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Dave — FM2011 Ultimate European Challenge, Stuttgart half way point of season 17/18
Hello and welcome back to yet more of my Stuttgart challenge! Previously, I gave you my pre-season report and a run through of my team. I have high hopes for this season and believe that this could be the year that I win the title. I have played until the Winter shutdown again so without further ado, lets see how I got on!
August
I was pleased with the nice convincing win in the German Cup to kick us off for the season particularly as it was a mixture of reserves and first team players. The league has started off well too except for the draw against Kaiserslautern. I dominated that game and they had a player sent off but a daft own goal 20 minutes from time prevented us from getting the 3 points.
In August the Champions League groups were drawn.
A nice and easy group for me then! I think I groaned when I was drawn against Barcelona and Napoli. My mind is already thinking about 3rd place and a UEFA cup spot but I could sneak 2nd if I am really lucky.
September
Very disappointed to have gone out of the German Cup already however, I tried playing a couple of youngsters and reserves and it backfired on me. Hoffenheim are always a very tricky team to play against and with Reading legend Glyfi Sigurdsson pulling the strings in midfield for them, it’s no wonder! Champions League campaign has started with the loss away to Napoli. The scoreline looks quite respectable but it could easily have been a lot worse for us. Good news is that we are still going strong in the league keeping us near the top. Again another silly draw, this time away to Koln. Patrick Funk was sent off early on for what appeared to be an off the ball incident! We managed to draw level with a penalty kick in the 82nd minute.
October
We started off with being shown a footballing lesson by Barcelona. It just shows how much further we have to go to become a great team. 2 30 year olds, Messi linking up with Gonzalo Higuain (!) tore us apart. I was hoping that this wouldn’t have a detrimental effect on our players and the draw against our rivals Karlsruhe didn’t do much to ease my concerns. A nice 4 nil win over Bayern was quickly followed by a humiliating 3-2 loss to Brondby leaving us bottom in the Champions League group. This was then swiftly followed by the draw against bogey team Hoffenheim. October proved to be a strange month!
November
An amazing run of games, too many draws perhaps but nevertheless it is more than what I done at Fiorentina and Liverpool! The rest of the league games this month went quite well, particularly the win against Wolfsburg. I exacted revenge against Brondby but then lost to Napoli which means we cannot qualify. I go into the last game of the group against Barcelona 3 points ahead of Brondby. I should gain 3rd spot as predicted unless they get a freak high scoring win against Napoli.
December
A frustrating month started off well with a win against a struggling Dortmund team who find themselves scrapping at the bottom! Nurnberg and Freiburg are performing above themselves this season with both in the top 6 but I still should have beaten them. The last 2 games of the year were extremely frustrating and is the first time since the beginning of last season that I have gone 2 games without scoring. However, the stand out result as you can all see is the 5-2 mauling of Barcelona!
Completely unexpected and youngster Sandro Jungwirth helping himself to a couple of goals and having an excellent game. The group stage has now finished with Barcelona and Napoli qualifying and Stuttgart going into the UEFA cup. We will face Toulouse who I like to think we can beat!
Final Thoughts
The convincing win against Barcelona shows what my team is capable of which is all the more annoying when I draw nil nil draw and lose 1 nil straight afterwards! I guess the shutdown came at the right time and I can use the friendlies to re-evaluate much like I did last season but for different reasons. The table currently looks like this
Not bad really but Leverkusen and Bayern are showing great form. The lead has been alternating between the 3 of us so far this season. I seem to have the upper hand in games against Bayern so if I beat them next time as well and get a result against Leverkusen then who knows?
My biggest fear at the start of the season is that I didn’t have an established man to play alongside Kryvstov in the centre of defence and them fears have been realised. What I didn’t account for is Kryvstov and my goalkeeper Broun having really poor seasons so far, in fact I dropped Broun in favour of young goalie Rafael who has done okay but nothing special. I have been so disappointed in them so I had to react quick otherwise this season could escape from us. I have brought in this guy
Turkish International with plenty of experience and yet still relatively young. A fairly sizeable 9.25 million for his services which has now left my transfer budget empty but I feel he is all I will need.
Hopefully he will plug the whole in defence and seemed pretty good in the friendlies I have played. Now to make a serious charge to the finish line and with any luck, my next update I will have some silverware to tell you about!