Football Manager 2013 Stories

Hello and welcome to a new era in the history of San Marino as we enter the Serie A for the first time in their history. I am certainly hoping that it will not be a disappointing season as i think we have enough quality to have a decent season. The expectations have been set at a mid-table finish which may be a bit optimistic but i though that the extra wage budget would prove to be crucial in bring in some players. 

I have managed to bring in a hell of a lot of players and this is mainly due to the fact that i sold 50% of Pedrinho to Catania for £3.1 million. The thinking behind this is that it will allow me to bring in some more players than before without having to sell him completely for at least a season. I will be able to replace him next season if i can’t sign the 50% back.

The first player I am going to introduce you to is Giovanni Cristofari, he was signed on a free from Palermo who are a very good Serie A outfit. He will be mainly a rotation player in my opinion.

Gerardo Strumbo was signed on a free from Catania. He will be a key player in the defence hopefully but as of yet I am not sure of my best centre back partnership.

Custodio is a great free transfer and will be key in our attempt of keeping the ball in the middle of the park and he is good enough at defending to provide some cover.

Vincenzo Sarno was signed from Varese for £90k and will probably play ahead of [...]

Hello and welcome back to my San Marino story. We left it last time with my team really performing well due to a change in tactics. i am definitely hoping that we can carry on this good form for the rest of the season if possible and maybe even slip into the play-offs.

Well it is January and because we were performing above our initial expectations meant that i had the opportunity to change them. I decided to tell the board that we could finish in the top half which is definitely achievable if our form continues. I will use the extra wage to bring in a few more players.

I decided to bring in a young centre back for 55 pound and then three other players on frees which you will see below. Antonio Cassano was signed as i needed some more options upfront if one of my two strikers got injure we would be very weak up there. 

Well as you can see we had a great second half of the season winning most of our games and only losing five games in twenty two games. i have to admit i am really surprised with this team as the average age is 22 i think and the average age of my starting line up probably 19-20. Whenever we lost we also managed to come back and win the next game which was really impressive.

We actually managed to finish third and this is a huge achievement for San Marino. We were predicted to finish 21st this season but we go and finish 3rd which is absolutely amazing. If we hadn’t have had such a poor start to the [...]

Well we started the season hoping to achieve a safe mid table finish and build on our success of last season which was staying in the league. We have brought in lots of players but mainly all are very young with only a few players over twenty five.

Well as you can see we started the year very badly we only managed to get two wins in twelve games and i was really getting annoyed at the team as we should definitely have been performing better than this so i decided to take a step back and look at the strengths i have in my squad and the weaker areas and i tried to get as many of the strengths in to my formation and get rid of the weak parts and i think i managed to do that pretty well as our form has turned dramatically as we are unbeaten since i changed formation and we have played ten games winning five of them. I will show you the formation later on in the post.

This good form towards the end of the year we ended up 11th and this was great as we were in the relegation zone for ages and the gap was increasing all the time between us and getting out of the relegation zone.

Some player have really impressed me this this season and have played really well. The youngsters are developing really well and looks like they could actually be the players to eventually win promotion to the Serie A.

I made two transfers during the season and they were both obviously on frees. They are two very good prospects.

The tactic which has [...]

Hello and welcome back to my San Marino story and this is the beginning of my second season in the Serie B. I will be going over all my transfer dealings and as the title suggests we will be reducing the wage bill massively to try and sort out the clubs financial state. I will be looking to better my position from last season which was 17th and i would be happy with about 12th.

Well this is how i reduced the wage bill.I usually only give players really short length deals when I am a club like San Marino because you are always required to chop and change as you progress up the leagues but to get where I am I have probably spent to much money on waged and this season I am going to rectify this. A lot of these players were on around a grand a week which is just unsustainable for a club of San Marino’s stature so they left on frees. Marco Cellini was the biggest player i had to see go because he was on three grand a week and not playing every game. I actually managed to sell some players and i brought in £40K which is pretty decent from just two sales.

This year i focused mainly on bringing in players around the age of 18 de to their potential and there cheaper wages. I have some really good prospects signed this season and I look forward to seeing them thrive like my youngsters last season. I am trying to build this club around the youngsters and then just a have a few more experienced players to provide the quality the [...]

Well we started the update in 17th place and i was very confident that we could stay up if we string together a few good results. It doesn’t have to be loads we just need to double our points really.

Well we started the year really bad and we just couldn’t get any form together until we played fellow strugglers Juve Stabia where we won 2-1. After this game we went on a great run and won 7 games in a row including that game which definitely kept us up this season. We then ended the season a bit bad and got a few draws and losses but on the last day we beat Ascoli 4-3 to end the season very well.

Well we managed to just avoid the relegation play-out which was definitely a must as our form is quite erratic. I do think that this is a decent result for the first season in the Serie B. The youngsters i introduced to you are becoming key in my team and they are improving so much and will be really good players by the end of next season no doubt. Parma were brilliant all season and definitely deserved to win the league and surprisingly for me Cittadella were relegated after only losing one game in the league below.

I made two transfers in January as i brought in yound centre back Dwight Brinkman and a young Brazilian defensive midfielder on a free. I will show you these two players next season when i discuss my transfer dealings as they didn’t play a huge part.

Well we started this update in 15th looking good to stay up and maybe push on and get a good secure stay in Serie B. I will definitely be looking to win the games against the teams that are around me in the league.

Well we had another decent two months where we managed to get two wins in the league and a draw but the biggest positive came in teh Italian Cup where we managed to beat Genoa to go through to the main part of the cup. We went one nil up but they equalised just before half time. In the last minute one of my young strikers nicked the ball from there goalie after a poor touch and put the ball in from about 20 yards. I am not worried about the losses as they are expected this season but i will be hoping for a little bit of an improvement as my youngsters develop and gain more experience.

This update we finish in 17th place which is disappointing but probably quite a likely result for us as a club. Parma who i tipped to win the league at the start of the season are playing really well and are top by five points.

Well the big moment has come and this will certainly be a hard season with a lot more losses than i am use to. It will test my management skills the most out of all the seasons so far as there is a possibility of relegation. The team had a good preseason however and went in to the first league game on the back of a great victory over Chievo.

Well we got off to a good start and managed to beat fellow strugglers Andria 2-1 but in all fairness it should have been much more. I was happy with how things were going until the game against Parma where we collapsed and our season started going down hill. We just couldn’t defend. Our attackers were doing pretty decent though in all fairness until the game against Cittadella where we lost four nil. I couldn’t quite believe this game and it really annoyed me.It forced me to change the starting line up and tactics as in the last few games we really struggled to create enough chances. Against Cittadella we had no shots at all. In the game against Brescia i basically said who gives a shit and decided to play the younger players and go for a attacking formation and it worked. I couldn’t quite believe it. The youngsters carried on doing well in the next two games as well and this little bit of good form has put me in a much better mood with the team.

Well after the first two months and a bit we find our selves 15th in the table and to be honest we could very well climb a few more places as [...]