DP91's European Glory

Transfer Trauma


After the quick success at Man City and the methods which lead to the quick European Glory I decided that a similar approach would be adapted at Monaco which would also hopefully keep things interesting right from the off with Monaco. What helped as is well known about Monaco is the Russian billionaire owner and the financial backing which actually see's the club inside the top 10 wealthiest in the world as I take charge of the club. The club is though way behind the likes of previous side Man City in the rankings.

Just a £16m budget to spend however at the start of my reign although a squad with plenty of both value and talent which would get plenty of clubs sniffing around. Once again though I only actually listed 2/3 players for transfers myself with the rest of the sales coming from genuine interest without encouragement.
Transfers Out

There were an additional 2 players not included on the page of departures of which there were so many that the wage budget actually halved at one stage from it's original status. Trinidade de Vilhena left for £5m to Toulouse and Samir Nasri along with his insane wage left for £1.4m to Reading.

Transfers In
There was one player I had my eye on after an incredible debut season in Italy for Udinese which only came to my attention on the back of checking the progress of previous employers Roma. In his debut season he scored a whopping 25 goals, Serie A's top scorer and 5 assists from 32 appearances at the age of 21! Not to my knowledge he also had a minimum release clause in his contract and therefore became my number 1 target and 1st signing.


Transfers in this time in comparison to those conducted at Man City included a majority of regens. Rick Jonk, my star backup CM last season was sold by City on the cheap to my joy along with loans for young signings last season Koga and Eze were my only signings from previous clubs although Memphis Depay signed on a free to provide cover to wide area's having previously spent time under my management at Roma on loan.

The David Luiz signed is of course not the 'Sideshow Bob' look-a-like, it's safe to say I believe he is possibly the most overrated player to ever grace Champions League football, International football and maybe even club football. Yeah I'm not a fan. This 'David Luiz' is my new CM prodigy whom will partner Jonk in CM this season for the club. An incredible looking talent and for a fee of only £13m a bargain and only a 5th of the fee paid for his atrocious name sake.

Finally most expensive signings were Filippo Romagna from Juventus a youngster currently in real life who has shown bags of potential and clearly the scouting staff at FM agree. His signing ensures strength and solidarity in defence, which I believe will be key this season and in my stint at Monaco as the rest of the squad are all very young ranging 19-22 for the most part. Even at 24 he is an experienced head from his time in Italy. The there is Frank Fontaine, a name I love for anyone who ever played Bioshock. He was a brilliant talent at Arsenal and can play as a full back on either side with preference to LB. At the age of 19 this was a pretty crazy transfer although conducted with £40m of the fee's being paid of a 48 month period, making use of that clause once more. I believe he is already in the top 5 maybe even 3 LB's in the game at this stage also and therefore hopefully a very good investment!

As ever for any player profiles and such please just ask! The first two months of the season will be posted shortly!

Trouble In Paradise


So with the attempt at employing the successful tactic of rebuilding a squad of stars at Man City somewhat we have encountered quite a troublesome first 2 months in France with Monaco. This time around the squad consists of a very young team and a vast proportion of regens in comparison to Man City however I had hoped it would workout better than it has thus far into our time in the principality!

A Good Start
New signing and star striker Ortega actually suffered from an early set-back at his new club and found himself injured for the first two months of the season to my dismay but in contradiction to the intro we actually had a good start to the season and managed to secure the French version of the Community Shield with relative ease against Marseille.


Our first two months have actually occurred a very worrying message for the first time in my career as my job was questioned within the media after a start that fell short of expectations.


August & September Fixtures

As you can see it hasn't been an awful start to the season with just 1 loss however plenty of points have been dropped and as you can see in the table below we find ourselves quite a way behind in the league table after 9 games.
Positives for sure however after a good point away to PSG in a tough fixture which did see the opposition dominate the majority of the game and also a good performance against Spanish giants Real Madrid again away which did see the opposition completely play us off the park however a brilliant defensive display meant we came away with a respectable 2-1 defeat.

01/10/2020 Table


So interested stuff at Monaco so far. A good squad which I know just needs a little time, the club / squad are also adapting to my tactics which they were not accustomed to at all for at the start of the campaign however are now seeing pretty fast results in nailing down the setup. Let's hope there's a quick turnaround otherwise it will be a case of 'Paradise Lost!

Things Are Looking Up


After our poor start we desperately needed things to turnaround and quickly as well as the media had just released comments questioning my position after only 9 games. Thankfully October was going to be the kickstart to the season that we needed.


Goals galore for the month and a brighter looking league table to go with it. Ortega had returned and was banging in the goals and when he wasn't he was assisting them as the team found new life. Still ground to gain however and conceding plenty of goals as well so still plenty of work to do before we can settle into a routine. Rotation between Horn and young keeper Hewitt have not helped in stopping the rot of goals conceded but as mentioned we can be thankful that the goals have been flying in and plenty have been contributing to the cause.

In Good Form


November was set to be a short month however an important one for the club with 2 Champions League games that needed wins. Striker Ortega had just been hit with another setback and this time for 2-3 weeks so thankfully not as long as the previous injury. This meant that Eze was asked to step up again and the young 19 year old English prodigy stepped up and bagged himself a goal in our first of the 2 Champions League ties in the month.

Another setback in the league followed as we dropped points to Nantes whom had made a good start to the league season recording a 0-0 draw. Ortega made a return in the next fixture although not even close to full fitness in an attempt to ensure we would not slip back out of form and although he found the net twice he was perhaps not needed in a goal-glut against Le Havre.

A rest for the Argentine in the Champions League fixture against Dinamo Moscow and a good performance claimed 3 points and a 3-0 win. David Luiz made a phenomenal start to the game banging in two goals within the first 10 minutes of the game really proving his worth and value to the side. Following this, more goals for new stars as the ridiculously named Randrianatonisolo or 'Han Solo' for short got his first goal along with another for Ortega



A good enough month to see us keep the pace in the league table, moving above Marseille and into second place for the first time this season. Catching the 5 points we currently are behind rivals PSG however will be no easy accomplishment but as long as the goals keep flying in we will be in contention domestically.

Delightful December


Great news arrived at the start of December as the board saw fit to reward our turn of fortunes of late and pump additionally money into the club, you'd think that I didn't make any to spend during the summer! Clearly what Monaco really needed was another £65m


Champions League
Our first game of the month was our final group game in the Champions League against Real Madrid and a chance to see where the club is at in terms of competing with the elite after a few months in charge. After a 2-1 defeat away in Madrid it was also a chance for revenge. We managed to dominate the majority of the game and it also proved to be a fixture which we were well capable of winning and had it been a fixture that was in the knockout stages we would have been heading to extra time as the game finished 2-1 to Monaco after Madrid's late equaliser.
What the result additionally meant was we leapfrogged Real Madrid into top spot in the group keeping my record of having done so at every attempt.


The draw for the last 16 saw a return of 'The Old Lady' as we would return to Italy once more and face old foes Juventus


Domestic Fixtures
The month was a perfect one as we picked up wins in every fixture including league fixtures against Saint-Ettiene Bastia & Lorient whilst also progressing to the next stage of the Coupe de la Ligue after a 3-0 victory over Toulouse. Again not many were conceded this month, one to both Madrid and Ettiene which made for good reading also concluding a great month for Monaco.


The league table however changed very slightly although a 2 point gain on leaders PSG was very welcome!

It's All Happening in January


We started 2021 with great news for star striker Ortega as he bagged one of Europe's top awards and did so with a record of almost a goal a game for 2020!

This good news for Ortega was however followed by bad news for our centre back Romagna as he was now set to sit on the sidelines for the foreseeable future with a predicted 3 months in return for his torn hamstring, a big blow for the club.


Elsewhere there were records being set by both PSG & my Monaco side with the topic of unbeaten runs the subject of the records. Sadly however our record was quite some way off of the current PSG run of results putting into context the dominance that the Paris outfit have had in Ligue 1 in recent times.



Finally for non fixture related subjects we move to transfers or transfer should I say. If you have money, flaunt it right? Well we have money, I have a pretty good record over the last couple of season of spending it at the very least if not flaunting it and also an eye on an old player. This player should of course be well known to most in their own career's and also for those following this career a player that shone quite recently for me.
Patrick Roberts Returns

A fee of just under £40m which I thought was incredible business actually. I signed him last season for £27.5m and after a fantastic year & a half at Man City in which whilst under my management he was the clubs top scorer as an inside forward, they let him leave for only an initial £12m profit. Sadly Roberts cannot be registered for the Champions League due to already playing in this years competition for Man City.

Last but not least our fixtures for January which was a month of cup games coming thick and fast and a month of fixtures which almost saw another perfect streak for us but dropped points right at the end of the month let us down. The month was almost a perfect one for Ortega also as he scored in all but 1 game!

Flying Through February


Early February saw Ortega break the clubs one season goalscoring record unbelievably with not far from 4 months worth of fixtures still remaining! Being his debut season for the club and also within France an incredible achievement and to do so this early on in the season is mad but long may the goals keep coming from the lad!


Another month of cup fixtures galore as we played 8 games in only 24 days. Thankfully no drama's as we managed success in all but one fixture which happened to come in the away tie to Juventus in the Champions League which by all means was not a bad result for us. A shame to have not bagged the desired away goal but we did well to not concede too many goals against a Juventus side who managed to hit the target plenty more times than ourselves who actually failed to do so! Having dominated especially within the first quarter of the game seeing the ball hit the woodwork twice this stat really surprised me.


Elsewhere we played PSG this month in a must win league game especially as prior to the game we managed back-to-back draws dropping 4 points further behind PSG which was actually a relief that it wasn't 5 as we lost a 2-0 lead over Lille to be 3-2 down before a late Ortega equaliser. Thankfully though the lads decided they would turn up to the PSG game to ensure that the league wasn't taken right out of our hands in a month of poor results in hindsight points wise although really it meant we maintained our unbeaten status.




The league table didn't look too bad after the months games thanks to that win over PSG as we only dropped a point over the Paris outfit. Plenty to still play for as we drew PSG in the 'Coupe de la Ligue' final and progressed to the later stages of the Coupe de France. Of course as well the 1-0 deficit to Juventus is definitely salvageable and will hopefully see us progress to the Quarter-Final stage of the Champions League which would additionally mean that I have never failed to achieve such feat with any club in the competition.

Magnific Monaco


Our first league game of the month saw us defeat Toulouse whilst PSG on the back of our victory over the club dropped points on the same weekend meaning the league was now all tied up with 9 games remaining!


Champions League - Last 16 - 2nd Leg
After the 1-0 away defeat against 'The Old Lady' we needed to ensure that we wouldn't concede away goals against our opponents in the 2nd leg of the tie in order to progress. At half time however we found ourselves 2-1 down on the night, 3-1 down on aggregate and now behind on the away goals as well. An awful first half for us and one which I was near resigned to expecting that it would be the sentence upon our Champions League campaign this year and after 6 minutes of the second half I had lost all hope after Matias Granata pounced on a save from Hewitt to put the ball away at the second opportunity for Juventus, 4-1 down on aggregate now. At half time I had said I was embarrassed and they were letting both themselves and the fans down and now with things at an all time low I thought, 'what the hell, were out now anyway' and replaced both wingers opting for an overload option to at least try to get a goal back to make the result look respectable.

What occurred in the remaining 40 minutes might even top the performance last season by my Man City side over Barcelona.

A phenomenal turn of events as Ortega rallied the team into a 4 goal come-back by first dribbling past 3 opposing players which lead to the assist for inside forward Tom Brown before grabbing his second of the night. Left-side inside forward Sinan Kurt then grabbed a goal on the break to put the night's game back in our favour and then Ortega decided that he wasn't done there as the striker went on to complete his hat-trick in the 89th minute and put the tie in our hands 5-4 on aggregate! Forget about Messi, this kid is the future.

Ortega had earned our place in the quarter final stage of the competition and our reward was for the first time for me, a tie against a former club and that club being the current holders of the competition, Man City. To be fair I had given up on us being here just a day ago with 45 minutes of season in the competition remaining so everything from here is a gift, even if that is a fixture against the side I achieved European Glory with in less than a year.


Fixtures

Perhaps the true story of this month isn't 'Magnific Monaco but Magnific Ortega! who bagged a goal in every single fixture we played through March, Roberts came close to the feat at Man City but Ortega has achieved it by scoring 9 times in only 5 games, unbelievable this guy and only 21! Watch out Messi!

Table

So at the end of March we have managed to drop the points we have been clawing back all season to match PSG which is extremely frustrating. Just 2 games ago we even managed to tie points with the Paris outfit but the recent poor performance against Rennes of all clubs meant we have yet again dropped off of the pace. The news is even worse and I'm sure some of you may have noticed, having tied points after 29 games with PSG we still sat in 2nd even though we had drawn and beaten PSG this season already. It looks like goal difference is going to decide the league at best with 7 games remaining and not results against alike to the time we managed to top Serie A over Juventus on such a basis. I guess what goes around, comes around!

Leaps & Bounds


After our early set-back's at the start of the year we've barely had time to look back as the games have come thick and fast and down to the likes of Ortega so have the wins. Having found ourselves right back in contention midway through March we started April back to 3 points behind but still in the Champions League with a fixture that would take me back to Manchester sooner than anyone would have liked having spent the previous few months sunning it up in Monaco and it's the 1st leg of that fixture where we start the month.

Champions League - Quarter Final
Starting with the home fixture first in the tie has never been something I desire but until 70 minutes had passed in the game I was happy with the tie. 2-0 to the good and looking like we might have a shot at the final 4 in the competition but then Man City turned up the heat and we melted. A 2 goal comeback and complete dominance by our opposition was how the tie ended and the final score ended up flattering us.


The tie of course isn't over at this stage but 2 away goals will be a hard task against last years champions and the dominant force they have been of late winning the Club World Championship and sitting top of the Premier League.

Quarter Final - Second Leg
The second leg alike to our fixture against Juventus left me with hope of progression but a feeling that deep down the tie was probably over. Yet again our side had other ideas, either that or this years game has really implemented something which prevents a side becoming the first to retain the coveted trophy.
The 2nd leg was a much closer tie than the first faired for Monaco although we were the away side and although Man City once more found themselves getting plenty of shots on goal they were unable to hit the back of the net all too often. We however had other ideas.

5 different scorers for Monaco in the 2nd leg; David Luiz, Sinan Kurt, the obvious Ortega, Romagna and Tom Brown all getting themselves on the scoresheet as we scored over half our chances which found the target. Nothing as dramatic as our comeback against Juventus but an unlikely dominance against the competition holders.
I had feared that I may had created a monster at Man City having dominated the competition last season with a newly built squad but with the same model adopted once more at Monaco we have destroyed the opposition and progressed to the semi-finals

Domestic Round-Up
Amongst our European triumphs we faced plenty of fixtures domestically with cup games coming thick and fast once more. Progression in the Coupe de France semi-final was followed by our long awaited Coupe de la Ligue against rivals across the board PSG. Having not faired too well since joining the club in January, Patrick Roberts came good when it mattered and scored a quick-fire double to hurt PSG in the first half and in doing so effectively won the tie with the Paris outfit only capable of pulling back the 1 goal late into the game as we came away with a big win over our rivals in the cup.
The league may have fallen out of our hands in the previous month with only our second defeat of the season but we had hurt PSG on the big stage and I was happy with the knowledge that we had done so. April was a good month for us in the league campaign however as we picked up 3/3 wins against somewhat lowly opposition but opposition that needed defeating all the same.
Ortega came close to completing what would been an insane 2 straight scoring months only failing to score in two of our 7 fixtures.


With 3 games remaining in the league this season the league still remains out of our hands although PSG decided to once more put us back in contention dropping 2 points in the month. It's still all to play for as we remain in the running in every competition even still with a Coupe de France final set against Toulouse, a point to makeup in the league over PSG, a win of course coming this month against PSG in the Coupe de la Ligue and now a semi-final appearance against an earlier foe this season all to be revealed in the next update!