Football Manager 2011

Nice. Just finished the group stage of the CL. Qualified first out of my group. Scored 19 and allowed 3 in the 6 matches. I'm on a pretty good roll. Hopefully I can keep it up.
 
Talking about a congested fixture list. I play Chelsea at home on 1/1/2018 and my next match is the next day away to West Ham. That has never happened to me. Hopefully I can get through this and keep my unbeated streak in the EPL alive. It's at 42 matches I believe.
 
Lol that's just messed up! There' fixture congestions which s playing every 3 days and what I'm currently experiencing and then there's THAT! A bug. That would never happen in real life.
 
I'm out of the Euro League in the semi-finals against Spartak Moskva.
0-0 at home and a 2-1 loss away.

Currently third in Ligue 1. The title race is between Lille (leaders) and Marseille (one point behind). Montpellier are third 7 points behind Lille and on equal points with Lyon and one point behind is PSG. Then there is a massive gap. Montpellier will not finish beyond 5th position.

Third seems difficult with my small squad. Another difficulty is that we loose much points against relegation teams. I can't motivate my players against teams like Sochaux and Valenciennes while they won both matches against L'OM, Lyon, PSG and one match against Lille.
 
For the very weak relegation teams I've started using "You Can Win Today" teamtalk and we have won 5-1 and 6-0 against 19th and 20th in the league :DD. I find my group of players don't react particularly well to "I Expect A Win" talk, so not going to use it that much.
 
Few months into the season, sitting top of the league after Olympiakos were defeated 2-1 at home (they got a man sent off). Looking forward to my first derby game against Diagoras, I've gaven them a ridiculous amount of money but they never really splash the cash (I've raised there profile to be the most attractive club in Greece) but there team is still pretty weak and they are roughly around middle of the league.

I'm going to find it tough to qualify out of the CL group, sitting 3rd, Porto are top, Schalke in 2nd spot and Rubin Kazan are 4th with 1 point. Have a 3 point lead on Kazan but am 3 points short of Schalke who have me beat on head to heads. I'd need to win my 2 games (away to Rubin Kazan and home to Porto) to have any chance, but can't see it.

Having won the Greek cup last year, I'll play the reserves in that.

As though, didn't have much money to spend, only around £2m and wages aren't too high that I can attract. Managed to get Jo on a free transfer and he's been brilliant for me, him and Ahmed Khalil have formed a good partnership although Khalil is on a little lean spell at the moment.

Finding a lot of unhappy players though at the moment, so a fair few up for sale, not getting a game, not settling in area. Also my star players (a few created players I made) who still have a few years on their contracts I'm unable to offer them enough wages to keep. My brother was telling me that he was signing Fabregas for Barca and he wanted £325k a week and £20m signing on fee, WTF.


FD
 
Can you create players in FM, Frank?
I've never heard of that and would not know how to do that...

PS: good run...
 
I ended winning those 2 back to back matches. Beat Chelsea 3-0 and beat West Ham 1-0. Now I have matches against Leeds and Ipswich then I face Arsenal 3 out of the next 4 matches. League Cup, FA Cup and league.
 
The league table in your FM sounds pretty realistic Gerd. Lille as leaders and OM challenging them right behind... and Lyon a little further behind. Is Bordeaux having a terrible year just like real life? And is Monaco in relegation threat like in real life? If those two things were true as well then that's just insane! lol

You're doing a very good job with Montpellier by the way. I just faced them in France as they're in my group along with Metalist (Ukraine) and Leverkusen. My young CB Alvaro Dominguez who I had set to 'challenge' keeper' because I noticed Jourdren has low jumping/aerial ability and is overall kinda short for a keeper managed to give us the winner in 82nd minute by raising above the keeper (Had set corners to be delivered to 6-yard box) and so young Alvaro got his first ever goal for his beloved Atletico and I made it 3 wins out of 3 and 9 points sitting pretty on top of table having come away with narrow but very valuable LATE victories AWAY from home against both Leverkusen who are right behind me with 6 points and Montpellier who now have lost 3 narrow matches and poor guys look out of it with 0 points out of 3.

How are your two young promising Moroccan wingers doing? And Mbiwa is gonna be a real star isn't he?
 
Correction on my Arsenal fixture list. I actually play them in 4 of the next 5 matches. I forgot I'm in the semis of the Carling Cup and we have a home and away against them. WOW!
 
Finished 6th with Villa after the 2015/16 season, did well to rescue a Europa League finish after a poor 1st half to the season. We got to the FA Cup final too, but lost a very even game to Spurs 1-0. During the summer England were awful at Euro 2016, didn't win a game. So they sacked Stuart Pearce and offered me the job. I accepted and am now Aston Villa & England manager. Will name my first squad for a friendly with Italy and the 1st World Cup qualifier against Luxembourg. I've got 1 season left in my Villa contract and they offered me a new one but I have declined to sign on again for now. Keeping my options open. If all goes well with England then I think I'll let the Villa contract expire at the end of the season and just concentrate on England during next season then the World Cup.
 
Bordeaux are not doing very well, their season beginning was a catastrophe they lost their first match with 4-0 against Montpellier.
Monaco are just above relegation.
Arles-Avignon are last way behind the other teams, Sochaux are just above them (irl life they are doing astonishly well, since they are currently 6th) and the there are Nancy and Monaco and Lens...
Jourdren is doing fantastic for me, i have the best defense of Ligue 1 (by far) and he has the highest average score of my squad.
I had to sell Mbiwa to Lyon, their offer was too good. The problem is that he never plays for them...he hasn't played a single match (i follow some of the players i sold). Maybe i can buy him back.

I have 3 Moroccan players in my team: El Kouatari (who can play as LB or as CB), Ait Fana (left winger who sometimes plays as a CF) and Belhanda (RW or RMF). They are perhaps the post important players of the team. El Kouatari is a rock in an otherwise ageing defense (Spahic and Dzokic are older players). Both Ait Fana and Belhanda have decided quite a few matches with individual actions. All 3 players are regulars in the Moroccan national team. I plan to buy another Moroccan player from Caen who irl scores lots of goals (and in my game too), forgot his name (edit: Youssuf El Harabi), but he is one of the highest scorers in Ligue 1. I desperately need a good striker, i'm also after Jelle Vossen from Genk.

Right at the moment Montpellier are doing great, but i think things will go downhill because my squad is not big enough...i have a couple of promising youth players...
 
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That's pretty much what I was expecting to hear.

I meant the two Moroccan wingers so not El Kouatari. Those 2 are quite young but already quite fast and skillful and I'm not surprised to hear they've decided things with individual talent already.

Jourdren is definitely a good keeper and fairly young too. Only real weakness is, he's not the tallest for a goalie and so crosses/aerial ability is mediocre.

Wondering how much you sold Mbiwa for? What was the too good offer? And is there a sell-on % fee you put in there? Because he looks like he's gonna be a real star and might even leave Lyon later for big money which you could profit from.

The table looks incredibly realistic!!

Did you spend the money from Mbiwa already or is that how you're going to try to finance El Arabi's signature?

Lots of questions but I'm genuinely curious especially as I'm just about to face them at home for the 4th match of my Europa league game, no doubt they'll want revenge and although a decent team, the odds are heavily stacked in my favor giving them 4-1 odds which I think is too low! Yes I have much better team, am on good run and playing at home but those odds are like me facing a 2nd division side, not the team sitting 3rd (as in my game) in Ligue 1. So in the pre-match press-conference, I said that "If the team thinks they've already won the game, that would be disastrous!" as well as "I'm confident as long as we stick to our plans" to hopefully battle possibly complacency and ensure another good performance from my boys.

I also singled out Karim Ait Fana as potential threat to our winning chances having seen the winger score against me in Montpellier in my 2-1 win and hoping he has 'low pressure' attribute and indeed he does! :D The media came out saying, he's one of those who doesn't like the media spot light on him and that he could now not play up to potential. And I checked, his morale has shot down to poor and his status is 'Unsure what type of impact he will have against Atletico'. So hopefully his efforts will be minimized today and he'll have a poor game! :)

My squad has been hit with a few injuries and I'm lacking cover in certain areas which means I've promoted a few of my U-19 squad, the talented ones who were doing well both in training and U-19 league to come for cover. It should be a fairly straightforward home Europa league match today against Montpellier and then in 3 days time, we got the big derby against the undefeated Real Madrid who've made an almost perfect start to the season in Bernabeu! Gonna need some luck as well as Aguero to continue his good form.

@Tim, That's awesome you got the England job now. Let me warn you though, I've heard and I can see why, it'd be incredibly boring to only manage a national team. Because you don't do $hit for months in between matches (unless you're gonna go and 'watch' games to spot players, etc.) I highly suggest having the England job as a side along with a 'club' job or you'll find yourself probably bored sooner than you'd think and just holidaying etc. Maybe it's time to leave Villa at end of your contract like you say but pick up on another exciting challenge or good club if the opportunity arises to go with your England adventure.
 
I don't remember for how much i sold him to Lyon PLF.
In the midseason transfer window i sold two defenders: Mbiwa to Lyon and Gary Bocali (RB, very offensive minded) to As Roma.

At the beginning of the season this was my team in a 4-3-3:

GK: Jourdren
RB: Bocaly
CB: Yanga Mbiwa
CB: Spahic
LB: Jeunechamp or El Kaoutari
CMF: Marveaux
CMF: Estrada
AMF: Dernis
RW: Belhanda
CF: Utaka or Koïta (sold to Juventus)
LW: Ait Fana

At the beginning of the season Belhanda was the star of the team, now Ait Fana is the best player. The player who impressed me most however (and you would like him) is Joris Marveaux (but he broke a leg while playing with the reserves after another injury, he has barely played 4 or 5 competition matches).
 
So check to see how much you sold them for and let me know. :P I'm curious.

Selling two important 1st team-players MID-SEASON!, one with huge potential, you must have got good $$$ for them. Just how much, I'll soon find out I guess.

This is your very first season by the way, right? I'm assuming like me, you're in your first.

And yeah I like Marveaux and Estrada has a good left-foot / long shot on him as well though I don't like his personality. Bit of a dirty player.

Dernis I remember from his LOSC days. Very talented and very inconsistent lol. You never know what to expect from him. He's not a player I would wanna 'rely' on though he's capable of producing magic.

Have you brought anyone yet?
 
You're the next Fergie aren't you?! lol
Setting all kinds of new records!

Fulham's very own Sir Alex Becanes :P
 
My board wants me to reduce the salary mass PLF. Since i've sold Bocali, the team is unbalanced...
I've only bought one player: Carlos Villanueva a Chilean AMF who has great stats, but who hasn't convinced me yet...
 
Thanks PLF but the run has come to an end at West Brom. I was heavy favorites and I lost 2-0. Gutted. I blasted the team, so we'll see how they respond in the next match.
 
There's a bug with international players who have been withdrawn from friendlies. They stay withdrawn permanently and you can't call them up ever again :((.
 
Yeah you can only fix that with Fmrte which is I guess what ya gotta do now. So at least there's a way....

That's why I personally never withdraw them, only give them 45 min instructions for friendlies though.

Gerd, I see, but you still haven't told me what price you sold your players for? Can you check and let me know? I'm curious.

@becanes, well it had to happen some time amigo. :/

My team just completely underperformed away at Anoeta (San Sebastian - Real Sociedad's home) as well. This after a nice Int'l break where I finally had almost all my players back, 100% and on superb or very good morale. Was expecting a routine victory like I got against Osasuna, Sporting Gijon, etc. Instead, Aguero who at times has carried me single-handedly is having the worst game of his life and ends up with a 5.7 final rating! I had to sub him after 70 mins he was so bad and hope my sub striker can do something, and he nearly did.....

This 5.7 right after his last game where he scored a hat-trick inside the first 26 mins and ended up with a 9.6

So I shouted at him and was 'angry' and hopefully he'll come back to his usual self for next match. I can complain about the result and his performance in this game but not about his overall contribution this season. I've even thought about giving him a new contract even though he still has 4-5 years left just to get rid of that $66M buy-out clause he has as he's possibly worth even more than that to me and this club!
 
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Argh, I'm getting frustrated. 9 times out of 10 I'm getting my players "Fired Up" or "Looking Motivated", yet we are playing shite and losing :((.
 
PLF:

Koïta for 1,2 million euro to Juventus
Yanga Mbia for 8,75 million to Lyon
Bocaly for 7,1 million to AS Roma

I bought Villanueva for 1,2 million from an Arabic team.

In one my last posts i mentioned that i'm not convinced by Villanueva and suddenly he's on fire, het got a mark of 9,3 in his last match.
 
Tim, I have that sometimes too. Half my team motivated/fired up especially after half time but we're playing fairly poor still...

Gerd, I see. Thanks.

If I recall correctly, this is I think the same Villaneuva (the Chilean winger) who was picked up by Villarreal (bought by them but loaned out and never really played for them I think) a few years ago. Because Villarreal have such good scouting system especially when it comes to South Americans, at the time they bought this young Chilean winger, everyone thought he's probably some next big thing too... of course it didn't turn out that way....

Is Bocaly a 1st-teamer in As Roma? not necessarily what his contract says but actual appearances, is he playing for them regularly?

Those are good prices you sold them for. I would've probably tried to put a sell on fee /profit clause on Yanga Mbiwa though like 20% or something if I could because who knows... a few years from now Lyon might sell him to Bayern or something for $20M.
 
Bocaly plays regularly for Roma PLF.
As for the fees when the players are transferred, i always do that (15%, i'm a rather bad negotiator, i've always the impression i pay too much for my players).

The strange thing is that Yang Mbiwa hasn't played a single match for Lyon (surely his must be a bug). In the next transfer window, i will try to buy him back for a much lesser sum of money.
 
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