Addickted To Winning (A Charlton story) IIIIIIIII

I'm gonna pick this shit up again. Don't currently have FM open, but here is what I remember;
- I'm now in the year 2081
- I won the CL for the first time in like 2078, and that was the target I first set myself when I started this career
- Transfers wise I've been selling my best players to rebuild the squad, hit over 100m in player sales quite a few times in the past five or six seasons
- I've started making some clause ridden transfers for the games best youngsters, shite like 5m after 10 league games, 100k per league appearance, etc, I've done this for two reasons, firstly I want the world's best talent passing through my doors, secondly, most of the youngsters I sign don't even get a game for me, they get sold without every progressing so only the best of the best will see their clauses met
- I plan on starting an FM14 career in a few weeks, so lets enjoy this while we can

So the next few posts will cover;
A) Our history
B) The current squad
C) My transfer policy
4) My current scouting setup

If it's 2081 in the game, aren't you a centurion by now?

Think my DOB was like 85/86, so nearly there.

Best thing about being this far into the game is watching a player go through his whole career at your club. I've only had the two players that have started and ended their full careers at the club as first teamers, I've had loads that have stayed for over a decade though. The club has evolved from depending solely on our own youth products to snapping up prospects from other clubs. I'm constantly signing 14-19 year olds, the transfers vary from free transfers from Panama to £20m deals for teenagers from Arsenal (riddles with clauses of course).

We're now a club with a Worldwide rep and we are on our way to hopefully overtaking Porto as Portugal's biggest clubs. Think my remaining targets with Mirandela pretty much are;
- Win another CL
- Get a new stadium
- Topple Porto
- Get £1b in the bank

Depending on how much game time I get in I could achieve none, I could achieve them all. I've kind of got into the habit of just playing for a few hours every night and it leads to steady progress. So most of my updates will probably come at night.

Fair play getting to such a late on season buddy! Incredible work! wish I could get there, think my latest save would be 2030 or so! Be nice to see some screenshots if you get a chance )

This was basically the last thing I've ever wanted to do in FM, build a club up from absolutely nothing and take them to CL glory. Its why I've struggled so much to get hooked into other games. Just gotta battle on through, I think its good to leave a save for a few days or weeks and then return to it. Always nice to return with a fresh perspective.

Definitely pal! I am going to look into doing something like this now I think, just need a respectable team to start with!

Some history;






Obviously it took a hell of a lot to get the club off the ground. We were in the third division for so long simply because I didn't want to do the easy thing and throw money (relatively speaking) at a promotion push. I tried to operate at a profit, I tried all sorts of new tactics and I liked depending solely on my youth team for long periods. Once we got into the second division the money came in a little more and I started snapping up some real prospects who were sold for ok prices, the top division brought the rep boost and I begun selling players for a few million. No real looking back from there, once you have money, everything is easy.





My transfers are ridiculous, here's a quick recap;

Season - Transfers In - Transfers out

76/77 - £53m - £120m
77/78 - £38.5 - £55m
78/79 - £5.75m - £94m
79/80 - £47.5m - £142m
80/81 - £106m - £164m
81/82 - £86m - £86m

I pretty much just spend a load on youngsters and sell my first teamers. Can't remember the last time I signed a player to go straight into my first team. Every summer I promote players who were out on loan or if they aren't good enough I go out and sign a 19-23 year old who will hopefully grow into a first teamer.



I hated Eduardo Agues and I still do, shite midfielder. Shouldn't be in that list, shouldn't be partnering Carlos Santos. Pedro Miguel is the only modern day player there, this is a shame. As most of the players there were shite, my strikers practically had 1 for finishing and my defenders had -7 for tackling.



Won something like eleven trophies in the last three seasons, just shows for how long we (I) were (am) shit.



A long career, very long. Only really started to spend money properly in recent years and that's because I made it my mission to sign every best youngster in the game. Ah what boredom can do.

Now for everyones favourite thing; scouting.

Obviously at the start scouting was a strictly Portuguese affair, I didn't really expand the network until I won promotion. Once that came about I moved into Scandinavia and Eastern Europe and found some absolute gems, I then made my way to North and Central America and found some quality players. Countries such as Honduras, Jamaica, the USA and even Panama provided me with players who went on to be worth a good few million. When I started the game I made sure the DB included players from North and Central America and the Caribbean, I wanted a new talent pool to tap in. With my scouting I tried to avoid Central Europe and South America, I knew the players would be good from those regions, but they would also be costly. Most players from Central America and the Caribbean can be secured on a free and then sold for a few million quid if you are lucky.

I got a lot of joy from approaching American youngsters on pre-contracts and snapping up talents from Jamaica, Honduras, El Salvador and Panama for next to nothing.

Fast forward, a bit and I took a scouting approach based upon competitions. I literally had scouts at every competition going, Toulon tournament, Asian cup, Pan-American games, U19 Copa Libertadores, but they just weren't throwing up the talents that I wanted. So heading into this season I revamped things, here's how my 31 scouts now line up;

Region - Number of scouts

UK - 2
Scandinavia - 2
Central Europe - 3
South Europe - 2
Eastern Europe - 5

North America - 2
Central America - 3
Caribbean - 1
South America - 4

North Africa - 2
Central Africa - 1
Western Africa - 1
Southern Africa - 1

Middle East - 1
East Asia - 1

--------

Heavily focusing my efforts in Eastern Europe, South America, Central Europe and Central America. Pretty much the footballing hotbeds in this game, I had some success in Africa when I was a second division side but tbh I've always struggled to crack scouting Africa. Kind of just scout there for the sake of it now, we've got to the stage where I'm only signing youngsters who are at least 4 star PA, so for the most part they are coming from established academies and are costing me anything above 500k.

On the loan front I basically loan players who are 18 and above, unless they are one year from getting club grown status and if that's the case I keep them in the U19s. I then keep loaning the players until I either sell them or promote them to the first team.

Most of my players don't even get a game for the first team, but I nigh on always make a profit on my players. I've recently started to splash more on youngsters and undoubtedly some of them will be huge busts. But I have full faith in a handful of them going for 40m+, so that will more than make up for the flops that will inevitably come.

Final post of the night, my starting eleven. Basic 433 setup, usual spiel.

GK;



Defenders;









Midfielders;







Attackers;







My attack is by far the strongest element of my squad, any of my wingers or strikers are more than capable of playing. Borges is my guaranteed starting ST, Miguel always gets a look in cos he's been here since he was 15 and he's my homeboy, the other players get played whenever they are my flavour of the month. Chokito is my least favourite.

F'kin hell mate. That's amazing! Persistence and awards with it, must make it feel a lot better than other saves.
And that Borges is absolutely amazing, wow.

Skacel is back \o/ Borges is beast

Got Borges on a free too, I'd been scouting him since he was 16, couldn't get a price, contract was running down and I jumped straight in. Won the CL in his first season and he got a hat trick in the final vs Madrid.

If you look at the wages I still have quite a few players on around 20k, I've been dead stubborn with wages and its only since the CL win that players have inflated their demands. Think I only had one player on over 30k when we won the CL and that was Pedro Miguel. Before that I was always a tough negotiator on wages and I would just sell someone if they wouldn't lessen their demands. Now I'm starting to offer out bigger deals because the players want a lot more because of our rep boost and because I want to hang onto players until they are 26/27 as opposed to 22/23 so I can sell them for more.

Is training and youth facilities are the best rating?

Aye they are, when I was coming up through the leagues I focused investment more on junior coaching so I could get the best youngsters as possible coming through. I also didn't want to be investing big sums of money just on facilities, I didn't think I could afford to lose a few hundred k in bulk sums.

Started to take more of an interest in the training side of things too, only just recently began to get specific youth coaches and start doing individual attribute training. I've always done position retraining to cover me in times of injury crisis and give me more rotation possibilities, but attribute training has only really entered my mind recently.

Borges looks unplayable! How do you manage to stick to one save for so long? I think my longest was about 6 or 7 seven season with Celtic in FM13.

I imagine there isn't even any del (retired players) staff left either?

I've played FM that much I've learned that I always almost regret leaving clubs, so I knew that if I ever left Mirandela I would just get bored of things. I've also always wanted to build a club up from absolutely nothing and that target kept me going.

For my next career I want a wide range of leagues so I can have a similar career to the ones I had on FM11 and FM12 where I globe trotted, but I also want to add some fifth and sixth tiers to countries like Holland so that I can build up a club from nothing if that tickles my fancy too. Best of both worlds.

All original players and staff are gone, when I load up FM I'll post up the best player I've ever seen in FM. He's never played for me but he's dismantled me on more than one occasion.

You've gone too far now. Purely an exercise in self-flagellation, what;s even more concerning is you've only just rediscovered the ego required to publish this exercise in boredom. With that said 70+ is impressive but I can't do it any more. Not like the old days when we used to sink 1500 hours into one career. It feels like work.

We both know what career threads are for. The exercise in boredom is the publishing, not the playing. Its nice to talk FM again Max, this thread is less about me showcasing results and more me just rambling about FM.

Lap it up though, it may spark something in the catacombs of your heart. Pull an Ultimate Warrior, come back in a blaze of glory and then die.

This is FM theory, not FM practice.

The need, compulsion even, to share is actually one of the driving factors behind playing the game, for me at least. I mean what we're doing is basically shitting away valuable hours on doing something with no benefit. Sharing what we do give it some flimsy worth. I don't know, I wish I had the hours and patience to go big again, but not feel like balls doing it.

Your French game is a start though, I definitely could have won the CL in the 2040s with Mirandela if I had done what I usually do in an FM game. If I'd overlooked finances, stuck to tactics I knew and signed the players I knew would work we'd have been a lot more successful a lot quicker, but the save wouldn't have been as satisfying. You've got to make it harder for yourself to get the most out of the game. Even now I'm selling my best players just to keep things interesting.

Sounds stupid but I think because you've played so much FM you need to try and make it harder for yourself. I haven't got the time to sit and play FM like I used to, now and then I can still rattle off five seasons in five days but for the most part I play a few hours a day, I sometimes go weeks without even touching her and then return to it. For me FM has moved on from a game to a mindless exercise which relaxes me.

Worst comes to worst just load your favourite leagues, add in some curve balls, start unemployed and force yourself through the first few seasons. See where it goes. That's what I plan on doing, few things kill time better than FM.

This got deep.

He's the closest thing I've ever had to an internet Dad, except for maybe Q.

Managing for 70 years and only earned £3.4m? State of your contract

Gotta remember how long we were in the third tier for, my wage was only a few hundred quid a week, if that. Current wage is £4.2k a week, my contract expires in two years time and I just asked for a new one. Board came to me with a £12k offer.

I'm not the savviest of negotiators.

Right, you've motivated me to start a long term save, not going to follow you in Portugal though, I think I might start in the basements of Scotland?

I thought you were in a English LLM save Dan?
Skacel, I'm still in awe of you longevity in this save. Do you ever start other saves and the come back to this? I reckon I'd get bored after so long in a single game.

It took me 10+minutes to skip through after the first match day with other results, not sure why as Kierans ran fine so guna stick to something on the basic database!

I only started other saves when I delved into FM14, for the most part I kept myself more than entertained with Mirandela through constantly setting myself new goals and targets. Silly things like bringing through certain youth players, changing tactics to a three man attack, a three man defence, playing a sweeper, etc, getting a new stadium. All that kind of shite.

I missed you. Welcome home.