The Aragon Way (A Real Zaragoza Save)

[Guest]

I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time, please excuse typos and grammar but I frequently have to think in three different languages and ADHD effs me up too. 

Aragon is one of the largest autonomous regions in Spain and yet there are only two cities within Aragon which are Zaragoza and Huesca albeit Huesca is a much smaller city. Zaragoza (which is almost dead centre of Aragon was the seat of the Kingdom of Aragon for almost six hundred years and is still the DeFacto capital of the region today, as such Zaragoza is the team we will use as a vehicle to implement our plan. 

Both Zaragoza and Huesca are in the second tier of Spanish Football and it’s palpable that despite having some success in years past Zaragoza as the fifth largest city in Spain has woefully underperformed the rest of Spain's main cities, stagnating to a mid-table/relegation battling team since their last relegation from La Liga in 2013 . 

A large part of this malaise has been due to the huge debt racked up thanks to inept management with debt reaching has high as 50 million just a couple of years ago. Enter Jorge Mas, the Miami Billionaire and controlling owner of Inter Miami who has recently taken over at Zaragoza. Mas has stated that paying down the debt, rebuilding the infrastructure and returning the club to La Liga in an organic well managed way is a primary driver and I agree. 

 

Enter myself, a man who has completed his coaching badges to Continental Pro Level. In a bold move that incredibly worked I managed to pitch a plan to Jorge Mas, first via email and then in person over a period of time that remarkably appealed to Mas. The plan will attempt to make the people in our part of Aragon and beyond proud of their Aragon roots, heritage and language much like Athletic Bilbao has done for parts of the Basque region. The Aragonese language was once the primary language of the Crown of Aragon and has gradually receded Northwards to now where it is pretty much making a last stand in the mountainous Pyrenean region of Aragon thanks to Castilian influence and then outright suppression of the Aragonese way of life. 

So, the plan is a bold one, to essentially copy and paste what is being done by Bilbao to Zaragoza with some minor tweaks and put Aragon at the forefront of Spanish football and culture. Yes, essentially it will be an academy save but with a twist.

 

 

[Guest]

The Plan 

A) A massive overhaul of the Cantera, the youth team has been done away with completely(via the editor) and all the best youth players now play in the B team. This allows to completely focus on a small core of youth players and with a smaller concentrated playing squad allows us to focus on the better youth players with better coaches. It also has the added effect of saving upwards of half a million euros per year which is then poured in to the education of our players and staff on The Aragon way and language which is what will eventually be exclusively spoken within the Club. 

Our B team which is now called “Los Blanquillos de Aragon” becomes a key part of the fabric of our community and the end aim is to get them promoted as far as possible so that loaning players out becomes irrelevant as players here play at the best level possible before graduating to the first team. 15 year old players will focus primarily on training. 16 year old players will have a set amount of playing time as substitutes but primarily focus on training. 17 year olds will play more (dependent on ability) but again will not be overworked and will tend to be the ones most subbed off. 18 to 19 year olds are the graduate age players but hopefully at this point they are honing their skills in the second tier of Spanish football(the highest you can go in Spain with a B team) before playing full time with the first team. 

The end aim is to have a B team starting lineup of mostly 17 – 19 year olds but we won't shy away from 16 year olds starting too because let’s be honest a high quality and well developed 16 year old player is probably as good as most lower league players. 

2) A full redevelopment of all of the facilities as Jorge Mas has said. The Stadium, Cantera and training grounds are ridiculously out of date. The Romareda Stadium was built in 1952 and last given a facelift just before the 1982 World Cup and a tear down and rebuild of everything is much needed. 

3) We need to be promoted back to La Liga asap, this is obviously a huge part of the plan and we have to do this with limitations. The limitations are we can only sign former players, other players from around Aragon and promotions from within. No matter where a player a player comes through from our youth intake they will be welcomed in to our club provided they are 16 or younger. 

4) Like Bilbao we are going to need to pay higher wages(than market value) to our best players to keep them with us but we also will absolutely still have to accept huge transfers to pay the bills much like Bilbao had to with the 147 million pounds they got for Laporte and Kepa. The odd dabble in Europe and obviously the Champions League would be very welcome to prop up a high wage structure. 

5) Tactically I am going to be very boring here but it is who I am as a manager, the primary aim tactically is a 4-3-3 that dominates possession with relentless pressing and counter pressing. Fm23 has become a fine balance between dominating possession and being toothless in attack so balance is key. Defensively we are playing with the highest line possible and asking our defenders to step up so I absolutely require a certain type of player to carry out what is a complex defensive and offensive strategy.  

The key to my tactic in my mind is “speed of thought” I will watch first team and B team matches religiously looking at players with speed of thought on my mind and hopefully theirs. Their positioning without the ball and decision-making ability coupled with how quickly they process those decisions is what I am looking for primarily. 

Of course, pitching an idea of becoming a self-sufficient club who won’t need to spend much in transfer fees and becomes a corner stone of the wider Aragon community appealed to the billionaire Jorge Mas and with some values clearly aligned he took a huge gamble and appointed me manager. The main aim here is culture over winning.

Wish me luck! 

Edited July 17, 2023 by Crazy_Ivan

[Lasson]

Interesting. I will be following. 

Edited July 17, 2023 by Lasson

[Carambau]

Very nice to see a career update story from you  I surely will be following! Best of luck with Zaragoza  Good idea with concentrating the youth players onto one team too!

Edited July 18, 2023 by Carambau

[Sizeman21]

Sounds like a great challenge! Loved your introduction! Will be following! 

[warlock]

9 hours ago, Crazy_Ivan said:

Wish me luck! 

I wish you luck. A tough challenge, no doubt, but it should be a fun ride!

[_Ben_]

Lovely opening! I like how this kind of job takes of more than just the manager role as you're essentially a 'Head of Cantera' and, for want of a better phrase, 'King of Aragon' here, too!

I am intrigued by the removal of your U19 team and getting players straight into the B side. Will they get a youth intake or you? Is that youth intake then governed by their facilities?

[Guest]

22 hours ago, Lasson said:

Interesting. I will be following. 

 

22 hours ago, Carambau said:

Very nice to see a career update story from you  I surely will be following! Best of luck with Zaragoza  Good idea with concentrating the youth players onto one team too!

 

18 hours ago, Sizeman21 said:

Sounds like a great challenge! Loved your introduction! Will be following! 

 

14 hours ago, warlock said:

I wish you luck. A tough challenge, no doubt, but it should be a fun ride!

I thank you all for your messages, it's very appreciated.

7 hours ago, _Ben_ said:

Lovely opening! I like how this kind of job takes of more than just the manager role as you're essentially a 'Head of Cantera' and, for want of a better phrase, 'King of Aragon' here, too!

I am intrigued by the removal of your U19 team and getting players straight into the B side. Will they get a youth intake or you? Is that youth intake then governed by their facilities?

Thank you Ben. I actually have done this religiously in nearly every save I have started the last 2 years(within reason), obviously it does require playing in a country where your reserves or B teams are playing in competitive professional league against proper league teams. So  countries like Portugal, France, Spain or the Netherlands(to a degree) are good for that.  Yes you get a youth intake and the benefits are I can literally just pick the best players from that intake and bin everyone else off asap. The negatives are 15 year olds can't play in the Spanish lower leagues but I can still arrange under 19 friendlies to give them and some of the other 16 year old and even 17 tear old players some match fitness. 

 

[Guest]

The Playing Squads 

Both the 1st team and B team squads have the makings of a very good future for us. In the 1st team alone, we have a great spine made up of just Zaragoza born players with two outstanding central defenders in Alejandro Frances and Enrique Clemente. Francho has the ability to do the dirty work in central midfield but also enough technical ability to play through a congested midfield and Ivan Azon has work to do but he will be a great forward and certainly will be my striker for the future. Angel Lopez has the makings of being a very good fullback in the future and moves into the 1st team squad out of necessity as a backup, but he will definitely pick minutes up off the bench. 

We have a further two Aragon born players in the first team with the most notable one being the Captain and hopefully a future member of staff Alberto Zapater who is now 37 and has just started studying for his coaching badges. With his Model Professional personality Zapater is going to work with our younger players as much as possible before he retires, he is also 26 appearances shy of beating the Zaragoza appearance record and I am delighted to have this man here to look after our current crop of young players  and hopefully those in the future. 

B Team 

The 1st team squad is bloated, and although I have trimmed it as much as possible I can’t provide enough minutes for everyone so a few B team players who would normally be blooded in the 1st team will have to wait till January before moving up. Marc Aguado is an obvious candidate to move up right now and the hope is to clear space for him before the current transfer window shuts.

 

Past history 

Zaragoza have not been a stranger to winning trophies historically albeit we are now almost 20 years removed from winning a major trophy, however when we look at the legends and icons of the club most of whom are unknown to us(Poyet and Milito aside) it’s clear to see we need to bring some glory soon to Spains 5th largest city. 

 

Finances 

The owner Jorge Mas has paid off a large chunk of the debt however there is still a 20 million debt left outstanding to be paid albeit it’s far more affordable repayment terms and the projections overall look very positive. I have already spent my original one million transfer budget already bringing Clemente back to Zaragoza but since I am totally satisfied with the squad as is it was this is a no brainer to spend all of this on a player I consider to be key to our future. 

 

Staff 

I am again lucky again in that I have walked into a situation where most of the Zaragoza staff are Aragon born and raised. Our Assistant Manager and Head of Youth Development both started with the club in differing capacities in the early 1990s and indeed since I have got rid of the youth team I actually have too many Aragon born staff to cover the available positions so I have had to lay a few off which is sad but I am hoping to find spots for them in the future. 

To Summarise

I think we are in a far better place than I envisaged initially, in fact the playing squad as inherited is good enough for promotion and survival next year in my opinion if I keep them all together and the key components of my management team are pretty much what I would have hoped for. So with that said here's the squad and let's make the plan reality.

  

 

[Guest]

I certainly won't be doing this often but I have to say I was incredibly happy with the opening game at a time when the team aren't up to speed tactically or with our cohesion. A 4-2 away win for us which heavily flattered the home team thanks to our Captain Zapater gifting them a penalty in a nothing area and then a low cross literally bouncing off of our DLP totally wrong footing the keeper but they in no way carved us open at all.

There were various parts that I found especially enjoyable in our play and three of these happened to be goals but all displayed exactly how I want the team to play and how I want their movement and positioning to be done with speed of thought in their mind. Please excuse the absolutely terrible quality of the clips.

Goal Number One

We were all over Ibiza early on and I could sense within 16 minutes this would be a profitable day. This goal starts from our goal-keeper and goes via eight different players to get to the back of the opposition net. The part I really enjoyed was Mollejo not smashing the ball from a silly angle but laying it off unselfishly to Simeone jnr for our first goal.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiNT8HuOOzY

Goal Number Three

Although dominating possession is the priority I also encourage creativity and welcome verticality when the occasion calls for it. We naturally form overloads and in this clip at the very beginning you can see how an overload on our left has allowed for Mollejo to be isolated against his marker with space behind Ibizas backline. A beautiful switch pass from Jaume and a miscalculation by their CB allows Mollejo to get in and again there is no over-thinking has he gets off the shot sharpish to score.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypJFaFgq3eM

Goal Number Four

Another example of what I mean by speed of thought and movement as we pass through the opposition with purpose, unfortunately the pass from our young striker Azon to Mollejo was executed poorly and was too casual but I liked the idea. We immediately pressured the opposition goalie and recovered the ball straight back and end off with Simeone scoring a banger for his hat-trick as his movement takes him in to a seam where he has space to shoot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EA7Fm2IErI

Overall a great start apart from the two conceded but I have faith defensively we will be very solid going forward. Our young striker Azon had a pretty meh day at the office but you can see he has a lot going for him and he will make his mark soon I have no doubt of that.

 

Edited July 19, 2023 by Crazy_Ivan

[Guest]

Ten Games In

I am obviously pleased but feel we have more to come both offensively and defensively. Honestly I though the squad had the ability to be top so this start has been welcoming but also there is still much work to do to refine the tactical set-up too.

 

The B team has been thoroughly convincing so far which makes be appreciate my decision to keep some players in the B team this season to help move us up the divisions.

Summer Transfer Window

Going in to the deadline I was convinced we would be done with our transfer business, but two things happened, firstly we scouted a Zaragoza born player from Napoli's youth team and I thought he would provide some creative value in the future so coming in on a loan for us is Jorge Alastuey which I hope will get some development and then transfer in next season.

Leaving on deadline day(amongst some unwanted players)was Carlos Vigaray (who forced a move)which was a gut punch in that it forced me to move Alejandro Frances from developing at Centre Back to first choice Right Back which in turn lowered our CB/RB starters and backups to just five players(three of whom aren't supposed to start). As it is Frances got injured which forced me in to using the under-developed Angel Lopez but so far he's out played Frances. The other downside to losing Vigaray was my certainty that I could have got at least 5 million next season for him had he stayed.

Owners Word

So far Jorge Mas has been true to his word and approved everything I have asked for to make both the entire training  and Cantera set-up as impressive as it can be, so we are well on the way to totally revitalising the Club and City.

[Guest]

The Winter Break

Well the switched has flicked on and it's impossible not to be happy with this in a 2nd tier league I would only regard as being behind the English Championship in terms of competitiveness. The defensive solidity is there and attacking wise it's really starting to click.

The B team are fighting hard in their division too, in fact they are doing so well I have extended a large portion of the squad with the intention of integrating a few of them in next years 1st team.

 

The most satisfying part of our season is that Ivan Azon has turned up now, scoring 8 goals in his last 4 league game. I have been very patient with Azon even when he missed two penalties in games that cost us points and that patience is being rewarded now. It's not just that he's scoring either, it's how he's scoring. The hat-trick against Lugo was a perfect hat-trick having scored with his head and both feet.

The problem with Azon turning up is that these guys turned up too and as we approach the January window I know I will be fighting a huge battle to keep him. This guy is worth far more than what I can get in January so I have to stay strong.

Thankfully I got the magic words from my head of youth development albeit it seems rather concentrated at the striker position.

In case anyone is interested this is the filter I use for finding Aragonese players. It's a time consuming process that requires going on to the "regions" section of the editor and literally typing in every city of Aragon in to the scouting section of the game.

Scouting wise I have literally cut our scouting staff down to just two scouts and their job is to focus on all the local teams and known Aragonese players.

The scouting procedure is initially a scout viewing the target player over three games, this gives us an idea of whether we scout the player further. The next step is the other scout viewing the player for another 3 games which then gives us an idea of how the player plays in varying situations and against varying types of teams. The final process is the Director of Football viewing the player for another three matches which at this point puts them on the "must buy" shortlist if all scouts agree. After this I will watch them(if I can) for a couple of games to make sure they are what I want in my set-up. Using an attributeless skin this scouting is vital and it's an idea I got from the brilliant @MattyLewis11 "Monchi Masterclass" which I implore people to read.

Link

 

 

Edited July 23, 2023 by Crazy_Ivan

[SteinkelssonFM]

Thanks for the mention my friend, I will absolutely follow along with this save for multiple reasons.

1. I had a similar save earlier in FM with Villarreal.

2. Your approach to the B team which is similar to Brentford.

3. You are replicating Monchi with scouting. 

 

Keen to see how this one pans out.

[Guest]

11 minutes ago, MattyLewis11 said:

Thanks for the mention my friend, I will absolutely follow along with this save for multiple reasons.

1. I had a similar save earlier in FM with Villarreal.

2. Your approach to the B team which is similar to Brentford.

3. You are replicating Monchi with scouting. 

 

Keen to see how this one pans out.

Absolutely, the Brentford model was the main driver in this save. Sadly I believe Brentford have been forced to start an academy team which is counterintuitive to all the good work they have started.

[SteinkelssonFM]

9 minutes ago, Crazy_Ivan said:

Absolutely, the Brentford model was the main driver in this save. Sadly I believe Brentford have been forced to start an academy team which is counterintuitive to all the good work they have started.

You are indeed correct, still a heavily focus on the Bee Team, but they had to return to the academy model to comply. 😶

[Carambau]

It is nice to see that Azon is paying back your trust. I hope you can keep hold of him for some longer time  

[Guest]

On 24/07/2023 at 22:32, Carambau said:

It is nice to see that Azon is paying back your trust. I hope you can keep hold of him for some longer time  

Thank you, as you will see he totally has and he's already had four new contract deals making him the highest earner, I came close to losing him in January but clubs didn't want to trigger his release clause and after a brief strop he signed a new deal. Essentially every time a big club starts sniffing I immediately offer a new contract to shut it down, it has to be that way till I start getting proper funds in and the B team players start breaking through. 

 

[Guest]

End Of Season 1

Well the guys came through as expected, and in style in front of the home fans

The title came after a crushing victory over Cartagena and Ivan Azon scored a perfect hat-trick to put the seal on a heck of a season for him.

The final table emphasises just how dominant we were and for a good while we looked like we might end as Invincibles but standards dropped off after the title was won and alas it wasn't to be.

Our team of the season contained six players born in Zaragoza alone and one from Ejea in Aragon. Alberto Soro who is Aragonese  and came through the Zaragoza youth teams returned to Zaragoza on a loan with an option to buy in January and took over on the right wing making a pretty good impact. Due to an unavoidable transfer out we suddenly found ourselves short at right-back but Angel Lopez was promoted from the B team and shared time with Alejandro Frances, he however eventually made the position his own.

The main man however was Ivan Azon who turned his purple patch in to an explosive season. Despite being injured for the last month of the season he still won the top scorer award. To be noted is the man who finished third in scoring Alex Millan, having looked him up I was pleasantly surprised to see he was born in Zaragoza and Valencia are willing to sell him at a very affordable price so let's see if we can snag him as either back-up or an Azon replacement should the vultures strike.

The one other notable award went to Christian Alverez, the long serving Argentinian goalkeeper. He has already decided he wants to explore his options away from the club and at 37 years old and on really high wages comparative to the rest of the team I am fine moving on from him. BUTTTTTT this is a huge step up Dani Rebollo the back-up keeper and because we have no quality Aragon born goalies it means B team goalie Guillermo Acin moves up to the 1st team and let's just say any injury to Rebollo could cause us some serious problems in La Liga. Alvarez only played 29 matches as we decided to blood Rebollo for the run in to the finale and Rebollo did well enough. This area however is definitely our weakest position now.

 

One of the most satisfying stats was the dominance in possession which was exactly what I was looking for. 

 

This was echoed by our B team

Speaking of the B team, they did very well securing an automatic promotion to what is essentially Spains regional third tier.

The most interesting element of the B team was expecting highly rated youngster Luis Carbonell to dominate the scoring charts but instead it was striker Guillem Naranjo who ended the leagues top scorer. Naranjo on an attribute basis would have been released at his age but instead he is being moved up the 1st team thanks to his 27 goals from an XG of 16.23.

Luis Carbonell however dominated in nearly every creative metric and will also be moving up next season.

The legend that is our Model Citizen Captain Alberto Zapater has broken a long standing record and become our record appearance holder. The man is Aragon through and through and is studying for his coaching badges and I fully expect him to be on the coaching staff in some capacity in the near future.

Interestingly the previous record holder Xavier Aguado is the father of the man being blooded in to take over at our defensive midfield position Marc Aguado. So you can see how the theme of family and community are important in our team.

The youth intake was pretty decent, no superstars on the horizon but a few players that have the potential to become starters for the 1st team. I am especially happy with Ivan Pastor coming through at the GK position, a place we definitely need some talented youngsters to fill in at.

 

Lastly and importantly, this will be a very challenging upcoming season in La Liga. We need to gain a foothold in the league in order to try and keep our players. Last season felt like a plate balancing act every time some larger team started sniffing about our players and some players have already received two or three contract extensions through this one season. Like I said the aim here(much like Athletic Bilbao) is a lower transfer spend but higher wages in order to do so. My transfer spend so far has been to target players that fit our style of play so I am definitely not settling but tactically things like getting the tall technically gifted defensive midfielder I would normally aim for just can't happen. 

 

 

 

Edited August 16, 2023 by Crazy_Ivan

[Guest]

Onwards to Season Two 

Well the bookies don't like us. In fact this is an improvement as we were 901.00 odds on to end bottom earlier in pre-season.

Despite all the increases in salaries we are bottom in salary spending by some margin.

But the good news is we are projected to start making some serious profits. 

We have spent some money on some local lads. Firstly Alberto Soro's buy option was initiated and he's a very good player at just 1.7 million pounds. Secondly Roberto Lopez comes back home from Sociedad, he's a very versatile player and ticks a lot of boxes for us in terms of mentality and work ethic. 

The final bit of business for us was this little gem, Eliezer Mayenda, he comes to us on loan(140k) with an option to buy(1.3 million) from Sochaux in France and I am very excited about this kid. He's already very well rounded as a player and will improve . The media have dubbed him the next Fernando Torres so I am shocked Sochaux don't know just how much he should be worth. Thanks to his age he is one of the few players who can train with the first team and play for the B team so that's where he is right now and will hopefully have time to develop before Ivan Azon gets snapped up.

He was also born in Zaragoza so this was a no brainer for me.

The Ones that got away

Gabriel Fuentes spent last season on loan with us with an option to buy from Colombian club Junior. He's a very talented left back but he is not the first choice and wanting to become the third highest player on the squad is not an option for us with such a limited wage budget. It does leave us short at left back for now however.

I mentioned Alex Millan in a previous post and how he was the third highest scorer last season behind Ivan Azon, well it ended up being a straight battle between us and Levante to sign him and alas he chose Levante. It's understandable to be honest as he wouldn't have started for us but at that price I thought he would be a good deal. 

Finally, for better or worse this is our squad, 16 of these players are Aragon born, 5 of them have been promoted from the B team in the last year but they are now all considered Aragonese. 

[Guest]

The opening to the season has been excellent for us results wise, we got a really easy start in terms of fixtures and we have taken advantage of that to make sure relegation might not be a real worry. Ivan Azon scored early in to our campaign but that's been as good as it's got for him. He's been poor in a lot of facets but missing the penalty that let Cadiz beat us was the cherry on the cake on what's been another bad start to the season. He's been subbed off in every game so far and to rub salt in to the wound the recent B team promotion player Luis Carbonell came on vs Celta Vigo and together with Roberto Lopez turned a 1-0 deficit in to a 3-1 victory. 

Defensively we have been solid, every time I have analysed a goal against us it's been turned over at a crucial time in transition by an attacker, Azon has been the chief offender in this and mistakes he wasn't making last season are now becoming an issue. The other problem is that we are doing one of the things I really don't like but has crept in and that is every attacking player just seemingly wanting to want to shoot from anywhere rather than patiently wait for a proper chance.

Not bad right?

Well it kinda is when we are averaging 15 shots per game. 

Here's the main culprit.

His shots on target percent is 24 %. So I have a decision to make if this doesn't change soon.

The B team has had a serious reality check after a great start but they have come up against some seriously better teams and it's understandable when we aren't quite in the position I wanted this team to be at this point. It's now a team mostly of teenagers on the wrong side of their teens (pro football wise) which in two years time wont be a problem. I honestly think they will survive this season and then perhaps the third tier is the perfect development level for these guys before moving up to the 1st team. 

 

[Guest]

October

So with Ivan Azon on the naughty step we played Elche who were undefeated at this point at home and Azon was clinical, two shots and two goals. To be honest had he missed the first one I would have launched laptops all over the place.

 

What was palpable was the return of his overall game for the last four games which has resulted in three goals and an assist. We didn't change anything for Real Madrid because I am stubborn like that, we went toe to toe with them for 90 minutes and might have felt aggrieved to have not got the draw but I was super impressed with our overall game against the champions. The last two games were two wins against two really tricky teams and the one thing I have been really impressed with so far is our ability to come back in to a match from a losing situation. Seven of our points so far have resulted from coming back from losing positions which shows a really great mentality within the squad.

We have a tricky spell coming up next month and I am intrigued to see how my squad with the lowest average age in the league handles this, so far it's been great.

 

[Guest]

November 2023

The first match against Valencia was one of the most complete games of football we have played in this save so far. We dominated them in nearly every facet and they didn't have a sniff until right at the end of the match when a deflected looping cross hit our crossbar with some comical Shiltonesque(1990 WC) goalkeeping agility from our goalie saw him miss it and whilst sprawled on the turf Cavani had the easiest of tap ins.

Against Villareal I couldn't complain about twice throwing away the lead, Villareal were good value for the draw and Ivan Azon scored two goals from two brilliant headers that were incredibly difficult to pull off. The loss to Barca was pretty much a clear cut out-played by one of the title challengers performance but heads didn't drop and against Espanyol the team put up one of the most dominant displays almost completing 1000 passes whilst creating some beautiful chances and goals.

The table after November makes for very pleasant reading albeit we still have to play the other Madrid team and Sevilla from the top half.

The B Team have taken a nose dive results wise and are now 6 games without a win. Maybe promotion has come to early for them but they need to knuckle down and try to get out of this mess.

As you can see we are flirting with the relegation zone now albeit we play Valencia B at home next so there is a chance to pick some points up.

Frustratingly Jorge Mas the owner has backed us in every aspect apart from building a new stadium. We have the joint highest average attendance by stadium capacity.

We have sold out our season ticket allocation.

And yet this is third time he's told me that he just doesn't see it despite the decrepit state of our current stadium.

My suspicion is the 35k per year rent might appeal to the Billionaire businessman. 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest]

Mid Season Break

December hasn't been that bad with just the one loss to Atletico Madrid.

Yet we ended it in 6th, such is the nature of La Liga this season.

There was some steadying of the ship from the B team which has kept them away from the relegation team. 

The end of year awards came in and Ivan Azon has had an unbelievable haul. For a player that was essentially a second tier player(for 5 months of the year) to win an award ahead of the likes of Pedri and Fati is amazing.  He was also recognized by Fifa which was the cherry on the cake.

Unfortunately this has brought out the usual suspects to sniff around again, and I have already just offered him another contract because retaining him till at least the end of the season is vital now with us challenging for European spots.

One other player who received some acknowledgment is Angel Lopez, the left-back who came in as cover last season and one the starting role has come second in the Spanish U20 player of the year award.

Lopez is honestly a warrior, one of those players that you just can't see it with but ends up putting a higher rated prospect in his rear view mirror and makes the position his own and his development so far has been phenomenal.

This guy is 5 ft 9 but leads the league in percentage of headers won, it's pretty damn phenomenal.

 

The final part of December is this beaut and I remain seriously hopeful this will provide more talent for the future.

 

 

Edited August 26, 2023 by Crazy_Ivan

[SixPointer]

Going along very nicely mate 👏🏻

[Guest]

End of January 2024

By far the most complete month of the entire save so far. Four league and three cup games throughout the month and just the two goals conceded, this was no fluke either as we allowed an XG of just 2.08 for the whole month. I couldn't have asked for more from such a young team in their first La Liga season. One of the more pleasing aspects was letting the highly rated (on loan with a option to buy) 18 year old player Eliezer Mayenda start the the two cup (second and third round) games and he stepped up with three goals.

I actually somewhat mentally surrendered the fourth round cup game against Villarreal. I was convinced we would lose and being in the hunt for euro places with injury risks being high I wanted to rest some over-worked players. I did leave Ivan Azon in for this one and the team were remarkable, Villarreal were pegged back early by the flukiest of own goals and then Azon scored 5 minutes later from a ridiculously acute angle and after that Villarreal who were at full strength and are 4th in La Liga seemed shell shocked and out of it with Miguel Puche sealing the win with 10 mins to go. Puche who is the back-up winger ended the month with three goals, two of which came as an impact sub.

Transfers

A few days after I offered a new deal to Ivan Azon,  Juventus came in with what I would consider to be a very good offer of over 20 million plus add-ons for him. I was delighted when he had a meh attitude to the offer so I declined it and then five days later he signed our latest contract offer which now stretches us to the limit of what we can do considering our current financial situation. It's however worth it in the short term to help us qualify for European football but I think I we are now close to the point where I think he will probably leave at the end of this season.

Apart from that there was no business out and no business in apart from our earlier summer business.

Any final business

The last bit of news was the announcement of the retirement of club legend Alberto Zapater at the the end of the current season, he has played over four hundred games for the club and the man is through and through Aragonese and as such has been offered a contract as a coach on the team.

One of my priorities when I took over was to fast track him through his coaching badges in anticipation of this moment and he's now not that far away from his Continental pro Licence.