The Preston North End Challenge

[Nisbet]

(Preston North End in 1888-89, the first Football League Champions)

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Main Challenge

The challenge is straight forward, take control of Preston North End & make them the Champions of the top flight of English football again.

Side challenges are:

• Win the top league 3 years in a row beating the club record of 2 consecutive wins set 122 years ago.
• Emulate Preston's famous 1888/89 team by going through an entire season unbeaten in the top flight league & FA Cup (without loosing a goal in the Cup if possible).
• Return Preston North End to the top flight for the first time since 1961 in as few seasons as possible.
• Win the Champions League.
• Become a legend at the club.
• Have one of your players capped for England (only the second player to play for England since the great Sir Thomas Finney, the other being David Nugent).
• If possible beat the home record attendance of 42,684 set in April 1938 in a game against Arsenal.

This will not be a straight forward challenge as the club is in an insecure financial state with a hefty £24.5m loan debt. When you first take over at the club the boards minimum expectation is "win promotion from League 1" (so keeping yourself in the job longer than a year will be a challenge in itself). For this you will be offered £0 transfer funds & £64k p/w wages with the club currently paying £58k p/w.



For continuity if you would like to do this challenge then load only the English leagues Premiership-League 2, on a Large database only & set your reputation as Automatic.


At the End of each Season please upload screen shots of your the final league table, best 11 & any other relevant information (good cup runs/wins, keys players ratings ect).


Bring Them Home!

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Make Sir Thomas Finney proud!

Sir Tom Finney
Born 5th April 1922 (aged 89)
Preston North End 1946-1960, 433 appearances, 187 goals.
England 1946-1958, 76 appearances, 30 goals.

 

[Nisbet]

Hi please feel free to comment on this challenge.

 

[leedsunited1987]

good luck

 

[Will1981]

nice challenge, well thoughout and good layout

started it this morning, here are my pre-season transfers all free agents and 3 youngsters on loan from Everton my parent club

 

[Nisbet]

nice challenge, well thoughout and good layout

started it this morning, here are my pre-season transfers all free agents and 3 youngsters on loan from Everton my parent club

Cool, good luck with it. Think I'm going to finish the second half of the season with a current save that I have & then give it a go. Keep me updated.

Cheers

 

[Darren Colgrave]

Sounds like a good challenge. Will give it ago, Hopefully i can do this without starting a different game as i can't seem to get into a game at the moment

 

[santa2]

Just googled FM 2012 Preston as I fancied playing with them and came across this!
Haven't really played FM for 5-10 years. Had a little play on this one & wow what a difference
I've been waiting for the next patch to come before I really started playing, but it seems to be taking it's time, so I'll start this game.


Until my computer upgrades come I'm going to have to do Med Database and Lge 1, (even with this my computer may have a heart attack!)

 

[santa2]

found this guide that may be useful for some
http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/football-manager-2012-discussion/85605-guide-preston-north-end.html

 

[santa2]

So I had a look at the team before the update, but started with the new 12.2 patch. For others looking at this challenge;

1)The team has changed a fair bit! Different captain aswell
2)A new chairman (Peter Risdale!), even a new backroom.

3)Best players seem to be;

ST - Hume
MF- Coutts
and their new German Goalkeeper; Stuckmann (Iain Turner has gone on loan).

4)The key to success may come from;
Dino Maamria

He's the first team coach - but has excellent scouting knowledge. I have promising youngsters in Brazil interested in coming to a league 1 side. Something to take advantage of in the summer transfer window!

5) Financially it's going to be hard. Espcially if you parachute yourself in mid-season, as the club seems to be haemoraging money!

6) There seems to be some good youth players to build around