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

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About 100k - so I can lift by around 50%. A lot of players have a 30% promotion rise owing so it will be less than that - unless I dump the players that won't cut it in the EPL.
 
Getting towards the end of the season, here's a very quick summary of our last few games:

Had a difficult time away to Sunderland (4th). They played a physical game and caused 4 injuries, including one to my keeper who I couldnt take off. They ran riot and put in 3 goals with Glover hobbling around. My team underperformed too, 3:0 to Sunderland.
Scraped past Norwich 2:1, Teixeira putting away a great goal in the 85th minute to seal the win and push Norwich back to 3rd spot.
Palace in 5th needed to win matches to stay in playoffs contention. They were 1:0 up for most of the game, substitute loanee Benoist scored the equalizer in the 80th minute.

At this point my core scoring options of Towell, Galloway, Kent and Stockton were all in very poor form. I took them aside to give them a roasting. There is only 3 games left but I don't want them to drop too far. Also it will affect their chances of individual recognition in the end of season awards, which would be a pity given their performances so far. After 43 games Stockton is a pretty certain bet for golden boot with 24 goals, 6 ahead of the closest competitor. Towell has the highest average rating, with Ake and Kent also in the top 4. Da Silva has the 3rd highest PotM awards which is frankly shocking, as he hasnt started all that much

Schedule:
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Early moves on the transfer market are not promising. Made an offer for the soon-to-expire Lewis MacLeod from Rangers. He has a 4.5 star potential and would be a decent backup if we fail to get Galloway next year. He wanted 16k per week, the board is limiting me to 8.5. Uh oh. Several of my key players asked for renewals in the low 10s too, which is a problem. Looks like I'll need to scrimp on the transfers and put most of the budget into salaries, and hope for a few good loans. As I have done every other season so far!
 
In the FA Cup semis Man City beat Chelsea on penalties, and Liverpool beat Man U 2:1.
 
Last three games:

We held off Bolton to win 2:1 at home. Da Silva asked for a renewed contract, 19.5k wages. I adjusted the budget, the low amount is definitely not going to work. I managed to knock him to 15k, but the transfer budget is now 10M...
Drew 2:2 to Leeds. I made a full rotation before this game, pretty much playing the U18s. They did ok.
Final game, away to Derby. They played well but we hung on for a 2:1 win. I gave the first choice players a run in this one, I figured it was the last time many of the loan player would get a run in a Tranmere shirt.

Our U21s side won their division as well, which is nice.
 
During a break at the end of season party, someone tinkles a glass and asks me to say a few words.

"Hooray for Tranmere!" I cry, leading to a cheer that lasts for some time. "We did it! Top of the table, Premier League awaits. You guys did yourselves proud this season. Remember the fans roaring as we came home after that last game. Champions! The club has never achieved more, and the fans, the board and I love you all for it!"

Another cheer.

"What next boss?" fon Williams asks. "What's your plan for the next season?"

"Well Owain, with the right strengthening to the squad I know we can stay up. We're going to build towards a mid-table finish in 2 years, and then maybe challenge for Europe spots the year after. I am confident we have it in us. What about you?"

Another roar of approval. Ake chimes in "staying up is a huge challenge, but one I know this squad is capable of". That's the spirit, and I see Steve taking notes for his discussions with Chelsea later this month. The lad loves playing here, and we'd love to keep him. Galloway is next to speak. "Yes, and with new players the squad will be even stronger, which will take us to greater heights next season!". Another good sign. Coppell is delighted! If we keep Ake and Galloway I'll be very happy. Billing is also off contract at the end of June, but for some quirky reason my phone is incapable of dialling his agent since he is currently under contract with us. I really want to do a deal to keep him now, and the fact that he hasnt signed again for Huddersfield is promising. He's looking happy and content to be here too.

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End of season awards.

After a dominant season in the Championship you would expect Tranmere to dominate the awards... let's see how they did.

Top goalscorer: Cole Stockton
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Young player of the year... Ryan Kent, Tranmere (on loan from Liverpool)
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Manager of the year - me :)

Player's team of the year:
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GK - Ruddy (Norwich)
DL - Parr (Burnley)
DCL - Vergini (Sunderland)
DCR - Ake (Tranmere, loan from Chelsea) Yay!
DR - Trippler (Burnley)
ML - Johnson (Sunderland)
MCL - Young (Fulham)
MCR - Towell (Tranmere) Yay!
MR - Sperdutti (Wigan)
STL - Wells (Huddersfield)
STR - Stockton (Tranmere) Yay!

subs
fon Williams (Tranmere) yay
Galloway (Tranmere) yay
Redmond (Norwich)
Kent (Tranmere) Yay
Mahoney (Blackburn)
Juanfran (Watford)
Woodrow (Fulham)

3 in the team and 3 subs, excellent.

Player of the year: Johnson (Sunderland) - boo! Appearances 34, goals 11, assists 17, rating 7.41. Ok that's pretty good.

Goal of the season: Johnson (Sunderland)
 
Fantastic to get 6 players in the team of the year.
It is a pitty you didnt get player of the year though,

Who else went up with you?
Are you moving all of your tb to wages? Seems to be alot more decent free transfers in this years fm every year
 
Would be really interesting to see a whole period with a focus on transfers for the team. How to solve the economic part and which players are attempting to sign for you now when ur gonna play BPL.


I would recommend that you check the left back Sean Kavanagh (Fulham) and Luke Garbut (Everton). Really good players at left back. And might be good choices for u, low wages.


Take a look at Ryan Mason also, Think he is avaible cheap. But no clue if he is good enough for u!

Anyway, brilliant storie! And sorry for my poor english ;)
 
Link to the tactics downloads is on this post:
http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/shar...ianeriksen-beautiful-play-15.html#post2334585

I assume the downloads are still available. I was using v5 all season. I didnt change the instructions but if I am losing I sometimes change to an overload mentality, and if I want to protect a lead sometimes I change the tempo to low. Umm I dont really remember any other tactics tweaks that I did apart from that. I used an AF striker but it seems to work well with other roles, depends more on your striker than the tactic I think.

I had a lot of success with v5 but have just updated to the latest version each season. v10 is working well this year after a slight stumble in trying to work out how to make the players actually try and score.

Thanks mate Ive found them I you ever use v5.1 aswell 5v ??? Well again
 
I'll check these guys out. The U20 World Cup is on in June 2017, I'm using this as an opportunity to identify young talent, will keep you posted.
 
Some interesting candidates from the U20 world cup

DR:
Mandelo Egbo, Crystal Palace
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Already fast, good positioning and tackling, ok dribbling and crossing, and my scouts give him a 4 star + 1 black star potential... would be a good signing but he's apparently "not interested".

DL
Andrew Blinkhorn, Bristol
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Not as quick, but excellent tackling, marking and stamina. I had noticed this guy before. Another interesting prospect

Moussa Camara, Montpellier
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Fast! So fast! Excellent across the board. He is left footed only

ST:
Pat Collis, Chelsea
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Fast, excellent dribbling and off the ball skills, decent finishing (but needs work there), and good tackling?! Another that my scouts had previously flagged. He may be available on loan, and only has 12 months on contract... I might put in an offer.

Frederic Kamel - OM
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I already identified this target when looking through the French youth teams earlier - definitely worthwhile. He already has 17 finishing, is super fast, tall and with good heading/reach/agility - would love to have him. His contract runs to 2020 though... and he is valued at 5m, OM wants 78m. Seriously! He is not available on loan either. A few other French youngsters are equally appealing, but also unavailable and "not interested in joining" - Coulibaly, Diaby. I think the computer is still looking at the loans as potentially playing in the Championship, so I will try again in a few weeks when we are flagged as an EPL team.

Hugo Carabali - Colombia U20s.
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Looks awesome - and as you can see from the screenshot, he was available on a free and I picked him up! Well for January next year. Pace is a total unknown but that finishing is fantastic, good first touch, passing and stamina. For some reason I "could not afford to scout" even though he is currently in the Czech Republic at the World Cup, seems a bug in the game that I can't scout that competition even though it is in my range. I think he is worth the gamble - for free, and at 170 pounds per week there's no real risk.

Will keep looking but happy with that first pickup. I still need to strengthen DR.

Oh I also extended Kent, Ake and Galloway with no trouble. I'm in two minds about Billing, I was wrong about his expiry it's in 2018. I will hope to extend him too but at the moment his owners (Huddersfield) think we'll be rivals in the Championship next season so are refusing the loan.
 
Thanks mate Ive found them I you ever use v5.1 aswell 5v ??? Well again

No I never used v5.1. 5.1 is for teams that play the long ball, of which you get plenty in the lower divisions, but I didnt seem vulnerable to it anyway. I trained in it just in case anyway
 
I would recommend that you check the left back Sean Kavanagh (Fulham) and Luke Garbut (Everton) ... Ryan Mason

I have sent scouts to check out Mason and Garbut. Kavanagh is "not a worthwhile signing" according to my head scout. I think all these guys will need to be ready for the first team now, they are 23-24 so are a bit too old to take on as a development option. I still have Barbosa on loan for next season at this stage, he has a decent rating and should mature during the season. And Ake as well, he's awesome at left back, DM and DC - a brilliant defender all round. He is off contract at the end of next season, with any luck I'll be able to grab him before he renews his contract.
 
News - Tranmere is ranked 55th in European teams on "club coefficients" (whatever that is) after our efforts over the last three seasons. It was 15/16 that put us there - playing in the Euros (and going well) is worth a lot more than doing well in domestic comps.

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So winning League 2 and the FA Cup in 14/15 was worth 4.3 points, winning League 1 and getting through to the 2nd knockout in the Euros in 15/16 was worth 24 points, getting to the 6th round of the FA Cup and winning the Championship in 16/17 was worth 4.1 points (so the difference between League 2 and the Championship is a bit less than the difference between being in the last 8 and winning the FA Cup).

Other English team rankings in the top 100:

2 Chelsea
7 Man City
10 Arsenal
13 Spurs
15 Man U
17 Liverpool
39 Newcastle
48 QPR
55 Tranmere :)
72 Everton - we are ranked above our neighbours!
73 Hull
79 Swansea
84 Wigan
100 Derby
 
Who else went up with you?
Are you moving all of your tb to wages? Seems to be alot more decent free transfers in this years fm every year

Fulham and Norwich were the other promotions. And yes I probably will need to do this. At the moment I've shifted half across just in case, but the way the game works you have to pay a lot to get decent players! I will look to see who gets offloaded on 1 July, and have sent out offers for trial to pretty much every player at the U20 World Cup!
 
I've locked the backroom team in the board room to discuss transfer options and targets for the next season.

"OK here's the situation", I start with, "we are in the Premier League, and we're here to stay. I know we're all agreed on that. Now it's time to go through every position in the team, and consider our options. I want to consider our whole squad, not just the first team, and I'm looking to each of you to advise who is our first XI this year, and who we have as the current backup. We need to be brutal - some of these guys started with us in League 2, and that's probably where they should be. We can't afford to be carrying dead weight in the Premier League. So unless someone is in the plans for the first XI this year, or is a development option, we will consider cutting them. We'll also need to go through our weakest positions to work out where the squad needs strengthening. Finally, as you all are aware by the dozens of new faces around, I personally scoured the squad lists for the U20 World Cup and have invited many players for trials. I wanted to get them here to have a close look at them, and frankly we couldnt afford to scout lots of them! Once we've identified the gaps, I want you to consider the triallists and recent scouting reports to help me identify the right players to fill them."

Steve Coppell backs me up. "Once we've identified the targets, the gaffer and I will start signing new players. You can see he already managed to pick up one of the stars of the youth cup, I think that young Colombian will be a good prospect. Provided we get a work permit, you know how tricky immigration can be about these things! If we all work together, we'll build a squad to last".

"Right," I say. "Are all your coffee cups full? Strap in, because this is going to be a marathon. We might need to break, just let me know if you need to."

First up - goalkeeper. Dave, what's your take?"

Dave Timmins, goalkeeping coach, speaks up. "fon Williams is already at Premier League standards I reckon. We have young Thomas Glover as backup and long term option - he'll be ready for the first team in 2 years time probably. I think we're solid here."
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"Great. Phil, you are the youth development guru. Do you agree with Dave on Glover?"

"Well, Glover is already at Championship level as we saw at the end of last season - he fared well in some tough games. He has plenty of development left in him at 19. Yes I agree although we might have a gap if fon Williams gets injured again - I don't think Glover is ready to be #1 yet". hmm, food for thought. "So you're saying if a stopgap comes up for free we should get them as a backup?" Steve asks. "Yes, I think that would be wise if we have the salary for it. But they would mostly be on the bench so you should make sure they are professional enough to be happy with that."

"OK guys, thanks - Steve can you make a note for us to look into that during the July free transfer chaos".
 
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"Moving on then, what about our wide defenders. We've been weak here so I'm already looking out particularly on the right. Julian, give us your thoughts."

"OK boss, here's my list for everyone to have a look at."
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I see you've extended the loans for Ake and Barbosa, they are good for the moment. I think Barbosa is almost ready to be the first choice, although I need to keep working with him on marking - we saw how easily Hazard lost him in the Cup. So we should be fine this year. Young Skokic is a good long term option I think, he will be Premier League quality soon enough. I think the strategy should be to use Barbosa this year, and Skokic as backup looking to bring him into the team from next year. We might need a fallback next year but the loans should have us covered for this season."

"Excellent news. Phil, your thoughts on Skokic's potential? We have a few youngsters here - should we be looking to drop some off the lists?"

"In my view Skokic is not up to Premier League standards this year - we will be very vulnerable on the left if he is in the team. But he has the potential to be better than either Barbosa or Ake, even though those two are still developing. Yes he will be a good option in 2 or 3 years time but we will likely need a backup next year too. I would like to keep him here rather than sending him out on loan for development though, I find that we bring on the players much better in house than if they are on loan."

"In terms of the long list of others, I'd say Knudsen is worth keeping as a long term backup to Skokic, and maybe to develop into a centre back. Dan Dickinson has work permit problems and is in Croatian limbo at the moment. He's not really worth the effort in my view, best to sell him off now. Smith Tiesse is also not worth extending."

"OK. So to summarise, we are set for three years time, providing Skokic and Knudsen continue to develop well. And we are ok this year with Ake and Barbosa. But it might be worth looking for a player to fill the gap to Skokic being ready. Steve - make a note that this is a lower priority target, but we should keep an eye out for free players that fit the mould - say mid 20s, decent skill levels but ok if they are not going to be a star. What about the right, Julian?"

"If you could all flick on to the report for that side you'll see we have a problem here."
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It was a good option to train Donacien up as a fullback, he has adapted to the role well and is a decent backup player. But he is not really Premiership level in my view, more a Championship player. I know you just extended his contract - but I am not sure that was wise. I guess we don't have any other options right now."

I grimace at the suggestion that I've made a mistake, but I appreciate the honesty. I don't want yes men, I want these guys to give it to me straight. And yes I think I did act hastily in giving Donacien a pay rise. Sentimentality is a killer in this business.

"Anyway, we still have Sweeney as a loan and I notice you didnt ask to get him extended. I think that's the right option - he'll be a good player in a few years, but he's not ready to play at this level right now. We still have Holmes, he should go really, he is a League 1 level player in my view, and we didnt use him much at all last year. Our young term option is Svatopluk Bocek, that kid we got for free a couple of years ago. He is not bad, but I dont envisage him being a star at this level, maybe he will get to at best "decent" in a couple of years. We desparately need both a short and long term option in this position".

"OK, that matches what I was thinking. Phil - Bocek good enough for more development, or not?"

"Well with due respect to Julian, I see a bit more in the lad than he does. He will get to a good Premier League standard in a few years, definitely worth keeping around. He is nowhere near ready for Premier League, we already spoke about the risk you were taking giving him some game time last year. Young De Bonis also has good potential, but I'm less certain about him, it could go either way at this stage. We've also got Jamie Webber who came up through our youth network a couple of year ago. He will never make Premier League standard but might be worth keeping as a backup - perhaps farm him out to a lower division side at this stage."

I am a little surprised by this assessment of the youngsters. I knew we were taking a big risk playing Bocek last year, he didnt even have a one star rating at that stage. But it did help his development, and Phil is now talking up his potential. That's a good sign for a few years time, but we are in trouble right now.

"OK. Steve, are you getting this? We need either a loaner or a decent player that can play fullback for us for a few years. Let's hope one lands on our doorstep because we can't afford much in transfers!"
 
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