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Group A: Barcelona, Napoli, Basel Group B: Marseille, Wrexham, Valencia Group C: Milan, Bayern, Rijeka Group D: Arsenal, Benfica, Salzburg Group E: Real Madrid, PSV, Slask Group F: Man U, Dortmund, Anderlecht Group G: Juventus, Lyon, Porto Group H: Man City, PSG, Granada Wrexham goal count: 205
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May 28, 2014 16:22
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habeasdorkus posted:Instead of finishing the update I watched sports all night. That included the US game with Azerbaijan, wherein the Land of Fire played straight up with the Land of the Free for 75 minutes before we stopped being awful. This is why the Group we are in is the "Group of Death". If we are as good as we think we are (I think we think we are pretty drat good), we should have pasted the Azerbaijan. We didn't. I'll be shocked we get more than a point.
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May 28, 2014 17:11
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Each of these will be predicted from left to right first second third Group A Barca Napoli and Basel Group B Valencia Wrexham and Shalke Group C Bayern Milan and Rijeka Group D Arsenal Benfica and FC Energy Drink Group E Madrid PSV and Slask Group F Man U Dortmund and Anderlecht Group G Juventus Porto and Rangers Group H Man City PSG and Grenada Wrexham will score 158 Goals
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May 28, 2014 17:32
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tarbrush posted:The one thing that binds all non-Indian cricket fans together is "gently caress the BCCI", a collection of corrupt nepotistic arseholes who FTFY
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May 28, 2014 18:13
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sulovilen posted:In my opinion ice hockey suffers from inconsistent refereeing - maybe not so much in the NHL but every year in the IIHF world champs. In addition the crowd favorites seem to get a ridiculous advantage from ref calls, like the disallowed goal from Latvia against the host country Belarus (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1n8ozHh7x0) In my experience the IIHF World Juniors (Both Mens and Womens) are fairly popular here in Canada.
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May 28, 2014 19:05
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Chapter the First: Fixture congestion August 6, 2021-September 1, 2021 If you look back at the last few years we've only had four matches scheduled in August. This year we've got six. We play in Glasgow and then host Celtic to see which of us makes it to the group stage of the Champions League, we have our standard three league matches, and we kick off the season by playing Manchester United in the Community Shield. The only thing taken off our schedule is the second round of the Capital One Cup, as we're playing in a European competition we've been given a bye into the third round rather than the second.  90,000 fans at Wembley Stadium means a lot of gate receipts. Given that we spent over £50m in the close season on players, improvements, and purchasing our stadium we could use the money. vs. Manchester United, August 8, 2021 Community Shield  The Community Shield, previously the Charity Shield, is contested by the winner of the Premier League and the winner of the FA Cup. In years where the winner of the Premier League also won the FA Cup, the second placed Premier League team plays them. It's a glorified friendly, but it's still a trophy. That makes this a good chance to get our team going at full speed into the season. Our ex-captain, Cyril Boumsong, is in the starting lineup for Manchester United, he improved a great deal while on loan with us and is likely to be a key player from them over the next decade. They're also starting an unproven teenage keeper, a sign that they're not taking this game as seriously as we are. We'll make them pay for that. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Todd, Laux, Suslov, Morvan, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Mair, Djurovic, Matko, Cardozo. We jump out to a lead with a classic Meteor streak down the sideline followed by a cross from near the byline. Manchester United's 18 year old keeper mistimes his jump and can't get a glove on the ball, and it reaches a lurking Nieddu at the far post. The ensuing tap in put us ahead at fourteen minutes. Five minutes later Cirjak plays an incisive pass to Nieddu on the break. Nieddu feeds the ball ahead to Bastable, who skips ahead of Boumsong's last ditch effort. The rookie keeper can't react quickly enough to the shot, 2-0. We look dominant and the Red Devils look all out of sorts. The the worm turns. Kovacevic gets a piece of Shahed Parr's shot in the 24th minute, but deflects it into the net and is unfairly punished with an own goal for his efforts. Just minutes later Todd misplays a header clearance directly to an opposing midfielder, who sends it ahead to Parr for a breakaway and the equalizer. After jumping out to a lead in the first twenty minutes, we've been dragged back to even after half an hour. It gets worse from there, as United dominate the rest of the half. They take the lead before the half courtesy a free kick from parallel the penalty spot. We cant clear it, and when it's in the back of the net United have stormed back from a two goal deficit. They seal the result at 85 minutes with another set piece goal, this time from a corner, and despite an answer from Bastable two minutes later we can't find a fourth goal before the final whistle. We started the game motivated and ready to take the fight to our opponents. After twenty minutes of thrashing them we got lazy and lost our edge while Manchester regained theirs. The first trophy of the year slips from our fingers. Man of the Match: Rocky Bastable.   Wrexham 3-4 Manchester United  He never developed and was proven woefully unprepared for Premier League football. We recouped the amount we spent on him, at least.  I negotiated this up from an initial offer of £6.5m. Djurovic is still a very good player, but now that we most commonly play without a standard right midfielder and because Petts has usurped his central midfield role, he isn't a member of our starting eleven. Julio is good enough to play his role when we need to rotate Petts out for rest, and has a chance to be better than Djurovic in the long run. We're making a profit of £8m on this sale even with the percentage we have to forward to Galatasary, and given that we're presently £16.8m in the red after this summer's spending I want to get us closer to break even. The bean counters are telling me we're going to make a £22m profit this season, and that's not counting the money we'll make by reaching the group stage in the Champions League, but I don't like seeing big red numbers when I look at our balance sheet and Djurovic won't get much more valuable.  Suffer in agony, Americanos! I would have won that match, and El Tri would have had to flee the Azteca in fear of their lives.  That's a pity, I was hoping to see a transfer embargo slapped down for the last couple weeks of the window. I want every advantage possible to undermine the current lord and master of club football.   The TV revenue will become much larger when we make it past Celtic.  Everton's managers have a habit of not liking me, but they're the ones who keep getting sacked. vs. Everton, August 14, 2021 Premier League  We'll see how the players hold up playing every three or four days, for now I want to get the most out of our first team and see ourselves start the season with a whole lot of points. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Todd, Laux, Suslov, Mair, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Feruga, Pejkovic, Morvan, Julio, Matko, Cardozo. After a quarter hour we've had 72% possession and nothing to show for it. After a half hour it's still 72% possession and nothing to show for it. When Everton scores against the run of play, it's on their first shot all day and some of the first moments they've had the ball in our third of the field. The half comes to a close, and we're losing despite having had 68% possession and 13 shots to their 1. We finally equalize in the 52nd minute, thanks to Nieddu picking the pocket of an Everton defender right at the byline, and scooting the ball over to a wide open and waiting Bastable. It's the only goal we'll get. Despite our utter dominance of the stats sheet we drop points at home on opening day. To have 19 shots and only 5 on target is pathetic. To have 9 chances and only 1 goal is pathetic. To not win despite a lackluster performance from Everton is pathetic. If I could execute a player as decimation for the squad's failure in this game to put the rest on notice, I would.   Wrexham 1-1 Everton  We follow up a disappointing result with disappointing season ticket sales. I can't believe that with 58,000 club members we have fewer than 9,000 season ticket holders.  All of England shall be forced to watch the much better football being played in Wales.  Shut up, Meteor. I promised him last year that the club could match his ambitions by making the Europa League. Instead we made the Champion's League, and he's pissed that I didn't follow through on my promise. He doesn't seem to actually be unhappy, and doesn't react to my refusal to transfer list him. I guess this was a pro-forma demand. Or more likely it's a bug in the game. At Celtic, August 18, 2021 Champion's League, Best Placed Playoff Away Leg  Scotland's teams have been done a world of good on the continental stage by Celtic's run to the final a few years back, they now have their champion go straight to the group stage while the runner up has a shot of making the group stage via two rounds of the best placed playoffs. As A Tartan Tory would happily tell you, Celtic are only the second most titled club in Scotland, still four first division titles back from Rangers despite nearly a decade of wins while Rangers rebuilt themselves (ed note: we regret the error in the original version). The reason we're playing them now is because they got trumped at long last by their resurgent cross-town foes, and forced into the Champions League qualifiers. We should have little trouble with them, they're one of the two best teams in Scotland and possess a world class central midfielder but they'd be merely a top half team in England. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Morvan, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Mair, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. I guess my negative estimate of their chances got around to the Celtic lockers, because they come out determined to prove us wrong. A rampant start begets a Celtic lead inside the first ten minutes, and I have to switch us to a counter-attacking posture as our possession game is proving completely ineffective. The change works, and soon we're making slashing runs through the Celtic defense. After half an hour the tactical shift pays off. Shirra flat outworks his counterpart to a ball in the corner and delivers a cross that Bastable craniums in to equalize, and after 32 minutes it's tied and we've gotten a vital away goal. We get another when Bastable uses his silky smooth first touch to control a difficult ball and then with his second touch places it deftly past the keeper. Celtic's players gern about offside, but Bastable clearly had a man in front of him when Petts delivered the ball. Celtic remain dangerous, it's clear that our back line of Suslov, Todd, Laux, and Cirjak have yet to cohere into a seamless unit, but we keep creating chances of our own that we just can't capitalize on. I bring Julio in as a sub, and he proves himself a worthy replacement for Djurovic by capping the game with our third away goal near the end of the match. We leave Glasgow in great shape to advance to the group stage, we could lose 2-0 next week and still move on. Man of the Match: Rocky Bastable   Celtic 1-3 Wrexham  Playing a midweek match every week is draining. By March 2022 we're going to have some tired legs. At Blackburn Rovers, August 21, 2021 Premier League   : Yuo are playing many backups. Why disrespect for Poland owned team? : No, I'm not disrespecting you. I just need to rotate players to keep everyone fit. And our reserves are really good!: We will make you pay for this, just like we make UKIP pay for trying take Polish jobs by buying English football team!Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Pejkovic, O'Hanlon, Feruga (c), Mejasic, Mair, Julio, Matko, Nieddu, Cardozo, Aarts. Subs: El Sayed, Cirjak, Todd, Dixon, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. The first half is reminiscent of the Everton match, except with more goals. Aarts scores his first competitive goal in ages on a breakaway, but Blackburn responds on their first shot of the game after 23 minutes. Nieddu restores the lead, but Blackburn ties it just before the half on their second shot of the game. Aarts knocks one off the upright in the second half, and isn't finishing when it counts, but Nieddu inspires the visiting fans to song with a brilliant free kick goal in the 67th minute. We keep piling on pressure, but despite eight clear cut chances we have only three goals. Hard work pays off, though, when El Juez locks down the game with a clean finish on a killer ball from Julio in the 82nd minute. Deciding that the scoreline isn't intimidating enough, El Juez adds to his verdict less than 90 seconds later. After some cause for concern in the first half, we poured it on just as we should. Man of the Match: Dimitri Nieddu.   Blackburn 2-5 Wrexham  Argentina proves itself to have the best youth, at least when it comes to international competition.  El Juez is off to a fierce start, he's still no Bastard but thus far he looks like a major improvement on Di Martino from last year. His ability to create and score will give us additional punch off the bench late in games, and he'll be able to spell Bastable and Mujkic when they're worn down. vs. Celtic, August 24, 2021 Champions League, Best Placed Playoff Home Leg  Celtic need to win by a score of 3-0 or better to advance. They need to do that with their backs to the wall, away from home. They're not going to. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Morvan, Petts, Matko, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Mair, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. We have an early possession lead, and are content to let time tick down against Celtic. When Oleg Suslov scores in the 35th minute our victory becomes even more likely. Celtic now needs to score four times to beat us. They do get a goal in the 57th minute, but it's far too little, far too late. They play with fury born of desperation, but despite additional opportunities cannot whittle away further at our lead as the inexorable march of time proceeds. When the final whistle blows, we've secured our spot in the group stage, and sent the 51 time champions of Scotland packing off to the Europa League. I still would have liked to win outright, but I can't complain about the result.   Wrexham 1-1 Celtic  It turns out you can charge a lot of money for Champions League tickets.  A new contract? Well, I'm listening.  A new contract with a £29,000 pay cut? Why are you wasting my time?  Ah, that sweet, sweet Champion's league cash is starting to roll in. We're now just £4.8m in the red, an amount that would easily be wiped clear by the lump sum we'll get at the end of our Premier League season.  We're a fourth seed thanks to our comparative lack of success in the recent past, with just one fourth place finish in the Premier League and an FA Cup trophy to go along with no Continental play. That means we're going to get drawn with three teams with more past success than we have, it also means that our group is likely to be a group of death as we're miles better than the average fourth seed squad hailing from places like Hungary and Denmark.  We do not want to be drawn into Groups A, C, F or H.  Whew. Schalke, Valencia, and Marseilles are all good, solid clubs- there's not going to be any gimmes out of our six matches against them- but I think we're the best team of the four and we have a very good chance of advancing to the knockout stage.  We get an easy draw in the League Cup, Wolves remain a good Championship side while we're now deserving Champions League participants.  Cirjak gets a rest when I'm sure he'd rather be playing for his national team. I'm a bit irked on his behalf, he's just as good as the right backs picked ahead of him. vs. Swansea, August 28, 2021 Premier League, Welsh Derby  With no Cwp to contest, all that's left is a North vs. South Welsh derby. Swansea remain a good team, and we'll have to do a professional job against them. The international break is rapidly approaching, I'll be able to rest players over that time and thus can use my first choice starting eleven. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Mair, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Morvan, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. The first half sees us bestride the pitch like colossi, playing a high possession game where we create chances at will from the wide areas thanks to Nieddu and Mujkic. The latter is to thank for our first goal, he delivered a sweet ball to Shirra that was volleyed home just before the half. Swans have only our profligacy to thank that they're not down three-nil at the half, they've yet to even take a shot against us. As we saw against Blackburn, that sort of mastery on the pitch tends to pay off over time as the opposition fatigues, and our hard work pays off in second half. Todd picks up a goal by being in the right place at the right time in the aftermath of an indirect free kick at 52 minutes, then the Swans defense leaves Mujkic all alone in front of the net and suffer the resultant Meteor strike four minutes late. Shirra makes it 4-0 with his second goal of the game just after the hour, and I can bring on subs with the game tucked away. Swansea denies us a clean sheet, finally scoring on their first shot of the day after seventy minutes of play, but the game was even more lopsided than the final tally indicates. Thanks to our high octane offense we sit atop the table after three matches. Man of the Match: Scott Shirra   Wrexham 4-1 Swansea  I'd forgotten I'd even put that clause into the Upson transfer. He never got into a game for Swansea, but they foisted him off on Derby for twice what they paid us.  At the close of the window we now have wages in line with the majority of the Premier League, spending a reasonable £44m a year. This marks the first time since our League Two days that our salary didn't sit amongst the bottom three of the division, and we remain vastly outspent by the megabastards.  First place in the Premier League and into the group stage of the Champions League. I can't complain. Well, I can, we really should have beaten Man U in the Community Shield, and not winning the Everton match is unacceptable to both myself and the fans who haven't stopped complaining about it. I'll have to see how well we handle the strain of continental play, we've already been sending out our best players two to three times a week in just the first month. If we can't keep up our stamina this hot start could fade and we could struggle. 
habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 23:10 on May 28, 2014 |
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May 28, 2014 21:28
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habeasdorkus posted:As A Tartan Tory could grumpily tell you, Celtic are the most titled club in Scotland. The reason we're playing them now is because they got trumped at long last by their resurgent cross-town foes, and forced into the Champions League qualifiers. We should have little trouble with them, they're one of the two best teams in Scotland and possess a world class central midfielder but they'd be merely a top half team in England. Unless they somehow managed to win basically everything in the years Rangers were out, Rangers should still be the most titled club in Scotland (and coincidentally the World).  Also you have an error at the end of the Blackburn game when giving out the final score. A Tartan Tory fucked around with this message at 21:38 on May 28, 2014 |
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May 28, 2014 21:36
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I should really put in my entry. Group A: Barca, Napoli, Basel Group B: Wrexham, Schalke, Valencia Group C: Milan, Bayern, Rijeka Group D: Arsenal, Benfica, Salzburg Group E: Real, PSV, Anji Group F: Dortmund, Man Utd, Anderlecht Group G: Lyon, Juve, Porto Group H: PSG, Man City, Granada 214 goals Quick aside, lawyers and prospective lawyers should visit this thread: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3301274
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May 28, 2014 22:15
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A Tartan Tory posted:Unless they somehow managed to win basically everything in the years Rangers were out, Rangers should still be the most titled club in Scotland (and coincidentally the World). Fixed! We regret the error.
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May 28, 2014 23:10
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Chapter the Second: Late escapes and near misses. September 1, 2021-October 1, 2021 Who's up for another six matches played in the span of 18 days? I hope you are, because we don't have a choice about our schedule.  The odds are drawn up when the transfer window opens, I believe. I can't believe a bookmaker could look at our team at the close of the window and think we're less likely to win the league than Spurs. We're roughly equal on paper to Arsenal/Chelsea/Man City, and all four of us are a half step behind Manchester United. Given that our oldest player is 25, I think we have to be considered likely to improve, and thus likely to be second only to United at the end of the year. That's especially the case as the game doesn't do a great job of modeling player development stall-outs. I can think of any number of high ceiling prospects who improved at varying rates when they were young, or who took steps backwards when young, but in FM you rarely see a prospect at your club fail to develop year over year.  We've got 22 first team players, and 12 of them are on their national squad. Almost all the rest are on their national U21 squads. That means only Cirjak, Petts, Cardozo, and the injured Taborda will be around the clubhouse during the international break. I feel worst for Petts, he's never earned a single cap at even the youth level for England and he might never earn a cap despite being one of the better English midfielders.   I'm trying to be congratulatory, not patronizing.   And so when I try not to patronize you, you get all stressed! Yeesh. The good news is that Nieddu's nose for goal carried over to the international level, he scored twice in his first two senior team matches.   See, that's the sort of reaction I'm looking for.   And that reaction is even better.   Our boys scored goals galore during the break.  14-1 odds aren't that bad, but I'd toss 50 quid on us to win it all at those odds. At Stoke City, September 11, 2021 Premier League  Stoke remain a good side, coming into this match 6th in the league and having qualified for the Europa League last year. We need to win away matches like this one if we're to take home the league title this year. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Morvan, Petts, Matko, Nieddu, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Mair, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. In the 12th minute Bastable is free in front of the goal and appears to net us the lead, but he was so open because he was well offside. The goal is correctly called off, and for the next fifteen minutes we're denied repeatedly by the Stoke keeper. Finally, Nieddu breaks through. He's followed quickly by Daniel Matko, who puts the ball into the back of the net for his first competitive goal for the club three years after we originally signed him. Stoke quickly pull one back, but it is similarly ruled out by the keen eyed ref. Bastable finally gets on the scoreboard just before halftime, and we take a big lead into the break. After the hour mark passes with the score still three-nil I order the team to lower the tempo and try to husband their stamina for future matches. The change allows Stoke to find more success than all game prior, but our defense holds them to a sole consolation goal in the 88th minute. It's a good, solid win that also allows me to use all my substitutions to reduce fatigue. Man of the Match: Dimitri Nieddu   Stoke 1-3 Wrexham  Vive le Roi-Dieu de Galles! At Olympique Marseille, September 14, 2021 Champions League, Group B  We've got five players starting with less than 95% stamina: Bastable, Mujkic, Suslov, Nieddu, Todd, Laux. This is going to become a pretty common sight over the next few months, and even further if we get to the knockout stage of the Champions League. As we're away from home against a very solid Marseille squad I've decided to play a counter attacking style from our 4-2-3-1 formation. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Counter Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Mair, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Mejasic, Pejkovic, Morvan, Julio, Matko, Cardozo. I'm a tactical genius. The visiting stands erupt when Shirra scores at seven minutes, and again when Meteor scores a set piece goal twenty minutes later. From there our Scottish midfield maestro conducts the shearing of Provence. He bags his brace just after the half hour and earns his hat trick at 52 minutes. I tell the team to stop playing such an uptempo style as several players are looking gassed on the field, and use all three substitutions to conserve our legs for the upcoming Tottenham Hotspur match. We yet again don't keep a clean sheet, but yet again it doesn't matter thanks to our jet fueled offense. 10 points is usually enough to make it out of the group stage in the Champions League, and we've already picked up three. Man of the Match: Scott Shirra   Marseille 1-4 Wrexham  Champions League prize money is nothing to sniff at, if we qualify for the next stage with games in hand I'll be torn between trying to rest our starting eleven and wanting to bag as much cash as we can.   It's not surprising that Shirra wants a new contract, or that he waited until he dropped a hat-trick on one of the most storied French clubs in history to ask for it. His current deal isn't up until 2024, and he's a massive bargain at £19,250, so I'm going to make it stick as long as I can without pissing him off.  Liverpool have now fired four managers in two and a half years. I cannot wait to see them get relegated despite being a supporter of real life Liverpool. They're literally the worst run team in the world in 2021. It's a crying shame, considering that the real life owner is actually quite excellent at running the teams he owns. At Tottenham Hotspur, September 19, 2021 Premier League  This is an away match against one of the few clubs that are still outspending us 2:1, coming just two days before our Capital One Cup match with Wolverhampton. The only bright spot is that Tottenham is also playing continental soccer, meaning that they're not any more rested than we are. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Counter Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Morvan, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Mair, Julio, Matko, Cardozo. The lads show quickly that ranking us below Tottenham was a huge mistake on the part of the bookmakers. The Bastard scores in less than a minute, pouncing on his own rebound after a first chance save. Nieddu knocks another in at 13 minutes, and the crossbar denies him a second shortly thereafter. The Bastard beats Nieddu in the race to score for a second time, his giant melon making a meaty thwack against the ball when redirecting a Cirjak cross five minutes before the half. Tottenham recover a bit when play resumes, scoring a goal at 49 minutes. That's all they get. After 70 minutes I tap on the brakes and send in the subs, and we coast to another easy victory over a well regarded team. Man of the Match: That thick skulled bastard, Rocky Bastable   Tottenham 1-3 Wrexham  Shirra has been playing out of his mind so far this season. In 7 games he's already notched 5 goals and 5 assists. Bastable has been similarly brilliant, he's scoring a goal a game.  It's time to run out the rookies.  Turns out that Stewart Lewis is still unemployed, as is Justin Bailey. I order the scouting staff to compile reports on them and determine how much money they want. Adding them back to the team at reasonable prices would be a nice boost for the long time fans. vs. Wolverhampton Wanderers, September 21, 2021 Capital One Cup, Third Round  I imagine Wolves fans were not pleased when they found out they'd drawn an away game against us in the League Cup. If teams don't yet fear us when it comes to cup draws, they'll soon learn to. As our players from the Tottenham match are still exhausted and mostly around 80% fitness, I'm running out an entirely different lineup for this match. Ben Dixon and Alex O'Hanlon earn a start, they're both 19 years old and I chose not to send them out on loan for the year precisely for situations like this where we're facing easy foes and I don't want to tire out our stars. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: El Sayed, Pejkovic, O'Hanlon, Feruga (c), Mejasic, Dixon, Mair, Matko, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. Subs: Kovacevic, Cirjak, Alvaro, Shirra, Petts, Rouissi, De Blasio. Wolverhampton are brought before the court of El Juez. Cardozo sits in judgment and finds them wanting. The first goal comes at five minutes from Julio courtesy a Cardozo assist. Late in the first half, a Wolves defender grabs onto Cardozo and keeps him from contesting a free kick and earns us a penalty. El Juez delivers the verdict from the penalty spot, and Wolves are guilty as charged. Wolverhampton are able to pull back a goal shortly after Daniel Matko and Dinko Mejasic are forced from the game with injuries eight minutes apart in the second half, but when El Juez is clattered by their right back he steps forward to take the free kick and dispenses his ruling off the bottom side of the crossbar and into the back of the net. Seeing that it would serve the interests of justice to score a hat trick, Cardozo scores his third goal just two minutes after his second, and Wolverhampton slink away after an epic display of jurisprudence from the young Argentine. Man of the Match: Carlos Matias “El Juez” Cardozo   Wrexham 4-1 Wolves  We won two games in a row while fielding an entirely distinct starting 11, and are given an achievement for it. Yay achievements.  This is good news. Matko is more than a little injury prone, and he had two minor injuries before going off. I'm glad that neither of them turned out to be serious. Mejasic is also fine, and will miss no time.   Bailey and Lewis still haven't found teams to latch onto, probably because of their wage demands. I'm going to keep an eye on both of them for signing at the new year. Lewis is the less likely to return, his asking price is way too high for our fifth choice centerback, but we can afford four figures a week for ol' Justin Bailey.  We didn't get one of the remaining Championship squads and didn't get a megabastard, making this an OK outcome. We won't have to worry about Manchester United, though, as they lost to Norwich in the third round. vs. Southampton, September 25, 2021 Premier League  President Sky Shadowing and his coach Noel Tosh.0 appear to have righted the Saint's ship. They currently sit fifth in the league after five matches. We'll need to be sharp today. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Morvan, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Mair, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. It's a gritty game in messy weather, and referee Howard Webb is giving yellow cards for virtually every foul called. Southampton kindly scores on our behalf with a classy header from the Saints' left back finding the corner of the net from a Meteor cross. But the own goal is the only thing we have going for us deep into the game as we're scuffing our chances and playing poorly. I yank a knackered Nieddu for El Juez at 65 minutes, and shortly thereafter things go to hell. With 13 minutes remaining Southampton scores an equalizer from a corner where our lackadaisical marking allows them to pass the ball with ease in the six yard box. I grunt in disappointment, we'll have to settle for a draw. Five minutes later and my grunt is one of being sucker punched, we're caught out of position on a counter attack and have surely pissed away the game. It's always darkest before dawn, and we still have justice on our side. Less than 70 seconds later El Juez is dashing forward, chests a pass by Bastable past the last defender, and blasts it past the keeper to bring us back to a tie. At least we'll salvage a draw, I think. We don't. In the 86th minute Suslov lofts a cross towards the net, which Shirra cannot reach but which the Southampton goalie can only knock up in the air. The ball rises and falls towards the Southampton left back, and Shirra is out of position to make a second effort. Then, at the last second, a shadow looms over the 5'7” Southampton defender. He never had a chance, giving up over half a foot to the Bastard of Wrexham. Bastable's leap carries first the ball and himself into the goal, and the day is ours. Man of the Match: Oleg Suslov   Wrexham 3-2 Southampton vs. Valencia, September 29, 2021 Champions League, Group B  Valencia beat Schalke in their first group stage game, and are unbeaten in La Liga, sitting in second place on goal differential. But we're at home, and a win here puts us atop the group with six points. We should win. Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak (c), Laux, Todd, Suslov, Mair, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic, Bastable. Subs: El Sayed, Pejkovic, Feruga, Morvan, Julio, Cardozo, Aarts. After twenty minutes we've got a significant possession advantage, but Valencia's defense has been excellent and allowed us to create just two shots. When they score due to lax marking from our defenders just before 30 minutes have elapsed, the one goal deficit looms before us like a mountain. We keep battering away at Los Ches, hitting the post just after play resumes in the second half, but I'm getting the feeling that they're just letting us punch ourselves out. We finally earn the equalizer when Chris Todd crashes the near post during a corner kick with less than 20 minutes remaining. It's enough to get us a point, but this time we can't muster a late winning goal. We put a pathetic 4 of our 16 shots on goal, and drop desperately needed points at home. Man of the Match: Richard Petts   Wrexham 1-1 Valencia  That's not shabby scratch for a draw.  McLeod and Manchester United are back to taunt us. Congratulations on stomping three relegation prospects, we were too busy topping Tottenham and Southampton to run up quite as nice a goal differential. Guess we'll just have to settle for being two points clear of everyone else atop the table. How sad for us.  We're undefeated in both the Premier and Champions Leagues. Of the six teams we've played in the Premiership so far none are below mid-table, our current table topping record has been built against good opposition. Meanwhile we sit at four points in our Champions League group, while Schalke and Marseille have just a point each. Things are going very well, but exhaustion is a major concern, especially given the last two matches.   Voting for the season contest is now closed.
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May 29, 2014 00:36
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nuvan posted:In my experience the IIHF World Juniors (Both Mens and Womens) are fairly popular here in Canada. Hockey is really regional here in the US. If you're in Michigan or Minnesota or Maine, it's a big loving deal. If you're in most of the rest of New England and the Upper Midwest/Big Sky country it's a medium deal. Some other places also really like their NHL teams, but don't care much about hockey in general.
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May 29, 2014 00:52
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habeasdorkus posted:Hockey is really regional here in the US. If you're in Michigan or Minnesota or Maine, it's a big loving deal. If you're in most of the rest of New England and the Upper Midwest/Big Sky country it's a medium deal. Some other places also really like their NHL teams, but don't care much about hockey in general. I'd say it's a pretty big deal in Massachusetts right now, but a lot of that comes from the Bruins being the best team in the Eastern Conference over the last 4-ish years. A Stanley Cup, a Conference championship win, and a President's Trophy are all tend to draw the eye.
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May 29, 2014 01:02
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Well, got in just under the bar. Who did Man U lose against in the league btw? And yeah, it does look like fatigue is definitely something that will haunt us.
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May 29, 2014 01:03
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I'm curious, what are the chances of going 'undefeated' for an entire season in game?
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May 29, 2014 01:10
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habeasdorkus posted:Hockey is really regional here in the US. If you're in Michigan or Minnesota or Maine, it's a big loving deal. If you're in most of the rest of New England and the Upper Midwest/Big Sky country it's a medium deal. Some other places also really like their NHL teams, but don't care much about hockey in general. You know something funny? I was listening to MPR a while back and they described the Minnesota Wild's performance in very similar terms to your preferred strategy. The head coach brought in a lot of young, raw talent with a lot of potential, and while they underperformed during the first half of the season, they rebounded and dominated the second half so well that they reached the conference semi-finals.
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May 29, 2014 01:33
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Man U lost to Arsenal at the Emirates, it's exactly the type of game that you'd expect Man U to lose. Very good opponent on their home turf. It's not impossible to go undefeated, the 2003-2004 Arsenal team did it by going 26-12-0. But the only team to do it before that was Preston North End in 1888-1889, who went 18-4-0. We're not going to go unbeaten, but if we did it would be by far the crowning achievement of my Football Managing life.
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May 29, 2014 01:35
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Trying to go all "Invincibles" in football is less likely the more competitions you're in. I can see it possible in FM if you're just in the PL and cups, but adding Champions League as well? Jesus
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May 29, 2014 01:44
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Preid posted:I'm curious, what are the chances of going 'undefeated' for an entire season in game? It depends. Without reloading, it comes down to a bunch of factors; what league you're in, how many compitetions you're in, and if you have to deal with things like the Club World Cup or the Champions League. It's incredibly hard in the Premier League, because at least one other team in the league is probably going to remain in your class, no matter how far you go. Somewhere like Belgium, or Eastern Europe? The League will be substantially easier, but it's harder to keep a hold on Champions League level players, and going unbeaten in the Champion's League is always a feat. It's certainly possible, and people have done it, but people pretty regularly do absurd things in FM. The closest I've ever gotten is unbeaten in the Premier League, winning the FA cup, and winning the Champions League, although I lost an away game in the knockouts.
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May 29, 2014 01:56
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habeasdorkus posted:Fixed! We regret the error. Seeing as you humped Celtic in a Battle of Britain (what Champions League matches between two nations in the UK are called, if you can call Celtic a UK team...) I'll forgive you!
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May 29, 2014 02:38
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Out of curiosity, what are Tackleford's transfer/wages compared with the rest of the Champions League? I'm hoping they're spending is in the top 5 since it means they might not get relegated again and thus we can knock the crap out of them in the future. EDIT: Also how much has Rouissi improved since this image during the Champion's League season? 
Dreamsicle fucked around with this message at 03:33 on May 30, 2014 |
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May 29, 2014 02:48
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TheFlyingLlama posted:Somewhere like Belgium, or Eastern Europe? The League will be substantially easier, but it's harder to keep a hold on Champions League level players Yeah, as a Belgian club, if you can scrape together a team that's competitive in the Champions League you'll almost certainly have to sell most of your players at the end of each season. Maybe in January, too. Your best bet for success in the League is to drop out of Europe as soon as possible.
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May 29, 2014 12:40
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kingturnip posted:Yeah, as a Belgian club, if you can scrape together a team that's competitive in the Champions League you'll almost certainly have to sell most of your players at the end of each season. Maybe in January, too. Your best bet for success in the League is to drop out of Europe as soon as possible. The league was the only trophy "The Invicibles" won that year. They lost against the eventual champions in both the FA and League cup and lost against Chelsea in the Champions League. They made pretty deep cup runs but their end of the season was reasonably clear.
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May 29, 2014 14:43
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Football and football related news, Malcolm Glazer, owner of the Tampa Bay Bucs and Manchester United, died today
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May 29, 2014 19:58
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I love the idea of someone owning one of the greatest soccer teams in the world... and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Granted, the Bucs aren't as bad as they were back when they were the creamsicle pimps, but as a kid of the 80s they'll always be a garbage team in my mind.
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May 30, 2014 05:25
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 How can that fail to make any gentledude or gentledudette's heart quicken? The gleam in his eye, the stilleto betwixt his lips. They scream adventure. Also, we just had our longest winless streak since our first month and a half in the Championship circa 2018:  Commence panic. habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 06:40 on May 30, 2014 |
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May 30, 2014 06:37
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Oh crap we're going to the Europa League. I really hope we knocked around Blackburn and West Brom. EDIT: Well maybe. I thought the Valencia game was new. Still not good though. Dreamsicle fucked around with this message at 07:07 on May 30, 2014 |
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May 30, 2014 06:46
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Why did I have to tempt the football gods with my question!?! Now, back to being serious, is this the predicted burnout from overplaying the Wrexham stars? I hope the situation improves with some softer opponents.
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May 30, 2014 07:06
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Probably a combo of burnout and just the fact that those five games are a hell of a stretch, 2 champions league games against legit teams and 3 megabastards? Not at all easy to deal with, especially if someone like Meteor or Bastable gets hurt.
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May 30, 2014 07:20
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I'd say it's probably the hardest part of the game - getting a second XI that's as competitive as your first XI. In my current save, I've just had a slightly panicky Christmas period because none of my out-and-out strikers could score nearly as often as my first choice. Cue me scouting just about every striker in Brazil and sifting through my Scouts' reports to try to find someone.
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May 30, 2014 10:42
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Not sure if this was posted here but I just came across this video today and I want to thank SkyShadowing and AJ_Impy for being better than guy. At least Wrexham somehow managed to benefit or at least not get hurt from Sky's embezzlement. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynbvYTZcZ9c Dreamsicle fucked around with this message at 19:01 on May 30, 2014 |
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May 30, 2014 18:58
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Yeah, there's three parts of the English LLM experience that I think are bigger challenges than the rest. The jump from the non-League football to League Two, the jump from League One to the Championship, and staying in the top four while also succeeding in the Champions League.* The first two are hard because your team just isn't as good as the teams at the new level, and it's a big reason why I focus so much on youth on the way up to the top. A team of 20-24 year olds will improve more over a season than a team of 27-31 year olds, and thus will better be able to hang against the tougher competition. That was so very true for our year in the Championship, we finished second after winning one and losing five of our first seven matches. That's the year Scott Shirra broke out towards the end of and pushed us over the top. The third is hard because you go from needing just 11 good players to succeed to needing 18-20. It's why I spent so heavily this offseason on new talent. For the first two updates, it worked. Then we ran into Champions League quality squads in Valencia and Schalke (probably Tottenham level in terms of talent, certainly no slouches) and played two megabastards (Chelsea and Man City) and a sleeping giant who still has a ton of talent even if they're wildly dysfunctional (Liverpool). So it's not like we're losing to Blackburn, West Brom, and Karpaty. But it is the first time we've gone five games without a win in over three years. * The jump from the Championship to the Premier League is also usually difficult, but because you're suddenly playing 8-10 fewer matches a year it's not as bad because you can just run out your best players every game and have a better chance of fighting your way to the mid-table.
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May 30, 2014 19:22
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Well what we need is to send our most promising prospects for Eurodisney training. We sent the Meteor and Shirra there and look where they are now!
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May 30, 2014 19:33
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Just to let you guys know, the Baseball Mogul signup thread is live. I'm on my phone so I can't link it directly, but just look for the title Harmon, Portrait Of A Serial Killebrew.
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May 30, 2014 21:48
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cbx posted:Just to let you guys know, the Baseball Mogul signup thread is live. I'm on my phone so I can't link it directly, but just look for the title Harmon, Portrait Of A Serial Killebrew. I'm not on a phone, so here's the link: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3638905
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May 30, 2014 21:50
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Bobbin Threadbare posted:I'm not on a phone, so here's the link: Awesome. Thanks, you are a scholar and a Goon.
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May 31, 2014 00:33
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When finding staff or players, is the enabling remove unrealistic transfers 100% accurate or are there some who can fall through the cracks?
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May 31, 2014 03:51
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Some can fall through the cracks, but it's not very common. Given how many players are out there it's generally worth clicking the filter unless you're going to go through each report and see if they have even a little bit of interest in joining the club. That's even more the case in the lower leagues, currently the only players not interested in joining us are mainly on the biggest clubs.
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May 31, 2014 04:58
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I haven't played FM for a long time but does the AI tend to suck at properly judging the potential of wonderkids?
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May 31, 2014 12:14
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Is there some sort of Football Manager for Dummies out there that will help a rookie out? This looks like it could be a fun game but the learning curve seems crazy.
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May 31, 2014 21:27
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KKKLIP ART posted:Is there some sort of Football Manager for Dummies out there that will help a rookie out? This looks like it could be a fun game but the learning curve seems crazy. Currently I'm using this to help me out: http://www.guidetofootballmanager.com/
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May 31, 2014 21:29
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