FM21 Global (Less England) Small Club to Big Club Challenge

[SolnaRoyal]

 

 
FC Karpaty Lviv Season 2028/2029
Introduction - Season 2021/2022 - 2022/2023 - 2023/2024 - 2024/2025 - 2025/2026 - 2026/2027 - 2027/2028

End of season recap

Переможці!

 We are back with another season, I have been taking it a little bit easier this weekend and have not been playing as much and hence these updates are a little delayed.
I am going to try a new format to keep these a little shorter as I dread ending the season and having to write a novel before I can start the next one. 

Transfer In &  Out 

We brought on 5 players this season and acually spent nothing at all, except for the salary of some loanees. 
On the transfers out we have a new record of 4.5M for our own product Sergly Kolomoets that was snatched by SIPG because I had forgotten that he had a stupid release clause of 4.5M. 
But hey what can you do? 4.5M can replace him but I really love having our own products with us, now we know better.

Most of the players that were brought on Oleg Kokhman, Minaev and Alfaro are all prospects for the future so I will not go in to detail on these players yet.

As you can see we are also letting more youngsters go on loan as they are not good enough for the first team but also too good for the second team, reduces our wages a little bit but also makes sure that they get to play at a decent level. Olexandriya plays in the PL so that gives them really good experience. We also let Manrique Alfaro go on loan as he really was not helping out the team, hopefully we can unload him for a profit next season. 

Spoiler

One player I do want to show off is Ivan Luchka that was sent on loan with Olexandriya in the PL as he had an amazing season with them and helped them reach a 6th place in the league this year!
16 goals in 23 apps, fantastic! We tied him down until 2034 when there was some interest from major clubs in Europe (No release clauses!).
He turned 20 now, but there is still some work being done with him.

Also a prospect from the 2024/2025 season, golden generation maybe?

Spoiler

Ukrainian Super Cup

We went in to the USC again this year, I still don´t understand how it works but I think it´s because we were runners up last year? Either way, we finally edged out Shakhtar and won on penalties.
The silverware looks good but there is nothing else linked to this cup so we don´t really celebrate too much, except we finally won it against our nemesis Shakthar.

The best part I guess is that we have finally broken the Shakthar and Dynamo Kyiv dominance in this cup, FM21 don´t show the results further back, but I think we all get the picture here.

Europe

After beating Rangers 2 -1 in the playoffs we reached the Champions League group stage for the first time, we were excited and recieved a few millions for taking part. Then we went in to the draw.
Paris SG, Man Utd and Bayer 04...

I knew we were up against some really though opposition so I decided to focus on the league and not rotade the team too much as we did last year, we ended up drawing 3 and loosing 3 and were knocked out of all european tournaments this year. We will remember it and we are also thankful that each draws gives us an income of 900K.

We are not ready to compete with the major players yet. However on another note, our dear Shakthar reached the semi finals this year after being knocked out by Paris SG..
Let´s hope they burn through all of that cash soon..

Spoiler

The League

This is were our focus were at this season, we knew that Shakthar had reached the semi finals and had to rotade / play with a tiered team (No idea if the AI is affected by this).
We did good, really good as we for the first time ever won the league!

Not only did we win the League, we won it at home against Shakthar, Maxym Kvasyuk scored the winning goal that had to be checked by VAR before being approved.
Maxym Kvasyuk is a youth prospect from the 2024/2025 season that has turned up for us and now plays regularly  with the first team.

I can´t think about a better way to win the league for the first time than this. 

There is a clear difference from the top 3 and the rest of the pack now, just look at the GD between us three and the rest, now we need to keep working and make sure Shakthar falls in the table.
We also have another 15M coming in from winning the league and getting an automatic spot in the group stages of the Champions League, so now with our previous years income in europe, this year and the promise of more next year, we can finally start to acually invest in some good players that are not only free transfers.

Spoiler

Spoiler

 

 

Progression

 Player of the season

40. Maxym Kvasyuk
Once again we had better players this year, we had players who scored more goals. But Kvasyuk had to take over after our unfortunate 4.5M release clause went through and we lost our left winger to China.
Technically he did not win us the title, but he did score the only goal against Shaktar that gave us the title on our own pitch at the end of the season.
I have some doubts that he will be a major player for us in the future, but the stats look decent and promising. 

 

Alright, until next time!

 

Edited March 14, 2021 by SolnaRoyal

[aldojags]

@Britrocksolid season. I like all those signings, all a good age, with obvious potential, all could be part of a league winning team in 2-3 seasons. Dont worry too much about the money, you’re right once you’re in Europe you start making more, your crowds will increase too if you continue improving, and you’ll start selling players on for big money to help balance the books!

 

 

[aldojags]

@SolnaRoyalbrilliant performance in the league, 27 wins from 30 is ridiculous form!

 

Hard luck about champions league but first few years its hard, just be patient build your team and you’ll soon be beating teams in it! Good run from

Shaktar too so the Ulranian coefficient should be goos!

[jmarchand]

Great season, @SolnaRoyal. Tough luck in Europe, but as aldojags says, it's always hard in the first years and you'll get through it. 27 wins is a great great form and I hope you'll be able to maintain this form in the future. 

[jmarchand]

 

Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. 

[aldojags]

@jmarchandsurely they dont have the funds to even think about this?

[rlipscombe]

@jmarchand - funny....  as if they're going to get him.

 

@SolnaRoyal - fantastic achievement in the league - well done.  Serious tough draw in the CL but as has been said before you'll only grow stringer with more experience.

 

@Britrockas has been said, solid season there.  moving in the right direction. 

[jmarchand]

The Winter transfer window is quite the show for me. I have all the Chinese clubs after most of my guys, even making some credible bids sometimes. Paintsil, our star central defender got in a 43 M€ bid, from a club he doesn't want to join. It wouldn't be a bad return on investment, considering that I bought him for 500 k€ 5 years ago. But he's not going anywhere...  

 

[aldojags]

@jmarchandis that one of those situations where u kinda wished he’d went? That’s a lot of money!

[jmarchand]

Almost, but at the same time, I was looking for potential replacements and there wasn't much available on the market that is of the similar quality and wishing to join us, so I'm sticking with him for the time being. Given that I have a credible title challenge and European run going on at the moment, I don't want to rock the boat too much... 

[SolnaRoyal]

@jmarchandlooking at his stats, then his value, then his stats again. Where do Wuhan see 43M in this guy ? 😉

On another note: It feels like the clubs from China / Qatar is there to even out the playing field, keeping your league not growing too strong.
They handed one of my players 50 - 60k / W so that it would be impossible to get him back, but I am thankful for the cash.

[aldojags]

6 hours ago, SolnaRoyal said:

@jmarchandlooking at his stats, then his value, then his stats again. Where do Wuhan see 43M in this guy ? 😉

On another note: It feels like the clubs from China / Qatar is there to even out the playing field, keeping your league not growing too strong.
They handed one of my players 50 - 60k / W so that it would be impossible to get him back, but I am thankful for the cash.

Ive definitely sold the chinese clubs a few players, who were decent, but not to the value ive been getting, sold them some players for £15-£20m who i have easily replaced (usually by just scouting steau bucharest, cluj, partizan or red star belgrade) for 3-4m ive got a wee conveyor belt going! Im basicaly the middle man between romania/serbia and china!

[Britrock]

I had my first Chinese club come in for a player this season as well - Kjartansson went for his £3m release fee, which was sorely needed as we were almost back to £5m in debt! 

[jmarchand]

Side-topic: has anyone been able to request a Reserve team to their board? We only have the main team and the U19 who play friendlies, but I'd love to have at one point the GOSK Dubrovnik II team promote their way to the Second League... 

[Biscotti]

1 hour ago, jmarchand said:

Side-topic: has anyone been able to request a Reserve team to their board? We only have the main team and the U19 who play friendlies, but I'd love to have at one point the GOSK Dubrovnik II team promote their way to the Second League... 

We got a B team added when we got our first promotion and turned professional

[aldojags]

13 hours ago, jmarchand said:

Side-topic: has anyone been able to request a Reserve team to their board? We only have the main team and the U19 who play friendlies, but I'd love to have at one point the GOSK Dubrovnik II team promote their way to the Second League... 

i requested and got a 2nd team about 6 years ago- however they have never shown up in the lower leagues, Ludogorets 2ns string is in Bulgarian 2nd tier i would love my 2nd string in there for my youth development. But they just play friendlies every week

[aldojags]

What do you guys do for scouting? Do you leave to chief scout to pick assignments or do you do it yourself? I go between doing it myself and assigning to chief scout, never noticed which is best!?

[Britrock]

14 hours ago, jmarchand said:

Side-topic: has anyone been able to request a Reserve team to their board? We only have the main team and the U19 who play friendlies, but I'd love to have at one point the GOSK Dubrovnik II team promote their way to the Second League... 

I don't think Greece has reserve teams, so that's a non starter for me sadly. I just keep my first team to 23 players and let anyone who isn't good enough walk at the end of their contract.

1 hour ago, aldojags said:

What do you guys do for scouting? Do you leave to chief scout to pick assignments or do you do it yourself? I go between doing it myself and assigning to chief scout, never noticed which is best!?

I'm the same, I left it with my chief scout for ages then switched to assigning scouts regions of Europe, but they don't seem to have found as many players that way so I don't know what's best either. My scouts are usually busy scouting players I'm interested in anyway, so they probably don't have time to find new players

[SolnaRoyal]

5 hours ago, aldojags said:

What do you guys do for scouting? Do you leave to chief scout to pick assignments or do you do it yourself? I go between doing it myself and assigning to chief scout, never noticed which is best!?

For the first 5 years I did the assignments myself, but to be honest my chief scout does the job so much better, I am way too specific in my assignments and end up with less than 10 reports.

[Biscotti]

11 hours ago, aldojags said:

What do you guys do for scouting? Do you leave to chief scout to pick assignments or do you do it yourself? I go between doing it myself and assigning to chief scout, never noticed which is best!?

Lower leagues, I let the chief do it, but once I get to a point where I can have 3 or 4 scouts on regional assignments without losing my ability to get quick reports on players I want to look at I take it on myself

[Britrock]

Veroia - 2027/28 end of season review

Spoiler

Another good season, we now seem to have settled into that no-mans land where we're better than the rest of the league but still a ways off from AEK, PAOK and Olympiakos. I really need to get a European run going to boost the finances to a point where we can compete with the big boys. Trying to get by with freebies and wages < £10k per week just isn't going to cut it. Especially when it comes to strikers which is our real problem at the moment I think. I don't think I have a player with finishing over 12 which means we that a lot of the chances we create just go to waste and we give teams a lot more chances to stay in games we should easily win. I'm up to 6 scouts and I've got the whole world scouting package now, so I'm hoping we can unearth someone to lead the line who will reliably get 20+ goals a year.

Other than that, a good year. I won manager of the year somehow and Koulierakis was voted Greek player of the year. How he doesn't have a single Greek cap to his name is an absolute mystery to me - he's played 189 games for us (a club record), has averaged 7.06 across that time, is club captain and has even chipped in with 11 goals. £600k very well spent in my eyes. Alonso Martin continues to be a wizard, racking up an insane 14 assists this year. How he doesn't have interest from a bigger club is a mystery.

Spoiler

Tr

Transfers in were fairly scarce this year, with only Guedes on loan and Psomoglu coming in. Guedes performed well enough that I've signed him permanently for next season, Psomoglu was ok. Truth be told I couldn't find anyone else who I thought would improve the squad, so I thought I'd just run it back. I'm going to need to buy a few players this year though, with McFall leaving to Saudi Arabia and Kjartansson going to China. McFall left for less than I wanted, but Al-Nassr came in for him and unsettled him so I had to let him go after he forced the issue. The rest of the outgoings were finally minor, Strikovic was given away because my finances were dire and he wasn't worth the £7k a week I was paying him.

Spoiler

The upside of selling McFall and Kjartansson was that my finances went from absolutely awful to actual ok. I think we bottomed out at around -£5m and managed to end the year ever so slightly in the black. We cracked £1m in sponsorship for the first time this year, so we've gone from having 1/30th of Olympiakos' income to 1/12th which is a good improvement in my eyes. The ground is way too small, but we're not near filling it yet and have no money, so there's no chance of an expansion anytime soon.

Spoiler

We go into the Conference League again next year, at the 3rd qualifying round this time, so hopefully we can make it to the promised land of the actual tournament! We were so close to beating LASK Linz this year, but we fell apart at home in the second leg after a terrific performance in the first leg. A good European run would help the finances and the reputation of the club, both things that would push us towards the big 3.

Spoiler

[SolnaRoyal]

@Britrocknice and stable around 4th place there, how far behind Olympiakos and AEK are you financially to be able to compete for a third or second place?
Worst thing about the Conference League is the lack of prize money to be honest, it´s "just" a coupld of hundred for winning the whole thing if I remember correctly. 

Does the Europa League spot go to the cup winner in Greece btw?

[SolnaRoyal]

 

 

 

 
FC Karpaty Lviv Season 2029/2030
Introduction - Season 2021/2022 - 2022/2023 - 2023/2024 - 2024/2025 - 2025/2026 - 2026/2027 - 2027/2028 -2028/2029

End of season recap

 

We keep on moving.

Another little shorter recap, to be honest I was done with the season earlier this week and then did not pick it up again until today so it´s a little shorter as I cannot remember all the details.
But we are on the right track.

Transfer In &  Out 

Well the transfers in and out is really starting to pay off, with two of our players leaving for China (probably because of my last comment here) for record breaking transfer fees.
Horacio and Portyanko both went for ~€13M each and Bestao for a meger €1.5M, netting us a total of €27.5M in transfer fees this year.

If you have been following these posts you also know the name Altair, we paid 150K for him during the 2026/2027 season and had to let him go for free this year. He still is a decent prospect but his finishing was just not working out for us, spent most of his time on loan and I´m glad to have freed up that FGN spot.

We are doing really good in the economy department, about 56M in the bank and wages are under control. some of this is going to be invested in training facilities the upcoming years to make sure that we can keep up with the big boys.

Spoiler

Spoiler

Horacio
Came on a free transfer during the 2026/2027 season and was let go for €12.25M, a great profit.
During his tenure he scored a total of 7 goals and 2 assists, he also holds the record for two years straight with 20 and 12 yellow cards. Wich ment he also was suspended from quite a few games. Something that we will not miss.
Overall I am not to worried about losing him as the was a 3,5 star CA and 4 star PA. So he was pretty much maxed out at 24. We got a few replacements for him with Vagner and Prudnikov both who joined us this season for a free. 

Portyanko

Came on a free transfer during the 2027/2028 season scored a total of 38 goals  and 10 assists during his tenure here, as he was a Ukrainian I was little bit more sad to see him go as it´s really hard to find a decent Ukrainian player on our level right now and if you find one they will be in either Dynamo Kiev or Shakthar and they demand high prices for their players. We let our youngster Ivan Luchka who was on loan and scored like crazy last year come up and start the remainder of the season.

Betao

Another 2026/2027 Brazilian that was a free agent at the time, only really played regularly during his second season with us. His contract was expiring in 6 months and 3 days when FLU came and offered 1.5M for him, if they had waiting until after the new year they would have had him for free.
2 goals 2 assists, 53 games.

Volodymyr Vovkodav
As we had to let some of our backup goalies go over the seasons I thought it would be wise to invest in a Ukrainian prospect that would also allow us to rotade the team if the foreign limit had been reach for any reason.
We had to pay 2.6M for him and is our biggest fee spent so far, with his value now rising and reaching 5M and showing to be a really good goalie for us, I´m happy with the investment. Rotating him and Smith quite a lot to give him playing time to develop. I just wish he was taller.

Spoiler

Anton Mokaev

A replacement for last years departure in Kolomets, kind of overpaid for him but we were really desperate to find a decent winger at the time. Also has a very expensive wage compared to others like him.
If we can find a replacement thats better and wont cost as much next season I think we might have to try to unload him, I want to keep the wages tight in the club. I don´t want to end up with a +/- 0 every year and see the balance drop to 0 at the end of the season and have to rely on a Champions League group stage, not yet.

Spoiler

 

Sifiso Mvelase

Curious investment, cheap wages and fee but does not fit as a wingback so we are playing him as an inverted wingback right now to see if he can do anything for us.
With 750k invested and a value of 5.75M I really hope we can make a decent profit here. 

Spoiler

Szymon Sedlaczek
Left us for 625K in 2026/2027 as you might remember, never played a game for Dynamo Kyiv so when his contract was expiring with them...we allowed him back to the club. Even after deciding to join our rivals for a brief moment. Bagged 7 goals during his comeback season and we hope he can be a good player together to rotade in and out of the striker position after the departure of Portyanko

Spoiler

Europe

Winning the league gave us a spot in the group stages and of course we draw Barcelona and OL in the group together with Rangers.
Lost both games against Barcelona and drew one with OL and Rangers and eventually beating Rangers to get the third place and a spot in the Europa League knockout rounds.
Here we got revenge on Bayer 04 after beating them 3 - 1 after both legs, sadly we would draw another hard team in the second kockout round in wich Borussia Mönchengladbach beat us at home 2 - 3 and the we played a draw 1 - 1 in Germany and were knocked out of Europe, a little too early to be honest, I felt we could have beaten Borussia and ventured on. (Shakthar went to the quarter finals those bastards)

The League

The train keeps on rolling in the league, after a rocky start we held the first place throughout the rest of the season and even after tripping in the end we managed to stay 4 points a head of Shakthar.
Brining home the first back to back championship is great and all, but there is much to be done, Shakthar has been a little shaky recently and with their money bags they could be right back up there before we know it.
The goal here is to bankrupt or atleast demolish their economy to make us the dominant force in Ukraine, but with their 40M sponsorship income and reaching the latter stages of Champions League, we have a long way to go.

We also won the Ukrainian Super Cup again, this time against Zorya, we also somehow managed to give away another cup title (and a treble) to Dnipro-1 after they won the game in the 107th minute.
3 seasons without a cup win and 2 of them we fell on the finish line during the finals!

Spoiler

 

 

Progression

 

 

Alright, until next time!

Edited March 19, 2021 by SolnaRoyal

[jmarchand]

     

Season 10 - 2030-2031 | Moar Trophies

After winning the EURO Cup, we only wanted to push for more trophies. I feel that we were not quite there with the big guys, but ranked 30th in Europe, we were still a force with the "medium" sized clubs. Our club is young and our players are on the rise. Our goals were not very different from last year (and I expect it will not move much until the end of the challenge): improve a weak spot in the squad, qualify in the CL Group stage and do well in the league. 

Goals for this season:

1. Improve defence
2. Qualify in our Champions League Group 
3. Challenge for the League title again
4. 15 points against Hajduk and Dinamo (only in the league)

 

Transfers - Goal 1 - Improve the defence

Lots of movement again this year, mostly people leaving... and a couple of key people coming in. 

With the emergence of Alexander Tolosa at right back, I was pretty well covered in the first team. But I stumbled upon Lithuanian kid Giantras Bickauskas, who, at 19 year old was quite a nice prospect, for a free transfer and an EU national. Turns out he's been playing quite well when asked to, contributing to 2 goals and 5 assists in 21 starts. I then stumbled upon Cristian Vasconcellos in Uruguay. A creative midfielder, he's earned a Wonderkid label and played well over the 25 starts that he got. 

So, why so few? Glad you asked! Well, I mismanaged a bit and really bumped hard this year on the number of non-EU players in my squad. In Croatia, there is a limit of 5 foreign players in the match squad (including subs), and I have 8 in my squad at the moment... I had to rotate them quite heavily and loan out some prospects to lighten the squad. Among these, Miguel Correra turned out to be serviceable for Slaven Belupo and Junior Canchari was really more at its place in the Second League, with limited prospect of progression this year. 

In the Out column, I have moved Vito Matjevic to SH Shenhua in China for 18.5 M€. Signed on a free transfer from Dinamo, scored 23 goals in 38 starts last year and, at 27 years old, it made sense to cash in as I'd be able to find another striker to take his place. He's now valued at 28.5M€, so I might have been able to raise the price a bit. The real blow came the very next day after the Croatian Transfer Window closes, Borussia Dortmund comes in with a 1M€ bid for my wonderkid right back Alexander Tolosa. I promptly reject the bid and they match their 11M€ release clause right away (which I had forgotten about). And there you go, I was glad I signed our Lithuanian kid 2 months earlier... Turns out that Tolosa played 10 games with Dortmund this season. It would really be a shame if he was let rotting out on the bench... Antonio Dalic satisfied my disease of signing youngsters in an attacking position this year. I could hardly pass him by, especially when I was facing EU-related selection troubles. He wasn't terribly expensive and was looking great. 

So, was my defence improved? Not so much. 

Here is a quick look at the new signings for the season. 

Spoiler

 

 

 

Objective 1: Improve the defence: Failed

 

 

 

Champions Cup

Our win in the EURO Cup last year seeded us in first position, which helped us land a somewhat soft group comprised of AS Monaco, Spartak Moscow and (yikes!) Manchester United. I was confident in finishing second Spartak being the lowest ranked team in all the groups and having beaten AS Monaco previously in the EURO Cup run. 

That indeed proved the case, losing badly in Manchester and drawing with them (1-1) at home. The other matches really weren't close, not allowing a single goal and scoring a ton. Of particular highlight was a match where Zakaria Talal, also known as Chairman's Pet #1, singlehandedly beat Spartak Moscow and scored all 4 goals in a 4-0 win. These 4 wins were particularly good on the bank account, netting us around 11 M€. Manchester United ultimately went on to win the whole thing. 

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

In the First Knockout Round, we were drawn against FC Bayern, which was a tough draw, but not entirely out of our reach, having beaten them in the past (it was clearly a fluke back then...). They ultimately proved to be a tad too strong for us, losing 2-3 at home in a match were we were dominated and were shown a red card at the 28th minute. 

On the return leg, at home, we gave all we had, but it proved to be not enough. We also got a red card in this one (after two yellow to Eduardo Pérez, in defence) and we were out of the competition. 

Overall result, not great, not terrible, but that's how our European challenge ends for 2030-2031. Nothing crazy on the individual front. Daniel Matas scored 7 goals in 8 matches, but at this point, it's almost an underwhelming performance for him. 

Objective 2:  Qualify from our Champions League Group - Success, but we can hope for more in the future! 

 

League Performance

With a somewhat short European campaign, we were able to adequately focus on the league, and we were in great form. Our defence was not great, but our attack was absolutely unstoppable, netting us 95 goals for the season, only 3 shy of the all time record dating back from 1993/94 by Dinamo. So we stayed in front and never looked back. 

Final result of the hostilities: 27 wins, 6 draws and 3 losses (1 against Dinamo and 2 against Rijeka, surprisingly). 

Of particular interest is Hajduk struggling all year, with 16 losses and finishing in 6th place, outside of the European qualification spots. This was quite surprising and they really weren't a factor when we played against them, getting 4 wins in the process. I think it's going to hurt our coefficients (and ultimately our push for more European places) as Hajduk was typically doing well in Europe. Dinamo was still a harder nut to crack, with 1 win, 2 draws and a loss, but we'll get there. 

 

Spoiler

 

With 32 league goals, Daniel Matas was a dominant force, but the rest of the team is quite up there in all the statistical categories, which is quite encouraging. 

I had 2 objectives in the league this year: 

• Objective 3: Challenge for the league title 
  • Won it by a mile! Resounding success! 
• Objective 4: Get 15 points against Dinamo and Hajduk in the league
  • 5 wins, 2 draws 1 loss - 17 points
  • Success! 

 

Croatian Cup Performance

We don,t care too too much, but the new board wanted us to get to the final, so we avoided to over rotate the squad for the cup matches. We got wins against Technicar (3L), Istra 1961 (2L), Osijek (1L), Sesvete (1L) and faced Hajduk in the final. It was a close match on the scoreline, but we dominated the whole way, going to extra time only because we conceded at the 89th minute. I'll let you guess who saved the day in extra time. 

Spoiler

So yeah, we did a domestic double! Nice! Here's to many more. 

 

European Super Cup

At the start of the season, got well beaten 4-0 by Chelsea, who had won the Champions League the year before. It was early in the season, but they clearly were many notches above us. 

 

The Team

This year, very few people averaged under 7.00 in average rating for the year, which is in line with our very good performance in the league. It's easy to get good ratings when you get 5-1 and 4-2 wins... 

Spoiler

 

 

Strikers

Daniel Matas again leading up front. Another 40+ goal season (44 in this case), which gives him an amazing total of 188 goals in 198 appearances (including the ones coming as a sub). This year was particularly good with an average rating of 7.64 and 12 assists on top of his goal production. I have renegotiated his contract this season too, getting rid of the 60M€ release clause that he had. He no longer has interest from the other teams, probably because I turned them all down, but at 9.25 k€ p/w, he's still amazingly cheap for what he brings to the team. He has notably improved his freekicks over the past year or so and has scored a couple of long range ones this season. He is now regularly part of the main Croatia squad, scoring 4 goals in 11 games this year. 

The supporting cast this year is composed of Zakaria Talal (CP1) who's been plaing well and getting 21 goals in 34 matches. A good showing, but at 21k per week and having 10M€ taken out of my pocket for him, I still feel a bit robbed (of my ability to make choices). Matija Lambulic has come up as a super sub and replacement option, scoring 15 goals in 15 starts. He wants to play more, but was not as efficient as Chairman's Pet 1. Finally, Paolo Sánchez was the unfortunate leftover most of the time from my troubles of having too many non-EU players on the squad. He rejected a loan offer to Kustosija and Mura (Slovenian 1st League), so I tried to rotate him as much as I could. He still has massive potential though, I'll be looking to play him more next year. 

Finally, Leon Sipos was offered to other clubs, but nobody was interested. I played him a bit so he could show off to other teams and scored what will ultimately be his last goal in the GOSK Dubrovnik shirt, a close range header like he's scored so much in the past. He'll remain vividly in our memories for his 27 league-goals season in our first season in the First League (which single-handedly got us to 4th place) and his subsequent run of grace in the EURO CUP II, in which he scored 14 goals in 13 matches. So long, buddy, hoping that you can still bag a few great goals in the Second League and come back to us as a Scout or a Coach. 

 

Have a closer look at Matas and Sanchez below! 

Spoiler

 

 

 

Attacking Midfielders

Aldair Torres got most of the action this year and made the most of it, getting an impressive 18 assists and 7 goals. Getting these through balls has been a key to Matas' success in front. He has really taken a step up this year. He is quickly followed by Cristian Vasconcellos, who's been playing both in the AMC position, but mostly a bit deeper at MC. Chelsea has an eye on him, but at 19 years old and already a 4-star rating, he's deserving his wonderkid status. I'm including a full screenshot of him below, how would you tend to play him? 

 

Spoiler

 

Midfielders

In the midfield, it's a mix of Vasconcellos, James Heyes, Fran Tomek and Mile Haramustek. The last two are Croatians, so were featured quite a bit in the side. Unfortunately for him, Ladislav Hajek (Chairman's Pet #2) fell a bit out of favour behind Tomek. I'll try to give him a good chance next year so he can show off and attract interest from other clubs. As you can see, there were still quite a few goals coming from these midfielders, Im quite happy about that. One player to note is Antonio Dalic a new transfer for us which rocked as a rotation option with 9 assists in his limited playing time. Not bad! Mikel Jusuf fell behind the other guys after breaking his leg at the end of last season and was out for 7 months in total. Talk about a career-ending injury... 

 

Spoiler

 

Defence and Keeper(s)

Very little changes in the central defence from last year. Paintsil has been attracting bids from China in the Winter, but he didn't want to go. Still a focus for improvement next year, especially if someone offers 40M€ again for Paintsil, he'll be going out this time. Nice emergence from Lecaros, who was signed last winter for 3M€. He played mostly in the defence, but can hold his own at midfield in a defensive role too. You will notice that I rotate quite a bit my keepers this year, giving roughly equal time to Mijailovic and Stojkovic, our youth product which I've featured last year. He hasn't yet made the step up I wanted, but didn't look like a fool most of the time. He'll probably get most of the starts next year, but I'll try to invest in better GK Coaching too.  

A bright spot at the end of the season is Zvonko Rudan, of our class of 2028. He played well for us down the stretch and will become a legitimate rotation option next year. 

 

Youth Intake/Progression

Our pipeline of youth products looks quite promising, getting another Golden Generation in 2031, with Jakov Maretic already looking quite promising. 

 

A look at who were previously featured in that column... 

Josip Strljic (YP28) - AMR ST - On loan at Inter Zapresic (2L) this year, getting 30 starts and 5 goals, playing mostly from AMR. Not bad, but I don't use them in my tactics so I'll probably find a way to get him to a new home where it would make more sense for him down the line. 

Max Tauer (YP25) - AMR | MC- On loan at Varazdin who won the Second League this year and got 6 goals. At 21 years old now, it's looking less and less likely that he'll make it to our first team. Plus, he plays mostly at AMR as an inverted winger 

Vice Vukusic (YP25) - ST - Chugging along in Osijek II. I hope we'll wee him cropping up in the first league at some point. He is transfer listed for 200k€ and wanted by Hajduk, Rjeka and Slaven Belupo, so there's hope for him. 

Milan Stojkovic (YP26) - GK - Moving to the first team and normally gets the starting job next year. 

Leon Kozic (YP26) - DC | DL - On loan at Mura at 19 years old, got 24 starts and is looking very good. at this time. He'll probably be in the First Team rotation next year. 

 

Records:

• Most League goals by a player in a season: Daniel Matas - 32
• Most assists by a player in a season: Aldair Torres - 18
• Most PoM awards in a season: Daniel Matas - 13
• Highest Transfer fee received: Vito Matjevic - 16.48 M€

Awards

• Daniel Matas - Croatian Player of the Year (calendar year award and this counts players abroad too!), Croatian Young Player of the Year, 1L Team of the Season, Champions Cup 3rd Striker of the season, 1L Player of the Year, 1L Top goalscorer, Second Place in European Golden Shoe. 
  • First League Player of the season, I'm calling that a changing of the guard. 
  • 
• Fran Tomek: 1L goal of the season
• Milan Stojkovic (YP26): 1L Goalkeeper of the season. 
• Samuel Painstil: African defender of the year
• Felipe Lecaros: 1st League Team of the Season
• James Heyes: 1st League Team of the Season
• Me: 1L Manager of the Year (for the 5th time in 6 years!)

 

Finances

Sponsorship is up this season, at 402k€ (up from 166k€). Still doesn't matter much as 95% of my income comes from competition prize money (40.6 M€ this year). We have a hefty 67 M€ balance right now. 

 

Spoiler

 

 

Goals for next season:

1. Improve defence (for real this time)
2. Qualify in our Champions League Group Stretch goal, get through the first knockout round 
3. Win the League title again
4. 15 points against Hajduk and Dinamo (only in the league)

Other News

• We'll be moving in our new stadium at the end of next season, which is a good news because we've been filling it up with 4000 people on a regular basis. In the league, our average attendance is 3909, good for 5th in the league. 
• This year, our European matches were in Osijek, a 12000 seater at the exact opposite of the country. 
• Hajduk and Dinamo managers were sacked. At Hajduk, it's quite understandable after their crappy year, but Dinamo still finished second and they still got 9 league wins in 11 years under Zoran Mamic's lead.  
• Facilities are now Superb for training and youth and Exceptional for academy coaching and youth recruitment. Glad to see that it actually pays off in my case for youngsters coming in. 
• Our Kustosija affiliate was in 2nd place in the Second League all year, but dropped to 3rd place on the last day of the season. They're making some real progress here and I hope to push them for promotion with our youngsters.

 

Croatian Clubs in Europe

It's not been as great as last year, but not so bad either. 6th place in the rankings seems closer, but at the same time, yet soooooo far! 

• Dinamo: After their EURO Cup II title last year, they're back in their bottom-of-the-CL-Groups habit. To be fair, they got handed out a tough one, with Man City, Juventus and Ajax, but got only 2 draws and 4 defeats. 
• Sesvete: got knocked out of the EURO Cup Playoff by Wolfsberger AC, then finished last in their EURO Cup II group. 
• Hajduk: Won their EURO Cup II Group after going through the qualifying rounds, but lost in the Second Knockout Round against Dynamo Kyiv. 
• Rijeka: Qualified for the EURO Cup II Groups after 3 qualification rounds (good job!) and finished 3rd, behind A. Bilbao and Rosenborg in a tight group. Not bad. A. Bilbao lost in the final. 

European winners: 

• Champions Cup: Manchester United
• Euro Cup: Sevilla 
• EC II: FC Kobenhavn

 

Season Progress

Season  |   League    |  Position (media pred)  |   Croatian Cup   |    Europe     |  Euro Position |  Avg. Att   |  vs. Dinamo/Hajduk |
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
21/22   |    2nd      |       7th (18th)        |   First Round    |     N/A       |       N/A      |     302     |         N/A        |
22/23   |    2nd      |       1st (18th) - PROM |   First Round    |     N/A       |       N/A      |     342     |         N/A        | 
23/24   |    1st      |       4th (10th)        |    Semi Final    |     N/A       |       N/A      |     817     |    4 pts (1-1-6)   |
24/25   |    1st      |       4th (9th)         |   Second Round   |  EC2 - 1st KO |       271      |    5012     |    4 pts (1-1-6)   |
25/26   |    1st      |       3rd (8th)         |   !! WINNERS !!  | EC2 - 3rd Qual|       218      |    1137     |   11 pts (3-2-4)   | 
26/27   |    1st      |       2nd (5th)         |   !! WINNERS !!  |  EC - 2nd KO  |       112      |    6115     |   10 pts (2-4-4)   | 
27/28   |    1st      |       2nd (4th)         |      Final       |  CL - Group   |       85       |    6973     |   14 pts (4-2-2)   |
28/29   |    1st      |       1st (4th)  - WIN! |    Semi Final    |  CL - 1st KO  |       51       |    8001     |   13 pts (4-1-3)   |
29/30   |    1st      |       2nd (2nd)         |   Quarter Final  |  EC - WINNER  |       30       |    4420     |   13 pts (3-4-1)   |
30/31   |    1st      |       1st (2nd)  - WIN! |   !! WINNERS !!  |  CL - 1st KO  |       20       |    5250     |   17 pts (5-2-1)   |

 

 

[Britrock]

10 hours ago, SolnaRoyal said:

@Britrocknice and stable around 4th place there, how far behind Olympiakos and AEK are you financially to be able to compete for a third or second place?
Worst thing about the Conference League is the lack of prize money to be honest, it´s "just" a coupld of hundred for winning the whole thing if I remember correctly. 

Does the Europa League spot go to the cup winner in Greece btw?

Financially the gap is pretty big, we're spending just over £4m a year while the big 3 are well over £20m and even pushing £30m! I'm also dwarfed in transfer spending - Olympiakos are only in profit because they sold £17.75m worth of players while buying £13.5m. Meanwhile my record transfer is £600k for Koulierakis (spread over 4 years) and in 4 years I didn't even spend a penny, I only signed players on frees.

Spoiler alert, we made it to the group stages of the Conference and £2.66m is not a small amount to me! Neither is the £170k per win - its all income that I didn't have last year and helps us stay somewhat near to a positive bank balance

[aldojags]

@BritrockGood season, I know 20 points off the top seems a lot, but you'll chip away into that over next few seasons, anytime I've done a save like that i've had the 2-4 seasons in the "no mans land" as you've called it, just on the outside but can't break in, then you just get your title year, it'll happen. My fixture list looked like yours a lot, good run until the championship split, then I just couldn't put a run together against the bigger clubs, but you will break that glass ceiling at some point I'm sure.

Greece must be very well off for centre halfs if Koulerakis can't get a cap! I think the game takes a lot from reputation etc so maybe as you're still looked at as a smaller club will be harder to get the recognition?

 

Good luck in the conference league!

 

@SolnaRoyal2 in a row in the league, building blocks are in place now you are holding Shaktar off, I like that keeper he sounds like he could be with you for years. Great bank balance too, wise to invest in facilities when you are flush with cash like that, in my game Ukraine have plenty of talented players all very good technically, so hopefully you'll get some good youth through the ranks.

 

 

@jmarchandgreat season there mate, romped the league, and getting through the champions league groups (which I still havent been able to do!) is a real achievement, looks like you pushed Bayern all the way. Vasconcellos and Dalic are going to be superstars, I think the supergiants will be sniffing around Vasconcellos before long! And that youth intake! Bloody hell!

 

[jmarchand]

To be fair, that’s the youth development screen, so it’s the product of the last 2-3 youth intakes. But yeah, I’ve been pretty blessed with them so far and I’ll be looking to feature some in the first team starting this season  

Fun fact, Kylian Mbappé moved from PSG to Real Madrid this season on a free transfer (!!!). They met in the CL semi final and Mbappé scored three to send Madrid to the final. Talk about payback!

[aldojags]

Spartak Pleven Season 2032-33 Review

 

Manager Profile - Bulgaria Profile

 

Competitions

Business as usual in the league - won it at a canter, now 7 in a row. My 3 main competitors - Levski, Ludogorets, and CSKA Sofia, are packed full of loanees from me, I think the 3 of them must have 3-4 players a season each from me that are amongst their best players each year, so it's quite nice having the competition train up my future prospects that I can use against them next year!

 

Heart break in Europe again - my 2nd Euro Cup final in 3 years, beat yet again, this time by Spurs. This after a champions league group where I got 10 points, but still was only good enough for 3rd. But I'm delighted with how I played, including an impressive 3-1 win over Bayern at home. But I need to qualify next year, this is getting beyond a joke now, never got out the group! But I'm up to 22nd in Europe now so hoping this could sneak me into pot 2 for the group stages although probably not!!

 

Won the Bulgarian cup and super cup also.

 

Club Info

 

Finances are strong - I am selling players every year for a lot of money, I can't spend all the money I bring in, it just kinda sits there, but I won't complain. The fact I have amassed this fortune, with this poor turnover, in a poor league in a poor country, I think something is probably broken somewhere with the games economy but you win some you lose some!

 

Facilities are best they can be - maxed everything out a while ago, not that it does my youth intakes any good...

But the frustrating thing about the stadium I don't own it, it doesn't have enough seats for Europe, so I have to play my European games at another stadium, I'd quite like to build our own stadium, with undersoil heating (lose 2-3 games to snow a season and adds to fixture congestion) and plenty seats, but I guess the games system dont recognise it as a need for us, as we get 11k per week in league in a 25k capacity stadium, but 3k seats is rubbish!

 

Youth System

Youth intake - poor this year, nothing to write home about. Signed a few but not expecting much.

Youth team won the league yet again, and did ok in Europe, really proud of the boys!

Home grown players to feature in first team - best of the bunch is Dimitrov, very reliable right back, not much to look at, but I like him a lot. Zhivko Tenev is also a fringe player, but he was the first player we brought through of note in the save, so I am keen to keep him around the club but he's getting itchy feet wanting football, will see if a loan will keep him happy.

Others to feature - Lazarov got a decent amount of football, I think Botev has high potential, Andonov could be decent league player, and Nikolov is getting coach reports suggestive of a superstar career, I do not see it myself, but I'll persevere as the 4.5 star potential would make him a champions league level striker. We'll see! I have another Nikolov, who I quite like look of, just hard to get them all game time. Only have 31 league games a season, 1 domestic cup, so I dont have a lot of games where i can rotate, without annoying my starters. 

 

Team

 

Have a few "wonderkids", have to say I feel that tag is a bit flattering for them, but I'll show you them anyways! - Milovanic. Vasko. Obregon

 

Best player - Roman Oraze. Best player by a mile, only weakness is his natural fitness, he's tired at end of every match, usually earlier than other players, but that by that point he's usually scored a goal or two so I cant complain. Fending off bids from all the Euro giants for him, and encouragingly he doesn't seem too bothered when I reject. Dortmund recently bit and the wee bit from his agent said he wasnt that interested, so I am hoping I can keep him forever. Recently signed a new 5 year deal too, no release clause. So unless he causes major dressing room issues he'll be staying.

 

Other top players - Krmar, Seone, Akehurst, Korac, Pavez to name but a few!

 

Some of the top players I sold this year - Gonzalez, Somolani, Cortez, Alzate, Mendes, Pasarica, Sorensen

 

Transfers in - got these south americans coming in (only allowed 3 non EU players in a matchday squad and I have about 9, all considered first teamers...this could be a problem! But Cortes looks like a star I'm sure you'll agree, and I signed Mocelin for ball playing defender, think I may have overpaid (£6m) I think his scout report made him look better than he is! But I do like a ball playing defender!

 

Next season - has to be about champions league progression, or if i dont get out the group, I want to win the Europa league. (not asking for much!)

 

I have built the Bulgarian league's reputation up now, so the winner of the league this year gets straight into the group stages. I actually quite liked qualifying for the champions league, you got to play some poor teams and score a lot of goals, give some youth players a taste of Europe, I'll kinda miss it!!

 

Champions League - Man Utd, Europa League - Spurs (beating us in final), Euro Conference - Lazio.

 

 

 

Edited March 20, 2021 by aldojags

[SolnaRoyal]

@aldojags love the responsible economy! Not spending all the wage budget and try to keep the coffers full. Have you upgraded all your facilities yet? I try to avoid going to hard on the youth facilties since they cost a fortune to run at the higher levels. Especially since Shakthar and Dynamo are taking  some of the best regens in Ukraine...for now.

[aldojags]

4 hours ago, SolnaRoyal said:

@aldojags love the responsible economy! Not spending all the wage budget and try to keep the coffers full. Have you upgraded all your facilities yet? I try to avoid going to hard on the youth facilties since they cost a fortune to run at the higher levels. Especially since Shakthar and Dynamo are taking  some of the best regens in Ukraine...for now.

Yeh my facilities and youth coaching/recruitment are all fully maxed out, need to spend the cash on something!

[aldojags]

Look at the absolute state of this, £6.75m from Estudiantes, surely he's going to be a world superstar? 

 

Spoiler

 

[jmarchand]

 

 

[SolnaRoyal]

Shakhtar are loosing ground fast. Sponsorship is dropping, failed to reach Champions League group stages 3 years in a row now. A nice profit of 14.74M after that I snatched one of their Ukrainian players.
That won´t last them long with those kind of wages! 😁😁😁

[Biscotti]

Francisco | Sestao River Club | Spain | 2037/38 (Season 17)

For the first time since we got here, we weren't predicted to be amongst the relegation fodder this time around! After last season's strong showing but ultimate failure, I felt this season we realistically stood a chance of going up, as long as we were able to improve on our weakest areas. As you'll be able to see from the scatter-plots, we've been much more successful defensively than last season without compromising our attacking ability too much.

This lead to us sitting on top of the table for 16 matchdays, but ultimately we threw a bottle again and I'm actually disappointed to only go up in second place. I'm uncertain if the drop off was due to some key players missing games here or there, or if it's a wider mentality issue, but it's definitely a problem I'll need to look to solve.

Competitions | Transfers | Youth Intake | Fixtures Part 1 & Part 2 | New Records/PotS | Finances | Best XI (All-Time)

This season saw me splash the cash a little. I knew it was going to be a big risk, but it turned out to be the right decision in the end. Arodi Toledo was the subject of our big spend, coming to us from a Tenerife side who had been relegated from the Sugunda. He led our regular starters for both key passes and chances created per 90, and finished with our top average rating. Deyvison Denilson has been occupying the hole previously filled by Alcazar and he's been the best of our already solid defence. This time he was, at least, backed by a good goalkeeper. Marcos Gori was our other fairly sizeable spend, coming in from Atletico for £600k, but as he set a new record for clean sheets in a season I think that was most certainly justified. Last, but by no means least, it is only right for me to again highlight the main man. Roberto Lázaro once again leads the line with 28 goals this season. With clubs circling him and 2 years left on his contract, there's a distinct possibility we may have to say goodbye to him over the summer if I'm not able to agree a contract extension with him.

Only Xabier Larrazabal (YP12) played with any degree of regularity from our own academy ranks this season. With him and Toledo being the same age, I suspect he'll get annoyed at only being the back-up before long. He only has another year left on his deal and I need to decide if I want to offer him an extension before he starts complaining. This season saw two players come through who my staff are keen on. Neither Borja Agirre (YP17a) or Álex Goñi (YP17b) leap out as outstanding prospects to me, but I'm prepared to give it a couple of seasons to see how they grow.

Basque count: 2 players (At least 10 starts, or 20 games overall)

The big news for next season is that Vincenzo di Vaio will be joining us permanently, with a new club record fee of £4.6m (rising to £8m) This still leaves us with some cash available to spend, and I have some idea of where I'd like to spend it, but I'm going to wait and see how big the TV money is before I go and splurge.

[aldojags]

Congrats on the promotion @Biscottiand i wouldnt worry about not winning league, getting up is the main thing! 
 

hopefully la liga tv money sees you good and u can get lazaro tied up as he looks quality! 
 

looking forward to seeing how u get on 

[Biscotti]

New stadium update: We successfully moved into the 14,750 seater "Sestao Stadium", and have sold out of season tickets at 13,311. I think TV money came in at around £38m, so assuming we survive I'll be very surprised to not see an expansion at the end of the season.

[Thebaker]

47 minutes ago, Biscotti said:

New stadium update: We successfully moved into the 14,750 seater "Sestao Stadium", and have sold out of season tickets at 13,311. I think TV money came in at around £38m, so assuming we survive I'll be very surprised to not see an expansion at the end of the season.

well done on promotion, looks like you are really moving on in the save.

[jmarchand]

Great job on the promotion, @Biscotti, looking forward to see how well you'll do against the big guys in Spain! 

[rlipscombe]

congrats on promotion @Biscotti - looking forwards to seeing the big boys visit Sestao Stadium....

[Britrock]

Veroia - 2028/29 end of season review

Spoiler

I don't think I realised just how much of a difference a season in Europe can make to a squad, the schedule is absolutely brutal. 2 games a week is so much more difficult than I thought it would be! I tried to load up on 2 players at every position, but I think I overestimated the quality of my backups and so when I rotated I didn't get nearly as much production as I was hoping for. It meant that by the end of the season I'd completely cancelled training (match tactics and match preview only, every other session was rest) and was rolling with my first team in almost every game. The season was a real drag because of this, in previous seasons we've gone on a roll where we were just beating teams with ease. At no point this season did I ever feel like we'd reached that zone, even games against the bottom teams were a struggle.

We started slowly in the league because of this, and very nearly didn't even make it to the Championship Group. We snuck in there right at the end, but incredibly Olympiakos didn't make it! They finished down in 7th after a miserable season. This should have been the opportunity for us to take 3rd place ... but we cocked it right up. We struggled mightily in the Championship Group, so 3rd was out of the question, but on the last day of the season 4th was in our hands - win and we should take it and guarantee a place in the Conference League again. We took a comfortable 2-0 lead against Asteras (currently in 4th) and they went down to 10 men. But then ...

Just look at the absolute state of that. What a complete collapse. The Nijhuis own goal was from a free kick that hit the post, then his back and slowly rolled 1 yard over the line. We just didn't turn up in the second half and that draw saw us end up in 6th and out of European football for next year unless we won the Conference League.

Spoiler

Talking of the Conference League... We had a fairly easy qualification, beating Bosnian and Romanian teams to make it to the real competition. There we got Steuea Bucharest, Ferencvaros and Olimpia Ljubljana from Slovenia. We dispatched the latter 2 with ease but lost to Bucharest twice. Luckily they didn't do so well against the other teams, so we ended up winning the group and going straight to the second knockout round.

In that second knockout round we faced ... Steuea Bucharest of course! We lost 2-0 at their place, but then in the second leg they came out in a weird 4-2-2-2 box formation (2DM, 2CM, 2ST) and we totally bossed them 3-0 to win the tie.

That gave us a quarter final against St Gallen from Switzerland - a 1-0 win at home in the first leg gave me hope and in the second leg we scored an early away goal which gave me even more hope. They equalised on the night, but we quickly got a second away goal and I thought we were home and dry. But they gave it their all, scoring a second before half time (2-2 on the night, 3-2 to us on agg) and then a third with 25 minutes still left to play. There was a lot of stress but we somehow hung on and won the tie on away goals, 3-3!

The semi final was against CSKA Moscow and in the first leg at their place they thoroughly outplayed us to take a 2-0 lead. We stole an away goal in the 91st minute that would prove to be vital however, with a 1-0 win at home giving us a trip to the final!

In the final we were up against Real Sociedad, a team with an average wage over 20 times ours. I was realistic, and we hung on until half time at 0-0. They scored right at the start of the second half and that was basically it, we had almost no attempts and it petered out into a 1-0 defeat.

Runners up in our first real European adventure! I couldn't be happier, I'm just gutted we won't get to have another go next season, the £7.2m in prize money came in very handily!

Spoiler

I'm not quite sure where we need to improve next year, I think mostly in depth more than the first team. Maybe the wide players need to be upgraded, the guys that I bought a few years back are still physical wonders but they haven't really progressed technically or mentally like I'd hoped, which means they can run away from people but they have minimal end product. Koulierakis was as consistent as ever and finally won his first Greek cap! Camus is in the Belgium squad, but as you can imagine there are a few behemoths ahead of him in the pecking order. Kristjansson had his best season at RB and is turning into a star, mararuding forwards down the right flank. I'm enjoying having youngsters long enough that I can train traits and get use out of them, Martin (tries killer balls, dictates tempo) and Kristjansson (get forward whenever) are two in particular that I've trained and got use from.

I said I wanted to try and find a 20 goal a season striker and I almost did. Jimmy Sanchez hit 16 and now has most of the Premier League sniffing around him. He has a £13.5m release fee so hopefully I can get someone to meet that and we can reinvest the money. Carlos Alberto was a good AMC, although I forgot I'd promised I'd play him as a DLF when he signed so he started to kick off near the end of the year. Hopefully he'll be able to continue his good performances next year and score a few more goals. The rest of the signees were backups, although Garnier had the Milan teams interested before he signed so it'll be interesting to see how long he hangs around.

Spoiler

Financially the £7m from the conference league really helped, we ended the season in profit and the board has agreed to upgrade the training facilities again which is good.

Spoiler

Next season the aim is to get back into Europe. Hopefully Olympiakos have another disaster season and AEK or PAOK win the cup so I can take 3rd and get into the Europa League. PAOK won the league with 7 games to spare this year! Lucas Gomes up front for them is insane, how he's still trolling around in Greece is an absolute mystery to me. He should be playing at one of the big clubs for sure - his record at PAOK is crazy, 196 goals in 219 games. And a lot of those are against me!

Spoiler

[Britrock]

Congrats @Biscotti The TV money from La Liga makes me very jealous!

[aldojags]

@Britrockwhat an achievement hitting European final at first attempt!

 

may be a blessing in disguise that you have a year off then of Europe, have another proper crack at the league?

 

that paok striker is a cheat code u need a european giant to come and take him!

[Thebaker]

After a disaster of a season at Xerex where the team were hammered in most matches and suffered relegation and the sack i went away to consider my tactics.

Defensively i've always been poor but rarely have i had teams that could not even muster shots on goal. my typical season ends with most goals conceded and most goals scored. I have now come up a new tactic to use AM's which i didn't before.

As such i have gone back to Sweden for a last effort with Hanvikens. An team since 1944 but never having reached this level before they have ok facilities for this level and a decent team who are expected to be near the top of the league.

[rlipscombe]

good luck in Sweden @Thebaker 

[Biscotti]

[SolnaRoyal]

Well I was going to write the recap tonight, but I think I´ll go to bed now. 👀

[jmarchand]

2 hours ago, SolnaRoyal said:

Well I was going to write the recap tonight, but I think I´ll go to bed now. 👀

Undefeated, but still second. Tough result. Still in the Champions League next season, though...!

[aldojags]

That ‘s a sickener @SolnaRoyalbut as @jmarchandsays thats still a successful season!

[SolnaRoyal]

 

 

 

 

 
FC Karpaty Lviv Season 10 Year Anniversary (Part 1)
2030/2031
Introduction - Season 2021/2022 - 2022/2023 - 2023/2024 - 2024/2025 - 2025/2026 - 2026/2027 - 2027/2028 -2028/2029 - 2029/2030

End of seasons recap

 

10th anniversary!

Let´s celebrate the 10th anniversary since the start of this same, the 2020s are now history and we are looking forward to the 2030s.
How have we progressed? Where are all our old favorite players? Goals for the new decade?

Let´s start out with the two seasons I played back to back without doing a recap and take it from there, this will be the first part of three.

2030 / 2031 Transfer In &  Out 

This season saw a major rehaul of the team, as I decided to sell some of our more prominent players. Why? Well some of them had dropped down to a 2 PA / 2 CA and held either a FGN spot or wanted a huge pay rise.
So we decided to cash in.

Olexandr Yevthushenko (YP23)
Sold to Beijing after they came in with an offer that we really could not refuse, he was brought up in the academy and eventually played 126 games and scored 27 goals for us. 

Olexandr Mikheev (YP22)
Sold to Rapid Vienna after we refused his high wage demands, played 149 games and scored 15 goals for us.

Marko Avbelj
Played two season with us and we had left a 11M release clause in his contract, he did hold a FGN spot but was also one of the better players in the back. Bought for  600K from Slovenia in 2028/2029.

Kostyantyn Vivcharenko
A 1 season player that we let go to Tigres for 6.7M, played only 18 games for us but the quality really was not there to progress any further with us.

Anton Kulinich

A seasoned player that arrived in 2026/2027 on a free transfer, played 97 games and scored 15 goals. Held a FGN spot and we did not see a reason to keep a FGN player with his CA/PA any longer so we cashed in.

Trevor Smith
It was time to let Smith go, after 110 games with us he was still good but he also held that FGN spot that I wanted to free up, Olympiakos came in with a 6.7M bid and we took it. We are working towards Champions League and not a daycare for nostalgia.

Total Income: 59M

Oleg Chumak
Ukrainian national and a star player, loves big matches and does not hold up a FGN spot. We had to pay our rivals Dynamo Kyiv 15M for him, but the quality is there and will help us moving forward.

Marvin Walsh
Players started complaining about the lack of quality in the midfield, so we decided to bring in Marvin Walsh from  Liverpool for 2.2M, does hold a FGN spot but added both quality and made the dressing room happy.

Danylo Yesyp
Another Ukrainian midfielder from Porto that was transferlisted for 1.1M, also added a bit of a quality in the midfield and can also play as a backup striker if needed.

Robert Iguarán
Prospect from Junior that we got for cheap, holds a FGN spot but I think he could be flipped for a good profit in a couple of years. Will mostly play backup in midfield or on the winger positions. 

Venizelos Christou

Transferlisted for 145K at Chelsea, the big club name made us pull the trigger, high wages and could not play as an IWB. Will have to find a replacement soon here...

Christopher Mudau

Our first wonderkid! had an expiring contract over at the South African team Sundowns (how?) so we of course picked him up. Great quality player.

We also added a few Ukrainian prospects on a free transfer, we will see if they can develop for the first team.

Spoiler

 

Europe

With another group stage in the Champions League, we draw PSG and Man Utd once again.. however this team we manage to dominate Rangers to allow us to qualify for the knockout stages of Europa League. 

First knockout round
We drew Universitatea Crainova from Roumania, we thought it was going to be an easy game but they decided to give us a run for our money. We managed to get away on scoring more goals away.

Second knockout round
We drew FC Köpenhamn, an easy two games were we just dominated them, a huge step up from the last game, now we have finally reached the Quarter Finals of the Europa League!

Quarter Finals
Goals, Goals, Goals. This game made us realise that we really had to start working on our defence, yet another game that we managed to edge out in France. Huge!

Semi Finals
We drew a hard one here in Valencia, however the results went our way and now we were in the finals. Once again the attacking side is amazing, while the defence is just horrible. 

The Final

We had made it to another final in Europe, this time against Leicester, we had managed to win most of our previous games over 2 legs. Now we had to do it in 1.
The game was going nowhere, 0-0 in half time, 0-0 after an hour played. But then in the 73rd minute our Russian winger Anton Mokaev scores the first goal! 1-0 ! 
We go back defensive and back down to a shape, allowing Leicester to bomb our end of the pitch, then Minaev pulls free on a counter-attack and scores the final goal 2 - 0 !

 

Spoiler

Another european title has been brought home! And with this we should get a first seed in next years Champions League, can we finally progress past the group stages?

 

The League & Cup

We defended our title and winning it over Shakthar with only two points, that makes it three in a row now. Have we finally broken Shakthar?
There is not much else to say about the league to be honest, we were in second for most of the season, only starting to poke Shakthar at the end and finally overtaking them after they started drawing their games.
The cup was another walk in the park and we finally brought it back home after an overtime win over Shakthar. I guess this makes it a treble? Even though I would rather have the Champions League title to call it a real treble of course.

 

Progression

 

 

End of Part 1

Edited March 23, 2021 by SolnaRoyal

[SolnaRoyal]

 

 

 

 

 

 
FC Karpaty Lviv Season 10 Year Anniversary (Part 2)
2031/2032
Introduction - Season 2021/2022 - 2022/2023 - 2023/2024 - 2024/2025 - 2025/2026 - 2026/2027 - 2027/2028 -2028/2029 - 2029/2030

End of seasons recap

 

 

2031 / 2032 Transfer In &  Out 

With the money generated during last transfer window we started to look in to strengthening our squad to grow in Europe, the win in EL had us wanting more.
Let´s take a look at happend here.

Anton Mokaev
Our right winger that scored a goal against Leicester in the finals picked up some attention over in Greece and Olympiakos came in with an offer, I keep talking about the FGN spots but it´s very important as you know to save those for the very best players. 

Olexnadr Shyshka (YP26)
Clearing out some players that no longer had any potential to grow and could be replaced by better players, and for 9M he could play for Porto, not a huge loss even though it´s one of our own.

Venizelos Christou

Joined us last season and took part in our European campaign, but as I said was unable to play as an IWB and started to ask for a star player position and wages to match that.
Sent off to Rangers for 8.75M

Total income: 28.5M

Now we started throwing some money around, but carefully as not to destroy our wages or our balance sheet. 

Andriy Makarenko
A club transfer record of 20.5M to replace Smith that was sold last season, it took a while to bring Dynamo down to an agreeable price so he joined very late and missed out on Champions League.

Ailton José
We were scoring goals, but we were lacking the depth, so after our scouts came back with Ailton José, we pulled the trigger for 12.25M and now have a great scorer. I´m a little concerned with his injury proness. But as long as we have a few people behind him, we should be ok.

Alexandr Krapivka
Shakthar was running out of cash after 3 years outside the Champions League, we managed to pickup Krapivka for cheap and also got rid of Alexandr Klishin as part of the transfer. 

Bladimir Vargas
Backup/Future Prospect player, also a cheap one but that added a well needed depth to our squad. 

Vladimir Kukushkin, Wilfried Dao, Petr Havel, Miguel Trasante and Tamás Simon are all future prospects that will be sent out on loan to both get more experience but also help other teams beat Shakthar. Yes we are running dirty now.

Total spent: 46M, but with transfers out we managed to keep only 19.5M run out from the club, excluding any sign on fees.

 

Spoiler

 

Europe

Winning Europa League last year gave us the first seed in Champions League, together with Liverpool, PSV and Bayer 04.
We thought it would be a cake walk but it proved to be a very close group, the only saving grace for us was a victory against Liverpool and PSV. The rest of the games we either drew or lost.
PSV were much stronger than expected.

First knockout round
We drew Club Brugge in the first knockout round and it turned out to be a very one sided game here, wich saw us move on to the second kockout round after a 4 - 1 scoreline.

Quarter Finals
Chelsea was up next, and this is where we started to ask if we could match ourselves against the big boys in Europe. First leg was away and was very quiet until Mvalase managed to hand Chelsea a pentalty in the 48th minute of the first half(!) of course Haaland scored the goal. 
Second half saw Chelsea pick up two red cards and we went Very Agressive to try and even out the score to get that away goal. But no luck. 1 - 0 Chelsea.

Spoiler

The second leg took place in our fortress in Ukraine were we had to climb a huge hill, it started off great as Ailton José the new kid on the block scored the first goal after only 5 minutes, we held the lead for 30 minutes until Chelsea with the help of C. Camara scored the equalizer. The aggregate was now 1 - 2 and we did not have that away goal.

Second half kicks off and it´s quiet, Chelsea started playing low and we could not penetrade their defence at all and then it happend, as Ailton José was running a counter attack by himself he gets pounded to the ground in the 76th minute and gets injured and has to come off, me having already used up all my three subs were forced to pull him out of the game and play 10 vs 11.

I had almost given up when D. Minaev at the 82nd minute scored another one! Now we are at 2 - 2 and could see us move in to ET and eventually penatlies. But the god himself, the backup transfer we brought on this year B. Vargas wanted to go home, scored another goal in the 88th minute! We had done it, we were now in the lead. 

We bring everyone back and maximize time wasting and just make sure to keep the scoreline. Eventually edging out Chelsea in the quarter finals!

Spoiler

Semi Finals
Ok we had reached the Semi Finals, a huge step for us after 10 years of fighting from rags to riches. We drew Juventus... 
This is where the season took a little turn for the worse as the entire squad were getting tiered and together with this schedule we had to try to keep the title from falling in to Shakthars hands.

Sadly Juventus were too much for us, we put up a good fight but eventually lost out after having them beat us 3 - 4 at home and us not scoring enough over in Italy.
Overall it was an amazing run after our Europa League win last year, but I really wanted to reach that final. And with all the luck we had in the run, I think there will be a  few years before we get this deep again sadly.

 

The League & Cup
Reaching the end of the season we only had Olexandriya left to play, a win against them would give us both the title and the unbeated status. However the luck in Champions League did not transfer to the league. Olexandriya held us to a 2 - 2 draw and we had to hand the titel to Shakthar after 3 years in our possesion.

We did manage to win the cup once again after beating Dynamo Kyiv 2 - 0 in the finals, but really? Who cares about the cup anymore? Well...we do because it´s the only thing we won this year 

..

 

 

Progression

 

 

End of Part 2

Edited March 23, 2021 by SolnaRoyal