[FM 23] ŁKS Łódź - A Crossroads

[Colonel_Buendia]

I am going into my fifth season managing ŁKS Łódź, and am really enjoying managing in Poland.

We just, barely, won the Ekstraklasa for the first time last season, pipping Lech on the final day, and made a deep run in the Conference League before getting spanked by Young Boys in the quarters. My consolation was learning that they play at a stadium called The Wankdorf.

We have enough money left over from strengthening the squad elsewhere to bring in only one of these two players, who I am set on for a mix of both footballing and sentimental reasons.

Buying either one of them will require us to break our transfer record several times and I know hard-headed managing would probably say I should just invest the money cautiously in bargain youth players and club improvements, but where's the fun in that?

1) The Prodigal Son 

Mateusz Kowalczyk was the team's golden boy to begin the save, leading us directly to promotion and then to a fifth-place finish in the top flight the next season. However, I couldn't manage to nullify his release clause after failing some promises to him and lost him to Bournemouth for a mere £550k. We desperately tried to bring him back on loan, but he kept insisting we weren't big enough for his ambitions.

After a loan spell in Holland and languishing on Bournemouth's bench while they got relegated he is available in their fire sale and conspicuously open to rejoining the club now that we will be playing in the Champions League. 

He is still only 22, would immediately be our best player, and fits our need for a more physical presence in midfield. We currently have a glut of diminutive playmakers that can only reluctantly play the box-to-box midfield role that I want, this guy being the best of them. 

2) The Magician 

Michal Kubr was never supposed to play in important games for us. I brought him in on loan in February purely as a backup. But when we were losing 3-0 late in a crucial game and my star striker went off with an injury, he was my only option. The boy grabbed the game by the scruff of the neck to score in the 87th minute, the 88th minute, and the 93rd minute to salvage a miraculous draw Then and there I vowed I had to bring him in if I possibly could. In the next game, he scored the winner in the derby, and on the final day of the season, he scored the lone goal needed to clinch the title for us. 

I'm loathe to start him ahead of my striker who got 36 goals last season, but I could also play Kubr as an Inside Forward and see how they both develop. 

----------

Thanks to anyone who reads this. In working my thoughts out on paper I am leaning towards signing Kubr now before he gets out of my price range and letting Kowalczyk make his own way a little longer before bringing him back as a squad player if the opportunity presents itself.

Edited February 1, 2023 by Colonel_Buendia