Playing as Platanias [2028/29]

 Job Offers

I holidayed for a bit and applied for as many jobs as possible. I got quite a few offers but only some really stand out.

Udinese, Ascoli, Sampdoria, Blackpool, Zaragoza.

All apart from Blackpool were in or had at the end of the season been relegated to the second tier. Blackpool were a level below in league 1. All apart from Blackpool were pretty much spent financially and had small transfer budgets and wage budgets with no real room in them. Blackpool had a whopping £2.6m to spend plus about £10k spare in the wage budget.

They were all tempting but I held off on accepting them. They would all be high pressure in that they'd all expected promotion but with limited resources (apart from Blackpool). Success wouldn't be met with much fan fare and failure would be punished pretty quickly. That on it's own wasn't too bad but they all had recent (ish) history of top flight or cup success. I wouldn't be reshaping them I'd just be returning them. I'd also been burnt the last time I'd taken over a team in a similar position (Leeds).

I held on until...

Recently promoted to the Greek Superleague, little history silverware wise. A big gap in the wage budget and some money to spend (in a league that some players wouldn't probably come to).

I delved a bit further (wiki to the rescue) and found the team was based on the Island of Crete. This added another incentive. I could become the main power on the island and then beat the mainland. Admitted there weren't a great deal of teams to beat on Crete but I liked the flavour it would give to the game. I'd had a similar job in a previous save where I'd taken over Maritimo in Portugal. To be dominant there I'd had to beat the other Madeira team and become the power

Added to this was the fact that since 2013 only 2 teams had won the title in Greece - Panathinaikos and Olympiakos. There was a monopoly to be broken.

So I accepted.

Small stadium of 3.5k probably meant we wouldn't be making much money, and would have to sink cash into a new stadium before long but that would all be part of the club development. Same with the facilities. I did managed to get them to upgrade the coaching and recruitment after a few weeks at the club though but they were still quite low.

Expectations wise I was predicted 13th and the board wanted midtable. After looking at the standard of the players in the team and standard elsewhere it became apparent that this would be a complete rebuild job. I needed a new starting 11.

Transfers

Goal and Defence

First up with have Lehman as our keeper. He came well recommended and the name is kind of reassuring.

[Pic to come - check next update. I forgot to take one initially]

For the wingback positions I brought in Fassi and Abbes. Both aren't great defensively to be honest. The tackling leaves a lot to be desired but would do well. Fassi certainly. Abbes might need replacing next season.

For the back three I brought in 5 possible players: Marengo, Courtoglou, Baltimas, Philippe & Helmer. I had high hopes for all of them really but my starting 3 would probably be Helmer, Philppe and then Marengo as the limited defender. I think they all have the potential to develop quite well, and as only Courtoglou and Baltimas came with a transfer fee it's quite a cheap back line. Or in other words a back line full of profit.

 [Pic to come for Marengo - check next update. I forgot to take one initially. That's what happens when you sign an entire team in one go!]


Midfield

For the BWN and DLP roles I brought in 4 players: Heese, Larsson, Thoniatis and Carrera. Thoniatis cost £375k but I had a feeling he would be worth the outlay. The others all came in on a free. Larsson would be there as back up and for a little bit of experience. I didn't expected him to stay much beyond next season, he'd be replaced by a younger player.

Santi Carrera I originally looked at because his name reminded me of Santi Carzola. Different player and standard entirely but I was glad I looked at him. I think he'll be a good ball winner in the future. Heese again looked like one for the future too.

At the moment it looked like a first choice of Carrera and Thoniatis for BWN and DLP respectively.

For the two AMC slots (IF and T) I brought in 2 players. Tavima and the extravagantly named Pedro Fernandez de los Riscos. Tavima looked a bargain at only £60k.

Attack

3 players this time which would be more than enough when playing one up front, but left us a little light when we wanted to switch to two but at this point funds were getting tight. There was another striker I wanted as first choice from China but it would have taken almost £900k to get them and I just couldn't manage it.

Instead I got Villia, Fengqi and Skarlatos. I had to pay a fee for each of them but the most expensive only came in at £160k. Villia and Fengqi with a bit of training would also be able to act as cover for the AMC roles.

My first choice here was likely going to be Fengqi despite his low finishing. Skarlatos would be making his appearances from the bench or in the cup. Villia would get rotated in and gradually developed.



Tactics

I felt fairly confident that we could do well enough (meet expectations at least) with the players we had. I just needed to make sure the tactics would suit. I decided I wanted in the long run to be able to play 3 different formations but in the short term I'd only really have the players/flexibility for 2.

I decided I would use my 32221 (or 541 depending on how you look at it) or my 4312. Both would be counterattacking initially and would try and play on the fact that as a relative underdog teams would be attacking me. So I could catch them on the break.

I would start with the 32221 and then ease into the other tactic for cup games or against smaller teams once the players were comfortable with it. It would give me some tactical flexibility without demanding a bigger or more talented squad. Next season all things being well I'd bring in some youth wingers/AML&R to allow me to play a  41221 at times.

The Season

So I was fairly confident of getting midtable but there were some potential issues I could see already.

1) Lots of new players - We had a new starting eleven and then some. That many new players will throw the team cohesion out completely and will take a while to actually mesh. I needed them to do this sooner rather than later. If it took too long then we'd find ourselves at the wrong end of the table.

2) Lots of different languages - A knock on effect of point 1 really. We had quite a few different nationalities so there was a language issue. Greek, Spanish, Italian, German, Polish, Chinese and French all in the first team. Some players had more than one which would help and everyone, aside from Fengqi had another team mate from the same country or who spoke the same language.

3) All spent up - All my transfer budget was gone and I didn't have much room left in the wage budget. If I needed another player I might be able to squeeze one in or break the budget slightly but that would be it. I had to hope that the team would be good enough, and injury free enough. I had back up players in the form of the Greek players already there but they weren't great.

I was happy though and I'm looking forward to the adventure at Platanias!

Oh... and as is tradition I thought I'd make some kits for them.

Home

Away

3rd Kit

No sponsors as I thought I'd leave that off until they get a new sponsorship deal. In the meantime I'll just assume that due to the harsh economic climate they are sponsorless.

Time to plan revenge [2024]

I was fuming after the sacking. I still am really. Not fuming in a "THE GAME IS BUGGED" way but just in a why would the board do that to me way? I didn't get promotion but I was all set for the next season. My young players had a season of experience under their collective belts. I had another 5 coming in to strengthen the weaker areas of the squad, and the board had just agreed to improve the junior coaching. Things were looking good.

I also had players there I liked. I'd gotten complete immersed in the game their and was irritated that I wouldn't get to see Stahl, Sundberg and the like progress under my guidance.

I was so mad that I actually wanted to stay in the division. Teams in Denmark and Norway were flattered by my apparent interest, as were teams in the Swedish Elite division but I help on for a team in the First Division North. Not very logical but potentially deeply satisfying.

And an offer came in...

I'd played against them a lot as 'Tuna City and I remember always looking at their youth intake for players to poach. More importantly though they were in the same division. I'd get to try and exact some revenge on the club that had, I feel, unfairly sacked me (something I stressed with expletives in the Vasteras SK press conference!).


How were they set?

Not too bad. They didn't have the same capital or wage budget as Degerfors though and had finished much lower.

Resources were scarcer, expectations were lower and the squad much smaller.


All that meant though was that I'd be able to build without as much pressure.


Tactically I decided that I would go with the same tactic as the one I'd used with Degerfors. I'd shown it could work, I'd tweaked it and it seem well suited for this level. Plus I wanted to do well with it to show them what they were missing. My replacement would undoubtedly be much more conservative tactically than I.

Recruitment

What did I need? Well wingbacks and plenty of midfielders. I actually recruited around 15 players but I'm just briefly covering the key ones.

Defence

Asberg and Jeppsson would sort out my wingback issues, and my youth and reserve players would provide back up. Jeppsson looked solid, though nothing special, and Asberg had been my youth backup at Degerfors. I had rotated him in occasionally and although he wasn't yet as good as the likes of Wallinder or Engstrom he did do well enough.

I did try and get Wallinder. My replacement shipped a lot of players out. I missed out though as despite offering Wallinder as much as I possibly could to join me for a 3rd time he decided to go to a Swedish Premier side. Understandable.

I also added Rahmanovic and Dalla Valle. My scouts thought reasonably highly of them and they would at the very least bolster my defence.

In an odd buggy glitchy twist I also tried to sign Blomme from Degerfors as a player/coach. He accepted and appeared on my squad screen....but when I clicked on him he was still down as as Degerfors player. I couldn't play him in any of my games and later in the season when he got fined by Degerfors I got asked about it. Weird and annoying but not a game breaker.

Midfield

Vasteras already had some promising midfielders. Not quite Stahl but in a similar mold. But they needed more. If you have a formation with 4 midfielders then you really need at least 8 in the team to provide cover and rotation. So I started signing.

Hamdi Al-Sheikh Al-Azhar had an amazing name and the scouts rated him. I imagined him being Stahl 2.0. Ali Khalaf was a bit of gamble but if he did well I had a feeling he would do really really well. A less risky singing was Hammenskog who would slot straight into that ball winning role. Bjorklund was then there for the Treq role and emergency cover upfront if things ever got dire.

Attack

We already had one player who looked half decent up front, and with only one striker in the squad I didn't need to recruit too heavily. Broberg was a player I'd almost signed for Degerfors. Biladama had experience at a higher level and would hopefully rotate.


The Season/Expectations

The board want mid table. The media think 8th. I'm of course hoping for more but I don't think things will be as smooth as last season. Anything above 6th I'll be happy with, above 3rd I'll be over the moon. Or alternatively finishing above Degerfors would do me, even if we both ended up relegated.

It's not enough that I succeed, they must fail also.

Houston we have a problem [2021]

I couldn't resist the title.

It didn't take long. I settled down into getting Aberdeen ready for the next season. Relegating players to the reserves and the unwanted list....saying no to an agent offer for Liam Polworth for the umpteenth time... and then I saw that the Houston job was open in the MLS. I express some interest and after initially laughing it off they then offer me the job. Cunning bastards, the Aberdeen board never saw it coming.

And whats the situation with Houston....oh...they're bottom...

And what makes it worse is that they were previously champions. They won it the year before so they have had a definite fall from grace.

I think there's enough there to work with. I just need to get to grips with the rules, and the transfer system, and get my staff set up, and get an assistant and...well a lot before the next match against Chivas!

The infrastructure is fairly good though and I think it'll be an interesting challenge. The US always seems to have quite fair and competitive leagues/competitions, at least as an outsider, so I think building a dynasty here will be harder but much more rewarding.

To the 'Dons [2019/20]

On to the next chapter. Hopefully a more successful one than I had with Leeds. That managerial jaunt has left me a little bitter. Mark my words, if I come up against Leeds in any competition now I will make the suffer.

Moving on...I got one job offer and one news item suggesting some interest. I didn't want to wait to see about the second offer so I bit the hand of the Aberdeen chairman off when the offer came in.

I'd wanted to manage in Scotland and I wanted to dominate it. Aberdeen seemed like a good club to do it with. They had past glories but they were way....waaaay in the past. But they had the infrastructure, support and stadium to make this potentially a great place to build from.

The problem here was that they had just been relegated.

I didn't mind, it just meant domination would take a little longer. It also meant my wage budget wasn't going to be the greatest for bit either. When I joined the club were already over the budget by a few grand. Then when the season reset and the new budget came in it got lowered even further so we were about 5k over the budget.

So my first job was to bring that down. Luckily we had a big squad, and we have a few players on wage reduction clauses in the case of relegation. I put my DoF to work and we managed to get rid of enough people to bring us about 3k a week under the budget. That's right, we slashed about 8k off the weekly wage bill.

I soon started adding to it. The team looked quite good, and balanced, so I thought that only a few recruits would be needed.

The board want me to develop youth. I'm happy to do that. Rather than panic about sorting out left and right back's I put the academy, or former academy, players in there. One is actually a WBL so should be perfectly suited to it.

I also had the awesomely named Bruce Bruce from the academy in midfield. And one or two others. They all looked good enough for this level.

The one area we looked weak on was up front. We didn't have many out and out strikers and when you have a formation with just the one forward in you need someone who can finish. So I brought in the following - Comrie and Byrne.

Comrie came from divisional rivals Falkirk and cost about 120k over a couple of years. He's young, decent, highly rated and Scottish.

Byrne was a real coup I think and cost nothing. Shamrock just wanted rid of him and I was happy to oblige. He doesn't quite look cut out for the Treq role but his finishing and physical stats should mean that he provides goals. The other players will just have to provide him with service rather than the other way around. The scouts already consider him to be a SPL level player.

I also brought in Guz' on a free.

Bit of a gamble but the scouts thought highly of him and I think if I can work on his quickness he could be a good impact sub.


With the forwards sorted I brought in two more players. I didn't really need them but again the scouts raved about them, and as they were free I felt at the very worst I could make some money off them - Pisa de Monterosa and Toubakaris.

Pisa looks solid at the back. He's rated as being SPL quality. Toubakaris is flexible and can cover a lot of the key positions in my formation, and the scouts reckon he'll be a leading SPL player eventually.


So onwards with the season. There's only one promotion place and the board think it should be ours. I have to agree really. Anything less than promotion would be failure I think. There are some other strong sides in the division (Falkirk & Livingston) but in the long run we should be able to out pace them in the title race.

There's also the challenge cup to look forward to :D