FM 2012 Scarborough AFC season 17 report: We’re back baby!

Hey guys and welcome to my FM 2012 Scarborough AFC season 17 report. Last year saw a dark contrast from what we have all come to expect in sunny old Scarborough…after selling off a shed load of my top stars, we were eliminated in the First Knockout round of the Champions League, lost in the Club World Championships and endured an early Carling Cup exit. While the Premier League title and FA Cup were retained, that poor showing in Europe sparked a change in philosophy for this season, so lets get straight into it.

Due to my European exploits the clubs reputation didn’t change and Man City’s heroics in the Champions League didn’t help either. So we remain 3rd behind Manchester City and Barcelona.

Financially things couldn’t be much better, after all those player sales Scarborough are now worth £506 million. This leaves us 3rd but still just short of £1 billion behind Real Madrid and Barcelona lol ;)

After last season my board will just be happy to see us qualify for Europe apparently, a little dramatic IMO. But I will be using some of their £279 million transfer budget to ensure we retain our status as Europe’s elite. The media odds pit Manchester City as favorites for the title for the millionth time in a row despite me winning the last 6, fools!

And now we skip onto transfers, today I’ll begin with players departing Scarborough. Quite a few names on this list really, but very few were top players. In fact the only player that got some real first team football was defensive midfielder Albachar, I sold him for £7.75 million to make room for a better replacement. Almost £20 million was raised this year, nothing like seasons gone by but I have thrown finances out the window for season 18.

Now I present to you the next generation of talent! Gabriel Lopez is an 18 year old wonderkid who has the potential to be the best left winger on the planet, the Spaniard cost £13 million but the potential profit to be made is scary. His compatriot, Alexander, is just 17 years old and has the potential to become one of the best attacking midfielders in world football. Again the transfer fee was hefty at £16.25 million, but more than worth it. And finally I signed a rock solid ball winning midfielder, he is 24 years old and could make the difference this season. Signed for £14.5 million, Stepanov is a true beast and fits into my tactic like a glove.

Premier League results — first half of season

With one thought on the poor previous season and another on the upcoming Euro Championship’s with Spain, I tried to focus on the job at hand. To be honest I didn’t need to do too much, just pick the right team and watch them do the business. From August to December my boys won 12, drew none and lost just 3 from 15 matches. This run included the 7-0 hammering of Peterborough, 5-2 onslaught against Manchester United and 8-2 thrashing of Huddersfield.

The league table is shaping up well, Scarborough sit 3rd one point off top, but with a game in hand. Simply put the best performers in the second half of the season will be crowned champions.

With that in mind I decided to strengthen my youth. Marko Ilic joined for £2.3 million and should be a very capable central midfielder in the future. While Gutierrez looks like a promising forward, with first team football he could be excellent, so the £1.7 million fee seemed very reasonable.

Premier League results — second half of season

After a good start I just needed to maintain our form, I could see the ‘S’ inscribed into the trophy with 15 wins, 1 draw and 2 losses from our next 18 games. But then ridiculous fixture congestion (of which I blame the lower league database for) led to one win, 3 draws and a loss from our remaining 5 fixtures. Looking at the dates you may say, ‘the fixtures weren’t that bad’. But mix them with cup competitions and the last five fixtures left me with a two day interval between each match whether it be league or cup…obviously a bug with using such a custom database I guess.

So did that slip cost me? Well it probably should have done and considering the point totals that second place has taken over the last few seasons I got lucky. But thankfully we finished the season 6 points clear of Chelsea on 88 points to retain the title for the seventh season.

Carling Cup results

After the disappointment of last season, I was planning a much longer run in this years Carling Cup. After victory against Sunderland, we then beat Stevenage, Man City and Tottenham to reach the final with ease. Chelsea enjoyed a similar run and await us at Wembley.

I think its fair to say we have endured a tough run to the final and capped it all off against the toughest of opponents. This wasn’t the prettiest of matches, the main theme seemed to be squandered chances and a lot of tussling in the middle. After going to extra-time my boys finally got their break with a Cavus goal (or the Turkish Messi as I call him!) The game finished 1-0 after 58% possession and 26 shots to Chelsea’s 6.

FA Cup results

With the Carling Cup under our belt I was hungry for silverware, but we suffered an early scare in the FA Cup. After thrashing Blackpool 3-0, Wigan were within seconds of eliminating us in the forth round, thankfully an Ilic stoppage time goal brought about a replay of which we won 2-0. It was all roses from there as Scarborough beat Bournemouth, Sheffield United and Liverpool to reach the final where Man Utd await.

United have endured a steady decline in my save…despite having an excellent squad they seem to put up with 4th place at best season in season out. So when I took the lead after 42 minutes it seemed as though the second half would be easy. But I couldn’t have been more wrong, Man Utd scored 4 minutes after the restart and then again with just 30 minutes remaining. I was somewhat shocked and made a few substitutions instantly. One of those changes was Diez who made an instant impact scoring on the 66th minute. With the clock running down I went all out for the winner and it arrived with 4 minutes of normal time remaining. The final finished 3-2 and was one of the most exciting matches I’ve been involved in.

Champions League results

This year saw me drawn in a group alongside Fenerbahce, Kobenhavn and Werder Bremen. All very easy opposition that led to a perfect 6 wins from 6 matches.

Some very high scoring matches left me with an average of more than 4 goals a game. I haven’t qualified from the group stages so convincingly before but the opposition were to thank for that.

My opponents for the first knockout round were Napoli, a nice easy victory was in order and my boys delivered 5-2 on aggregate. I was then a little disappointed to see Real Madrid in the quarter-final, our first leg experience at home involved some counter attacking football which led to a 1-0 victory. I was nervous heading into the second leg and used the counter strategy again, but what followed was shocking. My boys went on to thrash the Spanish giants away from home 6-2, this was probably the best result of my FM12 career. And it was followed by a 1-0 semi-final first leg victory over Juventus and 2-1 second leg victory. For the keen eyed readers out there, you’ll notice we reached the final winning every single game with a goal to game average of 3.33.

After all that my opponents will be Getafe, very weird I know. After inspecting their squad the full backs and midfield seem solid but the rest isn’t amazing and they have just finished 3rd in La Liga. Needless to say my boys dominated the first half scoring early through a Nene wonder strike, but just before the break Getafe clawed one back. The second half was a nervy affair but only saw the Spanish side conjure two half chance counters. The rest was all Scarborough and we were rewarded on 84 minutes as Arancibia headed home from a set piece. That could well be his last action for Scarborough!

Squad stats and finances

An incredible season and completely different from the last campaign. I was delighted to win the quadruple and have a lot of players to thank. Fabricio scored 38 goals and assisted 13 from 27 starts, now that is a real record. I also enjoyed my Spanish strikers form, Diez scored 29 goals and assisted 11. But I think player of the year goes to right winger Nene who scored 24 goals and assisted 17, an outstanding effort indeed.

Off the pitch things could be better though, I certainly paid for getting our football back on track. Last season finished with £200 million in the bank, but this campaign saw the balance drop to £129 million. I only spent an extra £25 million in the transfer market and while the wages aren’t exactly low they shouldn’t result in such woeful losses, I think these financial problems may end the save. Don’t get me wrong that won’t happen yet, but eventually I can see myself getting sick of playing catch up just because the board won’t expand or build a new stadium.

The Internationl scene — Spain

With the Euro Championships just around the corner I needed to a) wrap up qualifying and b) find my strongest squad. Qualifying was done with ease as we beat Malta 7-1, Hungary 3-0 and Cyprus 3-1. Then I arranged a tonne of Friendly matches, the first couple saw us draw to Mexico and Germany. Not bad results and my side seemed to be improving in quality within the tactic and their understanding of each other. This must have led to the victories over Czech Republic, Nigeria, Croatia and Romania. The perfect Euro build up and most importantly, no injuries!!

Here is how we qualified for the competition, 8 wins from 8 fixtures.

And I’ll leave you with the European Championship group draw, here is how each nation will line up. I have a decent group, Holland will be very tough but Israel posses very little threat and bar four or five stars Portugal will struggle. Surprising to see no group of death this year, guess that means the knockout rounds will be tougher. But what is very weird is that there are 6 groups, of which the top two nations qualify from, then the four best placed third position nations also go through. So instead of there just been a quarter-final the knockout stages start with 16 teams making it a second round…basically more teams qualify and as a result there is one extra round. Can anyone explain that? It would seem the rules changed in 2016, I wonder if this is planned for real life and that is something SI have allowed for? Or is it just another glitch in my game?

Anyway, that is all for today. My next post will be on the European Championships with Spain of which England are the hosts (they also won the World Cup so tough to beat.) I hope you’ll join me then, but for now please feel free to leave a comment below.