"The Heir to Tabárez" - Rio de la Plata #FM20 — CoffeehouseFM

Previously on Rio de la Plata, Ángel Bastardo led the charge against Nacional and looked to the future.

Intro

Having accepted Ruslan Chepiga's offer to take on the Uruguayan U20s deep within the Colombian jungle, International football has been an element to my save since Day 1. However, I haven't really documented what's happened so far. Today's post will therefore bring you the events affecting 'La Celeste' between 2018-2020. We'll also have an update from the 1st half of Peñarol's 2020 campaigns (both at home and in the Copa Libertadores) and some detail behind some transfer hackz I’ve made. Vamos…

The Heir to Tabárez

My thinking behind taking on the U20 Uruguayan side in FM20 was that I could use La Celeste as a conveyor belt for my younger academy players. Peñarol have one of the best youth systems in Uruguay and by using their players in the U20 setup, I can test them against their peers from around the world and boost their reputation. Additionally I could also make use of the National reports that you can get for any young Uruguayan player, which is a good way of getting to know the league’s next generation without having to scout them from my club’s scouting budget.

My overall ambition with the U20s was to impress the Uruguayan Federation in order to be in the frame for taking on the top job, whenever 72 year-old Óscar Tabárez retires in Football Manager. Here are my results in 2019:

I adopted the Peñarol 4141 / 433 that had done well domestically in Uruguay and had some lovely 19/20 year-olds to call upon: Ronald Araújo, Brian Rodríguez & Juan Manuel Sanabria to name just three supreme talents that had already moved away from Uruguay. In 2019, I integrated three Peñarol youngsters into the U20 setup: Agustín Dávila, Ezequiel Busquets and Facundo Torres. Unfortunately I would have called up wonderboy Ezequiel Mechoso (who I wrote about here), if he had not been injured in the 2nd half of 2019.

Despite the Bolivia loss up in the mountains, the U20 results were incredibly promising and I looked forward to the 2020 invitational tournament where I expected to face some strong European opposition…until the opportunity to replace Tabárez occurred in January 2020! Óscar Tabárez retiring after almost 14 years in his 2nd stint with La Celeste:

There was no guarantee my application would be successful, but I am delighted to get the full national team job. The U20 was fun and different, but the big disadvantage is that I really only had friendlies to play. Whereas, with the full squad, I will have the Copa América and the World Cup Qualifiers over 2020:

I will continue to use the Peñarol formation and tactics I have used previously in this save, and Bastardo-ball with some of the best/cuntiest players in the World is a mouth-watering prospect:

Bastardo’s Uruguayan squad for the 2020 Copa América.

I plan to enjoy the Copa América tournament, so I’m taking it slow with the possible return of a couple of 90 minute matches (probably against Chile and Argentina). These matches ‘may’ be streamed over on twitch.tv/fm_grasshopper….but don’t count on it. There are 5 group games before the knockout games start with the Quarter Finals…my aim is to finish up the groups before heading off to France for the Christmas holidays (sadly, no laptop will accompany me as I plan to drink wine and talk to people). So, we’ll most likely finish off the tournament around the New Year 🎉

Season 2020

Domestic

Back in Peñarol and it’s largely been a productive season. Buoyed by the signing of Mauro Zárate for €900k from Boca Juniors, Peñarol won the Opening Stage with 12 straight victories (9 of those being clean sheets). However there were three disappointing performances, notably the Super Cup loss to River Plate Montevideo and the away match against Wanderers (no connection to my podcast co-host Daniel Gear).

Continental

In the Copa Libertadores, we once again progressed from the Group Stage; which contained holders Flamengo and a difficult trip to the Bolivian mountains (I’m finding altitude having an effect this year, honest). We’ll look back at the last round victory with fond memories, with Mauro Zárate netting both goals…and paying off his transfer fee (earning us €947k prize money for our 2nd Round appearance against Deportivo Cali). Hero & Maverick.

Signing Sebastián

In previous blogs I said that I’d use all available transfer budget to sign older stars in this save. But in June 2020, the opportunity to sign one of the league’s best central defenders presented itself: Sebastián Cáceres. At 20 years-old, Cáceres was both club captain at Liverpool Montevideo and also within my U20 Uruguayan side. At the time, his transfer value was €300k, but his Scouting Report said he was well out of my transfer budget range and I didn’t think he’d be a viable option for Peñarol.

Until I used the Interact with Board transfer hackz:

I selected the option that signing Cáceres would “help me achieve my goals this season”…and the board agreed. You can see from the above that the Board shook the magic money tree and found extra monies from the bank balance to make the deal happen. It was then up to the management, including the Director Football Pierre Aubame, to get the deal over the line:

It’s a great deal in terms of wages and I like the three-year length but I am slightly worried about the minimum release fee (however the Board have said they are pleased to see the clause in the contract via the Club Vision screen). More importantly though, from a 1st team coach perspective, I am getting one of the best defenders in the league with Cáceres arriving as a 4-star ability central defender:

This technique does come with a caveat though, and should be treated with caution: on successful delivery of this Board request, the Board will freeze transfer/wage budgets on the short-medium term. This means that you will be unable to make budget adjustments from wages to transfer budget for example. So my recommendation would be to use this option if that’s the one deal you want to get done in that particular transfer window, or at least the final signing of the window.

La Celeste

So, it’s now over to Uruguayan National Team to continue this gripping save. Ranked 6th in the World, can Bastardo’s Uruguay win the Copa América and tick off a major ambition of this save? As always, you can stay up-to-date over on my Twitter page…or wait for the next blog post sometime in January 2020.

Thanks for reading/sharing/caring,

FM Grasshopper as Ángel Bastardo: “The Heir to Tabárez”