Stade Malherbe Caen: End of story

I felt with Warrens comment, that it really was a shame to end in mid-season so I’ve decided to finish the season with this post to get a clean break going into my new English story.

January

A great string of wins. Three especially tough encounters against Bordeaux, Marseille and Lyon.

On the transfer market we sold Michael Bastos, Lars Saalbach and Gregorz Krychowiak (back-up player). We bought wonderkid Amado Gueye using his on-loan clause. Then I signed Rene Khrin and Fernando Belluschi to add depth to the squad.

February

Still going strong despit one loss and one draw there. Zenit is our opponents in the first knockout stage and we got the advantage at home with 1-0. Gignac and Yatabaré are producing the goods.

March

6 wins in 6 games and we’re continuing our good form this season. We also beat Zenit on their home turf. Guingamp was a nice break in the French cup quarter final seeing as we’ve beaten far tougher opponents to get there.

April

A heavy loss in the first game against Napoli. Quagliarella finds goals out of nothing at all. He scored every goal for them in both legs even though we had pressure on them constantly. Maybe this was the real reason that I ended this Story to start a new one?

The french Cup adventure goes on with a win against Lille this time. The league run is still going strong despite a draw and a loss.

May

Winning the French cup was a nice feat, especially in that way.

A spectacular freekick from Verratti was the highlight of the season against Toulouse in the French cup final.

We managed to win the league comfortably but that Napoli loss still stung.

Andrea Consigli won Goalkeeper of the season and Villalva won Rookie of the season after his fine second half.

I’d like to say a few words about the top players of Caen. I can’t stress enough how good these players get with the right training, tutelage and deployment.

Sambou Yatabaré — AMR/AMC/ST — Is incredibly versatile, but uses his height and physical prowess to gain new advantages for an attacking winger. Wingers are normally very quick, technical and creative. Sambou adds strength and fantastic aerial ability to that to make up a Fast-tracking Tank on the wing. Sign this player!

Sergiy Kryvtsov — DC — He’s rather well known at this stage but I believe he is much more than just a good central defender. He’s amazing and I believe that he’s been a bit improved in the latest patch aswell, or maybe its just because he got playing-time right off the bat at the age of 18. Scores on a lot of corners if he’s put on the far post and is relentless at the back.

James «Roddy» Rodriguez — MC/AMC — I’ve had him on a few saves now but I’ve never really put him in the starting line. He has a great eye for through balls and is packing one of the best left feet I’ve seen in the game. His long shots are unstoppable, much like when Gourcuff decides that he’s going to try a shot at goal on FM2010. He is a bit fragile but he is worth having to sub late in the game.

That’s that. I’d like to thank you for following this story and I hope that you’ll continue doing it with my next one.

Cheers

Majk