DaneBramage

January 2022 Current Squad I'm glad we're a professional club (as is everyone else in the division), as I find that easier to deal with than starting amateur or semi-pro. I won't have to worry about players being stolen away the whole time. There looks to be plenty of quality and potential in the squad, with Fabricio Lopez and Franco Almanza possible the standout players on first glance (both 4.0 CA and 5.0 PA). I'm actually pleasantly surprised by how good the standard is, I was expecting worse. There are a few gaps which we'll have to look in the other squads for solutions. We could do with another left-back, and we're short at centre-back too. German Aguirre will likely miss the whole season with a knackered ACL. We're also short of wingers, which are pretty vital for the 4-4-2 system I normally use. -------------------------------------------- Reserves Six players with 4.0 CA are out on loan elsewhere. That's quite the decision that someone has made, though to use a cliche, they'll be like new signings when they return. We do have two players in on loan ourselves, but I've decided to banish them to the reserves and not use them (including a left-winger who would have been a starting player, this might be a bad decision). At least we're not paying anything for them. -------------------------------------------- Under 20s A number of youth players were generated to fill out the squad, so I've labelled them as the first intake. There is a bug in FM23 where nearly all Argentina newgen players are called Tomas, so I'm using old World Cup squads to give them different first names for my sanity. I know he's only 15, but given the scarcity of left-wingers in the squad Tobias Luna will probably be promoted to the first-team sooner rather than later. --------------------------------------------

This thread is a chance for me to rectify some past failures. My most recent career (which isn't necessarily finished, but I was getting the urge to try something different) saw me trying to manage as many promotions as possible. Twice I ended up in the Argentine second division, and twice I failed miserably. So I'm looking for some redemption in Argentina. I've also tried youth only a few times before, but without huge amounts of success. I can normally achieve a promotion or two, but then progress stalls. So I'm looking to do better this time. It might be youth only+ though, rather than strictly youth only. I like the idea of building up a collection of feeder clubs and signing the best players from their academies, similar to the Red Bull or City groups. And given the club's Armenian heritage, it might be fun to also look out for young Armenian players to add to the mix. But these ideas are years away, we may never get to the point where we can pick feeder clubs or scout abroad, so I'll worry about that if and when it comes to it. The manager is an English fella, with suitable qualifications for the Argentine third tier (Continental B licence, ex-pro footballer at a local level). Active leagues: Argentina (top 3), Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Uruguay (all top 2), Peru (top 1 only), England, France, Germany, Italy, Spain (all top 2), Portugal (top 1 only).

Club Deportivo Armenio were formed in 1962, by members of the Armenian community in Argentina. After ten years of existence they won the Primera D title in 1972, securing promotion to the third tier. Four years later they won the Primera C title, making it up to the second tier for the first time. 1986/87 was the most successful year in the clubs history, as a 38 game unbeaten run was the catalyst to winning the Primera B title. However, their spell in the Primera Division only lasted a couple of seasons, and Armenio suffered relegation in 1988/89. In the present day, Armenio have been in Primera B for a few years (although due to league restructuring, this is now the third tier of Argentine football). So it's time for a new manager to take charge and attempt to get them back to the top flight for the first time in 35 years.

May 2057 - Kilmarnock Championship December - I took over for the final game of 2056, and we won 4-2. January - Three wins and two draws. February - Form dropped away a bit, and we suffered the first loss in my time here. The important game was against Partick Thistle though, and we won that one. March - Two wins from two. Also, cups are stupid. But if you get to the final and the league is pretty much sewn up, you should win it. And we did, beating Queen's Park to raise the Challenge Cup trophy. April - With four games remaining we held an 11 point lead over Partick Thistle, and when they lost their first game of the month they handed the trophy to us before we even kicked a ball. Which is lucky really, as when we did play we only earned one point from three games. May - We ended the season with a win. Partick Thistle dropped away and Livingston ended up as the nearest challengers. -------------------------------------------------------------- History Promotion number 22, and the tenth in Europe. I took over with an eight point lead, and finished the season with an eight point lead. -------------------------------------------------------------- Job Search I've adjusted the game world again, and will now have the top two leagues active from England, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. --------------------------------------------------------------

December 2056 Job Search A short break, then back to the grind. St. Mirren sacked their manager (12th in the Premiership) and they were sufficiently impressed by the man at Kilmarnock, who'd led them to a five point lead at the top of the Championship. So that was a pretty appealing job for me to apply for. The caretaker manager won four of his five games in charge, so the gap at the top had grown to eight points by the time I took over. Perhaps surprisingly given the length of my career (or maybe not, given how much I've jumped between different countries and continents), I think this is the first time I've managed a player at two different clubs. Yusuf Ibrahim was a near ever-present during my first year at Ipswich, but in the second year he fell to the bench. He then moved up north when his contract expired and has been playing well in Scotland. --------------------------------------------------------------

November 2056 - North Macedonia History That's another goal ticked off, an international promotion. In fact, that's most targets ticked off now. There's not many areas I haven't hit yet apart from Scandinavia. -------------------------------------------------------------- Job Search Another resignation, and on to the next job. I did consider calling it a day here, thinking that a Nations League success would be a fine way to cap off the save. But I don't really have a good idea in mind for what save I'd want to move on to next, so I'm sticking with this a bit longer. --------------------------------------------------------------

November 2056 - North Macedonia Job Offer Blimey, big one. France reached the quarter-finals of the European Championships back in the summer and are currently 2nd in their League A group. Not sure I've done anything to deserve this, but obviously I can't take it anyway. -------------------------------------------------------------- Nations League C - Group 1 We made a bad start against Hungary, going 1-0 down within five minutes. They scored again just before half-time to double the deficit, and had they not missed a penalty it would been even worse. In the second half we played much better, and Ylber Dhimitri came off the bench to rescue a point, scoring twice on his debut. Azerbaijan beat Lithuania, so we went into the final set of fixtures top of the table with 10 points, then Azerbaijan on 9 points, and Hungary on 8. A win would see us promoted, a loss would see us miss out, a draw would only be enough if Hungary failed to win against Lithuania. Winners! Azerbaijan had a couple of half-chances after the interval, but that was about it. They didn't offer much at all and we handled them easily. Redemption! It took three attempts, but I finally managed to get North Macedonia promoted. --------------------------------------------------------------

October 2056 - North Macedonia Nations League C - Group 1 Good win against Azerbaijan. We pretty much dominated and it was exactly what we needed. Felix Seger is the star boy of North Macedonian football, a left-winger that came through at Manchester City before being sold to Brighton for £36.5 million. Darko Kostovski is the next big hope up front, with a prolific record for Schalke's reserve team. We followed this up with a straightforward win over Lithuania, the goals coming each side of half-time. Vlado Krstevski has a one-in-three record for his country (14 goals in 44 games), and over 170 goals for Vardar Skopje where he's won the North Macedonian league ten times. We're in a good position at the moment, but have two tough games still to come (Hungary home and Azerbaijan away). --------------------------------------------------------------

September 2056 - North Macedonia Nations League C - Group 1 We kicked the campaign off with a home game against Lithuania, and were comfortably the better side. We should have won by more. The goals came from players that play in the North Macedonian leagues, the assists from Goran Trajkov who is part of Red Bull Salzburg's U21 team. The game with Hungary was a close encounter, it could have gone either way. It was a match with just one goal, and unfortunately it went against us. Azerbaijan are the surprise early leaders. We host them in our next game, it will be important to win that game to stay in touch. --------------------------------------------------------------

July 2056 Job Search They say don't go back. So going back twice, after failing twice previously, is probably even sillier. But sod it, here we go! North Macedonia again! In 2042 we came bottom of League B and were relegated. In 2048 we came second in League C and missed out on promotion, doomed by a loss to Luxembourg. Luxembourg! But this will be our year. --------------------------------------------------------------

July 2056 Job Search I holidayed for a couple of months until the European Championships ended, and sure enough the offers started coming in. First up was Croatia. But they're in League A, so I can't take that job. Then it was Georgia, in League B. But a group with Denmark, Slovenia, and Northern Ireland looked unappealing, with success unlikely. And then I received an offer from a League C team... --------------------------------------------------------------

April 2056 - Ipswich Town Squad Stats In 2054/55 we scored a lot of goals, and we beat that tally this year. Top scorer Michael Leach improved to manage 41 this time around, and Kane Martin wasn't far off with 34. Three other reached double figures, while five reached ten or more assists. The biggest upgrade was in defence though, we conceded less than half the amount of goals we did last season. This was mainly due to the strength of the loanees we brought in, improving both our first-choice and second-string line-ups. Aidy Paley was actually named in the NexGen 50 and has improved to 3.5 stars, so perhaps I misjudged by only slotting him into the second-string. Vashon Wyatt ended up breaking the rules and missing training or games four times, losing a total of seven weeks wages. He finished the season with the lowest average rating. Michael Leach will be leaving when his contract expires, as will the loan army. So a bit of a rebuild, particularly in defence, will be needed for next year in the Championship. -------------------------------------------------------------- History This is the twentieth promotion of my career, and the thirteenth time we've gone up as champions. -------------------------------------------------------------- Job Search I didn't have to quit, I could have stayed to take on the Championship. But I was still annoyed how the players just stopped playing in the final couple of months, mentally hitting the beach as soon as promotion was assured rather than fighting for a double. I was pretty quickly offered a route back into international football with Ghana for the African Cup of Nations qualifying, but obviously that was a non-starter. However, international football is my next target. The European Championships are happening this summer, so with the inevitable turnover of managers after this competition hopefully something will open up for another crack at the Nations League this autumn. --------------------------------------------------------------

April 2056 - Ipswich Town League One Cups are stupid, but given that we'd made the final and already won the league I was annoyed we didn't make it a double. The draw against Sheffield Wednesday made it seven games without a win in all competitions. At least we ended the campaign back in winning form, beating the teams that ended up 2nd and 3rd. Emphatic. We managed 121 goals, 40 more than anyone else. We also had the best defence in the division. In addition to this we also managed to beat Reading's record total of 106 points in a 46 game season. --------------------------------------------------------------

March 2056 - Ipswich Town League One Promotion was confirmed after the draw with Oxford, and the point against Salford ensured we were going up as champions. But I am not happy at all with how this month has gone. After we reached the EFL Trophy final our form has completely fallen off. We've gone five games without a win and we're struggling to score goals. We get completely FMed at Plymouth. We scored in the opening minute, then they scored twice from four shots with an xG of 0.31, while we couldn't add to our tally despite 33 shots (13 on target) and an xG of 4.06. Champions. I was considering staying here next season for a crack at the Championship, but these past few weeks have diminished my enthusiasm for that idea. --------------------------------------------------------------

February 2056 - Ipswich Town League One Absence number four. I can see why Arsenal were happy to send him away for the year. Perfect form. Five games, five wins, loads of goals. We've passed the 100 goal mark in the league with 10 games to go, we could run up a cricket score. Start engraving lads. --------------------------------------------------------------

January 2056 - Ipswich Town League One Annoyed by the loss to Portsmouth. It means they've done the double over us this season. We won our other three league games with a clean sheet in each. We now hold a nine point lead and we have a game in hand. --------------------------------------------------------------

December 2055 - Ipswich Town League One The loss to Derby was my fault. I got overzealous with the continue button and accidentally picked the second-string twice in a row, so they were tired from their midweek game. Other than that though it was a perfect month and the rotation policy paid off. When we lost to Derby the gap went down to just three points, but Bristol City failed to capitalise on our slip up, They drew and lost their next two matches, and we built our lead up to eight points. --------------------------------------------------------------

November 2055 - Ipswich Town League One A third time! What an absolute clown. He's not even good enough to pull this off, he's mainly a sub and he's scored once so far, averaging around a 6.75 rating. I reckon Vashon Whyatt will end the season with five of these incidents. We had another busy month, including our toughest test of the season so far. The game against Bristol City was a 1st v 2nd clash, and unfortunately it fell midweek so our second-string played (I probably should have planned that better). A draw would have been a fair result, but an own goal from one of our centre-backs lost us the tie. We nearly went two games without a win for the first time this season, but Kane Martin converted an extremely late penalty at Lincoln. We stay top, but if only the Bristol City game had gone the other way we'd be 12 points clear. --------------------------------------------------------------

October 2055 - Ipswich Town League One A very busy month, but one we handled well. We now have a squad large enough and strong enough to use a different team in midweek, though the second-string did drop points for the first time this season. Against Cambridge United we were so close to being FMed (26 shots and 3.21 xG compared to 2 shots and 0.55 xG), but we grabbed a very late equaliser to take a point. We couldn't repeat the trick against Portsmouth though, we were just lacking on the day. The fresh legs allowed us to absolutely batter relegation threatened Sutton United, even if we did give them a headstart with a goal in the first minute. Kane Martin and Michael Leach both scored hat-tricks, the latter is now finding his stride after recovering from injury. We no longer hold a perfect record, but we're still at the top with a decent gap, and a far superior goal difference. --------------------------------------------------------------

September 2055 - Ipswich Town League One Strike two. Now I'm annoyed and it's two weeks wages gone. The loan deal can't be terminated, but I can't bin him off to the reserves either as a first-choice midfielder has just gotten injured so this fella is still needed. Otherwise though, it's been a perfect month with four wins from four, and three clean sheets for good measure. The hat-trick from Michael Shields means he's already reached double figures this season. A perfect start, eight wins from eight. --------------------------------------------------------------

August 2055 - Ipswich Town Transfer Business We made one big sale over the summer, Jack Graham joining Leeds for £12 million. He was a talented young striker so for a long-term save it would have been madness to sell him, but with the amount of attacking players we have at the club and the short-term goals it made sense to sell and use that to bankroll a few signings in more needed positions. We proceeded to spend £2.2 million on a new starting goalkeeper, centre-back, and central midfielder. We also went slightly over the top with loans, bringing in six players from Premier League clubs, including two as part of a new partnership with Arsenal. All are in defence of midfield, so we are significantly strengthened compared to last year. We are now favourites for promotion, and seven of our players are in the media's dream eleven (and only one of them is a loanee). The board accepted a £17 million offer from Bournemouth for Michael Leach and it would have been a big hit had he left, but he couldn't agree terms and is staying with us. His contract runs out at the end of the season and he's currently planning on leaving on a Bosman, but if all goes well that will be someone else's problem to deal with. -------------------------------------------------------------- League One Normally I'd be annoyed by this, but just this once I'm going to admire the cheek of the lad, doing this within a week of his loan deal starting. I'm just going to assume he got overexcited after making a winning debut at the club. Still lost a week's wages though. We've made a perfect start in the league despite Michael Leach missing out with a twisted ankle. In his absence ten different players have hit the net already. --------------------------------------------------------------

May 2055 - Ipswich Town Squad Stats A couple of times during the season I moaned about having a small squad, but taking these screenshots now that doesn't seem particularly true. We have a lot of players in the first-team, it's not just very balanced. We're overloaded with attacking players, and short in defence and central midfield. So some young signings who aren't really ready to play so much made 40+ starts, and a couple of old boys on their last legs started 30+ times. Hence why there was so much fatigue and our defence was the worst in the top-half. On the other hand, our attack was generally really good. We were the second top scorers in the division and Michael Leach plundered a cracking 37 goals. He was ably backed-up by three other players reaching double figures, and six players managed 10 or more assists. Over the summer we'll be aiming to retain as much of our attacking talent as possible, and strengthen in defence. -------------------------------------------------------------- History 11th place is the lowest league finish of the career so far. Given that promotion was expected, this is definitely amongst the worst seasons so far, probably beaten out just by the two attempts in Argentina. --------------------------------------------------------------

May 2055 - Ipswich Town League One The final four games of the season, though the campaign was basically over after the loss to Sheffield Wednesday. That ended any chance of making the top six and the last three games didn't matter. Of course, with the pressure off we took seven points from a possible nine. Not good. After the two wins in April we were in 8th, but the draw on the final day saw us drop down to 11th. And that was enough to get the board unhappy again. -------------------------------------------------------------- Board Meeting They're probably right here, this season hasn't been good enough. Our form has been streaky, a great December and February balanced out by an awful September and January, and we were never in the mix for promotion, spending most of the year midtable. I told the board that performances hadn't been too bad, but luck and results didn't go our way. They bought that, and for now at least, I still have a job. --------------------------------------------------------------

March 2055 - Ipswich Town League One We battered managerless Wycombe 7-0, adding to their woes when they were already bottom of the table with a -60 goal difference. But my suggestion last month that we might sneak into the play-offs was nonsense. Losses to Preston and Charlton, each time conceding three goals, pretty much ended that hope. Six points away with four games remaining, it's not going to happen. --------------------------------------------------------------

February 2055 - Ipswich Town League One During the winter transfer window Mark Turner was signed for £350k from Portsmouth. Whichever member of my recruitment team picked him out deserves a raise, as he has been instrumental in our form turning around. Since joining and taking over the left-winger position he's scored six and assisted three more in just nine games. I also managed to sign a new goalkeeper, and he promptly conceded three on his debut. He's been better since though, and even if he's not a massive upgrade, I just don't want to use the old fella any more. Whisper it quietly, but we might just have pulled ourselves into the mix. We're only four points off of the play-offs now, and we have a game in hand on Portsmouth (admittedly, the rest of the competitors do as well). --------------------------------------------------------------