Quote (supmango @ 14 Oct 2014 03:06)
I enjoy doing similar but I always choose championship teams like notts instead cuz its so hard to get good players to join even when u get enough funds otherwise..
how do u get past that?
Well that's the challenge. Winning the CL with a 4th level team isn't as hard as it sounds; all you need is time. Winning it with a team from a garbage league is imo much harder because, as you say, it's much harder to make signings (and to prevent big clubs from raiding your team). Here are some tips I follow:
-Make sure you have a good staff. You need good scouts and good coaches so you can sign youngsters and develop them (once regens kick in, it makes things much easier).
-Scout for players in crappy leagues as every year there are a few quality players playing in weak leagues... in previous games I found players like Kovacic in Croatia, Claudemir in Denmark, Lazovic in Serbia, Balanta in Argentina, etc, which in that particular game had the potential to become world class.
-Scout for players in the lower levels of england/italy/spain/etc and pay attention to what clubs relegate from top flight, as there will always be someone decent you can sign... for example as manager of Crvena Zvezda I signed Verratti when he was playing for Pescara in Serie B, and I signed Ospina when Nice relegated
-Obviousy also look for free agents and players whose contract is running out.
-Focus on doing well in european competitions to improve your leagues reputation (and also your club's rep)... it shouldn't take you long to build a team capable of dominating national competitions while rotating heavily and focusing on EL/CL games
-Try to help your national rivals. Don't feed on the clubs from the country you are managing, and if you do have to sign a player from a club in your league then make sure you give a generous amount of money -> having stronger rivals in your league will increase the league's reputation and help their european performances
And some more obvious general tips when managing small teams:
-Be smart with your signings. Don't be like Abramovic and sign Shevchenko for Chelsea because he's world class, when he obviously won't fit in Mourinho's system. Just because your scouts rate someone 4.5 stars it doesn't mean it will be a good signing, look at his attributes. If you play counterattacking football you are better off with a 3 star striker that has something close to max speed, acceleration and good finishing but is only rated 3 stars because he sucks at everything else, than a 5 star striker that has excellent technique but is too slow fo your system or needs a bunch of chances to score. The opposite applies if you play possession, you will want good passers and won't care too much about recovering the ball, spped, etc. You should be able to find many cheap mediocre players that will do wonders for your team.
-Make sure you have CBs that can often score cornerkick goals. You will be worse than your european rivals, so it's important to use cornerkicks to your favour. It's worth investing heavily on a good keeper and a striker that can average a goal per game.
-Make sure you don't have any players that choke against big teams. You can let them do poorly in the league because you should eventually be so much better than your natioanl rivals that that you won't sweat to win the title, but make sure they perform at their best level when you face the stronger clubs you will come accross in european competitions.
You don't need a superb team to win the CL, as long as your tactics are good and your players fit prefectly in your system. Normally it takes years to build a squad that's good enough, but it really doesn't need to be that great if luck is on your side. I mean, I managed to win the CL in my 3rd season with Panathinaikos. Normally it would have taken me at least a few more years, but I got lucky and I managed to win it with a very mediocre side.
It can be hard, but it's not impossible at all. For example,my hardest ever chalenge was winning the CL with Crvena Zvezda. The team was ridiculously weak and poor, and they played in a league with a garbage reputation... but most importantly, Serbia isn't in the EU, so they had rules such as "you can't field more than 3 foreigners older than 22 years old". That made it very challenging (and also very, very fun). I had to mostly sign serb players (while trying to not weaken the teams in my league), and foreigners below the age of 20 (because it takes around 3 years to get serbian nationality).
It was funny because on that file I signed Verratti from Pescara when he was 18 or so, and he got serbian citizenship and got capped for Serbia and became the national superstar
It took me many years, and by then I had carried the serbian league to the 7th spot in the UEFA rankings, but I eventually won it
This post was edited by zarkadon on Oct 14 2014 11:44am