I'm glad I don't play PES2019, or else by the time PES2020 was released I'd be yet to finish my first ML season. I'm becoming a very slow player...
Anyway, I'm almost done with the first season on my PES3 ML, the first ML I've played in PES3 since I can remember. Honestly, I only recall playing the ML mode since PES4-onwards, despite having played all the PES games since the PS1 days.
I started with Parma because of the gorgeous kits they have on the game. I remember back in the day playing with that team just so that I could appreciate how great the kits look.
Isn't it beautiful?
So, Minanda, Castolo & the bunch took over this italian team for this ML save.
I used the classic 3-5-2, which as the PES fan knows, is the Master League Defaults trademark one.
Ivarov; Dulic, Vornander, Stremer/Valeny; Iouga, Celinili, Espimas, Ximelez, Minanda; Castolo, Barota.
Right from the start, it's clear that we wouldn't be able to play...like other teams play. You know, actual football. The difference in quality is so obvious on the pitch that if you try something a little too complex with a player that shouldn't be able to do it, as I told
@ballsinwater, you'll be punished severely. That means, building up from the back with the likes of Vornander and Valeny? Get outta here!
Though the defaults on PES3 are less hopeless stats-wise than on later editions, still I'm finding that the difference in quality between them and other teams is more pronounced here.
So, our strategy is pretty simple:
kickoff -> ball to Vornander -> long-ball to Barota -> fight for the loose ball -> Castolo and Minanda, quick, do something! -> goal??? -> rinse and repeat
That doesn't mean we don't often build up a few decent plays, but since this game pretty much nails longball football so very well (try it out for yourselves, feels so goddamn good) and we are short of talent, "Route One" is our go-to-strategy more often than not. As a result, most of our matches look and play like football from the 1970s, and the only thing missing is the thick moustaches and gorgeous heads of hair (except for Espimas and Minanda's beautiful hairdos). And when the opponent joins in and decides to play longball football themselves? Oh my. The ball spends more time up in the air than on the ground.
Birds hate the Parma ML United team, I can tell you that much.
Anyway, I wasn't aware that one could get as many transfer windows as PES3 brings to the table. With the right moves, you can begin shaping your desired squad right off the bat on the first season, and have the players join in while you're still fighting for promotion to the D1. I did exactly that. This time, unlike other previous ventures of mine that you can read on this thread (somewhere buried in 133 pages of content here on the Corner
), I decided not to have any transfer restrictions, so rightaway I tried to get rid of as much defaults as I could.
The first to go were Dulic, Iouga, Njorgo and Harty, and I brought in:
- Espinosa: equatorian defender, 87 defense, 91 balance, a big guy who could easily be Sol Campbell in disguise: both because of his looks and his stats.
- Sznaucer: austrian? sideback/smf combo, doesn't have any weakness to his game. Replaces Ximelez as LWB.
- Grella: australian DMF/CMF, again a very balanced player who actually played for Parma back then.
- Mantorras (Malyorras on PES3): a striker from Angola, used to play for Benfica (Lisbonera). In real-life he had tremendous potential, was thought to be the next iteration of Eusebio, but his knee was absolutely destroyed after many recurrent injuries, so he ended up becoming a super-sub kind of player who played when Benfica needed a goal on those last 15/20 minutes of a match. The crowd usually started chanting "Deixem jogar o Mantorras" (let Mantorras play!), and when he was finally subbed in, they lost their shit everytime - sounded as if Benfica had just scored a goal.
I bought Mantorras for my ML team mostly because of what he meant in real-life, but he has some interesting stats such as 89 shot acc/79 shot technique and good speed stats, despite his only 72 attack stat.
Before these moves we were a mid-table team, and now we're fighting for promotion with just 3 matches to go until the end of the season. We're currently 2nd behind Lisbonera, but two other teams are right below us so we can't afford to lose more points from now on.
As for the D2 cup, we were eliminated in the first round.
Despite the upgrades, Parma is still playing Route One football, and so far it's working. Might the era of the "tiki-taka" be coming to an end?
I've never seen anything like it ever again. I can tell you I've seen Benfica supporters celebrate league titles with less passion than when Mantorras played a match and scored a goal...and the guy had a thing for scoring EXACTLY when the team needed a goal, doesn't matter if he played 5/10/15/20 minutes (because of the pain on his knee, he couldn't play more minutes than that) he scored anyway.
