Itchygon

Inspired by Eric Portapotty's African adventures (Pentagon) I thought it was time to explore some new land. Downloaded a bunch of databases and loaded these:




I started unemployed and were offered about 200 interviews. I decided I want to start in Africa, and attended interviews for a couple of clubs in Nigeria and Ghana, turning down all others.

Finally I went with Bayelsa United for a coupe of reasons. Firstly, the squad wasn't entirely made up of greyed out players, secondly they were sitting in 7:th position in the Premier League with half season gone. I like this, being thrown into a team in the middle of the season, and work with what's there.

So the first game to play was in the Cup against Akwa, a team in the bottom half of the table. I decided, based on the players available to me to go with a slightly Holland inspired tactic looking like this:



I would like to use more attacking wing backs, but unfortunately we don't have that here, we'll see what we can find during the last days of the transfer window. I don't have much hope though, as we don't have much of a budget to play with. I would also like to play a libero, as it's really cool.

And...



Ouch. Couldn't get a shot on goal for the entire match, the two shots released were from long range after they had a man sent off and never near any threat. There is some work to do...

As the tactics fell to place, our finishing of the season went quite well, including a 8 games winning streak. To give our midfield some pondus I picked up Papa Bouba Diop on a free, he will be a vital piece in this team as a leader and tutor. He's also still a good player at 35.



We ended up in 5:th place, which I'm really happy about. Next year we aim at the top four - meaning continental fotboll.

Itchygon, brilliant name

And cheers for the shoutout, will be following

Thanks, man. I hope to have a few more updates shortly.

Always enjoy your saves man and people exploring new areas! wil be following!

Good luck mate! Diop the wardrobe himself

Thanks Dan, really appreciate it!

Thanks George, let's get that wardrobe moving!

As the season is played from March to October, our pre season starts in January.

I've made quite a few signings, but these are the ones that stand out.


Sort of a FM legend - always looks great stats-wise, always performs horribly. I will try to retrain him to be a sweeper.


Picked up from the Taye Academy. This one can lead us to glory (or at least we can sell him for alot of money to Norway or something). At 17, he will be our starting striker, though I feel slighly bad for Buhari Jafar who scored 22 goals in 33 games last season and was elected as Player of the year by the fans.

On to the friendlies. I played Roseborg twice just because I could. It was part of a deal for two players I sold last year. Got me some money from them and we performed really well. Overall I'm happy with the team. Now let's see how we can do in the league.

Iheanacho looks incredible for a 17-year old, heck he looks incredible regardless of his age.

This! think you've found a potential star for the league there!

Indeed. And he scored on his debut, but, as it has become a habit we were thrashed by Akwa (4-2). We already have a boogie team...

Good to see you're back Enjoyed your Europe, from A to Z (or W, actually) save

Good luck in Nigeria.

Thanks Johno, glad to hear that!

After a positive pre season we were ready for some competetive games. Or so I thought.



It took us five games before getting a win. We picked up form eventually, adjusting the tactics slightly. But the most important thing was told new signing Peter Ebibor (transfer already arranged when I joined) that he was useless, demoted him to back-up status and sent him to the U-21 team. Ofcours he whined about it and wanted to be transfer listed. Suited me fine, I mean, he started four matches and is now sporting a 6.03 average rating. Get out.

League table



Iheanacho is such a star. 7 goals in 14 matches, he has taken it a bit easy on the opponents after his initial 6 goals in 6 games.. Fun fact: He is labelled the next Viktor Ikpeba, and guess what?


I have the old one as well.

This was the last update in a while, I'm going on vacation and won't be able to play for a couple of weeks. I know it was quite a bad timing starting the career now, but I really felt like it, and had a couple of hour to spare at work. So see you in August or something.

Enjoy your vacation!

What logos do you use?

Cheers!

It's the metallic logo megapack from graphic section here.

Tough start but very good towards to the end! Have a fun vacation!

Have a fun vacation chief! A great start to the season to come back to thats for sure!

Cheers guys!

Alright. Back to work. Back to Nigeria. I didn't remember much of what I had be doing here, so I just figured "hey we're on a good run, let's keep going". And that looked like a pretty good idea:



Not bad. I am, however, a bit worried that Kelechi Iheanacho, my 17 year old super striker, hasn't scored for a long time. I think he might be on some 8 or 9 game goalless streak. But I will give him my full back up, and more: My really crappy assistant manager Uche has left the club to manage som team I don't remember, and I promoted Viktor Ikpeba (aka the old Iheanacho). Maybe he can get the lad firering.

... or maybe not.



Well he did score eventually. But that's about the only positive I can find here.

A few posts back I wrote about a defender named Ebibor:

When the game against Dolphins came, I had a slight shortage on central defenders and I though "Well let's give the poor sod a second chance".



Marvelous management.


Now I have some serious thinking to do. The only thing I do know is that Ebibor will never feature again. I think I have to play Lucky Omero some more, hopefully his name can prove to be a lucky omen. He's a right winger, a position I don't use. But well, it can't be worse.

Awful results

Hope you enjoyed your vacation

Awful, indeed.
And thanks, Johno, the summer has been great. Maybe I could have wished for a little more FM...

DUde don't stop playing Ebibor, just keep fining him, you don't want him to drain the coffers while rotting in the reserves do you?

That was one possibilty, I guess, but...

In another world:



After the horrendous results in May, I decided to alter the tactics slightly, and I came up with a straight 3-5-2 formation. And after an unlucky 1-0 loss against Niger Tornadoes, we only lost one game in during the summer months.





I made two simning during this window as I felt we needed more options in midfield. They are not exceptional, but they have played very well. I often need to sub both the box to box midfielders as they work alot and get tired quickly. They also seem very injury prone.


Starting man on the left. 3 goals and 4 assists in 8 games.


Playing as the more attacking midfielder. 3 goals 2 assists in 4 games.

Looks like your on a decent run mate, keep it up.

Still think itchygon sounds like a feminine hygiene product though

Yea, form is good. It's always nice when you make changes to the tactics - and it works!

Not sure how I should deal with the other part of the comment.... But thanks anyway.