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Football Manager 2012 Malaga story season 7 report
Hey guys and welcome to my Football Manager 2012 Malaga story season 7 report. Let me start by wishing you all a Merry Christmas, Christmas is an extra special season for me as I share my Birthday just three days prior on the 22nd. In fact as I write this post its actually my Birthday, some may think it a little sad but I can’t think of a better way to brush aside a few hours before the festivities begin. :) Anyway, I hope you all have a great Christmas and enjoy your break from school/college/work…
And with that lets get back to business. Over the last few seasons my Malaga side have fallen short in at least one competition per season. Season 5 saw us miss the La Liga title, while season 6 ended with an early Copa del Ray exit. Alongside the usual rituals of offloading the old and making money, I want to get our domination back on track this year. There’s a lot to get through today so I’ll skimp on the writing, but mainly because I have the World Cup waiting for me and I’m busting to get back to my save ;)
We’ll begin the post with transfers, I have compressed all players joining and leaving the club into one screenshot below. You’ll notice I only signed one player, Nene is a prospect upfront. While the players leaving Malaga were of a higher reputation in Martinez, Canales and Pirovano. A total of £51 million was raised making this the third profitable season in terms of transfers.
Club World Cup results
This tournament is becoming common place for Malaga with this been our fourth consecutive participation. Needless to say it doesn’t get much tougher every year, so I’ll just let the screenshot below explain all. Santos made yet another final but it was same old, same old.
La Liga results — first 20 matches
The domestic season started with a bang as Real Madrid were beaten on their home patch 4-2. This set the tone with Malaga going onto win 18 matches and lose just two.
The league table was also shaping up nicely as Malaga sat top of the pile 5 points clear of Barcelona.
La Liga results — last 18 matches
With the title edging closer, I just needed to maintain the form and keep all my players happy. This was achieved as Malaga won a further 15 matches and drew three from the 18 remaining games. These results included the 6-1 thrashing of Barcelona.
Needless to say the title was wrapped up rather quickly. Malaga notched up 102 points scoring 126 goals and conceding just 19 along the way. Our nearest competitors were Barcelona who finished 13 points behind and never really felt like trouble.
Just to offer you an idea of Malaga’s dominance domestically, take a look at the player stats below. Its crazy to think that 6 of the top 7 performers in the league are Malaga players and just look at Fierro’s scoring record, 41 goals and that was in the league alone!!
Copa del Ray results
After Real Madrid knocked us out last season, I felt the need to win the Copa del Ray this time around. We brushed easy opposition aside early on before beating tougher sides like Villarreal and Valencia. To reach the final we had to beat Real Sociedad which was done with ease and to my delight neither Real nor Barca had made the grade, instead At. Madrid were our final hurdle.
Copa del Ray final vs At. Madrid
Venue: Vicente Calderon (At. Madrid’s home ground)
Attendance: 65,057
Starting formations:
Both sides had a full strength XI and I decided that in light of our recent form an audacious 4-2-2-2 was in order. This attacking tactic has been used all season bar two matches (against Barcelona and Real Madrid.) I had full confidence in it, that is until the the match got under way. The scores were level at half-time, I was worried about At. Madrid’s dominance so made a bold move. I switched my formation to a 4-5-1 (the Arsenal tactic) to try and regain control of possession and therefore the game. Watch the match highlights below to see what happened next.
Match highlights: Click here to watch the Copa del Ray final highlights
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Match stats:
It certainly wasn’t pretty but we regained our composure and took full control of the match after the tactical switch. After a fair few chances it was the legend Kara that came to my rescue. The 1-0 victory may not look glamorous but I’m still delighted as it felt like a tactical victory.
Champions League results
The group stage draw went well again, all three sides left me the opportunity to rest key players and develop my youth. Bordeaux, Shakhtar and Napoli were beaten both home and away. My most pleasing result came away to Napoli as we brushed the Italians aside 3-0.
Malaga finished top of their group with a perfect record for the third consecutive season while Bordeaux provided a shock clinching second place.
The First Knockout Round was fairly kind drawing my boys against Juventus. The Italians used the same formation as myself (4-2-2-2) and it provided some end to end Football of which we were always going to finish on top. The tie finished 3-1 on aggregate. My quarter-final opponents had made massive improvements over the last two seasons and looked like one of the stronger outfits in this years competition. However, I stood by my attacking tactic and it paid off. AC Milan struggled to hold back wave after wave of attack and my boys won 5-1 on aggregate. One more hurdle before the final and Liverpool stood in my way, the Merseyside club have invested well and bought wonderkids that even I’d enjoy buying. But that just wasn’t enough as my boys destroyed the English club 4-1 on aggregate. In the other semi-final FC Bayern were thrashed by Manchester United meaning I’d meet the Red Devil’s for a second time in the Champions League final.
Champions League final vs Manchester United
Venue: Swedbank Arena, Stockholm
Attendance: 50,000
Starting formations:
Man Utd seemed to be missing a few big names such as Hernandez and Phil Jones. The English champions still had a good team but I certainly held the advantage. Having said that, I wasn’t about to take these guys for granted and opted for my Arsenal 4-5-1 tactic with attacking strategy. I wanted to dominate this final, but to see if that happened you know what to do…
Match highlights: Click here to see Champions League final highlights
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Match stats:
That’s right, Malaga achieved their second highest scoring Champions League final and to some very good opposition injuries and all. There’s not much to say, but I put our success down to consistency. While I am always signing and selling players the backbone of the team remains the same bar maybe 1-2 changes a season. The Malaga side seem to have formed a Barcelona like understanding.
Squad stats, finances and others
OK there’s still a lot to get through so less talk and more images. :) After such a great season there are far too many names to mention, so I’ll let you examine the squad stats below and then list my top 3 performers.
Top performers
3. Manuel Reich
2. Eden Hazard
Financially the club is more than all right, we finished the season with an impressive £148 million bank balance. Most of this is down to a well controlled wage budget and profit in the transfer market.
OK now we move onto two pieces of news that I’ve been busting to share. As most will already know I am on the clubs ‘legends’ list and the owners have decided to build a new 53,677 stadium with retractable roof. But guess what they have named the new stadium ;)
On top of that amazing news I also found out that Malaga are officially the best club in the world (reputation wise anyway.) We pipped Barcelona to the spot that they have been merely warming up for us. :)
OK we’re almost there guys, just stay with me a little longer as we still have to cover England. This is the World Cup year of course, so please go to the next page to see our warm up to the greatest show on earth and what happened in the tournament itself…
Go to the next page by clicking the number 2 situated just above the comments box…
WCQ and Friendly results
After an away draw to Slovenia it was all go for England. We walked through the remaining World Cup Qualifiers and then onto our Friendly matches. I personally arranged all the matches after our final WCQ against Cyprus. I wanted to gradually build the team up towards the mammoth task ahead. I think all the Friendlies served there purpose as we proved more than capable against easy, average and exceptional opponents.
WCQ final group table
I think its obvious England qualified for the World Cup, but below you can see by what margin.
Now for what really matters, the World Cup!! We’ll start with the draw and as you can see below things went well for England. Belarus, Cameroon and Honduras are all nations I’d fully expect to beat, but then again anything can happen in the World Cup.
To be continued…
Sorry guys but I’m leaving it there for today. I will write up a special post for the World Cup finals, the group stages will be done in one clump and everything else after that will done by the match for a nail biting experience (I hope.) Until then please feel free to comment below and Merry Christmas.