Rumple43
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Posts posted by Rumple43
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I think, with a heavy heart, I'm going to put this story on ice. Perhaps for a while at least, perhaps for good.
I underestimated how much longer content would take to put together when pulling together so many strands over a third of a season, and whilst playing and capturing content hasn't been terribly different between SWFC and ACT, the process of writing things up and trying to make it understandable and engaging for a reader is way more time consuming.
And sadly, that time just isn't something I've got right now.
I thought it better to put something here rather than just leave it hanging, and as I said to begin this post, never say never. I still have the content, I just don't have the free time to dedicate to the task and with the summer months here, my FM time has also been on a slide as well.
A massive thanks to everyone that have followed, read and commented, I probably wouldn't have gone this far without it.
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Our South African adventure continues on, allowing us to meander along through the first half of our second season. My updates are still slow, I apologise for that, but they are much longer than the previous ones I wrote when I was with SWFC, and I've also had some other stuff going on. Still, I am sorry.
The summer had been a good one, by all accounts. Plenty of improvement both on and off the pitch, and after some initial success, I felt like we were poised for more.
Let’s see how we got on, eh?
Team – On the pitch
SpoilerSo how did the team do in the first half of the season? Last year, we were unbeaten at the half way stage, and with a more rounded squad, more depth, I was expecting good things.
We’re Going to Need a Bigger Cabinet
Following the usual pre-season batterings of some minnows, including Manchester United (no, not that one) and Barcelona (not that one either), we moved onto the key early season competitions, the MTN8 and CAF Super Cup.
The Super Cup once again remained Super in my estimation, as we won it for the second year in a row. An entertaining 3-2 victory over the always impressive ES Tunis was a sweet result, with the soon-to-depart Teboho Byrne showing the Marseille fans what they were getting with two goals in two minutes late in the game to settle proceedings.
Victories over Bidvest, then a 0-1 loss and a 2-0 win across two legs with Kaizer Chiefs set up an MTN8 final date in October against SuperSport United. A strong side, but not one of the league’s best teams, they were duly dispatched 3-0 for my first domestic trophy, plus the tasty £1m pot of prize money. Oooooh yeah!
I Love Playing FM, Except When I Get FM’d
The league was also going pretty well. With the MTN and CAF commitments muddling the start of the season, we started later than most and were left to play catch up. No bother, we can reel off some early wins and get caught up in no time.
Except then we drew with lowly Black Leopards 2-2 in a hugely one-sided game. Then shortly after we lost to equally poor Baroka.
The usual drill, we outshot them on target 15-4, but a 1-0 advantage couldn’t withstand goals in 90+4 and 90+6, and that was my first loss of the season in the bag.
SpoilerAgain, lots of green, but just the occasional loss that continued to needle me. We lost at home to Bidvest in the Telkom, despite already beating them away in the MTN8, and we’d go on to beat them in the league in December. When we needed it though, the team didn’t produce.
I did maintain my unbeaten rivalry streak, but a 2-2 with Cape Town City was another lopsided contest we didn’t win. 34 shots to 6, 2-0 became a tied game with goals in the 84th and 91st minute. URGH!
One bright spot though, the CAF Champions League group stage. Far from struggling against the best in Africa, we’re handing some beatings out. Three wins from three, including a 5-0 and an 8-0. Lovely.
Not Going To Plan
So, solid league form, just one loss, a few unexpected draws but generally we’re smashing it. Top of the table stuff!
SpoilerWell, no. Granted I could go first by winning my game in hand, but AmaZulu were putting up a decent fight and those draws had begun to sting a little bit more.
All to play for across the second half of the season, but it was still a bit frustrating, to say the least.
It Wouldn’t Be January Without Transfers
With all the focus on the pitch, it was easy to forget about continuing my quest for World domination and pushing South Africa to the next level.
The main issue was, like my team that kept snatching draws from the jaws of victory, I didn’t really have much luck with transfers either.
I had a decent budget, and having spent next to nothing in the summer, I could make moves. But every South African prospect that caught my eye had a price tag that turned me off. Turns out that as much as I wanted to hoard the next generation of national talent, other teams had no desire to let me do so, and the financial demands to make a deal work were eye-watering.
In the end, our transfer dealings consisted of one in, and one out.
Knowing that Bamuza Shemi was still only on loan and I’d need a solution for his eventual return to Germany, I went back to the well once more for some options out wide.
SpoilerA youngster at 18, yes, but not South African. Selmi also didn’t really tick any boxes as a defensive winger, but with training and time to grow, there was always hope. Either way, he was free after being released by French side CS Bretigny Foot, so I took a chance.
Going the other way was the experienced and dependable CB/RB Thendo Mukumela. He’d had his head turned by the money from UAE pretty much as soon as the transfer window closed, and keeping him seemed pointless once the offers came in. He made 32 appearances for me last season, and was going to be a nailed on starter this year, but everyone has their price.
Turns out his was £625k plus 40% of whatever Al-Nasr sold him for. It left me with a problem at the back right as the season began, but it couldn’t be helped.
Spreadsheet
After it’s debut last update, we have a few extra lines to add to our transfer spreadsheet!
For once, the low-level of South African football worked in my favour. Byrne moved for less than 100 grand and was immediately worth over £700k. Equally, Mukumela was now worth over £3m. If either player was sold, even for face value or a bit of a loss, I’d be getting a fairly hefty chunk of change.
For reference, I’ve counted instalment money as “paid”, and included it in profit, since I’ll be getting it regardless. That’s in green. I’ll tick off other instalments as I get them, should they trigger, fingers crossed there.
So far, we’d had 18 months of doing great on the pitch, and we’d made nearly £1.5m in profit from player sales. Win win, baby!
TL;DR
We retained the CAF Super Cup with a 3-2 victory over ES Tunis, with departing prospect Teboho Byrne knocking two goals in.
We also won our first ever domestic cup, claiming the lucrative MTN8 following a 3-0 win over SuperSport United. The prize pot for the tournament winner was a very welcome £1m.
Results in the first half the season had been largely positive, with a few blips. The club was knocked out of the Telkom Cup at the QF stage, and we’d had four draws and a loss to go with 11 wins in the league. One of the draws was against bitter cross-town rival Cape Town City
That left us second behind AmaZulu at the half way stage, two points behind but with a game in hand.
I picked up an 18-year-old Algerian winger from France called Yahia Selmi for free and sold first team right back Thendo Mukumela to a team in UAE for £625k plus add ons.
As Byrne left to finally join Marseille as my first proper overseas export, transfer profit is now at just over £1.4m across three players sold, none of which cost me a penny to acquire.
Youth – Prospects and potential
SpoilerAs I was now about 18 months into my adventure with ACT, more youth prospects were beginning to make an impression on me. I’ve highlighted some before, and it’s worth noting it won’t always be the same names every update. That’s not say players previously mentioned have totally bust, but some players come on to the radar and may be more worthy of a mention than those who are already there.
There’s a mix of both here, with one returner and two new names, but rest assured, Yena Gcilishe and Collins Nene from my last update were both doing just fine.
Top prospects
Asavela Burgess, M(C)
SpoilerHe was still my best prospect I think, but that is becoming a more competitive race with each update. Still, if there was a player right now that I had tabbed as being the first to break into Europe’s top leagues and make an impact, it’s probably Burgess.
As you can see from the screen as well, he’s now a M(C), rather than a preferred DM(C), so that’s another plus and a string to his bow. I’ve been slowly bringing him through, including the first half of this season, but it won’t be long before he’s a locked in first choice for me, just like he is for the South Africa U20s and U23s. With a 7.18 average rating so far, it’s going to be hard to ignore him.
Njabulo Ngcobo, M(C)
SpoilerIf Burgess was 1A in line for Europe’s elite, Ngcobo could be 1B. He’s been great in the games he’s played so far, with a better average rating than Burgess in fact.
He played so well during the first half of the season that he broke in the senior National Team despite being 18, and was a regular starter during last month’s African Cup of Nations (more on that later).
The only negative is that the amount of football he’s playing domestically and internationally has left him a bit gassed, so he’ll probably need his minutes managing a bit more in the second half of the campaign.
Thapelo Phakathi, M(C)
SpoilerI had a wealth of M(C), prospects, but it was a nice problem to have. With Burgress and Ngcobo both breaking into first team, Phakathi would have to wait his turn.
That meant major problems for the other teams in my U21 and U19 leagues though. At 17, he was playing both, racking up an incredible 46 games by February. 20 goals from the middle of the park, 20 assists as well, 7.81 average rating.
As you can see, all that exposure is clearly helping him grow, so it shouldn’t be long until he also cracks the senior set up, potentially as a ready made replacement for one of the more established youngers leaving the nest.
TL;DR
My young prospects are becoming more defined, and I have some clearer tiers of players that are 18 or under yet ready for senior or U21 football.
I also have a variety of prospects across multiple positions, so choosing three players to feature is becoming more difficult. There’s plenty to go at here, which is a good sign.
All three prospects featured are M(C), which is a problem, but a good one. Asavela Burgess, Njabulo Ngcobo and Thapelo Phakathi are all around the 4/5 PA star mark and look set for a bright future.
Ngcobo, as the lone 18-year-old, has already broken into the senior South Africa set up, and did well at the recent AFCON tournament.
Structure – Off the pitch
SpoilerThings were going well on the pitch, with successful results and clear player development from multiple prospects. That may well have been linked to the success I was also having off the pitch, so thumbs up all round!
Staffing
After my initial struggles to find any staff good enough to improve me, or for staff that were good enough to improve me agreeing to take a big pay cut, I was still slowly making some headway with my backroom set up.
After about six months of trying to get him to join my merry crusade in Cape Town, a former SWFC hire in Paul Robinson finally agreed to enlist. He is class, a 4.5* Defence Technical coach, and that’s why I also had him at Wednesday.
SpoilerAndreas Biritz (4* fitness) and Paul Wotton (4* Def Tac) also came in, raising my training standards further still. I was on a roll!
Throw in Brendan MacFarlane, a 15 JPA 16 JPA scout who could scour England U19 leagues for more hidden gems that I could repurpose and send back home for a big profit, and things were going swimmingly!
With the new appointments, senior training improved from an average of 3.75 to 4.05
U21 training stays at 3.6 stars as I didn’t hire any youth staff this period.
If you think the budget for hiring good senior coaches is terrible, you don’t want to know what I can offer youth coaches!
Facilities
For those with long memories (or the ability to use the scroll function on this page), you’ll remember that during the summer the club agreed to improve our youth facilities.
With the last brick laid and the paint now dry, those facilities were completed around December time.
We were now the proud owners of a 20/20 youth facility set up, one of only a handful of teams worldwide that could boast such a thing.
Finances
Those facilities did come at a cost though, an actual financial one of course.
SpoilerWe closed the period at just a smidge under £3m, but for the season we’d lost just over £2m. Considering the youth facility upgrade cost £4.2m, this loss still seemed like pretty good going.
Also, you can see the dip in the summer where that work was paid for, but the balance has steadily grown since, showing we’re largely profitable.
Other Board Matters
A few worthy mentions here. My good work wasn’t going unnoticed, and the Board decided that my coaching staff could be expanded to double digits. I could now hire up to 10 senior coaches, so that was handy for increasing the speciality of the guys I appointed.
The number of scouts allowed was also increased, now six, meaning my scouting network was slowly creeping out of Africa and into a few other markets, specifically the U19 leagues of France and England.
Oh, and we’ve changed the black and white TVs in the Data Analysis facilities for colour ones, the cold tap in the bathroom no longer leaks, and there’s a fridge in the break room for staff to store their lunch. That all meant that those facilities were now upgraded to “average”. Great success!
TL;DR
Off field developments are still coming thick and fast.
I brought in three new senior coaches to raise the average star rating from 3.75 to 4.05, including Paul Robinson, who I had with me at SWFC. U21 coaching is still at 3.6 stars.
The Youth Facility work commissioned during the summer had been completed, and they were now rated as 20/20.
We had just under £3m in the bank, a good effort considering the youth facility upgrades cost £4.2m.
I could now employ more senior coaches (now 10), more scouts (now six) and the data analysis facilities had been upgraded to “average”.
National Side - Bafana Bafana
SpoilerStrap in for a longer update here, it's 2027 African Cup of Nations time baby!
Early success
September, October and November all provided plenty of cheer, with six wins from six as Bafana Bafana began to click.
The four wins in AFCON qualifying were impressive, but the team still finished 2nd behind Nigeria in group B. Still, that was enough to go through, which really was the minimum expectation.
The pair of wins over Tanzania and Mauritania were solid, but in truth, the National Team need to start testing themselves against much stronger opponents.
2027 AFCON
In a tough group with Senegal, The Gambia and DR Congo (both Senegal and DR Congo are ranked higher than SA right now), our boys were up against it early.
I had two players in the squad, youngster Njabulo Ngcobo, plus on loan right winger Bamuza Shezi.
Both played in all three group games, with a 2-2 draw against Senegal, a slender 1-0 win over The Gambia and a 1-1 draw with DR Congo, which was just enough for South Africa to sneak through the group in 2nd, on goal difference. Yikes!
From there, things improved. A 1-0 win over Congo was followed up by a 1-0 win over Tunisia, who had knocked us out of the 2025 AFCON at the same quarter final stage. Revenge!
The team was flourishing in front of my eyes. 18-year-old Ngcobo was magically becoming an international lynchpin in the centre of the park, and we smashed Cameroon 4-2, sealing a spot in the final!
Then we lost 1-0 to Morocco. Noooooooooooo!!!
After extra time as well. So close! My aims were already being realised though, to push the National Team forward. The loss was rubbish, but this was still progress.
It’s not all bad news
The seniors may have tasted defeat, but the U20 side wouldn’t be denied. The hammered their way through their own AFCON competition, thumping all before them before sealing a mighty 6-1 win over Morocco in the final. Get in lads!
It was a first AFCON win for that age group since 2021, and it was a great sign for the future. I had four players in that squad, with D(C) Mduduzi Gcaba, D(R) Siphilile Thango and ST(C) Given Nkosi all starting every game.
It’s also worth pointing out that I had five players in the U23 set up that were all U20s and could have featured. Great to see.
Looking forward
Not a lot to go on here, I’m afraid. There’s two friendly games with Mauritius and Equatorial Guinea in March, and that’s it until World Cup qualifiers in September.
Summary
It was going well, I can’t lie.
SpoilerI’m still not a major club in the nation though, that needs to change.
TL;DR
The seniors qualified for the 2027 African Cup of Nations, finishing 2nd in their group behind Nigeria, adding in a pair of easy friendly wins for good measure.
We squeaked out of the group stage on goal difference following a win and two draws, before making a run to the final, where we lost 1-0 AET to Morocco. Devastated!
The South Africa U20s smashed their own AFCON tournament, winning 6-1 in the final. I had 3 starters in that team, plus five U23 players that are U20 eligible but weren’t selected.
Bafana Bafana now have just two friendly games in March before World Cup qualifiers in September, and the team is up to 39th in the world, the highest since I began this write up.
Other – Because some things don’t fit anywhere else
SpoilerThere were a few other bits to recap, though nothing of any wild interest.
Wednesday were currently 4th in the Prem, though they’d lost in the FA Cup 4th round to Man City, and the League Cup 3rd round to West Brom on pens. Classic cup form from the Owls, then!
I was still on for the quadruple (league, MTN8, Nedbank and Champions League), though the Telkom loss was annoying.
After his run to the AFCON final, South Africa manager Molefi Ntseki’s job security was rated as “untouchable”, so any chance I had of getting that job seemed on the back burner for a while!
TL;DR
A short one, it might be the TL;DR section is as long as the actual section ha!
Wednesday were doing well, 4th in the league, but hadn’t done much in the FA or League Cup.
I still had three competitions I could win, having already sealed the MTN8, and being knocked out of the Telkom Cup. A quadruple still felt good though.
The South Africa manager’s job security was “untouchable” following their exploits at the 2027 AFCON.
Stats, stats, stats
SpoilerAs usual, let’s have a gander at some numbers to see how we’re doing.
Ajax rank in Africa
7th
No change here, but that’s because this one doesn’t normally change much until the end of the season when the big competitions are over.
National Team
Senior
2 – Ngcobo M(C), Shezi M(R) loanU23
5 - September D(L), Jonas D (RL), Burgess DM(C), Motale ST(C), Gcilishe ST(C)U20
4 - Mdatulwa GK, Gcaba D(C), Thango D(R), Nkosi ST(C)Some more solid representation here, and as I said in the National Team update, all five of the U23 selections are still eligible for the U20s, though weren’t needed in the U20 AFCON romp.
It seems inevitable that a number of my players will continue to filter through the system to the senior set up before long.
SA rank in Africa
9th
SA rank in World
39th
Strong gains here, from 13th in Africa and 59th worldwide in the last update, thanks to the excellent showing in the 2027 AFCON.
Domestic football
ABSA Prem rank in Africa
1st
ASBA Prem rank in World
50th.
Tiny change here, with the ASBA Prem rank slipping from 49th to 50th worldwide, but the competition still remains the one to win across the continent, so that’s good.
So there we are, another third of the season done. We still had the back portion of the campaign to go, with the opportunity to still win another three competitions and really put ACT on the map.
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On 10/06/2021 at 19:00, rlipscombe said:
Yes next season will be interesting - see what team we can put out. Club is a mess - feel a little sorry for Chansiri - think he was really badly advised in the early years and gambled on investing to get promoted. Since then we have been burdened by that financially and obviously Covid hasn't helped. Think we need a reset, a clear out and build to go again. Maybe take a little inspiration from those across the city... (did i say that out loud???)
I 100% agree with the fact we gambled and lost, but I think we held onto the dream for far too long once things went south, and that only made the effects worse. And then yeah, COVID etc has compounded things.
It's not just United though, Barnsley have far more of a plan and timeline than we do as well. It's not a nice feeling :-(
Just live in my fantasy SWFC world. It's warm and fuzzy and good here lol
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On 08/06/2021 at 21:25, rlipscombe said:
good to have another update... Sounds like you have spent a lot of the summer sorting out the staff and developing the youth facilities. Also good to see Sheffield Wednesday represented in the World Cup Final - let's face it, it's not something that is going to happen in real life for a while!
It has been good to get a grasp on the club and turn them around quickly into a reasonable outfit.
It could create an issue in that as a user I'm able to really unbalance a team in a league like South Africa just by running them more effectively, but we shall see. My training and staffing levels are already the best in the competition, and I don't feel like I've really scratched the surface all that much. I wonder if the majority of the AI sides will stay at the level ACT were when I inherited them, or if they to will improve. We'll see.
As for real life, yeah, less said the better! A complete joke of a club from top to bottom, wouldn't surprise me if we don't have a team to put out come next season.
It is worth noting that Wednesday have had a World Cup finalist, and winner no less, once in their history from what I can tell. Goalkeeper Ron Springett was a backup to the great Gordon Banks in 1966, but having four players in a Final is pure fantasy!
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A brief note before we begin. Firstly, apologies for the delay in updates, life has overtaken me and FM has fallen away for a time. Plus I've just had a week on holiday so that was never going to speed things up, though it was very welcome! I'll try to get back to posting every other week as I was, fingers crossed!
Moving swiftly on, and we had survived a season in South Africa. Not just survived I suppose, we had thrived!
We’d won the club’s first ever Premier League title, plus the CAF Confederations Cup and Super Cup, though we didn’t manage to snag a domestic knockout trophy.
More importantly, my first 12 months had taught me a lot of lessons about what to expect in my new venture, and spurred on by some initial success, I was confident I could keep the good times rolling.
Our first full summer was upon us. Season two, let’s go!
Oh, and more pictures!! Hurrah, I hear you exclaim! Each section is still in a spoiler tag, but as you can embed a spoiler section into a spoiler section, I’ll probably just put each image into one of those to keep things a bit shorter/tidier.
Onwards!
Team – On the pitch
SpoilerThere isn’t a lot of “on pitch” action during the summer, but there are of course plenty of things going on that affect the starting XI.
Speaking of which…..
Send in the cavalry
Last season could have been a relatively easy campaign to some extent, but the paper-thin squad that was largely populated by under 19 players and a fixture list that was packed fuller that a big lad’s lunchbox meant that life got a bit fraught at times, especially in May.
With the summer upon us, I made some immediate steps to try and remedy that one, and we did it for the grand total of….£0!
Bongani Zungu – M(C), FREE
SpoilerSome much-needed experience, at 33-years-old, and he had nearly 80 caps for South Africa. No problems on the registration front either, plus he could play centre mid or centre half so there was a tick for versatility as well.
He’d just been released after nine years in Amiens SC in France, and I was glad to have him on board.
Paul Thompson – M(L), FREE
SpoilerThompson came in via Sheffield Wednesday as a released youth player, so I knew a reasonable amount about him. He took up one of my five foreign spots, but it seemed a pretty good trade off for a position I struggled with last season.
With room to grow, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him back off to England in a year or two if all goes well.
Alexandre Ruiz – M(R), FREE
SpoilerRemember me saying I needed more wide midfielders? Ruiz could play down either flank and was another young cast-off, being let go by Stade Rennais.
Another one for the reclamation pile at ACT, he was hardly a typical wide player for my system, but I had little doubt he’d find success.
Bamuza Shezi - M(R), LOAN
SpoilerPossibly my biggest signing of the summer, Shezi was going to slot in on the right wing most likely and fit my South African developmental ethos even though he wasn’t mine.
The young winger had moved from Sundowns to 1.FSV Mainz 05 in Germany a year ago for the whopping sum of £350,000, but was yet to make an impact so I was happy to give him a chance to continue his development back in South Africa.
Raiding The Affiliates, And A Pair Of Familiar Faces
The four players above were the main intake to the club during the summer and all four should prove to be first teamers. There were some further reinforcements though as I plundered my senior affiliates for loan players that could fill out my squad:
Mark Steinlein, GK – FC Copenhagen
Morten Jensen, D(C) – FC Copenhagen
Gijs Verver, D(L) – Ajax AmsterdamAll were under 21 so didn’t need to be registered and would no doubt provide valuable minutes across the upcoming campaign, except Steinlein, who was very much pegged as the backup behind Reyaad Pieterse.
Before the window closed in August, I also enlisted the help of two players I’d brought in last summer:
Anderson Luiz, ST(C) – FLA
Ciro Bickel – ST(C) – GREI’d left Wednesday behind, but I couldn’t escape my filthy desire for Brazilian newgens. Disgusting.
In my defence, Luiz had scored 9 in 17 starts and Bickel scored 4 from 6, a useful return from a pair of 17-year-olds. Back once again, and a year older, I’m sure both would chip in once more.
And So It Begins
After plenty of success in season one, it was no surprise that before too long my lazy summer days were interrupted by the sound of the phone ringing.
I had talented youth prospects, and of course, people wanted to take them off my hands.
One I was expecting, the other less so, but both were done deals before long.
Asanele Velebhayi, M(C)
SpoilerVelebhayi was not only one of my top prospects, but a top first team player as well. Across 29 starts and seven sub appearances last season, he’s given me four goals, 11 assists and a 7.29 rating.
That was serious production, but ultimately a few offers came in and before long the 23-year-old wanted to go. I wasn’t going to stop him, and for a club with £4m or so in the bank, £550,000 plus 25% of his next sale was a good deal.
I was disappointed he wanted to move domestically but with just a single league title to our name so far, we weren’t yet the biggest fish in South Africa’s pond.
Good luck to him, but I reckon he’ll be looking up at us in the table for a good few years to come.
Teboho Byrne, ST(C)
SpoilerAnd so it begins, well hopefully. If Byrne is the only player I ever send to Europe, this career move won’t have gone well for me!
At 17, his deal was packed with add-ons, and the initial fee wasn’t all that impressive either. I would get 40% of whatever Marseille sold him for though, so fingers crossed his development continues.
He made nine senior starts last season and scored four goals (34 in 47 for the youth teams), and he wouldn’t be leaving until January so I still had a chance to get some further production out of him.
Competitions and Objectives
Last season’s success had raised the bar, both internally and externally. We had odds of 5-1 to repeat as Premier League champs, the media had us pegged to finish third behind Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs. Clearly they thought our title win was a flash in the pan!
ABSA Premiership – From the aim of avoiding relegation last season to something far more ambitious for 2026/27. No messing about from the board, they know we’re the real deal now.
2026/27 objective – Challenge for the title.CAF Champions League – I’d be managing ACT in the Champions League for the first time and testing ourselves against the best in Africa. The Board clearly felt we had the ability to fight, though. We’d need to clear the group stage, then win our quarter-final. Easy as that.
2026/27 objective – Reach the semi-finals.CAF Super Cup – The most Super of all the cups, well, not really. It was a chance to pick this up for the second year running, though. As Super as this cup is, the Board’s stance hadn’t changed from last year.
2026/27 objective – Don’t care! Get that junk out of here. We’re not even coming to watch.Telekom, Nedbank and MTN8 – You want a knockout cup with a big money title sponsor, we got you covered! I was in the MTN8 this season after missing out last year and that £1m prize for the winner has my name on it. Hopefully, anyway. I’ve lumped these cups together as the Board had rather unimaginatively given me the same objective for them all. Considering I’d won none of them last year, they’d raised the bar for sure.
2026/27 objective – Reach the final.
Spreadsheet
With the first prospects leaving the club for pastures new, it was time to fire up my tracking spreadsheet.
I’ve stolen this one from @ToMexico!!, who has a lengthy and thoroughly excellent Africa thread in DR Congo with Etoile du Congo, which you should totally check out.
Hey, it’s a modest start, but it is a start. I figured I’d put players into this spreadsheet once they leave, so Byrne will go into it once he bolts in the next period rather than now.
Still, we’d made over half a mil on a player we got for nothing through the Academy, so I’m taking that as a win.
TL;DR
It was a semi-busy summer, bringing in some notable reinforcements for season two.
M(L) Paul Thompson came in on a free from my former employers SWFC, and M(C) Bongani Zungu (33yo, 79 caps for South Africa) was my main signing.
Loans were once again a popular route for getting players in, with former Sundowns prospect Bamuza Shezi joining from Germany. A GK, D(C) and D(L) came in from my affiliates and I also signed two Brazilian strikers that were at the club on loan last year as well, Anderson Luiz and Ciro Bickel.
We’d agreed to sell two young players, with M(C) Asanele Velebhayi joining Sundowns for £550,000 and ST(C) Teboho Byrne going to Marseille in January with an incentive-heavy deal. Both had healthy add on clauses.
After last season’s successes, the board has much higher aims for us this season. That included challenging for the PL title, reaching the semi-finals of the CAF Champions League and making the final of all three domestic cups. No pressure, then.
Youth – Prospects and potential
SpoilerIt was still early days for a lot of my prospects, but I finally have the ability to show them to you as well so that’s a bonus.
Top prospects
Asavela Burgess, M(C)
SpoilerVelebhayi had gone, but Zungu had come in. Still, Burgess had the ability to keep earning a spot on my bench and step into the team when fixtures allowed.
His passing and technique were solid, as were his three key mental stats that often highlight a good player (Anticipation, composure, decisions).
At 17 he was already at a level that he could compete in the South African Prem, even if he didn’t always get the chances in my team.
Yena Gcilishe, ST(C)
SpoilerGcilishe looked set to feature heavily for my U19 and U21 sides, but purely because he wasn’t quite ready for the first team and Cole Schoeman, Anderson Luiz and Ciro Bickel would all be ahead of him in the queue.
He was still one of my brightest prospects though, with top physical stats, high determination and numbers in the right places elsewhere.
Collins Nene, M(R)
SpoilerAfter signing the young wide man in January, Nene had gone from strength to strength. It would be nice to be able to pick his opportunities this season a little more with the arrival of Ruiz and Shezi, I leaned on him more than I’d have liked last year.
Even at 17, he had the making of a solid defensive winger as he wasn’t terrible defensively, yet he still worked hard, had good aggression plus technical ability to boot.
TL;DR
There are three leading South African prospects at the club, who should all continue to develop in the coming season. They also have screen shots now, yay!
Centre mid Asavela Burgess, striker Yena Gcilishe and right winger Collins Nene are all still U18 yet of an ability to contribute to the first team. All have 4/5 stars for PA.
With the new signings during the summer, all should be able to integrate into the first team more gradually this season, compared to last season and the lack of squad depth.
Structure – Off the pitch
SpoilerGetting new faces in on the pitch was relatively easy. Getting the staffing side of the club up to speed was a significantly harder task.
It was something that I attacked with serious vigour during the summer though, and I wasn’t going to be defeated. There was a lot of “this guy looks good, oh, he doesn’t want to join me” going on, but eventually I plundered away for long enough to find some success.
Staffing
By “success”, I mean 28 staff ha
I had pretty much brought in a whole new set of staff to the club, filling the raft of empty spots that I’d been forced to endure last season.
My lone positive signing of last season was Paulo Noga as my Head of Youth Development from China. I had a shot of him now, so you can enjoy it if you like. Sorry it wasn’t present in last season’s content when I first signed him! Solid JPA/JPP, plus useful world knowledge, I’m sure you’ll agree.
SpoilerI also had a new right-hand man in Spaniard Ramon De Quintana. He ticked the boxes as a reasonable coach as well as having some decent though not great attributes as an assistant. Another recruit from China, which was proving to be a decent little hunting ground for me.
SpoilerThe other major pick up of note was Victor De Los Santos to lead my scouting team. He wasn’t the top of the tree at 17/17 JPA/JPP, but it was a LOT better than the standard of scout I’d been able to attract last season and he was a no doubt choice to be my new chief scout.
SpoilerI now had a full compliment of senior staff, and my youth teams were also largely fully stocked. The U19 and U21s were still missing Data Analysts and Sport Scientists but given their complete scarcity for even my senior side, this wasn’t surprising.
That means that once again, my standard of coaching was on the rise!
Senior training has risen from an average of 3.15 stars to 3.75.
U21 training has risen from an average of 2.9 stars to 3.6.
To say senior coaching was at 1.6 stars and the U21s at 0 stars this time last year, I feel like we’re on the right track.
Facilities
As hoped, putting some decent prize money into the bank and some silverware into the trophy cabinet had warmed the board to my ever-lovable persona. It made the conversation much easier when I went to them for a request, anyway.
£4.2m was BIG money for a team our size, it was most of what we had in the bank. Plus, with youth facilities that were already rated as 18/20, it wasn’t exactly a necessary upgrade.
Still, the move should advance us to 19 or 20 out of 20, and in my quest to push South Africa’s youth products into Europe, it was always going to be a positive step. It just killed the bank account a bit.
Finances
Speaking of which, like a magical Segway into the next part of this section, here’s the finances!
Perhaps I was spooked by the huge chunk of cash we’d splashed on upgrading the youth facilities, or much more likely that I just forgot, but I didn’t grab a finance screenshot for this period.
Never fear, I do always make note. We did have £4.6m in the bank coming into the period, and with £4.2m spent on the upgrade plus just over half a mil coming in from the transfer of Velebhayi to Sundowns, we closed the period with a balance of £1.5m.
Nothing to worry about there, especially as we spent last season being profitable month on month anyway.
Wait, did you think you were going to get LOADS of pictures now? I can’t give you all too much of a good thing 😊
Other Board Matters
The board’s good will towards me didn’t start and stop with emptying the piggy bank to upgrade the youth facilities. I must have been making a name for myself as the summer was a successful one in terms of getting what I asked for!
The Data Facilities continued to improve and were now up to a fairly mediocre “below average” rating. In short, we’ve replaced the pencils with pens, and there’s a wonky table in the corner of one of the rooms. We don’t have a way to fix the wobble, though.
The board agreed that despite the recruitment of 28 staff, the whole support structure was still too small. I successfully appealed for more senior coaches (now eight), more scouts (now five) and more physios (now four). I'll fill these extra slots once I find some worthy candidates that can improve my current levels, which could be the tricky bit.
In line with the improvement to the youth facilities, I also got the club to increase the junior coaching budget, which is now “excellent”. This was all going rather well!
TL;DR
Loads to recap, but it was pretty much all good news!
My summer recruitment on the staffing front had peaked at an impressive 28 new hires. That included a new assistant manager and chief scout.
I’d also managed to recruit the majority of my youth staff, though Data Analysts and Sport Scientists are still rarer than hen’s teeth.
Senior training was now up from an average of 3.15 to 3.75 stars, and U21 training was up from 2.9 to 3.6.
The board agreed to spend the bulk of our finances on improving the already impressive youth facilities, dropping £4.2m on the work.
With the outlay for the facility improvements, transfer money coming in plus the club’s general profitability, the accounts closed for the period with a balance of about £1.5m.
The board clearly had a happy summer, as they were willing to do loads more for me. The Data Analysis Facilities were improved to “below average”, I could now hire more senior coaches (eight), scouts (five) and physios (four), and the junior coaching budget was increased to “excellent”.
National Side - Bafana Bafana
SpoilerFor all the fun I’d been having with ACT, South Africa were also strutting their stuff on the world stage for the first time since 2010.
It was World Cup time, the 2026 tournament in North America.
Warm Up
In a somewhat questionable decision on the part of the South African FA, they elected to prepare for a tournament against the best teams on the planet with friendly games against……
Cape Verde and Namibia.
Perhaps it was to boost the confidence? It could work as well. They beat Cape Verde (78th in the world) 7-0 and Namibia (144th in the world) 4-0, two strong home wins and two clean sheets.
Could it work?!
L Is For Loser
In a word, no. It didn’t work. Drawn in Group L with reigning champions Italy plus fairly competitive South Americans Colombia, even the highly friendly structural reshuffle of the World Cup itself couldn’t save our boys.
I grew up with the four team groups, top two go through World Cups, but with a stupidly vast 48 teams now making the tournament proper, there’s 16 three team groups where the top two go through. Two teams from three is much easier than two from four, but it didn’t help.
A 2-0 loss to eventual finalists Italy was followed by a 3-0 defeat by Columbia, and just like that, South Africa’s first World Cup in 16 years was over.
No points. No goals. I’m not sure what expectations the FA had for the team, but they were surely higher than that.
Oh, and Pieterse hadn’t played a single minute. Just a nice holiday to North America to sit on the bench for two games. Never mind.
Fallout
The upshot of South Africa’s dismal effort in front of the eyes of the world was….pretty small.
Long time manager Molefi Ntseki (he’s been there since 2019, where he started as an assistant then became the full manager) had clearly had his debrief at FA HQ, and then that was that.
His job status went down to very insecure after the tournament, but he was never sacked.
I think I’d like the National Team job if it came up, to further push the country forward first-hand, but it appears my luck with international management opportunities had continued.
Looking forward
With the World Cup out of the way, next up were some more AFCON qualifiers, plus friendly games against Tanzania and Mauritania, who I’ve never even heard of.
On the brighter side, while the seniors were getting spanked in North America, the U20s successfully qualified for the U20 AFCONs. I had five players in the squad, with two starters, so that was a positive at least.
Summary
Here’s a handy at a glance look at the National Team, yay once more for the screenshots.
SpoilerZero ACT involvement on that screen. We need to get on with changing that as soon as possible. Hopefully another season of success will at least push us into the top six major clubs.
59th was also yet another improvement to the world rankings. South Africa were 68th in the final period of season one, so just appearing at the World Cup and losing had done the country some good at least.
TL;DR
South Africa warmed up for the 2026 World Cup with resounding home wins against Cape Verde (7-0) and Namibia (4-0). Neither team is ranks in the top 75 teams in the world.
Drawn in group L, South Africa lost 2-0 to defending champs Italy and 3-0 against Columbia. With no points and no goals, we went out of the tournament at the group stage.
My only player at the World Cup, goalkeeper Reyaad Pieterse, didn’t play a single minute in either game.
Long time manager Molefi Ntseki retained his job despite becoming very insecure on the jobs screen.
South Africa now have some AFCON qualifiers to look forward to, and the U20s have qualified for the next year’s U20 AFCON tournament. ACT had 5 players in that squad.
The National Team has risen in the rankings once again, with a World Cup appearance that yielded two losses still pushing South Africa to 59th.
Other – Because some things don’t fit anywhere else
SpoilerThis is a hard section to write. Very, very hard. I’ll not lie, and I make no secrets about it. Here goes.
First up, I advise you all to go to this update from July & August 2024, when I was still at Sheffield Wednesday. Specifically, section 3, you can skip the rest. It’s ok, I’ll wait:
Despite a wholly unspectacular track record as a domestic manager, Paul Hurst had been chosen to lead England following the departure of Graham Potter. At that point I’d won the FA and League Cup, and I’d just taken a second straight trip to the quarter finals of the Champions League. Still, my application for the job was rejected. I was, unimpressed, to say the least.
The 2026 World Cup was full of strong teams, as you’d expect. England stumbled to a win over Peru and a draw with Ivory Coast to top a weak Group F on four points.
A 4-1 second round win over Russia followed, as did a 5-0 pumping of Holland, who always seem to underperform on my FM games.
A logic-defying 3-2 win over Germany lit up the quarter-finals before Hurst’s Barmy Army destroyed Spain 4-1. The Three Lions had avoided the world’s top sides in France, Italy, Brazil and Argentina, but wins over top 10 sides Germany and Spain were impressive, and Holland are still in the top 20.
So there we are. The eagle-eyed amongst you may have seen that I mentioned in the previous section about South Africa that Bafana Bafana shared a group with World Cup finalists Italy, BECAUSE PAUL HURST AND ENGLAND WON THE 2026 WORLD CUP.
SpoilerIt was a horrible combination throughout the tournament of wanting England to do well, of course, mixed with the bitter hatred for the fact I felt I should be managing them and that Paul Hurst was a terrible appointment that was doomed to fail.
Until he didn’t. Humble pie sure does taste good.
All that’s left to do before I skip over this and never, ever, ever mention it again, is that Italy picked Moise Kean, had Seb Esposito on the bench (pure stupidity, I might add), plus former D(C) Alessandro Bastoni (now at Arsenal). England had Tommy Doyle, plus Ryan Sessegnon as an unused sub. The Sheffield Wednesday connection was strong.
TL;DR
After being hugely irritated at the appointment of Paul Hurst to manage England in 2024 over my good self, he has led England to the 2026 World Cup, beating Italy 2-1 in the final.
Sheffield Wednesday players Moise Kean, Seb Esposito, Tommy Doyle and Ryan Sessegnon were all involved in the final, with Kean and Doyle both starting, Esposito coming off the bench and Sessgnon an unused sub.
Former SWFC D(C) Alessandro Bastoni, now with Arsenal, also started for Italy.
Stats, stats, stats
SpoilerHere we go then! For reference, I’ll wait until the end of this season before I start putting these numbers into graphs since this is only the second instalment of stats so far. That way there’s a solid 4-6 data points to start seeing any trends.
Ajax rank in Africa
7th
We had climbed two spots from 7th to 9th based on last season’s efforts. The clubs we had passed were fellow SA side AmaZulu and Congo’s TP Mazembe, who had dropped down a little following a poor showing in the CAF Champions League.
National Team
Senior
2 - Pieterse GK, Shezi M(R) loanU23
3 - September D(L), Burgess DM(C), Ngcobo M(C)U20
5 - Shereni GK, Mdatulwa GK, Jonas D(RL), Motale ST(C), Nkosi ST(C)Still some strong representation, with Shezi joining Pieterse in the senior side even if he’s only with me temporarily. Shezi didn’t make the World Cup but was drafted into the squad shortly before the period closed and I grabbed this data.
Of the five U20s that helped SA qualify for next year’s U20 AFCON, Shereni and Motale were both regular starters.
SA rank in Africa
13th
SA rank in World
68th
Both rises, with SA moving up in Africa from 15th to 13th, and from 68th to 59th in the world. I assume both were linked to making the World Cup and playing two group games.
Domestic football
ABSA Prem rank in Africa
1st
ASBA Prem rank in World
49th
The SA Prem remains top dog in Africa, with a modest rise from 55th to 49th for the competition overall. Still nothing of any particular value, but movement up rather than down is always going to be positive.
And there we have it, we are all set for the 2026/27 season. It’s been a busy summer with the World Cup, hiring nearly 30 staff members, plus trying to get the squad in shape as well.
Tune in next time to see how we got on between September and February, plus there was the 2027 AFCON to look forward to, should South Africa manage to qualify!
0 -
Congratulations, you’ve made it to the end of season one. Well, not quite, you still have some information to sift through that wraps up the second half of my first season, but this should be the last update that is truly text heavy.
As you may recall, the club was still unbeaten at the halfway stage, and top by eight points over rivals Orlando Pirates. It’s a pretty sweet effort considering how unstable the club looked when I arrived, plus things can only get better the longer I stay and continue to build.
I’ll also have the first lot of stats at the end of the this update, though nothing too fancy in terms of charting rise and fall just yet.
Let’s jump in and see how our first season panned out, and if we could start our tenure in SA with a league win.
Team – On the pitch
SpoilerIn anticipation of things to come, this section has not one, not two, but three images to help recap! What a time to be alive!!
Cross-city rivals cross Africa
Our general success in season one wasn’t just contained to domestic matters, we were also putting the rest of Africa on notice.
Knockout wins against Algeria’s CS Constantine and South African neighbours AmaZulu FC had set up a Continental Cup final against……Cape Town City!
That’s right, our cross-town, ground sharing rivals were the only team standing in our way of a first major continental trophy, since I took over anyway.
And where was this titanic battle set to place between two such heated local rivals?
A casual 10,000KM North of Cape Town in Egypt, as it happens. Fairly brutal for all concerned, not least the fans. We didn’t get many of those even when we played at home!
Either way, the game was a success. We won 2-0 with another two goals from Brazilian loan sensation Anderson Luiz. He was far too good for this level and I was glad to have him aboard.
Our second trophy of the season was in the bag, following up our CAF Super Cup success with a second successive CAF Confederations Cup (though I of course didn’t win it last season, thanks AI!)
I predict a riot
Two updates in and I’ve already used up my Kaizer Chief reference. Now I just have to work out how many more posts I need to churn out before I can slip it in again and nobody will remember….
We had made the final of the Nedbank Cup (FA Cup) against the mighty Kaizer Chiefs. They were doing well in the league (not as good as us, I might add), but in short, the boys ran out of steam. We were playing our eighth game in three weeks (not a typo, more on that shortly) and my paper thin squad of kids didn’t have one more performance in them.
We gave it a good go, of course, but after leading 1-0 at the half, we shipped two after the break to lose 2-1.
The club’s wait for a first ever Nedbank Cup goes on, but hopefully not too much longer.
Results + Table
As it turns out, the end of the season was fairly insane. I’m not sure if it is down to poor planning on the part of the league/CAF etc, but my fixture list was absolute packed. Dangerously so in fact. For a team with as little depth as we had, we were playing on the following dates in May:
2nd
6th
9th
13th
16th
18th
20th
23rd
25th
27thFor real. By doing well in the Nedbank and Confederations Cup (Europa League), we’d postponed a lot of games and the answer appeared to be.....errr....just chuck them into the final month of the season and see what happens? Sure, why not.
Anyway, here’s how we did.
SpoilerThere was a wobble in the league in late April as we lost back-to-back games in fairly one-sided circumstances (see –-> “Getting FM’d”), but we managed to right the ship again.
In the end, it all added up to one thing:
We’d won our first ever Premier League title. It came a lot faster than it did with Wednesday, but it was no less special. Things certainly felt pretty dicey in April with the losses and May with the idiotic fixture list, but we’d got over the hump and won in style!
A season in review
It was hard to say the season was anything other than a huge success.
Battling a lopsided squad, a trip into the unknown, some truly poor staffing behind the scenes and me still finding my feet, we’d:
- Won the Premier League, the first ever for the club I should add.
- Won the CAF Confederations Cup, which was the club’s second in a row.
- Won the CAF Super Cup, first ever there to.
- Made the final of the Nedbank, though we did lose with an exhausted squad.
- Lost in the first round of the Telkom.
The board were delighted, so were the fans. I was pretty pleased with the achievements as well, though it didn’t move my manager rating in any way, a clear indication of where all those competitions are ranked in terms of global importance.
TL;DR
The club battled a truly horrific fixture list that saw 10 games crammed into May, with our thin squad of kids feeling the burn.
We won our first major trophy, knocking off rivals Cape Town City 2-0 in the CAF Confederations Cup (Europa League). The game was played over 10,000KM away from Cape Town in Egypt, impressive considering we both share a stadium in South Africa!
Part of the late season stretch of games was the NedBank Cup (FA Cup) final, where the squad was exhausted. We lost 2-1 to Kaizer Chiefs.
We won the Premier League, finishing nine points ahead of second place Orlando Pirates. It was the club’s first ever PL title.
Season one saw ACT capture the Premier League, CAF Super Cup and CAF Confederations Cup, plus make the final of the Nedbank Cup. Pretty good going, all told.
Youth – Prospects and potential
SpoilerLike Christmas Eve
The end of the season came and as we moved into April, I was anticipating a news item that would no doubt take on significant importance in this write up.
I am talking about, of course, the yearly youth intake.
It would appear that South Africa’s date is early April, around the 3rd or 4th, so we didn’t have to wait long once the calendar flipped over from March.
Now, I’m sure a lovely screen shot of the relevant prospects would be a great idea in this section, but I don’t have one. So, here we are instead:
The class was fairly poor
I had one 4/5*PA striker, called Given Nkosi
I had one 4*PA centre mid, called Thapelo Phakathi
That’s about it. Everything else was three stars or lower, hardly setting the world alight. I’ll not lie, with the club’s rating for youth recruitment, I was hoping for better. Still, it’s early days.
Top prospects
We had now played a full season, and two players had stuck their hand up as looking like they were going to be solid prospects going forward. What their future held remains to be seen, but as a pair of 16-year-olds, both looked like they were able to cut it at the Premier League level with plenty of room still to grow.
Asavela Burgess M(C) – He’s made 9 senior starts with 12 appearances off the bench, chipping in a goal and a 6.88 average rating. For the junior teams, he’d managed a 7.7 rating from 40 appearances, so the ability was clearly there. Previously a DM(C), a full season of training as a M(C) had just about converted him.
Yena Gcilishe ST(C) – 6 starts, 4 subs for 3 goals and a 6.91 rating. He was playing second fiddle to Anderson Luiz and Cole Schoeman (who scored 43 goals between them, with Schoeman getting 34 on his own!), but the youngster had scored an outrageous 57 goals in 50(11) for the youth teams at 7.93. He was too good for that level, and no doubt it wouldn’t be long before he was a solid addition to the PL squad.
And that’s about it. We don’t have any prospects that we’ve sold yet, though I’m not sure if that is a good thing or not. The point is to start sending players out into Europe rather than keep them for my own success, but we’d only had one season I suppose.
TL;DR
Another relatively short section as we’re still only a year into our adventure with ACT.
The club had its first youth intake since taking over, with a one 4/5*PA striker called Given Nkosi and one 4*PA centre mid, called Thapelo Phakathi. Everyone else was 3* or lower.
Two prospects had stood out during 2025/26, M(C) Asavela Burgess and ST(C) Yena Gcilishe.
Both had killed it at youth level (Glcilishe scored 57 goals this season at U19 and U21 level) and were now beginning to make an impact for the senior team.
Structure – Off the pitch
SpoilerIt was a relatively quiet period off the pitch, but that is to be expected. Once the second half of the season gets underway, the focus is very much on the pitch for the business end of the schedule. The off the pitch focus then comes back once we reach the summer, but there were still a few things to note.
Staffing
Of the things were noting though, staffing wasn’t one haha
No new staff came into the club during this period, so the training levels remain the same:
Senior training is still an average of 3.15 stars.
U21 training is still an average of 2.9 stars.
Facilities
Likewise, the club still wasn’t interested in doing much to the already impressive facilities, apart from to add a few pencils and an extra notebook to the cardboard box that we called our “Data Analysis Facilities”.
Another upgrade was completed during the period, taking their description to “fairly poor”. Not a massive issue as we still didn’t have any actual analysts to employ to use the facilities anyway!
Finances
Much to love here though. Even when taking some dollar out to buy said pencils and notebooks for the pathetic data facilities above, once we’d added in the prize money for the various competitions we’d excelled in this season, the bank account was showing a very healthy £4.9m.
Considering we started the season on £1.2m, we’d won a bunch of stuff and not really paid for much of anything, this was undoubtedly an area to be pleased with.
With the added gravitas of winning some stuff, plus extra money available, I was hopeful that next period I’d be able to sweet talk the board into pushing some other facilities forward. We shall see.
Attendance
A brief one, but the club’s end of season average attendance was 17,316. In a 64,100 seater stadium, that wasn’t particularly impressive.
This is a stat that I will track year on year through to see if we have any growth.
Other board matters
There were only two other off the pitch developments worth mentioning.
One was that I got a notice about a potential takeover, with a consortium rumoured to be interested in the club. In truth, I had enough with that nonsense at Sheffield Wednesday and didn’t take the slightest bit of notice. As per, nothing materialised and the news item went away as quickly as it came up.
Secondly, with Ajax and FC Copenhagen in the mix as senior affiliates to tap up for young loan players, I went to the board and asked for a third. You can’t have too much of a good thing, right? And dodging player wages because of the affiliate agreement was excellent given the financial constraints of South African football.
The board flatly refused.
I guess I’ll have to win another Premier League or two before they start warming to me, eh?
TL;DR
No new staff came to the club during this period, so senior training is still an average of 3.15 stars, U21 training is still 2.9 stars.
The board were unwilling to make wholescale upgrades to the majority of the already impressive facilities, but did agree to continue the work on our Data Analysis centre, which is now “fairly poor.”
With the general success from this season, prize money has swelled the bank balance to £4.9m, up from £1.2m when I took over.
The club’s average attendance for the season was 17,316. Lots of space for supporters to spread out with 64,100 seats to fill.
There was briefly mention of a consortium that was interested in a takeover. It never came to anything.
I asked for another senior affiliate to tap into loan signings without having to pay wages. With Ajax and FC Copenhagen already providing such an arrangement, the board turned my request down.
National Side - Bafana Bafana
SpoilerLike the off-pitch writeup, this will also be a fairly quite section in in the final third of the season.
There’s usually only one international window in the period, which falls in March. That leaves the AFCON/CHAN to fall in the pervious period and any summer tournaments, like the upcoming 2026 World Cup, to fall in the next update.
March’s international window does contain two games though, either friendlies or the final two AFCON qualifiers, depending on the season.
This year’s offering is of the AFCON variety, with South Africa beating Niger away 3-0 before losing at home 2-0 to Nigeria. Still, it was enough for our boys to seal a spot in next January’s tournament, so good news there regardless.
With the World Cup now just a month or so away, there are a few prep games to look forward to in June before the tournament kicks off.
One Ajax Cape Town player will be in North America as part of the SA squad, and that is keeper Reyaad Pieterse. He’d had a solid season for me but I wasn’t sure if he’d get any game time at the tournament. Good luck to him though!
Finally, South Africa has risen in the world rankings once again. In my intro, they were 76th, then 70th last update. Now they’re 68th. Hopefully appearing at the World Cup will help that number continue to improve.
If only there was some sort of chart or image I could use to plot the changes in ranking over a period of time? That would show the differences up and down at a glance? I’ll have a think about that one and see what I can do….
TL;DR
Period three is slow one for international football, with just a single window in March.
AFCON qualification went well, with South Africa sealing a spot at next season’s tournament following a 3-0 away win against Niger and a 2-0 home loss to Nigeria.
The 2026 World Cup is just around the corner, with goalkeeper Reyaad Pieterse the only ACT representative for South Africa, or any other country for that matter.
The club had made another modest rise in the World rankings, up to 68th now.
Other – Because some things don’t fit anywhere else
SpoilerLife was going pretty well in England for Thomas Tuchel, though obviously not as good as when I was there.
Wednesday finished third in his first season, with Man City winning the league and Man United coming second. The club had won the Community Shield to begin the year, so yay for that, and they exited both the League Cup and the FA Cup at the quarter-final stage.
Picking up a trend that I endured towards the end of my tenure, the Owls had done well in the Champions League before getting dumped out at the semi-final stage by….Man City. It marked the third time in four seasons that City had beaten us, though one game short of the final was still the furthest the club had ever gone in Europe.
TL;DR
You can expand and get checking that section, ya filthy skim readers. It’s only short anyway.
Only kidding.
Wednesday finished 3rd in their first season without me, coming in behind both Manchester sides as City took the title.
There were exits in both the League and FA Cup at the quarter-final stage, whilst City also knocked the Owls out of the semi-finals of the Champions League, the furthest the club had ever been in Europe.
Stats, stats, stats
SpoilerI do love stats, and I figure that for a set up like this one that will take place and track the evolution of club and country over multiple seasons, they should be useful for showing any trends that are taking place, or not taking place (as could sadly be the case!).
To recap, I’d outlined these rough aims before I began:
- Could I help kick start the development of South Africa as a footballing market?
- Can I produce the level of talent required to send successful players to Europe?
- Is there sufficient potential for the future for the country to become a footballing power?
As such, it seemed a good idea to track how ACT were improving, how I was affecting the National Team and their progress, plus how South African domestic football was improving thanks to my exploits.
If and when I start exporting the stars of tomorrow to Europe, I’ll also keep an eye on those trends as well.
Ajax rank in Africa
9th
We were the fifth highest South African team following our PL win, behind AmaZulu, Kaizer Chiefs, Sundowns and Orlando Pirates. ES Tunis, Al-Ahly and Congo’s TP Mazembe were also above us.
National Team
Senior
1 - Pieterse GKU23
3 - September D(L), Burgess DM(C), Ngcobo M(C)U20
5 - Shereni GK, Mdatyulwa GK, Jonas D(RL), Motale ST(C), Nkosi ST(C)A healthy smattering of youth players there, so that is a pleasing start. Hopefully we can begin to push some of those players through to the full set up in the next year. Surprisingly, no place for Yena Gcilishe, clearly the National Team aren’t casting a careful enough eye onmy youth sides to pick their teams because he's been insane at that level.
SA rank in Africa
15th
SA rank in World
68th
Both are fairly low, lower than they should be I’d say. It seems ridiculous that South Africa are only the 15th best teams in Africa. That puts them behind Angola, Burkina Faso, Guinea, but saying that Egypt are also 10th. They should be higher as well I reckon!
World ranking continues to steadily rise, so good stuff there.
Domestic football
ABSA Prem rank in Africa
1st
ASBA Prem rank in World
55th
The good news, the South African Premier League is the #1 domestic league in Africa.
The bad news, it lags way down the list of world competitions, not even cracking the top 50. Leagues that were narrowly ahead of us included the 2nd tiers in Spain, France, Brazil and Italy, plus the top leagues in Saudi Arabia, Bulgaria and Belarus.
I guess I’ll not get my hopes up for increasing my manager rating then, even if I win everything there is to win here for the next 10 years ha!
So there we are, you’ve made it through season one. We’ll be laughing from here on in, and if the first year is anything to go by, I'll be laughing to!
1 -
So, with the introductions out of the way, it was time to dive in. Two footed as well, no messing about. I was a little apprehensive about what could be achieved, at least in the short term, given the quality of both the playing squad and the staff that were already in place. We had to start somewhere though.
Just to recap, the Premier League season in South Africa is split into four periods. The first is eight games and lasts just over two months from late August to 1st November. The second is seven games and ends in mid-December. There is then about a six-week break for the AFCON or CHAN to take place.
Period three begins about a week into February, with eight games until mid-March. Period four is then mid-March until mid-May, with those seven games wrapping the season up.
My approach was going to be a simple one. I was going to try and replicate everything I did at SWFC as closely as possible, budgetary constraints aside, as it was a proven formula in terms of tactics, approach, training and so on. Would it work in South Africa? We were going to find out!
Oh, and once again, apologies for the amount of text. It will get better soon, promise!
Team – On the pitch
SpoilerSo, what were my first impressions?
Training
Right off the bat, this was almost a semi-pro set up, amateur in fact. The team trains once a day, occasionally twice. That wasn’t going to cut it, and these boys were about to be in for a rude awakening!
In keeping with what I did with the Owls, it’s two sessions a day with an extra set piece/technical/team building/low impact session on top. Mainly focussing on ball retention, pressing, defending from the front, all those types of things.
It seemed like the combination of poor coaches already at club kind of went hand in hand with the lousy schedule, so both will be overhauled.
Early success
Pre-season went well, 4 wins and a draw against some fun sides, including Steenberg United, Cape Omoya United and Mpumalanga United. Catchy!
I won 4-1 and then 2-0 in the CAF Confederations Cup prelim round, so that was positive to.
I went into the CAF Super Cup against ES Tunis, a powerhouse and six-time CAF Champions League winner from Tunisia, with pretty low expectations. The team was still trying to mesh with my system, the one striker thing wasn’t ideal, and the lack of M(L) and M(R) in a 4-4-2 was an ongoing concern.
That said, we won 1-0. The revolution had begun! I’d love to say some 18-year-old local product had popped up with the winner, but that would have been too perfect. Instead it was left back/left mid Rodrick Kabwe, my only non-South African player in fact!
It’s worth noting it was also the club’s first ever CAF Super Cup, so we’re breaking new ground already. Excellent all round.
I also continued my solid form in the CAF Confederations Cup, knocking off Senegal’s AS Academie Generation Foot 6-0 on aggregate to meet the board’s objective and reach the group stage. Another tick.
Transfers – part 1
As previously discussed, the squad was a bit of a mess. Sadly, I somewhat shot myself in the foot early on this one and my initial ability to bring players in was seriously hampered.
Here was my thinking, see if you can spot where the pitfall is:
Step 1 – Come into club, look at existing staff.
Step 2 – Realise existing staff are abysmal, sack 95% of said staff immediately.
Step 3 – Hire much better staff.
Step 4 – Success!
10 points for anyone that said step 3, because after firing pretty much all my staff, I realised that unlike yours truly, nobody actually really wanted to come and join my one-man crusade in South Africa to raise the mighty ACT into a global superpower.
It took some back and forth for my lofty desire for top class staff to drop and align with what I could actually appoint, and the meeting point between the two was disappointingly low. Crushingly low in fact haha
That also applied to my scouts, so I was pretty much recruiting blind during my first summer as I pondered getting some early reinforcements in.
In the end, I settled on picking up a young 19-year-old centre back from Ajax on a loan called Ardit Strakosha, and I bought Sundowns keeper Reyaad Pieterse for a whopping £17k. Both were easy on the registration front though, Pieterse is South African and Strakosha doesn’t need to be registered until he’s 21.
Still, hardly the sweeping squad changes that we probably needed. But that was largely my fault so the less said the better. Moving swiftly on!
Results + table
Yes, finally a screen shot! And a chance to drop a spoiler inside a spoiler, class!
SpoilerI’ll say this, there’s a lot of green there! Gutted to knocked out in the Telkom 1st round, but I did say during my intro that reaching the quarters would largely depend on the draw I got and away to Kaizer Chiefs is probably one of the hardest draws I could have received. The board agreed, no harm done.
We were unbeaten in the league at the halfway stage, 15 games. 12 wins, three draws, but annoyingly one was against rivals Cape Town City. Still, it wasn’t a loss. I also never lost to Sheffield United, Barnsley or Rotherham, so the derby streak lives on.
Sadly, the screen shots start and stop with the results above, so I’ll have to tell you I was top of the league, eight points ahead of Orlando in second.
With little squad depth, a number of kids were already playing serious minutes and more than holding their own (as results suggest).
Cole Schoeman was the saviour 3.0. Despite his 2.5 star CA billing, the 25-year-old had 17 goals from 23 games in all competitions. Go on lad!
Transfers – part 2
By the time the window opened again January, I had a much better handle on what we needed, I had some scouts in place, and most importantly, I knew that what we had already was capable of winning the league, give or take.
January consisted of four loans and a permanent transfer. On loan we had:
- ST(C) Anderson Luiz (FLA)
- ST(C) Ciro Bickel (GRE)
- M(C) Jergo Meerdink (Ajax)
- D(C) Klaus Bay (KOB)
Two strikers from Brazil. Both were recruited without me knowing half of their attributes, but what I could see made me confident they would rip up South Africa. I got in an attacking minded centre mid from Ajax in Meerdink, and then also picked up another CB in the shape of Klaus Bay from FC Copenhagen (more about that one in the club section).
The only piece of permanent business I made was to buy a 4.5* PA M(R) from Bloemfontein Celtic called Collins Nene. He looks pretty tidy for 17, should immediately get minutes in an area where I lack depth, and he cost me £74k. That pretty much ended my budget for the season, but hopefully he joins the conveyor belt of talent heading to Europe in a year or two.
Oh, and all 5 players are U21, so no need for registration issues either. Hurrah!
TL;DR
The club is set up in a semi-pro fashion at best, with limited training sessions planned each week. This has been remedied immediately. Get running, boys!
We won the club’s first ever CAF Super Cup, beating reputable Tunisian side ES Tunis 1-0. Our first trophy!
The club is unbeaten through 15 league games, with 12 wins and three draws. We drew the first Ikapa derby 1-1 against Cape Town City.
We’re top of the league at the halfway stage, leading second place Orlando Pirates by eight points.
We got knocked out of the Telkom Cup, but continue to go well in the CAF Confederation Cup, reaching the group stages and winning three from three so far.
Due to sacking off all the deadwood staff when I first arrived, recruitment has been slow. A South African GK plus a CB from Ajax on loan were brought in during pre-season, with four further loans in January plus the permanent signing of a 17-year-old South African M(R) called Collins Nene for £74k.
Youth – Prospects and potential
SpoilerThis is another short section.
Through 15 league games and a few cup matches, multiple players have featured. Some had impressed, some hadn’t, most had been fairly inconsistent. They are kids, after all.
Some players were beginning to emerge, and coupled with the rather unreliable star ratings from my rag-tag bunch of backroom staff, I could take a stab in the dark and say:
- AM(C) Asanele Velebhayi looks a solid prospect, and at 22, he could be retrained to the attacking mid of my centre mid pairing. He’s played 12 games so far, with a rating of just over 7 and two goals.
- ST(C) Teboho Byrne also looks fairly handy, and he’s scoring at more than a goal a game from my U21s despite being 17. He’s hasn’t scored in a handful of senior appearances so far, however.
- DM(C) Asavela Burgess is 16 and clocking a 7.62 rating across 22 U19 and U21 appearances. He has also been given a smattering of first team opportunities, with mixed results. Retraining is also needed, like Velebhayi, to make him a M(C).
This is no doubt a section that will begin to flesh out once we get into future seasons, but they’re my early observations for now.
TL;DR
Not a lot to this section, so dive into it if you wish.
I’ve picked three players out that have impressed initially, 22-year old AM(C) Asanele Velebhayi, 17-year-old striker Teboho Byrne and 16-year-old DM(C) Asavela Burgess.
Structure – Off the pitch
SpoilerStaff recruitment – part 1
Oh boy. Live look in at my first off-season from a staffing perspective:
I came in hot, and it didn't really pan out, to put it mildly.
In a lot of cases, I eventually signed guys just to have "someone". It turns out having a terrible member of staff was only marginally better than not having anyone, but a lot these early hires are on borrowed time before they’ve even walked in the door.
That said, I lucked my way into a solid Head of Youth Development. 55-year-old Paulo Noga had recently finished a stint at the Shandong Luneng Football School in China, and remarkably (unlike 99% of the initial staff members I approached), he wanted to join me!
With 16 for JPP and JPA, and 19 for working with youngsters, he was actually good. The sort of staff members I was hoping I’d be able to sign.
Alas, that trend didn’t continue. The fact the board would only give me a pitiful amount in staff wages combined with the complete dead fish appeal of South African football, recruitment was a long and disappointing thrash.
In the end, I managed to at least appoint a reserve, U21 and U19 manager, and an assistant manager for myself who was barely usable. Honestly, I don’t think I’d have trusted him to be a cone on the training ground every day. The English Premier League was a long and distant memory....
The only signings of note, Noga aside, were as follows:
- I signed former Blackburn keeper Bobby Mimms as a goalkeeping coach. This guy has had more clubs than I’ve had hot dinners, and as a relatively rotund fellow, that is some achievement. Wiki suggests he played for 13 teams in his career, and he’s had 13 different coaching jobs since 2001. Oh, and he’s won the Premier League with Blackburn as a player. Most recently he’d been knocking around India with ATK in Kolkata, plus SC East Bengal (and a stop with the Bangladesh national side in there to). Still, he was an 18/17/17 GK coach, and was gratefully snapped up.
- I signed Arjen Robben as a coach. Yeah, that Arjen Robben. With 96 caps to his name, this was his first job since he retired at Bayern in 2019, and he was a 3.5 star possession – technical coach that I was happy to have on board.
The various signings allowed my coaching ratings to rise to the following:
- Senior training – 1.6 star average to 2.4 star average, then up to 3.15 in January.
- U21 training – 0 star average to 1.4 star average, then up to 2.9 in January.
Facilities
I was yet to convince the board to really improve any of our already impressive facilities due to my limited time at the club, but one thing they did sign off was to improve the data analysis facilities.
I had, however, found out why those facilities were so badly lacking when everything else at the club appeared so shiny and new.
From what I can gather, data analysis isn’t a thing in South African football. I was led to this realisation when I was filling my staff, and went to search for available data analysts.
There are none. Perhaps I had ticked a box wrong, or set my criteria too high. I checked the search settings. Nope. It was set to show me literally any interested data analysts in the world, of any ability.
Zero.
Sports Scientists were a similar story. There was 1 of those available for me. In the world.
So for now, I’ll just keep improving my data analysis facilities, even if I can’t find anyone to use them!
Finances
In short, these were looking pretty good.
In a rare turn events for a football club, we weren’t losing money. Good job as well, given the relatively meagre amounts we were talking about. Getting into the red with such a modest income would have been dire at this level.
So we are making cash, but not a lot.
My original £1.2m in the bank has increased to £2.3m, but neither my transfer budget nor my wage budget has increased.
Still, going well on the money front. Shouldn’t be selling the Academy any time soon!
A new affiliate
It appears that getting young loan players in that don’t need to be registered as they’re U21 will be a useful way to go.
With that in mind I went, cap in hand, to the board and asked for a new senior affiliate. They weren’t willing to give me the power to choose one, but of the teams they came back with, FC Copenhagen seemed the most likely candidate.
And so it was done, and that’s how CB Klaus Bay came to the club as well. Hopefully the stream of prospects from Denmark is as fruitful as the one from Holland!
TL;DR
The club brought in some new staff, but in a lot of cases they were pretty terrible hires.
We did manage to find a pretty good Head of Youth Development, a good goalkeeping coach in former Premier League winner Bobby Mimms, and Dutch winger Arjen Robben.
Training averages currently stand at 3.15 stars for the seniors and 2.9 for the U21s.
The club has begun upgrading the data analysis facilities, though recruiting both data analysts and sports scientists is proving highly problematic.
The club was slowly making money, with the finances up from £1.2m to £2.3m in the bank. Neither my transfer budget nor wage budget had increased however.
We have a new affiliate in FC Copenhagen, with a young CB already joining us from Denmark in Klaus Bay.
National Side - Bafana Bafana
SpoilerNot a lot cooking for the national side, who managed a win over Sudan plus a pair of draws with Guinea-Bissau and one against DR Congo to scrap through to the upcoming World Cup. Hardly setting the world on fire, and they wouldn’t have made it were it not for the expanded format and more teams qualifying than in previous years.
They did have two friendly games in the period as well, pulling out a 2-0 win away to Libya, and a 5-3 victory on the road in Liberia. Not much to draw from those results either as both teams aren’t highly ranked, unsurprisingly.
There’s two final AFCON qualifiers for next January’s tournament still to play next month against Niger and Nigeria, but Bafana Bafana should have enough about them to still make it through.
In January, there was a CHAN tournament but despite SA’s recent success at that tournament, we didn’t even qualify. Very odd drop off indeed, but yeah, nothing to write about from the January break I’m afraid, just lots of guys sat around with nothing to do!
Only one other piece of business and that is ranking. South Africa is now 70th in the world, which is a small rise from 76 in the last update. It’s not much, but it’s something at least.
TL;DR
The team has qualified for the 2026 World Cup, but not by much, and they wouldn’t have made it were it not for the tournament's expansion.
There were also friendly wins away to Libya and Liberia, both of which are pretty poor opponents.
South Africa have two final AFCON qualifiers in March, but the team should qualify regardless. The tournament is next January, so a year or so to wait.
This season’s January break contained a CHAN tournament for domestically based national team player. SA didn’t qualify, despite winning the last three CHAN tournaments in a row.
We’re ranked 70th in the world, up from 76 in the last update.
Other – Because some things don’t fit anywhere else
SpoilerTL;DR
You don’t need to skip past this section as…..there isn’t one this time.
Nothing really interesting or worthy of note happened, so there’s nothing extra to add. I've kept you good folks here long enough as it is. I’d say you got off lightly, but given the amount of text above, you really haven’t!
One more update to go, then we’re through season one.
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True, and I get the domination in a smaller nation....but:
1) There can always be a slip up, somewhere, or a rotated squad, or a red card, or all three at once!
2) Even getting through that number of games is a serious achievement, regardless of result. Do you leave the house often?
I mean, I know that most people haven't left the house for a good year, but you get what I mean
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On 16/04/2021 at 09:43, ToMexico!! said:
Unbeaten Run - May 2060
Our long standing unbeaten league run has come to an end at 446 games, shame we couldn't reach the 500. We were defeated 2-1 by CARA Brazzaville.
Those numbers are mind blowing!!
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21 hours ago, ToMexico!! said:
I finally managed to have a read through a what a save you have here, well written with so much depth.
Looking forward to seeing how it goes in South Africa!
Thank you matey, very kind of you to say.
Hopefully things go our way, and I'll keep an eye on your thread as well :-)
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South Africa is now booted up as a playable league, it’s time to have a peek at what the game has been doing in the background whilst I’ve been conquering England with the mighty Owls.
My knowledge of South African football starts and ends at the World Cup they hosted, vuvuzelas, Kaizer Chiefs (because of the band), and the fact Orlando Pirates are based there (and have a fun badge that is popular to use on FIFA Ultimate Team)
Let’s have a look at what I stumbled upon once I took over at Ajax Cape Town. As always, click the spoiler for a proper read, or feel free to skim the Too Long, Didn’t Read (TL;DR) sections instead. I won’t judge you for it, honest…..
Team – On the pitch
SpoilerThe Club
So, a whistle stop tour of the club’s history, which will now be known as ACT as typing Ajax Cape Town every time is a thrash haha
Cape Town Spurs (as they were at inception, and are again now in real life) were founded in 1970 and continued happily in South Africa’s upper tiers until around 1997. At that point, local neighbours Seven Stars sold highly rated 19-year-old (and still current South African national team record goal scorer) Benni McCarthy to Ajax Amsterdam. McCarthy was a success, and the Dutch side began casting a more interested eye towards South Africa as a whole.
The transfer and subsequent impressive performances by McCarthy set in motion a series of events that results in the formation of ACT.
Cape Town Spurs and local rivals Seven Stars amalgamated and joined in a venture with Ajax Amsterdam to form the club I’ll now be managing.
It has all the pieces you could want. Two local clubs united to pool resource, support and momentum, additional funding from a European powerhouse interested in youth, and a rich hotbed of young talent to develop and ship off to the bright lights of European football.
Moderate success followed. Three pieces of silverware were nabbed in the 2000’s, and the club finished as runners up in the South African Premier League in 2003/04, 2007/08 and 2010/11 (missing out on the title that season on goal difference!)
Results declined in the 2010’s, with the clubs’ eventual relegation from the topflight in 2017/18. This is where real life and FM split.
On my game, ACT won promotion back to the Prem in 2019/20 (the season I went up to the Prem with Wednesday, funnily enough), and they’ve been there ever since. In real life, ACT remain in the First Division.
In 2023/24, the club finished 4th in the league, qualifying for the CAF Confederation Cup (equivalent – Europa League).
2024/25 was a hugely mixed bag. The club won the CAF Confederations Cup, the first continental title in their history. They also finished 15th out of 16 teams in the Premiership, staying up after surviving a relegation playoff. This got their manager binned, unsurprisingly.
That takes us to the start of 2025/26, where our story begins!
The club has some rivals of note:
- Cape Town City are the cross-town rival, making up the “Ikapa Derby”, this will be the big one as we also share a stadium.
- Santos F.C are part of the “Old Cape Town Derby”, but aside from friendlies, I can’t see me playing them. They’re down in the second division, so two leagues away.
- Cape Town All Stars are now defunct, but are still listed as a rival. They form the “New Cape Town Derby.”
- Hugely successful Orlando Pirates are listed as a competitive rather than geographical rival.
- Stellenbosch FC are a local rival but have no official derby and are currently in down in D1.
Squad
As mentioned previously, this first season is screen shot light and text heavy, so apologies for that.
I’ll try and keep this brief!
The standard of domestic football in South Africa is…..not good.
If we’re talking average size of club, think in terms of larger League 1 perhaps, Ipswich, Charlton, Wigan, they were the closest I could find in terms of comparisons. The infrastructure is there at least, in terms of stadium size and finance, but that's about it.
In terms of player quality, think a little lower. Bottom of League 1, top of League 2 perhaps. We aren’t talking world beaters here, that’s for sure. That also shows the size of the task at hand. We’re looking to push League 1 and 2 players into the Champions League and Europe’s top sides.
In terms of what we have to work with now though, the squad is all over the place. It doesn’t fit the 4-4-2 I’m going to play, and we only have 1 actual striker. Our best player is Siboniso Mathebula, a low work-rate left winger who at least has some flair and leadership, oh and he can take free kicks, but he’s the best of a bad bunch all round.
25-year-old Cole Schoeman is going to have to fire us to success as the only guy I’ve got up front. He’ll have plenty of opportunity, that’s for sure haha
The squad is also fairly thin in a lot of places. Fortunately, I need to bring the youngsters through and by the looks of things, I won’t have a choice on this one.
It should also be noted, and this will come as no surprise, I have an existing senior affiliation with Ajax Amsterdam. I know, shocking, right? But hopefully that will help with bringing in some quick reinforcements.
In terms of registration and squad building, South Africa has a limit of five non-SA players registered at one time, so you could have more if say, one left in January and you got another one in. Players U21 of any nationality don’t have to be registered though.
Competitions and Objectives
So there are a few different competitions in South Africa, most of which we are in. I’ll outline them below, as well as providing a handy “English to South Africa” comparison.
ABSA Premiership – ABSA is the sponsor (Amalgamated Banks of South Africa, for those that care). In real life, the sponsor has just changed to DStv, a pay TV company. Anyway, this is the league. The top dog. The Prem. Based on last season’s shambles, the board’s objective for this one seems sensible.
2025/26 objective – Avoid relegation.Orange CAF Confederations Cup – Orange (as in the telecoms company) is the sponsor, and CAF is Confederation of African Football (equivalent – UEFA). This is the Europa League comparison, it’s the 2nd tier of continental football. The top competition is the Orange CAF Champions League (equivalent - UEFA Champions League, funnily enough!)
The format is as follows, with all rounds apart from the final being over two legs. The group stage is 4 teams, playing home and away, top two go through. The Champions League works in an identical format, only there’s no 2nd round, goes 1st round then group stage.Prelim stage --> 1st round --> 2nd round --> Group stage --> Quarters --> Semis --> Final
Despite winning this one last year, the Board are being a lot more conservative.
2025/26 objective – Reach the group stage.
CAF Super Cup – Fairly simple, the winner of the Confederation Cup and the Champions League meet, exactly as they do in Europe.
As we won the Confederations Cup last season, my first shot at silverware as part of this new venture will actually come pretty quickly. That said, the Board aren’t interested.
2025/26 objective – Not bothered! Do what you like. Play yourself in goal for all we care!
Telekom Knockout – Another sponsor named tournament, this is a 16-team knockout competition, single game elimination, so no home and away. Only Premier League teams enter, starts in October and is done in December (equivalent – League Cup, Carabao, Rumbalows, Milk, Carling, Worthingtons, “insert sponsor name here” Cup, but much smaller).
I only need to win 1 game in this, so progress from round 1 to the quarters basically. Will probably be down to who I draw and if I’m home or away I reckon.
2025/26 objective – Reach the quarter-finals.
Nedbank Cup – They do love their sponsors in South Africa, money, money, money. This is the FA Cup. The prelim round is in December but Prem teams don’t enter until the 1st round in February. The final is mid-May. Single game knockout again.
1st round, 2nd round then quarters, which my rather unimaginative board has again pegged as a target, just like the Telekom.
2025/26 objective – Reach the quarter-finals.
MTN 8 – Yet another telecoms firm! But this one is a pre-season competition featuring the top eight (get it, from the name?) teams from the previous season’s Premiership standings. After the train wreck of last season before my arrival, that ain’t us. Well, not this year at least.
Strangely, the quarters are single game knockout, the semi final is two legs, and the final is a single game. Either way, the only thing you need to know about this bad boy is the prize money. 8m Rand goes to the winner, which in more familiar terms, is £1m. That’s a huge amount at this level. I’ll earmark this as one to win as soon as possible!2025/26 objective – Didn’t qualify, losers!
TL;DR
- The club (hereby known as ACT for ease) is coming off a season where they won the CAF Confederations Cup (Europa League) but finished 15th and narrowly avoided relegation.
- ACT has a few rivals, but the big one is cross-towners Cape Town City, who we share a stadium with. It’s like Sheffield Wednesday v Sheffield United all over again….
- The squad is a mess, with only one recognised striker and few players that will fit into my 4-4-2. Our best player is a semi-lazy AM(L) with a bit of flair, so that’s not ideal.
- The board has set out some fairly modest aims, including avoiding relegation, plus a win or two in each of our cup competitions.
- ACT has an existing senior affiliation with Ajax Amsterdam that I’ll probably need to tap into if I’m going to fill my squad out in a meaningful way.
Youth – Prospects and potential
SpoilerIt’s difficult to say who is a solid prospect at this stage as I don’t really have a firm grasp on the standard of football in South Africa, the standard of my own team, and how I stack up compared to Europe’s top sides.
Once I know that, it’ll be easier to peg who I think can ultimately make the grade.
Plus, and it's just a minor note this one.....I fired most of my staff when I arrived (nice guy that I am, but they were terrible), and now I don’t really have a good read on most players. Egg on my face there!
By using what little intel I have from my remaining staff, I can say this as a rough rule of thumb:
- I have five 16-year-olds who I reckon will translate to 4/5 stars for PA
- I have one 23-year-old who has 4.5 stars for PA
- I have about four 16-year-olds with 3.5/4.5 stars for PA
In short, there’s something here to work with by South African standards, but if that will translate into creating players that are then able to compete in Europe, I’m far less certain.
TL;DR
- You can just read this bit. But basically, I don’t know much about the youth players at the club, for reasons that will remain largely ignored.....
- There does seem to be some talent at my disposal, but that’s by South African standards. If they’ll make the grade at the top level very much remains to be seen.
Structure – Off the pitch
SpoilerSo the club is….unspectacular on the pitch. How about off it? Any chance the club’s training ground gets sold before I’ve completed my first year?
Stadium
No complaints here, the stadium is an absolute stunner.
The official capacity for Cape Town Stadium seems to vary, but FM has it pegged as 64,100.
Built in 2009 ready for the 2010 World Cup, the stadium was one of 10 used across the tournament. The site has since hosted other sports, rugby, cricket, tennis, plus concerts. It is also shared with rivals Cape Town City.
Whilst it is undoubtedly a spanking good stadium, it is also hugely impractical. As you can imagine, there aren’t many 64,100 seater stadiums in League 1 and League 2, for good reason as well.
The average attendance for ACT last season was 13,943.
In real life, it appears the stadium is despised locally. It is a huge tax burden for the city, is hardly used, is massively oversized, has few tenants outside of ACT and Cape Town City (who hardly have any fans anyway), and most citizens are already calling for it to be demolished.
That’s legacy for you, FIFA. Thanks guys.
Facilities
So the stadium is huge, and the rest of the club is actually fantastic.
Turns out all that money from Amsterdam can pay for a thing or two. As mentioned previously, I have an editor installed to grab the facility levels as numbers rather than text, so I can tell you the club’s facilities are as follows.
- Training facilities 18/20
- Youth Facilities 18/20
- Youth Importance 20/20
- Youth Recruitment 17/20
- Junior Coaching 15/20
Tasty. It was one of the reasons I was drawn to ACT originally, but yes, those facilities should help me in my quest to push South Africa into becoming a footballing superpower!
The only downer is that the data analysis facilities are pretty much non-existent. Seems odd that so much of the club would be excellent and that has been left behind, but no bother. An early area for improvement.
Staffing
Ahhhh, here we go. This is more what I was expecting. The stadium is tops, the facilities are stunning. The staff are poor.
It’s a twofold issue in fact. The existing staff are poor, both compared to what other clubs in South Africa have but certainly in comparison to where I’ve come from. But also there’s large swathes of jobs that have no staff member at all, including no reserve, U21 or U19 staff pretty much.
What staff we do have are replaceable. My average rating for each training area at present is 1.6 stars for the seniors and 0 stars for the U21s, as I have no staff.
The standard is loooooow, but at least I know where I’m starting and it’s a clean slate to work with for the most part. We don’t need to pay off staff if we hardly have any employed!
Finances
It was always going to be a shock to the system to go from the excess of the English Premier League to South Africa, but this is quite the step!
In the bank, we have a solid £1.2m. That seems fairly healthy.
The transfer budget for this season is £120,000.
The wage budget is £31,000 per week.
Just to put that into context, the last deal I did for SWFC was to buy Tommy Doyle from Man City for £32.5m, and he earns £135k a week.
That is quite the contrast!
TL;DR
- The club has a massive stadium that it doesn’t even come close to filling. It’s a stunning venue that was built for the 2010 World Cup, and it is shared with rivals Cape Town City. To say it is hugely disproportionate to what the club needs is an understatement.
- ACT have facilities that rival most teams in the world, and they outstrip every other team in South Africa. That includes youth facilities, junior coaching and youth recruitment.
- The staffing structure is in a shocking state, with huge gaps across the club where nobody is employed. Those that are employed aren’t good at all.
- Current training levels are 1.6 stars average for seniors, and 0 stars average for U21s, as I have no U21 staff!
- There’s £1.2m in the bank, with a transfer kitty of £120,000 and £31,000 per week to spend on wages.
National Side - Bafana Bafana
SpoilerI think it is fair to say that the grand FIFA plan to award the 2010 World Cup to South Africa to kick start their emergence on the footballing stage has failed to materialise thus far.
2010 is still the last World Cup that South Africa qualified for, and they did that as the hosts anyway. The country also hasn’t won the African Cup of Nations (AFCON) since 1996.
In fact, Bafana Bafana as they’re known, have probably gone backwards since my FM game has begun.
The side didn’t make the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. Won by Italy and “Saviour 2.0” Seb Esposito, my feelings on that particular competition as a manager are well documented in this thread. The CAF sides that made the tournament were Ghana, Ivory Coast, Morocco, DR Congo and Cameroon.
Likewise, the results at AFCON tournaments have also been poor. Although the country has made it out of the group stage of each other the last three tourneys, that’s about as good as it’s gotten. Crashing out at the 2nd round (basically the first knockout game once the group stage is completed) in both 2021 and 2023, they went one step further and lost in the QFs in 2025.
That means South Africa haven’t reached the final four of their own continental tournament since 2000. That's a hefty stretch for such a country.
At present, South Africa are ranked 76th in the world, behind countries such as Iran, Uzbekistan, Venezuela and Panama.
Not good.
The country does have some quality. Teboho Mokoena has been at Celtic for a few years and is worth around £11m, he’s a solid M(C). Centre back Rivaldo Coetzee played for ACT many moons ago but left in 2018 to go to rivals Mamelodi Sundowns. In 2023 he went to Dynamo Kiev, so he’s in the Champions League as well. Left winger Siphesihle Ndlovu is perhaps the other notable star, clocking in at about £13m for Sampdoria, top half of Serie A.
There are other reasons to be optimistic. The reconfiguration of the World Cup to expand the number of teams that qualify has opened the door on that front. Previously only five CAF teams made the cut and this has increased to nine for 2026, with South Africa sealing one of those spots. That means they’ll be in North America this coming summer.
In 2020, 2022 and 2024, South Africa also won the African Nations Championships (abbreviated as CHAN, for some reason). The CHAN happens every two years, alternating with the AFCON. It is a CAF tournament where only players from domestic leagues can be selected. A form of B Team tournament if you will, but it’s specifically aimed at domestic talent across African nations. That suggests there are at least some solid domestic players in South Africa.
There will be another CHAN in January of 2026, so about 6 months away.
TL;DR
- South Africa have floundered in recent years and currently sit 76th in the world rankings.
- The country last appeared at the World Cup in 2010, when they qualified as hosts. The missed out on the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, but will be at the 2026 World Cup due to the expanded format.
- South Africa haven’t won the African Cup of Nations (AFCON) since 1996 and haven’t made the last four since 2000. Since my FM game began, the team has made the QFs just once.
- There are some talented South African players scattered amongst Europe’s top leagues, and the African Nations Championship (CHAN), which only features domestically based players, was won by South Africa in 2020, 2022, and 2024.
Other – Because some things don’t fit anywhere else
SpoilerNot much to cover in this section as we’ve only just moved on.
It speaks quite highly of the job I did at Sheffield Wednesday that Thomas Tuchel was lured from the bright lights of PSG to replace me at Hillsborough.
The Owls’ top brass paid £20m in compensation for his services, that felt like quite the compliment indeed!
The club didn’t really buy anyone in the summer outside of players that I’d already lined up before my departure.
Tommy Doyle came in, as did a young full back from PSG (funnily enough!) called Cyril Sylla. Goalkeeping prodigy Tiago Pimenta finalised his deal and moved to S6, as did the Mid-Western Ronaldino, Reinaldinho.
The only bit of business that Tuchel did of his own was to sign newgen Jaud Kayembe from AS Monaco for £2m. He’s 17, so I won’t judge him quite yet, but he could turn into a handy player and for that price, the club will 100% turn a decent profit on him.
On the international front, Paul Hurst is still gearing England up for the 2026 World Cup, which is now just a year away. I’ll be sure to keep an eye on that one as well, but I am 100% certain he will fail and I should have his job right now.
Still not bitter, honest.
TL;DR
- Again, not a super long section if you want to glance, but Wednesday paid £20m in compensation to PSG and signed Thomas Tuchel to replace me.
- Wednesday did very little business in the summer apart from to finalise deals I’d already lined up.
- Paul Hurst and England are a year out from the 2026 World Cup, and I should have his job were it not for the FA’s incompetence.
So there we are. Introduction completed!
That was longer than expected, I do apologise. As predicted, it was text heavy, and hopefully you stuck with it. Only a few more updates then season one will be in the rear-view mirror and you can have more shiny pictures to look at going forward!
Thanks guys.
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On 08/04/2021 at 21:48, rlipscombe said:
it's been a great read @Rumple43 - looking forward to seeing how you get on in South Africa
Thanks matey, very kind indeed. Looking forward to SA, somewhere I've never been to on FM and a country I know pretty much zero about from a footballing perspective.
Gonna push those frontiers and see what we can achieve, and prove real-life Ajax wrong!!
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And there it is!
10,000 thread views.
That is class, and far exceeded my initial expectations.
When I started, I just figured it'd be me posting here rather than bugging my friends, talking to myself and knocking the occasional update out!
Thank you all so much, to people who just read, to those who post, and to anyone who pops a head in going forward. I appreciate it!
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I caught up with this thread over the weekend, it was highly enjoyable.
I recently changed course with my own save, taking over Ajax Cape Town in the bid of helping South Africa become a world force:
I'm interested in how the National Team have done since your 35 years or so of dominance? I seem to remember seeing that the country had won an AFCON? And they're the #1 nation in Africa? Would be interested to know how your success has moved the needle internationally.
I'm also going to shamelessly steal your spreadsheet for the prospects that you've sold with various add on clauses. And I do mean shamelessly, as it is a great idea and shows the info perfectly, so no need to change what isn't broken!
I assume that is ok?
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From Sheffield to South Africa - A Sheffield Wednesday, Ajax Cape Town (and probably other places) career
So, here we are. Sheffield to South Africa. A fun little change of direction, I’d say!
As you will have seen, I decided to call time on my Sheffield Wednesday career once I won the Premier League. Was there merit in defending my title? Trying to win the Champions League? Bringing further Cup glory to S6? Absolutely, without doubt.
But it wasn’t something I was overly drawn to, and after six seasons. I fancied a change. With the team I’d assembled, most of them young and ready continue improving year after year, I felt it was more a question of when, rather than if, I’d take over the world. That just didn’t tick the right boxes for me. I was more interested in climbing mountains than staying at the top of them.
Instead, welcome to Cape Town.
Background
Why Ajax Cape Town? For one, at the time I was winning the Prem with Wednesday and pondering a change of direction, I happened across this little piece of news that I found rather interesting.
Specifically, this caught my eye from Ajax’s own press release:
“After the strategic reorientation, which was reported in February 2020 during the presentation of the half-year figures, Ajax concluded that the ambitions and results in Amsterdam are in too great a contrast to the development of the football market in South Africa.
"Ajax has expressed the ambition to reach the top of European football and in recent years the South African football market has not produced enough talent at the level that Ajax strives for.
"Moreover, Ajax does not see sufficient potential for the future.”
Ouch! That’s a fairly blunt way of getting dumped.
The fallout from the split is that Ajax Cape Town no longer exists in real life, they have rebranded to Cape Town Spurs. They are still on FM20 however, and it made me ponder what might have been.....
Aims & Objectives
Based on the rather damning statement above from the boys in Amsterdam, I wanted to prove them wrong:
- Could I help kick start the development of South Africa as a footballing market?
- Can I produce the level of talent required to send successful players to Europe?
- Is there sufficient potential for the future for the country to become a footballing power?
So there we are. Can I improve the club to a level of ability and sustainability that we consistently win, produce a sufficient level of player that they can make it in Europe, and push the National Team forward whilst I’m at it?
In truth, I don’t know. But we’re going to try!
Play Style & Set Up
I will be continuing my career rather than start as a new manager. That means my reputation will stay at 4 stars thanks to my PL win, and my badge will be Continental Pro. I am a pretty top manager and coach, attributes wise. Far higher than what is currently in South Africa, that’s for sure.
I’ll also still be using the official 20.4.0 database update as I’m not starting a new game.
As I’m six or so years into the game, my FM universe has already started to play out. I don’t use online lists or recommendations, but they’d already be of little use now I’m well into my career.
Wonderkids and bargains have long since been snapped up, and the next generation of talent are newgens anyway. My own player and staff knowledge will no doubt be of use, but I’ll continue to utilise my staff to scout and assess players as my only means of evaluation.
Full disclosure – I do have an FM editor, but I only use it for finding out the ratings of my facilities on a 0-20 scale rather than the written descriptions you can see in the game. I don’t use it to look at players, otherwise, what’s the point in playing? Each to their own of course, but I don't see the point.
For my Wednesday career, I tried to limit unrealistic transfers until I reached the higher end of the PL, at which point I somewhat cashed in my morals and started plundering South America. It is a shame I’ll take to my grave.
I’ll not lie, I’ve no idea what sort of transfer approach I’ll be employing in South Africa so I can’t give any hard and fast thoughts on this one. Since I do have an ethos of developing SA youth, it seems counterintuitive to pack my team with foreign players, but we’ll see where that balance ends up.
Similarly, I have previously always tried to utilise my staff where possible. However, I have no idea what quality of staff I’m going to be able to employ, so it may be that I end up doing a lot of the heavy lifting myself in Cape Town. We shall see!
Previously, I enjoyed a two-month, five point update system for my Wednesday career. I liked that, but I’m not sure it will work here so it needs to go on the back burner.
As I see this one being a bit more a long-haul project with more specific goals in place, I’m going for the following update method instead.
I’ll be splitting each season into three:
- The summer/off season – 1 June to late August (which will be an intro post for season 1)
- First half of the season – late August to mid-February
- Second half of the season – mid-February to end of May
The South African league season is split into four quarters anyway, with periods one and two up to January, then there’s a month break, then three and four run up until mid-May.
Each update will have six main points relating to the aims and objectives I’ve outlined:
- Team – The on-pitch stuff, results, competitions, transfers etc.
- Youth – Prospects that are coming through, plus my own players that have left and how they’re getting on.
- Structure – The off-pitch stuff, staff, board, facilities, finances etc.
- National Team – Results, rankings, plus any major competitions
- Other – A recap of anything else I’ve found, plus I’ll be keeping an eye on SWFC of course.
- Stats – Because I do enjoy numbers, I’ll be keeping an eye on some stats to see if we are trending in the right direction. Is anything I’m doing having any impact at all?
Each section will be hidden behind a spoiler tag which you can expand for some detailed discussion, screen shots and so on, but I’ll also do a TL;DR for each section in case anyone wants to just see what is happening at a glance. I'd imagine updates will come every few weeks as they'll be longer than the ones I did for Wednesday, so don't expect a fast flowing torrent of information now I've shifted to the Southern hemisphere!
So that’s it. Each season will be three updates, split into six sections, and you can skim or deep dive each section as you wish. Still nice and bite sized I hope, but not too thin that nobody knows what is going on.
I’ll not lie, the first season is light on screen shots. This wasn’t deliberate, but looking back, it doesn’t have the depth that I’ve put into subsequent seasons. For one, I didn’t know if this was going to be something I’d write up or if I’d stop after SWFC, and two, I didn’t know if South Africa would be fun, if I’d find this could be a viable story, all that jazz. So yeah, stick with me. Season 1 may be a little heavy going, but it will (hopefully) get better haha
Wish me luck!
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On 01/04/2021 at 14:44, karanhsingh said:
Great wrap up, and look forward to seeing where you go next!
Thanks matey, great to see you back again
It was a fun run with Wednesday and I'm really pleased with how well this thread appears to be going so far.
New update should be around next week I reckon!
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2 hours ago, karanhsingh said:
Thank you bud, appreciate it! Are you doing a new save on FM21?
I'm not. My FM20 career will be continuing and I have no plans to upgrade, so you can look forward to seeing where I end up next!
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Just dropped into this one as I saw you had a topic (and you have of course poked your head into my topic on multiple occasions!)
A fun read, love how you've dotted yourself around the globe so far, both domestically and internationally. Really interesting that you decided to turn down the France job, but fair play for wanting to see through what you'd already started.Will keep an eye on this one, good stuff!
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23 hours ago, Marcussy said:
Just started and finished reading this in the last few days - brilliant! Would defo be interested in reading more about this particular FM universe.
Awesome, great to have you along and thanks for taking the time to go through the stuff that has been posted to date.
I'm not that far from starting the next chapter, just lining it up now. Should be in the next week or so, providing the UK bank holiday doesn't interfere with things in any way.
Have a great long weekend!
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On 25/03/2021 at 18:59, rlipscombe said:
also, if you decide to do another thread like this for FM21, can you link it here, so i can follow it? This has been a great read (and not just because it is the Owls....)
Oh my lord, I finally got a 5th page haha That 4th page was getting massive!!
No plans to get FM21, even now it's gone down in price. 20 still fills my needs and I get so much more from enjoying a game world that I've watched evolve than starting with one that's up to date when I begin.
I'm currently on the fence about posting my next adventure as it'll be a lengthy undertaking and once I start, I'll need to see it through. Write ups and collecting all the info does take time, but it is enjoyable so I'd imagine I will
Plus, I still seem to be picking up a minimum of a couple of hundred views each update, even if I only get a few posts from time to time.
While there's some interest there, I should probably keep going!
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I sat at my desk, as I had so many countless hours before. Seemingly endless days and nights had moulded into a six-year journey in the blink of an eye. Pouring over the sort of fine detail and tough decision making that had landed Sheffield Wednesday their first topflight title since 1930.
The Premier League winners medal still sat on top of the dark wood, one of the few elements of glistening light in what was now a room cast in darkness and shadow. The sun had long since set, only a desk lamp for illumination, allowing the silvery reflection from the medal to catch the eye.
The memory of lifting the trophy at Molineux would never truly disappear, but everything fades with time. The season had now wrapped, the dust had settled. The roar of the crowd, the shot of adrenaline on a match day, the euphoria of reaching the finish line at the front of the pack. Instead giving way to the long days of summer, planning, strategy, filling the mental reserves to go again once more.
A flick of the wrist sloshed the rapidly diminishing whisky and ice in a crystal tumbler, a sign that perhaps it was time to call it a night. Yet there was still something left unresolved, a mental itch without a scratch. I pulled out my mobile phone and called an old friend.
“Dejphon, how are you?”
“Ah, hello lad. I wasn’t expecting to ‘ear from you. Well done on winning the league, it was what we always dreamed of!” His Yorkshire drawl was unmistakable, even after all this time.
I put a finger to my temple, rocking back on the chair and casting a glance out of the window to the deserted training pitch. “It was, but something doesn’t feel right. I can’t place it.”
There was a pause.
“What’s left after you climb a mountain?” the former chairman quipped, pausing for an answer that wasn’t forthcoming. “Unless you plan on retiring, you need to find another mountain lad.”
And there it was. The remedy to a problem that had bothered me not just this evening, but since I was stood on that podium in the West Midlands, trophy aloft. It was also the last thing I wanted to hear. The truth often is.
Realisation was setting in. Perhaps it had for a while, but in the back of my mind, far enough back that I could lock it away and keep it quiet. Sadly, thoughts like that have a way of breaking down the door before too long.
“City will come back, you know. United looked strong as well, better than I’ve seen them recently. And we never did win the Champions League,” I offered, without conviction. It was telling.
“True, but I think unless you plan on climbing this mountain over and over, we both know you need to find a new one. Goodbye lad, and good luck.”
The phone went dead. I let out a sigh and finished my drink.
With a rueful smile I stood up, dropped the silver medal into my pocket, then switched off the desk lamp for what would be the final time.
***************
The atmosphere in the press room was electric, long past standing room only, you could barely open the door for the number of cameras, tripods and reporters. I stood hidden from view behind an all-too-familiar veil, waiting for my turn. This room had been like home for six years, post-game, pre-game, highs and lows. But never like this.
I felt the phone vibrate in my suit jacket. I pulled it out to find a text from my agent, Mick.
ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO DO THIS? IT’S NOT TOO LATE.
I scanned my eyes across the message before another one quickly filled the bottom of the screen.
AND I STILL THINK YOU’RE MENTAL.
I let out a low chuckle. Always the businessman. He knew it was career suicide, but I wasn’t going to be swayed.
YES, SIGN THE PAPERS AND SORT MY TICKET, I’LL GO OUT TOMORROW MORNING.
I clicked the send button. No hesitation. It was done.
As I dropped the phone back inside my jacket, I heard the noise of the side door opening behind me as the club’s Press Officer Ella Dobson slid quietly into the room.
“Ready to go?” she asked, looking somewhat downcast.
“Aye, as I’ll ever be. And thanks for everything.”
I gave a smile, she did the same, then I walked out and towards the podium. A lone figure amongst a crescendo of camera shutters, clicking Dictaphones and reporters shuffling to attention.
I sat down, unsure how to start, adjusting myself on the chair nervously. I remembered the notes in front of me, laid out carefully on the table, exactly where I’d placed them an hour or so before. Amazing how the mind can wander once the lights are on.
“Thank you all for coming, I really appreciate it.”
I reached for a glass of water. Give me a tracksuit and a field full of footballers any day. I continued.
“After much deliberation, I have decided to step down as the manager of Sheffield Wednesday Football Club.”
A murmur went around the room. You can’t keep many secrets in the public eye these days, but there was still an audible surprise that this one was true. Within a few seconds, I realised I needed to keep speaking.
“I've loved my time in Sheffield, establishing this team as the best not only in this city, but in the country as well. Winning the Premier League was a dream come true, that’s what I set out to do and here we are.
“Taking this marvellous club, one that I’ve supported all my life, from the Championship to the top, that’s something I’ll cherish for the rest of my life.”
A sense of relief swept over me. There was no going back now, it was done. I looked at the notes below me again, typed out and precisely ordered. I picked up the papers and shuffled them together before pushing them to one side.
“Thank you to the players, the staff, and all those that helped to make this possible,” a smile crept up on me as I thought back to some of the incredible people I'd worked with, for better or worse.
“When I first came to S6 there was plenty to do. I’m so very proud of what we achieved, but I feel now is the time to find myself a new mountain.”
I stood up. So much for the script.
“Thank you for all your support. We’re all Wednesday, aren’t we?”
The initial murmurs had been replaced by stunned silence, then a flurry of noise as reporters scrambled to ask questions that would get no answer.
I turned and walked back to the veil and with that, my time with Sheffield Wednesday was over.
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So we’d done it. For those that stayed with this thread to this point from such humble beginnings, my heartfelt thanks and admiration. For those who have popped in and out, you guys are pretty awesome to! Every upvote and comment drives me on to keep saving screen shots, writing, posting, it is all truly appreciated.
Now that I’d managed to win the PL, I thought I’d throw in a post to summaries the squad that had done it. A lot of my updates mention the same names, Kean, Esposito, Pauly, or players get named when I buy them then are lost when they play regularly but don’t score etc.
So here it is, the Premier League title winning overview. It’s been a long time coming!
At A Glance
I’ll split this one in two, one defensive, one attacking, that seems a good place to start.
SpoilerTop of the shop in terms of average rating, the only player who stayed with me for the entire course of this story so far. Dominic Iorfa, he baffles me. His attributes aren’t amazing. He isn’t a stunning CB, and he isn’t attacking enough to be anything but a defensive fullback (which I don't use and never will), but here he is. 19 appearances across all competitions and getting it done despite me crowbarring him into my system. No clue, but take a bow my friend!
With a 7.22 rating across 40 appearances, plus eight assists and being a part of the league’s best defence, the purchase of Mykolenko can’t be anything but a success. Same for Murray, both contributed and hit the ground running.
Onguene and Segalli were a formidable CB partnership, with the former making me feel absolutely justified for letting Bastoni go when Arsenal came calling.
I also love the production from the players that are basically backups. Hateboer is getting on and plays behind Murray, Renatinho is still only 18. Laimer, Arthur and Kimpembe on loan. All came in when needed, rotation, suspension, tactics, and they put in a shift.
For the keepers, it was the Onana show, but I won’t grade him too harshly on average rating since the man between the sticks always scores a low number each game. That goes double if I’m battering teams and he has nothing to do.
SpoilerPauly is a beast. 49 apps, goals, assists, and still only 21. I leaned on him hard all season and he absolutely came through. Can’t wait to see how his career develops.
I also had a soft spot for Will Hughes. Another less than flashy signing, he fit into the Iorfa mould. He shouldn’t have contributing like he did, but he squeezed every ounce out of his potential and featured at a European level after basically being cast off by Championship standard Watford. Can’t knock it.
I don’t know what to say about Moise Kean. He was the ultimate hunch that paid off I think. Bouncing between Everton and then Brighton (?!?!), his attributed just said he should be perfect for the role I needed. As far as pressing forwards go, he ticked all the boxes. I took the chance and got rewarded.
In all my years of playing FM games, he might be one of the most accomplished strikers I’ve had, and in terms of one-off campaigns, this was a memorable one.
Esposito. The saviour 2.0. Another ludicrous individual, and one I nearly didn’t buy. When I think back to the toss up between Fininho (who I later bought anyway), Pellegri or the Italian Stallion, I think I chose correctly without even needing to look up Pellegri’s current stats.
I liked Sergio Gomes a lot. I took a fling on him after promotion knowing very little about him, I had a limited budget and he’s another hunch that paid off in a big way. I never truly settled on if I preferred him as my attacking CM, or as a LM, but with 10 goals and 10 assists, he chipped in regardless. A few times I came close to moving him on because he didn’t seem to “fit”. Glad I didn’t!
Hlozek was a fun one. At 20, he was a highly rated AM(R), which I have no use for in my formation. How would retraining him work? For £9.75m, I wanted to find out. As you can see, he is now 22 and a preferred M(R), he generally played pretty well. A fun experiment, but also a now versatile guy who could contribute going forward.
Like Hlozek, Stefano Giordani was a young right sided mid who had bags of potential. He hadn’t been at his best this season and he played a bit more than I’d liked for one reason or another, but he still showed more than enough that he can be a part of things going forward.
Sessegnon, Cucurella and McTominay had all had their moments, but hadn’t really been stars. Consistent. Adequate. But that was about all I’d got. Still, all teams need those players and they certainly weren’t a liability by any means.
The Future – Goalkeeper and Defence
The team had excelled, understandably. Were we set up for sustained success though? I figured I’d break down some of the prospects in a bit more details, these were the kids that could keep on pushing me forwards.
Nick Murray – D (R), 21
SpoilerThe jewel in the crown I think. Assuming England don’t just hammer Trent Alexander-Arnold into the ground, I can’t see a reason Murray won’t get 100 caps for England.
He is a perfect attacking fullback, and his blend of excellent physical attributes plus solid mental attributes are complimented by a few technical standouts, like his 17 for passing. Add that to his resolute personality, he is going to be a winner.
Pordur Fridriksson – D(C), 16
SpoilerStill no idea how to pronounce his name, and I’ll be buggered if I’m going to look up the keyboard shortcuts to type his name properly, but he did look like he was going to be a high-quality player.
I’d have preferred a bit taller than 5’11” and his strength wasn’t the best, but his key attributes were already at a reasonable level, he was a potential captain candidate down the line, and he had some standout mental attributes. Plus time to grow of course, both literally and figuratively.
Tiago Pimenta – GK, 20
SpoilerHe hadn’t joined yet so I had to wait for my 20/20 DoF to get a proper look at him, but from everything I could see there was the potential he’d be my keeper for 10-15 years.
Considering keepers don’t usually reach their peak until around 32, this kid was already pretty good and had 12 years of growing to do.
Plus, perfectionist personality. Have I mentioned before how much I love that personality type? Haha!
With the three guys above, plus Rodolfo Martins (D(C), 20), Renatinho (D(R), 18, could easily have featured here were it not for Murray), Douglas Segalli (D(C), 23) and Frederico Milani (D(C), 21), the future at the back was bright for sure.
The Future – Midfield
Reinaldinho – M(C), 17
SpoilerAhhhh, the Mid-Western Ronaldinho. He was going to be a good ‘un. Not even 18 yet, look at that first touch. That passing. Those physical attributes, the determination. Oh, and another Perfectionist personality, plus he had a growing leadership stat.
Between him and Pauly, these two could take over the world. Speaking of which…..
Bernd Pauly – M(C), 21
SpoilerAnother player I nearly didn’t bag after a game of eeny, meeny, miny, mo antics, Pauly had been worth his weight in gold and he was still only 21. Stunning first touch, passing and technique to go with killer vision, off the ball, determination, leadership, composure, plus the physicals.
I can’t see a reason why this kid won’t be a legend. If there’s one player that doesn’t play up front that I’m genuinely excited about from this team, it’s this gem.
I didn’t have quite as many prospects waiting in the wings in this part of the pitch, but Sergio Gomes (M(C/L), 24), Adam Hlozek (M(R), 22) and Stefano Giodani (M(R), 21) were all looking pretty solid. Plus my annual CM loan signing, of course!
The Future – Attack
Sebastiano Esposito – ST(C), 22
SpoilerSince signing for me, he’d scored 88 goals in 135 games, including European contests and matches against some of the best teams in the world. The fact he was still only 22 was absolutely ridiculous.
He was already a World Cup winner and I didn’t really know how far he’d keep going. I’m excited to find out, but even if he stays where he is now, he’ll still be a world-beater.
I suppose the funny thing is that I don’t even play him how he’d prefer, as an advanced forward. I’m still forcing him to be a pressing forward, so imagine how bonkers he could be playing in his preferred role?!
Fininho – ST(C), 21
SpoilerI still see Fininho as being like the young understudy, but considering Esposito is only a year older, that doesn’t really work.
His technical attributes were top notch, though his mental game could be better, especially his composure. Can’t knock his physical skills, and considering the best he’s going to be for me right now is 3rd choice after Kean and Esposito, pulling a player like Fininho off the bench felt pretty sweet to be honest.
The fact Italy could call on all three strikers was also fairly crazy, just play all three of them up front and win every game 10-7! Brazil really did let this kid slip through their fingers.
Augustin M’Barga – ST(C), 20
SpoilerAnother interesting prospect that would star for most teams but might still struggle to get in mine, M’Barga had finished the season on loan at Norwich and scored nine goals in 18 games. Not a bad way to introduce yourself to the Premier League.
The fact he could also play down the wings was one to ponder, but he has plenty going for him and loads of time to develop. I just hope I have the space and opportunity to help him grow!
I was generally using 24 as a cut off here, but it’s hard to say that Moise Kean (S(C), 25) is over the hill considering he’s scored 47 goals in 63 games since he signed!
The three Italians plus M’Braga are pretty much my attacking options, but I wouldn’t say I’m thin at the area. There’s plenty to go at.
Job Done
The future, as I’m sure you’ll agree, is bright. In terms of legacy, it was all going quite well.
As detailed above, we had a rich bank of youth coming through, the majority of which had already earned their stripes as part of the title winning team this season.
The youth facilities had gone from category 4 to category 3, so that was a step in the right direction. In December, further upgrades would be completed so there is no reason to think that we won’t be at category 2 this time next year. A far cry from a few years ago when we didn’t have a youth category at all!
The finances were incredible, the best in the club’s history. Success, TV rights, prize money and huge transfer fees had set the club up to not only having a healthy balance, but paying off most of the current debt.
The stadium was 100% full last season so the board agreed to expand things by a further 4,750 seats. That takes the maximum capacity to 44,562, further progress as we continue to grow.
As mentioned last update, I was a club icon, and Esposito already a club legend at the age of 22. We had quickly but successfully woven our names into the history of the club.
Most importantly, I was the undoubtedly top dog in Sheffield. Considering why I started this journey in the first place, it really was job done!
Gone, But Not Forgotten
It was fun looking around at what we'd built over six seasons, when a cool little message dropped into my inbox. It was an annual message that I usually have a glance over then forget about, but this time, I was nostalgically drawn to it.
It is, of course, where this all began. First story I'd ever written on here. Struggling into the playoffs. Overpaid squad. Financial oblivion. The last second winner at Wembley over Forest. That was a sweet memory, for sure.
It was fairly telling that no player from that team had really kicked on and become part of a top side. Most had settled back into the Championship/League One level, with a few of the better players being the ones I had on loan, like Baker, Simpson and Fosu-Mensah.
A couple of the older guys were without a club, and Hutchinson and Bannan had both retired. I'm surprised Hutch's knees lasted that long to be honest!
Still, it was a neat little full circle message that fittingly wrapped a historic season.
Cheers for getting us to the Promised Land gents, against all the odds. This one is for you guys to!
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15 hours ago, rlipscombe said:
great read as ever. great to see that Pressman rocket again - no one was stopping that! Great to see you finally secure Tommy Doyle. Maybe he'll help fire us to CL success next season... Owls in Europe... Brings back the 'glory days' of Spora Luxembourg and an 8-1 win!! (and those kits - my dad worked for Sanderson, the shirt sponsor, at the time - he even presented Jeff Winter with the match ball one match at Hillsborough!!) Always amused me how they had to cover the logo for European matches as the sponsor could only be one line.... - True fact. Check the white patch above the 'Sanderson'
Europe is now the final mountain to climb! It feels like it is more a case of when than if, but that's assuming all the players keep coming through and developing.
I miss those Sanderson days, I associate them with generally being pretty good and not a laughing stock like we are now!
Tommy Doyle was a funny one, I couldn't be believe how close I got to signing him for nearly £100m and then how easy it was to get him for just over £30m ha!4 hours ago, karanhsingh said:Well done, congratulations on winning the title!
Thank you friend, mighty kind of you! It has been a fun ride :-)
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So here we are. It has been a long road. I couldn’t decide if it was longer than I expected, or shorter. More than 40 updates (this is #41) had spanned six highly enjoyable seasons as I tried to push Sheffield Wednesday to pinnacle of English football.
And now, I was one good result away from doing it.
Sadly, I also didn’t know what else to do. I suppose when you set your sights on climbing a mountain, there’s the elation from doing it, but then I’d imagine some form of natural come down once you’ve achieved your goal and wonder where to go next.
The Wait Is Over
I pondered how to write this section, mulling it over for multiple seasons in fact, wondering what I'd do should I ever actually achieve my aim and win it all.
As a story teller, you always want the grand finale. The one, heroic act of brilliance when all feels lost, to steal victory from the jaws of defeat and paint that one immortal picture of your triumph.
I can’t do that though. Or if there’s a way, a more talented writer than myself if required!
As the dust settled, we were champions, and….it was a total anti-climax haha
Our mighty crescendo of success to end the season was a really scrappy, hugely underwhelming 1-1 draw away to Wolves, and that point was all we needed to seal the title. The performance was nearly as messy as the edit on the gif above ha
Still, the title was ours and I’d finally done it!
It was the first top flight win for the club since 1930, quite the wait! I should focus on the journey that got me here, rather than crossing the line itself. That felt like a much better story than grinding out a bore draw in the West Midlands then lifting the PL trophy.
I cast my mind back to the start of season, where I suggested the following needed to happen to win the title:
Quote- We would need to get a lot better, especially defensively.
- Man City would need to regress across the board.
Well, we got 10 points more than the year before (92 to 82) and conceded just 22 goals, down 14 from a year ago. Our offensive output was the killer though, with 99 goals a solid improvement of 21 on the previous campaign.
And yes, City did regress. Fewer points, fewer goals scored, more goals conceded.
But never mind all the nonsense analytical guff, we are champions!!!
Sing it, Frank
The season’s remaining two games also ended in a relatively low key manner. Beating City at home felt symbolic after wrapping up the title, then we had another bore draw against lowly Burnley, closing the season on a fairly tepid note. Still, we were top of the tree. Nothing could take that away!
We scored more goals than anyone else (a lot more), and conceded the fewest goals in the league. Delving into the stats as I always do, we had the most fouls, the most yellow cards, the most crosses completed, and we were miles ahead for chances created (164, 2nd was on 108). It was the footballing model I'd spent multiple seasons creating, and it had carried us to a title.
The salary table also provided great reading. Buying two world class fullbacks meant that my net transfer spend was now up there with the league’s big rollers, so nothing to crow about there. In terms of salary though, my £111m a year was blown out of the water by Man U (£234m) and Man City (£250m), and we’d beaten them both.
We’d finally climbed to the top of the mountain, and we’d done it our way. Satisfying.
Awards, Awards, Awards
There's no I in team, but there isn't an I in award either, so I'm not sure where I'm going with this. Alas, the end of a title winning season brought with it plenty of recognition (there is an i in that at least!). We had played some fine football, and the world had taken note.
Moise Kean knocked in 25 goals in 28 games in the PL, winning him the top scorer award as well as the coveted European Golden Boot for the top marksman in Europe. Well deserved, he was a difference maker.
Despite being around my team for a while now, Esposito won the Young Player of the Year, he scored 18 goals in 28 PL games (plus plenty more in other competitions!) with a final rating of 7.5.
I received my 2nd Manager of the Year award, though it was probably hard to give it to anyone else. Plus I’d have been hugely annoyed if they had. It felt like a nice middle finger to the FA, and all those other guys who took a pass on me, but I’ll try not to get too bitter about it.
Then there was this, which was pretty sweet indeed.
7 selections out of 11 for the Players’ Team of the Year. Both my high-priced full backs, my young Brazilian CB, the LM/CM that I bought when I first made it to the Prem and developed along the way, my rising star CM and my two stud strikers who blasted me to a title.
We’d had a hell of a season, no doubt about it. Great work from the lads!
Legendary
I think whenever you take over a club, particularly one dear to your heart, there is always an appeal to etching your name into their (albeit imaginary) history. To become one of the players or managers that fans associate with success. Becoming an icon, role model and the rest.
For me, my favourite player will always be Kevin Pressman. As a young goalkeeper myself many moons ago, I spent countless hours watching him and studying how I could get better. Plus he always played a blinder against United, that was class. There are a lot of players thought of favourably from around that era, but Big Kev was always my #1.
Even if it’s just for the fact he took one of the greatest penalties ever.
Could have had five keepers in the net for that one, no stopping it!
Anyway, I digress. Winning the Premier League had vaulted me into the middle of the three tiers of fandom at my beloved club, I was now a “club icon.”
Rubbing shoulders with the likes of Nigel Pearson, Roland Nilsson, Des Walker, John Sheridan, Mel Sterland, Lee Bullen and Gary Megson, my name would hopefully be talked about for years to come as a fond memory of “glory years.”
More appropriately, when times were grim (as they are now IRL), I’m sure fans would look wistfully to the sky and wish that they still had an Espositio (now a club legend, I should add), Kean, or Pauly, and that football sure was good during this era.
It was pleasing to know that I built that era, even if it wasn’t real.
True Love Lasts
I should probably close this update with a piece of business that took place almost as soon as the season ended.
My somewhat embarrassing man-crush on Tommy Doyle nearly led me to ruin before the title winning season had even begun. I had been a single button click away from spending nearly £100m on the lad, before realising I had a younger, slightly better version of Doyle in Belgian Bernd Pauly.
With City losing the title to yours truly, the Etihad was due its annual clear out as more stupidly expensive players came in and equally expensive but now forgotten player were binned off.
On the transfer list this year…..Tommy Doyle. Like the jilted lover, I had been forced to bide my time, but a love like that can never be extinguished. It was still burning bright, and I had the cash to make it happen.
Thanks guys, I’ll take him off your hands for £32.5m. What a way to end the season ha!
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[FM20] From Sheffield to South Africa
in FM Career Updates
Posted · Edited by Rumple43
So, where did I get to?
Sadly, this isn't the message where swan I back in and pick up where I left off. Life is still fairly hectic these days, and as much as I enjoyed my varied write up with Sheffield Wednesday as well as Ajax Cape Town, my time to write as well as my time to play is still sadly lacking.
However, I did manage to continue with ACT past where this write up ended. At a point where I may be ready to shelve FM19 for pastures new, I wanted to stick my head back in one last time and tie things up for anyone still lurking.
In short, I won it all. South Africa was a breeze, to the point where there was little to no challenge achieving results on the pitch. Outside of the odd shock/frustrating Champions League or League Cup result, the only real test for me was to beat my own personal benchmarks for goals/wins/points each year, or try to go undefeated. It was too easy to bring in quality loan players, either from Ajax as my affiliate, or from South America, that were far too good at 18/19 for any standard of opponent I was playing against.
The only real focus then became on player development, and ensuring I gave as many minutes as possible to 15/16/17 year olds around my more established stars. That said, those "stars" were all under 21 themselves. Occasionally I got caught out, but that was still pretty rare. In turn the real wins came from securing lucrative and also beneficial moves for those young players, making sure they had opportunities to take the right next step, not just a move that was unlikely to pan out in the long run.
It left me with a career that looked something like this:
As you can see, seven years and seven titles, plus plenty of other silverware along the way. 30 trophies in total, including three seasons doing the quintuple.
For a change of pace, I took the Russia job in 2030, guiding them to a 2nd round exit at Euro 2032 in Scotland & Wales. We lost to a fairly stacked Portugal side, with a now 32 year old Joao Felix knocking in a hattrick, easy as you like.
Following Euro 2032, I knew my time with ACT was coming to an end. There was only so much interest in dominating, so I took over England and won the 2034 World Cup. Their team is as stacked as ever, and I wanted to finally get my chance with the Three Lions. I had waited about 13 years, after all!! Hat tip to the long time readers there...
That leaves me just outside the top 20 of the Hall of Fame, with eight domestic wins (7 in SA plus 1 PL with SWFC), 15 domestic cups, 10 other club trophies and a World Cup.
So putting my own achievements to one side, here were the objectives I set myself when I moved to ACT:
The answers were probably, yes, and maybe.
To answer points one and two together, I developed and tracked a number of players across the seven years. Most were South African, but not all. I tracked how I acquired them, who I sold them to, and where they went afterwards.
In summary:
When I joined ACT, they had £1.2m in the bank. Their transfer budget was £120k, and their wage budget was £31k p/w. They currently have £45m in the bank, with a £33m transfer budget and a £372k p/w wage budget.
I was consistently either bringing through my own youngsters, or buying South African prospects from other clubs to develop, before eventually passing them on to teams across Europe. I was able to offer the best coaching, the best facilities, and an amount of first team experience that no other team could come close to offering without suffering in terms of results.
South Africa had players in top leagues across the world, England, Spain, Italy, Germany, Portugal, France, and they were generally playing good minutes as well.
Other teams did send players to Europe, I wasn't the only one, but they did it a far more pedestrian rate. I can say for sure that I increased the number of players moving to Europe, but if that can be qualified as kick starting the whole of South Africa is up for debate. The players were definitely good enough though.
So what about the National Team?
Despite multiple temptations, I never did take over Bafana Bafana. It felt more organic to let the AI do it, and me to be feeding that set up than running it as well.
Turns out, they may not have needed me anyway. This shows the seven years from when I started at ACT, plus the two seasons after I left.
As my original youngsters managed to become established professionals across Europe, that then began the trickle down effect to the National Team. With the conveyor belt continuing, 13th in 2032/22 represents the #1 team in Africa, with 17th and 15th making them 2nd. They were the 15th best team in African when this journey began.
Results followed suit. The country won the 2031 African Cup of Nations, their first since 1996.
The 2026 World Cup included two games, two losses, five goals conceded and zero scored in the new three team per group set up. It was a short and disappointing campaign for all concerned.
By 2030, South Africa not only qualified from their group with a win and a loss, but then beat Australia 2-1 AET in the 2nd round. They were then knocked out by Belgium, 1-0, in the 3rd round. Still, it was a hell of an effort.
This was nearly repeated in 2034, the World Cup I won, with group qualification (1 win and 1 loss) and a 2nd round 4-3 loss to Columbia. A slight step back, but not a big one.
Most pleasing of all given what I set out to do at ACT in the first place (which was to develop South African footballers and the country as a whole), of the 23 South African players tracked in my bullet points above, they have 489 caps between them.
Burgess has 79, Mandlazi has 75, Gcilishe has 68 and 44 goals. With all being 25, there's no reason they can't all notch triple digits and more, most likely. Others had also become fairly useful squad players, and some players that I thought would make the grade strangely didn't. That's football for you.
Most of all I enjoyed all the writing I did, across both SWFC and ACT, and wanted to say thanks to all the people who chipped in with comments or questions. Cheers!