[FM 21] Making Dinamo Split With Hajduk

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HNK Hajduk Split

...a club founded in 1911 and what is arguably the biggest club in Croatia. Well, unless you actually look at cold-hard facts. And those are - last cup won in 2013, last league won in 2005 and didn't even get to group stages of European League in last 2 years. Club is on downward direction.

But we're here to right the ship! For what is arguably the best club in the country, sickens me to say as Dinamo Zagreb fan, it is pretty remarkable how bad the management is last 15 years - from front office, to coaches, to youth. This is the same team that has discarded Modrić and Višća because they were too weak, among many others. And I plan to revert it to how Hajduk is supposed to look and feel. I wanna put the plan that failed in real life - Naša dica. Or for people not knowing Dalmatian dialect of Croatian language - Our kids.

My plan is to always have 15 youth academy players OR players that are HGC by the time they are 19 in the first team which is a stark contrast from the situation that is around the club in last 10 or so years. And try to have rest of the players be from Croatia as well. A foreign player has to be a lot better than the one that is home-grown and especially if he is from my academy! Another plan is to sell off youth academy players to other, worse, Croatian teams in order for them to be better even if it means that I do not get as much money.

And since I have B team in second tier I also wanna have a smooth production line of talent and this makes it incredibly easier to achieve.

So...without further ado...

Edited November 10, 2020 by rosque

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Edited November 10, 2020 by rosque

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Team Overview

For this one I am not even going to look at the stars and what positions I need. I will only look to see what players are homegrown. 7 homegrown players is abysmal for a club of the stature that is Hajduk. It is also pretty obvious I need to get rid of players up front and get some domestic talent. But, this is the team that I will manage this year because I have, for realism reasons, turned off transfer budget in the summer. So either I put up with foreigners or sell them and promote youngsters which are not up to task as far as I am concerned.

Edited November 10, 2020 by rosque

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Goalkeepers

Both of these are pretty good for what their roles are. Posavec being first option and HGN, which is not perfect but manageable, and Ljubic will be a Cup keeper while having a pretty solid personality and is the product of youth academy.

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Right Backs

 

Todorovic is loanee from RB Salzburg and not in long term plans but will be a good option for this year. Filipovic is HGN and not that good of an option with no one better in the club. Definitely room for improvement which will be brought up on next Recruitment meeting.

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Center Backs

 

Stefan Simic and Dimitrov are foreigners but they are first option for this year but they are not here long term. Bozo Mikulic is nationally homegrown player and will be in the team for now, his place as squad player is safe. Mujakic is completely not needed for my squad as he is foreign player and also loanee. I cannot terminate his loan which means he will be last option for the center back position. Stipe Radic makes me slightly excited in the sense that he has most of the attributes needed for a classic center back and still has enough room to grow and is also youth academy prospect. He will definitely see action this year.

 

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Left Backs

Both Dolcek and Colina are HGN and both are top tier prospects with me leaning slightly towards ex-Monaco player David Colina as first choice left back.

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Defensive Midfielders

All three of these players are first team material for this squad with Nejasmic and Vuskovic being youth academy products with room to grow. I am debating whether or not to play double pivot because I only have three ready players for this position. But checking B team I have found a solid backup player that could play for the creative part of the pivot, Jani Atanasov, a former Bursaspor player.

Edited November 10, 2020 by rosque

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Central Midfielders

Both of these are youth academy products and players that will successfully fill the no.10 spot on the field. Mijo Caktas is the captain but Tonio Teklic looks like a proper successor to him.

 

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Right Wingers

Jradi is a solid first option but is already 27, foreign and poor mentally. Will be moved on during next summer if I can find the replacement for him. Backing him up is Mario Cuic who is HGN and has plenty of potential but not much to show for currently.

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Left Wingers

Both of these are first team players but both are foreign and nearing 30. Jairo and Gyurcso can both play on the right as well so having poor proper right winger backup is not that bad currently. Definitely need both wing positions in next 2 years with not much to show for in B team and U19.

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 Strikers 

Another problematic area of my squad. Diamantakos is definitely the first option but, again, is foreigner and nearing 30. Will keep him unless I can find adequate replacement which is currently not looking likely. Nayir is loanee from Besiktas and not in long term plans but solid backup for first year. Marin Jakolis has number 9 but is the farthest thing from a 9 in my club. He is definitely getting sold.

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That's it for the first team preview for first season. As you can see it is not bad with plenty of bright spots but also a lot of problematic areas regarding my vision. I will set up scouting network and see if I can get someone for next year. This is the squad for the year.

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First Team Meeting

It went fine as I have managed to persuade Caktas that I am not completely clueless. Support for me is very poor due to me being only a Sunday League player. They think that I was too ambitious in that we can win the Cup. We shall see about that.

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Big Blow in Pre-Season

[DavidBeckham]

If you can get legs around Caktas and Jradi in the team, they look like they can do well for you. Unlucky with the injury though Good luck for the save ahead mate!

Edited November 11, 2020 by DavidBeckham

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Season Ticket Sales

Pretty good considering that in real life rest of teams barely scrap together 1000 viewers.

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4 minutes ago, DavidBeckham said:

If you can get legs around Caktas and Jradi in the team, they look like they can do well for you. Unlucky with the injury though Good luck for the save ahead mate!

Yeah, Caktas will be the heartbeat of the team and Jraid, Gyurcso and Jairo will rotate on the wings. Thanks!

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Pre-Season Successfully Done

We got off to a rough start versus Yantra and Lokomotiv but managed to settle on tactics by the time Vaduz was coming to Poljud.

And the tactic we settled on is...

That is also provisional starting eleven. Diamantakos has suspension for first game of the year and Caktas is recovering from injury and will not play.

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New Affiliate

 

I managed to convince my board that we get new affiliate and they managed to get back to me with this gem. I will try and re-purpose this link to be a youth one so that we can hopefully get regens from Romania.

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August 2020 Update

Even though we are sitting in 4th place I do not think that we got everything that we wanted from this month. Loss to Dinamo was expected given the discrepancy in quality but drawing versus Istra is just inexcusable. Stefan Simic gave away a pen and that was their only chance in the game while we could not convert chances on the other end. Mikulic is replacing Simic for the time being.

Mentoring has started to work after one month already.

 

Edited November 11, 2020 by rosque

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5 Week Injury

This means change of plans in tactics.

[scarp]

I am actually surprised with the quality of players 

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Revised Tactics

Went to a 433 with holding DM. Diamantakos is a waste of space on my team sheet and as such is being replaced as by either Caktas or Jairo up front in False 9 role. We can afford that since we have former AC Milan and international player free transfer in the pipeline.

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15 minutes ago, scarp said:

I am actually surprised with the quality of players 

Players are actually not that bad. It's just that Dinamo is in another stratosphere in regards to us. And Rijeka and Osijek are comparable to my team.

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Former Barca, Milan Player Signs!

Alen is former Barca and AC Milan player as well as has been capped 10 times for the main international team but has mainly unrealized talent. He came on free and is on cheaper salary than some of the foreign players. Will help in both MC and AMR spot and I expect him to play big part this season.

[karanhsingh]

Like the start, and the Halilovic transfer. With the squad restrictions you are putting on yourself, this will be quite the challenge. Best of luck!

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14 minutes ago, karanhsingh said:

Like the start, and the Halilovic transfer. With the squad restrictions you are putting on yourself, this will be quite the challenge. Best of luck!

Thanks! Squad restrictions are definitely long term considering dire players in youth teams. These are the top players in other teams interested in joining me that are not super old.

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September 2020 Update

Hrvatski Telekom Prva liga

There was an international break and we lost to Osijek at Gradski vrt and it was then when I went to the new tactic (which is again slightly different to the one shown) and it proved fruitful. We drew versus Lokomotiva who were 2nd in the league last year and won against poor Varaždin.

UEFA Europa League

We dominated Sutjeska from the get go and Caktas even missed a penalty in first half but we managed to put two behind their keeper.

Even though Maribor had better chances than me for the most part of the match we were able to scrap a draw and I decided to put only composed players on pens in penalty shootout and it paid off! Caktas, Simic, Dolcek, Colina, Todorovic all scored.

Next opponent is mighty Basel.

Board is not ecstatic with me.

Support and atmosphere are in upward direction so it's a positive sign!

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Hope you like the post-match analysis screenshots for big games as it adds a bit more context to the match

Edited November 11, 2020 by rosque

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Europa League League Path Fourth Qualifying Round v Basel

With the goal of Mijo Caktas after a scramble in front of their goal and...well, have a look for yourself!

This and along with per-game money awards we have secured our financial stability for next year seeing as our wage bill is €4.5m per year.

We have not found out our group stage opponents yet.

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Europa League 2020 Group Stages Draw

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Facilities Upgrade

Thankfully the board has seen my results and granted me my wish for better facilities!

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October 2020 Update

With a game in hand we could leapfrog Osijek in the League. We were unbeaten in the month of October in domestic competitions. Only loss overall came against PSV where I struggled to keep them from behind my back line but I have since sorted that out.

Performance Analyst Report

 

We are finally closing the gap between goals per game and xG per game. And I can see that Posavec being a monster is helping me keep conceded goals per game under 1 when it should be exactly one. Kudos to you!

Defensively we have been very strong though I would us to face less shots per game but we are conceding less than average so that is good.

Not where I'd like us to be. I need a better striker and/or more clinical wingers. Which brings me to my next point. Something that will screw me over a bit.

Caktas Case

He has been immense for me in the Europa League and less so in the League but is clearly my most important player with 7 goals in 13 appearances. The problem is he doesn't want to renew his contract that is running out in the summer. I need a striker.

My conundrum is whether to try and sell my captain and best player in the winter or power through this with him and possibly lose him for nothing in the summer? What do you guys think?

I do have him loaned out but the problems are immediately evident - foreigner and on high wages. But it does give me an option until at least 2022 to find a domestic replacement.

 

Edited November 11, 2020 by rosque

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Other October 2020 Bits and Bobs

[karanhsingh]

Sorry stupid question, but where do you see that analysis? General performance, defensive efficiency, etc.

[Carambau]

Sell Edouk! And this is a good read. Keep on pushing Dinamo

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4 hours ago, karanhsingh said:

Sorry stupid question, but where do you see that analysis? General performance, defensive efficiency, etc.

There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers as my old maths teacher would tell us. You get it at the end of every month from your Head of Performance Analyst. I got mine on the 1st of the month at 8:49 AM. Guess he overslept since working day starts at 8:00 AM.

2 hours ago, Carambau said:

Sell Edouk! And this is a good read. Keep on pushing Dinamo

Eduok could be replacement for Caktas. Caktas has his contract running out. Problem is that Eduok will be 27 and have that monster of a contract. I will have to see what options are there in the summer regarding strikers. Thanks!

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Captain Abandons Ship

Since Mijo was not happy and did not want to sign a new contract I have decided to look for suitors for Mijo Caktas and only RC Lens came back with an offer that will not leave me crying at my desk. €850k is nothing to laugh at and especially when I already have a target player that will replace him up top.

Enter - Kristijan Lovric

As you can see he is 24(to be 25) year old who is actually a winger but will play as a striker for me. Has a tremendous shot and good personality. His agent says he'd cost me €238k annually which is around 50% of what Caktas is costing me. Asking price is €325k because his contract is running out. But I will try and buy him earlier because there is a lot of interest in the young lad. And a lot of better options for him, realistically.

Mission Lovric is officially go!

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Lovric Signs!

Had to give him slightly more money in wages because I insisted on the three year deal. Ecstatic about it!

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November 2020 Update

Only one win is not acceptable from our team. Though I am extremely happy that we managed to nab a draw versus bitter rivals Dinamo! It was a rough game, boring for the viewers but it showed us we can cope defensively and we just have to find a way to make that push up front. Hopefully Lovric changes that part as Caktas seems to score only from pens in the league.

Monthly Performance Analyst Report

We are getting better and better and we are above average in every aspect but still sit in 5th spot. Too many draws.

Defensively we are moving to that ever elusive bottom left of the Cartesian coordinate system. Big improvements compared to last month.

Offensively we are in that aggressive and clinical category but just by a small margin. Would rather get more clinical than more aggressive. But also improvement compared to November.

Not exactly what I wanted but these two players are looking less and less like they'll be wearing Hajduk shirt in few years.

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Other November Bits and Bobs

Managerial support is finally coming close to that green color!

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Youth Intake 2021 Preview

All around pretty poor except the one central midfielder from near Split.

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December 2020 Update

This was a decent month from us with wins over Besiktas and Osijek but a loss to Lokomotiva was disappointing. Despite getting 8 points we have not managed to go through to the knockout stages of Europa League. Caktas finally started to score goals from open play and now he leaves us. 14 goals, 1 assist in 23 apps for us this year. Goodbye captain

Monthly Performance Analyst Report

We are still above average in every category except shot on target ratio% which should be higher considering we are trying to work ball into box.

We have gotten worse in this regard and Osijek game with 3 conceded goals contributed to this. Still not a bad place to be.

Gotten better than last time and again, Osijek game helped.

Actually not bad but have removed some players from mentoring that might be the culprit of lost professionalism for Vuskovic.

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Old Captain is Dead, All Hail New Captain!

Both young, Mario being 19 and Darko being 21, but both are academy products and have good attributes for leadership and teamwork.

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Youth Academy Alert

Ivan Cubelic is one of the few players in our youth system that actually looks like will be a solid player. He has spent first half of season in U19 and has done enough to convince me to move him to II team that is playing in Druga HNL, 2nd tier of professional football in Croatia. I have also given him his first professional contract. If he is solid enough for II team in next few months then he will spend end of the season in first team getting his first taste of Poljud for main squad.

Absolutely marvelous. 5 goals from open play and as many assists and he has gotten 7 PoM awards in 17 apps. Definitely worthy of promotion.

Ivan Saric is best goal scorer for my II team with 10 goals in a division right below me so he deserves a mention. Also has been given a 2 year professional contract.

[ajt]

Cubelic looks quality mate, best of luck with your save 

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9 hours ago, ajt said:

Cubelic looks quality mate, best of luck with your save 

He definitely makes me excited as already looks like could make an impact in lower level games and in cup for me but want to develop him a bit further and get his technicals to another level. And what better way to do that than putting him in professional level football in my II team  Thanks!

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New Kids on the Block

I have done some wheeling and dealing in December and brought in 5 kids, 5 prospects that will fill up my dire youth setup. Since I will get a central mid in youth intake I wanted to see if I can get any other position filled and managed to get two centre-backs, two wingers and a striker. Only Adrian Barisic will be put into II team while the rest of the gang will go into U19 team and see if they can make an impact there. None of the kids were fully scouted and just decided to take a punt on them.

And the man that is supposed to succeed Caktas as the main player of my team, Kristijan Lovric.

I know it says he is a winger but c'mon, look at those stats. He is tall, amazing shot, good traits, physical. That is a striker. A deep lying forward.

I also brought another older HGN player earlier in the month.

Gabrijel Boban is an experienced player both domestically so his experience will be helpful. He is ambidextrous and a solid backup for left flank as inside forward. Very physical player so his age should not be a problem in next 1.5 years at the club. He's had multiple seasons with 10+ goals so I can expect some output from him up front.

 

Edited November 14, 2020 by rosque

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Big Boy Signing

Former Dinamo youth product, former Ajax prospect, former FM wonderkid - Robert Muric arrives for €575k as a star player!

This is absolutely huge signing for us as it means I can basically stop playing inefficient foreigners and focus more on Croatian, domestic players.

We have started the save with 7 HGC, 7 HGN and 9 foreigners as Simic has Croatian passport.

Now we have 6 HGC (Caktas was the 7th), 11 HGN and 8 foreigners. This is a step in right direction and number of HGC players can only grow.

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January, February and 30% of March 2021 Update

I kind of got into the game too much. I was on verge of getting fired. But I have managed to escape getting sacked. Apologies for lack of updates, but had more time than usual today and just got into the game.

This was after Osijek game which was pretty rough experience I have to say.

Largely disappointing but we can still make it into that 4th spot or maybe get into European Competitions via Cup. Those early draws were killing me.

I am in the semi final versus 9th team in the league which should be a fairly easy task but will rotate for the game considering that league is top priority.