Tranmere Rovers 2014-15... Sky Bet League 2 Champions and FA Cup WINNERS

  • Thread starter Thread starter liquefry
  • Start date Start date
  • Replies Replies 288
  • Views Views 72K
L

liquefry

Member
Joined
Mar 9, 2013
Messages
228
Reaction score
0
Points
16
Edit: here's a link to the tactics that I used for this game - ChristianEriksen's Beautiful Play

I just got the most unexpected results from my first season in FM 2015.
Team - Tranmere Rovers - starting in Sky Bet League 2
Season 2014/15
Board expectations - reach playoffs
Transfer / wages amount extremely low - got a few loans in but these achievements were mostly with free transfers and the original team.

Results:
League position - 1st, won 31 drew 12 lost 3, +66 GD.
View attachment 327483
The losses and draws stacked up at the end when I started playing the U18s to save my players for the more exciting results...

FA Cup position - WINNER
Results up to final:
View attachment 327481
Final: Tranmere 1 : Arsenal 0
View attachment 327480

Summary:
View attachment 327482

Full results of the FA Cup for Tranmere:
Round 1: Tranmere 2 Northampton 0 (finished the season 15th in Sky Bet League 2)
Round 2: Tranmere 1 Chesterfield 0 (Finished the season 18th in Sky Bet League 1)
Round 3: Tranmere 3 Man City 0 (Man City finished the season as PL champs)
Round 4: Tranmere 1 Birmingham 0 (finished season 24th in Championship - relegated)
Round 5: Tranmere 2 Chelsea 1 (finished season 4th in PL)
Round 6: Tranmere 2 Man Utd 0 (finished 2nd in PL)
Semi Final: Tranmere 3 Everton 2 (finished 8th in PL)
Final: Tranmere 1 Arsenal 0 (finished 5th in PL)

Seriously - my team from the lowest division beat 5 of the top 8 teams in the country!

I did not spend a thing on transfers during the season, although I did enter into one fee-paying loan because my wages bill was too low to cover the demands of the home team. I signed 9 players on free transfers, and 4 on loans, but none of the free transfers ended up breaking into the first team on a regular basis. The loans were much more successful.

My preferred first XI was:
GK Owain fon Williams - games 54, rating 6.92. 28 year old who has played 4 seasons for Tranmere. He is a great shot stopper, with 26 clean sheets, saving 118 shots and conceding 35. This more than made up for terrible passing (completion rate 56%)
DL Matt Hill - games 38(4), rating 7.12. A 34 year old who joined in 2014 (before I took over at the start of the season). A good defender with 4.18 tackles per game, but fairly ineffective on attack with just 3 assists and 1 goal. He is too slow to be effective in a higher division, will be moved to reserve next season.
DCL Janoi Donacien - games 16(2), rating 7.42. A 21 year old on loan from Aston Villa. He had a miserable run of injuries but was my most talented if somewhat mercurial defender when playing with a rating of 7.34. He made 3 tackles per game and wasnt the best passer with 63% completion.
DCR Marcus Holness (C) - games 48, rating 7.24. A 26 year old who also joined in 2014. He made 4 tackles per game, and also poor passing with 62% completion.
DR Danny Holmes - games 48(3), rating 7.35. A 26 year old who has played their whole career at Tranmere. He was probably the best defender overall despite the slightly lower average rating than Donacien, with 4 PoM awards, 8 assists, 6.4 tackles per game and a 77% pass completion rate. He's not the speediest full back but he was very effective.
DM - Philip Billing - games 36(1), rating 7.26. An 18 year old from Huddersfield I signed on a free loan. Billing was the rock of the team with 4 tackles per game and an 82% pass completion. He did have a slight disciplinary problem - 9 yellows and 3 reds during the season.
MCL - James Rowe - games 43(1), rating 7.53. A 23 year old who has played 2 seasons at Tranmere, Rowe was a consistent performer with 9 goals, 13 assists and 6 PoM awards. He featured in the team of the season, and was in the team of the week 4 times. He probably deserved more plaudits but was slightly outshone by his midfield partner...
MCR - Max Power - games 38(4), rating 7.44. A 21 year old who came up through the ranks to become one of the best players in the team. Power got 10 PoM awards, 12 goals and 12 assists. He was named the player of the year in the league and got 2 young player of the month awards. Although his average rating was lower than Rowe's, he seemed to come up with the big moments more often.
AML - Abdulai Bell Baggie - games 34(3), rating 7.19. A 23 year old that has been at Tranmere for 3 seasons. He was injured for the mid part of the season but was brilliant when he played, scoring 9 goals, 8 assists and getting 3 PoM awards. He was in the team of the week 7 times. He was great in the normal season but underperformed in important games
AMR - Jack Stacey - games 15, rating 7.59. A 19 year old from Reading signed on a free loan in the January window. He got 3 goals and 12 assists with 1 PoM in his short stint before a season-ending injury in March.
ST - Cole Stockton - games 52, rating 7.19. A 21 year old who has played his career at Tranmere. He scored 40 goals in the season, picked up the golden boot for both the league and FA Cup, and was in the league team of the year. He was PoM 8 times. His form was brilliant in the first half of the season, but dipped a bit in the end apart from a brilliant hat trick against Everton in the FA Cup semifinal.

Notes: I used the ChristianEriksen beautiful tactic v5.
 
Last edited:
So the down sides of that amazing season: it is now January in the next season, and due to fixture congestion in the first half of the year I have now only played 10 games while everyone else has played 22 or 23 games! So my team is undefeated, but in 19th spot...

Every press conference is now about the pressure on me to reverse the fortunes of the team, and fringe players are making grumpy noises about the "underperformance" of the team based on league position. We have a +14 goal difference. I wonder what will happen!
 
you should never have won the FA Cup :P but how you doing in Europe?
 
Totally agree, shows how awesome the ChristianEriksen tactics are to have these guys win the cup!

In the Euro group stage I had Dinamo Kiev, Stuttgart and Austria Wien. Managed to top the group :), Kiev came in second place. The team is semi-decent now, I made some sweet loan deals, and picked up a few extra players on free transfers. With the Eriksen tactics and these players we'd probably do ok in the championship... according to the coach all our players are already at that standard.

My preferred lineup at the moment is:
ST Stockton (same as last year) - he is continuing to improve. Current coach report "good player for most championship sides"
AMR Ryan Kent, on loan from Liverpool. Coach - "decent premier player for most Premier Division sides"... pretty awesome player
AML Joao Teixeira, picked up on a free from Liverpool. At the same level as Stockton according to the coach
MCR Max Power - still improving, also a "good player for championship sides"
MCL Brendan Galloway - on loan from Everton, coach says he would be a "good player for Premier Division sides"
DM Marco Da Silva - Free transfer from Valenciennes FC in France - "decent player for championship sides"
DR Danny Holmes - "Leading player for most Sky Bet League 1 sides". Probably now our weakest position but Holmes seems to get the job done ok.
DCR Donacien - on loan from Fulham - another "good player for Championship sides"
DCL Donervan Daniels - on loan from West Brom - a "leading player for Championship sides"
DL Nathan Ake - on loan from Chelsea - another "leading player for Championship sides".
GK - fon Williams - another "good player for Championship"

With the delayed fixtures I'm now playing every second day, hope my backup team is up to it!
 
wow some nice players there!! Teixiera is a great player, doing well in my Brighton game so far, keep it up matey!!!!
 
Update on Tranmere's romp through Europe. We were drawn in the knockout phase against Dnipro, a Ukrainian powerhouse team. The first game away in the Ukraine went pretty well for the underdog English team, a 1-1 draw in which the home team scored an outrageously offside goal - seriously was about two body lengths offside and not called. A player had sent in a cross from deep towards the offside striker. It drifted towards the goal, and under extreme pressure from the offside player right in front of him fon Williams went for the intercept, fumbled, and then the striker picked off an easy goal. In a game this would definitely be offside since the striker was challenging for the ball from an offside position, even though the goalkeeper played him back onside by touching the ball. I was pretty steamed about that but didnt even have an option to vent my frustration in the press conference! I am wondering if it was a game bug.

Anyway the return leg at Tranmere's Prenton Park was action packed, for my team at least. Brendan Galloway, a player far too good for League 1, scored a hat-trick before half time. The first goal was the result of amazing movement off the ball combined with precision passing. Galloway received the ball 40m out from goal. He passed forward to Teixiera on the left, who drifted back toward the middle before playing a cheeky backheel to Nathan Ake making a barnstorming and unmarked run up from left fullback. Ake worked the ball to the left corner before passing back to Teixiera in the top left corner of the box. Tiexiera laid the ball on with a one touch pass to an unmarked Galloway sitting practically on the spot, who banged it in the top left corner of the goal. Brilliant. Galloway followed up with an unstoppable strike from pretty much the same spot, this time distributed to him via a corner. The hat trick came from a penalty.

The game ended 3-0, giving Tranmere a 4-1 aggregate victory!

The news is more mixed in the domestic game. Tranmere has now been knocked out of all the domestic cups apart from the Johnstone Paint Trophy. Newcastle beat us in the fourth round of the FA Cup, Leicester in the QF of the Capital Cup, and Man City won the Community Shield. In the league we are looking good for top spot, having crammed a huge amount of games in over January we now only have 6 games in hand, and are top by 3 points.

The heavy schedule is taking its toll on the players too. The U18s are loving it as I need to do a massive amount of rotation to keep the best players fresh for the Euro. Unfortunately I am suffering from a few injuries now. Ryan Kent, my superstar winger, suffered a 3-4 month injury and will not be back until April at the earliest. Donacien is also injured for a month, along with some of the youngsters I've played.

Great progress anyway. I'm drawn against Mainz in the next round of the Euro. From Ukraine to Germany... fingers crossed for further progress!
 
First leg report Mainz v Tranmere

Coming into this game Tranmere had played some good football, beating Wolves 4-1, Sheffield Wednesday 5-2 and coming back from 0-2 at half time away to Birmingham (2nd in the league) to win the game 3-2. The team was on a high and confident about snatching something from this first leg of the 2nd knockout stage in the Euros.

The first goal came at 27 mins to Brendan Galloway in a crowded penalty area, somehow connecting to a nothing cross. The match report characterised it as a "fluke goal"... bit harsh! A second goal followed shortly after from a perfectly placed Teixeira free kick. Donervon Daniels broke off the back of the Mainz wall to connect with the free kick on the volley. The keeper could only parry the ball straight back to the waiting Pierce Sweeney, Tranmere's reserve centre back who accepted the gift with a well placed shot.

From then Tranmere was very much on the back foot. Mainz threw everything into attack and had a multitude of chances, but the Tranmere back line stayed firm. ish. On 55 mins, Sweeney, perhaps overexcited by his efforts up front, was outpaced by Mainz striker Okazaki who was clean through on goal just outside the box. Sweeney made a horrendous sliding tackle from behind to bring him down. A deserved red card, and Tranmere down to 10 men. Still they held firm through one wave after another of attacks, with desperate goal line clearances, acrobatic saves and crunching tackles somehow keeping Mainz goalless. Mainz didnt do themselves any favours either, some very wayward finishing including a missed penalty, and many offsides making their job harder.

Final score Mainz 0 Tranmere 2.

Stats: Mainz 24 shots Tranmere 6, Mainz 66% possession. Donervon Daniels was PoTM. Tranmere in a very strong position going into the second leg at home.
 
The return leg - Tranmere 4 Mainz 0

It was always going to be an uphill battle for Mainz to overcome a 2 goal deficit, but an early goal from Teixeira made it an impossibility. To their credit, Mainz went on the attack but this only served to open big holes in their defence, which Tranmere exploited.

Teixeira scored the first from a short corner. His celebration included a Tim Cahill corner flag punch! The second came from a Teixeira break down the left side. Stockton got on the end of his perfect cross in with a sharp volley that the Mainz keeper deflected back into the path of Richie Towell. Nathan Ake scored a freakish goal early in the second half. He speared a cross in from the deep, which Stockton tried to get on the end of. Stockton ended up being tripped up by a Mainz defender without touching the ball before it landed in the back of the net, the keeper having played for a shot by Stockton. The final goal was scored in the 89th minute by youngster Dan Cotterill, a home grown talent from the youth team who latched onto a Teixeira cross.

The lads have made it through to the quarter finals comfortably. Unfortunately Daniels will miss the first leg after picking up his third yellow card.

Next match: Tranmere v Girondins Bordeaux. Also still in the draw are Bayer Leverkusen, Inter, Napoli, Arsenal, Steaua and Dortmund. All in all I probably got the best possible chance to make it through to the semis, although I don't fancy my chances against these teams...
 
Update: Tranmere won the Johnstone Paint trophy on penalties

After mixing it two days earlier with big name Germans, Tranmere struggled against Wycombe Wanderers from Sky Bet League The game ended 0-0 after extra time, and Tranmere managed to miss a penalty before winning 0:0(4-3). Pretty ordinary effort!
 
heh awesome tactics, seriously give the ChristianEriksen tactics a try, they are brilliant.

Anyway, update from the QF first leg Girondins Bordeaux 2 Tranmere 2.

An action packed game, Tranmere missed a penalty in the first minute (hit the post), then Stockton and a Bordeaux striker exchanged goals for a 1:1 half time score. Bordeaux hit the lead in the 76th minute thanks to a terrible backpass from Ake that went straight to an unmarked striker, who had no problem scoring. A Bordeaux player was sent off in the 87th minute to set up a nailbiting finish when Stockton converted the resulting penalty to make it 2:2. Tranmere then had four good chances in quick succession, including one where the opposition keeper ran out of the penalty area to attempt a tackle on the unmarked Tranmere right winger. He missed the tackle, but the shot on an open goal was miraculously cleared by a defender. Ended up 2:2. At least Tranmere has locked in 2 away goals. We dominated the game statistically, making 19 shots to 7 and controlling 58% possession.
 
Last game before bed: QF return leg at home in Tranmere vs Girondins Bordeaux. During the week we secured promotion to the Championship with a big win over Burton. There are 11 games left to play in the season and we are on top of the table by 16 points with 6 games in hand! These players really are too good for this league, the ones on loan must have been influenced by Europe exposure.

Tranmere is quite hard to beat at home, we have a "terrible" pitch that every second manager complains about. My starting XI for this game is going to be:
STC Stockton
AML Teixeira AMR Kent back from injury (although not 100% fit so a bit of a risk)
MCL Galloway MCR Power
DM Da Silva
DL Ake DCL Sweeney DCR Daniels DR Holmes
GK fon Williams

Sweeney has come on leaps and bounds during the season, I picked him up for free from Reading in the winter and he is now ranked as a "good player for championship" with 1-2 stars left of development in him. Will be very interesting to see if he develops into a star in a couple of years.

View attachment 327448
 
First goal to Bordeaux at 15 mins, powerful strike from a corner. Bad start!
 
1-0 to Bordeaux at half time, giving them a 3-2 aggregate lead. I have given the team a real gee-up and they are all motivated and raring to get back in there.

View attachment 327444
 
Yes! Stockton scores after a goalmouth scramble in the 60th minute. 3-3 on aggregate, Tranmere has a lead on away goals!
 
Tragedy... having made all three substitutes, Teixeira needed to come off injured. Down to 10 men and Bordeaux score a messy goal in the 92nd minute. No time for a reply! We dominated the stats, but couldnt hold on in the end... the agony of getting so close! So ends the European adventure.

View attachment 327442
 
done great though to get as far as you did! now can focus on league
 
2015/16 season summary

Tranmere had another successful season in 2015/16. They will only spend one season in League 1, easily gaining promotion to the Championship. Their first trip into Europe was also a great success both for the team's reputation and finances!

Final standings
View attachment 327104
Tranmere won the league by 33 points. Pretty comfortable I'd say! Not surprisingly, we captured a few of the end of season awards.

Player of the year: Cole Stockton 28 goals, 10 assists in 34 appearances
Manager of the year: me :)
Players team of the year reps: Cole Stockton and Owain fon Williams
Stockton was pipped by one goal for the golden boot.

New division record for most team points and team goals
New division record for highest average rating: Max Power 7.85 from 32 appearances

View attachment 327105

The Tranmere select XI (in my view not the computers):
STC Cole Stockton - 63 games, 48 goals, 13 assists, 10 PotM awards and 7.4 average. A brilliant season.
AML Joao Teixeira - 58 games, 15 goals, 20 assists, 2 PotM and 7.2 average. He is a AMC by nature, easily retrained into the winger role. He has pretty good stats for a Reumdeuter as well, I might give that a try next season.
AMR Ryan Kent (Liverpool loanee) - 36 games, 11 goals 16 assists 1 PotM and 7.43 average. He was incredible in early European games in particular, scoring 4 goals in 6 games and setting up 3 more, averaging 8.2. If he had been available for the knockout we might have gotten further in!
MCL Brendan Galloway (Evertone loanee) - 57 games, 22 goals, 12 assists, 6 PotM awards and 7.65 average.
MCR Max Power - 59 games, 5 goals, 17 assists, 14 PotM awards and 7.99 average. Was not the scoring force of last season, but a much stronger contribution going from average rating.
DM Marco Da Silva - 43 games, 5 goals, 6 assists, 1 PotM award and 7.3 average. Da Silva took over from Philip Billing, who we still have on loan and also played 46 games this season. I put Da Silva in by preference for the second half of the season largely as he is a contract player rather than a loanee.
DL Nathan Ake (Chelsea loanee) - 49 games, 3 goals, 6 assists, 1 PotM and 7.3 average. Quite effective on the left.
DCL Donervon Daniels (WBA loanee) - 53 games, 6 goals, 2 assists, 4 PotM and 7.53 average. Very solid.
DCR Pierce Sweeney - 46 games, 3 goals, 1 PotM, 7.3 average. Not bad
DR Danny Holmes - 51 games, 4 assists, 7.2 average. Not so effective on the right, this position needs bolstering over summer.
GK Owain fon Williams - 76 games, conceded 58 goals with 32 clean sheets. Average 7.03.

Rotation players worth a mention:
Joaquin Torrano - generated wonderkid, played 25 games mostly off the bench to score 4 goals, set up 6 others and achieve a 72 average
Janoi Donacien - loanee from Aston Villa. Played 36 games with an average score of 7.5. Tended to get dropped for contracted players.
Jack Stacey - loanee from Reading. Played 44 games with 10 goals and 22 assists, and an average score of 7.3. He is on par with Teixeira.
Richie Towell - 45 games, 13 goals, 9 assists and 6 PotM awards. Average score 7.44. Not in the first XI only because Power and Galloway are better.

Now I am looking toward strengthening the squad for the Championship!
 
Unbelievable result there mate,to win Fa Cup with Tranmere so quick is something...Keep up :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

FMBase

Beta

Resources

Back
Top