djchapsticks Posted March 7, 2022 Author Share Posted March 7, 2022 Bit of a bumper update as truth be told, I completely forgot to post! Fired through another two months of fixtures, which in Thai standards, is a lot - April was jam packed. I meant to do a side post for the Buriram match but forgot. Either way, a tremendous win and aside from two draws, the form has been top notch. So surely we're now on top right? NOPE! Aside from their slip up to us, Buriram have been absolutely perfect and I still find myself four points behind. Suphanburi were tucked right up behind me but since meeting us, have drawn 1 and lost 4, so they are out of the running. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 9, 2022 Author Share Posted March 9, 2022 June 2029 Another relatively straightforward month. 5 games, 5 wins. We're on a cracking run of form. How did Buriram get on? Oaft, not good at all for them but brilliant for us! Also shows the strength of them that they pushed Bayern all the way in the CWC. Yes this is a pre-season tournament for Bayern but still. Another goal against Huachipato and they'd have been sending the Germans home early. We've opened up a gap now and Buriram have a game in hand plus we travel to them in mid-July so it's still very much all to play for. June transfer window also saw 3 new faces plus loan backs for two of my players who were sold (Leroux had his 700k release clause met by both Newcastle and Arsenal - good to see players from places like New Caledonia getting their big moves in this database!) Srirat is very decent at only 17 and will hopefully get better with game time. Spoiler Yooyen - Pretty much the same. Nowhere near my best midfielder for now but he'll improve in time. Spoiler Parachart - Brought in because he was a) Thai and b) a good replacement for losing two of my foreign centre halves (before I was offered them on a loan back). Spoiler He was my 2nd choice to be fair, I lost out on this lad to Porto. Spoiler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 10, 2022 Author Share Posted March 10, 2022 So with 7 games to go, we are two points ahead of Buriram and travelling to our closest rivals. A draw keeps us ahead, a win likely takes us out of sight. I'm missing Gutierrez who is still at the Gold Cup and Kebela who has had an injury hit season. Anything we can scrape would be ideal... Spoiler What....the....fuck? I know we're a good side but we've just went in dry on one of the top sides in not only Thailand, but the whole of Asia. I don't think we're blowing it from here... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 15, 2022 Author Share Posted March 15, 2022 End of season 2029 Well after the Buriram win it was more or less a victory march to the title for Port. We never dropped another point en route to a first championship win. Comfortable champions in the end - that mid-season wobble put paid to Buriram and they never recovered. In the Thai League cup, we hard a much harder time of it against Buriram but once they were gone, it was plain sailing with 17 year old Iamsa-Ard more or less ragdolling Nakhom by himself. Boy's going to be player. Over on the Ivory Coast front, well the WC qualifiers had already gotten underway before I joined with two wins from two. I just had to negotiate my way through a straightforward group to take the side to a first World Cup in 16 years. Totally drama-free. So there's only one thing left to do. The season may be finished domestically. But not in the AFC CL.... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 15, 2022 Author Share Posted March 15, 2022 (edited) Spoiler 2nd Round - Melbourne City KO Games in Asia appear to be single leg encounters. So I had advantage of the home tie against Melbourne. They took the lead right away and had us under pressure to the point where I was happy to get in level. But we blew them away in the second half. Spoiler Quarter final threw up.... Ah, my old mates. So onto the first half.... A total non-event. Nerves clearly getting the better of a few on each side. Second half and the ref points to the spot for a clear shove on Keleba - pentality! He fires it away and then in a typical summary of the season he's had, hurts himself a few minutes later. The rest of the 90 plus 5 added minutes passed without any incident. Until the 90+6th added minute (which wasn't actually added at all). MASSIVE equaliser for Buriram and a pain in the arse for us. We should have seen it out but didn't. We're going for another 30. 1st half of extra-time, we skelped the inside of the post and then.... f**k....15 minutes to save the season. Can we do it? Spoiler Nope. Devastating. We've pumped them all season and then shat the bed at the moment that mattered most. The AFC CL dream ends in tatters Spoiler This spoiler is to kid you on that I made it to the Semis. I didn't really. Spoiler Final isn't for another month. This is just another spoiler to throw you off the scent Edited March 15, 2022 by djchapsticks 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 16, 2022 Author Share Posted March 16, 2022 Season 2030 So after a bit of humming and hawing, I decided not to take Port up on their offer of a new 3 year deal. I was tempted to hang about but we've lost our 2 best players to Newcastle and Braga and no-one is really willing to sign on without a ludicrous minimum release clause. Two jobs in particular came up that interested for different reasons. Henan, who were just relegated from the CSL and were all for bouncing straight back up. A £52m transfer budget and £2.2m wage budget was offered up to the manager in place to do that. Jeonbuk in the K-League had a strong, strong run in the top two positions of the league before falling to 5th and out of the ACL places last season. In the end, both approached me and I plumped for... Spoiler The money on offer in China for a budget was huge but in the CSL1, there is a 2 foreign player rule and Henan had about 8 foreign players in the squad. It just didn't strike me as a lot of fun. Jeonbuk is a genuinely interesting one and truth be told, I want that AFC CL win ASAP to move over to Central America or Africa. I can get it here in 2 seasons 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 16, 2022 Author Share Posted March 16, 2022 So on we move to South Korea - One of Asian football's powerhouses. Numerous World Cup appearances, one 4th placed finish (however dodgy it might have been) and two (3 in game) AFC Nations cup wins. Owned by Hyundai, Jeonbuk are from the city of Jeonju (which literally means Perfect region) and are one of Korean football's biggest success stories. Their home games take place in the 42,000 seater Jeonju stadium which hosted 2 group games and a round of 16 match at the 2002 World Cup as well as the 2011 AFC CL final. The club is a 9 time (11 in current game) K-League winner and 2 x AFC CL winner. So there is plenty of pedigree there. A shite season last year sees no continental football for the first time in many years so my first point of order is to bring a bit of domestic success back. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 16, 2022 Author Share Posted March 16, 2022 As an aside before pre-season comings and goings, we have some, erm....International duty? I had no idea I was also in charge of Ivory Coast's B team and we qualified for the CHAN (Championship of African Nations) which hilariously is an international competition for B teams in Africa where all players in the squad must be based domestically. Here's my group: Luckily, ASEC Mimosas are one of the best sides in Africa (and definitely on my list for managing when I get to the continent) so 13/25 of the squad is made up of ASEC players. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 18, 2022 Author Share Posted March 18, 2022 2030 Championship of African Nations: No need for spoilers or anything here, this is quite literally a B level tournament but is just out there enough to be interesting. Long and short of it. 3rd place overall. South Africa, with the strongest domestic division in Africa, were better than us and won out in the end. No drama. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 2030 Pre season Alrighty. Came into the club and first thing I noticed was a full complement of foreign players. Only one of whom was any good. The rest were old, shite or both and I set about cleaning them out. Juninho was already gone - and not a foreigner as he's naturalised South Korean, as is Kunimoto. Forss is decent enough but now 30. Had to go and free up space. Hardani, 31, 5 Iranian caps and a full back. Not what I'm needed. Akolo, ancient and stuck in reserves. Miya, 32 year old Uganda AMC. Got nearly £1m so not bad. That left me with one foreign player who didn't hold South Korean nationality, Ivorian CM, Mo Diomande. Spoiler As for on the way in... Phan Thanh Phong - Vietnamese striker from Sparta Prague who is very good indeed. No obvious glaring weakness in his stats. Spoiler Keleba follows me over from Port after a bit of an injury prone season. However it should be mentioned he still performed amazingly when he did start. 16 games last season, 14 goals, 11 assists and an 8.01 rating from AMR. He's a talent - had an 800k release clause that I met more or less straight away. Spoiler Kim Jae Joon - Spent many years with Ulsan before moving to Milan. 10 league games in 2 years left him on the loan list and rather than trying to pull in a loan, I just chanced my arm and was surprised that I got him! Spoiler Thongkaew also joined from Port, there were better RBs available but none with Korean nationality or 2nd nationality as the case is here, so signing him was a bit of a no-brainer. Spoiler Sang Min and Radenovic are a backup keeper and young striker respectively. Neither will be playing much. Ivanovic is a young Aussie centre half who is already going to be my first choice. Just an all round impressive addition. Spoiler Inderberg - At £5m (£2m this season and 3 x £1m over next 3 seasons), this lad represents a large outlay but in my defence, he looks a wee bit special. No real glaring weakness in his stats at just 18, he is only going to get better and better. Spoiler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CaspianChris Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 Should send some of those pensioners St Mirrens way 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 21, 2022 Author Share Posted March 21, 2022 Can we please take just a moment to appreciate the fact that there are two Motherwell players making up the top 3 NxGn players in 2030? One isn't even on loan either (but has signed a PCA with Spurs). Oh and St. Mirren player (on loan from Rangers) as well. 2030 is a strange world. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 21, 2022 Author Share Posted March 21, 2022 March 2030 The season started with a mixed bag of an opener. The 3-3 draw, despite a 90th minute equaliser for us was ridiculous. Seongnam ended up with something like 3 shots and 3 goals with an xG of about 0.31 or something. Was raging. The Gangwon defeat came from nothing as well as we'd looked like we were starting to settle and Suwon are the champions and our biggest rival so won't complain too much about the draw. There's no immediately obviously shite teams in the K-League so it's going to be pretty tighht. I also started the AFCON qualifying with Ivory Coast in quite routine fashion. No dramas whatsoever, we'll qualify without any problems. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 22, 2022 Author Share Posted March 22, 2022 April 2030 A decent month. We're prone though to having a stinker and it's going to cost us the league this season. Keleba and Inderberg unsurprisingly are the star men so far. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 22, 2022 Author Share Posted March 22, 2022 (edited) May 2030 The last full month of fixtures before signing off for a mid season break for the World Cup in Spain. Important that we don't lose any more ground in the title race. Dropping points to Ulsan and Busan was the most painful, both are significantly worse than we are and we were 2-0 up on Busan at home after 4 minutes and still couldn't beat them. But lose ground we did. One of the worst overall months I think I've had in this save, only rescued by two convincing wins at the end. Over half way and 9 points back, we'll be doing well to get Pohang reeled back in. We also had one last match in June to sign off on before the break. Suwon away - it's a big one. And we're going it without Inderberg or Ivanovic who have been pulled into their World Cup squads a week earlier than the other 8 players I have travelling. How did we get on? Spoiler Oooft... Edited March 22, 2022 by djchapsticks 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 23, 2022 Author Share Posted March 23, 2022 World Cup 2030 We go into the Centenary edition of the greatest tournament of them all with a couple of good wins against strong European opposition at our back. We'll need to go some to make any sort of history as Senegal made it to the 2022 final where they fell at the final hurdle against Italy but a run to the quarters would be a successful showing. First group game is Norway. Anything here leaves us in a good position to qualify as Thailand is my other group match. Spoiler Happy with that. Despite us missing a penalty, Norway were the better side and Haaland should have had at least a couple where he missed one on ones so I'll cut and run with a point. 2nd group game vs Thailand Spoiler Ooft, a rollercoaster, I just couldn't shake Thailand at all and they gave me a few scares. We secured passage to 2nd round safely in the end though. Spoiler So the path is clear. The route to the Quarters goes through 2022 finalists Senegal and despite what the graphic says, the winner of Canada vs Uruguay. Spoiler Second Round They scored early on and it was rightly chopped off for being offside and afterwards, we just hounded them, especially in a 10 minute first half spell. We go on to meet Uruguay who leathered Canada. Spoiler Third Round Wow. All over them from first minute to 85th and the 5-1 scoreline definitely didn't flatter us at all. Then in last 5 minutes they decided to ramp it up and really should have pegged us back to 5-4 after missing a sitter on 91 mins. Anyway...Onto the quarters we go! This has probably been the kindest run I could have conceivably hoped for. Spoiler Quarter final: Or not. Ukraine deserved to go through. But I had a run in mind and achieved that, so happy with the showing. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrman2011 Posted March 23, 2022 Share Posted March 23, 2022 Good work. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oneteaminglasgow Posted March 23, 2022 Share Posted March 23, 2022 Who won the World Cup in the end? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 23, 2022 Author Share Posted March 23, 2022 Not been played yet as I'm right back into the League season. Argentina vs Brazil 3rd placed playoff and Ukraine vs Portugal final still to come. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 23, 2022 Author Share Posted March 23, 2022 Portugal beat Ukraine 3-1 in the final. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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