I noticed that nobody else on here seems to be doing a story based in any of the Nordic countries. This may prove to be because they are not at all popular leagues to manage in and I may have made a huge mistake in starting one....or it may prove to be a stroke of genius that captures the attention of every avid story follower on FM Base. Only time will tell...
So, before we begin, let's set the scene here. AIK are without doubt one of the most successful clubs on Swedish football, having lifted the Allsvenskan (Sweden's top division) title on no less than 12 occasions. Weighing in with 8 Svenska Cupen wins as well isn't half bad! So why take over such a successful club which should be easy to manage I hear you ask...
Well, despite previous successes and a title win as recently as 2018, the club have taken a massive step backwards over the past couple of years. I've updated my game to reflect all of last season's league positions/promotions/relegations as well as every transfer up to Gareth Bale's move back to Spurs confirmed yesterday. Still, back to the predicament my new club find themselves in.... They are one of 3 major clubs based in Stockholm, Sweden, alongside Djurgardens IF and Hammarby IF. We are currently the joint most successful of the three with Djurgardens having won 12 league titles as well, whilst Hammarby only have the one. Despite that fact and our recent title win in 2018, AIK only managed to finish in 4th position in 2019 and were behind both of the Stockholm rivals in the process (Djurgardens lifting the title and sitting as current defending champions)....something the fans will find simply unacceptable. So as per the story title....my first job at hand is to make us the best team in Stockholm again...with immediate effect.
Moving on from there, I aim to make AIK the most successful Swedish club in domestic history and to do that, I'll have to catch Malmo who are way ahead of us with 20 Allsvenskan titles to their name, as well as 14 Svenska Cupen wins. IFK Goteborg are also ahead of us in the rankings with 18 league titles and 7 Swedish cups (whilst also lifting the Europa League title twice back in the 1980s).
Naturally, once Sweden is domestically conquered, we can turn our attention to European honours and try to compete with Europe's elite in the Europa League and Champions League competitions.
Not such an easy task ahead of me after all, I think you'll agree ladies and gents. So let's get this show on the road!
PS. A little side note that in real life, AIK currently sit 13th of 16 after 20 games in the Allsvenskan so this season really has been a shambles!
Our story begins at the start of Swedish pre-season in January 2020. As I arrive at my new home, it's fair to say I'm impressed. The Friends Arena is an outstanding stadium, both inside and out!
Next up, it was time to meet the squad and after the initial wow factor of the stadium, the players I had at my disposal to play in it were a little underwhelming to say the least. With my Assistant Manager rating most of our players as mediocre at best and the stand out performers tending to be approaching retirement age, it looks like this could be a period of transition for the club if we are going to fulfil my ambitions. We look particularly week between the sticks, and have a severe lack of decent wide midfielders as well!
Sebastian Larsson has been at AIK for two seasons now after returning to his home country following a career in England that saw him play for Arsenal, Birmingham, Sunderland and a very brief spell at Hull City. Without a doubt, he is one of my most talented players but at the age of 34, I might only realistically have one more year in him.
Another player that really stands out is Henok Goitom, but again he is one of the oldest players in the squad at 35 and it remains to be seen what he can offer the club. As a striker, he has an OK goalscoring record for the club with 28 goals in 84 appearances, but he's certainly not set the world alight here.
The final player worth mentioning at this stage is the versatile Karol Mets, who can cover both central defence and central midfield roles. He's a lump at 6ft 3" and at 26 years old, is in his prime. A player that I can definitely build my team around in my first couple of years here for sure!
With the extreme lack of options out wide, this is the formation I have opted for initially to try during pre season and see how we get on. Naturally, I will look to add some of my own players to the squad and things might change, but this is what I've come up with for now.
I won't be going too mad in the transfer market though with only £800,000 available to me.
As far as the board's expectations go, anything short of a top 3 finish this season will likely see me out of a job, whilst I'm expected to progress to the final in the cup as well. Within the next 4 years, we need to be qualifying for the Champions League, and winning the league title again within 5 (personally, I'll be aiming for a title win before this but we'll see).
There is plenty of time for me to become acquainted with my side though as the competitive season doesn't kick off until April and we have loads of friendlies and the group stage of the cup before then.
With my squad assessed and my starting tactic good to go, it was time to get some friendlies under our belt. All in all, the opening 5 friendlies went well enough, with only one narrow defeat coming at the hands of Dinamo Zagreb….a team that in terms of European competition are probably at a similar level to us. Three clean sheets bodes well at this stage as we look to build a solid foundation at the back.
Svenska Cupen – Group Stage Matchday 1
Orebro SK vs AIK Solna
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, M.Lustig, P.Karlsson, K.Mets, R.Lindqvist, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel*, S.Larsson (B.Hussein 82), E.Ofori, B.Radulovic, S.Silva (N.Tesfai Negash 82)
My first competitive game in charge resulted in a nice little win over fellow Allsvenskan side, Orebro, in the opening group stage game of the cup. We looked solid and our opponents never really troubled us as we cruised to a comfortable 2-0 win.
LOAN SIGNING; First signing of the season is a real little gem I think. Rhian Brewster comes in from Liverpool on loan and there’s no doubting that this 19 year old has talent. He could absolutely tear it up for us this year if I can get the best out of him and he has the ability to play out wide as well, although he is best up top!
Svenska Cupen – Group Stage Matchday 2
AIK Solna vs BK Hacken
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, R.Lundstrom, P.Karlsson, K.Mets, R.Lindqvist, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel, S.Larsson (B.Hussein 69), E.Ofori, B.Radulovic, S.Silva (R.Brewster* 45)
It only took 4 minutes and 12 seconds for Rhian Brewster to make his mark after coming on at half time. A lacklustre first half where we failed to create any meaningful chances, meant changes were needed at the break and the introduction of youngster Brewster came a little earlier than I’d originally planned in this game. After Brewster’s goal, we went on to dominate the rest of the game and probably should have won by 2 or 3.
Svenska Cupen – Group Stage Matchday 3
AIK Solna vs Norrby IF
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, M.Lustig*, P.Karlsson, K.Mets, R.Lindqvist, P.Dimitriadis, F.Michel, S.Larsson, E.Ofori, B.Radulovic, R.Brewster
Brewster earned himself an early start as we took on lower league opposition for our final group game in the cup, but it was strike partner Radulovic that got us on our way early on with an easy tap in from close range. Total domination for us here as we registered 32 shots on goal, scoring 3 along the way, rounded off by a superb Seb Larsson penalty in the final minute of the game.
Three wins from three games saw us top the group and progress to the knockout stages of the Svenska Cupen.
And the quarter final will take place next month, with us drawn against Helsingborgs IF. No Malmo FF in the knockout rounds as they were beaten to top spot in their group by IF Elfsborg.
Svenska Cupen – Quarter Final AIK Solna vs Helsingborgs IF
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, R.Lundstrom (M.Lustig 90), P.Karlsson, K.Mets, R.Lindqvist, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel, S.Larsson, E.Ofori, H.Goitom (K.Sigporsson 67), R.Brewster (B.Radulovic* 67)
No doubt we were dominating this match and had created a number of chances, but our strikers just weren’t on form. So a double change to the front two on 67 minutes was made and within 30 seconds, it had paid off as the two new strikers on the field had combined to give us the lead! A lapse in concentration late on allowed them to equalize though, taking the game to ET. During that added 30 minutes, we absolutely demolished our opponents as we made up for 90 minutes of not taking our chances! Radulovich completed his hat trick to take the match ball!
That would set up a semi final with Mjallby.
Svenska Cupen – Semi Final
AIK Solna vs Mjallby AIF
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, M.Lustig, P.Karlsson, K.Mets, R.Lindqvist*, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel, S.Larsson, E.Ofori, B.Radulovic, H.Goitom (R.Brewster 90)
A tight game, but we squeak through to the final. Ebenezer Ofori turned in the only goal of the game to see us through, a powerful effort from just inside the box.
We will now take on our Stockholm rivals in the final in a couple of months time. Could I be lifting silverware in my first season at the club? In all fairness, it will definitely help me win the fans over quickly if I can beat our greatest rivals to the cup!
The pre season odds are out and it’s tight at the top with a number of clubs fancied to mount a title challenge. We’ve come in at second favourites behind Malmo but to be honest, the bookies look like they’re expecting it to be tight between all of the top 5.
I’ve not even decided if Henok Goitom will be one of my first choice strikers just yet, but the bookies are fancying him to be up amongst the top goalscorers in the division this season anyway.
Seb Larsson might be getting on a bit, but the bookies still rate him as one of the best players in the country!
Which justifies him getting the captaincy for the upcoming season!
It was no surprise to see the richest club in Sweden were the most active in the transfer window. However, a mere £2.6 million spent by Malmo is minimal in relation to the type of transfers that go on around the rest of Europe each year.
We finished off March and our pre season with 2 more friendly wins. Now, as we move into April, it is finally time for some competitive league action.
A quick reminder from the board of their expectations for the season, before our first league game kicks off. I’ve already led us to the final of the cup, so a top 3 finish in the league this year should see me in the boss’s good books.
We’d already managed a 2-0 victory over Orebro in the cup, which was extremely comfortable, so I felt confident going into our first game of the league campaign. My confidence wasn’t misplaced as we completely dominated from start to finish! The first half saw us miss a load of good chances, before striking twice right on the half time whistle! A 3rd goal 10 minutes into the restart saw the game put to bed, when Ebenezer Ofori’s 25 yard strike rattled the top corner of the net!
Helsingborgs finished 10th in the division last year, and many expect them to struggle again this season! However, in a rather dull first half, it was our opponents that came closest to scoring as they struck the crossbar on 16 minutes from about 12 yards out. My lads were given a stern talking to at the break, and it seemed to work as they came out for the 2nd half with a lot more urgency. 10 minutes in and we were in front, as Ofori scored for the second time in two games, although this one had a bit of good fortune about it with the goalkeeper making a glaring error to let the ball in underneath his body! Helsingborgs simply crumbled after that goal and we went on to win it easily from there!
Injury; I won’t be reporting on every single injury that we pick up during this story, however I will report on any that are lengthy or significant. This is our first long term injury to come up as Stefan Silva looks set to miss a few months!
50,000 fans packed the Friends Arena for my first derby against one of our local rivals and our home supporters left with all the bragging rights after an amazing headed effort in injury time from Kolbeinn Sigporsson ensured our opponents made the short trip home with nothing!
Fair to say I put Hammarby manager, Stefan Billborn, in his place during and after the match as a managerial rivalry is born!
My first competitive defeat as AIK boss comes at the hands of IFK Norrkoping! A frustrating day for us as we hammered their goal for 90 minutes, with them sitting with 11 men behind the ball clearly playing for a point! As it happens, a lapse of concentration from Felix Michel handed them a penalty as they ended up taking all 3!
Allsvenskan – Matchday 5
IFK Goteborg vs AIK Solna
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, M.Lustig, P.Karlsson, S.Papagiannopoloulos*, E.Otieno, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel, S.Larsson, B.Hussein, B.Radulovic, R.Brewster (H.Goitom 75)
We quickly get back to winning ways with a solid 1-0 victory over a decent Goteborg side. We defended really well here throughout the match!
My first encounter with the biggest team in Sweden ended in an underwhelming draw. Not the most entertaining of games as both sides seemed to give each other a little too much respect. Still, a point away at Malmo has to be seen as a decent result.
Player of the Month Mikael Lustig
A really solid start to the season for me first choice right back!
IFK Norrkoping are the only side to register victory over us so far, and they’re the only side that sit above us in the table at this early stage of the season! A good start for my lads though and I’m happy!
In my first month in charge, I lift the manager of the month award. Boom!!
Our opponents had their best spell in the opening 10 minutes of the match as they definitely started the game better than us. However, once we’d ‘warmed up’, it was easy as you like and they never threatened as we cruised to comfortable 3-0 victory. A masterclass in central midfield from Seb Larsson as he despatched a penalty and got the assists for both the other goals.
Injury; Henok Goitom only last 11 minutes off the bench in our previous game before going off again with a hip injury. He’ll now receive specialist attention to nurse him back to fitness, but is still likely to miss up to 3 months of action!
It’s fair to say that Sweden is not renowned for producing Europe’s best players (Zlatan apart), but we do have 16 players out there playing in the top 5 leagues that have come through Swedish development. Three of those came from us here at AIK.
Ostersunds certainly aren’t the same side they were under Graham Potter and they came into this game sitting in the bottom 3 with only 1 win to their name this season. A comfortable win was expected and within 25 minutes, we were already 3 up! We didn’t let up there either, adding a 4th before the break, with goal 5 coming in the 2nd half through Seb Larsson’s second penalty of the game. Rhian Brewster rounded things off late on with a nice headed effort as he bagged his 2nd goal of the match too. I fear for Ostersunds this season as they are easily the worst team we’ve played so far and look nailed on for relegation to me, even at such an early stage of the campaign.
Well if the Ostersunds game was extremely comfortable, this was the polar opposite! We struggled for fluency throughout and just couldn’t find our rhythm. Every time it looked like we was putting together a decent attack, we’d fire off a wayward pass and the move would break down. Ultimately, we were punished for our lack of conviction in the final third as Mjallby bagged a late, late equalizer to share the spoils.
Injury; Another striker down as we lose Kolbeinn Sigporsson for up to a month!! A lot of weight is quickly mounting on the shoulders of young Rhian Brewster to bag the goals with all his strike partners falling victim of injuries!
A solid performance where we dominated possession (61%) and were good value for our 3-0 win. Scoring three goals with a depleted strike force is never a bad thing!
My first encounter with the defending champions and one of our biggest local rivals….and this would be a warm up for the cup final in 11 days time too, so not only would the winner walk away with the bragging rights, but maybe a psychological edge as well. As it turned out, neither team gained the upper hand as we played out a bore draw. With our 22 shots to their 4, it’s obvious which team should have won the game though, but some poor finishing cost us.
Allsvenskan – Matchday 12
AIK Solna vs BK Hacken
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, R.Lundstrom, S.Papagiannopoulos, K.Mets, R.Lindkvist (E.Otieno 45), P.Dimitriadis, S.Larsson (T.Strannegard 45), B.Hussein, E.Ofori, R.Georgis*, R.Brewster (B.Radulovic 59)
I had to rotate the squad a little and use half time subs here as this game came just days before our Svenska Cup Final. Rany Georgis (a 20 year old Greek striker) came into the starting lineup for the first time, after scoring 6 in 9 for the reserves this season, and bagged two goals for himself! A comfortable win, which never really looked in doubt.
Our cup final was up next, so to avoid making this post too long, I’ll split the month into two halves, so I can give the cup final a more detailed overview that it deserves.
May 2020 (Part 2) Svenska Cup - Final
Djurgardens vs AIK Solna
Formation; 4-1-3-2 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, M.Lustig (R.Lundstrom 68), P.Karlsson, K.Mets, R.Lindkvist, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel, S.Larsson, E.Ofori, B.Radulovic, R.Brewster (R.Georgis 68)
Our opponents had an element of home advantage going into this final as the game was set to be played at their stadium! Pre match interviews and team talks had gone well though and my lads seemed right up for this one!
AIK GOAL; It wasn’t long before we were in front. In fact, it only took 4 minutes for Bojan Radulovic to slot home in the bottom corner after beating his defender and dribbling inside the box.
DJURGARDENS PEN; On 15 minutes, our opponents had the opportunity to get level as we gifted them a soft penalty.
PENALTY SAVE; But Haugaard stood strong in his goal and saved the pen to keep us in front!
AIK GOAL; Only 1 minute later, we punished the penalty miss, as Seb Larsson scored with a first time finish from about 10 yards.
HALF TIME; We went into the break with a 2-0 lead and Seb Larsson had been running the show!
AIK PEN; The second half didn’t offer up any real action until the 76th minute when the ref awarded us a penalty of our own after Robert Lundstrom was brought down as he dribbled into the Djurgardens penalty area.
AIK GOAL; Seb Larsson made no mistake from the spot and put the game out of Djurgardens reach!
AIK GOAL; Felix Michel rounded off an emphatic win over our biggest rivals with a headed effort from a corner in injury time!
Man of the Match; Sebastian Larsson
A very nice cup final win sees me lift a trophy within only 6 months of taking over at the club! To get the final win over our biggest rivals is a huge bonus and will earn me the plaudits of our fans. Hopefully, this is the first of many trophies I will bring to the club!
The cup win means that we go into this year’s Europa League competition, although we’ll have to get through some tricky qualification ties before reaching the main group stage competition.
An uninspiring performance after our cup win as we labour to a 0-0 draw with Elfsborg. Maybe the lads partied too hard after the cup final?
Player of the Month Sebastian Larsson
Our captain has turned in 4 man of the match performances this month, including a sensational performance in the final of the cup! He is proving that even at the age of 34, he can still compete at the top level in Sweden!
We’ve dropped to third in the league table, but are still within touching distance of the top 2. Malmo remain the only unbeaten side in the division, whilst Ostersunds are still searching for their first win of the campaign!
A preliminary look at the youth coming through this season shows that the only thing to get excited about is an influx of full backs apparently!
We currently lead the way for bringing through players in the national side, which does bode well for our youth development prospects moving forward though. Although we do need to try to keep hold of our top players a bit better as not one of the four currently earn their living at AIK.
Swedish football is on the rise as the Allsvenskan closes in on the top 20 leagues in Europe.
Although our personal status in Europe is on a massive decline as we drop outside of the top 300 clubs in the continent.
The coefficient rankings now have us having 1 entry into the Champions League (1Q round), no entries into the Europa League and 3 entries into the Europa Conference League at the 2nd qualifying stage.
As the big leagues around Europe come to a close, it’s Lazio who are surprise winners of the Serie A, whilst Atletico Madrid also beat Barcelona to the La Liga title. Although it had already switched to the new season, PSG were winners of Ligue 1 in France.
Three offers came in for Seb Larsson, all of which were rejected as he is far too important to us right now.
However, it seems Seb fancies the move to Germany and has come to me asking for chat about me rejected Hertha’s bid for him. I tried my hardest to convince him to stay, but he wasn’t having any of it and I’ve had to agree with him that if they come in with a bid of at least £95,000 I will accept it! All I can do now is hope and pray they don’t renew their interest.
Three offers also came in for Panos Dimitriadis. Another player I’d like to keep hold of if I can.
However, he really got the ump with me rejecting transfer bids for him and went as far as handing in a transfer request to try to force a move!
I asked the board to go out and find me an affiliate club. Hopefully, they will come back with a giant of European football that we can get some good youngsters on loan from without having to pay their wages….here’s hoping!
Allsvenskan – Matchday 14
Kalmar FF vs AIK Solna
Formation; 4-1-2-3 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, H.Rashidi, S.Papagiannopoulos (P.Karlsson 74), K.Mets, R.Lindkvist, E.Kofi Adu, P.Dimitriadis, B.Hussein, E.Ofori, B.Radulovic* (K.Sigporsson 74), R.Brewster
After a month off, we resume our league campaign with a decent enough win away at Kalmar.
Twenty games into my career and I’ve racked up an impressive 15 wins so far. However, it’s possibly even more impressive that we’ve only conceded 6 goals in those 20 games!! Incredible stuff!
Well that’s disappointing!!
I won’t bother with a player of the month and league table update as there’s no point with only one game played this month.
Our finishing let us down here and it’s no overexaggeration to say we should have been 4-0 up inside the first 15 minutes! We had 62% of the possession and 20 shots on goal but ultimately, our opponents were much more clinical than us in front of goal and punished us for our own shortcomings.
Maybe I should have accepted some money for Seb Larsson when I had the chance, as he will now leave for Young Boys at the end of the season. Gutted to see my captain go, but at the same time, he is 35 years old and how much I’d have got out of him next season I’m not sure.
On the other hand, some goods news as I managed to tie up one of my other key centre mids on a new deal, despite him receiving an offer from Galatassaray as well.
Panos Dimitriadis had made his feelings on leaving the club perfectly clear when he handed in a transfer request last month, so this wasn’t really a shock.
A Swedish legend joins the coaching staff.
I had £400k in the transfer kitty, so requested a bit more from the board. At best I thought they might double my budget, so this was a nice surprise.
Injury; Hussein has featured in 11 of our 15 league games so far this season, so will be missed over the next month or so.
We have a Europa League tie in the diary and it’s Azerbaijan side, Qabala Futbol Klubu, that stand in our way.
I managed to snap up Serbian centre back, Nemanja Pejcinovic, on a free transfer, and he initially looks like a good addition to the squad. At 32 years of age, he still has a couple of seasons left in him (just look at how Seb Larsson is smashing it this year), and will certainly strengthen our back line for sure.
A single strike from Rhian Brewster gets us back to winning ways after the disappointing result against Falkenbergs. A well deserved 3 points after we dominated majority of the game.
Injury; Right back, Robert Lundstrom will now miss around a month of action after limping off against Orebro.
A fantastic achievement for Per Karlsson who becomes the club’s new record for most league appearances.
Karlsson has literally spent his entire career at the club. Incredible loyalty from the centre back!
Another incoming transfer and this time I decided to fork out some of that extra budget the board had given me. We bring in Luca Palmiero from Napoli for a fee of £625,000. I think the 24 year old deep lying playmaker is a bit of a coup for the club and is a sign of my intention to really take this squad to the next level.
UEFA Europa League – Second Qualifying Round 1st Leg
FK Qabala vs AIK Solna
Formation; 4-1-2-3 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; J.Haugaard, M.Lustig, P.Karlsson (N.Pejcinovic 63), K.Mets, E.Otieno, E.Kofi Adu, F.Michel, S.Larsson*, E.Ofori, B.Radulovic (K.Sigporsson 63), R.Brewster
Comfortable as you like and this big win in Azerbaijan should mean that the 2nd leg will be just a formality. The highlight of the goals was a great headed effort as Karol Mets outjumped two defenders to score his 1st of the season.
Injury; The injuries continue to mount up as we lose Felix Michel for up to 2 months. He will be sorely missed in the central midfield triangle as he has been one of the backbones of the team so far this season, with his 89% tackle win ratio.
We were embarrassed by our local rivals and it goes without saying that my lads were given the b*llocking of a lifetime after the game. This simply must never happen again!
I like my bosses!
UEFA Europa League – Second Qualifying Round 2nd Leg
AIK Solna vs FK Qabala
Formation; 4-1-2-3 Narrow, Mentality; Attacking
Lineup; B.Janosevic, H.Rashidi*, N.Pejcinovic, S.Papagiannopoulos, E.Kahl, P.Dimitriadis, T.Strannegard, S.Larsson, E.Ofori, K.Sigporsson, S.Silva
With a five goal lead from the 1st leg, I rotated the squad pretty heavily for this one. We definitely weren’t anywhere near our best with our weakened side, but still managed to scrape a narrow win.
No doubt Swiss side, FC Zurich, will offer up more of a challenge in the next qualifying round.
Player of the Month Rhian Brewster
The young loanee was the stand out player of the last month as he bagged 4 goals in 4 games.
As we have passed the mid way stage of the season, we have to be careful that the gap between us and the top two clubs doesn’t grow any wider and put the title out of our reach. I’m keen for us to compete this season and if we can’t win the league, I at least want to be in the running all the way to the very end if possible.
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