So season 1 ended on a very positive note. 2nd placed finish in the league, Champions League football secured and to top it all off we won the Europa Conference League. You can catch up on all of that here.
As the players jet off on their well deserved holidays I ask myself ‘how do we ensure we don’t stagnate and progress to yet another level?’ We will find European football far tougher this coming season - our current squad as it is will be a year older, wiser and in a lot of cases ‘better’ than last season, but I can’t just rely on that to take us to the next level.
So during pre-season I need to set out what my targets are for next season, what does evolution of this squad look like? I decided we need to evolve both tactically and in terms of personnel. The tactics come first of course, how can you properly recruit for players if you don’t know what role they’ll play or what you’ll ask of them? Having a defined style of way of playing is usually something I struggle with so I made it my key focus.
As I write this post we are 5 games into the new season, the tactical evolution blog will follow this one even though I settled on our tactics beforehand…simply because I need more time to analyse it and the players need more time playing it. So for now, let’s focus on how I approached recruitment ahead of season 2.
Rewind 6 Months
Believe it or not I started considering the next stage of evolution at AZ back in the January transfer window. I had an idea of a new system I wanted to deploy (to better allow us to utilise positional play) so I kept an eye on scouting reports and created specific recruitment focuses on the types of ‘new players’ I’d like to have in the squad.
On the left we have the system we finished our first season on and on the right the new one I’d be thinking about for a while. So the main new/different roles are:
Left back (FB-A to IWB-S)
Right back (FB-A to IFB-D)
Central midfield (CM-S to Defensive Midfield VOL-A)
You’ll see I’ve also made a few other tweaks to roles but those will be covered in Part 2 - Tactics.
When I took over at AZ I picked a tactic that suited the skillset of the players I had at my disposal, but now, after a year in charge, I feel it’s time to stamp more of my authority on how I want the team to play. When I focused on recruitment it was with a view to overload central areas with 5 players in an unpredictable way, with runs from deep and wide forwards cutting inside I wanted to see if this would sew chaos in opposition defences. Will it? I bloody hope so.
Left Back - IWB-S
The first signing in this position was almost accidental - an agent offered me the player for £1.5m and, given his age and profile, I was sold. In came Edvard Tagesth in January (loaned back to his previous club till the end of the season. I know FMSamo is a keen admirer.
I really hate it when there are down arrows when you need a screenshot…
Able to operate in a number of positions, Tagseth will most often be deployed in the IWB-S role and has solid attributes where they’re needed. Concentration is a little low so I hope to improve that but he’s young and will get better. This role will move into the DM strata in possession and he’s already a natural operating in those spaces.
Within my squad I have two very natural wing backs in Mees De Wit and David Møller Wolfe - I envisaged offloading De Wit & bringing in a rotation option with Tagseth BUT I also needed cover at centre back going into the new season. So, could I not kill two birds with one stone? (those poor birds, that’s really not a nice saying when you write it down…)
So this new DL/DC player needed to be a number of things:
Left footed
Versatile (ideally natural at DC and DL)
Solid in a number of attributes; namely heading, marking, tackling, anticipation, concentration, decisions and passing
Young-ish (club philosophy is to sign no one 30 and over).
I factored the above into a player search filter and came up with the players below:
Boyomo - solid all-rounder, not naturally left footed and ‘tries to play way out of trouble’ does scare me as a player trait…transfer fee and wages are high
Pirola - 100% first choice, great attributes, left footed, aggressive and strong to boot, but Salernitana wanted over £10m and wage demands look steep
Smolčić - similar profile to Pirola and yet available for less than £5m…
I tried my luck with Pirola but his wage demands were stupid and he ended up joining Torino for £12m and sits on £39k p/w. In context, before I signed Redondo on £24k p/w (more on him soon) my highest earner was on £11k p/w!
So Smolčić was the obvious choice, similar profile and infinitely cheaper. He joined for £3.9m & £17.5k p/w.
Defensive Midfield - VOL (A)
Briefly mentioned above, Fernando Redondo joined us for £5.5m from Argentinos Juniors. My scouting team had picked him out around January time but I didn’t go for him until the end of the season due to his wage demands - I wanted to ensure we had Champions League football to cover the large jump in wages that we’ll need to pay. He’s totally worth it though.
I had originally marked him as my central midfielder on support role but he has all the attributes required to perform the Segunto Volante role. No secret to his recruitment - just my scouts looking in Argentina, available fairly cheap - thank-you very much.
Right Back - IFB-D
Recruitment can be a done a number of different ways; scouts returning their recommendations, agents offering their players around, me personally scouring squads to find hidden gems, people utilising statistics.
And then sometimes, there’s the internal solution - say hello to Alexandre Penetra.
Penetra spent all of last season at centre back where he was pretty solid on the whole - yet the fact that he’s a natural IFB-D meant I knew I had a ready made player for that role once my tactical shift was confirmed. Sugawara was my flying full back last season but then I sold him for £47m - knowing full well I didn’t need to replace him. Penetra is perfectly suited to this new role.
Any other business?
Now, I know I just said I didn’t need to replace Sugawara, but sometimes I’m susceptible to impulsive purchases on FM and Gastón Martirena was one such buy. I like the look of him on the surface, he was cheap, but I’ve a nagging feeling he’s going to be a pain in the arse.
Another was Markus Solbakken who I actually signed in January but have failed to mention until now. Brought in as a backup to the ageing Jordie Clasie he mainly operates as my DLP but would no doubt perform competently as my VOL-A if required.
Finally, in came Ondřej Lingr as a Shadow Striker - again a role I wanted some more depth in and he’ll rotate with Sven Mijnans.
All 3 of the purchases above I found and made through specifically filtered player searches using attributes I like to see in each of their roles. They were all fairly cheap and on reasonable wages as well.
That’s it for this recruitment post - I’ll be back with Part 2 - Tactics once I’ve progressed further into season 2. Here’s to the evolution!