My relationship with Football Manager has fluctuated these past 12 months more than it ever had previously. I’ve always owned every version of the game, pumping 100s of hours into each iteration, but something felt a little different, a little off about FM22. I found it quite straight forward to be successful – far more so than in previous years – to the point where I wasn’t actually playing the game, I was just sinking my time into a repetitive action that required very little thought.

This led to me dropping the game completely in February. In the last cycle of FM I produced no content and shamefully read no content either. I was annoyed with the game and maybe a little envious of those who were experiencing the enjoyment and escape FM can give whereas I succumbed to a melancholy.

Yet, as with the turning of the seasons, a new FM was on the horizon before long and a dormant part of my brain was slowly massaged into its usual way of working. Despite Sports Interactive woeful announcements (or non-announcements) around headlines and features, having a relatively chunky time away from the game only made the heart grow fonder. I felt re-energised for playing & writing about FM again.

A new name for the blog is born along with a new save – born out of a love of a player from my FM yesteryears.

Welcome to Instituto Atlético Central Córdoba – La Nueva Joya

Props to @jord_713 for the blog title and @rocksendfm for the correct spelling. The name stands for ‘The New Jewel’ and relates to a nickname of a certain Paulo Dybala. A wonderfully gifted footballer who started his career at IACC and was dubbed ‘La Joya’.

Those of you who have had the enjoyment of consuming my blogs from years ago may remember my love for Dybala budding like a rose in spring as he signed for my all-conquering Stoke side in FM16, gradually becoming the best central midfielder in the world, then again playing for my just-as-conquering Red Bull Leipzig team in FM17. It’s been a few years since then so now I plan to unearth the next jewel, the next Dybala, by managing his first club in Argentina.

Hopes & Dreams

As with a previous save I had with Bodo/Glimt I enjoyed setting some (loose) restrictions to try and add extra difficulty & reasons for playing this save. As ever, they’re more targets than absolutes but I’ll look to stick as close to them as I can – especially to begin with.  

• Squad to be made up primarily of Argentinians (75% of first team squad)

• Utilise a ‘Number 10’ within our tactic either as a playmaker or shadow striker

• Focus on youth development in order to maximise the chance of high quality newgens

• Sell a player to a top European league for more than £10m (breaking the record set by the sale of Dybala)

• Challenge for silverware within 5 seasons

I understand that wanting to unearth the next Dybala through my own youth system may be an aim that just never comes to fruition. Whilst I can control my staff and facilities (providing I can gain some on field success to assist that bank balance), I can’t control luck and that plays a fairly large chunk in my hopes of having someone come through with the right potential ability and able to play in the number 10, or a deeper striker role. But I will remain ever hopeful.

Statistical Recruitment

With the above in mind that’s why I can’t have it be the sole focus of the save. FM23, whilst not packed full of new features, has seemingly improved again on the statistics it provides. I’ll admit, I’ve never played FM like some others do where there is a large focus on statistics, despite this being the way of the real world now. I’ve enjoyed being able to view players as quantifiable ‘things’ where the game has made a judgement of their ability and shown it via attributes. I’ve always played FM at a fairly quick pace, largely for my enjoyment levels, but this year I’d like to do things a little differently.

Given I want to (at least try to) have a squad full of Argentinians I’m going to need to get creative and maybe a little less selective when it comes to recruitment. Less selective insofar as I want to not just sell/buy players based off of scout reports and attributes alone, more creative by utilising specific statistics alongside attributes when considering purchases.

It’s not something I’ll be worrying about too much, if at all, until the end of our first season given that we have exactly £0 in the bank and therefore no scope to make any signings of any nature right now. Yet when forming potential shortlists as the season goes on I’d like to form 3 or 4 key statistics per position that I’d use as comparison tools amongst similar players to try and gauge how a player is performing. Does that make sense? I’ll try explaining another way…

Say I need a new right back; traditionally I’d consider attributes & a scout report and that’s it. Given I’m looking to utilise a narrow 4-3-1-2 system with IACC this may mean I’d want higher attributes in:

• Crossing

• Stamina

• Pace

• Work Rate

• Tackling

• Decisions

I’d want my full backs to be quite aggressive & attack-minded, pushing beyond our central midfielders to contribute in transition as well as providing width and crosses to the strikers. So the above may form my initial assessment. I like decisions as an attribute; in my head I picture if it’s higher then my player will make the right pass, cross, tackle more often than a player of a lower number.

So how will statistics come into this? Well for a right back and the statistical feedback available to me I’d pick a handful of specific measurements that I hope will help aid any decision. For the right back role, given that I want them to be up & down the wing whipping crosses in, I could consider:

• XA/90 (Expected assists per 90mins)

• Dist/90 (distance covered per 90mins)

• CHC/90 (chances created per 90mins)

• DRB/90 (dribbles per 90mins)

• CR C/90 (crosses completed per 90mins)

There’s no defensive statistics above, maybe I’ll need to consider what of the defensive statistics are important to an attacking full-back role. I know these can be grouped to produce all sorts of statistical tables and charts - but I’m hoping to devise a way of collating this information quickly to allow me to make decisions without spending too much time crunching numbers or exporting data.

By considering a select few statistics, I hope that they can help paint a more vibrant picture of a player before I decide on a purchase – they may also help if I’m torn between two players. I may end up utilising a tool such as @FM_Stag’s Player Comparison Tool. It’s an element I’m keen to explore further in FM23.

Getting Started

So I’ve fired up FM23, a new skin, logos, faces, kits, stadium et al are all in place and I’ve even gone out and backfilled some of the staff roles at the club.

As far as my starting XI is concerned I’ve mentioned previously that I’m hoping to make good use of a narrow 4-3-1-2 system as per the below:

It’ll get tweaked (it already has after two friendlies) as we progress and I dissect early performances but this is what’ll hopefully be a solid foundation for us to play. The idea behind the system is to funnel the ball through my Advanced Playmaker at AMC. I visualise that if Dybala were there, that’s what I’d want my team to do, rightly or wrongly. Love is blind.

There are a few player instructions behind the scenes to help facilitate this as well and I may divulge these should they work and it be worth me telling you. Otherwise if we’re hopeless I’d rather not admit to the contributing factors of my failure, ok? But I’m a glass half full kind of guy.

Finally I just wanted to show you Franco Watson – our current AMC and arguably our best player – which could be seen as ironic and portentous…time will tell.

I’m quite excited to kick things off and blog about my progress in Argentina – hell I’ve even considered writing #creativeFM in true Grasshopper style. Sorry everyone.

To La Neuva Joya!