DaneBramage

June 2025 Departure Alejandro Vignati made 90 appearances for me over the last few years, starting roughly half of them, but the time was up for him when he decided to skip training a couple of months back. -------------------------------------------- Rejected Offer A big offer came in from France for 22 Roberto Heredia. Saint-Etienne have just clinched promotion to Ligue Un and they were looking for a new striker, offering £775k + £175k after 50 games + 20% of profit. He's our top scorer so far so I had to reject it, but I do wonder at what point the board would jump in and accept it given our perilous financial situation. Of course he was annoyed by this and had to call a meeting with his agent. It was agreed that if Saint-Etienne came in with a higher offer we'd have to accept it, and £4.5 million was the figure we shook hands on. Crisis averted. -------------------------------------------- Poached Player Unless I've missed one previously, I think this is the first player that's been poached from our academy before coming through our youth intakes. I'll keep an eye out for them coming through at Instituto ACC in a year or two. They are currently in the league above us, the Primera Division. -------------------------------------------- Primera Nacional 25a Maximiliano D'Alessandro has made a few appearances now, and set a record with a goal against Ferro. That game itself was a thriller, we were always on top but the goals were flowing at both ends. After my criticism of him last month Jonathan Herrera has responded with 6 goals in three games. This included a hat-trick against Tristan Suarez. They were down in 36th place so I picked seven academy players in the starting line-up, and we managed our biggest win of the season so far. We just weren't very good against Alte Brown, we didn't deserve to get anything from that match. Still flying high, we were even up in 2nd place at one point. -------------------------------------------- Finances A smaller loss than normal due to the sale. --------------------------------------------

May 2025 New Contract £200 a week increase. -------------------------------------------- Primera Nacional We started the month with a solid win over Temperley, both goals coming from a surprise source, centre-back 22 Fernando Pardal with a pair of headers from set-pieces. We then drew the next game, a back-and-forth affair which could have gone either way. A bore draw followed, their keeper was MotM but we didn't work him a huge amount. The 91st minute is a great time to grab a winner. We really should have won against Brown. Their goal came from a penalty, while we couldn't score from an xG of 2.34. Jonathan Herrera in particular had a stinker. He's been a goal machine over the last three years, but has now gone 10 games without a goal this season. He's considering his options and is annoyed that our goalkeeper depth isn't very strong (and he's not wrong about that). Since it won't be resolved I think we'll definitely be losing him at the end of the year, if anyone shows any interest before then I think we'll have to let him go. We're still going strong near the top. I'm sure we'll fall away at some point, but it hasn't come yet. -------------------------------------------- Finances --------------------------------------------

May 2025 Youth Intake This was rated as a 5.0 star Excellent intake (3 Elite talents, 3 Top talents, 5 Good talents, and 5 Decent talents). Everyone is Argentine, with a splash of Spanish in the second nationalities. There's a good amount of potential and also a decent amount of current ability among the top players. Good amounts of determination at the top of the list too. Hopefully some of the defensive players will be better than this first judgement suggests, we could also do with a goalkeeper coming through. I will try and make sure 25a Maximiliano D'Alessandro sees some gametime this season. They beat the Under 20s 6-3 in the tryout match, four goals coming from 25e Valentin Maldonado. --------------------------------------------

April 2025 Primera Nacional Alejandro Vignati is apparently upset over some promise I broke, though I can not remember at all what it was. Pretty annoying since he's recently signed a new three year contract, but now he has to be transfer-listed and banished to the reserves. We've done well without him though. We started the month coming from behind three times to beat Ferro Carril Oeste 4-3, 22 Angel Cabrera eventually turning the game in our favour with two goals from the bench. We then battered Guillermo Brown, doing most of the damage in a four minute spell in the second-half. In a way we were lucky to get anything from Almagro - we were largely the better team but created very little, and scored our goal from an xG of just 0.23. The game against Villa Mitre was very tight, and could have gone either way, luckily we grabbed the only goal late on. The stupid league table doesn't even fit into one screenshot. I'm very surprised and chuffed with how we've started, I don't know if we can keep it up but at least we've shown that we shouldn't be in a relegation fight. -------------------------------------------- Finances --------------------------------------------

March 2025 Expectations The bookies and media think we'll do okay, predicting that we'll finish between 24th and 28th. Yes, 28th. The Primera Nacional is a stupid division, with 37 teams in it. Everyone plays each other once, the top team goes up automatically, and 2nd-13th go into a play-off series for another promotion spot. Luckily the board have more realistic ideas, just wanting us to try and avoid relegation, so that means finishing above the bottom two. I think we might get destroyed on a regular basis this year, but hopefully we can find two teams worse than us. -------------------------------------------- Primera Nacional 22 Roberto Heredia made a great start to his time in Primera Nacional with a brace on the opening day. Unfortunately we couldn't hold on for the win, a late own goal (deflection from a cross) costing us a couple of points. We had double the amount of chances that Gimnasia Mendoza did, but they were more accurate with their finishing. We dominated Alvarado and finished well, scoring three times from an xG of just 0.71. They had double our xG, but most of it was due to a late penalty when the game was already dead and buried. I'm more optimistic after this opening month. We've proved ourselves capable of getting results, we may well stand a chance. -------------------------------------------- Finances The usual. --------------------------------------------

February 2025 Copa Argentina I was caught out by this. I knew we were being entered in the cup this year, but the game came earlier than expected so we weren't match ready. Turns out that it had originally been scheduled for the 19th, but was pushed forward two weeks as River Plate had their preparations for the Copa Libertadores, and I'd just missed that message.. So while we weren't at full sharpness, they probably weren't either. But they are a much better side. We did manage to take the lead twice, but their superior quality showed and both times they pulled us back before overhauling us in the second-half. -------------------------------------------- Finances Profit! The rest of the season ticket money came through, and we've now sold over 2,500 packages this year, nearly double the previous seasons. But the real money was the cup tie. We received roughly £290k from the gate receipts against River Plate, which is almost three times the gate receipts we made in the entirety of 2024. Still deep in the red though, so it doesn't really matter. Most teams in the Primera Nacional are listed as having insecure finances, so it doesn't look like our money issues will be solved any time soon. --------------------------------------------

January 2025 Departures A couple of significant losses here, one that was expected and another that is a bit of a blow. Gonzalo Rios and his £5k per week had to go, but he represented us well last year and we'll have to hope someone steps up and contributes what he did from the left-wing. 23h Hector Leon was our back-up goalkeeper and was poached away during the period we couldn't offer new contracts. We're now left very thin in that position. A few of the others were regulars in 2022 and 2023, but frozen out last year when they were considering their options. Turned out to be for the best considering how well we did without using them. In total these departures will save us about £8k a week. -------------------------------------------- Finances A smaller hit than normal due to the season tickets being bought this month (currently at 1,358, the exact same amount as the last two years). --------------------------------------------

November 2024 Squad Stats Both of my starting strikers had great seasons. Jonathan Herrera beat his tallies from the last two seasons, managing 31 goals this time, while 22 Roberto Heredia also had his best year yet with 23. Gonzalo Rios is the player earning £5k a week that I couldn't shift, but he knuckled down and played well. I thought he might complain about often being on the bench but he didn't and contributed 11 assists. I did have a cheeky punt at asking if he'd like to stay (obviously on massively reduced wages), but he still wants to leave when his contract is up. On the other wing 22 Angel Cabrera also impressed. He reached double-figures for assists, and nearly the same with goals too. -------------------------------------------- Academy Player Records Four academy players are now in our first-choice starting XI, with another two rotating in and out. 22 Roberto Heredia is the obvious star man with more than 40 goals already, but 22 Angel Cabrera is also breaking out. -------------------------------------------- History We sold the exact same amount of season tickets to the faithful, but the average attendance rose in line with our success. Jonathan Herrera is continuing and improving on his own records. -------------------------------------------- Facilities + Finances After promotion was confirmed we received a bump to our reputation, from 2.0 stars to 2.5. Our bank balance is basically the same as it was this time last year, a tiny bit over £1 million in the red. There doesn't seem to be any way of making significant amounts of money, we need regular injections of cash put in by the board. --------------------------------------------

November 2024 Primera B Metropolitana The final two games of the season didn't matter, but I was still annoyed by the loss to Lujan. The team was rotated slightly, but it should still have been strong enough to get at least a point. It looked like the season was going to end with a whimper, but Gonzalo Lazzarotto came off the bench to grab a 93rd minute winner. I was ready to let him leave this summer, but since September he's scored three late winners so I think he might have earned himself a new contract. I expected nothing from this season, so I'm massively surprised that we've won the title. I thought it was nonsense when the bookies made us favourites and the board wanted promotion, and thought I'd be doomed to being fired. Then when we went five games without a win over June and July I still thought we'd fall away. But then we just started winning again. An incredible year. -------------------------------------------- Finances Crossing my fingers that going up a division will see more money coming in next year. --------------------------------------------

October 2024 Primera B Metropolitana The game against Ituzaingo could have gone either way, but 22 Angel Cabrera made the difference with an assist and a goal in a MotM performance. Sacachispas could only draw, while Sporting Italiano won to become our nearest challengers, albeit seven points behind. We didn't allow Estudiantes anything, but they restricted us pretty well too. It took until the 87th minute for a couple of substitutes to make the difference. And the goal from Gonzalo Lazzarotto was the one that won us the title! Sporting Italiano drew, Sacachispas lost, no one can catch us now. We celebrated by giving San Miguel a whooping. YES LADS!!! We've been on a great run of form, and while doing so our rivals were floundering and falling away. The title was wrapped up with three games to go, and whatever happens over the final two matches we'll end up with a good winning margin. -------------------------------------------- Finances Keep 'em coming. The real good news is that with promotion confirmed, our wage budget has been increased accordingly and we can start offering contracts again. If this hadn't happened our squad would have been decimated in December, as it stands we now shouldn't lose anyone vital. --------------------------------------------

September 2024 Primera B Metropolitana If Sporting Italiano thought they might squirm their way back into contention, then that was a short-lived hope. We were comfortable and arguably should have beaten them by more. We nearly suffered an embarrassing loss to relegation candidates Defensores Unidos though. We were looking well on course for a 1-0 win until a five minute disaster in the 79th-83rd minutes saw us reduced to ten men and concede twice, the second from a terrible defensive mistake. But our strength in depth saw us take the win really late, both stoppage-time goals coming from substitutes. UAI Urquiza are a decent side, 5th in the table, but it's never good to concede from every shot on target. The game against Central Cordoba looked like it was going to be a bore draw, but Jonathan Herrera had other ideas with his 30th goal of the season. Wow! We might actually do this? We started the month three points above Sacachispas, but they lost two games this month and the gap has grown to six points with just five games remaining. And our goal difference is far superior. -------------------------------------------- Finances More of this please. --------------------------------------------

August 2024 Primera B Metropolitana A bit of a potentially tricky month with four away games, but we handled it very nicely. Two away draws at first was fine, but the turning point was the home game against Dock Sud. We battered them in a dominating performance, admittedly where we did benefit from them going down to ten men during the first-half. That then gave us the momentum to follow this up with a pair of away wins, both by the only goal of the game. Sporting Italiano only won one of their games this month, and we've climbed back to the top. -------------------------------------------- Finances --------------------------------------------

July 2024 Primera B Metropolitana A mixed month, but better than last so I'll take it. We really should have received two points more, we were the far stronger team against Midland but just couldn't make the breakthrough. I'm trying my hardest to move on Gonzalo Rios, he of the £5k weekly wages, but no one will take him. In the meantime though he put on a MotM performance against Comunicaciones with a goal and an assist. We've dropped to second and fallen a couple of points behind Sporting Italiano, but it's still all to play for. -------------------------------------------- Departures We did manage to shift one of the big money drains, letting Francisco Molina go for free to remove £3.3k from the weekly wage costs. Nicolas Gimenez was a first-choice player during my first two years, but when he announced he was considering his options at the end of his contract I froze him out. That's another £1.1k per week saved. -------------------------------------------- Finances Profit! Just a one-off though due to the player sales and a new sponsorship deal. --------------------------------------------

June 2024 Primera B Metropolitana I thought we were on for a good month after the big win against Lujan (5th at the time). But that turned out to be our only win of the month. We lost three points due to late goals, two in the last five minutes at San Miguel and another in the 87th minute against Deportivo Laferrere. We also struggled a little with injuries; nothing major, but issues keeping players out for a couple of games at a time meant we weren't able to field consistent line-ups. We had eight academy players starting against Sacachispas, including one debutee, but it was more out of necessity than choice. We're just past the halfway point now. Top on goal difference. Hopefully this month was just a blip rather than a turn in fortunes. -------------------------------------------- Finances Cheers lads, very helpful. --------------------------------------------

May 2024 Primera B Metropolitana Three good wins, all with clean sheets, and one astonishing loss. I'm baffled how we lost to UAI Urquiza. They were 4-0 up at half-time, we dragged it back to 4-2 but then they added another after 55 minutes. We carried on battling and got two more, but couldn't find a fifth. Infuriating, and their goals came from an xG of just 1.01. All free training sessions over the next week were replaced with additional goalkeeper sessions, and we responded well. Against Ituzaingo seven academy players started the game, including two debutees. We've scored 40 goals so far this season. Nobody else has more than 24. We've conceded 20 goals, and only three teams have let it more. -------------------------------------------- Finances --------------------------------------------

May 2024 Youth Intake This was rated as a 5.0 star Excellent intake (zero Elite talents, 3 Top talents, 9 Good talents, and 4 Decent talents). Everyone is Argentine, with one Italian and one Spanish second nationalities. A lot of low determination stats here, that sucks. I wasn't able to sign three of these players as they wanted more than £90 per week. By the time the tryout match happened the deals for the other 13 to join the club had been completed. So in the tryout match the candidates team was made up of the three unsigned players and a bunch of greys. They beat the Under 20s 4-3. --------------------------------------------

There's just so little money coming in. Even if we weren't paying any wages we'd still be losing money each month. The largest source of income last month was fund raising, just over £23k. Then 'other' and gate receipts, about £9k each. The total income was £46,758. Our total expenditure was more than four times higher, at £219.585. Player wages of £115k made up more than half of this, along with another £21k on bonuses and £19k on staff wages. But then there's nearly £20k on loan repayments and interest (we don't have any loans being repaid, so this must all be interest on the overdraft) and £15k tax, plus the other smaller ongoing costs. ----------------------------------- At the end of the last couple of seasons we received sponsorship payments of just under £200k per year (if I remember correctly). It looks like one of these deals ended and a new one has started at a much lower rate, as the deals now come to a total of just £58.1k per annum. This is the second lowest amount in the division, though this screen only seems to be picking up a couple of these deals. ----------------------------------- Our wages are the highest in the division, entirely due to the three players who returned from their loans that I was unable to move on. - ----------------------------------- We made more money selling players during pre-season that all other teams combined, and only one side spent more than they brought in. - ----------------------------------- Only 7 clubs have finances listed as okay, the other 13 are listed as insecure. So it's not an issue isolated to us, it's a division-wide problem.

April 2024 Primera B Metropolitana Our great run of form continued, making it as far as six wins in a row. It was ended by a stinker of a match with Sarmiento, a game of low chances and low skill but they just eked out the one goal needed. The scoring run of 22 Roberto Heredia also ended at this time, previously he had scored in seven consecutive games. We stay top thanks to the win over Sporting Italiano, a 1st v 2nd clash, but way too early in the season to call it a six-pointer. -------------------------------------------- Finances Our crap financial situation could put us into some major trouble soon. We're limited to offering wages of only £90 per week, so we're not able to renew contracts. A lot of deals are running out in December, including three first-team regulars (22 Fernando Pardal, 22 Roberto Heredia, and 22 Angel Cabrera), and it's pretty worrying. Once we reach 1st July they'll be within six months of expiry and other clubs will be able to talk to them, and we won't be able to counter their offers. --------------------------------------------

March 2024 Primera B Metropolitana This lad is great. In my last save I went through 22 teams (and 1 country) in 35 seasons, so I never really knew any of the players. But this chap is obviously my favourite here. He just won't stop scoring, he's already at 12 goals this year in 7 games. The draw with Midland was a decent point, as they were newly-relegated into this division. But losing to El Porvenir was poor, as they're new to this division from the other direction. We somehow conceded three times from just four shots on target. and a 0.91 xG. We bounced back though with three good wins, something we haven't achieved since August 2022. We're top of the table, but I don't know why we're playing so much better than last year. It can't be all down to the return of Gonzalo Rios can it? Though he has slotted in well, with 4 assists and 1 goal so far. Academy players aren't being forgotten, we generally have at least three in the starting line-up. 22 Roberto Heredia has 4 goals so far and 22 Angel Cabrera has 3 assists. -------------------------------------------- Finances --------------------------------------------

February 2024 Expectations I think I might be screwed. The media are predicting that we'll be winning the league this year, the bookies have us 6-4 favourites, and the board want us to secure promotion. I don't see it happening. The pressure will definitely be on. -------------------------------------------- Primera B Metropolitana Although if Jonathan Herrera continues on like this, we might stand a chance. Seven goals in the first two games is certainly a good start to the campaign. Three of the loanees that returned to the club are still here, we haven't managed to move them on. The 33 year old is in the reserves, but Gonzalo Rios (AML, 25) and Agustin Pereyra (DR, 25) are involved with the first-team. They will be allowed to leave if any offers come in, but in the meantime and given how much we're paying them, it seems silly not to use them, especially with the ridiculous expectations this year (which is probably partly due to the fact that they are here). -------------------------------------------- Finances --------------------------------------------

January 2024 Departures Any transfer fee for Ivan Lopez would go straight to him, so he was let go for free, although we will get 50% of his next transfer fee and a friendly. Two of last year's loanees were shifted for a total of £675k. There's also an additional £63k after 50 games for the first player, and £83k after 50 games for the second (plus 20% of any profit on his next transfer). This saves us £4.5k per week on wages, roughly £235k for the year. -------------------------------------------- Finances Some improvement but the finances are still in a poor state. In reality we lose so much money each month we need a lot of sales all in one go to stand any chance of reaching a positive balance again, and then we have to hope the board are amenable to any upgrades immediately if and when that happens. --------------------------------------------

December 2023 New Contract Renewed for two years on the same terms. -------------------------------------------- Affiliate Club Last time I asked for a senior affiliate the board looked for a team, but couldn't find anyone suitable to link up with. This time they provided a shortlist of three teams, but all were for loan options only and didn't offer any financial incentives, so no point taking them up on it. -------------------------------------------- Returning Loanees When I took over there were six players out on loan for two years, and these deals have now come to an end. One of their contracts expired in December, but the other five have now returned to the club, and this poses quite the dilemma. Four of them are ranked among the six best players at the club, so they would obviously massively improve our starting XI. But they are very expensive, between the five of them adding £13.1k to the weekly wage bill (just over £680k per annum). The one not listed here is 33 and on £3.5k per week, so it's an easy choice to get rid of him. But the other four are at their peak or approaching it in the next few years, so they still have a lot to offer. But they would of course be removing opportunities for young players to come through, and AML and DR are both positions where academy graduates have been involved a decent amount. And they are very expensive. And all four only have a year left on their contracts, and have already stated they'll be considering their options. I think I know what I have to do really, for the long-term gains rather than the short-term advantages (which will fall apart when they leave anyway). -------------------------------------------- Finances Sponsorship money for 2024 has come in, but things are still looking bad. Also, with the aforementioned players returning from loan, wages are a disaster. --------------------------------------------

November 2023 Squad Stats Not a lot to be impressed with this year. Jonathan Herrera and Lautaro Montani are probably the only players coming away with any credit, also maybe 22 Roberto Heredia and 22 Angel Cabrera if I'm feeling generous. I wasn't really able to introduce as many young players into the team as with how badly the senior players were performing it was a battle just to meet the top-half expectations. -------------------------------------------- Academy Player Records 22 Roberto Heredia is by far the best product of the academy at the moment, with the most appearances, goals, and assists. Three more players made their debuts this season and 23a Ernesto Farias is showing some early promise. 22c Javier Banegas is the first academy player to be sold. -------------------------------------------- History A significant step back from last year, though as long as we're not being relegated it doesn't really matter. There's no prize money so just not getting fired is the aim really until if and when we start producing enough players to have a proper crack at promotion. But the difference between our home and away from was mad. At home we won 39 points, best in the division. Away we won just 13 points, worst in the division. Our games were exciting for the neutral - we scored 65 goals, best in the division. But conceded 67 goals, worst in the division. -------------------------------------------- Finances + Facilities No change other than our bank account sinking deeper into the red --------------------------------------------

November 2023 Primera B Metropolitana A strong end to the season, though we can thank the AssMan for that. I put him in charge of team selection, and he picked 22c Javier Banegas. I'd probably have removed him if I'd noticed, but I didn't, and he went on to score twice in the first game and add an assist in the second. We recovered to rise back up to 10th, just about scraping a top-half finish. The board are delighted with this, I'm lucky it doesn't take much to keep them happy. -------------------------------------------- Finances Back over a million in the red again. --------------------------------------------

October 2023 Primera B Metropolitana Ugh. We scored six goals over two games, yet managed to come away from them with just a point. Idiot goalkeeper and idiot defenders can't do their stupid jobs properly. Yikes. We've slipped to our worst position since the opening months of the season, and the board are now disappointed in my performance. Media messages are also starting up about the fans being disillusioned with the tactics we're using (4-4-2). -------------------------------------------- Finances I missed getting the value, but I think it's safe to assume we continued losing money. --------------------------------------------