The problem with international management in FM 2006 is that in every major tournament, my players were not match fit unless they were playing in the English league. This is really discouraging as I can't help but feel that I would be able to do a better job if the game wasn't artificially handicapping me. In the end, I decided that it just wasn't worth the grief.
Anyway, 2028/29 was another successful year for Liverpool. I managed to do another cup quadruple (Premier division, Champions Cup, FA Cup and Club World Champ) but just missed out on 5 trophies when I lost 1:0 to Chelsea in the final. Bummer!
After my massive spending spree in 2025/26, I've been able to save up a bit of money and I now have well over GBP100m in the bank again. I naturally went on another spending spree at the end of the year (details below)!
Status update on 2025/26 acquisitions
My GK, Stefan Van Dijk, who I signed to replace Dave Robertson has done a great job in the last couple of years. Other than a poor spell of form halfway through the first season, he has been a very consistent GK. Not as good as Robertson but still very good. The only thing which worries me is that I still don't have a quality GK as backup (not been able to buy one at a reasonable price - I don't want to shell out big bucks for someone to sit on the bench long term).
Carlos Sanchez, the other big money buy in 2025/26, has also settled in well and has averaged over 30 goals each season (although he only managed 29 this year due to an injury crisis at the start of the season). The great thing about Sanchez is that he plays really well in the big games. The downside is that he is sometimes anonymous in smaller games which is the only reason he doesn't score more goals. Despite this, his partnership with John Blake is really yielding results as I managed to score 99 goals again this year.
Both Marcio and Galli has settled in as well but not really in a superstar capacity. Which is fair enough considering I did sign them on the expectation that they were squad players. Having said that, Marcio is getting a lot of games now that Dembele is starting to show his age.
The real revelation for me this year has been a young 22 year old midfielder I signed the year before (when he was 21). He joined Liverpool at the start of the season and my initial plan was simply as backup for my MCs (although the scout report showed him as a useful addition, the initial scout report in 2023 said that he would never develop into a player good enough for Liverpool). The reality is that he has been an excellent player and quickly started to play in a lot of games. Over the course of the year, his value has jumped to GBP12m which is pretty good considering I paid GBP7.5m for him (which was obviously an inflated price to begin with).
New Acquisitions at end of year
As I said above, I spent a wad of money on new acquisitions for next year.
The first was Jamie Sadler, another MC to help bolster my aging midfield. Although he cost me GBP35m, he is really a hot prospect for the future (only 19 years old!). I really hope he turns out to be worth the money!
I also spent GBP20m on Dario Romano, an Italian international. He is a DL who can also play ML and is really a replacement for Alessandro Marini who is now 35 (but still playing well believe it or not!). I also have an Italian youngster at LB called Andrea De Luca who is really promising and could well play in rotation with Romano. De Luca has been with me for several years now and has a really mean crossing foot.
The last acquisition is Ross Mills. Mills is a 17 year old hot prospect for which I paid GBP16.75m. I'll try and play him in a couple of games this year but really, he is my star of the future.
Anyway, you can see the latest squad here:
5 comments:
Holy crap - 35M for a 19 year old, and close to 17M for a 17 year old!!! I guess the cost inflation has been a major factor by 2028/29!
hahaha - it really does seem like the game is also modeling inflation doesn't it!
The reality is that the cost is so high for a couple of reasons.
1) This is just an impression (no data as backup) but it seems to me that the overall quality of regens isn't high enough which means that star players and potential stars are ridiculously expensive. To be fair, this might just be due to me having a star squad already so finding another star to fit in isn't easy - after all, how many superstars do Man Utd have?
2) With the ongoing success of Liverpool, I can't help but wonder if this makes other teams reluctant to sell to me. I know for a fact that some transfers fail regardless of how much I offer simply because the opposing manager doesn't like me on a personal level (prob cos I kicked his ass then slagged him off in the press - serves him right though as I never start press wars, just react to them).
Don't know if it was already modelled into FM06, but FM08 for sure has manager relationships - if you have a poor relationship, they will either refuse to sell to you or will ask for an inflated price.
Just started a new FM08 game with season 08/09 data update. Playing as liverpool too and in season 10/11 now. Robbie Keane is still in my team, but isn't the most consistent of players! :)
I'm always careful about the data updates. My view is that I like data updates to bring players up to date at the start of the season. What I don't like are player updates that update for transfers during the Jan transfer window.
My opinion is that, if a player started the season at Liverpool, then I should continue to have that player available to me. After the game starts, its my choice to sell him or not in the transfer window. Similar rationale for buying players.
Agree - thats why I go for full season updates...
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