's currently valued at over £10 million), but nobody is interested and I'm not sure I'd accept anyway with him being the only person who can score goals.

Expectations

  

The club vision was to become an established Premier League club, so after a 5th and 9th place finish the board are no longer happy with avoiding relegation, and have increased their expectations to mid-table.

Edited December 4, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

October 2031

This was coming, it was pretty inevitable and it was just a case of when, not if.

 We finished last season in terrible form, just 1 win from the final 7 games, and that spread over into this year too, but even worse. Just the 1 win from 12 games and nothing went our way. We weren't being destroyed, 3-1 was the worst loss, and several times we were the better team with a lot more shots and possession. But we just couldn't score goals. There were 2 on the first day of the season but after that we never scored more than once per game. 

A toxic dressing room was the other issue. Mario Augusto asked for a new contract, and because of the poor financial situation I said he had to earn it rather than just expecting a new one. He kicked up a fuss, a few players took his side and got upset when I told them to be professional and concentrate on playing football, a team meeting went badly and it escalated quickly from there.

Can't really complain looking at the results and league table, though I'm definitely putting the blame on the players rather than myself.

[DaneBramage]

November 2031

I was tempted to give up on playing in Ukraine. It wasn't working, On three occasions so far I'd been with a club 4-5 years and seen some improvement, but then each time things went wrong and ended with a sacking or resigning in disgrace. I checked out the job centre to see what was available, and decided it was probably time to try my luck elsewhere. I applied for the CS Craiova job (3rd in Romania), and before long was invited for an interview which I attended.

However, after my final game with Rukh Lviv this was the headline: 

I didn't think much of it the time, other than being annoyed at being beaten again, let alone by a team without a manager. But it turns out they weren't managerless for long, hiring the Dnipro-1 manager as a replacement. Shortly after going to the CS Craiova job interview, I was contacted by a journalist.

Sure enough, I checked the job centre again and was listed as the favourite for the Dnipro-1 job.

I applied for it, and shortly after was summoned for an interview, although they weren't convinced I was right for the job.

In the meantime CS Craiova came in to offer me their job, so I asked to delay making a decision for a week.

And lo and behold, a few days later I'm given the Dnipro-1 job. Looks like I'm staying in Ukraine a bit longer then, with a team that have finished 3rd four times in the last five years. I've fallen upwards again!

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

November 2031

The season so far

Dnipro-1 have had a good start to the season. They lost on the first day, then had another blip when they were knocked out of Europe, but other than that there's been a lot of wins. Recently they've been on a great run from September to November, picking up 23 points from 9 league games, and getting through to the cup quarter-finals.

Premier League Table

Dnipro-1 currently sit in their customary 3rd place spot, and are right on the heels of Shakhtar.

Meanwhile, Rukh Lviv have only won 1 more game since I left, and have fallen to bottom of the table.

Finances and Facilities

The facilities are much better than anything I've seen so far. There's improvements that could be still be made for bringing through youth candidates, but the facilities for both young and senior players are quality. The bank balance is okay at the moment though it does look like it has the Ukrainian tendency to fall on a monthly basis without any investment. But with the balance being over £25 million just a year ago, this shows that it won't take much to make it look a lot healthier, just a player sale or two, or a decent European run.

Expectations

Big club, big expectations. 

  

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

December 2031 + January 2032

Results

Whoops, not the start I was hoping for! The club culture is to play defensively solid football, instead I've conceded 4 goals straight away. Good time to go on a winter break, I don't want to get myself fired again this quickly.

Outgoing

When I joined Dinho was a player with an outstanding issue about playing time. I said he'd get some time on the pitch, and he started both games. He was poor both times, and responded badly to a team-talk. I decided it wasn't worth wasting my time on him, so got rid. A good chunk of cash coming in too. 

Incoming

Upon joining Dnipro-1 I sent out scouts around the Ukraine, eastern Europe, central Europe, and Brazil. My central European scout found this fella at Real Madrid, with his contract expiring in the summer. Joao Nuno Basilio is an Andorran international (5 goals in 15 games), so I've got him in on loan to take a look and see if it's worth signing him permanently.

Squad

That leaves our squad looking like this. Generally pretty strong, but definitely room for improvement. 

Star players

Absolutely tonnes of potential here. Andriy Shevchenko is a 19 year old wonderkid who already has 19 Premier League goals for the club, and let's be honest, with the most famous name in Ukrainian football he's certainly got the name for the occasion

Anton Azarov is a big part of the reason I was happy to let Dinho leave. He was on loan at BATA Borisov when I joined, but as they have a summer season I knew he'd be back soon. He played a considerable role in them winning the league, with 18 goals in 27 games.

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

March 2032

Youth intake preview

I've no real knowledge of what positions we need strengthening in yet, but it's certainly good to see a preview with so much green.

Youth intake

An entirely Ukrainian intake, and I've signed the top 9 players. Can never be upset about a 5 star PA player coming through, ably backed up by others at 4.5 and 4 stars. A couple of really poor personalities in there though.

When I joined there were very few staff members with the club, there had been a large exodus when the previous manager left. Most of the staff I brought in have decent/good personalities, so hopefully this will help with future intakes.

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

February + March 2032

Tactics

I used the tactics creator to make a 4-4-2 formation with focus on the wings. I then amended a couple of roles I didn't like, and pushed the wingers forward. The second striker was changed to a false nine on my AssMan's recommendation.

Results

We returned to action in style with two good wins. The loss in the cup was a disappointment, especially as we'd only just beaten Zorya in the league.

But we bounced back with a big win over Desna, before a narrow win over Shakhtar. I believe that's my first victory over one of the big two, which is a nice box to tick off.

Then it was the big one, my first encounter against Rukh Lviv since being fired. What a game! I've no idea what happened, it just turned into an absolute goalfest, which thankfully we came out the right side of.

Premier League table

Yes, this'll do nicely. With 5 wins in a row we've jumped over Shakhtar into 2nd place.

Further down the table Rukh Lviv have lost 4 in a row and look doomed.

Outgoing

I didn't want to sell Jose, especially outside of the transfer window when we can't sign a replacement, but when Gremio came in for him he wanted to leave. I asked if he could wait until the end of the season, but he threatened to kick up a fuss if he couldn't go now. So I had to let him go to avoid causing a bad dressing room atmosphere.

The players did call a team meeting after this to say there's now a lack of depth in defence, which I agreed with, and I placated them by saying this position would be strengthened in the next window.

Edited December 5, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

April + May 2032

Results

April was a perfect month, at one stage putting us just a couple of points behind Dynamo and possibly in a position to challenge for the title. This idea was snuffed out as soon at it appeared though, as the loss to Chornomorets and subsequent draw with Obolon-Brewer saw us drop away, though at least we ended the season strong with a couple of away wins.

Premier League Table

Excellent. Dynamo were too strong, not losing any games in the post-winter period, so we weren't able to catch them. But we overtook Shakhtar and pulled away convincingly to secure 2nd, clinching the club's highest ever finish.

We go into the Champions League qualifying rounds next season, which if we get right could be a real money spinner for the club.

Rukh Lviv won a penalty shootout in the relegation play-off to survive.

Board confidence

They're happy that I provided Champions League football, but this is balanced out by not getting to the cup semi-final, and not playing defensive football.

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

2031/32 Season Review

Awards Night

No surprises here as wonderkid Andriy Shevchenko picked up a bunch of awards for his 16 goals. The 13 in the league made him the division's joint second top scorer.

Season Stats

Lots of this was played before I joined. Ruslan Nescheret was an ever-present in goal. Benedito, Olexiy Chernik, Marat Kirillov, and Volodymyr Dykvi all made good contributions across midfield.

Andriy Shevchenko took the plaudits up front, but Anton Azarov also impressed in his half season after returning from his loan.

[DaneBramage]

[DaneBramage]

Ukraine

2031/32 Competition Winners

As seen above Dynamo Kyiv won the league again to extend their lead at the top of the all-time rankings, but we have a new name on the board after Zorya won the cup final to compound Shakhtar's disappointing season.

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

Pre-season 2032

Outgoing

Only one name of any note here, and it's a big one. Anton Azarov was a bit of a revelation last year, scoring 7 times in 14 games (plus 5 assists). But he asked for a new contract over the summer, at a much higher wage than we could offer. He reacted badly, started upsetting other players in the squad, so the only option was to move him on and bring in as much cash as we could. It was £9 million up front, with another £3 million to come in instalments.

Incoming

Signing players was difficult. I'd enquire about players worth a few hundred thousand, and clubs would come back asking for £15 million+, obviously well over my budget. So pickings were rather slim.

Sead Todorovic was a cheap option as his contract was expiring, a Slovenian international with 21 caps will add depth to our midfield. Juninho was a player I signed on loan to Rukh Lviv the year I was fired. He didn't make an immediate impact for me there but did score a hat-trick when I went up against them with Dnipro-1. I arranged his signing immediately after that, which was maybe  a bit rash, but he'll be replacing Azarov up front.

We really needed another centre-back as that was a position of weakness, and we managed to sign three. Ezequiel isn't ready for first-team football yet and is one for the future, but the other two are ready to step in. Fabio Arroz was quite far down my list of targets, but when all others were ruled out I went for him. He has good stats all round, but a poor personality (fickle). Mateo Gonzalez was found later on by my scouts, I snapped him up on loan straight away (which satisfied the players who were awaiting the defence being strengthened).

Key Signing

Facilities

Youth recruitment was improved.

Expectations

    

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

July + August 2032

Premier League Results

We made a great start to the season with three consecutive wins, but then facing the big two in successive games and losing both times tempered expectations quickly. A disappointing draw with Minaj followed, before we got back to winning ways with a big win over Kolos. Defence has been a problem, we haven't kept a clean sheet since the opening day and we've conceded twice in each of the last 4 matches. 

Juninho has made a good start to his career here, with 5 goals already.

Premier League table

At this early stage we're sitting just outside the top 3. We've scored more goals than anyone else so far, hopefully with games against the big two out of the way we can now go on a good run against the lesser lights of the division. That will depend though on how we cope with rotation before and after European games.

Champions League Results

Oof, there goes a big payday. We put ourselves in a great position with the home win, and even in the second leg we opened the scoring to increase our lead further (with an away goal too) but then Feyenoord blitzed us and showed their class. We go into the Europa League instead.

Europa League Group

A tough first seed, but (touch wood) the other teams should be beatable.

Edited December 9, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

October 2032

Signing

I don't know how this fella was found. I assumed it must have been my scout in Brazil, but then I checked and it turns out Atletico Nacional actually play in Colombia. They have been in the Copa Sudamerica, but didn't come up against any Brazilian opposition. I don't use the player search screen at all, so I don't remember how he was recommended.

Either way, he came on my radar somehow (suggested by his agent maybe?) and I got him scouted. A wonderkid label is always worth a look so I added him as a transfer target, and within a couple of days my DoF had finalised a deal for him. A pretty low cost up front, though if he does well and moves later on a significant amount more will be due then.

Future sale

This lad must have some serious potential then. We did offer (32a) Ilya Kovalenko a new contract, but he turned it down to join PSG. This isn't going through for another three years though, he's only 14 at the moment so I guess there are rules about selling or buying young players in either Ukraine or France. Either way, it's a shame to be losing the best rated player from the recent intake. Receiving nearly a million pound for a 14 year old that's never seen a minute of football is easy money, but if he has potential it could turn out to be a steal for PSG.

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

September + October 2032

Premier League Results

Both of my wonderkid strikers have been hitting the target regularly over the last two months, with 10 goals between them in these 7 league games. In particular Marcelo Perez got in my good books with a hat-trick against my old club Rukh Lviv.

However, it wasn't all good times. We got smashed by Desna, they were rampant and battered us. I had to adjust my tactic at that point, the amount of goals we were conceding was getting out of hand. I didn't do much, just pushed the defensive line up and advised defenders to stay on their feet, but it seemed to take effect straight away as things were much improved over the next 4 games, with just 1 goal conceded and 3 clean sheets. The highest ranked of any these teams was Vorskla in 8th though, so this may just have been an easier run of games with bigger tests yet to come.

Premier League Table

Shakhtar are running away with it at the top, but there's very little to separate the five teams behind them. At the moment we're leading the challengers, our vastly superior goal tally making the difference.

Europa League Results

Pretty much what I was expecting, I'm happy with this. We beat the two teams I wanted to, while we lost to Inter with a weakened team put out (to focus on the league games either side).

Europa League Table

Going to plan.

Ukrainian Cup

A rotated team was knocked out after taking the tie to extra-time. 

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

November + December 2032

Premier League Results

The dreaded traffic light sequence, where a good win is followed by a poor performance when you just about scrape a point, before the inevitable loss. We would have had another match earlier in November bit it was postponed due to international call-ups.

Premier League Table

With the poor results we've slipped down the league, but we're not completely out of it and are still in the mix for a European place.

Europa League Results

Due to a postponed league match we were able to put out our strongest side against Inter, but it didn't help at all and we got battered. A result against them would just have been a bonus though, the two other games were the important ones. We left it late but snatched a win with the final kick against Rapid, before handing out a thrashing to Hapoel Bo'er Sheva, Andriy Shevchenko going goal crazy.

Europa League Table

Easily made it through in second place.

We're rewarded with ties against Tottenham in the first knockout round. They won this competition in 2031, but Jordan Henderson currently has them struggling in 13th in the Premier League.

Board Confidence

Not really impressed with anything at the moment other than our Europa League progress. We're conceding less goals now though so that's suiting their defensive football vision better, but we need to get our act together in the league and move back up into the top 3 again.

Facilities

Part of the club vision is to have the best youth system in the country by 2035, so they were happy to improve the junior coaching.

Job Interview Offer

Declined as the aim of this save is entirely Ukraine based. The 2026 Europe League winners are currently 8th in the Premier League.

[DaneBramage]

 

Dnipro-1

December 2032

A prestigious award win for Andriy Shevchenko, and some large offers are coming in for him. He has a £25 million release clause for foreign clubs but doesn't seem to be in any rush to move on, and I'm pleasantly surprised that the Shakhtar bid didn't turn his head (I know I'm tempting fate by saying this...).

Edited December 11, 2020 by DaneBramage

[DaneBramage]

Dnipro-1

December 2032

Balls. This seems a bit harsh. I know we're a couple of places below where we should be in the league, but we're only a few points away with plenty of games to go. And the defensive performances have improved massively in recent months. I'll wing my way through the interview and then hope we can be more consistent in the league after the winter break.

Yikes, or maybe not! No good options here, I'll go with 'the last thing the club needs is more upheaval' and hope for the best.

Unbelievable Jeff.

[DaneBramage]

One of the rare occasions where the interview answers actually give you an option worth picking.

[DaneBramage]

I was enjoying this save and really felt like I had a team that would go on to win the league, not this season but not too far off. I was hoping our good European run would cover the slightly faltering league form, but it was not to be. Thus, it's time to call it a day here and try something new.

Edited December 12, 2020 by DaneBramage

[Lodi Lemmer]

Enjoyed following this career. Looking forward to your next adventure.

[Polski97]

honestly ... how the hell did you get fired so many times WTF. 

 

Do you actually put out a starting 11 ?