**FRESH UPDATES** Inspired by: The road from 2nd Div. B1 to the Champions League
After reading Ronio's story: http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/f61/...ivision-b1-to-the-champions-league-t9189.html I decided to have a crack at managing Cultural y Dep. Leonesa myself. (moderators please dont merge the two threads as i dont want to undermine Ronios story, besides my career has only just begun whereas hes now in the champions league)
For those of you not familiar with Cultural (i certainly wasnt!!) they are a small club in the lowest of the spanish leagues, Spanish Second Div. B1. I'm not used to playing in Spain, let alone at this level so i knew i would have my work cut out.
As i write this first post i am half way through the first season. I aim to do a season every 1-2 days and post updates on my progress.
CLUB OVERVIEW:
I quickly set about gaining a knowledge of the club from top to bottom and spent at least half an hour just looking at my players in comparison to others in the league. I reckoned all the teams seemed fairly even, with a couple of clubs having a stand out player, usually a striker or AMC. Pace is at a premium in this league, my quickest player having pace of 14 and the quickest in the league being only 16 (hes on loan from a Belgian team though)
My facilities are average and i have a 13451 all seater, but my average crowd is more like 5000. All my players are pros, which is an advantage compared to lower league management in England. The staff seem OK-ish but i added a scout and 4 decent (for this level) coaches. i also replaced the useless asssitant manager with a Brazilian who seems half decent. Most of my training is 4 star with 3 star set pieces and 5 star goalkeeping.
There are literally zero exciting prospects in my frankly oversized B and U19 sqauds so i will not be renewing many of those contracts when they expire.
SEASON ONE:
I arrived at the club with little knowledge of this level of the Spanish game and without much cheer or expectation from the fans or the board about my arrival i quickly realised it wasnt going to be easy.
The board expect a mid table finish and give me no money or flexibility. The fans seem unconvinced by my arrival and i noticed a crowd of 12 at my first game in charge, a 4-0 friendly win over Sporting Clube Lamengo.....
I decided to exceed board expectation and go for glory. My plan is to win the division or at least gain promotion this season. Then to acclimatise for a season or 2 in Liga Adelante. Then after restructuring the squad i will push for the big time of Liga BBVA (didnt it used to be La Liga??)
I identified my biggest threats to the title as Real Union and Ferrol. I also expected the 'B' teams of bigger clubs like Deportivo, Sporting, Racing Santander and Real Sociedad to mount a challenge.
However with no transfer money (%age of transfer revenue made available was zero as well) acquiring players would be difficult. And I was already just over the wage budget of 9.8k per week. At least the club had no loans to pay back.
I decided to see who if anyone would be interested in coming to have a kickabout down at the Reino de Leon Stadium and wasnt really surprised by the results. My best signings were former Barcelona and Spanish internationals Dani and Gerard. Both brought prestige and experience to the club but did little to improve the sqaud in terms of ability. My other signings are in the screenshot. De Coz, Matej Rapnik and Alejandro Rocamora being the only players of note. All free transfers of course.
In vain i bid £0 for Saviola at Madrid and they accepted but the little tinker didnt want to come to play at 'la culturalistas' as we are known. We'll see whos laughing in a few seasons Javier...
The media and the bookies ahd no faith and tipped me for a struggle, with a mid table finish at a push. As I expected, Ferrol and Real Union were tipped to win the league.
Currently in January of season one I'm top of the league and I've suffered my first defeat of the season (after a 20 game unbeaten run) a dissapointing loss really. The fans and board are loving it. Their only gripe being my signature of striker Fabio Lemes, who may as well be called Fabio Lemon as far as they are concerned. I'm hoping his Brazilian roots shine through soon as i dont know if Dani has the stamina to last the whole season. Ive noticed that the 'B' teams of the big clubs who I expected to push me hard are really struggling, which means I've only got Ferrol, Real Union and new pretenders Ponferradina to deal with.
In the January Transfer window i secured the signature of Fernando Couto (110 Portugal caps!) to add some extra strength at the back (not that i need to stop leaking goals as the screenshots show) The guy is 39 years old but he's still one of my better defenders.
I will update when i finish the first season later tonight.
After reading Ronio's story: http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/f61/...ivision-b1-to-the-champions-league-t9189.html I decided to have a crack at managing Cultural y Dep. Leonesa myself. (moderators please dont merge the two threads as i dont want to undermine Ronios story, besides my career has only just begun whereas hes now in the champions league)
For those of you not familiar with Cultural (i certainly wasnt!!) they are a small club in the lowest of the spanish leagues, Spanish Second Div. B1. I'm not used to playing in Spain, let alone at this level so i knew i would have my work cut out.
As i write this first post i am half way through the first season. I aim to do a season every 1-2 days and post updates on my progress.
CLUB OVERVIEW:
I quickly set about gaining a knowledge of the club from top to bottom and spent at least half an hour just looking at my players in comparison to others in the league. I reckoned all the teams seemed fairly even, with a couple of clubs having a stand out player, usually a striker or AMC. Pace is at a premium in this league, my quickest player having pace of 14 and the quickest in the league being only 16 (hes on loan from a Belgian team though)
My facilities are average and i have a 13451 all seater, but my average crowd is more like 5000. All my players are pros, which is an advantage compared to lower league management in England. The staff seem OK-ish but i added a scout and 4 decent (for this level) coaches. i also replaced the useless asssitant manager with a Brazilian who seems half decent. Most of my training is 4 star with 3 star set pieces and 5 star goalkeeping.
There are literally zero exciting prospects in my frankly oversized B and U19 sqauds so i will not be renewing many of those contracts when they expire.
SEASON ONE:
I arrived at the club with little knowledge of this level of the Spanish game and without much cheer or expectation from the fans or the board about my arrival i quickly realised it wasnt going to be easy.
The board expect a mid table finish and give me no money or flexibility. The fans seem unconvinced by my arrival and i noticed a crowd of 12 at my first game in charge, a 4-0 friendly win over Sporting Clube Lamengo.....
I decided to exceed board expectation and go for glory. My plan is to win the division or at least gain promotion this season. Then to acclimatise for a season or 2 in Liga Adelante. Then after restructuring the squad i will push for the big time of Liga BBVA (didnt it used to be La Liga??)
I identified my biggest threats to the title as Real Union and Ferrol. I also expected the 'B' teams of bigger clubs like Deportivo, Sporting, Racing Santander and Real Sociedad to mount a challenge.
However with no transfer money (%age of transfer revenue made available was zero as well) acquiring players would be difficult. And I was already just over the wage budget of 9.8k per week. At least the club had no loans to pay back.
I decided to see who if anyone would be interested in coming to have a kickabout down at the Reino de Leon Stadium and wasnt really surprised by the results. My best signings were former Barcelona and Spanish internationals Dani and Gerard. Both brought prestige and experience to the club but did little to improve the sqaud in terms of ability. My other signings are in the screenshot. De Coz, Matej Rapnik and Alejandro Rocamora being the only players of note. All free transfers of course.
In vain i bid £0 for Saviola at Madrid and they accepted but the little tinker didnt want to come to play at 'la culturalistas' as we are known. We'll see whos laughing in a few seasons Javier...
The media and the bookies ahd no faith and tipped me for a struggle, with a mid table finish at a push. As I expected, Ferrol and Real Union were tipped to win the league.
Currently in January of season one I'm top of the league and I've suffered my first defeat of the season (after a 20 game unbeaten run) a dissapointing loss really. The fans and board are loving it. Their only gripe being my signature of striker Fabio Lemes, who may as well be called Fabio Lemon as far as they are concerned. I'm hoping his Brazilian roots shine through soon as i dont know if Dani has the stamina to last the whole season. Ive noticed that the 'B' teams of the big clubs who I expected to push me hard are really struggling, which means I've only got Ferrol, Real Union and new pretenders Ponferradina to deal with.
In the January Transfer window i secured the signature of Fernando Couto (110 Portugal caps!) to add some extra strength at the back (not that i need to stop leaking goals as the screenshots show) The guy is 39 years old but he's still one of my better defenders.
I will update when i finish the first season later tonight.
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