Hello all and welcome back to the North West of France and my game! I have progressed through to the winter shutdown on 21st December so without further ado, let’s see how I am getting on!
August
A pretty decent month which fills me with hope for the season. The first league game of the season against Le Mans was particularly pleasing as they are predicted first by the media. However, they soon gained revenge in the cup. We were awful that day and I had no answer to it. My other loss this month was against Laval where I had a player sent off after just 15 seconds which is the quickest I have ever seen on this game! I thought we did pretty well to finish with 2 goals.
Halfway through the first game, I decided that my lone striker in the 4-5-1 formation was too isolated so changed to a 4-4-2 formation and it appears to be working at the moment but still not as well as I would like. I will just wait for the team to blend together and get accustomed to it.
During August as well, I lost my first choice goalkeeper Guy Roland Ndy Assembe to FC Twente for 1.8 million when his value was 1 million. Luckily I had read through Sears’ notes on wonderkids before starting this game and noted that Nantes have an 18 year old goalkeeper Erwin Zelazny featured on there! He is now my first choice man between the sticks! Just before writing this up, I had a conversation with Academia manager Alex (otherwise known as responding to a comment he put in my previous post!) . He was unsure about my first rule of letting players go for almost double the amount and I agreed to some extent. I am still keeping it in but have decided to only sell to clubs outside of my current division and if I have players capable enough to replace them. This way I am not strengthening my rivals and also not weakening myself!
September
I decided to make full use of the international break by playing another friendly against my reserves. Firstly, to get my players more familar with the formation change and secondly, to see if I have improved on the 1-1 draw we played out in pre-season. We had improved :)
A bit of a mixed bag in the league with 1 win, 1 draw and 1 loss! I am not too bothered with the draw against Metz due to their reputation. My first choice left back Damien Tixier suffered a torn calf muscle during the match but that gives Lucas Digne a chance to shine which I am quite excited about! The loss against Reims is a bit concerning seeing as I beat them comfortably in the cup but the big win against Grenoble shows me that this is going to be a wacky season and not so straight forward!
The transfer window slammed shut at the beginning of the month but I had no reason to add any further to my squad. Erwin Zelazny has performed reasonably well in goal so no need for someone more experienced. If I do need to get someone in though, I could make full use of the French ‘joker window’. This would allow me to sign 1 player from another French club and is open until the end of the December when, of course, the main transfer window would open again!
October
Another slightly odd month for Les Canaris. I was so frustrated with the loss to Tours that I changed back to Darren’s 4-5-1 formation although I made some adjustments to better suit my team. I had used the 4-4-2 for 10 games by then but I never felt the team was comfortable with it. Maybe I should have left it longer but first game after the change, I won 2 nil and then 4 nil so felt quite pleased with myself….. until I lost to Dijon who like Tours, are a team I really should be beating. The Dijon game itself was a strange one. I had my best centre back Papy Mison Djilobodji sent off in the 59th minute and was 2 down. I managed to claw it back to level terms and felt we could go on to win it. Then disaster struck, they had a free kick which took a huge deflection off my right back and spun into the goal in the 89th minute and all hopes of any points were gone.
November
An undefeated month! The first under my stewardship which is pleasing! The results could have been more comfortable but the team still have plenty of time to grow. The dropped points against Angers are not so disappointing as they are one of the favourites for the Ligue 2 title and it was at their place too. The team is progressing quite nicely in the French Cup too. The win against Bastelicaccia puts us into the 9th round of the competition. I have only played in the last 2 rounds with both of them against non league opposition. I have more non league action in the next round coming up in December.
December
This month was going swimmingly until I hit Sedan and Havre who were both in a similar position to me in the league. Initially I was more disappointed to lose to Havre but I think I was going more on my personal knowledge because I have not heard of them but had heard of Sedan. I checked after both games and saw that media prediction for Sedan is lower than mine so should be more annoyed with that result! Either way, a horrible end to what I considered a pretty good year.
Overall
Let’s start off with the league table
At the start of the season I would have been quite happy with 6th place and not far off of top spot in terms of points. I can’t help but think that if I hadn’t of lost the matches against Tours and Dijon then I would have been top! As mentioned earlier, this is going to be a wacky season. If you look at my position graph, you will see why
An alarming slump at the end there due to losing my last 2 games but I feel it is easily recoverable. The fact that I am still in with a shout of promotion says that the top teams are all taking points off each other. Which leads me to believe that if we can find some consistency then we would have a major chance of pulling off an incredible feat in my first season!
Finally, I will leave you with my team ratings so far
Stephane Darbion is my playmaker in midfield but he does have the odd game with a poor rating. Presumably, he is being marked out of the game so will have to learn to look out for that! Honourable mentions go to 2 players — neither of them are French! First is Brazillian Matheus Vivian who is not only looking solid at the back but has also pitched in with a nice 4 goals too. Secondly is my South Korean forward Lee Yong-Jae. He is not actually my leading scorer but I feel more comfortable with him up front due to his pace. He also places the ball when he shoots whilst my other 2 strikers, Djordjevic and Rodelin, get into good positions but blast it over! I have spoken to the pair of them asking nicely to place their shots but they don’t feel it is beneficial to their game?!
That is all for now, next post will be at the end of the season and possibly with a promotion party? who knows!
