[FM22] San Marino build a nation (Folgore/Falciano)

[TheNapalmNerd]

A little dance with the board, we got some improvements!

[TheNapalmNerd]

We won the first match!

Massive pressure on FCSB from the first match. We did well against a better team. Again this season we see that we're actually doing very well at home, even though we were down to 10 after half an hour. Massive result, and something that provides omtimism before the second leg.

[TheNapalmNerd]

We destroyed FCSB!!!

It started out terribly, and I thought that was it, but then everything went in our way, and we stand victorious! I think full time training has done a lot for this result. Team Cohesion has increased, and the players are blending well together now that they are training everyday. This is a massive result. If we win in the next round we are once more guaranteed Conference League football.

The injury to Michael Fabbro paid off, and we've offered him a one year full time contract, with two optional years.

[TheNapalmNerd]

They seem very doable! FCSB were a much better side.

[TheNapalmNerd]

When you can only sign one year contracts

[TheNapalmNerd]

I guess we're through to the next round

The result says everything. The lithuanian champions never stood a chance. These are incredible results compared to the preliminary rounds where both results were very tight.

[TheNapalmNerd]

It's the small things

[TheNapalmNerd]

Conference league secured

Not as dominant as the first match, but an okay performance. Another red card and I think we have to find two new centre backs before the transfer window shuts. Cremonesi is 34 and Genevois is 35. They are okay, but physically they have taken a toll over the last year.

Bodø/Glimt coming up in the next round of qualification.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Bodø puts he pressure on us

Bodø more clinical, but we fought well. I wouldn't mind losing, because Conference League might be better for coefficients, but the money would serve us well though...

The Winner will go up against Dinamo Zagreb or Ludogorets.

[TheNapalmNerd]

We're into the playoffs!

Once again we're great at home with mote clinical finishing. I was setting myself up for the Conference league, but now we're into at least the Europa League, and are guaranteed even more money from participating in the playoffs for the Champions League.

Ludogorets are waiting in the last match. They lost to Olympiakos (who beat us) last season in the champions path playoff. I'm hoping we can win as well, but they have a very strong squad. Kiril Despodov and Dominik Yankov are still in their squad and they would fit in well with most top flight squads.

Edited August 25, 2023 by TheNapalmNerd

[TheNapalmNerd]

It seems like we're fulfilling board expectations

Yeah they were just better than us. We still have them at home though, but Europa League is already better than expected. Champions League in the second season would be too good to be true.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Another loss

This hurts. I would have wanted at least a draw at home, but another loss and another red card.

Being a part of the playoffs was still a great succes and it paid well:

Our finances are looking good for now, and we still haven't even got the money from participating in the Europa League:

They better enhance our budgets soon.

[TheNapalmNerd]

We've been handed a tough group

I don't know. Maybe we can get a draw in one of those matches. Otherwise I think we'll mostly be focusing on preparation for next season. We have 5-6 spots in the first team that could do with younger blood. Two Central defenders, Two Central midfielders and an inverted winger on the right side.

We have the money now. I requested a higher wage budget and it got rejected.

[TheNapalmNerd]

We lost the super cup

The problem with holidaying a game is you might end up losing a match you should have won comfortably.

[TheNapalmNerd]

A little upgrade

[TheNapalmNerd]

Great result at home

An amazing result at home. We once again get great results at home, and this might give us a chance of not ending fourth in the group.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Loss to Dinamo Zagreb

They just have a better team than us adn were more clinical, but we did okay. Livakovic was a wall in goal.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Transfers 2022

It occurred to me that I haven't really given an update on the thing I like the most about playing Football Manager; Transfers!

They are all mostly reserves and our reserve goalkeeper Octavian Valceanu came in on a noncontract and signed with Heerenveen for free before I had the option of signing him up full time. Therefore we brought in Damian Schobert (now worth a screenshot) as a reserve option in goal. We stil don't have the option of buying any of the real good San Marinese players, therefore we are limited to buying foreigners for the team.

While last summer we had the option of signing players without having any wage expenses, this season things have taken a turn as we're no longer able to make lots of free transfers because of our new status as a professional football team. This shows in the fact that we didn't really buy that many new players, as most of our players were better than the ones available to us. Instead I spent most of the summer signing our squad up for professional contracts instead. We did get a few players, but these are mostly reserve players who I tried to buy due to the existing club vision of buying players for the first team under the age of 23:

As you can tell, the board is not too happy with how I've spent transfers so far. I tried to lighten them up a bit, but it didn't really work out how I expected. As a result of that we are not able to buy players at the age of 24 or older right now which has affected our pursuit of a replacement for Ben Arfa, as the board has decided to shut down every approach I made for his potential replacement:

Our big signing of the summer is Aurelien Nguiamba who we signed as a potential replacement for our midfiels axis of Samaris or Paul Lasne. They're both 33 years old but still the better options compared to Nguiamba who I mostly tried to sign to maybe let the board see their vision coming truel and letting me buy Tchimbembe for our right wing. I just hope they let me buy him, before he's off the transfer list. Actually every player we brought in is a younger reserve player to our more experienced players in the first team squad.

Amongst our future targets we're looking to replace our goalkeeper, both centre backs, both central midfielders and our right winger. Still we mostly find great players for the other positions, but once our board start giving us some of the 12 million euros we have in our banking balance things will probably start to look quite positive.

 

In the future we will keep an eye on Marco Giorgetti. He's got potential to be 3,5 stars in our current squad which would be by far the best San Marinese player in the game. He can already finish very good and if we can train up his physical attributes he might become a very deadly striker for the national squad in the future. Right now he doesn't want to join us, which isn't a problem as we can't get him before he turns 18 anyways. But a big prospect for now in San Marino:

 

[TheNapalmNerd]

Draw against Wolfsburg!

This is a massive result in our pursuit of progressing from the group. I'm hoping we can get Conference league in the spring and a draw away from home certainly helps. I'm acutally a bit disappointed in the result as we outplayed them and the highlights showed us hitting the woodwork two times in the first half, while Wolfsburg only had one big chance. Still, this is great but everything can happen in this group:

[TheNapalmNerd]

We beat Wolfsburg at home!!

This is crazy! I saw the tendency in the last game, that we were actually competitive, but this is amazing. I honestly think our obscure reputation is helping us. Wolfsburg fielded an okay team, but they have so many great players they didn't use. And we capitalised on that.

As you can see almost all of their good players were given a rest in this match:

I don't mind them doing it. This gives us a fantastic chance of progressing through the group stages. We still have Dinamo Zagreb at home, and Genk away.

A draw against Zagreb will guarantee third place and european football in spring!

Edited August 28, 2023 by TheNapalmNerd

[TheNapalmNerd]

It is something \o/

So generous with 12 million in the bank, but it is better than nothing. We weren't able to adjust our wage budget though, so we still only have below 35K there and are overspending, so we're gonna have to sell some players to get new in. This means that we're saying goodbye to Luca Antei and Abdou Diakhate in january. We won't miss them. They haven't really been a part of everything anyways.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Revenge against Zagreb

Three home games and three victories! This is much more than I could have expected and we are now guaranteed an extended european campaign. All round it was a massive performance once again. Hatem Ben Arfa has been a very important player in this campaign and we'll miss his performances once he retires. Once again he was an attacking presence all the time and we might need to find someone who had the same flair and dribbling skills as him. So far this season he has 6 goals and 14 assists in 15 european matches. Alex Lopez showed up in front of goal again today and took his continental tally to 17 goals in 13 matches. We're rewarding him with a contract extension until 2025.

Too many ways this can end, but they all end well for us now. We're hoping for another win, but we've already exceeded expectations.

[TheNapalmNerd]

We're not a big club, but we can do wonders!

I've said this before every game in our Europa League campaign, and once again it worked out well.

We should have had 'em long before the end of the game, but things got very tense in the end and I was so relieved to come out with a draw. Meanwhile Wolfsburg lost to Zagreb, so we would have gotten Europa League anyways, but this is massive. We won Group H, and I'd doomed us before the first match:

Not only are we given Europa League in spring, we are also through to the second round already, and even though we might realistically end up losing, we've had a wonderful season in europe in our first season as a professional team, and are about to take a huge jump in the coefficients.

It has also showed in the nation coefficients:

Wonderful! Our autumn season is technically over, and we'll be concentrating on strengthening the first team in the january transfer window. We've already got a few players signed up on free transfers. Luckily the board allows us to buy players over 23 on a free right now. They just don't want to spend any money on "old players".

[Muttley84]

Pretty unbelievable achievement, not only qualifying for the group stages of EL this early, but winning the group also. It would have taken me years to perform such a task. Congrats, will be following!

[TheNapalmNerd]

10 minutes ago, Muttley84 said:

Pretty unbelievable achievement, not only qualifying for the group stages of EL this early, but winning the group also. It would have taken me years to perform such a task. Congrats, will be following!

Thanks! I'm astounded by the results so far, and honestly can't quite believe it myself. I'm just hoping all our opponents underestimate us and rest their players like Wolfsburg did.

[TheNapalmNerd]

A few upgrades! We got a higher wage budget!

With next seasons transfer budget already at an okay level, we'll hopefully be able to plan a bit before summer. But the biggest news after discussing a bit with the board!

And after adjustments with our transferbudget we got it all the way up to 50.4K.

We've already spent a little bit of the new wage budget and will be welcoming Marco Tuminello in January. He's got good finishing and heading attributes and will surely be a competitor up front. Unfortunately he wanted a release clause at about 500K, bu we'll try to work our ways around that. So far He's on a trial and will be training with the team until January when he joins. 

[Thomassje123]

Good luck in the save, it is going to be a long one  

Spoiler

And yes, it can be done if you play long enough. I also play with Folgore only I have an other database I see (mine is San Marino by dave)

You had an very good start! Mine was very slow, in season 5 I played in the Conference League groupstage for the first time but in the end it all worked out

Good luck!

Edited August 28, 2023 by Thomassje123

[TheNapalmNerd]

Usually one of my favorite times of the season

Another poor intake. I just hope we can get someone who has more than 1,5 star potential like last time.

 

 

[TheNapalmNerd]

18 minutes ago, Thomassje123 said:

Good luck in the save, it is going to be a long one  

  Reveal hidden contents

 

And yes, it can be done if you play long enough. I also play with Folgore only I have an other database I see (mine is San Marino by dave)

You had an very good start! Mine was very slow, in season 5 I played in the Conference League groupstage for the first time but in the end it all worked out

Good luck!

Thank you! That is dedication I see right there, and something I am dreaming of doing Did you get any good San Marinese players throughout those season?

(I'm playing San Marino by Classen)

 

Yeah I took maybe a bit too much advantage of the noncontracts, and it really sped up progress.

I think our club reputation was largely influenced by our sliding doors though. We are by far the least reputable club in San Marino, even though we went fthrough the group stage:

It's gone up. We started the second season with an "obscure" reputation. Never seen that before in any of my saves.

Edited August 28, 2023 by TheNapalmNerd

[Thomassje123]

@TheNapalmNerd

Quote

Thank you! That is dedication I see right there, and something I am dreaming of doing  Did you get any good San Marinese players throughout those season?

No, not at all. I had one player with 154 PA where his sealing was 132 CA. And I have one striker now with 163PA and 133CA (23 years old)

Spoiler

Reputation grows really slow, it is really annoying. That's why I said that you are in for a long game. Especially with the other teams doing absolutely nothing the first like 15/20 seasons. Try to get the 15th spot on the coefficients as quick as possible. After that it is really starting to pick up

[TheNapalmNerd]

1 hour ago, Thomassje123 said:

@TheNapalmNerd

No, not at all. I had one player with 154 PA where his sealing was 132 CA. And I have one striker now with 163PA and 133CA (23 years old)

  Hide contents

Reputation grows really slow, it is really annoying. That's why I said that you are in for a long game. Especially with the other teams doing absolutely nothing the first like 15/20 seasons. Try to get the 15th spot on the coefficients as quick as possible. After that it is really starting to pick up

Amazing talent for a San Marinese player

[TheNapalmNerd]

January Transferwindow

We've gotten past the January transfer window and some changes has been made to our squad.

We've said goodbye to Niccolo Giannetti, Romain Genevois and Paul Lasne who were prominent players in our European Campaign.

Genevois was our primary central defender, but when bids started to come in, he became unhappy and at that age we couldnt let one of our team leaders destroy morale at the club and decided to let him go. Instead we've supplied the squad with Luka Koblar who isn't nowhere near as good, but we're hoping we can get better players in, when summer hits.

Giannetti was also unhappy as he wasn't guaranteed a first team spot and when italian teams came for him, we decided to let him go and replaced him with Marco Tumminello who is a younger and better alternative.

Paul Lasne was getting old but has been good for us the last year. We got a few free transfers in, Mainly Zonta and Maistro who will provide cover until we find new players who can strenghten our squad in the summer.

We had a few problems this window, as we're only able to make year long contracts. Or half year long contracts when we're in january. This means that we actually had some bids accepted for very good players who take a chunk on our financial balance, but it wouldn't make sense to buy a player who only wants to be here for half a year, and wouldn't accept our optional contract extension.

The team is okay, but I don't think we'll do well in europe right now, with how far we've gotten, and am looking forward to youth intake and summer transfer window.

Also now in the middle of february we finally got a transfer budget that can take us to higher grounds.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Second knockout round draw

We're up against Brest who is maybe the best we could get. They are 20th in Ligue 1, and I'm hoping morale is rock bottom. That would be our chance.

[TheNapalmNerd]

They hit rock bottom!

Clinical finishing from Alex Lopez as he scored his 59th, 60th and 61st goals of the season. He's been a monster up front all season and once again helps us tremendously in a campaign that that is looking unbelievable. I actually started the game with Ben arfa on the pitch, but he was nowhere to be found and was replaced at halftime. This will be his last few months at the club. We have lots of injuries and suspensions in the squad right now, but still managed an almost perfect match.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Youth upgrades!

[TheNapalmNerd]

Youth intake

Nothing much. No one worth mentioning.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Lucky Europa League drawing once again

I must have missed something. I was sure we'd have another match vs Brest, but then all of a sudden we had a draw for the quarter finals. I thought there would be two matches in the second round. This seems strange. I don't know if it is because it was the world cup year, me who doesn't know the rules, or the database there's an issue with.

Anyways! we drew Getafe, who are 11th in La Liga, and by the looks of it, the luckiest we could get once again. I don't know if we stand a chance this far in the competition. I'm hoping they're resting players. Still amazing we got this far. I would have been ecstatic  to have a campaign in the conference league where we went to the quarter finals.

Winner of our draw goes up against Arsenal or Tottenham.

Edited August 28, 2023 by TheNapalmNerd

[TheNapalmNerd]

We dominated but lost the first leg

This was another promising performance and we came very close to a huge result when we hit the woodwork at 94:45, but things weren't meant to be in this one. We still have a leg at home and might be able to surprise them, but looking at their starting 11 it's easy to see why they are still in la liga. We've got some way to go before we can compete at that level consistently, but we might still be able to cause a few upsets .

[TheNapalmNerd]

Training facilities!

Our training facilities are adequate right now. This will come in handy!

[TheNapalmNerd]

Our european adventure is over

We've reached the end and we fell with grace. A match we weren't supposed to get anything from even though we were ahead twice. I'm really looking forward to that time within a few years when we'll start having some homegrown talent in our squad. We only had four players on the bench today and one of them was Vitaioli who is decent in San Marino, but nothing in europe. We had 3 suspensions in this match, with two in defence and the last being our midfield general Samaris. We're gonna have to focus on our central defence once again, as we're really not capable in that area. If we could get a new goalkeeper as well, that would be awesome.

 

And with that. Our season is over. I'm mostly holidaying the matches in San Marino, as the other teams are still no match for us.

We're going into the playoffs soon, and we're also still in the Coppa Titano.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Big name incoming!

And it's Lucas Lima. Kind of a legend in FM, as he has been a go to brazilian for many versions of the game. Limas contract ran out, and I've been keeping an eye on him for a few months. He'll be a strong player in central midfield, for one maybe two seasons.

We've already got a few other players coming in this summer. Another brazilian is regen player José Mário, who we wil be tryin to train up in central defence.

Last but not least swedish/english/georgian regen Andy Harwood will be coming in to take over our left back:

We signed Andy Harwood last season and will be looking to convert his amateur contract right away, so he won't leave on a free transfer. He's already made big improvements from being two stars when we originally bid for him to three and a half stars now. He's looking like a starter.

[TheNapalmNerd]

The Double

And we're off to the Champions League Qualification once again next season!

[TheNapalmNerd]

[TheNapalmNerd]

Budgets for the new season

I think we're good for now. If I adjust the budget we can go up to 120K Euro in our wage budget. Finally we'll be able to buy great players without having to rely on them being free transfers.

[TheNapalmNerd]

[TheNapalmNerd]

European Competition Rankings:

We've gone above the Norwegian fourth division but are still below Vanarame North/South. The're still a long way to go.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Club Coefficients:

Our incredible campaign has paid off, and we're once again the most improved side in all of Europe. We've gone into the top 100, and are looking good, as we don't really have any coefficient points we can lose within the next three seasons.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Nation Coefficients:

Big hike up, as we're now 29th overall. Things are looking good for the small nation.

[TheNapalmNerd]

San Marinese Summer Signings

After two seasons we got some top players from San Marino in. Three big names and the only one we're missing is Elia Benedettini.

The national topstriker, and the man who is going to be leading our front in the national league many years from now on. At 23 years of age, we can have him for many seasons to come.

A player who would have been the best player in our squad when we started this game and he is still leading in San Marino.

Second best San Marinese goalkeeper, and we're paying him way too much, but now we have him.

 

 

These signings mean we're saying goodbye to Mirko Palazzi and Matteo Vitaioli

 

Huge upgrades for the San Marinese league. Nanni, Berardi and Colombo are amongst the best players in the league, if they had played for any other team.

[TheNapalmNerd]

Champions Path First Qualifying round:

Great result against a team that can easily upset us. I'd actually given up when we hit the 59th minute. Tumminello (arguably our best player, but not in this match) was already tired and since we're having problem meeting registration regulations, we don't have any wingers strikers on the bench while Alex Lopez is injured. Nguessan is a midfielder who used to score goals for us, so I put him up front, moved fabbro to left winger, and Cerro to right wing as he can use both legs, and we play with inverted wingers. Then all of a sudden we have this turnaround. We still have a chance of making it to the next round now. The winner of this match goes up against Vålerenga.

 

Morale in our squad is hitting a low right now as most of our players want away, and I've rejected offers for Fabbro, Raicevic, Samaris and our sub Zonta. The're will probably be lots of changes this season.

Our new young starlet Andy Harwood is being lent out to League One. I was thinking about using him and letting him become homegrown, but our starter Julien Serrano is just so much better even though they're both three stars. If He can get a few seasons with gametime he might be a real gem and take us to the next level. We don't have the best setup yet, and it's important that he can grow as much as possible. I will however be trying to focus on getting some homegrown talent into our squad, but we're not quite there yet.