Season 11: Foligno, Italy Serie A
After gleefully swimming in Euros following the sales of the Chilean and Italian strikers, I realised with some alarm that I didn't know any decent, cheap strikers to replace them with. I ended up signing 4 strikers on frees as back-ups. I splurged £7.25m on a DC/DM from Cagliari (who I capped a couple of months later), £3.1m on a DR from Fulham (for the 6 months before his £4.4m replacement arrived from Sao Paulo) and £400k on a DM Wonderkid from Santos.
Serie A: Following some poor results early on, I stripped
Napoleon of the captaincy. A loss to Roma (hardly unusual) sent us into my 500th game in charge - away at Sampdoria - which we lost 3-2, having been 2-0 up. Unimpressed doesn't even come close. Putting 20 goals past their U20s over 2 games was my personal '**** you'. A poor January saw us drop 3 league places and it should have been more, but we rallied (or at least faux-Chupacabras got fit) to lie 5th with 6 games to go. Imagine my
delight at our final 4 games being against Roma(1st), Sampdoria(13th), Juventus(4th) and Inter(2nd). We beat Roma
and Sampdoria before Juve shanked us 3-1(A) - the only match all season where I substituted my keeper in disgust. By the final day, players were dropping like flies but some PVA glue, a bit of sticky-back plastic and an old milk carton crafted a 2-0(H) against Inter as Juve slumped to Napoli, leaving me grinning like a loon.
Final Position: P:38 W:19 D:8 L:11 GD:+25 Pts:65 Pos:4th. Champions League Qualification! Italian Cup: As last year, we skipped the opening rounds and sauntered through until meeting Lazio whose reserves rolled over us - in the QF this time.
EURO Cup: Put 8 past Loko Moscow in qualifying, then a 0-1(H) to Dinamo Kiev and 0-0(A) to Furth made further progression less of a certainty. Thankfully, our final two opponents in the group were
bad; 2-0(H) and 5-1(A) gave us Sparta Prague who weren't much better - 1-0(H) and 2-0(A). I was less than thrilled, however, to draw Sporting Lisbon; 1-0(H) was a tad fortunate, but 1-0(A) was deserved as we limited them to 2 long range shots only. Aston Villa scored late in the first leg and then early in the second as we lost in the Q/Fs 3-1 on aggregate (our keeper winning the coveted 'Braindead ****wit of the Week' award for the second leg, just as Villa's was winning 'Geriatric Superstar of the Week'). We should have won.
U-20s: In the Cup, we sauntered through to the final where we crushed Torino 5-0. We won the league on matchday 29 - our 37th consecutive unbeaten match - as we brutalised the rest of the league before conceding 3 from 3 shots to Bologna on the last day to spoil the whole thing. 150 goals scored (+124) and 105 points paints a nice picture though.
My first and second team players lost a total of 129 weeks of the season through injury combined.
Two and a half years! 
On the plus side, when they played, they tended to play very well; 16 regulars getting averages of 7 or more. All hail Chupa-Chup (aka Faux-Chupacabras) who bagged 27 goals in 36 appearances and Serie A Foreign Player Of The Season (presumably because Roma's
sickening ST - who now has 181 league goals in his last 168 appearances - took Italian citizenship). Also hail £7.25m DC/DM who finished with 33 games at 7.61 and 8 MoMs and Serie A Signing Of The Season runner-up. But spare a thought for The *** (aka Hungarian ST) who seemed to crock himself every other time he walked out onto the pitch.
Italy:
Drawn in WC Qualifying in a group with Norway, Sweden, Montenegro, Iceland and Luxembourg. Played 6: won 5, drawn 1. Top of the group after halfway.
. Champions Marseille sent Bordeaux down on the final day.
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