Very nice!

I had been looking at going for the Brazil job, but I doubt they would've taken me on. Then out of nowhere I get an offer to take over Italy after Frank Rijkaard's sacking. I accepted the offer, although I will still be managing Middlesbrough, i'm not bailing out now!

37 year old Ronaldo still looks pretty good!

Indeed! His passing could be better though. I'm quite happy that I managed to get him to accept such a low wage as well!

Tough Champions League draw. Anderlecht should finish bottom though. It'll be hard but we can definatly progress judging by last seasons performances.

Just saw a surprising result in the Champions League.

Have now reached January and the global awards threw up some surprises. Will post the results in a bit, but for now the awards.

Unexpectedly Will Hughes won both the main awards and also made it into the team of the year alongside Renato. I was very surprised as Hazard, Neymar, Renato, Kenedy and Munir were the clear favourites for the award.

Tough Champions League group

It was Johno, but we did reach the semi last year so we wont be ideal opposition for them.


August - December

First off the transfer business. As i've already posted, Cristiano Ronaldo has joined us at Boro. The only other signing was Malcom for £6m from Fluminense. As you can see from his attributes, £6m is a real bargain!




We began the season with a date at Wembley against Chelsea for the Community Shield due to our FA Cup win last season. We beat them and added another trophy to our growing collection.

For the rest of August and the whole of September, we won all of our games. That included a surprise mauling of Barcelona in the Champions League. We had a slight dip in form after that game as we won just twice in seven outings. Not great when a top of the table clash with Chelsea was coming up. Before that though, Ronaldo showed us all that he has still got it by scoring a hatrick against Hull. The Chelsea game followed that and we won it too. Going into the away game at Barcelona, the sixth group game, a win would guarantee us top spot and qualification to the next round. We were winning 2-1 but Barcelona scored a late equaliser to make everything complicated. Both of us and PSG finished with 11 points. But PSG won the head to head with us, we won the head to head with Barcelona and Barcelona won the head to head with PSG. Im still not sure how it was decided who went through, but in the end we came second behind Barcelona.

We remained unbeaten in the league until boxing day when we lost 3-2 to Spurs. We haven't beaten them since 2018 which is a worry. In the League Cup, I have been playing a reserve side in every round so far and amazingly, we are still in it. The run includes a win over Man Utd.




As you can see, it couldn't be any closer! We will face Red Bull Leipzig in the first knockout round.




Despite that great league form and beating Chelsea, they are still ahead of us in the league. They are only two points ahead though so we are still very much competing for the title.

January - May

No transfers in January, but lots of matches! I continued to field reserve teams in the League Cup and FA Cup but we still managed to make it past Newcastle and into the League Cup final. The FA Cup didn't go so well as we lost to Leicester in a replay in the 4th round. The reason for not taking the cups too seriously was becuase we have already won them in recent years and the league and Champions League were far more important.

In the league we continued to be in top form and won every game until the Man City game in February. Just before that we beat RBL in the Champions League first leg 3-1. We went to Germany for the second leg and won by the same score to take us into the quarter finals. Inbetween those RBL games was the League Cup final. It was a nervy game against Liverpool and the full time score was 0-0. While in extra time though, we exploded into life and ended up winning 3-0. Yet another trophy!

Next up in Europe were Portuguese side Benfica. The Lisbon side actually took the first leg 3-2 but with no fixtures until the second leg, we were able to rest and prepare for their visit to the Riverside Stadium. Thankfully we managed to overcome the one goal defecit and progress to the semi finals for a second straight year. After those games, we beat QPR and Newcastle without conceding to head into the Champions League semi against Chelsea full of confidence. Once again though, we suffered a defeat in the first leg, going down 2-1. Shortly afterwards we got beat heavily by Man Utd leaving confidence low right before the return leg against Chelsea. A tight and hard fought game took place, but we were able to once again come from behind to beat Chelsea on away goals. This meant a Champions League final against Real Madrid would take place at the end of the season!

Before we played Madrid, we still had the league title to be decided. Going into the last day of the season, we were three points behind Chelsea but had a superior goal difference. To win the league we would have to go and win at White Hart Lane and hope Chelsea lose at already relegated Brentford. Sadly for us, neither of those results happened. We drew at Spurs after being 2-0 down but Chelsea won 2-0 at Brentford to claim a fourth straight title.

We couldn't dwell on that for too long. Real Madrid, who beat us three years ago in the Europa League final, were quickly approaching. They were the clear favourites, but with our form both this year and last year in Europe, we knew we would have a chance. The first half was 50-50 until Salah gave us a 1-0 lead in the final minute of the half. Naturally, for a team that has never been in this position, it was all a bit nervy in the second half. But as Real continued to struggle, our confidence that we could actually do this grew. Then with just 14 minutes left on the clock, Robert scored a second goal to put the trophy almost in our hands. I had wanted us to defend this out and win 2-0, but the players had ideas of their own and added further goals in the 80th and 81st minute to eliminate any remaining hopes of a Madrid comeback! Revenge for the late goal Rodriguez scored three years ago! Middlesbrough, Champions of Europe!








The final league standings. Obviously it was annoying to miss out on the last day of the season, but we will be back stronger next season.




My first job as Italy manager was in the Nations League against England and Belgium. We secured progression to the next round with eight points and went on to beat Russia in the semi final. We also had a couple of European qualifiers against Cyprus and Wales which we won. The Nations League final was against France, who have been in both previous finals. It was an extremely difficult final, but we managed to steal the win in the 122nd minute when Romagnoli scored his first ever goal for Italy to give us the win.




About a month after the final, I resigned as Italy manager. Initially it had been something I wanted to do, but international management just wasn't exciting me. It was good while it lasted though and at least I can go forward with a taste of what its like on the international stage.

Shortly after the Champions League final, this came up in my inbox. Goodbye to a legend!

Champions League Draw

As defending champions, we were in pot 1. The result was a much easier group than last year. We should top this group.

Wow congrats on winning the Champions League Sad to see Kike retired

Thanks, I didn't expect it to finish 4-0!

Shame about Kike, was only 33 as well, could've hung on for a couple more years maybe.

I have decided to get this save going again after nearly 3 months of inactivity. Time to win that elusive Premier League title with Boro! Will continue to update every 6 months or so.

Already seen one crazy result in the league:

Ok so apparently that Huddersfield result wasn't a fluke...



Wow, 23 goals scored in 3 away games.

August - December

Not too much money exchanged hands over the summer, although Jeronimo was a much needed natural left back. Novotny looked like he could be a future first team player, but it is already looking unlikely and will be spending this season at Watford in the Championship. Fierro was brought in on a free as a third choice striker after Kike's retirement and signing Vidal was a no-brainer once I found him. Oviedo was the only player sold for half a million pounds.




The season began with a match against Wolfsburg in the European Super Cup after our Champions League success last season. It turned out to be an easy victory as we added a new trophy to our growing collection. The league campaign got underway with a trip to Norwich. We always seem to struggle against Norwich, but I still expected more than a draw on the opening day. After that, we went on to win all but two of our next 19 games in all competitions. We did eventually lose our first game of the season to Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League group stage, but it didn't do any damage whatsoever as we had already qualified from the group as winners. After a draw against Arsenal, we turned our attention to the Club World Cup. Its not exactly a priority on my list, but as we are in it and have never won it before, I thought we should go for it and try to win. The semi final was won with ease as a largely rotated squad hammered Wanderers FC 9-0. The final threw up a bit of a scare against Estudiantes. We were on course for a 1-0 win until they levelled the match late on. They then took the lead early in extra time and it lloked like they were going to hang on for the win. But two late goals from Kuhl and Bakkali won the game for us to make us the Club World Champions!



Despite being unbeaten in the league so far, we sit in second place because of our two games in hand.



As said earlier, we lost our first game of the season to Donetsk, but we won the group with ease so it didn't really matter.

The draw for the First knockout round of the Champions League hasn't been too kind to us. We have been handed probably the toughest draw possible...

Yes! Great to see this back Tough draw against Barcelona. Superb start to the season And brilliant signings

Thanks! We are the reigning European champions though so it wont be easy for them either

January - May

I don't usually make that many signings in January, but a player I had been chasing for a while was finally available at a reasonable price. He is mainly a left back but can also play in the middle if needed.




Our great form continued into the new year. In fact we managed to remain unbeaten until a defeat at the hands of title rivals Man Utd at Old Trafford. Before that though, we did beat Chelsea in the League cup semi final to set up a Wembley clash with Huddersfield. They did manage to score twice against us in the final, but overall we were by far the better team and ended up winning 4-2. We have now won the League cup three times in four seasons!

In Europe, we had that tricky tie against Barcelona to deal with. In the first leg I decided to go for the win straight from kick off, despite the quality of our opposition and the fact it was in their stadium. We probably just edged the game in terms of performance, but we were happy to come away with a 2-2 draw. Our efforts in that game had an impact in the league though as we suffered our second league loss of the season to Newcastle. I took no chances for the second leg, even resting players for a FA Cup game against Chelsea. Thankfully it paid off as we thumped Barcelona 4-2 and seal a Champions League quarter final against Man Utd. Just before the first leg of that quarter final, we had a FA Cup replay against Chelsea. For some reason the game was scheduled to take place towards the end of an international break. That meant our players from South America hadn't yet returned and as a result, we were missing 6 first team players. To make it even worse Chelsea had all of their players available and ended up winning via a 92nd minute winner. We followed that up with a draw at West Ham before losing again at Old Trafford to give us a tough task for the second leg. But once again we responded at home and took Man Utd apart to win the quarter final 4-0 on the night and 5-2 on aggregate.

Now our season was looking like it was going to be a great one. A Champions League semi against Arsenal and possibly a Premier League title awaited us. Sadly though, our season collapsed in the last five games. We got hammered by Arsenal 9-4 on aggregate in the Champions League and ended up losing our last three league games. As a result, both trophies slipped away. Had we won just two of those last three games, we would've been champions. Yet again, we are close, but not close enough. Hopefully the board will keep me in a job as they expected us to win the league, we shall see.




Yeah, not great viewing...

A bit of good news.

Decent finish in the table, such a shame you stalled in last few games and could have won the league if you hadn't slipped up.

Another boring name stadium Would have thought something like Kiké stadium

Yeah it was a terrible end. I plan to spend big this summer so this could be my make or break season!

They should've called it 'Lord Master Kike Arena' or something Chelsea got a new stadium, but they called it Zola Park.

Just had this quite attractive offer from Chelsea. I will probably turn it down, but if this season ends without a Premier League or Champions League trophy coming to Boro, then I would probably consider an exit next summer should I get an offer.

Massive transfer and wage budgets.

Interesting offer from Chelsea, I would take it to be honest, think you have done everything with Boro.

Except win the Premier League

Finish what you've started, hollow victory if you go to Chelsea and win.

Yeah thats what I thought, so I rejected them. I did also have offers from Italy, France and Holland but I didn't fancy going back into international management.

Chelsea eventually hired Brendan Rodgers as their new manager.

August - December

Just the two singings this summer, although I did spunk 40 big ones on a winger from Juventus. The other guy has instantly rejoined Kobenhavn on a season long loan.

About half of that spent money came from player sales. Vidal and Fierro were brought in on free transfers last summer and were sold for a combined £7.9m this summer, a nice amount. Chadli was getting old and wasn't good enough so he left to free up wages for the new winger. Gomez was a youth player that was never going to be good enough for us so I sold him to whoever wanted him. Novotny turned out to be rubbish but despite not playing a single game for me last season, I managed to sell him for £1.5m more than I paid for him. Forest got mugged. Acosta was just sitting around not doing much either so he went off for a good amount.




The season began in the same way it always seems to. Plenty of goals, dominant performances and very few losses. In fact the home games against Portsmouth and Dinamo Zagreb combined saw us have over 100 shots, although scoring with just six of them isn't that great. If you look through the fixtures, i'm sure you can see why it has taken so long for this update to arrive. Thats right, the 8-1 loss to Man Utd which made no sense at all. We had more possession and only three less shots than they did, but somehow lost by seven goals. I may have suffered a rage quit afterwards...

In the Champions League, we won every single game with ease. I did actually forget to grab a screenshot of the table, but it doesn't matter because obviously we topped it due to the six wins. After the group stage was over, we seemed to stop performing and as a result, we suffered three defeats in four league games in December. That was exactly what we didn't need when our main rivals, Man Utd, are performing as they are. (More on that later...)





The draw for the first knockout round of the Champions League has been made and we got a tough one. The only possible draw that would've been harder for us was Real Madrid.




Now for the table. Man Utd are proving to be pretty much unstoppable and look to have one hand on the title already. They are heading into 2025 unbeaten and nine points clear of the chasing pack. Their two main stikers, Munir and Schurrle, have between them already scored 10 more goals than the entire Man City squad have.



Look at this shit, its the amount of goals they've scored against each team. They've only played 18 games and have played each of these teams just once...

#RonaldoStillBangs