Glory Hunter - We Dive Into Stardom (We Hope)

[RicohOwen1996]

Ladies and gentlemen, hello and welcome to my first ever shared story on a Football Manager game. My name is Owen and I will attempt to guide you through the wondrous world of Europe, and try to win all of the main domestic and European trophies in this game. In case you're not sure of what is going on and you want to find out, this is what is going to happen.

We have 20 seasons to win the following trophies in the game. There is a slight difference from the original Doctor Benjy run on YouTube as I'm going to play for a couple of more trophies.
England - Premier League, Carabao Cup, FA Cup
Spain - La Liga, Copa Del Rey
France - Ligue 1, Coupe de France
Italy - Serie A, Coppa Italia
Germany - Bundesliga, DFB-Pokal
Europe - UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League, UEFA Europa Conference League
International - FIFA World Cup, UEFA European Championship.

I have decided to add the Carabao Cup in England and obviously there is now a third European competition, so we will be aiming to win that as well. But where do we begin? How do we get to the top? Will I finally end 57 years of hurt, or will I take a shock team to a World title? First off, let's find out where we're going. I placed all 5 nations involved in this save into a wheel online to determine where we will begin and we travel to the land of fiestas, siestas and Iniestas as we travel to the sunny climes of Spain. I then placed the teams that are 2nd-6th favourites to win the league title in game and put them into a wheel. Although I don't want to make the game too easy by taking the favourites to every single thing there is, I also don't want to try and take Girona through the motions. I only have 20 seasons.

Our first team in this save on our road to glory is to the Red and Whites of Madrid. Diego Simeone has had 11 years of trying to cement Atletico to the top of the European ladder. Now it's my go. We start with the maximum coaching badges and playing career you can get, and we are predicted to finish 3rd behind the El Clasico pairing. With only one player in the dream XI, it certainly looks like we are in with a challenge of overcoming the top 2. The finances are fairly uncompetitive compared to those sides and with a board demanding we fight for the title, we have our work cut out here if we are to get off to a fantastic start. Jan Oblak is very handy to have between the sticks for me, and I'm half expecting Griezmann to prove why he is in that world beating French team. We have a lot of experience in this side, and it'll be down to me to use it wisely. We could sign young blood, but they'd have to be very cheap despite our decent wage budget. If we are to do this, we would have to be in each country theoretically an average of four years per club, but I can assure you it will not be that easy. I hope you're looking forward to getting into this as much as I am. As I say, I've never done one of these on here before so any advice would be great. I promise not to write an essay for every entry. Thank you for reading and I will see you for the pre season update.

 

[RicohOwen1996]

Our pre-season started by giving away the odd jobs in the club that I didn't wanna do cause I'm not a noob. We then started our pre season with a victory against our own B Team by 3-0, while playing a 4-2-4 Gegenpress with two attacking wingers cutting inside to feed the two strikers. I do expect goals this season using that against the weaker teams in LaLiga. With our dreadful finances in terms of low transfer budget, our aim will be extending the contracts of our main players to try and see off the other teams around Europe wanting our best players (I'm watching you, PSG). Yannick Carrasco is staying for 4 seasons, up until the end of the 2025-26 season. Our main signings have all been staff signings for both the first team and the B Team, trying to get the best unit around us this season.

We then hammered Etoile Carouge of the Swiss third tier 6-1, a hat trick from Alvaro Morata boosting his confidence, with goals from Kondogbia, Felipe and a screamer from Reguilon (Remember him Spurs fans?), proving we knew what we were doing against smaller opposition. The home side were down to 10 men for all but 17 seconds of the second half as their goalscorer Bruno Caslei, got sent off straight away after kick off. After that game, we were met with this.

He has showed fantastic signs during pre-season, probably one of our vital players this season, and he picked up an injury against a third tier Swiss team. It will be touch and go up until the start of the season to see if he will be available when we start our season against Villarreal on 14th August. Away from that unfortunate news, we do now have scouts coming out of our ears, even if we can't buy big players in our first season. It'll be fantastic for us to send these out throughout the season, and hopefully get some good reports ahead of next season. Our third pre-season game is a David de Gea testimonial against Manchester United at Old Trafford. De Gea was Atletico's keeper before he left for Manchester United in 2011. Hoping for one or two penalties in this game, we were hoping to give the Red Devils a pre season nightmare. United played a second string XI, not even playing the aforementioned De Gea. We played probably our strongest team and ran to a 3-0 victory with goals from Marcos Llorente (with another screamer), a Carrasco penalty and a Griezmann volley after Mainoo was sent off for the home team. Unfortunately another injury occurred with Koke out for 3 weeks, which again is gutting and he will definitely miss the Villarreal game.

The aim is to make these month-by-month updates and it's definitely been an interesting start with a couple of injuries to major players, but comprehensive victories in all of our friendlies so far to give the boys some encouragement. I really hope you've enjoyed the start of the journey. In my August update, I will bring you the start of the La Liga season with our first 4 matches, and finding out who we will get in our first attempt at the Champions League. I will be back for your next update soon.

 

[RicohOwen1996]

This is Part 3 of this save, covering August 2022. A couple of friendlies were put in last minute, against both Lille and Napoli, which I intend to play, especially as they're against teams we could be further down the line. For me to only be commenting on friendlies at the moment with no signings is unbearable but trust me, we will get somewhere. In our first game of the month against Lille, Alvaro Morata scored 3 goals and set up the other in a 4-2 win, the other goalscorer being Thomas Lemar after a beautiful run inside after being found by AM. Watch Morata get nothing in the season now. Saul smacked the crossbar early on from 30 yards out. These players know how to hit them. Our final pre-season game was away at Napoli, a 2-2 draw with Reinildo scoring a beauty from the edge of the box that moved through the air to beat the keeper, and Angel Correa got on the scoresheet. Anguissa got a fantastic run through on goal, beating our entire defence for their equaliser.

On the 9th August we got the fantastic news that Kondogbia had started training again after 2 weeks out with his injury, and the hope that he may be able to make an appearance off the bench. Literally a few moments later, we got this message.

I suppose he needs to be careful when turning. It's rather annoying but something that I think we can pull through. Looking through the fixtures, we don't actually face the big 2 until after the Qatar World Cup so that is a saving grace. Outside of those, I feel we can beat anyone in this league. The season gets underway without much more happening than what we've already discussed. No notable highlights, so we face Villarreal in our first game in La Liga, with both of us wanting to get to a good start with ambitions for the Champions League for both sides. This is how we lined up for that first game.

Spain is very much an attacking league but in the last 2 friendlies we conceded more goals than I would have liked, so this is the line-up that I think will do the best of both worlds in this first game. I thought after our first half performance (2-0 up and dominating shots and the wings), that we would win this game. It wasn't to be. Yannick Carrasco got our first goal sweeping it in off the post from a Correa cross, and Correa curled one into the top corner from the D to make it 2-0. 3 minutes of madness brought Villarreal back into it with a Moreno tap in and a Parejo penalty. A ball from the left from Axel Witsel found Correa and made it 3-2. But then we gave Moreno time to turn and shoot and make it 3-3 in the end. A point on opening day is never bad, but we should have won.

Dodgy defending and injuries. I hate this game sometimes. Cheers FM Gods. Matchday 2 against Getafe is a chance to show some form of dominance against the smaller teams at this level, no disrespect intended. 2 headers from Alvaro Morata comfortably got us past Getafe 2-0, in a game that the hosts never really threatened. We have the all important draw coming up next. Let's see who we get drawn against in the Champions League Group Stages. Seeded 2nd for this draw, the music is playing, the balls are ready... Let's find out who we are playing in the UEFA Champions League.

I've had worse Champions League draws. Got a feeling we will top this one to be honest. Milan are definitely beatable and aren't what they were in Europe in recent years. Sporting are one of those teams that will always cause a shock, and Celtic are Celtic. Real Valladolid came up next in the league, another game we definitely should be winning with the players we have at our disposal. I decided to change it up ahead of the Valladolid game, thinking the passing game will dominate them.

The 4-3-3 still works well for our wingers there, still allows them to cut inside and create chances. That's the aim, use the wings effectively. A disappointing result in this game against Valladolid, a 1-1 draw with both goals coming from free-kicks. In FM23, if you get a free-kick from just outside the area, I find they're almost like penalties. Monchu gave them the lead to make it 1-0, but we equalised in a similar fashion through Thomas Lemar. A missed penalty from Joao Felix just about summed our game up. We weren't great and we still haven't won at home. Our final game of the month was at Girona where we needed to keep up our 100% away record to at least try and be in the top 4 come the end of the month. Thomas Lemar rejected a loan offer from Benfica in the build up to this game, purely because he thinks he will get game time with us, and with the Champions League matches being played within the next 2 months, he won't be wrong. Again, another uninspiring performance away at Girona, but the passing game worked in the end, winning 2-1 with Morata turning provider for both Joao Felix cutting in from the left, and Griezmann scoring a tap in. Former Middlesbrough striker Stuani scored an equaliser for Girona to make it 1-1 but it wasn't to be for them.

At the end of August, we find ourselves in 5th place with 8 points, our city rivals Real being 2 points ahead of us at the top of the league. Early days but we're scoring goals and playing well. We may need to at least sure up the defence a little bit but it will take a little bit of time to address that. I've definitely had worse starts though.

Heading into deadline day, we don't have the best transfer budget at only just over £1,000,000 but it will get better as we go into future successes and future tournaments. We've got £3,000,000 in the wage budget. Could we get a couple of loans in maybe? Possibly not with what we've got left over.

We've had a decent start to the season, I really hope you're enjoying it. September will be up at the latest tomorrow.

 

[RicohOwen1996]

We head into September 2022 and we start with transfer deadline day. It's going to be a very, very quiet Deadline Day with no one coming in, but will we lose players? I hope not. Our main thing was players coming in for Thomas Lemar, with Roma becoming the first club to go for him. He's on the transfer list cause he made it clear he didn't want to be at the club, but as I mentioned in my previous entry, he probably won't go because of the playing time between the UCL and La Liga. We're offloading a load of youth players to Real Mallorca as well. Thankfully, we didn't have anyone sold, so we've managed to consolidate our Champions League and La Liga squads.

Real Betis is our first away day of the month, before we face Celtic at home in midweek. The time is here to at least try and carry on our perfect away run. We start off today with the 4-2-3-1 cautious as I do think Betis will have something up their sleeve in this one. Morata playing as the lone striker today, hopefully ready to hit his pre-season form but he impressed in the Girona game by setting up the goals. Real Betis got the good start in the first half, Nabil Fekir getting on the scoresheet in the middle of the box, something we need to start defending properly against. The second half was when the Griezmann and Morata Show made an appearance. A cutback and a through ball from Griezmann found Morata both times and he had a tap in on both occasions. 100% record continues.

We now take on Scottish Champions Celtic, who are quite comfortably the weakest team in the group. Personally, I can see them maybe getting a lucky win but that'll be about it. We should be winning this one. The odds for the Champions League are as follows:

Griezmann swaps sides for our first Champions League game, cutting in from the right onto his left foot to create the opportunities. Correa starts alone up top, and the rest of the team really speaks for itself. No defeats at all so far, let's go! Felix picks up a knock early on, so I replace him with Thomas Lemar. Today's not the day for him to try so hard. Not much happened in the first half, but Axel Witsel opened his account for the club from the penalty spot after 25 minutes to give us a 1-0 HT lead against Celtic. It ended up being the most boring game of the season so far, but it finished Atletico Madrid 1-0 Celtic. Celtic never looked like scoring. Top quality game management from the lads.

Matchday 6 is a Madrid derby against Rayo Vallecano at home. De Paul's comeback has been successful from injury, while Koke has had a successful recovery also. Koke starts today. A first half we dominated started with Koke becoming the latest to hit a long range thumper, powering it past the keeper with a curler to give us the lead after 6 minutes. Rayo equalised on 19 minutes with Palazon scoring a tap in that broke to him with a bit of luck. Koke found a ball through to Morata who gave us the lead on 39 minutes with a typical finish into the bottom corner. We also hit the post and had a shot cleared off the line in the first half. When Griezmann scored a belter into the top left corner from a free kick, it seemed to be how many we will score. But Koke destroyed his game after 57 minutes, planting an elbow into an opponent and getting sent off. Griezmann scored a 4th for us and his 100th goal for the club when Kondogbia slid him through. We calmed the game down after being reduced to 10 men and we take the three points comfortably. Atletico Madrid 4-1 Rayo Vallecano.

Matchday 2 in the UEFA Champions League takes us to our Iberian neighbours in Portugal, and the capital city Lisbon, as we tackle Sporting, as we attempt to make it 2 from 2 in this group. We go back to the 4-2-3-1 for this game. The first half was just a mismatch with Sporting picking up chance after chance, but both teams only had one shot on target in the first half as it was incredibly drab. Koke gave away a penalty in the second half and picked up a yellow card, and Trincao sent Oblak the wrong way to make it 1-0 to Sporting. That was how it finished despite having a chance at the end but Morata put the ball straight into the goalkeeper's hands. Our first defeat as Atletico manager, but at least it was just 1 goal. We should have been battered.

Our last game before the first international break of the season is against Espanyol, who sit in 7th in the table after a reasonable start to the season. Koke will be out of this one and the first two league games after the international break due to his red card against Rayo. Yannick Carrasco has gone back to full training as well, so for the first time since pre-season, at this point anyway, we have no one in the medical centre. For the final game of September, I changed back to the 4-3-3 after we struggled so much in Portugal. Witsel comes back into the league team alongside Kondogbia and Saul. A penalty that wasn't given by VAR inspired us to take the lead in the 16th minute, a slide rule ball from Witsel into Joao Felix who slid it wide and slotted it in from a narrow angle. Felipe hit the bar after he got his head onto a free kick just before half time. We remained the dominant team in the second half, missing several chances to double the lead and even hitting the bar, but that one goal proved to be enough to pick up the 3 points and keep in touch with the teams at the top.

Before I show you the tables from La Liga and the Champions League, for me as a whole, this month has definitely shown that we are on it against the smaller teams, whether it's seeing out a game when we go 1-0 up against teams like Celtic, or absolutely mullering teams like we did to Rayo Vallecano, we are definitely showing we can manage games against any form of opposition. The Sporting game was a disappointment but we're gonna lose games. Overall, we've played well this month, especially in the league. We have received news that Witsel has got a bruised thigh but hopefully he will be back for the Sociedad game in October. Another minor thing that has happened during the international break is Jan Oblak eating a dodgy paella, and he will now spend the next couple of days at home with food poisoning.

It's always good to see this happen. Felipe has been effective for me this season, holding his own at the back, controlling the defence and helping us see games through. For me, he is my main man at centre-back and it was pivotal for me to sign him on for another couple of years.

The La Liga table shows us what I thought may happen at the end of the season, and it's happening now. Barcelona currently lead the way but they literally played just before I took this screenshot with us and Real playing tomorrow. We're currently 5 points off the top but we are still unbeaten which is all I could have asked for at this stage. Sociedad also sit in the top 4 with Bilbao and Valencia not far behind. 4 league wins in a row when at the start of the month, we couldn't buy a win at home, definitely makes that table taste sweeter this month.

I think I called the Champions League far too early. We definitely started well, but it's Sporting that lead the way at the top of the group. We're only ahead of Celtic in a head to head record and we need to pick up our game in the double header against Milan coming up. The group is wide open and anyone can take this.

So that was September and proud of how we're doing so far. Tomorrow we will play up to the FIFA World Cup and there will also be the chance of an early International job after that tournament, but we will see how the land lies. Thank you for the support I've received so far, and I will update again tomorrow as we hit October.

 

[misterioBean]

I love Glory Hunter saves! First time I did it was last year and it took me around 8 or 9 seasons to complete it but I got lucky with the teams that came to me. This was a very nice reading and I'll keep jumping in here to see your progress. Reading your thread made me want to start another glory hunter save so I think I'll actually use the wheel method aswell, didn't remember those were a thing last year lol.

Keep up the good job and happy saves!