mpm2342

Continuing the League updates, October and November finished with victories. I played the top squad against the Magpies to keep them in shape for an upcoming European game and after that did not play the complete starting 11 in any of the league matches.

Looks like a fun one. Good luck and will be following

For the league and league cups, I am going to just post condensed updates as they are not that interesting anymore. If something interesting happens, I will post, but for the most part, we will be rotating the squad and winning most, if not all, the games.

UEFA Europa League League Phase - Game 1: First up FC Utrecht who play in the Eredivisie in the Netherlands. Netherlands is 9th in the nation club rankings and FC Utrecht is 190th. This is a tough matchup but one where I think we might have an outside chance. Well, it was close and we had a higher XG, but just couldn't capitalize. Would have liked a win or draw but losing by one is the next best thing UEFA Europa League League Phase - Game 2: Next up is Tottenhham who play in the English Premier Division. England is 1st in the nation club rankings and Tottenham is 36th. 22% of those polled think we have a chance ... I don't. Well, well, 22% were right. I can't believe the result and the statistics, but on further digging, Tottenham figured us for patsies and rested most of their stars... that will teach them !!!! So thrilled to get a win when I was hoping to just keep the goal differential reasonable.

UEFA Europa League Playoffs We have drawn St. Pat's Athletic from the Irish Premier Division in the Europa League playoffs. Ireland is 34th in the Europe Nation club rankings and St. Pat's Athletic is 374th. This is a good draw for us as we should have a solid chance of advancing. Match 1 at home and we dominated to go up by 4 heading to their place Took the opportunity to get some playing time for others on the squad and it worked out ok, though we did not win the game and were out played. Going down a player would not have helped. We received £2.91M for qualifying for the league phase, but we have draw some scary good teams. Looking at the draw, I think we will be lucky to win one match - Zalgiris seems the match to target and hope for any result from the other matches.

UEFA Champions League Champions Path Third Qualifying Round: Next up we play against FCSB from the Romanian First League. Romania is 28th in the Nation Club Coefficients and FCSB is 157th in the European club rankings. This is another tough one, but maybe we can sneak one through. First leg away from home and we were out played, but managed to get a draw to bring back home. It wasn't to be dropping the game 1-0 at home. Good run again this year and we are getting closer to being able to beat some of the early to mid tier league champions.

UEFA Champions League Champions Path Second Qualifying Round: Next up we play against Ferencvaros from the Hungarian Division 1. Hungary is 27th in the Nation Club Coefficients and Ferencvaros is 54th in the European club rankings. They are favoured and the should be based on the quality of their squad. We beat them in the third qualifying round two years ago, which prompted me to add all the top leagues in Europe as playable, which has definitely toughened things up. First leg at their place was a bit disappointing as it looks like we carried the play slightly. Second leg at home with a two goal deficit produced a wonderful result for us. The team really played well. I went with the positive variant of my tactic instead of the very attacking one used in the first match. Both Europa FC and Lynx lost in their second round so it is only us left in Europe.

UEFA Champions League Champions Path First Qualifying Round: First up we play against Tre Penne from the San Marino League. San Marino is 53rd in the Nation Club Coefficients and Tre Penne is 375th in the European club rankings. We should not have much difficulty with this matchup. Well, the boys ran wild on Tre Penne and padded some statistics for themselves. I probably could have got playing time for some of the backups in the second game if I had been thinking clearer. Progress of the other Gibraltar teams in Europe: Lincoln Red Imps got knocked out in the first round via penalties. They didn't make Europe for a couple of seasons and went from professional to semi-pro. That will set us back a bit in growing the nation/league as they already had a decent reputation. Europa FC won their first round match up Lynx also won their first round Three teams still going in Europe, let's keep it rolling!

Fast forward to the end of June and Gibraltar has improved it's rankings in the Nation Club coefficient, but has slid back a bit in the national competitions, they are now in qualifying for the Euro Championships and I suspect they will not win a game, so I will be keeping an eye on the HC role. The league moved up 9 spots which will be helpful in getting players. Our club reputation and ranking improved nicely as well. We spent a lot of money upgrading facilities last season, so are going to have to win some prize money in Europe if we want to keep improving things. Our current expenditures will incur a deficit of 1.5M without taking into account the prize money. I am hoping to start getting some good youngsters coming through. We did sign a couple of players, Yuri who will start at CD and rotate with Morata. He has a 60.2 rating and 4.5 star potential. We also signed Mbemba who has 5 star potential, but is unambitious. We are trying to loan him out to get him playing time as he is not quite at the club level yet.

POSITIONAL REVIEW (I have highlighted homegrown players in blue in the charts) GK - L1 target = 58.2 Alonso is the clear starter and performed the best. Hankins is ok and certainly good enough to play in the league games given the team in front of him. I gave McCormick a couple of games just to see since he was part of our youth system, but he didn't do well and at 5' 9" with poor aerial reach, is just not going to cut it. Plan - continue to start Alonso and play Hankins in League matches as much as possible without annoying Alonso. Playing Hankins gives us one of the 5 homegrown spots in league and the associated flexibility in the other positions. Continue to look for GK with the potential to have ratings above the L1 target who will come and play for us. Have only found a couple so far who are good enough and they won't talk to us. Need to continue to build the club and league reputation over time to be able to get those players. CD - L1 Target = 64.7 All the players who put time in a CD played pretty well. Sofikitis was probably the worst performer of the group. The others varied, Morata and Rojas or Diaz got all the tough games, so they get a little boost when I consider their stats. We have Albiach joining the team for the next season and he has a rating of 60.2 with loads of potential, so a good shot to grow beyond the L1 target. Morata is growing a bit each season, but will not make the target. Diaz, Craggs, Rojas are ok backups. Plan - start Albiach and Morata. Keep 2 of the three others as backups, let Sofikitis go and look for another CD with the potential to grow past the L1 target. FB - L1 Target = 60.8 Caldiera is the best performing FB, but they all played very well. Roman becomes homegrown before the next season starts. I don't think any of the current FBs are going to grow to hit the L1 target, but they play ok and help with the homegrown numbers. Plan - Start Britto and Caldiera and use Roman as the primary backup and homegrown substitute for Caldeira if needed. Monveneur is a useful bench player for lots of positional flexibility. Will continue to look for young FB with potential to surpass the L1 target to take over for Britto and Roman. BWM - L1 Target = 67.2 This is a tough position for stats, so I also look at the CM numbers for additional clues. Angong had slightly better stats than Cottrell, but not a lot. Angong has a 63.7 rating and can improve slightly, but won't make it past the L1 rating in all likelihood. Cottrell can improve slightly as well, but at 54.5, he won't make the L1 target. They are both consistent players who like big matches and just seem to perform well. Plan - Angong for European matches and Cottrell for the league with Angong playing when I can balance the homegrown numbers. Look for upgrades. DLP - L1 Target = 64.4 Parker just keeps playing well. His rating isn't growing, but his work rate, teamwork and leadership makes the team much better, so he gets playing time. Key played 13 games as a DLP with an average match rating of 7.02, so he played better as an AP. Marcos had nice stats as well. While they are performing well on the pitch, neither Parker or Marcos are going to develop to the L1 level, Plan - rotate Parker and Marcos and look for an upgrade. Winger - L1 Target = 63.2 Gbeme played very well and the rest of the wingers played well, De Stefano was the lowest performer of the bunch and he is leaving at the end of the season. Gbeme's rating of 65.3 is already above the L1 target as is Rafael's rating of 65.9. Gbeme will only improve a bit and Rafael still has potential to grow. They are both Right Wingers, so I need to retrain Rafael to play LW as he has a reasonable left foot. The retraining will use up some of his potential, but that is ok because his rating as a winger is very strong already. Plan - start Gbeme and Rafael and keep Negrette and Coombes as backups. Coombes is very useful as he played very well in 4 different positions AM (RLC) and ST. Advanced Playmaker - L1 Target = 62.5 Golliard had the best statistics of the AP, with Key close behind. Key is likely to leave in the transfer window before the season. Golliard's rating of 61.5 is very close to the L1 target, so even though he is unlikely to develop further, he is a good player for us at this stage. Marcos can fill in as a sub as can Coombes. Plan - Golliard starts, Marcos and Coombes backup. Look for a bit more depth here. Advanced Forward - L1 Target = 61.9 Rafael scored 15 goals in 13 games and so why am I moving him to Winger? because I signed a very strong AF in Carrasco. and because he is an awesome winger. Kawe performed very well as did Golliard and Coombes (not shown, but scored 3 in 3 games as ST) Rafael is rated 58.9 as AF with room to grow, so would likely make the L1 target. Carrasco is rated 62.1, already above the L1 target with room to grow. Kawe makes a strong backup and we have deeper options with Coombes and Golliard. Plan - start Carrasco with Kawe etc. as backups. If he sucks big time, then reverse plan and put Rafael back in as AF. Upcoming Season Recruiting needs: GK - Look for upgrade - not urgent CD - Need one upgrade - normal urgency FB - Both positions could use an upgrade - Urgent BWM - Could use an upgrade - Urgent DLP - Could use an upgrade - normal urgency Winger - We are good AP - Look for depth - not urgent ST - We are good

End of Season 4 (26/27) Analysis: The team average rating improved by 2.6, improving from 56.7 to 59.3. We are almost at the next "level" England League Two (60.4 average). I will be targeting L1 for the next season and beyond. De Stefano declined a bit from last season, so I didn't attempt to resign him and he has already accepted a transfer when his contract is up. Key got offers from a Spanish first division team and an English Championship team, so he is not happy and wants to move. I doubt I will be able to keep him, but will try as I have an agreed upon price to move him, but they will likely pay up for that. It is ok as Marcos is homegrown now and we have a replacement for AP who is close to Key, so we won't lose too much. I can see we will be challenged to keep the players if the team gets much better than it's reputation and the reputation of the Gibraltar league. The end of season squad depth chart has changed a fair bit. Carrasco was a later signing who played a bit, but didn't replace Rafael. Rafael can play Wing and has a strong Left foot, so I am going to train him into the LW spot and in two more years he will be homegrown. Albiach was a signing in Jan who had a loanback as part of the deal, but is a good 18yr old for next season.

An update to the end of the season where we won out the Rock cup and the league, nothing too interesting any more as the Lions are now overpowered for the league. Gibraltar League Results: League standings at the end of the regular season: Gibraltar League Championship Round: We won the league after the first game of the Championship round and we have 4 teams going into the European competitions next season Rock Cup Quarterfinals Rock Cup Semi-Finals Rock Cup Finals: The other update is our youth intake that had a few players with some potential. I signed the top 4.

More transfer activity. We found a great player who was willing to join us and gave us reason to spend some of the transfer budget and salary budget that we had. Feels funny to have all that room, but not spending it because the only players who would come weren't much better than the current team, if at all. Introducing Mervin Gbeme. We spent 2.2M on him 1 up front and the rest based on league appearances. His rating as a winger is 64.1 which puts him above the ENG L1 target of 63.2 and on the way to the ENG Champ target of 69.6. With a 5 star potential, he has a good chance to get there. He is the first player on the team to make the L1 target, so one down and ten to go. In other news we got rid of a few players to clear up the roster and playing time pathways. Nunes (ST) on loan with option future fee to Lincoln - he will help them be better Yenpariye (ST) to Europa FC on loan Pinto (AM/ST) transfer to Lynx Those players will help make the other teams better and are all young enough to become homegrown in the next season or two. Starting trying to build up the league now.

Back to league play with a close one with Magpies and then a tie with Lincoln. We signed two players who joined us at the start of the transfer window. First up is Louis Rafael who is a striker / winger with good ball control. He will play advanced forward and take the lead role as I really need to develop a homegrown option for flexibility. He has 5 star potential and a current rating of 55, so hopefully can develop into a solid option for us. Bernardino is a decent player who we sent out on loan. He likely won't ever make the team, but he can become homegrown and be useful to the other teams in the league, so I am planning to transfer him out at some point. More league games more victories. Rafael's second game and he scores 4 goals for us ... watching the goal replays and 3 of them were from runs using his pace to receive a pass, gives the team a nice element.

Another league match and another victory, this time against the second best team in the league. UEFA Europa Conference League match four: Next up is HNK Gorica from the Croatian First League. Croatia is ranked 16th in the nation club rankings and HNK Gorica is 335th with no points until last year, so they are better than their ranking for sure. Would love to get some points from this one if we are going to challenge for a spot in the playoffs. The score was closer than the game and we could not sneak away with a result as they got a late goal to take the victory. Another League win. Youth intake preview and it says it will be a good one, doesn't really look like it though. A good striker would be very nice to start developing a homegrown one. Kawe and Yenpariye have been great, but their ceiling is below my target ratings. UEFA Europa Conference League match five: Next up is our old friends Larne from the Sports Direct Premiership in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland is 39th in the Nation Club Coefficients and Larne is 208th in the European club rankings. We played Larne in the Champions League and tied them at home and then beat them 3-0 on the road. Would absolutely need to win this one if we are going to challenge for a spot in the playoffs. I also got an email saying if we didn't win, we are going to set a record for the longest winless streak in Conference League play... definitely need to win now. Wow! The boys really listened to the urgency for this one. What a game. Check out the game from Golliard: 3 goals, 5 assists and 8 key passes. That's one for the ages. Good thing I am not paying him by the assist.... oh wait, I am because I was so smart that I put him on a heavy pay for performance plan, at least we made way more money from the win than we paid him. Back to league play and another victory brings us to the halfway point Not much to say when you are in complete control. UEFA Europa Conference League match six: Last up is our old friends Ludogorets from the Bulgarian First League. Bulgaria is 18th in the Nation Club Coefficients and Ludogorets is 59th in the European club rankings. They are not doing well in the competition, but look to be a much better team than us. We sit a point out of a playoff spot, so a win or draw will get us in thanks to out goal differential. Close, but not this year. We will be back stronger next year and hopefully progress a bit further.

A couple more league games and a couple more convincing wins. The team appears to have developed to the point the league cannot play with us anymore. I will now have to try and make the other teams better by feeding them some players. Will target the teams who are making Europe first and see if I can do anything in the Jan window. I will also keep an eye on the Gibraltar HC position and apply if it come up and I can keep the Lions job at the same time. UEFA Europa Conference League match two: Next up is Valencia from the Spanish First Division. Spain is ranked 3rd in the nation club rankings and Valencia is 132. We aren't ready yet for the top flight teams, but hopefully we can keep it close. Not bad. We managed to keep it close and respectable and looks like we sent them home with a few bumps and bruises for their trouble. A couple more league games with the same result. I am mixing in the squad depth to get them development time and to keep the main starters fresh for the European competitions. Only two complaints so far - Diaz complained twice, first time he agreed to a lower playing time and second time he agreed to be let go at the end of the season, which is already the plan, so I am good with that. Going to try and get him to land at one of the other Gibraltar team as he is a good player. McCafferty complained and I agreed to give him more playing time as I hadn't been playing him enough anyways, so far the squad is happy. UEFA Europa Conference League match three: Next up is Slovan Bratislava from the Slovak First Division. Slovakia is ranked 25th in the nation club rankings and Slovan Bratislava is 82. Another game where we want to try and keep it close. Slovan Bratislava should not be as strong as Valencia, but are still too strong for us. Wow! Nice result from a game we were out played a bit and down a man for most of the match. I will take the point and run! Back to league play and we beat up on College '75. Yenpariye's agent really liked his game too: He is currently making £130, so am happy to give him a raise as long as I can keep the playing time commitment down. Which is what happened, so the agent was truthful in the message and signed a contract for £160 p/w as a breakthrough prospect.

We open the new Gibraltar season with the Pepe Reyes Cup against Lynx and walk away with a victory in fine fashion. That is now 3 years in a row for us and we are planning for a permanent location in the club's trophy case, which will hopefully be upgraded to a room by the time I am done. The season opener is up next against Lincoln and it was painfully obvious which club had been playing football for over a month and which one was just getting their season started. Lincoln never had a chance. Great game from Marcos with 4 goals. UEFA Europa Conference League match one: First up is Brondby IF from the 3F Superliga in Denmark. Denmark is ranked 12th in the nation club rankings and Brondby is 261. Going to be a tough match, but hopefully we can pull it out. Alonso gut sick before the game, so Hankins stepped in and left us to wonder if we could have pulled off the win with Alonso. In any case, I will take a tie and the point and hope for more down the road. Last season we only got one point, so we have equalled that already. Back to league matches and a convincing victory, though Alonso gave up one goal on 2 shots and answered our wondering from the Bondby game - he wouldn't have helped playing this way.

UEFA Europa League Playoffs We have drawn AIK from the Swedish Premier Division in the Europa League playoffs. Not sure there would be a good draw at this stage, but this one is not very good for us. Sweden is 27th in the Europe Nation club rankings and AIK is 277th! They are a much better team than that. First leg is in Sweden and , say what? A victory? Well DONE Lads!!!! That was an unexpected result, but the statistics show we had the better chances, so I will take it. We had loads of yellow cards and lose two players (Rojas and Roman) from the next match which will hurt some. Second leg is back home. We can close this out right! Right? oh well, maybe next time. We still had the edge in shots and XG, but out D and Alonso picked a bad game to have a bad game. We did get £2.5M for our trouble, so that's cool. The draw for the Conference League matches was done and looks better than last year, but we will see. Hopefully we can do enough to advance from this round.

UEFA Champions League Champions Path Third Qualifying Round: Next we play against Slavia Prague from the Czech First Division. Czechia is 21st in the Nation Club Coefficients and Slavia Prague is 75th in the European club rankings, right in the middle of some premier league teams, so I am not expecting much. Decent account from the team, but a step too far at this point in our growth. FYI, the second screenshot is the match summary I use when I forget to hit the simulate button.

UEFA Champions League Champions Path Second Qualifying Round: Next we play against Larne from the Sports Direct Premiership in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland is 39th in the Nation Club Coefficients and Larne is 208th in the European club rankings. The polls think we can win, I am hoping we can, their team looks slightly stronger based on attributes. A draw keeps the hopes alive, now just need to pull one out in the second leg. It doesn't help that our top 2 strikers are injured. Before the second leg, another player signing came through. This will likely be the last for a while as the team now has pretty good depth and I need to give play time to the ones I want to develop. Caldeira is a solid FB and will rotate with Romain. We now have a decent league squad and a better European cup squad with only one or two players who are going to give us grief over playing time. Second leg is in the books and we pulled it out on the road with a fine game. A couple of late goals from the bench put this one away. Happy to see the deeper squad contributing.

UEFA Champions League Champions Path First Qualifying Round: First up we play against Sutjeska from the Montenegrin First League. Montenegro is 49th in the Nation Club Coefficients and Sutjeska is 260th in the European club rankings. First leg at home and we came away with a disappointing draw in a game we should have won based on the statistics. We had a number of players suspended from last season, including all 3 of our right fullbacks, so that gave us a bit of an odd lineup. Hopefully the second leg goes better. The next day after the game, my new right FB signed ... could have come a day earlier. Monveneur has strong physicals and is rated our best right fullback, so he will get a rotation with Roman and we will see who plays better. Well, I was nervous heading into the second leg away from home, but I should not have been as the boys put on a show. That's how you do it!

I did get one very strong player in for a £74K transfer fee: Theo Golliard could be the starter in multiple positions as he is highest ranked as: DLP (60.6), AP (62.4) Winger (61.3) and AF (59.7). He is at my L1 target ratings for AP, but that is where Key will play, so Golliard will sub in at DLP and AP while he also trains at right Wing and Striker. Happy to have him on the team as he is a very balanced player. Signed a player for the future as well. Great physicals for 17, hopefully everything else develops.

July has arrived and we signed a few players with one to help now and three 18 year olds for the future. Not all (if any) of the 18 year olds will make the team, but I am hoping I can bring them in and then farm them out to the other Gibraltar clubs to improve them. The most important signing is Frank Angong a BWM with a rating of 63.4, much closer to the target of 67.2 than our current players. He is consistent, likes big matches and has solid work rate and determination. He will start the European and cup games and Cottrell will start the league matches. The best part of the Angong signing is that he only wanted to be a Fringe player... I won't complain about that as it gives me the flexibility to swap squads for league matches. Luke Craggs is an interesting case in that he has solid attributes for CD, a 5 star potential in our strong club, but his technicals are horrible. It will be very interesting to see if he can turn into a serviceable player or not. Barosi and Nunes are here to fill out the youth ranks. Barosi has a 4.5 star potential and will be sent on loan. Nunes only has a 3 star potential, so will likely keep him around to play on the U23 team and be emergency depth Have offers out to a couple more players, one strong first team and another youth player... we will see if they pan out. I tried to get the top players to come, but they wouldn't join us. It is nice to have a couple of million in the transfer budget, but there are no players to spend it on who will come. I targeted the best of the players that I am aware of based on my rules and struck out. The scouts are hard at work to try and find more, but I expect we will play the year with this team and grow reputation again to get better players and repeat a couple of times before we are ready to truly compete.

This email made my day!!!!

The end of year rankings and coefficients got updated and Gibraltar moved up to 42 in the Nation Club rankings. This is great as it now means an extra team gets to play in Europe to help collect money and improve the rankings.