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Lisburn Rangers. N.Ireland Division 1. 2009/10. Season 3.
So after tearing up Division 2 last season, I thought we would be brought down to Earth with a bump. Larne (), gave us an early lesson, beating us in the big Cup, but we gained revenge on them by beating them in a little Cup Final, and then beating them in the league at home and drawing at their place. Unfortunately, they only dropped another 7 points all season and we couldn't compete with that.
The League Table shows that we collected over 2 points per game over the season, but were still a massive 8 points behind Larne, (who took their foot off the pedal and didn't win any of their last 3 games of the season). I think I'm right in saying that usually 2 points per game will win you a league.
The League Graph shows that we were always in posession of the Playoff spot.
We played Limavady Utd in the 2 legged playoffs. They had finished 2nd bottom in the Premiership, (15th), and the winner over 2 legs would stay in/be promoted to the Premiership.
All Ireland Cup.
Not entered. (A dual nation cup that starts with 2 groups of 4 with the top 2 progressing from each group. Each group consisting of 2 teams each from the top of the Eire and N.Ireland leagues).
TM.Anto/Roy. Neither of these 2 were fit enough to play 3 games in 9 days, so they rotated all season. Anto wanted to play more, but eventually came round. Roy has demanded to leave and will not extend his contract.
SC. Ally. He only scored 1 goal in his last 14 games of the season. Imagine how many he would have scored if he could have kept his form going.
GK Trialist who played in goal in the Intermediate Cup Final victory and the playoffs.
Next season I will be rubbing shoulders with the big boys of N.Ireland football. I'm don't think that I will even be entered in some of the competitions that I have done so well at over the last few seasons. Maybe just as well as I will need to concentrate on my league form I think. Money is still worrying me. We are about £200,000 in the red at the start of the off-season. With a capacity of only 1000, it's going to be pretty hard to generate income that way and the prize money is pretty poor as you would expect all through N.Ireland. It's like a viscious circle really. I need to get into Europe and scrape through some early rounds in order to generate some income to improve the facilities which will in turn improve the payers abilities. I'm still a little distraught that there appears to be little or no money coming in from the English structure via transfer fees. I'll see if I can do something about that. Maybe an English parent club is the way forward in that respect, but not sure how realistic that is. I can but try.
Good luck all :thup:.
03-26-2007, 03:00 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #512
This thread, would seem to indicate that far from this challenge being a challenge with a team from N.Ireland, it is actually impossible.
Kaiserwatman will be pleased to read the comments about the timing of the Irish league structure start in this respect. I'm not giving in though. I might consider a certain amount of holidaying through Cup games, but I am still going to give it a go.
03-26-2007, 03:53 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #513
Originally posted by Jimbokav1971: Lisburn Rangers. N.Ireland Division 1. 2009/10. Season 3.
So after tearing up Division 2 last season, I thought we would be brought down to Earth with a bump. Larne (), gave us an early lesson, beating us in the big Cup, but we gained revenge on them by beating them in a little Cup Final, and then beating them in the league at home and drawing at their place. Unfortunately, they only dropped another 7 points all season and we couldn't compete with that.
The League Table shows that we collected over 2 points per game over the season, but were still a massive 8 points behind Larne, (who took their foot off the pedal and didn't win any of their last 3 games of the season). I think I'm right in saying that usually 2 points per game will win you a league.
The League Graph shows that we were always in posession of the Playoff spot.
We played Limavady Utd in the 2 legged playoffs. They had finished 2nd bottom in the Premiership, (15th), and the winner over 2 legs would stay in/be promoted to the Premiership.
All Ireland Cup.
Not entered. (A dual nation cup that starts with 2 groups of 4 with the top 2 progressing from each group. Each group consisting of 2 teams each from the top of the Eire and N.Ireland leagues).
TM.Anto/Roy. Neither of these 2 were fit enough to play 3 games in 9 days, so they rotated all season. Anto wanted to play more, but eventually came round. Roy has demanded to leave and will not extend his contract.
SC. Ally. He only scored 1 goal in his last 14 games of the season. Imagine how many he would have scored if he could have kept his form going.
GK Trialist who played in goal in the Intermediate Cup Final victory and the playoffs.
Next season I will be rubbing shoulders with the big boys of N.Ireland football. I'm don't think that I will even be entered in some of the competitions that I have done so well at over the last few seasons. Maybe just as well as I will need to concentrate on my league form I think. Money is still worrying me. We are about £200,000 in the red at the start of the off-season. With a capacity of only 1000, it's going to be pretty hard to generate income that way and the prize money is pretty poor as you would expect all through N.Ireland. It's like a viscious circle really. I need to get into Europe and scrape through some early rounds in order to generate some income to improve the facilities which will in turn improve the payers abilities. I'm still a little distraught that there appears to be little or no money coming in from the English structure via transfer fees. I'll see if I can do something about that. Maybe an English parent club is the way forward in that respect, but not sure how realistic that is. I can but try.
Good luck all :thup:. </BLOCKQUOTE>
Well done on promotion. :thup:
Your trophy cabinet is quite impressive for just 3 seasons in charge, they really make you play alot of cup games over their don't they. They are just the type of target men i'd pictured you would have aswell.
Well now your rubbing shoulders with the big boys and with 200k worth of debt that ain't going be an easy first season in the top flight. Good luck next season. :thup:
03-26-2007, 04:45 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #514
Originally posted by Jimbokav1971: This thread, would seem to indicate that far from this challenge being a challenge with a team from N.Ireland, it is actually impossible.
Kaiserwatman will be pleased to read the comments about the timing of the Irish league structure start in this respect. I'm not giving in though. I might consider a certain amount of holidaying through Cup games, but I am still going to give it a go.
That was actually a very interesting read Jimbo. Their do seem to be issues whilst managing in the N.Irish leagues and i'm just left wondering how or indeed if it would be possible to complete the challenge with a club from this country.
03-26-2007, 04:48 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #515
I think that the only thing that will stop anyone from completing this challenge is the finances.
It's much easier in England and some of the major European counties because of the large amount of TV money and even a small club would have a couple of players they can sell to get more much needed dosh in.
But in my game the Belgian transfer market is a little stagnant with most players getting transferred for trifling amounts of money and, it looks like, no player being sold outside of the country for a decently large amount.
I suspect that most of the other countries will be the same.
03-26-2007, 04:51 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #516
Originally posted by spankie:
I think that the only thing that will stop anyone from completing this challenge is the finances.
It's much easier in England and some of the major European counties because of the large amount of TV money and even a small club would have a couple of players they can sell to get more much needed dosh in.
But in my game the Belgian transfer market is a little stagnant with most players getting transferred for trifling amounts of money and, it looks like, no player being sold outside of the country for a decently large amount.
I suspect that most of the other countries will be the same.
I completely agree from my Belgium game, although some of the biggest clubs (e.g. Anderlecht [sp]) are starting to buy some players for about £5mil. In the lower leagues, I have found that this can help, as clubs are willing to accept low amounts of money, and a lot of frees to reduce their wage bills, due to this lack of income.
03-26-2007, 05:12 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #517
Originally posted by spankie:
I think that the only thing that will stop anyone from completing this challenge is the finances.
It's much easier in England and some of the major European counties because of the large amount of TV money and even a small club would have a couple of players they can sell to get more much needed dosh in.
But in my game the Belgian transfer market is a little stagnant with most players getting transferred for trifling amounts of money and, it looks like, no player being sold outside of the country for a decently large amount.
I suspect that most of the other countries will be the same.
I think in this respect FM07 is simulating real life very well. :thup:
I think the key then to this challenge as with most small club to big club challenges will be to establish you club in that nations top tier and then and maybe more importantly stabilize and increase your finances when their. The money isn't going to come a bouts easily in some of these smaller nations and I think that if you can increase the reputation of your club to at least be closer to that nations big clubs then and maybe only then the money will flow in. This should be possible to achieve domestically I believe over time (maybe as many as 10 seasons or more) rather than having to wait in hope of achieving a relativity early European finish within the league, although obviously this is an option too.
SI have always said that they've tried not to make anything impossible in the game. So Jimbo even though you may have it a little tougher than most (well alot tougher than most) it could still happen.
03-26-2007, 05:36 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #518
Mighty NK Metalac - Croatian Second Division - Mid-Season Report - 08/09
Last season, we started slowly and then rose up until the 4th place. Determined not to keep up our good form, I made a couple of good signings during the off season that quickly found their way into our starting XI. (To be fair, I was mostly plugging the gaping holes I had in my team with the signings, but still...)
So we did a tour of Albania again, just for fun. I wanted to measure how much my team had progressed over last season. Result: 4 dominant wins, even when I was playing to get my youngsters in form. :cool: My friendlies ended with 7 wins and 1 draw, including a 4-2 hammering of Division 1 Zadar.
We started the season with a 10 game winning streak, beating recently relegated Zagreb in our season opener. Our run ended with a 1-3 loss at Slaven Belupo, ranked 6th in Division 1. To be fair, they completely dominated us, leaving us with 2 shots on goal. I still have a lot to do to compete with the big guys...
That defeat affected our confidence, as we went on a bad run, tying the next 2 games, winning 1 and then losing 0-2 at Vukovar'91, a much lower opposition. That result was embarrassing for our guys and I made no mistake in telling them (I absolutely love the fact that you can leave your team locked in the dressing room after the game...! )
My guys showed character and drew 0-0 against Cibalia (promotion contenders) and then crushed the 2nd place team Hr. Dragovoljac 3-0. Moral is then back up for our winter break (100 days). I've sent my youngsters in the U19 squad so they can keep in form.
GK - Varvodic
DL - Ugresic
DC - Starcevic : Replacing Novosel who got injured for 2 months after keeping an impressive 7.81 rating)
DC - Cerkez
DR - Topic : Got him on loan from Osijek. I had to go get him, it wasn't a spontaneous offer from my parent club...
DM - Sambolec : As dominant as ever. In the team of the week pretty much each week
Rotating between these 3 youngsters. Stipisic got injured for 1 month, but he is one impressive kid.
MC - Ivic
MC - Barisic
MC - Stipisic
AMR - Brkic
AML - Dukic : Fan favorite, but seems a bit injury prone. Got a nice youngster on a free to cover for him once in a while.
ST - Aleksic : Majer, my striker of choice from last year has not yet scored in 14 appearances. He is starting to lose his cool. On the other side, Aleksic keeps on banging the goals at each possible occasion. He used to be my backup last season but now the roles are inverted.
Hopes for the next half of the season
I'm a couple of points ahead, so I'm hoping to keep those and get straight promotion by winning the league. Assuming few injuries, I'm pretty sure it's possible... As for finances, no worry here. Making roughly 200K$ each month. and the board just agreed to upgrade the training and youth facilities...!
03-26-2007, 05:45 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #519
Champions Cup
Rijeka: 2nd Qual. Rnd: Lost on penalties against Wisla (Poland) after tying 3-3 on agg.
EURO Cup
Hajduk: 1st Qual. Rnd: Won 3-0 on agg. against Nistru Otaci (Moldavia)
2nd Qual. Rnd: Won 4-1 on agg. against Sparta (Netherlands)
1st Rnd: Lost 3-1 on agg. against Olympiakos (Greece)
Dinamo: 1st Qual. Rnd: Won 2-1 on agg. against HB (Faroe Islands)
2nd Qual. Rnd: Lost 2-1 on agg. against Vozdovac (Serbia)
Euro Vase
Kamen Ingrad: 2nd Rnd: Got crushed 8-2 on agg. against Chronomorets (Ukraine). Two 4-1 losses... that hurts.
03-26-2007, 05:47 PM
Gundo's FM2007 Small club from a small nation European adventure challenge. Post #520
Konquest You are doing really well on the pitch and your finances seem to be in a healthy state too. Good work.:thup: Unless something goes drastically wrong in the second half of your season things look good for the future.:thup:
You've inspired me to arrange a tour myself next pre season, possibly of neighbouring Denmark or Sweden.
), gave us an early lesson, beating us in the big Cup, but we gained revenge on them by beating them in a little Cup Final, and then beating them in the league at home and drawing at their place. Unfortunately, they only dropped another 7 points all season and we couldn't compete with that.
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