FMREGEN: FULL CIRCLE

Hi guys. I'm thinking of bringing my blog save over to this site for you all to read.

The basic idea is to complete the Club and Country Pentagon challenge but also the Club World Championships and World Cup.

I have 9 parts written on my blog that I want to copy over to here. If people are interested I will do 1 post per day for you to catch up on.

Most posts are either a full season or two posts per season.

I'm really enjoying the save and having some good success although I've not actually won a Champions League trophy yet.

So if your interested let me know!

The more the merrier!

We need our careers section to remain somewhat active @ThatFMRegen so feel free.

OK mate I'll have to reword a few bits as it's related to twitter and other posts but I'll try and get the first one up tonight

Hi all, as mentioned in a previous comment this is an FM17 Save that I've been running on my blog. It's called

FMREGEN:FULL CIRCLE

The idea of this save is to travel the world and on the way try and win the following competitions:

Club

You have to win the 5 Continental Champions Leagues, these are:

European Champions League
Copa Libertadores
North American Champions League
Asian Champions League
African Champions League
Alongside this you have to win the Club World Championships

Country

You have to win the 5 international tournaments, these are:

Copa America
European Championships
African Nations Cup
Asian Cup
North America Gold Cup

Alongside this you have to win the World Cup

I have named this "The Club & Country Hexagon Challenge"

I will be starting as an Unemployed Manager with No Badges and Sunday League Reputation

The following Nations will be loaded at the start and I will add/remove when I require:

Australia
Singapore
Malaysia
India
South Africa
China


I am already several seasons into the save so will post them in regular intervals until I have caught up. I am still learning how the careers sections works so if you have any tips and hints for me then please leave me a comment

The Job Hunt

Firstly comes the arduous task of finding a job. I fully expect with no badges or experience it will be very hard, there are a few jobs available at the start so I've stuck my name in the hat for all 5. One of the job available is a job I earmarked as I club I wanted to manage due to their interesting history. Niigata Unicorn (or Albirex Niigata - Singapore) as they are known in the real world are a Japanese team playing in the Singapore League, there are basically a franchise club of Albirex Niigata - Japan.



Applications in, there are also a couple of International jobs available and seeing as that is part of my "Club and Country Hexagon Challenge" I may as well stick my name in for those as well.



Clearly no one has heard of me and I was rejected straight the way from all 4 of them. But surprisingly I received job interviews for all 5 domestic clubs I went for. I certainly didn't expect that. I had heard it was very very hard to get a first job but clearly the nations and clubs were of such a poor level even they wanted me!

Interviews done, I felt like it all went well and within days I was offered a job, and it was the dream job every manager wants (or is that just me?!).



That's right Niigata offered me the job, amazing that my first job would be one I had shortlisted before the game even came out. I had to accept it and my journey begins, starting in Singapore.

Welcome to Niigata Unicorn (Singapore))



Here is a little bit of background about the club in the FM17 style.



One thing you will see with some of the screenshots, especially with players screenshots is the writing on the toolbar is very hard to see. Clearly the Niigata board decided to dress their players in some obscene colour but come on guys Orange and Light Grey really doesn't go together does it?!



A quick glance at the League table tells me that we are currently 15 games into the season already, with only 9 more games to play and a couple of league cup games. We are sitting 4th which is pretty good as we are predicted to end bottom according to the odds.



As you can see there is no relegation. The team that ends top is entered into the Asian Champions League Qualifying.

So things look good, we are exceeding expectations but can we keep it up? I won't have much time to get my ideas across but for now build a platform, try to keep us around the top 4 and then reassess the playing squad, etc at the end of the season.

Talking of the playing squad it looks OK, we have large-ish squad with some good strength-in-depth.



4231 is screaming at me looking at the list of players so that's what I will go with. The team comparison says we have the best Work Rate and Aggression in the league so we will play High Tempo, Closing Down more but be More Disciplined. We are the lowest in the league for Passing so I will play Counter with the idea to get the ball forward quickly when we have the ball. We have some good Wingers so I will try to play most of my game through them.

In my next season post I will go a bit more into detail about my tactic.

End of Season Review

Well we only had 9 games to play plus a few League Cup games so there isn't a lot to tell you about but overall my first few games as a professional manager has gone very well!

The 4231 tactic that I employed seemed to be Ok, there is a lot of room for improvement but as a first draft of a tactic I can't complain. That's not to say I didn't change it. After a couple of dodgy games as we headed towards the end of the season I changed a Standard/Flexible 424 tactic. I would've preferred to have made it a 442 but with no real M R/L and lots of AM R/L I went with 424. Next season I will try to retrain most of them to play further back.

As there are only a few games to cover I won't do what my usual plan will be for these posts. In the usual season review post I will go through on a month by month basis, charting the results, players and any other business.

But for this post I'll just show you my results then talk a little bit about it because to be honest I've rambled enough already!



Overall it's not been too bad. We had an amazing start winning our first game even though we were very lucky to nick it 2-1. Our campaign in the League Cup started amazingly winning all 3 group games without conceding a goal but we ended up being hammered 3-0 by Warriors in the Semi Final.

After that our form was kind of patchy, away from home we were really good but at home we struggled to hold onto games, no more so than the 2-2 draw against (once again) Warriors who came from 2-0 down to score 2 in the last 4 minutes to get a draw.

But I can't complain, seeing as the team is still getting used to me and my tactic I am very pleased with how they have played, and with those results we managed to keep hold of 4th place, although any other than a defeat in the final game would've got us 3rd place.



I do feel next season with the right additions we can improve on 4th place even though, at the moment we have a squad only capable of a mid-table finish. If I can get my 424/442 working and we get a bit more solid in defence then I'm confident we can upset a few.

A quick talk about who were my standout players in the games I was in charge.

Keisuke Suzuki - Central Defender

Won the player of the year award at the club by quite a way and played a massive part in our half decent run of form. We didn't concede loads at the end of the season and most was down to this guy. In 23 games he averaged 7.02 and even got 3 assists. He averaged 85 % on tackles won and 74% on pass completion. He will be a big player for us next season.



Kazuhiko Sato - Central Midfielder

Played every league game averaging 6.84, he looked great for me taking control of the midfield and covering lots of ground helping out both in attack and defence. He was shortlisted for the Singapore Player of the Year award but lost out.




Next Season

I now need to try and remove the dead wood and bring in some fresh faces. Overall the squad is decent we just need to improve in one or two areas to push us to the next level. A Striker to play with Nonaka is imperative, we also need a Left Back and maybe a Wide Midfielder or two depending on how well the AMs retrain in that position.

I know the end of season review on this post has been a bit short but with only a few games played there wasn't much time for assessing. In the next end of season review, I'll delve more into my tactics and my squad. I'll also talk a bit more about how I set up my training, both team and individual and anything else that crops up.

I hope you have enjoyed this rather longer post than I expected. I will endeavour to shrink them down a little bit. I am so excited for this save and I really hope you all stick around and follow the ride.

For now that's all, thanks for reading and speak to you all soon

Good to see another league I know little about!

Keep the posts coming!

Good luck with this, looks interesting

I've taken over that club before on FM16, found it tough at first with the Japanese-only transfer policy, unless that has changed of course which I doubt

Last seasons 4th place finish for Niigata Unicorn (Singapore) was really good, although I only had 9 league games in charge I definitely saw some positives and the players looked good with the tactic I put together rather hurriedly. Now in my 2nd season in charge I need to put my own stamp on the team, bring some new faces in and get the club heading upwards.

This post will take you through all the trials and tribulations of the 2017 Season in Singapore, safe to say there are lots of lots of things to go through!



I knew when I took over that it would be hard to rebuild my squad, being a Japanese club playing in Singapore we are only allowed to sign Japanese players, this kind of slipped my mind when loading the game because I never expected to be getting this job first. If I had of known I would've loaded all Japanese players up but didn't and now I have a serious problem.

There are 69 Japanese players who would be interested in joining me and the problem is I can't scout them as we can only scout players in Singapore! So I have to go on my instinct and go by the attributes. Easy I hear you ask, well yes BUT hardly any of these players are available. You can "Approach to Sign" but all can't join until Mid-2017. Not sure why this is as most of the youngsters seem to be without a club!

So I have to reassess my aims and objectives here. If I don't have the options to sign many players then I need to look inside the club. Improve facilities, youth recruitment, junior coaching, etc. The finances are OK, we ended the 2016 season with around £200k in the bank and with a £245k sponsorship deal we have a bit of room to improve things.

So as we entered the new season I went to the board and requested a few things. Firstly I have to look after myself so I asked the board to start my road to gaining coaching badges. The accepted and I am now working on my National C Licence



Secondly is to try to get the board to improve my scouting range which in turn will hopefully give me more Japanese players to scout. The rejected but after a bit of persuasion they accepted and I can now scout anywhere in Asia.

The third and final thing was to start improving the facilities, I asked to improve the Youth Facilities and they duly agreed.



Seems to be taking ages to upgrade but I'll take it, we currently have "Basic" Youth facilities so this will push it one step high (not sure what that is!).

So the board seems to be on my side which is great, hopefully as the season goes on we can start to improve other areas as well.

The Club

A little bit more about Niigata Unicorn, firstly the finances. I mentioned before we are in the pretty healthy state. As we entered pre-season the balance sat at just over £500k. By the looks of the projections we will be losing around £80-£90k a month which clearly isn't good. Projections show us to be around £250k in the red by the end of the season. With my restrictions on player signing's I can't afford to lose players so, for the time being will just have to deal with it, try to gain some income via cup comps and hope the projections are wrong!



Next the facilities, I already mentioned we have "Basic" Youth Facilities which is now being improved.




I'm very surprised by the high level of Youth Recruitment, let's hope this helps us out when we receive an Intake, which currently hasn't happened as we head into pre-season.

Everything else is OK but will need improving. The fact I can't really sign many players leads we to have to rely on the Youth players and my current players. I will be doing my best to get all these things improved as quick as possible.



I did somehow manage to make a 2 signing in pre-season, but I also signed 4 players who will join me at different points of the next season.

Daisuke Ota - Striker (Free Transfer)

I needed a Striker desperately and Ota was the only person available who looked half decent and could join me immediately.Only 2 star rated but his attributes are more than good enough for this division. He will probably be my 3rd choice Striker



Austin Wong - Attacking Midfielder (Free Transfer)

Yes he is Australian but his 2nd nationality is Japanese and that's good enough to get him signed up. He looks fantastic and will be a huge player in the upcoming season.



The other signings I will go through in my season review.



So as we entered pre-season and with only 1 signing my squad looks OK. I haven't lost anyone from last season, only 1 player has made noises about wanting to leave but no-one seems to want him. I have promoted a few players from my reserve and youth teams as well. Here is the squad I currently have (Austin Wong is missing as this screenshot was taken before he arrived):



We have decent strength in-depth and some good youth prospects in there. In the team comparison we are ranked No.1 for Teamwork and Aggression but bottom for Passing and Strength. Training will consist and mainly getting these attributes increased both by team and individual training.

Improvements are needed but it's a good base to work on.

So pre-season finished and overall the results were good. I won't bore you with all the results but we had some dominant performances against some rubbish teams, we couldn't arrange any friendly against bigger teams, the only teams in comparison to us were in our own division and I'd rather not play them before the season starts.

The Season

I'm going to go through this month by month so you can see our progression but firstly the odds and expectations, as you can see we aren't expected to pull up any trees. The odds have us at 100-1 to win the league and we are predicted to end 7th.



The board expect a little more than that with them wanting us to end in the top half, so anywhere 5th and above. They don't seem to fussed about the cups either but I want to try to win as much as I can so won't rotate in the cups. Most cup games tend to be in the middle of the season so don't interfere with the league games





What a start! 4 straight wins in our first 4 games and we sat top of the league. I am mixing things up with a 442 and 4231 formation dependant on how I feel. The 442 gets employed when I feel we need more potency upfront but need more stability on the wings and the 4231 gets employed when we need a bit more creativity going forward. I also plan to change tactics if we have a bad couple of games.

But overall a great start to the season, the month ended with a defeat away to Home Utd which was deserved. they played better than us and we just didn't get started.





Only 2 games and 4 points from it. The 2-2 draw was sensational, 2-0 down at half-time, I gave them a rollicking and we grabbed 2 goals in the final 12 minutes to grab a draw. The 1-0 win away to Tampines was also a great result.Tampines are the current champions are by far and away the best team in the league. We went 442 but made a few tweaks to the Team Instructions to play a more solid and compact and it worked a treat as we ran out 1-0 winners.





A really busy but fantastic month. 6 games, 4 wins, 1 draw and 1 defeat against our old enemies Warriors. They always seem to beat us! The 1st game of the month was by far the most exciting game. Once again we found ourselves 2-0 down at half time, we nicked back after 57 mins, I pushed forward and we equalized with 5 minutes left. Then with the final kick of the game Striker Nonaka nipped in the far post to head the ball into the net to win the game 3-2, safe to say I went absolutely mental! Another great month but we sat in 2nd place behind Tampines, their only slip up was against us.





A quiet month and 2 poor performances. Only 1 league game which ended in a bore draw. We then had a shocking game in the Prelim Round of the Singapore cup and were knocked out. Really disappointing as I wanted to win as much as I can.



We also signed 3 new players in May. These were all approached in January but for some reason their deals wouldn't complete until May

Yusei Kitade - Attacking Midfielder (Free Transfer)

For my 4231 he will be fantastic as he can play anywhere across the Attacking Midfield and also in Central Midfield. He looks great and will be a big player for us going forward.



Shin'ichi Asai - Striker (Free Transfer)

A superstar Striker who I feel can be a massive player in the years to come. He needs some improvement on some of his attributes but he has 14 for finishing, good balance, acceleration, fitness and some great mental attributes.



Go Shirai - Right Midfield (Free Transfer)

A bit of a desperation signing and probably won't stay long. I needed a RM and because I have limited Japanese players he was 1 of very few I could sign. He looks solid, has good dribbling and some good physicals.





For some reason we have a 6-week break, not sure why but that's why there are no games in June.

July was an OK month, only 1 league game and it was our 3rd defeat of the season, we didn't play well and deserved the defeat. Then came the 3 games in the League Cup Group Stage. We managed to claim 7 points and qualified in top spot, Asai grabbing his 1st league goals for the club.





Only 2 games and both defeats. Form was really slipping and the 442 was becoming less effective than it had been during the start of the season. After these 2 games it has been put in the background and I will try and stick to my 4231. Mainly because Asai looks good to play upfront on his own with Wong just behind. After our 3rd straight league defeat we had dropped down to 3rd place.





3 games and it went better. The 4231 was played in all 3 games, the 4-0 win was absolutely amazing, probably our best performance of the season. This was followed up by a 1-1 draw away to Warriors, I think this is the first time we haven't lost to them! We then lost 1-0 at Home to bottom place DPMM, a shocker of a game and a really bad performance.



At the end of September came the Youth Intake and my god I wasn't expecting it to be this good. We have so many decent players and 1 amazing player.



Here are the best 3 players in my eyes.

Firstly is Hamada, this guy looks awesome, he will go straight into the 1st team squad and may even become a starter very quickly



Here are the other 2, both will stay in the Youth team for now but may get moved up for next season

October

The final few games and by now the title has gone but 2nd will still all to play for even if it didn't actually merit anything, only the top team qualifies for the Asian Champions League.

It was another month of inconsistencies, 5 games, 2 wins, 2 draws and 1 defeat to the eventual Champions Tampines. They really look like they are going to be a tough nut to crack.

The Final Table

We ended 3rd but overall it was a great season. We improved on both our points tally and position from the previous season and with the new signings bedding in well and some good youth players I really feel we can improve further next season.

End of Season Review

Right Back Takano won Player of the Year, personally I think Wong should have won it, he was truly amazing all season. The top goalscorer ended on 8 goals which clearly isn't good enough. Now we have Asai who as long as he stays fit will be my No.1 Striker I feel we have a guy who can hit 15-20 goals next season.

A Few Final Notes

I have taken and completed both my National C and B license during the past year so my badges and reputation are slowly increasing. I don't have any plans to leave at the moment, I want to give this club at least 5 seasons to see how far I can take them but with the player signing restrictions it's going to be tough to move them to a stage where they can be challenging in the Champions League.

There are also a couple of players wanting to leave at the end of the season. Left Winger Suzuki, who is probably my best player won't sign a new contract, also Central Defender Kawamata won't sign a new deal. With Hamada coming in from the Intake I won't need to replace him.

I won't go too much into my tactics but I quickly wanted to show you the 4231 tactic that I feel is the main tactic I will use moving forward.

A pretty basic 4231 shape. Asai looks great as a Poacher. The TIs are to play wide, exploit the flanks and get the ball in the box. I added Tight Marking as too many times my players were getting out of shape and the CBs kept losing their player.




If you have got this far then I applaud you!

Hope you enjoyed the rather long read, speak to you all soon

@Keisuke Suzuki, a 164 cm centre back, i have seen it all now

Nice stuff, @ThatFMRegen! Excellent season, especially given the media prediction. Also improved upon your first (half a) season, if not for that draw against Warriors, the second place was yours. Wish you luck for your next season.

2018 Season - Niigata Unicorn (Singapore)

Welcome back to my FM17 blog where I am currently in Singapore with Niigata Unicorn (or Niigata Albirex as they are called in real life). A Japanese team playing in the Singapore League. This post will take you through my 3rd season in charge (My 2nd full season).

After last seasons 3rd place finish in the S-League confidence is high, not only from me but also from the board, the are fully expecting me to win the League this season, a very tough ask!

Pre-Season Transfers, Squad and Results

We entered into pre-season with high hopes, I had arranged quite a few friendlies, mostly easy ones as for some reason no big teams wanted to play me. Tampines are the team to beat from last season, they completed the League and Cup double last season so we need to improve and quick.

As you will know from my previous post players to bring in are very hard to find. We are only allowed to sign Japanese players and because of our low reputation not many players want to come to us. After reviewing my squad, the players that had left and my reserve and youth players I came to the conclusion not much was needed. The squad was rated pretty highly in the comparison tab and with some really good youth intake players coming through last season the idea would be to bring a few of them in.

I want to keep to my 4231 tactic that I went through in the previous post and want to make sure I have 2 players per position with an extra Striker just in case of injuries. And then at least 1 player per position in my Youth/Reserve team as cover.

We were going to lose a couple of players as they were refusing to sign a new contract. Left Winger Suzuki who was amazing last year and Central Defender Kawamata both left (and funnily enough never signed for another club!). Striker Ota decided to retire, he wasn't that good anyway so more than happy to take him off the wage bill. I also let a few players leave who didn't fit into my squad planning ideas, so now my squad had been trimmed down to what I wanted and after some deliberation decided all I needed was a backup Attacking Midfielder.

Now there isn't that much to play with here so went with the best of a bad lot, only on a 1-year deal and low-ish wages.

Shunsuke Nakatake - Attacking Midfield (Free Transfer)

Good passing, decent physicals and some half decent mental attributes. He will be back-up to Kitade who signed last season and looks quality.



That was my only signing. I think that's a record for me but with all the good youth players coming through I didn't need to go mad. After that signing and the outs our squad looks like this:



2 players per position with an extra Striker and Central Defender just in case. The squad is very young and we have some amazing potential coming through. If players stick with me I really feel over the next few years we can have one amazing team. The issue is keeping players, most players are going to use this club to go to bigger and better things so we need success and we need it quickly.

I'm particularly excited to see how Central Defender Hamada does, he came through my intake from last season and will be a starter this season, and also 2 Goalkeepers Ito and Sato. Kimura retired last season and both of these guys are pretty similar in attributes, who will become my 1st choice?

Pre-season itself went very very well. Like I said earlier we didn't manage to play any really big teams so I went with a max of rubbish teams, the best foreign teams I could find and last seasons champs Tampines to see how much we had progressed.

As you can see below we beat them 3-0 and played really well. As you will see Asai, the Striker I bigged up so much in my last post didn't score or feature much, he wasn't injured he just didn't play well and after I gave Okamoto a chance he never came back into the team but I'll go more into that later.

So 7 games, 7 wins, 6 clean sheets and plenty of goals. This is going to be a good season.

The 2018 Season

I mentioned earlier that expectations were high. The board wanted us to win the league (we couldn't even change it to lower), and the season odds have us in 2nd spot behind Tampines.

https://thatfmregencom.files.wordpress.com/2016/10/expectations1.png


Their not to bothered in the Cup comps, the League Cup is a bit pointless but the Singapore Cup winner or runners-up (depending on the League winners) can qualify for the Asian Confederations Cup (a bit like the Europa League) so I want to do as well as I can in that one and give some of my youth players a go in the League Cup.

February

The season kicked off and we started well. It was clear as the 1st few games progressed Home Utd were to be our biggest rivals. Tampines has started horribly and had 2 points from the 1st 4 games. 3 wins from our 1st 4 was very good and we played some really good football. The defeat to Home Utd was tough to take, we found ourselves 3-0 down at half-time. Okamoto came off the bench (for Asai) and scored 2 goals to claw it back but we couldn't find a 3rd.

As you can see Okamoto score 5 in 2 games and after that had well and truly displaced Asai. Although in the 4th game Asai came off the bench to grab 2 priceless goals to beat Young Lions 3-1 after being 1-0 down at half-time. Asia just isn't consistent enough at the moment and Okamoto looks really good as a lone striker.

March

4 more games and an unbeaten month. Okamoto missed the 2 0-0s and you can see how much it affected us. Although another 8 points was enough to put us top of the league. Tampines still way down in 7th and we smashed them 5-1 in probably our best performance so far in my tenure at the club. We were absolutely sensational, Wong scoring 2 20 yard stunners. Young Striker Harada came off the bench scoring his 1st ever goal for the club.

April

Another really good month, 5 games and 0 defeats. Okamoto again scoring in 4 of the 5 games. We also beat Tampines again, this time winning 3-0. The team were looking fantastic by this time and we found ourselves 6 points clear at the top of the league with a game in hand. We were now over half way through the season and well on our way to our 1st title.

May

Only 2 games and 2 really good wins. Warriors was a tough game, in previous seasons they have been a real bogie team. We scored after 14 seconds to take the lead, and made it 2 after Left Winger Izumi scored a screamer, Warriors clawed it back to 2-2 but our main man Wong scored with 20 minutes left to grab a 3-2 win. We were now 8 points clear at the top.

July

After our (rather pointless) mid-season break we came back at the start of July to play our cup games. Because of our high finish last season we didn't need to play in the Pre-lim Round of the Singapore Cup and entered at the Quarter Final stage where we played 3rd place Hougang Utd, the informed break really showed in our performance drawing the Home game 1-1 and then losing 3-2 away from home to go out at the 1st time of asking once again.

We did play 1 League game dispatching DPMM Brunei 2-0 in a very good and clinical performance against a team in-form who were moving up the League.

We then played 2 of our League Cup game. I said earlier I wasn't bothered about this competition so gave some of my back-up players a chance. We lost 2-0 to Home Utd before drawing Warriors 1-1. Both poor performances but I'm not too bothered.

August

We started the month with our 3rd and final League Cup and it we handed Tampines another hammering, I really don't know what has happened to them this season, their squad hasn't changed much but they are doing dreadfully. The win though wasn't enough to qualify us for the Semi-Final and we ended 3rd in the League

We returned to League action with 2 really good wins, we seemed to be struggling more defensively, all 3 of our goals conceded came from near post corners so I needed to address that but we won both and that's all that matter. With 6 games to go we needed 10 points to win the title. Our next game would be away to 2nd place Home Utd, a win would 99% guarantee us the title.

September

Well it didn't go well and we got absolutely hammered! 4-0 was well deserved, we never showed up, only our 2nd defeat of the season and we were now 9 points clear with 5 games to go. We then played Tampines and once again we beat them convincingly. Home Utd also won but now we knew the next game could be decisive. 9 clear with 4 games left. Home Utd would play before us and if they slipped up the title would be ours.

I never expected them to slip up at Home to Geyland Utd but somehow they drew the game 1-1 and with that we had won the League with 4 games to go.

An amazing achievement but the title was expected by my board so I couldn't do anything less. The players had stepped up to the mark in nearly every single game and fully deserved the title, the 1st title for Niigata Unicorn since joining the S-League in 2012.





The Youth Intake

Another incredible Youth Intake, I'm starting to think either Intakes in this version are over-powered or my 1st team are really poor!



Some real good quality in there but 1 player stand out more than anyone and that is Hayashi, a really good looking Striker. He has good finishing and some really good physical attributes and will go straight into the 1st team.

If you look back up at the results from this month you will see Hayashi scored. He came on as sub and scored with his 1st touch of the ball! I have high hopes for this guy.

October/November

The final 3 games of our title winning season and 3 decent performances. Not much to say here.



What a season! We are Champions of Singapore winning the League by 10 points, losing only 2 games, both against 2nd place Home Utd.

Player Performances

So who performed well in our amazing season?

One of our best of most consistent players was Left Back Kajimura, he played 20 league game, missing the final 4 due to playing for the Japanese Under 23s. He averages 7.4.



I have to mention Striker Okamoto, what a season this guy had. He only started 15 games due to a 4 weeks lay-off but scored 11 goals in that time. He was deadly in front of goals even if his attributes aren't the best. Wirth Hayashi breathing down his neck and Harada also looking good I don't even think I have space to have Asai in my squad anymore. A far cry from what I said in my last post which said he was 1 of our best players!



Well what a season it has been. I expected to be challenging but to win it by such a margin was a big surprise.

Now for the serious problem. I wondered why after I had won the League nothing had been said about my qualification for the Asian Champions League so I had a look on google and found this on Wiki.



We aren't allowed to enter any of the Asian Continental Comps as we are a Japanese based club. I have to say I am absolutely gutted, I am loving being at this club but as the challenge of this save it to win the Champions League there is really no point in staying. Even if we turned this team into the greatest team ever we still could only win the S-League and Cups.

So my plan is not to leave but to start applying for other jobs. Somewhere where I can qualify for the Champions League. I don't want to leave but feel I have no choice.

I have to admit I am absolutely gutted. I wanted to spend a long time here building Niigata into a huge club, I feel I am letting people down by moving already but also feel to progress my game and to make myself a better manager moving to a new club to be the best idea.

The club is also in a lot of debt and the club are refusing to let me get my National A Licence so my progression is also stalling here.

Anyway I've gone on long enough. For now thanks for reading. My next update will come either when I finish the next season or when I find a new club.

Congratulations! Very good season, you absolutely bossed the league. Big shame indeed that the club cannot qualify for AFC Champions League. Interested to see your next step.

A NEW JOB!

So after having a long think I quit my job at Niigata Unicorn in Singapore and it didn't take long for a few offers to come in. I was offered to join Beijing in the Chinese 1st Division but then an offer came in that was too good to turn down.



It came from Malaysian based club Johur DT and with a £3.2m transfer budget I couldn't say no. I immediately accepted!

A little bit of Club History

Johor Darul Ta'zim are based in Malaysia and have won the previous 4 Malaysian Super League Titles. They aren't the most successful team in Malaysia but under the direction of HRH Tunku Ismail who is the Crown Prince of the Malay state Johur they started to improve after a few years of playing in the lower tiers of Malay football.

They arrived in the Malaysian Super League in 2006 after an expansion of the League but spent most of their time in mid-table. Then in 2012 the Johur State FA decided to disband a lot of the Johurian teams but kept 2 teams, one of them was Johur DT. After this their fortunes changed and they won their 1st League Title in 2014.

They then became the 1st ever Malaysian team (and 1st ever South-East Asian team) to win an Asian Continental Competition winning the Asian Confederations Cup in 2015.

In-game they have won the 2 League titles so far in 2017 and 2018 but haven't progressed past the Champions League prelim rounds. It looks like in my 1st season they have been given a Group Stage spot in the Champions League so no prelim qualifiers for us!

So in my eyes winning the Super League should be pretty easy therefore the main aim is to become the 1st ever Malaysian team to win the Asian Champions League. It's going to be very tough but I like tough.

The Malaysian Season

It's currently December 2018 and the League doesn't start until February 2019 so we have plenty of time to assess things. With regards to the League we are obviously favourites to win the League.



As you can there are 12 teams in the Super League, we play each team twice so there are only 22 League games to play.

We also have the Malaysian FA Cup which has 6 rounds, we enter in the 2nd round and unsurprisingly are the current holders. And the League Cup which has a Group stage then Knockout rounds.

The season helpfully runs in parallel with the Champions League, starting Mid-February and finishing at the end of October. The Champions League starts at the end of February with the final in November.

The Club - Finances

As you will have saw from the job offer we have been given a hefty budget of £3.2m transfer budget and around £32k spare wage budget. The total wage budget is £63k so we are spending about 50% so far.



Projections show that we will be losing around £2.5m per season but from the looks of our income we tend to get given an investment sum of around £1.5m each year.

Ticket prices are very low (£3 game ticket, £25 season ticket), we have 8,228 season ticket holder so our season ticket sales per season are around £200k.

I read a really good post by TheHigherTempoPress in FM16 that said the best way to manage finances was to try and keep your League gate receipts the same as your wages. I will try and keep to this as much as I can.

Our home attendances are around 20,000 so 11 home games and 12,000 game paying ticket holders at £3 comes to around £400k a season. £400k + £200k for season ticket sales comes to £600k.

If we divide this by 12 months we get a monthly amount of £50,000. Which means a week wage of around £12,000. We currently spend £30,000! So I can't cut the wage budget that much but will try and keep it down as much as I can knowing that we will also have 3 Home Champions League games and Cup games which will give us extra gate receipts.

Balancing finances is a key part for me so will try as hard as I can!

The First Team Squad

A quick look at the squad and overall it looks good.We have a wealth of Central Defenders and Right Wingers so may need to trim that down a bit even though a few of my RWs can play as Right Back.



A quick look through each player and here is who I think can be our key players.

Nur Saiful Abdul Rahman - Left/Centre Back

My most highly rated player with regards to PA. Suited to both Central Defender or Left Back. I think he will be better at left back as his marking is too low to play central. He has really good pace and acceleration alongside good decisions, composure and first touch, 3 things I look for in all my players.



Hariss Harun - Central Midfield

Some really good physical and mental attributes on this guy. He has the PPM gets forward wherever possible so I will probably employ him as a B2B in a midfield 2, I want to try and use my 4231 from when I was at Niigata.



Aarom Romein - Goalkeeper

A really decent looking Keeper, eccentricity of 17 worries me but it could be fun as long as doesn't play like Claudio Bravo! Overall he has some really good attributes and everything you want in a GK.



They are my 3 key players but to be honest all my team looks good and the Team Comparison page kind of backs this up.



Above average in every department, this is a good start.

Club Facilities

This is one area that could do with some improvement. As you can see our facilities generally aren't up to scratch. The only thing half decent is the "Above Average Youth Recruitment", at Niigata this was "Established". The first thing I need to do, once I have the boards trust is to start improving things, mainly the Youth and Training Facilities and then Junior Coaching.



The ground is good, we average around 20,000 fans so only fill the ground by about 2/3rds.

I absolutely love this picture of the ground and it's name:

The Tan Sri Dato Hj Hassan Yunos Stadium

Aims/Objectives

So the playing squad looks OK, I have mentioned my aim now is to gain the board's trust and start improving facilities but to do that I need to get results on the pitch.

Winning the Super League is my No. 1 target this season alongside trying to put up a half decent showing the Champions League Group Stage. The FA and League Cups won't be a priority and I may play some reserve and youth players in that.

Looking ahead I want to get the club structure improved, try to improve the quality of Intakes we get and then build a squad of young, hungry Malaysian players.

Each season I want to try and go 1 step further in the Champions League, that means:

2019 - Be Competitive

2020 - Qualify for Knockout Rd

2021 - Quarter Final

2022 - Semi Final

2023 - Win the damn thing!

So 5 seasons to do it. Is that achievable? I'm not sure but I love a challenge!

Anyway enough of my rambling, I hope you have found this little intro to the club post OK. If it goes down well I will do this for each new club I join.

I now head into my 1st Malaysian Pre-season. Wish me luck!

Good luck in Malaysia, @ThatFMRegen. I managed Selangor PKNS on FM16, I enjoyed it a lot so hopefully you will too. Johor is the ideal job in the country. Champions League has to be the goal, let's hope you can win it by 2023!

This will end up a great save if you can do it. Keep it up!

2019 Mid-Season Review - Johur DT

Welcome back to my FULL CIRCLE save where I am currently playing my first season in Malaysia with the wonderfully titled Johor Darul Ta'zim F.C (or Johur DT) as FM and myself call them!

So it's 2019, my third full season in the save and after deciding to leave Niigata Unicorn (Singapore) due to issues with their banning for continental qualification I left and signed up for Johur DT. The Malaysian champions for the past 4 seasons.

I have decided to split the season up into 2 posts. I am a little bit ahead of where I'm going to end this post but this part will be best if it gets left on a cliff-hanger don't you think? Nothing like building some suspense!

Pre-Season Transfers

I said in my previous post after analysing my squad I didn't need to sign many players. The only department we were relatively short in was in central midfield, we only had 1 DM, 1 CM and 1 AM. I will talk a little about my tactics after going through my 3 transfers.

Lim Chi Kai - Central Midfield (£68k from Perak)

Only 17 so one for the future although he will be in my first team squad. His passing, vision and determination drew me to him. He has the PPM "Tried to play his way out of trouble" which concerns me but playing as a CM(a) he shouldn't find himself in situations where he is doing this in deeper areas.



Peter Sawan - Attacking Midfielder (Free Transfer from Malvern City)

A top player and I managed to nick him on a pre-contract deal. He will probably play in Central Midfield alongside Haris Harun who is one of my best players at the club and I feel these two can take us to new heights. Sawan has some really good mental attributes as well as good first touch, passing, technique. He will play as my CM(a) and I will also get him tutoring Lim Chi Kai.

Muhd Irfan Zakaria - Central Midfield (£14k from Penang)

Another Central Midfielder, Zakaria will be back-up to Harun and Sawan, he looks more of a physical player than the others, he has great strength, marking and is pretty quick but as well as that he has decent dribbling, he really could be a key player for us late on in games when players are getting tired.



So three signings, £82k spent of my £3m transfer budget! I really can't work out why the board gave me so much. We also haven't increased the wages too much which is one of my plans, wages are too high compared to our income and I really can't afford to increase it.

So here is the squad for the start of the season. I'm really pleased with how it looks.

The Tactic

I said in the last post the team looked suited to playing a 4231 and that's what I set as my main tactic but as you will see later my first few games didn't go as well as I planned. We are the current champions and teams seem scared against us. I will touch more on this when I go through the results but teams sat back, gave us no space and liked to hit us on the break which, due to my crappy defenders caused lots of issues.

I kept the 4231 in one of my tactic slots but also created myself a 4141 formation. It was a bit more solid although I decided to put us on Attacking and Fluid. The idea was to play a bit deeper, keep the ball in deep areas, drag the opposition out a bit and then use our pace on the wings and creativity in midfield to exploit the space. It worked a treat!



It's a pretty basic 4141 shape, mainly neutral roles which helps with the Fluid shape. Our Left FB is a lot better attacking-wise than our Right FB hence the (A) role. The Midfield 3 like to hold the ball and wait for runs from the wide players.

I have the Striker as a CF(s). With lower standard players it doesn't suit many of them but I feel a CF offers much more than any other role when playing as a lone striker. They like to come deep, but also like to run the channels. I have his passing set to shorter, he also has the "Hold Up Ball" PI pre-set which is great as it gives time for my midfield runners to get into positions to score.



The Team Instructions backs up what I said earlier. We play a bit deeper to bring teams onto us a bit but we play wider to exploit the spaces when the opportunity arises. Shorter Passing, Lower Tempo and Retain Possession seems a bit OTT but it stops my lower quality players doing something stupid and also means that when my CMs and DM have the ball it gives players time to get into dangerous positions.

Play out defence just slows it down that little bit more and stops my CBs from hoofing it forward. Look for overlap and exploit the flanks are selected as this is where I feel we can exploit lower quality teams. We have a plethora of good pacey wingers and it caused lots of problems for the opposition throughout the season.

Finally, we have Close Down More which is just there to slightly increase the D-Line but also when an opposition players dallies on the ball we close them down and win it back.

A lot of Team Instructions, I don't tend to have that many but it seems to work.

Expectations for the Season

Seeing as Johur DT have won the previous 4 league titles the main expectation is to win the League, the board expect it, I expect it and so do the media.



The board aren't bothered about the two cup competitions. I always like to give 100% in everything we enter but with the added incentive of the Asian Champions League the cups may take a back seat, but only if players seem tired or there are fitness issues.

For some reason the board didn't give me their expectations for the ACL in the above screenshot but after a quick look they have just asked us to "Be Competitive", we enter this at Group Stage. I mentioned in my previous post that this season I just want to give it a go, maybe win a game and not be outclassed too often.



We are only slight favourites to win the League from Selangor but I fully expect us to win it and win it comfortably. There are only 22 games in the Leauge season so we need to get off to a quick start.

February

Just before the League Season starts the draw is made for the Asian Champions League Group Stage.



Not much to say here, we have the team that ended 5th in the South Korean Top Division, and two others who aren't in playable Leagues but the media are suggesting it's a tough group.



It was a solid enough starr to the season but if you take a little look at the results above you can see that in our opening 3 league games we only gained 5 points. After the 1-1 with Sarawak I changed to the 4141. Teams were just playing too defensive against us and the 4231 just wasn't working, we would have lots of the ball but semeed to have no penetration when required. The 4141 sounds a bit more defensive with regards to roles and formation but it worked wonders and in the next game (FA Cup 2nd Round) we played a lot better even if we did concede 2. The final game was our first champions league match where we were outclassed by a very good Hiroshima team.

March

What a month it was! 6 games, 6 wins and 5 clean sheets. We looked so good and some of the football we were producing was out of this world. We only had 2 League games winning them both, at this point we sat joint top.

We also had two Champions League games and won them both, playing very well in the process. Pohang were apparently the best team in the group and we were 1-10 to win the game. We pulled off a stunning performance, not only did we win, we dominated the match as well.

We also progressed to the Quarter Final of the FA Cup winning the first leg against PBDKT (I won't even try and tell you their long name!). I did play a few reserve players in this game, they performed very well and put us in pole position for a Semi-Final spot.

April

Another really good month. Only one League game but another decent win, the game itself was chaos, at half time it was 3-2, we then went 5-2 ahead, they got one back right at the end, it ended 5-3 but it could've been 8-6!

We progressed to the Semi-Final of the FA Cup, I once again played a few reserve players mainly to keep some of my more tired players fit for more important games, the 1st leg of the Semi was poor, away to a Non-League team we only managed a 1-1 draw but we did play a team of reserve and youth players, I will put out a pretty full strength team in the 2nd Leg, once you get this far you want to win it right?

The two Champions League wins guaranteed us a place in the Knockout Rounds with a game to spare, one hell of an achievement but one we fully deserved. The result against Hiroshima was a stunner, backs to the wall for the whole match, a man down and we nicked it with a late goal. I screamed when we scored and woke my daughter up!



Let's leave it there shall we?

It's been a superb start to the season. League wise it's been pretty quiet with only 6 games played, but with 4 wins and 2 draws we find ourselves top of the League but only just.

We are through (surprisingly) to the Knockout Stages of the ACL with a game to spare and also looking good for a spot in the FA Cup Final if we can come through the 2nd leg.

The next post will take you through the final 6 months of the season, the Youth Intake, a new signing and any other news that has cropped up.

Quality start to your tenure at Johor! Persipura aside, that was a tough ACL group but you deservedly progressed. Well done!

End of 2019 Season Review - Johur DT

Welcome back to Part Two of the 2019 Season Review

So let's not mess around any longer and get straight into it!

May

An incredibly busy but very good month overall. We started with a crushing 6-0 win over Non-League Kuala Lumpur in Leg 2 of the FA Cup Semi-Final. After drawing the 1st leg we needed a performance and that's certainly we the players did.

We then played our final Champions League game, I wasn't too fussed about this game, we played a few reserves as we were already through. We ended the Group in second place behind Hiroshima and as you will see in the results above we played Henan in the 2nd Round losing the home leg 2-1. They are a much better team than us and I was pleased with our performance. We took the lead just before half-time but Henan showed their quality in the 2nd half to win the game 2-1. We then drew the away leg 2-2 which meant we were knocked out 4-3 on aggregate. It was another pleasing performance. We lead twice but couldn't hold out.

We also played 3 games in the League where we gained 2 wins and 1 draw. This kept us top of the League on goal difference, as you can see the 2 wins we had were stunning results. Pahang and Penang would end up being 2 of our closest challengers towards the end of the season, we smashed both of them.

Finally is the FA Cup Final and as you can see we won the game comfortably to give me my first trophy at Johur DT, we fully deserved the 4-1 scoreline, hopefully it'll be the first of many trophies during my time here.

June

Now the FA Cup and Asian Champions League were out the way we had a month where we could solely concentrate on the League. It didn't start well as we lost our first game of the season. We didn't play well and deserved to lose. We followed that up with 2 solid victories and then drew the next 2. In both games we took the lead and due to my tactical ineptness we couldn't hold out.

At the end of the month we brought in a new defender. Every so often I get told about a player and normally they look rubbish but when this player dropped into my inbox I had to try and sign him.

Muhd Muslim Zainal - Central Defender (£44k from Terengganu)

Ok he isn't the best player in the world but compared to my other Central Defenders he looks decent. Good heading, marking, tackling alongside Natural Fitness and some good mental attributes and at only 17 he is one for the future.

July

League wise this was a great month. 3 games and 3 solid wins. We had goals coming from numerous people, mainly on the wings. Wan Zakaria (Left) and Zamri (Right) were a constant threat and with Bakri up front getting better and better with each game he played we were now well on course for the title. With 5 games left we sat 9 points clear at the top.

We also start our Malaysia Cup campaign. I mentioned in my season expectations that this competition offered me nothing, my plan was to give my Youth and Reserve players a chance, this would be at least until we had won the League. We had 6 group games to play during the most important stretch of the League so I really wanted to keep my first team squad injury free until it didn't matter.

In the first couple of games we looked good. The 2-0 win over Kedah was fantastic, we gave 5 players their competitive debut and some of the performances were really good. The next game we slipped up to Kelantan but we once again have numerous players their debut for the team.

The Youth Intake

At the end of July we received the Youth Intake, the first since I joined Johur DT, it wasn't as good as the ones I received at Niigata but we had a couple of players who could become fantastic players.



3 highly rated players but only the top 2 took my eye, let's take a closer look at them.

Omar Irwan - Defensive Midfielder

This is a position I am very light on in the first team squad. We only have Gary Steven as a natural DM so to receive one in my Intake was good news. He has some great mental attributes alongside decent tackling and natural fitness.



Mohd Zaini Kamsani

With the 4141 I am playing this guy doesn't fit what I want to do. The first thing I plan to do is train him as a Central Midfielder and get him tutored by Haris Harun. Overall he looks amazing. His set piece taking attributes are top notch and is something we are desperately short of in the current squad. He also possesses some great physical attributes and has good vision, decisions and leadership.



So after the trial game I signed these 2 players up and also signed the Goalkeeper.

August

The League Cup was in full swing and the Youth and Reserve players were really putting in a shift. 4 group games and 10 points gained. We managed to qualify in top spot which was totally unexpected. The players I picked really aren't the best attributes wise but most proved that in time they could develop into decent players.

We also played 1 game in the League, it was another win which with other results going our way put us 10 points clear with only 4 games left. 1 win would guarantee us the title.

September

The month didn't start well. We lost the opening leg of the League Cup Quarter Final 2-0. I once again picked a total reserve team, this time they didn't play well and we fully deserved the defeat.

Next up was the big one, could we win which would wrap up the title? Errr no we couldn't, after 14 minutes we found ourselves 2-0 down, we managed to claw it back to 2-2 but in the last minute Penang grabbed the winner. Could we do it in the next game?

YES WE COULD! We had done it with 2 games to spare. It was a fully expected League title win but at some points, especially during the opening few months it looked like it could be a struggle.

So after winning the League we only had the League Cup to worry about, I put the first teamers back in and my god did it work! The 2nd leg against Terengganu was one hell of a turnaround but it took one of those calamitous own goals to put us through.

The month ended with a fantastic victory, again it was against Terengganu.

Ocotober

Before our final League game we had the 2 legs of the League Cup Semi-Final. Both games were solid wins, we looked good, form had certainly picked up in the last few games. It seemed like the pressure was off. Players looked calmer on the ball and defensively we seemed a lot more solid. Could we claim a domestic treble in my first season in charge?

Before that came our final League game, it was another solid victory, we had ended the season in style and the final League table looked very good.

Top by 12 points. It just shows you how poorly some of our challengers ended the season.

November

1 game to go and it was the League Cup Final. We were to play Selangor, at the start of the season they were predicted to end 2nd behind us, but they had a shocker of a season and had been relegated. You would expect that they would be well up for this game to try and give their fans something to cheers about.



Nope, they never showed up! We 2 before the half hour and never looked back. A dominant performance and we had done it. The domestic treble was ours!

What a season it has been, we have a lot to live up to in the next.

End of Season Awards & Player Performance Stats

It was virtually a clean sweep of the Malaysian Awards.

Striker Ahmad Hasman Bakri ended up as the League top scorer. He wasn't even my first choice at the start of the season but as his confidence grew he was lethal in front of goal scoring 14 goals in 20 games.



In the Player of the Year awards for each position we won 3 of the 4 available. Left Back Nur Saiful Abdul Raham, Right Winger Muhd Azry Reza Zamri and that man Ahmad Hasman Bakri the winners.



Left Winger Wan Zaharul Nizam Wan Zakaria won the MVP Local Player of the Year and Central Midfielder Haris Harun won MVP Foreign Player of the Year.



We also had 7 players in the Team of the Year.

Finances

I mentioned in my team into post (#4) my plan for finances, but after reading it back it may have come across as a little contradictory. The idea was to try and balance the wage budget with the money we received from season tickets and gate receipts which would in turn stabilise the bank balance, what I also said was over time I wanted to improve the facilities which would end up being extra costs than just the idea of balancing the books.

I have to admit I am not good with the financial side. In previous versions I just spend money and let my board deal with the problems that may cause. I spent a good few hours assessing the income and expenditure and I came to the conclusion that there were too many factors involved to just consider wages and ticket sales. We spend large amounts of money each month on other things from staff wages to travel costs, which are exceedingly high due to the Asian Champions League.

So I have scrapped my plan and will look at it on a season by season basis. The board seems to pump money in when required. Each season so far in the game at a random point they have invested £1.5m.

When we started the season we had a balance of around £5.5m, and were projected to lose around £2.5m. I have good news! We have ended the season with a balance of £5.9m. This includes the investment of £1.5m so technically we have spent around £1.2m more than we have brought in.

This was mainly due to the wages both player and staff. We do have a few players leaving at the end of the season as they aren't needed, most of them are some of our highest paid players, our staff wage budget seems quite high, I have quite a few out of contract and am going to see whether I can bring in equal quality for lower wages.

Like I say I'm not going to let this worry me. The board seem quite happy to pump in money when required. We have made a small profit this season due to that and I don't see that stopping especially if we can start increasing attendances and keep the good cup runs going.

Upgrades

With that in mind I went to the board and asked to try and upgrade a few of our facilities. They duly obliged but one thing that confused me was the money that the upgrades costs hasn't come out of my budget. Does this mean the board have just written it off or does the money come out once they have been completed?

At just over £1.1m it's a hefty investment but I hope that it will not only improve the current 1st team but also help the youth players coming through.




I have also had a few personal upgrades. I completed my National A Licence and I am now on a course to gain my Continental C Licence.

Aims and Objectives for next season.

The board are obviously going to want the same as this season. That means winning the League is a must. I will use the two domestic cups to blood some of my youngsters again and see how far they can get. The first teamers will come back in at the end if the title is wrapped up by then.

As for the Champions League I'm not sure. In my team intro post I set myself a 5-year plan to win it but according to what I set out we are already 2 years ahead. The idea was each year to go one step further than the year before. That would mean this season our expectation would be the Quarter Finals. I really can't see us getting that far unless we completely revamp the squad which with our low reputation would be incredibly hard. Therefore I will keep my 5-year plan so this year the expectation is to get out of the Group Stage.

As for the players, I mentioned before a couple are leaving but I plan to bring in Youth Players if I feel they are good enough. I don't want to disrupt the squad too much. Morale is good and they are playing well so why ruin that with a load of new faces. One or two may come in if I feel they are too good to turn down but don't expect too much business to be done.

Anyway, I think I've gone on enough don't you?

Thanks for reading, it's been a great season, let's hope next season will be even better!

Domination! As expected, but still a top achievement. Congrats.

2020 - Mid-Season Review (Johur DT)

After last season's domestic treble there isn't much more we can do in Malaysia apart from keep winning everything each season and making steps in the Asian Champions League. The latter will be very hard but I'm still sticking to my 5-year plan to try and win the competition. Last season we made it into the knockout round which was a fantastic achievement, that is also the aim for this season. If for some reason in 5 years we haven't won it I will be reassessing my long-term future at the club.

But that's too far ahead, let's talk about the here and now shall we?

Pre-Season - Transfers

I mentioned in my previous post we didn't need to change much. The squad itself is very good. I spent a good few hours assessing each player and decided after a bit of deliberation to sign myself a new Full Back and a new Striker/Winger. The only reason for signing them was I needed to strengthen that position as the players I had I felt weren't good enough moving forward.

Souheil Azagane - Right Winger/Striker (£2.1k from Port Melbourne SC)



A cheap signing but he looks seriously good. I decided a new Right Winger was needed. Zamri was my 1st choice but Downey, my back-up hadn't performed well enough and was our highest paid player at the club, he also took up one of my 4 foreigner slots so gave him a free transfer and bought Azagane in to replace him.

He looks seriously good, he can also play upfront which gives Bakri a bit of competition. His technicals are miles better than any player I have, he also has good composure, anticipation and flair. He will just offer something a little different.

Ahmad Mizam Mohd Rodzi - Right/Left Full Back (£18.75k from Kedah)



Malaysian Full Backs are in short supply and Rodzi was the best of a bad lot. I am not blessed with decent Left Backs so Rodzi will challenge Azmi for that spot. His mental attributes drew me to him, he probably won't play much but should provide good back-up when required.

So that's all my signings. I did let quite a few players leave. I sent some of my youth players out on loan, the likes of Downey, Left Winger Kunanlan (who's attributes were deteriorating), and Goalkeeper Rahim were released to reduce the wage bill. The only player to leave for a fee was back-up Striker Khasim who joined Selangor for £18.5k.

Recruitment

I always like to have a plan moving forward when it comes to signing and scouting players. I always lay down a base set of attributes that I look for in a player and with Johur DT that'll be no different. These attributes are:

Decisions, Anticipation, Concentration, Teamwork and Work Rate. For Midfielders and Forwards I also like them to have good First Touch and Passing.

The reason for these attributes are: I feel they run side-by-side with my tactic which hasn't changed too much since last season. I want my players to keep the ball and not make silly mistakes. Teams always pay us a lot of respect and sit back on us but also try to hit us on the break with quick counters when possible, because of this I need my players to make the right choices, not only when going forward but also playing out of defence. I want them to keep the ball but not mess about with it and make the right choices when they get in dangerous positions. Decisions and Concentration are the basis for this.

Anticipation for me is a good attribute so players can sniff out danger as it's happening, with teams likely to play counter against us my players need good anticipation to stop attacks before they happen.

Teamwork and Work Rate are a must for me, I want my team to play as a unit, never give up and always be there to help a team-mate out when danger arises. This also helps when going forward as with high Teamwork the players will always be on hand to help.

As I move forward I will only be signing players who have at least 10 in 4 of the attributes and for Midfielders and Forwards at least 10 for Passing and First Touch. When looking for youth players I want them to have at least 10 in 3 of the base attributes.

With the 4 foreigner limit in Malaysia I am severely limited when signing non-Malaysian players, especially as my 4 foreign players are really good and I hope to keep them around for a long time. Because of this my Scouts have been set to scour Malaysia only for the time being, each Scout is set to look at a certain competition, from the Super League to the Under 19s League.

Any enough of my rambling, lets crack on with the season!

Expectations/Season Odds

As expected the board will accept nothing less than the League Title. They don't care about the FA Cup and Malaysia Cup as they class it as "not important". Once again we haven't been given any expectations for the Champions League. I would expect them to want us to be competitive.

The odds put us unsurprisingly as favourites to win the League, but strangely our odds have lengthened compared to last season where we were 2-1 to the League, this season is 11-4.

February

Before the start of the League season we were handed a very tough Champions League draw. A lot more difficult than last season and we will do amazing to get out of this group.



Jiangsu ended 4th in the Chinese Super League, Seoul came 2nd in the South Korean Top League and Grampus Eight I know are a very good team even if they are in a Nation which is unplayable. I still want to get out of the group but know it will be very difficult.



Goals galore!! We had a superb start to the League season playing some fantastic football along the way. The one slip up was against Seoul in the ACL. We played superbly taking a 3-1 lead by half-time. The wheels then came off in the second half, Seoul played very well but to concede the losing goal in the 89th minute was a killer. Looking back now though we can be very proud of our performance.

We also progressed into the third round of the FA Cup, beating KDMM 2-0 with a virtual reserve team.

I have to mention the final game of the month. I have never been involved in a game like it. We had 4 penalties!!! Haris Harun scoring all 4 of them. The opposition also had a man sent off. It was the craziest game I've ever witnessed!

PLAYER OF THE MONTH - Central Midfielder Haris Harun (4 games, 8 goals - 8.18 ave rat.)

March

We started this month with a solid 1-1 draw against Grampus in the ACL, but again it was a late goal that denied us a victory. The second ACL game was a defeat away to Jiangsu who were proving to be the team to beat in the Group. With 3 games gone and 3 to go qualification was looking bleak but not impossible.

Our only League game of the month was another victory which kept our 100% record intact. We also took a commanding lead in the FA Cup Quarter Final, could we win it for the second year in a row?

PLAYER OF THE MONTH - Right Back/Winger Mohd Azrif Nasrulhaq Badrul Hisham (5 games, 3 goals - 7.64 ave rat.)

April

Another decent month. Only one league game and it was our first dropped points of the season. It was probably one of our toughest games we would play and we did well to scrape a draw courtesy of a late Gary Steven goal.

We also progressed in the FA Cup, we have a commanding lead in the Semi-Final, another final is on the horizon.

The best part of the month was our performances in the ACL. A draw against Seoul away was brilliant, we then followed that up with a stunning performance away to Grampus, nicking the game 1-0. This put us (somehow) into 2nd place in the group. Jiangsu are to be our final opponents. They were top with 13 points. We sat 2nd on 5 pts, with Grampus (5 pts) behind us due to our record against them and Seoul bottom on 4 pts. Only a win would do.

PLAYER OF THE MONTH - Striker Muhd Syafiq Ahmad (4 games, 3 goals - 7.5 ave rat.)

May

Lets split this up a little bit.

may.png

The month started with a 5-0 win in the FA Cup against Felda United (8-1 on aggregate). It was a clinical performance and we were into another cup final. We then played the final game in the ACL. It was a shocking game, the only highlight came in the 92nd minute. The game unsurprisingly ended 0-0 and it wasn't to be enough. Seoul had won against Grampus which dropped us down to 3rd place. A disappointing way to go out and the first real failure I've had since I took over.



Next up came the FA Cup Final against Penang and we performaned fantastically to win the game 3-1. It took a while to get going but after a harsh chat at half-time the players came out and took hold of the game. Striker Ahmad grabbing another 2 goals, he has pushed ahead of Bakri as the main Striker at the moment with Bakri moving to the Left Wing.

Another trophy to add to the cabinet, my 4th in 18 months since taking over at Johur DT.



Now to the 2nd part.



With the ACL and FA Cup over we could now solely concentrate on the League, and we continued to play amazingly. 4 games, 10 points, the only slip up was at home to PBDKT, we scored early and were coasting, poor finishing cost us and PBDKT scored with the final kick of the game.

PLAYER OF THE MONTH - Haris Harun (8 games, 5 goals - 7.8 ave rat.)

Overall though it was a good month. We were at the halfway point of the season having gained 29 points out of a possible 33. Another half like that and we will win the League by a long way. For the moment though we do have a challenger.



Other than Selangor everyone else is miles behind. Hopefully Selangor can keep it up and not let us run away with it too much. I wouldn't want it to get boring!

So it's been a fantastic start. My next update will be an end of season review. Hopefully we can keep the League form up and add that to our FA Cup win. We also have the Malaysia Cup to play where I will be doing what I did last season, playing youth and reserve players and resting my first-team squad until the League title has hopefully been won.


Thanks for reading and I'll catch you all soon

2020 - Mid-Season Review (Johur DT)

Welcome back to my Full Circle series where I am currently in Malaysia managing the rather dominant Johur DT. This post will take you through the second half of the 2020 season.

In the previous post we had won the FA Cup for the second season running and were also top of the League by four points with eleven games left. The only failure was in the Champions League where we had been knocked out in the Group Stage.Read more…

Let's not hang about and get straight into it.

June

Nothing short of amazing. three games, three wins and three clean sheets. This continued our unbeaten domestic season and put us eight points clear at the top with eight games left. We had also only dropped 4 points all season. The big players were certainly showing their class. Harun again was truly amazing but the Player of the Month has to go to:

PLAYER OF THE MONTH: Souheil Azagane (Games: 3, Goals: 3, 8.1 ave rat.)

July

A much busier month. We won the opening two games, both in League, this stretched our lead at the top to 14 points with only 18 points to play for (Selangor in second had totally collapsed under the pressure).

We then played two league cup games, this competition always falls at the worst time. I played a full youth team in the first game, it was a poor performance and we did well to only lose 2-1, that was our first domestic defeat of the season. The next game was a mix of reserve and youth players and we did well get a point.

Then came the game, a win in this could clinch the title but it would depend on how Selangor in second did. We did our job but only just, it was a tough game, Pahang are third in the league, Central Midfielder scored a screamer just after half-time to win the game 1-0. Now it all depended on Selangor, how did they do?

They drew!!! We are champions!!!! Unbeaten so far with only five games left. It was an expected title win but never did I imagine we would win it so easily.

We then played our third league cup game and lost again. This time with a virtual full strength team, maybe it was a hangover from winning the league? We now had an uphill battle to qualify but we still have a chance. Now the league is wrapped up I would like to do the domestic treble for a second season in row.

PLAYER OF THE MONTH: Wan Zaharul Nizam Wan Zakaria (Games: 3, Goals 2, Assists: 1, 7.8 ave rat.)

Youth Intake[center]

[/center]

At the end of July comes the intake and after three amazing ones I was really excited when it popped up in my inbox, once again it didn't disappoint.



After looking at all the players I signed four of them up and here they are:

Muhd Fais Kasim - Central Defender

On the face of it this guy looks absolutely amazing. After tweeting about him and saying how he looked sensational I got drawn by a follower to one thing: his height! He is 5"4'!!! I have noticed that a lot of Malaysian players are relatively short but that is crazy. He was still signed but he won't play as a Centre Back, he will re-trained to play as a Right Back. He has really good heading, marking and tackling alongside good decisions, teamwork, work rate and anticipation (three things I wanted in a Johur player)

Mohd Azrul Ismail - Left Back

Another decent looking player, he has good pace and also good mental attributes. I mentioned in my previous post that good left backs were hard to find in Malaysia so a decent one in my intake was much needed. He will go straight into my first team squad.

Mohd Suffian Karim - Striker

Not massively rated by my coaching staff but with 14 finishing I feel he could do a decent job for me. He also has decent acceleration, bravery, determination and flair. He could be a good player with the right training.

Nazhul Damit - Central Midfield

Another decent player, he has 15 for passing and has the PPM "Comes deep for ball". With my tactic based around short passing, playing out of defence and lower tempo I feel he could do a really good job. I will probably get him tutored by Harun and see how he develops. The coaches rate him very highly, lets hope he lives up to it.

August

Yes I changed skin half way through an update (don't string me up!)



With the League title already won I now turn my attention to the League Cup, I did play a few of my younger prospects but the bulk of my team were first teamers. The change in team bought a change in fortunes. We gained seven points from the final three group games to qualify in second place.

We had one league game as well which was a solid 3-1 win. With four games to go we still had the opportunity to end the season unbeaten.

The final game of the month was the first leg of the League Cup Quarter Finals and it was a win...just. Overall it was a very poor performance and it took a late goal to grab a slender lead.

PLAYER OF THE MONTH: Hard to choose but Ahmad Hazwan Bakri (Games: 3, Goals 2, 7.2 ave rat.)

September

No let up in form as the season was drawing to a close. three leagues games, still unbeaten but for only the third time this season we dropped points (shocking I know!)

One problem that has started is we are conceded quite a few goals. Whereas last season and the start of this season we were hammering teams and not letting in goals now all games were tight usually ending with us winning by only one goal, sometimes two.

We progressed to the Semi-Final of the League Cup with a 3-2 win over Pahang (5-3 on aggregate).

PLAYER OF THE MONTH: Mohd Azrif Nasrulhaq Badrul Hisham (Games: 3, Goals: 3, 7.8 ave rat.)

October/November

Two months at once because there was only one game in November



The final few games and three superb wins. Once again all the games were tight. The two legs against Felda United culminated in a 4-1 aggregate win. Another final and one game from another domestic treble.

The final league game was an OK win. We didn't play that well but a win is a win especially when it guarantees you an unbeaten season!

The final game of the season was the League Cup. We were to play Kedah, could we do the treble for a second season in a row?

Of course we could!

And it was probably our best performance of the season. What a way to end 2020!



And here is the final League table, absolutely amazing! The League title was expected, not only by me, but the board, the media, literally everyone, but to win it in style and by so far is stunning. That points tally will be hard to top.

End of Season Stats/Awards

As expected we once again cleared up in the Malaysian Super League awards. I won't bore you with loads of screenshots, I'll just run you through all the awards and the players stats.

Haris Harun (Central Midfielder) - MVP Foreign Player & Golden Boot
Games Played: 34
Goals: 22
Assists: 9
POTM's: 10
Average Rating: 7.57
Harun was also the Clubs Player of the Year.

Ahmad Hazwan Bakri (Striker) - MVP Local Player of the Year
Games Played: 32(3)
Goals: 17
Assists: 9
POTM's: 1
Average Rating: 7.24

Mohd Azrif Nasurlhaq Hisham (Right Full Back/Winger) - Malaysian Defender of the Year
Games Played: 32(2)
Goals: 10
Assists: 4
POTM's: 7
Average Rating: 7.44

Wan Zaharul Nizam Wan Zakaria (Left Winger) - Malaysian Midfielder of the Year
Games Played: 29(1)
Goals: 7
Assists: 6
POTM's: 2
Average Rating: 7.18

The Goalkeeper and Striker of the Year wasn't won by our players! Shocking!

I won the manager of the Year

We also had 6 players in the Team of the Year (Bakri wasn't in even though he won Player of the Year).

The Squad & Plans for Next Season

I want to take you through my current first team squad, and what I want to do next season. Clearly we are dominating everything domestically but we need to somehow improve the team. With only 4 foreign spaces for the Malaysian League we can make too many moves. The squad is OK but when it comes the Champions League we are miles off even making it to the Quarter Finals. I want to win it in 3 years!

Goalkeepers and Defenders



Goalkeepers

In goal we have one of our foreign players Aaron Romein, he has been first choice at the club for five seasons but I felt he slipped a bit this season. I'm wondering if I should move him on and free up a foreign spot. Our back-up Goalkeeper (Rahim) was brought in for some of the final games of the season and performed OK although he didn't pull up any trees. The plan is to search for a Malaysian GK who is better than my back-up.

Right Back

Hisham has performed amazingly this season and will be first choice in the next. Jasuli has asked to leave as he feels he has achieved everything here but that's fine as Rodzi is staying and will be back-up.

Left Back

Rahman is my best Left Back but spent this season playing as Centre Back and will stay there. Azmi is my first choice and there is no plans to change that. Ismail (who isn't on the squad depth screen) came through my intake this season and will be the back-up.

Central Defence

As mentioned Rahman will be playing, alongside him will be Mohd Shas, they have formed a great partnership over the past two seasons and there is no need to change it. As back-up there will be Yusof and Zainal. Kassim came though the intake this season, he will play in cup games.

The Midfield Three



This is where we really excel and it will not change this season.

Defensive Midfield

Gary Steven (nice Malaysian name) is my first choice but has Omar Irwan breathing down his neck. Steven did get injured quite a lot this season so that is something to keep an eye on. Irwan came through last seasons intake and has always put it good performances when called upon.

Central Midfield

Harun and Sawan have now played together for two seasons and my god they are good. You can see from earlier how good Harun has been this season. Sawan didn't have as good a season as the one before but there is no need to change these. This is two of my four foreign slots.

As back-up we have a wealth of youngsters. Lim Chi Kai, Zakaria, Mohd Ali (not on the list) are the three that will provide back-up. I do have numerous players in the Youth team who may get sent out on loan or play in the cup games if needed.

The Front Three



Like the Midfield we have great strength in depth here.

Right Wing

Azagane is my number one here, he does take up a foreign spot but he had a fantastic season and I was disappointing to not see him pick up an award. Zamri will be back-up and we also have Hisham (RB).

Left Wing

Bakri did play quite a lot of last season at Left Wing but will more than likely play as Striker. Wan Zakaria will be my first choice in this role but other than that I have no-one else. The above screen says we do have other but Ahmad is a Striker and Kamsani an attacking midfielder. This is an area I may look at strengthening.

Striker

As mentioned Bakri will be my first choice. Ahmad played OK when called upon but I don't feel he is good enough to move us forward. Azmi will be leaving as he doesn't want a new contract. I also have RW Azagane to play up front but like the Left Wing I will look to bring a forward in, maybe if I sell my GK it maybe a foreign player.

So that's my plan going forward. I have a shortlist of numerous decent players, the only issue is most of them are foreign, there are hardly any Malaysian players that will improve us and if they are then they're at foreign clubs and don't want to sign. It's going to be tough but we really need to start performing better in the Champions League and to do that I have to strengthen.



This is one thing I have been trying to keep an eye on. It has gone pretty well. Over the season we have made a profit of £500k, this does include the investment that we get every year of £1.5m so technically we lost £1m, that though is an improvement on last season where we lost around £1.5m.

The improvement has mainly come from wages, I cut the staff wage bill by £100k p/year and player wages by around £200k p/year.

I have also tried to limit the bonuses we pay out. Hopefully the balance (£6.4m) won't drop much this season, I don't plan to increase wages and do have a few staff members leaving as apparently they don't think my players are good enough!

Aims for Next Season

I've already touched on it but the main aim is to progress in the Champions League. Season one we got to the second round but this season we didn't get out of the group. The five year plan I had was in season three to get to the Quarter Final. I don't see why not but it's going to be very tough. If we get a group like the first season then I'm confident, anything like this season then we may struggle. Each season that goes by makes my five year plan look mental, but I have been told I am sometimes!

I said in my previous post after the five years are up if we haven't won the Champions League I will have reassess and maybe look to move on. My reputation has increased quite a bit since I have been here (0.5 star "minimal" is now 1.5 star "nominal", I am also learning my Continental B Licence, so if I do decide to leave in three years time I am confident of getting a job big enough to win it. But for now my future is at Johur DT, I am loving it here.

Congrats on the title and subsequent treble! Let's hope you can make it further in the ACL next season.

2021 Season Review - Johur DT

Welcome back to the third season with Johur DT in Malaysia.

Last season we won a second domestic treble, ending the League season unbeaten, but we failed to get out of the Group Stage of the Asian Champions League - my main aim for this save.

In this post I'm going to take you through the transfers, youth intake and then each competition at a time, ending with the end of season awards and thoughts for next season

Transfers

Lets take a look of a list of all the In's and then I'll talk a little bit about them and why they were signed.



As you can see there are a lot more than normal. I decided to sell a few players and try and replace them with better or younger players.

Condé was signed as my new first choice Striker, I decided to sell both my back-up Strikers as I felt they weren't good enough. Condé will also be my fourth foreign player. I let my GK Romein leave which freed up a foreign spot. Hashimuddin was signed to as a replacement in goal.

Harun was signed as my new first choice Right Back replacing the outgoing Jasuli who refused to sign a new contract.

Ghazali will be my third choice striker and is one for the future. Mohd-Saad is a Central Defender who has come in to bolster a defence that seemed quite leaky at some points last season.

Kadir, Kamaruddin, Balagumaran and Mokhtar were all signed due to my youth and reserve teams being quite short, as you will see (if you click the players name) they are all U19 players, they will be given games in the cup competitions.

The FA Cup

Board Expectations - Not Important

My Expectations - Win it by playing a rotated team



As expected we breezed into the final and never really looked troubled. I played mainly reserve and youth players mixing it with the odd first teamer now and then.

In the Final we played second tier team Perlis, it was a dirty game as you can see below but we smashed them scoring two early goals adding a third near the end to win my first trophy of the season and the FA Cup for a third season in a row.

League Cup

Board Expectation - Not Important

My Expectation - Play Youth and see what happens.



In the Group Stage I gave numerous youth players a chance even including some of my players that were still on trial from my youth intake (which I'll talk about later). We won all six group games only conceding one goal.

The Knockout rounds were a breeze, the youth and reserve players were doing fantastically and they had put us into another final.

The final itself is the last game of the domestic season. I played mainly first team players but kept a nucleus of youth players in the squad. It was a really nice win. We flew out of the blocks scoring two earlier goals and then added a third before half-time. A 3-1 result was fantastic.That was (like the FA Cup) the third successive League Cup win since joining the club.

The Malaysian Super League

Board Expectations - Win it

My Expectation - Better last season

Last season we ended unbeaten winning nineteen and drawing three. Could we improve on that?

Well just take a look!



Twenty wins and one draw, what an incredible season but it was gutting to mess up one game! In that game though we were 2-0 down with thirty minutes to go, we managed to turn it around to gain a draw. But a near perfect season and as you can see below we won the League by a country mile.

Asian Champions League

Board Expectation - Be Competitive

My Expectation - Knockout Round

Now to the big one, could we get out of the Group Stage and try and mount a challenge? When the draw came out for the Groups I wasn't confident, it was a very tough group.



Here are the Group Stage Results:



It was a shocking start and made me rethink my approach to games, but what happened after that was insane. A win against Suwon followed by a draw against Shanggang put us into second place. We knew we needed four points from the next two games to get through. A win against F. Marinos put us on the brink, we then drew Suwon away in a game we should have won but it was enough to put us through. The final game was absolutely mental. We found ourselves 2-0 down after twenty minutes but four goals in fifteen second half minutes put us into the lead, we grabbed another, they did pull one back but we had won. We had beaten the Chinese Super League Champions in their own backyard!



We were handed probably one of the hardest draws for the Second Round but after the final group game I felt confident.

Once again we had to come from behind to get something out of the first leg. It was a point but I felt it wasn't going to be enough. We now had to either win or outscore Guangzhou in the away leg.



The second leg felt like a re-run of the Shanggang game. We found ourselves 2-0 down after only nineteen minutes but somehow we clawed it back before half-time to get the advantage on away goals. We grabbed a third to put us in the lead. I set everyone to defend and see the game out, for the majority it worked but Guangzhou equalised with six minutes left, somehow we managed to hold on and we had made it through to the Quarter Finals. It was an insane game and that ended what was probably the most exciting night I've had on FM for a very long time.



Next up in the Quarter Final would be Perth Glory but this wasn't going to be so easy.

We got absolutely hammered in the away leg. Andy Taggart grabbing five goals, defensively we fell apart and the dream looked over.



In the second leg we came out all guns blazing. Perth scored two early goals to extend their lead but by half-time we had clawed three goals back but still needed at least three more. We added a fourth goal just after half-time, but another Danny Ings goals put the tie out of reach. We did score a fifth but it wasn't enough and we had been knocked out.



I was so proud of the lads though, we had exceeded every expectation. We had beaten the best two teams in China along the way as well. My aim for this season in my 5-year plan was to get to the Quarter Finals but it just shows you how difficult this is going to be to actually win the thing.

The Youth Intake

So far I've had amazing Youth Intakes, this one wasn't as good but I signed up three players who I feel can add to my youth squad, and here they are:







They all need a lot of work but have a good base and will be given a few games next season in the cup comps.

End of Season Awards

Not as many awards this season, but here is who won what:

Haris Harun - MVP Foreign Player



Games - 18

Goals 10

Average Rating - 7.55

Muhd Zarif Irfan Hashmuddin - GK of the Year



Games - 21

Clean Sheets - 14

Average Rating - 7.10

Mohd Azrif Nasrulhaq Badrul Hisham - Defender of the Year



Games - 14

Assists - 4

Average Rating - 7.43

We also dominated the Team of the Year with six players.

End of Season Review & Plans

Here is the squad overall with their season stats. I plan to move a few players out and try and bring some better players in which is tough with the Foreign player rule and the fact most Malaysian players are rubbish!

We do have a few of our lesser players out of contract and they will be moved on. My aim is improve the defence a little bit and try and make us a bit more solid in the ACL. I want to promote some of the youth players in for the domestic season and give them more of a chance.



So another season down and what a season it was. A third domestic treble in my three seasons in charge was amazing but to get to the Quarter Finals of the ACL was incredible, can we go one step further next season? I'm really not sure but I'll give it my best shot.

As for my plans I have a bit of thinking to do. I have one year left on my contract and may decide not to renew it. I do want to win the ACL here but feel it's going to be a challenge too far. It's very hard to improve the squad as mentioned above.

My 5-year plan gives me another two years to win the thing. So maybe if offered I'll renew for another season but I'll reassess at the end of next year.

In my head at the moment I'm thinking I'll renew my contract on a yearly basis and see how things go. I would expect (unless I'm really lucky) it'll take me about four or five more seasons to be near winning the ACL

Domestically we're smashing it and I can't get any better than I am currently doing. The players coming through are good but I know they aren't good enough for the ACL. If we win it then it'll be down to blind luck!

Any enough rambling, thanks for reading and speak to you all soon.

If you want to keep up with my save then I do Twitter updates of the games, transfers and other news. To follow it.save the hashtag #fmrfullcircle and follow me @thatfmregen.

IT'S ALL CHANGE

My time at Johur DT is over, it's been an amazing journey for the three and a half seasons I've been at the club. I've loved every minute of it until the start of this pre-season.

This post will talk a bit about the reasons for me leaving and then the amazing job offer that came in.

The End

As pre-season started some really bad news came my way. I was informed that because of how poorly Malaysian teams has performed in the Asian Continental Comps we would now have to go through two prelim rounds to get to the group stage.

It started well as we beat Indonesian side Persipura in the East second prelim round. Next up would be a playoff to get into the group stage. We would play away in a one leg shootout against Henan, a team that just ended third in the Chinese Super League. The game itself was amazing, we conceded early but like so many times before we clawed it back and with ten minutes to go we lead 2-1. We sat back and tried to fend Henan off but they scored in the 86th minute. It went to extra-time and Henan grabbed a third early on. We couldn't come back and we were out before the group stage had even started.

An absolute kick in the teeth and one that made me wonder what I was doing sticking about. Now I would either have to spend the whole domestic season winning every match as normal, which personally would bore the living daylights out of me or bite the bullet and look for pastures new.

I decided after a few Twitter chats to go on a job hunt whilst sticking at Johur DT until a decent job came up. Funnily enough the bad news started rolling in even quicker. Harun and my new Signing Hargreaves both got long-term injuries in pre-season and my striker Conde wanted to leave which lead to a massive player revolt. Results started to get affected and after four games of the League season we had won two and drawn two playing really poorly along the way.

The Offer

Then a job interview came in then took me by surprise. Melbourne Victory wanted to speak to me. The Australian season is close to finishing and currently Victory are in seventh place out of ten teams.



Six games left and we are only two points outside of the grand finals.

After a great interview they offered me the job, I really didn't think my reputation would help me get these kind of offers so soon.



So there we have it. After a little bit of thinking I decided to go ahead and accept. I wanted to play in Australia at some point and this seemed a great opportunity that I couldn't turn down. With close to £4m in transfer budget I feel I can do good things here, there is a bit of research I have to do to get my head around the squad registration rules but I really feel this can be the stepping stone to big things.

The Club

Victory have had a pretty rubbish few years in-game. In the 2016/17 season they ended fourth but did somehow win the Hyundai Grand Final. After that the only competition they won was the FFA Cup in 2020. In that same season they ended botton of the A-League, the first time they have ever ended there.



As mentioned before in the current season they still aren't fairing well and are currently seventh in the League. We do still have a chance to qualify for the Grand Finals which would be a nice bonus.

So what are my aims in the next few years?

Get them back to the top again, qualify for the grand finals and try to win it. The top 6 teams qualify for this so it should be pretty easy to get in to. Three teams qualify for the Asian Champions League, the League winner, the Finals winner and the third team by League position.

If we spend the money right and the players get used to the tactic quickly I really do feel within a couple of seasons we could be challenging in the Champions League. Optimistic? Maybe, can it be done? 100%

The Playing Squad

Overall it looks pretty decent, we have a large squad, but we have an even larger Youth team.




The first job will be to clear out all the rubbish. Squad registrations aren't easy to understand here but the one main thing is we are only allowed four foreigners. We currently have four, but one of those is on loan here and won't be coming back.

As for who I feel looks like my best players here are three to keep your eye on:

Jordan Cameron - Right/Centre Back

The most highly rated player at the club, he has had a pretty good season so far even though the club haven't, I think he looks best as a Central Defender but we will see.



Anthony Goff - Attacking Midfielder

This guy looks really good and has some fantastic mental attributes. I think I will stick to my 41221 formation that worked with the previous clubs so Goff will more than likely play as an Inside Forward on the left-hand side.



Jakov Mandac - Goalkeeper

Only twenty-one and looks brilliant. In fourteen league games he has only conceded ten goals this season! How are the club so low in the League then, I hear you ask? They conceded ten in the other seven games and have only scored seventeen goals!



With that above statement ringing in my ears I think you and me can all tell where the problem lies....goalscoring! Our top goalscorer so far this season has claimed four goals.

Number one target for next season has to be a top quality Striker.

Looking at the overall comparison page with the rest of the League we don't look too bad, we are above average in most departments. It's a good base to build on for sure.



Well that's where I'm going to leave it for now. I usually do a post at the end of each season so will use the next post to take you through the six games in charge (and maybe the grand finals) and I'll speak a little bit more about the club, finances, staff, etc to bulk it out a bit.

For now, thanks for reading and I'll catch you all soon

Hi everyone I just wanted to apologise for the lack of updates.

I was about 3 seasons ahead of where these updates are and then I had some bad news

My game had a bug which I think was due to me starting in the Beta. Basically when I decided to add a new nation to the game (the aim is to win all the Champions Lge so when I won it in Asia I would add new nations for my next continent) it didn't load any players or staff.

What this meant is no club had a manager or any staff and there were no managers or staff on the game from that nation that could take the job. But mainly clubs had no players until a youth intake came about which then meant they maybe had 10 or so players.

So I added USA and Mexico and no teams had any staff or players which meant it was impossible ti play in as you can't just go and buy foreigners due to the player restrictions.

I spoke to SI and they say it's a random bug which affected random games when they were set up and couldn't be rectified without restarting!

An absolute gutter as I was really enjoying this save.

I have started again and about 4 seasons in now but have refrained from blogging about it as I didn't wanna let anyone down if this one screwed up as well. What I did differently for this save was load all the nations that I wanted to play in from the start so I wouldn't have the big that hit my previous game (although I think it was only on the beta that it was the issue)

So the question is would you like me to bring my updates to this page?

I won't go through all my previous season in different posts but do one big post at the start telling you how my career has gone so far.