Gendo - Comments

Eastern Bloc nations: Poland, Serbia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Romania, Czech Republic, and Belarus.

£105 p/w is awesome for a player like Podolski; keep him!

I feel like if you want to phase him out, start shifting some younger guys in and see how they do. If they aren't coming close to Podolski, then you just have to tough it out wage wise until you find someone that can to replace him.

Solid form in league far, and great FA Cup draw too.

Mutual termination should be your last possible effort to get rid of someone. As mentioned before, transfer list and offer to clubs first, then ask him to speak to clubs (if given the option), otherwise keep playing him if he's decent enough and hope someone comes calling.

I was in the same thought process when I re-signed with Everton for the minimum. All of a sudden, my job security went from about 75% up to nearly 0%. That does make a lot of sense, Franck, and I'll remember that next time I negotiate contracts.

Good on ya, mate! Promotion and a scouting range update, time to get to work.

Thanks a bunch, K3VO. I had my doubts that each season would be a constant offload and reload of players, but these guys have gelled together extremely well. And the young guys I've continued to pick up have been nothing short of impressive to live up to their hype. The Champions League did start off on the wrong foot, but I'm still confident we'll advance.

Thanks, KEZ_7! A good league start bodes well for the rest of the season.

October 2017










Continuing the great form in each competition. We were able to rectify the opening match downer by winning the next two Champions League matches in fairly strong fashion. The league play has been strong as well, but once again EFFING HULL shoots us down to hand us our first loss of the season. It's gotten bad, people. In 8 matches against them, I've only defeated them twice at best? They've become the trap team, a team I dread facing. I need to change that and fast. And finally, we took Chelsea down in the Capital One Cup 1/8 finals convincingly, save for a dumb penalty conceded.



So that loss to Hull dropped us down the table slightly. Second place this early in the season is still a good position to be in, though I am wary about Hull making an early push to the top of the table themselves.



Juve and I take the early advancement positions in the group, whereas I'm on top due to the head to head victory.



And finally, our opponent for the Capital One Cup quarter finals will be Manchester United. We've still yet to face them in the league, but if recent history is any indication, we should squeak by with a victory here.

Strolling along into November, still looking pretty in all competitions. Will that remain the same? Who knows, but let's find out! Thanks again for reading, and as always, I'll see you in the next post!

Massive victories, mate! Congrats on the double!

Great job shooting up the league, mate! Your team proves to have lethal touch.

Couple more questions: is it X number of points per match when beating your rivals, or just if you beat your rivals at all during the season, there are your set X points allowed?

Also can you, at any time during the save, apply for better coaching qualifications, or do you need to stay at the lowest settings throughout?

Yeah, I've been playing with the idea that maybe the majority pictures for the monthly updates will be better in showing what has happened, SRB. Don't get me wrong, I like writing, but it's taking up much more of my time than I'd like.

And thanks as always, Danaand DP91. The Galatasaray result was certainly not ideal, but that's only one match out of 6; I'll sure try to pick the form up later on.

That's some wild and wacky formation you got going on there. Hope the players and tactics pan out for you!

Question, how many are promoted in these lower levels?

Roller coaster season so far, hoping you stay within that playoff zone!

Great result versus Barcelona! Save for that loss against Heerenveen, you've done very well in the league this month, and overall too.

Doctored only for name.

Thanks Dan, I look to try and improve upon that this season

September 2017

This'll be the first month that I'll employ the use of picture to show in depth how each match went.











It's definitely great to see the league form continue on as it is. Hit a little stumble against Galatasaray in the Champions League, as I feel we had them surely beaten. Just a bunch of mistimed errors had show us the boot in our opening match. We did get revenge on Tottenham again in a cup competition, which is always nice to see, however next up for us:



Oho, Chelsea, how I love to see you again. Will we see another Brazil? Probably not, but tune in to find out how the results play out. As always, thanks again for reading, sorry if this was a little rushed, but I promise to make up for it. See you in the next post!

My interest is stalling in my Everton save. I'll be giving this a go shortly. What would you say are the important screenshots to establish: coach setup/overview at the start, and then anything major, cup or league-wise, after that?

You can thank the Reformation for that bit of wackiness.

Nice placement so far this season. Yeah, a lot of people are hopping on the Ødegaard bandwagon, but if he develops like he should, he can be a solid AMC for you. I can't see you losing to any of those 3 teams in the Europa League, so keep up the good work!

Congrats on the promotion, mate!

I find that an assertive overall talk of whatever the ass man says followed by calmly telling each group the "you believe they have what it takes" line results in most if not all players in the green. It could be because most of my squad have the "professional" mentality, but idk how that comes in to play. I've just found that works best for me.

My guy is back! Great to see Patrick Roberts return. League form has dropped either, great stuff!

Good luck against Chelsea, cracking league form though!

Congrats on your amazing season!

Where do you go from here?

Finish strong, mate, finish strong! And take the form with you into the playoffs, get that promotion!

Just caught up myself, congrats on the CL win with Man City!

Good luck has shown a smile on you at Monaco so far, keep it up! (a little surprised to see Nantes in the top 5 )

August 2017





Starting up the Premier League season, we took it straight to newly promoted side Leeds, hammering them 5-0 in the opener. Patrick Roberts continues his strong development, bagging a brace, while Lucas Boyé as making a statement for himself to earn more playtime this season. His brace certainly has me questioning my tactics, since I only have a one striker front right now. And Leighton Baines caps the scoring with a free kick free goal from 20 yards out.

Our next match pitted us against Man City, predicted to win the title this season, so a solid result here could set the tone for the rest of season. However, it just turned out to be a bore 0-0 draw in the end. Even though we had majority possession, the shots on target were pretty abysmal.

We did improve in the next match, I'd say, against Chelsea. And by improvement, I mean we Brazil'd them. So many people scored for us, it's absolutely fantastic to see that we have a strikeforce again, and against a full strength Chelsea squad at that! All goals for us from the top: Tielemans scored off a keeper parry while just remaining onside; Baines whips in a cross and Lukaku heads it in; Rotariu launches a shot and is deflected by Chalobah into the net (labeled an own goal); Traoré to Roberts to Lukaku for his brace as the keeper was still focused on Roberts; Tielemans attempts a shot but is deflected right to the feet of Traoré who strikes it near post for the score; after a kerfuffle around the left side of the net, the ball finds Traoré and he again puts it past the keeper near side for his brace; after some beautiful passing to get to Lukaku, the ball if forced off of him but right to Roberts, as he strikes it home for the score.

Phew, that was a lot to talk about. And while the season is still young, here is the table so far:




Cup nemeses Tottenham are our opponents in the Capital One Cup again, will the result this time be different?



And finally, our Champions League group draw was handed out right before the Chelsea match. We will take on Juventus, Galatasaray, and Copenhagen. Juve and Galatasaray we've faced before, and to some stunning success too, so I'm not too worried about advancing from this set of matches.

What a phenomenal start to our season! Already bagging a trophy and putting our offense prowess to the test. Will it continue into the Champions League as well as the Premier League? We'll find out! Thanks again for reading, and as always, I'll see you in the next post!

Thank you, SBR, Jamie3, DP91. It was an absolutely stunning run minus the Tottenham match (and how we played against QPR overall). I was as shocked as anyone, since I had the live scores widget up, and watching it next to my scoreline. Seeing Man U go down 1, then two, then 3, it was surprising that they'd given up at the end. Champions League looks to be the next challenge, but realistically I'd be shooting for Europa League first building off that success, and then making a run at the CL in like 5 years.

Off-season 2017



Transfers Out:
For the first part of the transfer window, I was a seller. I didn't see Naismith, Barry, or Robles in my future plans for the club, since Vaclav Cerny, any other midfielder, and Jack Butland would respectively take their positions. Then after seeing Galloway coming back well developed from loan, and being 9 years younger, it was Darron Gibson's turn to hit the pavement. Aiden McGeady was pining for play time a lot last season, as he sat behind Deulofeu and Mirallas for the right winger role, and with who I loaned in, he still wasn't going to see the pitch in my system, so he was sold as well. And finally, Michael Keane was a bust. Fortunately I was able to turn a £4M profit on him as he goes to Hull (which may, in turn, bite me in the end).

Transfers In;







Halilovic and Traoré come in from Barcelona on loan as I want to trial them essentially for 5 months, seeing how they play and if I want to bring them in full time in the future. Bryan Cristante was basically brought in in case Hali doesn't work and Galloway's development stalls. Dosso is more for the future, and he was immediately loaned back out to Lille as a first teamer to help him develop. And finally, the prize of the transfer window, Kurt Zouma. He cost a pretty penny to get, but at the same time, Seamus Coleman, and Steve Caulker all picked up gruesome ligament injuries that would sideline them for at least 4 months. I needed someone to fill the gap, and Zouma was that someone.

Friendlies:


Not a bad run in the friendlies, the only low-light was the draw to Vanarama Conference side Barnet. Tim Howard, of course, got the run out in his Testimonial, as this could very well be his last season. Depending on how much they regress, this could be both Howard's and Phil Jagielka's last season in my side.



Merseyside Derby in the Community Shield! As I make final preparation for this, I'll leave you to wonder what the outcome of the match is going to be. Hoping for a win, but it wouldn't be the end of the world if we lost.

It'll be tough to keep up with them, DP91. They needs to falter at least twice (or once more if we beat them).

April / May 2017


An excellent string of results to keep the pressure on Manchester United at the end of the season. Or first match in the home stretch was against Norwich, and quite honestly they never stood a chance. We jumped out to a 3-0 lead before the half hour mark, thanks to Rotariu and Lukaku, and played possession football throughout the entire second half. They did manage to hit us on a break late in the second half due to a bad back pass, but the lead was not in doubt even after that.

Up next was perennial pain in the ass Stoke City, but this time, it was us that commenced the whoopin'. A solid 3-0 final, with all the goals scored again in the first half, sealed the Potters' fate, along with Jack Butland stopping all 2 shots on target that were taken by his former team.

Then came the date with destiny, the biggest match of the season for us, in the form of Manchester United. Beat them and we had a leg up on the title race. And beat them we did, but it was extremely close to being a bore draw. The two teams combined for only 11 shots total, 4 on target, and all 4 yellow cards were given to my side as we trying to maintain the ball long enough to get some attacking chances. It wasn't until the 86th minute that Romelu Lukaku broke through the defensive line and slotted a shot just past the right side of De Gea to give us the lead and the win. And thanks to a draw in their previous match, we now were two points up over Man U as table leaders.

Coming off the heels of that victory, we continued to stack wins with a 2-0 win over West Brom. Once again, it was Rotariu and Lukaku netting the goals for us, and even with Jagielka being sent off in the 60th minute, we held firm to prevent any goal to be scored against us.

We then had a little trouble versus QPR, as they try to usurp Stoke as the new thorn in my side. The Rangers jumped out in front early int he second half, and looked like the stronger up to that point. But after subbing him on, Lucas Boyé put the team on his back, scoring the tying and winning goals late in the game to keep our streak rolling, and giving me a semi heart attack in the process.

The only slip up for us this entire stretch so far was against Tottenham (of course), as we squeaked out of there with points in this 2-2 draw. Patrick Roberts started us out right with a wonder strike from 25+ yards out. Salomon Rondon then answered back 5 minutes later with a superb strike of his own. He also put Spurs ahead on the other side of half time, and we started to panic. Would this be the loss that would drop us back down to second? We keep grinding throughout the second half and in the dying minute, Youri Tielemans was the savior, netting a parried shot to force the match to end in a tie. It ultimately preserved out spot 2 points up, as Man U drew their match alongside us.

The penultimate match was another Merseyside derby, as we traveled to Anfield to face Liverpool. The score line was a lot closer than how the match was played out, as we defeated them 3-2. Patrick Roberts was in spectacular form as he grabbed himself a first half hat trick to seemingly put the game well out of reach. But the Reds showed some fight in the second half, as Raheem Sterling grabbed both of their goals off corner kicks around the hour mark. The defense didn't have many issues after that, and coming down to the final match, we still had the 2 point lead.

Going into Wigan, we knew a win would put us through, as would a draw given Man U didn't defeat Stoke by more than 3 goals. A loss, aside from being absolutely dreadful, would almost seal or fate, as we need to hope for a Man U loss as well. The final matchday went as follows:




We had the best possible outcome! A wonderous dismantling of Wigan coupled with Stoke absolutely blowing out Man U put the final stamp on Everton winning the Premier League!




Awards:







It took three years, but the squad I have created has melded together successfully, barely any qualms among them, and they all came together for a common goal. The off-season is going to be interesting, as the success is sure to bring in poachers to try and steal my squad. I do have a couple people in mind that I want to sell, but the big pieces like Lukaku, Rotariu, and Roberts I'm going to keep with all my might. Along with some developed players from my youth squads, I may not buy anyone this off-season, but plans may change, and I'll deal with them accordingly.

Thanks again for reading, and as always, I'll see you in the next post!

Congrats on the 3. Liga championship! Solid form in the pre-season, hope it carries over to the league.

With at least 4 games in hand over your opponents, there's no reason you shouldn't walk the lead at this point. Shame that you couldn't continue your success in the Europa League, Fenerbahçe are one of the tougher Turkish sides.