Thread by @MartinPlaysCM01

There is only one reason to start a save with River Plate really, and that's making sure you tick off the Argentinian league before it disintegrates and ruins your save. ODB, no StarterKit, back to basic, the original test of strength.

#Journeyman #Attempt73

We're halfway through and the league looks well within our reach, just focussing on winning as quietly as possible and not doing anything silly.

Wrapped up the Mercosur as expected along the way, despite not signing a single player.

League and Libertadores wrapped up, and although we lost a few games along the way the end result was never in doubt. Cardetti and Ortega players of the season.

Let's go job hunting.

#CM0102 #Journeyman

No interesting jobs came up in the summer, so we go again with River. It's business as usual as we've got the league under control and Mercosur in the bag by Christmas.

Sadly Lazio got the better of us on penalties in the Intercontinental Cup, causing our first missed trophy.

Another year, another title, but just as I was getting ready to sleep through some Libertadores matches the call comes in from Madrid and I immediately jump on the plane.

Ortega & Alessandro were our best players as Cardetti struggle with injuries all season.

Madrid are 6th in the league with 4 to play and in the cup final. Looking at the transfers it's not hard to see why they've fallen on hard times. What the absolute fuck has gone on here ?! Saving up for something I guess.

Despite the decimated squad we won the last 5 games quite easily, which sadly was only enough for 2nd and the cup. However if 64 points wins you the title here in Spain, this wont take long.

The dynamic duo of Raul and Morientes will do even better next year, I am sure.

I rarely manage these big clubs, so getting youth players of this standard is not something I'm used to.

Meanwhile we pick up our 2nd trophy in just 7 games for Los Blancos

Halfway through and we're trampling these peasants

Morientes already on 22 goals compared to the 21 he got the entire last season.

Spain done, picked up the cup as well. Ended up in a group with peak ManU and a strong Juve side, so disgracefully failed in the CHL. Morientes and Makelele had outstanding seasons.

Going to resign immediately and find a new destination for my talents.

Ooft, controversial destination 😂

3rd in the league halfway through the season, with a solid squad and money to burn. Not about to turn that down of course, all about the grind here at Journeyman HQ.

About as much fun as an open casket funeral managing here. Games were won, trophy collected, onwards to something a bit more challenging next. That's the plan anyway.

Bestchastnykh is pretty solid as a lone striker, in case you were wondering.

Inspired by the warnings of 8 years of suffering by Mr Megasave, we are off to Katowice. I've travelled along the A4 many times, but never been inclined to stop in this charming coal mine/city.

We're currently 7th and incapable of scoring goals, should be a blast.

Timing could not have been better, we have a 4 month winter break to fix this nightmare. Surlej is unironically our best AMC and he hasn't been playing, no fucking wonder we've scored 15 goals in 16 league games so far.

Yeah, that's gonna be a no from me dog. Unless I can get the Legia or Wisla job, I'm not touching this league with a ten foot pole again.

Last game sums it up nicely, and with no money and youth searches coming up with the same 10 Russians. Loans could work, but not my style.

The story continues tomorrow from Aalborg who find themselves in the 2nd tier in Denmark,

We have a healthy £5m in the bank though, but decisions in the past were odd. Not entirely sure why we sold this wonderkid for £500k after his loan spell for example 😲

Just paid £95k for an almost 35 year old striker, that's the level of depravity I am willing to sink to in order to get promoted asap. Hoping that set piece specialist Nordgren, will take care of the deliveries.

Promotion looking likely, as we brought in 15 new faces to sort out the mess. San Martin and Lundberg the pick of the bunch, and I've got high hopes for Nordgren who was already here when I arrived. Turned down £2.5m from Celtic already for him, which might have been a mistake.

Well well well.. if it isn't European football secured for next season, after we beat the champions in the Cup final. Heed and Nordgren both absolutely key for us this season, along with Lundberg's goals.

Major transfer activity summer coming up.

Looks like Lundberg's services wont be required for this season.

#Falcao

Looks like it will be a two horse race between ourselves and FCK this season, meanwhile some boys from Madrid are desperate to see me bank in the Spanish capital. First job offer where I didn't actively apply for the job of this save.

I promised myself I wouldn't spam a ton of updates, but THIS is exciting news. Our first encounter against a previously managed side, as we face Spartak Moscow in the 3rd round of the UEFA Cup. Our reward for beating an Atalanta side featuring Roy Keane in the previous round.

It's almost Christmas, and we've got our present early as we progress to the 4th round of the UEFA Cup against Lazio which will be good for reputation.

Looks like we'll be job hunting again in the summer as FCK struggles to keep up with our super signings.

Didn't expect to break FCK's dominance quite so easily but Joao Paiva is a straight up cheat code at this level. Lazio were too strong for us in Europe, but the Danish cup was secured without problems.

I enjoyed my time in Aalborg very much, but my job here is done.

Took a couple of month to gather our thoughts and celebrate the success, but we're back in business with the shittier of the Eindhoven clubs.

I'm thinking quick fixer-upper then jump ship to a better club who aren't broke with a 50k weekly wage bill and a dilapidated 5k ground

It's a rough start in the Netherlands, but my loan army of attacking players is starting to have an impact.

I'm not being helped by my scouts though, who rated Sergio Sierra as 2* - Fortunately I scan through this stuff to see what they miss.

The army of loanees is doing it's job and we're up to the dizzy heights of the non-scrolled section of the table. Might have to transfer list every single player and just rely on youthies and loan players to sort out this economic disaster though.

Well, that's Plan A fucked then 🤬

There's always next season I guess, might actually enjoy the absolutely monumental rebuilding challenge here with our pathetic 5k stadium anyway haha.

The objective was to battle bravely, and we certainly did that. Loaned our way out of trouble, but that's a legit Journeyman strat.

POTY was Bambang from De Graafschap, but all loanees did well. More importantly we've fixed the bank which will make next season interesting.

We fixed the bank, we did the scouting, the wheeling, the dealing, the bringing in 16 new players, putting a smile on everyone's face. Only to piss off to Feyenoord 10 days before the start of the new season 🤣

That's a REAL journeyman move

The different levels of quality in the Dutch league 🤣

Definitely shaping up to be a two horse race, but without European distractions and Mido on FIRE we should have this in the bag.

Sadly I have to go to the office tomorrow, so progress will be limited 🤬

Halfway through the season and things are progressing nicely. Already played Ajax twice and PSV once, all games ended in draws so no ground lost or gained. Our defensive record could be better, but our Iranian keeper William Furer is doing his best I'm sure 🤣

A truly bizarre and ultimately unsatisfying season, we struggled to beat even mediocre sides in the 2nd half of the season, fortunately PSV were too busy in Europe to take advantage. Our only defeat came to Ajax in the Cup final.

Mido and Davids players of the season.

Strangely it took almost 5 months of staring out the window after resigning at Feyenoord before an interesting job came up. IK Start is definitely a club with potential, so although it's likely to tank my rep it's going to be a nice rebuilding challenge.

After what seemed like forever and involved the signing of many a free youngster, we are finally underway in the Norwegian 1st Division. I have to say that this is my absolute favourite formation at the moment, with very minor tweaks it has served me well this save.

Plenty of conference calls today in my other job, so I'm hoping to make good progress with IK Start. Early signs are good with ex-Rosenborg youngster Evensen joining for free, sadly he immediately broke some ribs.

This is what pretty much all our games look like so far, not sure what the formula is but we are champing the hell out of this league. Dahl and Sæther leading the way from AMC and DMC respecitvely.

A few good sales and a cash injection from the board enabled us to bring in a few new faces to secure promotion with 3 games to go. Dahl was our "top scorer" with 9 - Sæther and the keeper Hagberg, the pick of the rest.

Just the 7 month winter break to look forward to now..

We have no money, can't offer meaningful contracts that anyone but the most average youth players would accept. Normally, I'd be 100% on board but as Journeyman, I just don't have time for this so I'm going to go and rescue Sevilla from the 2nd tier.

We're back in Spain after a lengthy delay, but I'm sure it'll be worth it. Our first game was pretty eventful to say the least, with Malaga's Pulido coming for Vallejo after 21 minutes (no injury) only to leave the game 5 minutes later for punching the ref 😂

Things are tricky at Sevilla, we are losing money rapidly and almost 3m in debt, partially thanks to paying a Norwegian full back 55k a week. Collecting old and overpaid players seems to have been a strategy, and needless to say they are mostly unhappy.

Big summer coming up

We finish off the season at our new club with 3 wins from 4 games to finish a respectable 12th. It's going to be a tough rebuild, but hopefully I wont have to sell Recio and Nacho to fund it, and I'm praying Esteban has another year in him.

Having rebuilt on a budget we find ourselves in a promotion battle, but it's tough going with the 44 game season and constant injuries to attacking midfielders. We carry one regardless though, and hopefully secure a return to the top tier. Yes, that is Guti and El-Hadji Diouf

..and so my confidence booster in Spain comes to an end (presumably). We secured promotion with 2 games to go, cleared the debt and signed enough players to give them a fighting chance next year.

Nacho and the young Turk Kenan Metin had pretty decent seasons.

Board doing their best to convince me to stay by showing their ambitions though🤣

I think it's time to invade the British Isle - Reigning Scottish champions Motherwell turned me down, but I found a back door open in Wales.

It's going to be a challenge, but hopefully it's a one and done here at Caernarfon. We've got Bari Morgan, so I'm sure it'll be fine.

This league is hilariously shit, and we're obviously going to win the title without too much trouble. Might see how many cups I can pick up for a laugh along the way. Signed roughly 20 youth players, Piper and Fitzgerald the pick of the bunch so far.

One and done, lost interest and forgot to swap between high and low energy formations which cost us a few result. Les Piper got the goals and David Cameron (lol) produced a solid display at DMC throughout the season. We even leave them with a few quid.

After a one and done, it looks like we have a project on out hands next. I Granata have missed out in the playoffs two season in a row, so decided to call in the expert. Money is pretty tight and we don't have a single DMC, decent coach though..

I have to questing my sanity here. That's 4 games, 5 shots on target and 4 goals conceded, is this part of the dreaded low-scoring bug kicking in already in 2013 ?

Things did return to almost normality, and we are in pole position for promotion.

Dilemma time, board are NOT generous with transfer budget so do I risk selling my only striker ? He will be sorely missed next season I think, but the cash could be a games changer in SerieB.

Turned out £2.5m was his release clause. Completely forgot to renegotiate contracts with the best players when I took over here.

In other news we threw away the title and auto promotion, and now face Livorno. Who I think it's fair to say we've got a 50/50 chance against.

Going up, fans are turning up in droves, won the Serie C Cup, but sadly the talented Bresciani will be leaving us.

I'm incredibly fed up with the black text on dark burgundy background though, so if the right job becomes available.... you never know

Here comes trouble 😂

How's that for a league debut - and look at this clause !!

@CM0102Smuts @TheEbfatz where does that come from ? I sure as hell didn't offer him that 😂

Big Nic continued his excellent start to the season and scored almost half of our league goals. Young Spanish dmc Zafra had a good season as well.

Bank balance is looking solid (before season tickets), so it'll take something special to tempt me away from here.

Might have to resign in protest, unless they give me the season ticket money to spend. We're going to struggle in Serie A without being allowed to spend more than this. We still don't have a single seat though, maybe that's what they are saving up for.

With Le Sulk on board I decided to give the project at least another season. The low scoring issue is in full effect, but of course the main man is still in double figures. The board loosened the purse stings a bit, and we've brought in just short of £5m worth of talent.

On the topic of transfers.... Madrid released Maxim after 13 season of criminal underutilisation.

Come to papa !

We finish the season in 9th place in what could be the last for Nicolas Anelka. If so, he goes out in style with 20 goals in 33 games under difficult circumstance. We've still got money to spend, but it's going to take a lot more than £7m to compete at this level.

Hello Europe !

A very short live European adventure saw us crashing out to Troyes due to horrendous fitness issues. The goal drought is well an truly upon us, but we soldier on regardless. Rolling in cash these days, and will most likely make the CL group stages next season.

It's a hotly contested finish to the season with everyone talking points off each other, but a draw with Juve who then got hammered by Milan, and a victory away at Lazio puts us in pole position with 4 to play.

Mainly thanks to you-know-who

We take on Atalanta, and Le Sulk converts his 12th out 13 penalties for Salernitana, with results elsewhere strongly in our favour.

Midfield maestro Vaclavik secures the 3 points for us. Only Lazio can catch us now, as we head into a busy week.

The Dynamic Duo strikes again and we lift the first trophy of the season. Strikwerda picks up the MOM, he's been a proper wall at the back this season.

It's a bore draw with Samp, but it doesn't matter to the 30000 at Arechi - We've only gone and done it

Anelka reveals a "Thank you Mister" t-shirt as he bangs in his 22 of the season. I've given him a home, but he, more than any, knows the call of the open road is stronger than any friendship formed along the way.

Arrivederci Nic 😘

We take a trip back across the Atlantic for the first time since the glorious River days. Atletico Mineiro last won the 1st Division back in 2004, but the squad looks decent (Keur will be key) - and there's money, even if I'm not allowed to spend it.

In case you were wondering why we aren't allowed to spend money, ground maintenance is about half a million a month.. At least we are prepared, in case we ever need to host the entire population of Southampton one day.

Hoping for a one and done here in Brazil after a long stint at Salernitana, would be ideal to finish up at Christmas and head back to Europe to tie up another league by the summer. Probably wishful thinking..

Still no explanation for the massive stadium, games don't get any bigger than this in Belo Horizonte and we've still got +150k empty seats.

Weirdly Cruzerio have better facilities at the same stadium, it's big enough I guess.

Finished top of the table, just.. Think I played an injured keeper for about 5 games which didn't help, but we face local rivals Cruzerio in the semi final, lets hope for a full stadium...

Roberto Carlos da Silva doing his best Anelka impression. Didn't fancy taking any chances here, so abandoned the usual 4 at the back for The Timmy, as Fluminense had spanked us in the regular season.

Country #8 in the bag

We're back in Poland with Stomil Olsztyn, an ambitious club from the Polish lake district of Masuria. The club finished 2nd last year but "star striker" Kaondera has struggled slightly, leaving the title out of reach with 9 games to play.

We show Widzew who would have been the champions if I had been in charge all season. Unfortunately we've only got 3 games left which wont be enough to close the 8 point gap.

Second place finish, but with quite a gap to close on Lodz. Got almost 200k to spend though and the scouts have been very busy. Sadly 2nd place is only UEFA Cup and not CHL, but an easier schedule will hopefully work to our advantage.

We've kicked off season two at Stomil, and boy oh boy did we find a bargain down in the second tier. Milewski has been ripping it up in his first 6 games, including hitting 4 on his debut at Pogon.

Meanwhile, out of nowhere, I was offered the Spain job which I gladly accepted.

I have no idea who this guy is the regen of, but holy crap.... Plays 90 minutes of every game, still in all the cups, but he rarely finished a game below 90% fitness.

Absolute legend.

Inter put out their youth team in the UEFA Cup after holding us to a 1-1 draw in Poland, didn't work out well for them. We finish the preliminary stage of the Polish league and head into the winter break.

With halved points, we're only 2 clear.

Milewski must stay fit 😁

It's a two horse race with us and Widzew, with plenty of chances to prove who the real champions are as we face each other in Domestic and European competitions

43 games unbeaten, and a manageable UEFA cup ahead.. This could be a 5 trophy season 😮

Rough as hell doesn't begin to describe it. Injuries everywhere due to congested schedule, losing at home to Widzew in the league, Milweski not scoring as many, but this takes the biscuit so far. A shove and a left hook from us, so they might not be back this season.

We choke twice, recording goalless draws, but fortunately one of them is against Widzew. Milewski rediscovers his form at the right time, putting Wisla to the sword and securing us the title.

Just the small matter of two cup finals to go.

Forgot that the UEFA Cup is decided on Golden Goal, but I'm not complaining. That's Milewski's 50th btw.

Well fall at the very last hurdle, and have to settle for the league, super cup, league cup and UEFA cup

Needless to say Milewski is my POTS, but solid DMC Cruz deserves a mention too..

Where to next I wonder 🤔

Don't think many people saw this one coming. I've taken up the wet Tuesday challenge, where my first action was to bring in player/coach Mark Kerr for £50k to help me settle.

Elsewhere Le Sulk has retired from playing after two years at Wasquehal (one as player/manager).

Transfers were many, two youngster from Spurs probably the picks of the bunch. Desperately trying to offload Mark Thomas who is costing us £40k a month for no reason.

Elsewhere Stomil failed to get into the CL group stage and are paying a 37 year old Agahowa £8k a week 😂

Qualified with ease for the Euros, but that's not an easy group.

Meanwhile we're sleepwalking the league thanks to our two awesome Spaniards, the diminutive Juan Cruz having joined is from Stomil on @champmegasave request, and Flores who cost us £60 from Burgos.

Div2 title wrapped up, despite scoring over 100 goals in all comps, due to heavy striker rotation our top scorer was MC Ian Rose with 16. Pina kept plenty clean sheets and we picked up the Vans Trophy.

Roll on the Euros !

It's EURO time baby. The Danes and the Welsh try to rough us up, but we get through the group picking up "just" two injuries along the way. We can the Czechs in the quarters with Germany and Holland being the other remaining favourites

Absolutely strolled it until the final, where the Germans put up a serious fight. Fortunately Romero was on hand to seal the deal with a golden goal 3 minutes into extra time.

Global reputation up to 10th, so if a cheeky top tier job comes up in the summer....🤔

Benfica turned down my application so I decided to see what would happen if I replaced the entire squad with Spaniards. Can they do it on a cold, wet and windy night in Stoke ?

Guiterrez has 2nd nationality of course.

Thought I might have a look at this old save, to break up the monotony of November. Resigned as Spain manager but will try to get Stoke to the top of the PL.

Not sure how I've managed to do so badly in the past, but we won 2 in a row after loading up the game.

I wonder if it might be an idea to fire this one up again 🤔

I would appear that I've played 5 league games using a 2-1-1-3-3 formation without much luck, since the previous screenshot was taken. I have no memory of this.

I'd also happily forgotten that my entire squad is Spanish for some reason 😂🇪🇸

Spanish clubs are desperate to have me back, but I am committed to Stoke for now. Asking everyone to shoot from distance in a 433 formation seems to have helped a bit, now I just need to recruit people who can shoot accurately as well.

We make light work of reigning champions and current PL leaders Cheltenham (yes, you read that right). Paddy Moore has been an absolute beast at MC since joining from Bristol City on Loan.

I honest can't tell you how much I love this game

The Spanish desperation continues, however we are too busy beating fellow Div1 side in the League Cup final to worry about such distractions. We've also managed to squeeze into the top 2.

Only temping option is Boavista who are looking for a manager, with 7 games left.