Big Changes At Anoeta For Season 4!

I have to say the pre-season i have had for season 4 has been one of the most enjoyable i have ever had. I decided i had to build on last years successful 6th place finish so there has been many changes to the playing staff.

The main players to leave were Giorgos Samaras to Sunderland for 6 million, Xabi Prieto to Bayern Munich for 6.5 million and Riquelme has joined Besiktas on loan for the season. This means he had effectively left as his contract is up at the end of the season.

I signed Bogdan Stancu from Besiktas, Andrey Arshavin from Zenit, Calvin Jong-A-Ping from Wolfsburg, Jose San Roman from Lille for free, and Xisco from Deportivo for free. Last Christmas i signed Romanian winger Doran Vladescu for 300k for the future but is now a first team regular which i'm delighted at. I have also signed Frank de-Boer as Assistant Manager after the contract expired on the old one.

My pre-season friendlies went well with no defeats for the first time. As usual with my first update of the season i have played my first 2 matches of the season. A fantastic 4-0 victory over Mallorca was followed by a 5-3 defeat to Real Madrid. To enter the group stages of the UEFA Cup i must first defeat FC Zurich in the 1st round so hopefully i can avoid an upset.

I have managed to upset my star defender Håvard Nordtveit in just about every way possible. He is angry that i have rejected enquiries from Man Utd, Real Madrid and Barcelona. Then because i sold my captain Xabi Prieto i was asked to pick a captain before a friendly and because his influence is 20 i picked him. Almost the whole team was unhappy about it so changed it to my goalkeeper so he asked for a transfer - which i refused!

I will update again halfway through the season where i will hopefully be riding high in the league and maybe even still in Europe. Adios for now.

The Poll Had To Go!

After getting 167 votes for my poll i pulled the plug on it because i was getting a bit bored of it.

There was no real surprises in the results with most people saying they would rather go the top 4 teams. Barcelona nicked it with 33% of the vote just ahead of Real Madrid.

As yet i have still not heard of anyone being able to win anything in 5 seasons (other than the 2nd division) but thanks to everyone who has been updating me of their progress so far. Apologies also for anyone who e-mailed me and never got a response. I had my e-mail account deleted when i cancelled the contract with my hosting company but a new one will be set up soon.

Season 3 Over And Finished 6th

With season 3 now over i am surprised and delighted at how it went for me. I managed to finish 6th in the league and have secured European Football for next season. I managed to go on a decent run on the 2nd half of the season despite losing key players to injury and had a very strong finish to the season.

My best players this season were Samaras who came runner up in signing of the season and Niculae. Samaras unfortunately got injured for 3 months but Niculae hardly missed a game. Something else i was really happy with was the defensive partnership of Dorian Dervite and Håvard Nordtveit. I played Nordtveit for the first half of the season as a defensive midfielder but he wasn't that good but when i moved him to defence he was great. Those 2 will be my central defenders for next season.

I was disappointed when Kenan Kodro broke his leg and very concerned when he returned to training the physio suggested he may never realise his full potential because of the injury. Next season i will continue to give him chances in the team.

In the summer i am going to try and offload 2 of my higher paid players. Xabi Prieto and Riquelme. Prieto had a very poor season and with Bayern after him i think i will sell him. Riquelme had a good season with 17 assists to his name but at 32 i will try and get a younger AMC.

In my next update i will hopefully have strengthened my squad so i can make an impact in the UEFA Cup and have another fantastic season. Adios.

Take That Barcelona!

Every so often while playing Footbal Manager 2008 a moment will happen to most of us which i like to call the "punch the air moment"! By this i mean you will be sitting perfectly normal in your seat then without any warning you will jump up and throw your fist in the air like a lunatic. For the first time in a long time this happened to me and i felt it deserved to be documented because if i don't win anything with Real Sociedad this will be my crowning glory!

As i previously mentioned in my last update i drew Barcelona in the 5th round of the Spanish Cup. The first leg ended in a 3-3 thriller at home and my aim for the return leg was simply to keep the score down and avoid embarrasment.

The fans were fearing the worst and i dealt with this by trying to take the heat off my team by telling the press i was just looking for a good performance and played down our chances of beating them. I also singled out Iniesta as a dangerman which very interestingly led to them leaving him out of the team. Perhaps the pressure got to him ha ha.

The tactic i went for was one of caution with the hope of us being able to catch them on the counter-attack. Things started badly with Henry scoring after 6 minutes to put them 4-3 up on aggregate. Then for the next 84 minutes i sat in utter disbelief as my team played them off the park. The hero of the hour was Giorgos Samaras. He put Barca to the sword with a brilliant double and prompted my fist to hit the air! To rub it in they had a goal dissalowed for offside and when asked to comment i stuck the knife in even more by saying they were bitter! Genius!

If anyone else has any "punch the air moments" like this please feel free to leave a comment.

*UPDATE* To follow on from me boasting about beating Barcelona i thought i'd also share my pain. In the next round i played Sevilla. In the 1st leg i was beaten at home 4-1 and Samaras got injured and is out for 3 months then in the 2nd leg i was beaten 5-4 and Kodro broke his leg and is out for 5 months. I should have made the title of the post - How To Beat Barcelona Then Get Absolutely Thrashed From Sevilla!

Promotion Missed On Final Day!

With all the attention on Euro 2008 at the moment i have been keeping one eye on the Spanish 2nd division which finished yesterday. Going into the last game my beloved Real Sociedad, sitting fourth, needed to beat Cordoba and hope either Sporting Gijón or Malaga slipped up. Unfortunately we could only manage a poor 1-1 draw with Cordoba but both teams above them won anyway so wouldn't have mattered. Gutted! I fully expected them to bounce straight back after their relegation last year and was looking forward to seeing them on the television again next season. Maybe i should e-mail the screenshots of my promotion season on fm2008 to the chairman of Real and he might give me the job!

I'm starting to get into this...

Hi folks i'm now halfway through season 3 and i'm delighted with the progress my team is making. I'm 8th in the league and still in the Spanish Cup after drawing 7-7 on aggregate with Almeria but going through on away goals. I have Barcelona in the fifth round so thats probably as far as i'll get. The league form started very poorly but we have went on a fantastic run which has seen us go 7 games unbeaten. The reult of the season so far was the 3-2 away victory over Sevilla. It was a very unexpected victory and was all the sweeter since it was the first of the season and got us off the foot of the table.

The stars of the show so far have been Giorgos Samaras and Marius Niculae who have been brilliant for me so far. If i want to maintain my challenge for a European place next season key to it will be keeping them fit. Keeping them on their toes though has been 17 year old Kenan Kodro. I said in my last post i was looking to give him a chance this year and i have. He has the potential to be brilliant in the game. A massive surprise and also key to my good fortunes has been the form of central defender Dorian Dervite. He was signed on a free for Spurs as one for the future but has been thrown in at the deep end. Due to the strikers great form poor old Morten Skoubo has been dumped in the B team where he will probably stay until he is sold.

I will update again at the end of the season when hopefully i will be looking forward to playing in Europe next season . Adios.

Season 3 Is Under Way

Hi folks season 3 is now under way and my expectations are that i will push for a European place but i think the reality may be i struggle in mid table again. In my last post i complained about being unable to sell anyone and this hit my pre-season preperations quite hard. At the time of writing i have played the first 3 league matches of the season and as you can see from the results so far my only win has came against our under 19s in a friendly. My first 2 league matches were away from home and both ended in 3-2 defeats to Espanyol and very painfully to Real Zaragoza where they won in the last minute!

The only player i got that wasn't a freebie was Bernard Mendy who i signed for 2.8 million as i was desperate for a right back. The best players i got for free were Greek forward Samaras, defensive midfielder Eduardo Costa and Gonzalo Garcia. For the rest of the tranfers you can view them by clicking here.

I have decided i am going to change my tactics for season 3. My home tactics will be much more attacking and key to it will be Riquelme who will hopefully pull the strings in the middle and create chances. My away tactics will be more defensive and will look to catch the opposition on the counter attack. I will also be looking to give my young striker Kenan Kodro some first team action this season as for the last 2 seasons he has been scoring an unbelievable amount of goals for the under 19's.

I will update again mid-season where i will be able to see if my poor pre-season of tranfer action has cost me.

Time For A Rant! I Can't Sell A Player!

I have just about to play my first league game of season 3 and have about a week left of the transfer window but am at my wits end! How do you sell players??? I have tried offloading several under performers and got nowhere! I have tried changing the tranfer status to "not needed by club" and placing them on the list. I even offered a player who is valued at 3 million to teams for free and still no-one was interested. If anyone has any suggestions or had the same problems please leave a comment. I'm wondering if its because we had such an average season but its unusual for me not to even have anyone wanted.

My next post will update on how pre-season went and unless i sell someone to get extra money there probably won't be any big signings unfortunately so another season of struggling is on the cards.