FM_Prospect
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Posts posted by FM_Prospect
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BOLTON 2020/21
"Hot and Cold Beginnings"
SEPTEMBER
Pre-Season is done and dusted it's time to get into the real stuff!, We come out the gate firing on all cylinders with an unexpected win against Rotherham!, A quick update in the post above will pay mention to the outstanding performance by Lloyd Isgrove netting 2 goals against Rotherham in the EFL Cup First Round, and then we comfortably took care of Newcastle United's Under 23's. Team Cohesion was still very poor and it showed against Forest Green in the first League game of the season with Forest running away with a 0 - 3 victory scoring all their goals in the last 30 minutes of the match. I made a tactical change and chose to go a bit more defensive and move to a 4-1-4-1 to make us a bit more sturdy in defense and it paid off with a 2 - 0 away win against Colchester but injuries hit us as Goalkeeper Billy Crellin who is on loan from Fleetwood Town picked up an injury during training meaning the 38 years old Goalkeeper stepped up into the first team, and did quite well respective of his poor match sharpness.
OCTOBER
Coming off a shaky performance against Newport County conceding a late goal, we continued our inconsistent form against Harrogate Town failing to put away chance after chance, and scraped through on penalties against Shrewsbury. Antoni Sarcevic returned from injury and took some time to adjust to the system, but Comley has been solid as a Defensive Midfielder shielding the back four, and breaking up play in central areas!. I was starting to see some good patches of play in the 4-1-4-1 and the change of turning Ali Crawford into a Mezzala on Attack helped link up to Eoin Doyle who has impressive as a Pressing Forward on Support and at times a Pressing Forward on Defend. Lloyd Isgrove and Nathan Delfouneso struggled early in the month for form, but both have started to find form on the wings. Something that has been consistent is the Center Backs, Delaney and Brockbank have been rock solid in defense and Brockbank picked up player of the month in October!.
We go into November in flying form, and Team Cohesion is improving every week!, I've been keeping an eye on the youth squad Bright Amoateng has definitely been impressing scoring 18 goals in 13 matches, and is very close to getting a call up to the senior team with that kind of form!, needs to develop a bit more but seems to have the ability to find the back of the net!.
Lloyd Isgrove re-captured his early season form banging in 2 goals against Bradford City, and a lovely counter attack against Leyton Orient.
Bright Amoateng Profile
SpoilerWe've really put ourselves back in the mix amongst the top few teams in the league after a inconsistent start, with January coming up it will be a chance to clear out some of the unwanted players chewing up the wage bill, and maybe bring in a cheap loan player. First on my priority list is a Left Back, Jamie Mascoll has been serviceable at times, but probably isn't upto the level of League Two and not really in my plans for the future. Identifying a Goalkeeper and a Right Winger to keep track of for the end of season is second on my priority list, as we lack depth in those areas.
We're still losing £500k per month on repayments, So I expect to go further into debt by the end of the season, meaning Promotion is vitally important!.
Thanks for reading so far feel free to leave a comment or feedback, the next update will be the end of January!
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On 09/12/2020 at 02:03, CornishGas said:
Ah, I see. I didn't realise you were planning to replace them. Yeah, that would indeed end up costing more!
I'm at Moss in Norway currently. They took longer to fall and didn't have as far to go but they've been pretty ruined over the last 20 years or so. It's a journeyman so I'm not necessarily planning to stay here but it's interesting for sure.
@CornishGas Nice One mate, let me know how you get on!
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59 minutes ago, CornishGas said:
Enjoying the updates, I've always been wanting to try a save with a club massively in debt (I sort of am at the moment by accident, might do a thread on it, bit nowhere near Bolton levels of debt!).
One thing though about the above quote, mutual terminations still save you money overall. Let's say a guy is making £20k a year but agrees to mutually terminate for £15k, you still save £5k overall except you pay it all at once. So depending on the savings you make it could be worth doing. In the face of a £34m shortfall though, probably not. 😂
Yeh @CornishGas it's a challenge that's for sure!, who are you managing?
Yeh I understand it saves me money, but then you still have to re-appoint a new staff member, So essentially your terminating someones contract for an upfront fee at a reduced cost, but re-hiring someone else to do the same job and paying them a wage too!.
I'm too deep in debt to be wasting money at this point!
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Thought I'd give a quick update for my Managerial debut against Rotherham to start the save!
Coming up against Rotherham I wasn't confident and I didn't want to get trounced on the first match!
But we settled in nicely playing the 4-1-4-1 Counter Attacking Tactic, and first half we didn't like getting scored on as we broke down a lot of Rotherhams attacks
49' - Just after halftime Lloyd Isgrove cuts in nicely and finishes a cross from Hickman!, Great start!
Bolton 1 - Rotherham 0
Absolutely buzzing with the start!, I didn't change much after halftime!
Rotherham came out firing, but we held firm
52' - Isgrove gathered the ball in a dangerous spot after the corner, Rotherham were all over the place defensively
Isgrove shoooooots!....WHAT A GOAL!!
Bolton 2 - Rotherham 0
Isgrove was sensational scoring again with this long range shot!
A very unexpected, but positive start to the season!
But it won't get any easier!
We drew Wolverhampton away in the Second Round!
Anyway thanks for reading so far I Just wanted to share a quick update!
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TACTICS
I decided on a 4-1-4-1 (Haven't settled on Team Instructions yet!) it also is a very flexible tactic and can easily be switched to the 4-4--1
PRE-SEASON
We kicked off Pre-Season really well, we mostly played teams below or around our level to build confidence, and cohesion!. Isgrove looked pretty dangerous on either wing, and Doyle and Delfouneso will be out main attacking threats
The Squad is so deep, it was impossible to try and get everyone Match fit!, there's so many players that need to be moved on!
Pre-Season came with a bit of bad luck as Antoni Sarcevic got a lower back stress fracture and will miss the start of the season!
We also have Two games before the season begins we will drew Rotheram in the first round of the Carabao Cup (or whatever it's called now) and Newcastle U23's in teh EFL Trophy before we face Forrest Green for the first game of the season!
So pretty tough match to kick of my Managerial life at Bolton!, still figuring things out and learning the squad.
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GOALKEEPERS
ONES TO WATCH!
I will be trying to turn a profit on players as best as I can until the debt is cleared, we do have some talented young players that will be getting some minutes in the senior squad. Here's a few players I've noted as "One's to watch" a small positive is Bolton do have a decent academy set up!, Unfortunately Dennis Politic won't be seeing any action this season with damaged cruciate knee ligament!, Regan Riley will most likely spend the year with the Under 18's, and Adam Senior will most likely go on loan in January. There's a few decent prospects in the U'18's that I will be monitoring as the season progresses.
REGAN RILEY - Only 17 years old, solid mental attributes, might see some playing time this season in the first team!
RONAN DARCY - Could be a breakout player this season, 19 years old and should be knocking on the door of the first team this season!
I'll focus Pre-Season on building continuity through the squad trying to build some Cohesion as it's currently on Abysmal levels which is worrying!, also Tactical familiarity and building Fitness levels. it's important we get off to a good start to the season and build momentum early. I mentioned I would add an Assistant Manager and just One Coach of my choice to the backroom staff and pretty happy with the new personal coming into the club, Byron Anthony joins as my Assistant Manager and I was able to sign Tim Cahill as a coach which is great to have another Australian on board, his coaching attributes are not great at the moment, but he will study to improve as a coach and he has a Perfectionist personality which is much needed around the club at the moment so pretty happy with two positive staff additions already.
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Currently reading through this as Schalke are struggling IRL!, quick question, where did you get the FM21 dark skin?
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This is my Manager profile, I'll keep this post as a reference point as the save progresses!
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INTRODUCTION!
Explaining the Debt!
I should probably explain how Bolton got into this position, after doing a little background check on how a debt of what was initially £41m (cuurently £35m!) but after getting relegated from the Premier League and then the Championship, Manager Phil Parkinson stepped away from the club due to players and staff not being paid!, eventually the club was brought by a consortium led by Sharon Brittan but Bolton suffered a -12 deduction in League One which seen them relegated by the end of the 2019/20 season. Manager Keith Hill left the club as they were headed to League Two, Chairman Sharon Brittan said the club believed it "to be in the best interests that we have a fresh approach to our management and coaching structure for the next season and beyond". Bolton, relegated from the Championship, endured a tumultuous build up to the 2019/20 season, having been threatened with expulsion from the English Football League before Football Ventures takeover eventually went through....With majority of the clubs senior players having left, they were fielding sides made up almost entirely of youth-team players, including the youngest ever side against Coventry on the 10th of August!.
I've been looking for a long term save and something to really settle into I decided on the challenge of trying to "Re-Build" Bolton and get them out of the enormous debt they have acquired. If you don't know the back story of Bolton, they have been sliding down the English Football League for the last few years, and find themselves in League Two with a Debt of £34,228,578. The main goal of this save is to get Bolton back into the Premier League and get the in debt free position. I really enjoyed an FM20 Bolton blog written by Dan Gear (host of the Grass and Gear podcast) and I wanted to give this challenge a go and see how far I can take this club and try the Bolton challenge myself!!. Below is a great video explaining "what was going on at Bolton last season".
Repayments of £500k per month will start on the 30/6/2020 which will take a massive toll on our finances, players will have to be sold, and I will have to be really careful with every staff and player contract until we get to more secure place financially. The club has a sell on clause for Zach Clough and Rob Holding which could potentially net us a bit of money in the future, but most of the profit will have to be made by either selling on Youth Players, or signing players on a free and developing them which also comes with a small problem of not being able to have a big backroom staff!. Currently all scouting is done by Director of Football Tobias Phoenix (very average 9 Judging Player Ability and 9 Judging Player Potential), but as we can't afford scout I will have to rely on trials and my own player knowledge to try and find the best value in the market. I'll only be bringing in an Assistant Manager and one Coach, I won't be terminating contracts as there's no point wasting money on termination fees!....So what we have is what I am working with!.
£35M in debt!
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Hi mate, welcome to FM, if you follow a team in the Premier League, LaLiga, Bundesliga etc, i'd recommend starting with them playing through a season or two seasons to get a grip on training, scouting, tactics, youth Intakes, transfer windows, off-seasons, and squad building.
Bust the Net is probably the guy you want to watch and he occasionally posts here under the name Rashidi, although I'm a relatively experienced player now, Zealand puts out some decent informative content too, it's sometimes basic stuff but good if your a beginner and he put's a lot of effort to make the videos humorous and seems like a good dude!.
I'd suggest reading through the tactics forums here for some tactical help, A dude called Experienced Defender who is a moderator who usually helps and is very good!, also more in depth there are some guides still floating around by a guy called Cleon that are always spot on but he doesn't write anymore unfortunately I'd love to hear his thoughts on the new versions of FM!.
Once you get a feel for the game, I wouldn't be shy to try a team from League One, and build them up slowly...me personally that's where I find the most satisfaction!.
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15 minutes ago, Rashidi said:
Yeah it’s just one small chapter from the book I wrote Over the course of the FM21 cycle I usually post chapters from the book on the forums, or on my blog and as video guides. If it helps just one of you then it’s great.
think it helps most of us mate!
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On 15/11/2020 at 06:56, Rashidi said:
I hope this helps some of you, its just a few chapters I have been working on for creating styles of football.
is this in your FM21 book Daljit?
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Great save!, I'm 6 seasons in with Posh as well, I sold Ivan Toney for £12m to Leeds!, I've tried to add staff with good personalities like you did!...currently floating around the top of the Championship pushing for promotion!, but started a new save so playing that a bit at the moment!.
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Also what are the imploc implications of having low Adaptabilty?, what would it affect most?, Team Cohesion and Morale?
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Well I always give myself 1 in Adaptability maybe that would explain why I struggle the first season
What do most people give for Adaptability?
I never valued this attribute, perhaps I was wrong
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Quick question regarding Adaptability. Is it relative to the nationionality of the manager or the language the manager speaks.
Example I'm an Australian Manager is England considered a foreign country although there is no language barrier.
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I cannot say I'm enjoying FM20, I think the match engine from FM17 was pretty good and I enjoyed FM17 the most.
FM20 probably looks the best and has some really nice features.
FM17 for ME, and general balance of Enjoyment.
So out of the last few iterations I'd say FM17, FM16, FM19 would be my top 3.
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On 27/01/2020 at 04:57, anagain said:
Good luck turning it around. Injuries really have hit you hard.
Thanks, definitely need some luck in this save!.
4 hours ago, Nobby_McDonald said:Oh dear, this isn't going very well.
Terribly, incredibly frustrated with FM20 so far hopefully, I can manage to keep my job through this injury crisis and turn some things around!
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September 19/20
It all started off promising, Two wins to kick off the month a well fought draw against Port Vale and a comfortable win against Newport County seen us 3 wins out of 4. With players returning from injury I thought I could really finally see this team in ful strength action, well I was wrong....as we just incurred more injuries. Tom Parkes returned from Injury as a much needed Center Back as 35 year old Gary Warren and Pierce Sweeney who is a RIght Back have been paying the Center Back role while Tom Parkes and Aaron Martin have been injured, but Tom Parkes got injured on his first session back in training sidelining him for a further 4 to 8 weeks....Great!. With the injury crisis currently depleting my defense I decided to try and bring in some medical staff to get a handle on things, signing a Head of Sports Science and Sports Scientist, Hopefully they can add a little more knowledge and data to prevent these injuries!
October 19/20
Frustrating, Frustrated, Frustration!, what a terrible month, Along with my 2 starting Center Backs injured, Stand in Center Back Gary Warren picked up a ban for too many Yellow Cards, and Pierce Sweeney picked up a small injury forcing me to play players from the Under 18's squad who were so clearly not at this level of Football. It also seemed that our Forwards Ryan Bowman and Nicky Ajose forgot how to score!, just 1 goal for the month scored by returning from injury Lee Holmes...ONE GOAL!....A completely embarrassing month, The squad is losing faith and I'm sure the board will be knocking on my door very soon if things don't turn around fast....Real fast!. Only positive from October is we didn't lose to our rivals Plymouth taking a 0-0 draw, but they currently are top of the table!.
Things must improve defensively as we end October in 18th, Club vision says we must finish top half, we also need a bit of luck with injuries. I've taken a few players on trial to try and bring a bit more cover Defensively in to the squad, Currently former Gillingham defender Alex Lacey and former Hull City Defender Ondrej Mazuch are on trial for the month, Mazuch looks like he could be a great signing for this league, but also I don't want to spend a fortune for his wages. Hopefully the next update will have some better results or this FM Save may become a Journeyman!...
- Thanks for reading.
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August 2019/20
With a load of injuries, and our two starting Centre Backs injured for the next few weeks, the beginning was always going to be tough...and it was. Ryan Bowman hit the ground running scoring 2 goals against Macclesfield Town and then went missing for the next 2 matches as struggled to break down a stubborn Stevenage and got pummeled by the superior Championship side Brentford in the EFL Cup. We were clearly so far out of our league in this match with former Exeter City youth prospect Ollie Watkins causing us all sorts of problems on the left wing. We gave away a penalty within the opening 2 minutes of the match, Lee Martin then collected a red card 31 minutes in sending us down to 10 men, and to top it off Jack Sparkes gave away an own goal...What a disaster!.
We re-grouped on the training pitch and played really well against Promotion favorites Swindon Town beating them 1 - 0, Jake Taylor was excellent and averaged an 8.7 rating . We came out guns blazing against Oldham scoring early and then to add more misery to the start of this season goalscorer Randall Williams scored a lovely goal 14 minutes in...and then got injured at the 21 minute mark, and now will miss 6 weeks with an ankle injury!.
So the looking at the table, considering our injuries, and form we're still not doing to bad in 9th, As long as I finish in the top half my job will be safe. But this squad is clearly lacking some quality depth and possibly the medical team needs a few more staff to help keep these players on the pitch!. Center Backs Aaron Martin and Tom Parkes are not to far away from returning to fitness, as well as Nigel Antangana so for now it's just about trying to get the best results we possibly can!.
Current Injury List
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PRE-SEASON
Pre-Season went relatively well results wise, it was a good chance to see the squad in action and try to find a formation for the season, tho it didn't come with some frustration as we suffered some injuries very early in the campaign. The two Centre Backs Aaron Martin and Tom Parkes are both going to miss the start of the season with Lower Back stress Fractures, and young prospect Jack Sparkes is out with a groin strain. Lee Holems and Nigel Atangana were already injured when I arrived. The depth of quality within the squad is not fantastic so this hurts us for the start to the season.
The Media have predicted us to finish 15th and the board have set the vision for the club top finish in the top half, Aside from the injuries I feel there is enough talent within the squad to reach those targets, and a cup run would be nice...especially for the bank balance which has had a bit of a bump after the pre-season. tactically I settled on a 4-1-4-1 DM Wide formation, tho I would at some point like to play two strikers up top and try to develop a partnership between Nicky Ajose and Ryan Bowan. Due to injuries at the moment I am quite limited in what I can do with this squad.
First match of the season will be against Macclesfield Town, Let's hope for a good start!. Thanks to everyone who has read so far or left a comment so far!, Throughout the save I will do various reports on Clubs, Transfers, Players, and Competitions such as Champions League, Europa League, World Cup and the Euro's so if there is a player or club you would like to know more about let me know and I will post some information!.
SpoilerRight after I posted this, Exeter City captain Jake Taylor picked up and injury and will miss the opening match of the season...things are going great!
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Is this still a known problem, as I cannot seem to post an image bigger than this example below?
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Incredible achievement with Rotherham!
How do you get your pics to that size?
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how do i change the size of my pictures?, every screenshot I take posts as the same size?
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Any reason why my Scout isn't doing his Job?
in Tactics, Training & Strategies Discussion
Posted
what's your scouts Attributes?