Benfica - Overturning the Curse

[addug]

Hey guys,

So a week or two I came across the Champions League challenge and figured it would be a good place to start my first serious save on the game. I decided Benfica would be one of the most challenging (but more achievable) clubs to try it with for my first time round.

Has anyone else tried a long term save with Benfica? Or even a similar level European club. I reached the quarters first year, and semis second year (alongside winning a domestic double), but now at the start of the third season I'm finding that I've almost run the club into financial difficulty trying to achieve it quickly. I did forsee this to an extent but not quite as quickly or as severely, the thing I wasn't expecting is how difficult it is to sell players at a high price down to the reputation of the league.

They're a really fun club to play with due to the contrast in strength of opposition and trying to balance a squad while also trying financial achieve anything in Europe, has anyone else got any experience with the club? I'll post my squad as soon as I get to July 1st and it's tidied up!

 

[kwan20]

Hi there,

Are U portuguese? I already have 4 seasons with Benfica since it's my club

Money it's a little bit of a problem since clubs in Portugal receive very little in TV transmission and so..

My tatic (like IRL) was sell 1 player for 20-30+ millions so I can buy another ones and dont have penalties FPP.

I bought Honda for free and sold him in season final for 14M, sold Schar for 30M after buy in for 3M 2 season before, buy Zouma to replace him for 6M.

Had a proposal from RM for Balanta for 47M and rejected.. wanna stay with him one more season. Bought Sergi Roberto for free and sold him for 33M for RM. Bought Rafinha for free to replace him.

Had a lot of players I can sell for 30M+ but wanna stay with them since I won da UCL in 3 season and wanna continue with a team that I can win again.

Basically in 3 season you can have a great team, In the pre season of season 4 I had 100M to spend on transfers after sell Schar and Sergi Roberto, so I bought several young players to improve them and sell after.

 

[addug]

Hey! No I'm not Portugese but love the country and Benfica are my Portugese team (I'm a Liverpool fan).

Yeah I noticed that very quickly! Even the prize money is really low for the league. Yeah I figured that would be the best way to do it but I've struggled to get any big fees sold matic for ?15m but that's the most I've managed.

I feel like I've missed out on loads of good buys there! Will definitely be looking into some of them when the transfer window opens. Do you have difficulty trying to get players to commit to long term contracts? I never seem to be able to get more than 3 years which obviously makes it hard going forward and trying to get big fees.

How do you line up? I play a 442, with wingers, mostly in the league, really quality midfield and attack but inexperienced and mixed defence on the whole. Morata and Damiao are lethal up top!

I'm in my third season now, won the league by 11pts last year and started strong this year. I didn't realise how long it had been since Benfica won back to back titles!

 

[kwan20]

I got offers ~30M for Matic in the final of first season but did not sell him, guess what? Im Benfica fan so Matic is one of the best...

Basically you have to find good players for good prices and then sell others for much more so you can renew the team with young players whos gonna value a lot more in 2-4 seasons.

Ex. I bought Stanciu for 15M and sell him from 50M in two seasons.
Bought Schar for 3M sell him for 30M and replace him for Zouma who cost 7M and hes one of the best.
Garay sell him for 20M and replace him for Schar.
Sergi Roberto for free and sell him for 33M after 1 season, got Rafinha for free.
Maxi Pereira for 9M in the beginning promote Cancelo who got offeres from 10M after 2 seasons. Keep it as hes one good promise and portuguese.
Bought Ruben from maritimo for 750k in the beginning and every end of season got offers from 7-9M.
Bought Rescaldani for 800k sold him for 10M for Inter after 2 seasons of loans..
And others like this... Now I dont have money problems...

The first season is key because you can find some good players for cheap.. like Doria, Balanta, Stanciu, Iancu, Honda & Vitinho for free. Zuculini..

I play 4-1-1-2-1.

Good Luck, Benfica is the best