Showing posts with label Manager Mode. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Manager Mode. Show all posts

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Luton is going UP


I’ve just finished my first season in England playing with Luton Town on Coca-Cola League 2. I have finished in 1st position, but the league wasn’t that easy. As matter of fact things only got a little bit easier on the second transfer window when I was able to get two additional players for the defense and another three for midfield. At the end, the only player I keep from original Luton squad was K. NICHOLLS since is good at free kicks.


Season Highlights
- Coca-Cola League 2 Champion (with the 1st and 2nd top scorers)
- Johnstone’s Paint Trophy Champion

Season Lowlights

- English League Cup (defeated by Aston Villa)
- F.A. Cup (defeated by Arsenal)

The Johnstone’s Paint Trophy final was pretty cool in a big stadium at night against Hartlepool which I defeat by 4x0 :)

I hope I will be able to buy Ronaldo now at the beginning of the season. Lets see how it goes!

My squad at the end of this first season with Luton Town (4-3-3):

SQUAD
Pos Num Name Overall

GK 37 RAFAEL 61
RB 21 DIOGO 73
RCB 12 DIEGO 77
LCB 17 RENATO 71
LB 27 ANDRE SANTOS 74
RCM 14 P. GARCIA MONTEIRO 76
CM 22 CRISTIAN 72
LCM 19 M. TRAORE 72
RW 15 MARCELINHO 70
ST 9 CRISTIANO 76
LW 10 G. HERRERA 70
SUBSTITUTES
LWB 5 ATHIRSON 69
CM 30 BOQUITA 61
RM 8 K. NICHOLLS 55
CAM 29 EDUARDO RAMOS 69
GK 40 L. PRICE 64
RESERVES
CDM 20 M. SPILLANE 55
GK 36 A. FLETCHER 49
CM 16 R. JARVIS 54
CB 6 G. PILKINGTON 58
RB 2 C. GNAKPA 57
LM 4 K. KEANE 60
ST 13 S. PARKIN 60

Friday, April 10, 2009

I am in England!


I started playing Fifa 09 Manager Mode with ST. PAULI from 2. BUDESLIGA. The reason for that is that I am current unable to play in manager mode with my favorite team: Corinthians. Since Corinthians played last year national second division in Brazil and Fifa 09 only has the first division available, there is no way to choose Corinthians on manager mode (its listed on Rest of the World). So, the initial strategy was to choose a team from the second (or third) division of another country and start transferring players from Corinthians to that team. And the chosen one for this first attempt was ST. PAULI in Germany.

It turned out that some Corinthians players are just not good enough if you are planning to win the most important tournament in Europe which is the Champions League. So, as long as I was going through my first attempt with ST. PAULI, it turned out that I start buying not only Corinthians players, but also other players for Corinthians weakest positions. And the players I brought were EDUARDO RATINHO, THIAGO SILVA, ANDRE DIAS, P.GUINAZU, G. HERRERA, NILMAR, and C. TEVEZ. So at the end, only for part of the midfield and the defense I was able to use Corinthians players.

By the way, if you are starting a Manager Mode and need a good Central Defender, THIAGO SILVA is the one. He is very good and, if you are playing with player auto growth enable, you will realize that after one or two seasons he will be one of the best players of the market.

After playing a while in Germany, I realize that most of teams I was playing against, I didn’t know so well, and this can make the matches kind of boring. So, after losing the Champions final to TOTTENHAM, I move to Italy to play the SERIE B with PARMA. And there the things got much more exiting, because I had the first season to make the changes I needed to the team during the first season, and on the second season I was ready for the big matches. And it is amazing playing against INTER, MILAN, LAZIO, FIORENTINA, ROMA and JUVENTUS. Not only because these teams are very popular here in Brazil, but also because they have a lot of Brazilian players.

After playing two seasons on Italy, EA released the updated squad file and there was a lot of interesting changes in Corinthians. I think that the most important one was that RONALDO finally showed up and could be used. Also, Corinthians younger’s players like DIEGO, RENATO and BOQUITA were available.

This makes me start a new Manager Mode with PORTUGUESA. The problem was that after playing the first season, I realized that the only tournaments I was able to play were LIGA DO BRASIL and COPA BRASIL. It’s really frustrating not been able to play LIBERTADORES DA AMERICA on Manager Mode, since we have so many good teams in Brazil , Argentine, and since tree of the five editions of FIFA Club World Cup were won by Brazilian teams. So this is something that EA should really fix in future versions.

Well, and this brings me where I am right now, England!

I have started a new manager mode in England’s COCA-COLA LEAGUE 2 (equivalent to Brazilian fourth division) with LUTON TOWN F.C., and it’s been really challenging.

First, because the players overall are very low and second because the matches are tough with closer marking and this makes it harder to keep or pass the ball. I am current playing on Professional difficult level with a half length of 5 minutes and I am on the math day 20 of the league. I am on the top of the table with 39 points followed by DARLINGTON with 37 points but I am 2 matches ahead. I leaved the ENGLISH LEAGUE CUP on the second round, been defeated by A.VILLA (It’s almost impossible beat a 4 stars team playing with a single star one).

What helped me a lot until now to keep me in the first positions were the players I bought in the beginning of the season, the reserve backs from Corinthians DIEGO and RENATO, the midfielder I have got from Mexico, M. TRAORE (scout recommendation) and the striker G. HERRERA. For this manager mode, I also created myself (CRISTIANO) to play as forward with HERRERA. And, of course, it would be impossible to be in this position without improving the FITNESS COACH at least to level 7.