Life in Football Manager

Hello everybody and welcome to the first post of Life in Football Manager. The aim of the blog is to offer a platform to write about my adventures in one of the nations favourite and most addictive management simulators. I haven’t really got any other aim to the website so it could become very random, I could review a player one day that has been playing well, or the next tell you how I lost in the final of the champions league in the 91st minute. I have hosted more conventional sites on the scene before as well personal blogs in a previous life. I have subjected myself to rollercoaster ride of FM for 10 years now, that’s almost half my lifetime scary when I think back at it.

Although I have been playing Football Manager and it’s previous incarnation Championship Manager for a long time the new version 2008 is proving a hard nut to crack. I have played a few games already and the only trophy that I have seen in my cabinet is the Champions League. I think the problem is that I have heavily relied in the power of my squads to compensate for my lack of tactical skills, something which I don’t seem to be able to do in the 08. So please join me in more failure, in the hope that maybe you will learn from my mistakes.

You join me well into a game I didn’t want to abandon it as I have been building a team so I thought why not keep it going and talking about it a few seasons in. I am the mighty reds Liverpool, the team I head most on Football Manager not only because it is the team of my choice but also because its a major top 4 team with great potential but plenty of room for improvement. I am in my third season with the Americans less than happy with the lack of a league title within two years, but they decided to be patient chairmen (in contrast to the real situation). I have been getting progressively better finishing 3rd in the first season and not far behind 2009 winners Man Yoo in the second season so if I can extrapolate the trend I should finish top this season, but any silverware of any sort would do me.

I have tried to balance first team players with the youngsters, building the youth squad is what I enjoy most in FM. I got rid of many of the reserve players to make room for my own squad, most notable was El Zhar, when signed Brouwer was promised to be the next big thing but I can’t see him getting anywhere in my team. Many went for under their values but I made sure to pop in at least 20% of their next move and in some cases I would take half, fingers crossed for a big move for one of them later on in the game. The highest profile player to depart during the first season was Steve Finnan who left to finish his careers at St James and I couldn’t refuse £6.5 million for an ageing right back when I had many other options the money would be useful in putting together the squad.

Liverpool Don’t have much to play with when you compare with teams of the same level, but bearing in mind Rafa had already spent a large chunk on Torres I wasn’t complaining too much, but for some reason the Yanks have not been able to keep hold of the costs and Liverpool are declining in financial strength. In total I splashed out £18.75 million. In came Iago, Dalla Valle, Aquino, Saviet, Tuia, Barkroth, Wijnaldum, Thiago, De Gea, Schwechlen and Torje. I do really want English talent in the squad but I either found it difficult to tempt them to the club as in the case of Jose Baxter or they just don’t exist but Bostock and Preston Edwards keep an English influence on the team.

In terms of the first team defenders were the priority Meira has been a good backup behind Carragher and Agger, plus Liverpool being in a fortunate position to be able to steal Deportivo of the great talent Antonio Barragan in a buy back clause worth £475k not bad for a first team player and will make sure Finnan isn’t missed. After much disappointment from Crouch and Vorinon an extra goalscorer was needed. I looked in my heart for this one and went for Zarate a great servant for me in my Football Manager games now I knew he would be the guy to fill their boots.

The second season again saw a mass exodus of reserve players as well as Crouch to Spurs for a cut price of £4.5m and Harry Kewell, who did play surprisingly well through the first season but I wanted to free up the position for Leto and Babel as well as Mota who joined the youth at the squad, so I refused to negotiate a contract with him, specially when he was asking for £60k per week. Xabi Alonso was the big move out which gave me cash to burn and to really stamp my mark on the team, I needed a big name it was the only thing missing from my squad building so in came Sergio Aguero. I was looking for Pandev to join the ranks but Lazio priced me out of the market and Aguero was the cheaper option. Also in was Assulin to join up with a few of his Barca friends and Camacho came on the same plane as Sergio also Lulinha finished off the buying for the season.

Bang up to date now all my money went on one player, an English player and one for now and beyond, the Futebol de Salão graduate Micah Richards. Now I think my first team is more or less complete and should on paper be able to win me something, its not all about the power of money though and I was pleased to wheel and deal a few free transfers for the future, another Barcelona young gun Dos Santos as well as Coelho and Russotto.

Well now that brings us up to date hopefully I can get to the intresting bits of the next post instead of just listing how the team looks now. Hopefully it will make for good playing and in turn good reading.