"Heir to the Empire" - Faceless #FM22

Previously in Faceless, Cuiabá achieved Série A survival.


 
 

Natasha

Cuiabá, Brazil

"If I loved you any less, I would have stayed"

The words came out of the metallic mask in a muffled manner, but Natasha Sibiski instantly deduced who sat in front of her. The voice belonged to Ángel Bastardo, although everybody else in the room only knew him as The Faceless: the protagonist of an increasingly popular urban legend circulating the continent. The rumours spoke of a dead body that washed up on the riverbank of Manaus: a corpse, nameless, faceless, that had floated down the river, shunned by The Shinigami. It was thus that the legend of The Faceless began: Faceless who rose from the dead and walked among the living; Faceless who went on to manage teams along the Atlantic coast, resurrecting many a football club from relative obscurity, before finding notable success in Brazil's Serie A, with Cuiabá. It was around this time that Natasha began to suspect who the masked wanderer was. Seeing him on a televised match made her leave Ruslan Chepiga in Gibraltar and head back immediately to the Americas.

"If I loved you any less, I would have stayed", The Faceless’ words echoed in Natasha’s mind. He continued:

"I was no father to you, Isabella Bastardo. That’s your real name. I left you with your Russian mother, a sister to Ruslan Chepiga. We watched over you in our different ways: Father and Uncle. I am sorry".

Natasha was unravelling her ancestry, along with the rest of the room's occupants, which contained various carers of the masked man. He was sick: her father. Now a dying man, he was nothing like the Ángel Bastardo she once knew.

An uncle too: Ruslan Chepiga. She digested the news of being both a Bastardo and a Chepiga, and it all strangely made sense to her now. The payment for her law degrees which no single working mother could ever afford, the protection she was always given from Hugo Ojeda, and the care provided by some of the most ruthless men in the world.

"Come with me. Come with me back to Ruslan and we will take revenge against Hugo Ojeda", she implored. The emotions were welling inside her, but no sooner did they rise than they were pushed aside in favour of stillness of mind. Was it her Russian coldness or her newfound Argentine fibre? Natasha could not tell…but she held her emotions in check regardless.

The mask facing her shook from side-to-side. "No. Only complete forgiveness from my people can end my suffering. YOU are my people, Isabella. I seek no revenge. Simply forgiveness and a merciful end. Please end the waning magic that is barely keeping me alive".

A male carer in white robes passed a blade to Natasha. His eyes gestured to her as they travelled from the blade’s edge to The Faceless' body, making sure she understood. The blade's hilt featured the plains of the savannah and depicted a bear and a lion chasing several bats and snakes into a jungle. Natasha contemplated the meaning it might have held for its creator, who had carved the intricate design.

Approaching Bastardo, she pulled back the blade before piercing it through his torso in one swift motion. “I’m sorry this happened to you, and I forgive everything”, she said, withdrawing the blade with surprising ease. It was as if no tissue or bones existed, and no sooner had the blade been withdrawn than the room was bathed in white light: a light so bright that Natasha had to turn her head away from Bastardo’s body and shield her eyes with her free hand. One or two seconds passed before the light quickly dimmed, and everything in the room could be seen again. That is, everything except the body, for only a mask and a set of robes remained on the chair that had seated Ángel Bastardo.


Hugo

Barranquilla, Colombia

Hugo Ojeda sat at his desk bemused as the bats took flight in the day, squealing past the high-rise apartment in central Barranquilla. Thousands upon thousands of the nocturnal winged mammals scaled up the building, just centimetres away from the tower’s glass façade, causing several people on the floors above and below to cry out in panic. The bats who had now risen above the Barranquilla skyline veered towards the sun, blocking it out temporarily as the sky turned black. It only lasted one or two seconds, but long enough for Hugo to ponder if something terrifying had happened elsewhere.

His left hand turned to his pills, whilst the right hand quickly reached for his whiskey.


Ángel

River Negro

As the blade entered his body, he was instantly transported back to the River Negro and was looking at the faces of The Shinigami once again. Their eyes burned a bright purple under the night sky. But unlike the first time, The Shinigami reached out for him now, as the Negro's current carried him closer towards their reach. With his bloodline secured through Natasha, the heir to his empire, there was no reason for the Shaman's magic to continue keeping him alive.

The Shinigami had him now, and this was the end.


Notes from the Editor

From Uruguay to Brazil, and all the bits in between, my La Plata series has come to an end. I set out in 2019 to have a creative arc that spanned three editions of Football Manager (FM20-FM22)…and I never would have predicted the World would have changed so much during this three-year-period. But I suppose the one constant has been the ability to release creatively with words, and I thank readers for the odd message or email throughout this period; telling me they have enjoyed the story etc. It’s been really appreciated. I also have to thank Arun and Chris, who have been a constant soundboard of ideas and have offered to sense check some [probably most] of the pieces that I write. Thank you guys, you are amazing.

But CreativeFM from me will be paused. I have not shut all the doors in the story, whilst Hugo Ojeda and Natasha (now Isabella) remain ‘alive’, but Ángel Bastardo is finally put to rest. But boy, did we have fun right? I am delighted I was able to set Hugo Ojeda up to be the heir to the empire in FM20, only for Operation Isabella to really be about the character that arrives a year later in FM21 cycle. Everything has been deliberate, most things foreshadowed and lots of unreliable narration to keep readers on their…thumbs.

I hope, if you have read this far, you have enjoyed it as much as I had fun writing it.

Thank you,

Tony / FM Grasshopper

“Original Pirate Material” - Faceless #FM22


Intro

Welcome back, Reader.

The English language is a pirate language. I don’t mean that “Ahoy, Me Hearties!” lark, I’m talking about how the English language was formed over hundreds of years of invasions/occupations, feudal societies, enlightenments, and the creation of a national identity. To give you just one example, take our meat. When animals are reared on farms, they keep their Old English names: cow, pig, and sheep. But when they are cooked into dishes, we use an Anglicised French word: beef (beouf), pork (porc) and mutton (mouton). The English language takes bits from other languages and passes it off as its own.

Why am I telling you this? Well, it’s a bit like my recent FM22 FMing. I’m taking three approaches to recruitment from others, and shamelessly passing it off as my own* (🐄🐖🐑). I am calling it Original Pirate Material.

Disclaimers: I should mention that this blog isn’t going to uncover an either footed 17-year-old Mali Wonderkid from Timbuktu and scream MONEYBALL at you. I have a limited Scouting Package in Brazil (Middle Tier: Série A, B and C), and I am filtering on players based in South America who have played at least 1,000 Minutes in 2024.

*Not really, full credit is below.


Zealand’s Moneyball™ 🐄

Moneyball. It’s a recruitment concept that’s well known, and which has been adopted by a lot of FMers over the years”, something I said on the blog a few months ago. Putting FM data into spreadsheets, particularly for a lot of FM Bloggers, has been a pastime for…well, decades.

However, it takes a well-known FM YouTuber sometimes to bring it into full public FM consciousness. Zealand Shannon has done exactly that, with a Moneyball YT video now over 150k views at the time of writing. What I like about the video is that he references the inspirations, references what is not quite perfect (yet) and lays out in simple terms how to “Moneyball” your save:

 

Click on the image to be taken to Zealand’s video. CNTRL + P to print this blog post.

 

Zealand’s offering is one I felt more passionate data savvy Bloggers should have done years ago, via a download on a blog (and apologise if they did and I just missed it). Zealand has simply provided a Search Filter (with the data parameters included) and shared a Google Sheet (with formulas) for you to download. Zealand and co. have not invented something new here, but they do deserve credit for opening it up and making the approach easy-to-use (for simpletons like me):

  1. Download Player Search filter and add it into your game. Run a search on whichever parameters you see fit e.g. Position, Age, Attributes etc.

  2. Export said Player Search results, and place into a Google Sheet.

  3. Check Google Sheet for statistical goodness.

I fancied giving it a try, so I used a modified Player Search based on the Half-Back role’s attributes, but I wanted to be agnostic in terms of who came up…so I did not set a Position within the search criteria. It did not bother me if Natural defenders came up in the search results, rather than natural DMs. Versatility would be a good thing and, depending on the game situation, this role could easily slot in at CB whilst I pushed a player up to AM (mimicking the 4-3-1-2 from last season which featured a No.10).

Therefore I set Half-Back in the search and did not expect players to meet 100% of the attributes; rather I set only 10 of the 16 attributes to match with a score of 13 or above. This meant a lot of CBs appeared in the search, but one name jumped out: Víctor Cuesta.

Using Zealand’s Google Sheet, I was quickly able to see that:

  • Cuesta had the highest Interceptions Per 90 for any top league player (2.54 per 90). Something I rate in any DM or CB position.

  • He ranked the 2nd best for Headers Won Per 90 for any top league player (10.63 per 90).

  • He was available for Free.

  • He is Argentine (meaning he’d become the 5th one in the current squad, but who is also a naturalised Brazilian status meaning he does not add to our FGN quota 🥰).

Now it was passed over to the General Manager, could he do a deal without me? Nope: he failed, but a new FM22 feature 🚨 allows me to take on the negotiations and keep the deal alive. I did just that, Víctor Cuesta signs on a one-year deal at $260k per annum.

36-year-old Víctor Cuesta takes a significant pay cut to join us!


FM Stag’s Goalkeeper Calculator™ 🐖

Personally, judging Goalkeepers is always a challenge for me on FM. Maybe it’s because the muscle memory just doesn’t exist, where the eye isn’t sharp enough to focus in the right places on the attributes screen. You see, I hardly sign Goalkeepers. Usually, it’s a case of finding one and then sticking with him for many seasons. When I discovered FM Stag had a Goalkeeper Calculator, I immediately asked to use it. The spreadsheet takes a combination of metrics, weightings + adds/subtracts to give me a GK Rating to work towards.

In this search, I simply wanted a Goalkeeper that had played at least 1,000 minutes in 2024 and was based in South America. The export was large, but because of the GK Rating, I filtered down to a Top 5…

Due to budgetary constraints, it was likely I could only afford the three Brazilians in the search (Megiolaro, Ricardo and Arias). So, it was over to the General Manager to tempt the best rated: Phelipe Megiolaro, who was available from Série C side Ituano on an expiring contract…

It’s a big gamble, putting your trust in the stats like this. But Phelipe Megiolaro has:

  • The best Saves per 90 out of the top 5 targets.

  • A strong Average Rating of 7.24.

  • Played every minute of Ituano’s successful promotion to Série B. He’s in a side that leaks a lot of shots, but he saves them…and they get promoted.

Megiolaro will jump two leagues up to Série A and will play as our Sweeper Keeper…as we look to play a more Counter Attacking style in 2025 during the Série A campaign.


Dan Gear’s General Manager/Director of Football Method™ 🐑

Read more about Dan’s approach here: https://www.footballmanager.com/the-byline/using-your-staff-recruitment-fm22

In this save, my current GM’s hit rate stands at 50%.

  1. Víctor Cuesta - Failed.

  2. Phelipe Megiolaro - Successful.

However, could the GM do one final deal from a recommendation provided by the scouting setup? It was over to the Short Term/Priority Focus screen to bring in another Striker within the Scouting Centre. The parameters: somebody who could play Deep Lying Forward aged 23 or below (to meet the Board’s club vision). Luciano Gondou topped the recommendations with an A (“sign whatever the price’) rating, and the reports indicate he is an adaptable and consistent performer. His contract expires towards the end of the calendar year, so I could have perhaps negotiated a cheap transfer deal. However, I instructed the GM to go for a loan deal because his current low wage means we can get him on a low-risk 8-month deal, to see how he does first.

Fall back to Minas Tirith, he’s only gone and made the deal!

Gondou, our 6th Argentine.

The GM got the deal done. Gondou is hopefully going to get a lot of game time, because he covers both the DLF and Poacher roles in my tactic. He’s decent in the air, can finish with two feet and makes good decisions…well done GM!


Season 2025: State Championships

My blog frequency will slow down a bit once I hit a full Série A campaign. I’m therefore unsure how best to capture a Brazilian season. Blog a whole calendar year, or cut it in half like a bit of undercooked cow? I have not decided yet, however I am here right now to let you know how the 2025 Mato Grosso State Championship went. It’s my first taste of genuine “stat padding” and I bloody loved it…

Cuiabá Esporte Clube: Mato Grosso State Champs 🏆

There was mixed success for the new signings: Víctor Cuesta missed most of the states with an ankle injury, making just 1 start and 6 substitute appearances. However, Phelipe Megiolaro kept 12 clean sheets in the 15 State fixtures. He hardly needed to make a save as we dominated games! Luciano Gondou arrived late in the States but managed to bag 3 goals in four knockout round games. The real hero however was Alan Empereur (who I shared last time out on the blog). The Emperor bagged 12 goals in fifteen matches from Centre-Back, with a mix of back post headers, freekicks and penalty area skirmishes. Maybe next year I’ll to play the kids so that games are more competitive!

Now, my Cuiabá side move into the Série A. The Board’s aim is to “fight bravely against relegation”, which sounds ominous, but let’s hope our new signings complement the existing squad and we do ‘enough’. Enough would be 16th place (out of 20 clubs), anything less would mean The Faceless moves on. Again.

As always, thanks for reading/sharing and caring. Faceless will be back 🎭

Tony / FM Grasshopper

"Cuiabá and The 4-3-1-2 Gold Rush" - Faceless #FM22

Previously in this story, Ángel Bastardo became The Faceless.


Intro

June 2024

 
 

In 2022, Cuiabá Esporte Clube had rejected the man they called The Faceless once before. Back then, they had been relegated from Série A and faced the heartache of returning to Serie B after just two years in Brazil's top league. It turned out, appointing a man with no identity as their 'saviour' for a return to the top was never a viable option.

Now June 2024, the club has finally opened their doors to The Faceless. Continuing to languish in Série B, the club has stagnated to the point where they now sit in Série B's relegation zone with spiralling debts. There is still time however (and games) to consolidate the club in Série B; with the view of promotion back to Série A in 2025 or 2026 years.

Welcome to the gold rush…


Cuiabá’s 2024 so far…

Did you know that Cuiabá is located in the geographic centre of South America? It’s the reason for the obelisk in the club’s logo, just in case you were wondering. Sadly, it seems the modest structure and plaque make a better attraction than the football on display lately. The Mid-West Brazil side has stagnated in recent years and after 12 matches played in Série B the club now face a relegation battle…

 

Série B - 16 June 2024

 

So, what am I walking into in terms of objectives, philosophies and visions?

  1. Expectation to finish Mid-Table in 2024. With 2/3 of the season still to play, this objective is entirely possible. Beyond this, the club has aspirations to win promotion to Série A within two years (by 2026).

  2. Sign players under the age of 23 for the first team. I don’t mind this one, however with the club already in the red I am not looking to sign anybody right now.

  3. Develop players using the club’s youth system. This philosophy suits the fact that there is limited money here at Cuiabá. I think I will be integrating 2-3 academy players each season regardless.


The 4-3-1-2 Gold Rush

Just as a brief update on history: Cuiabá grew in significance due to the 17/18th Century Gold Rush, where gold was discovered along the Cuiabá River. Sadly, once the gold was depleted the city was largely forgotten about until the 1960s, where investment in the roads and infrastructure was brought about by the construction of the country’s new capital called Brasília. Cuiabá Esporte Club took a further 40 years to be formed, where it was founded by footballer Gaúcho (who once briefly played for Boca Juniors)!

The mounting club debts in September 2024 led to cuts in both salary and transfer budgets.

Why do you need to know this? You don’t, but I thought I would name the tactic ‘Gold Rush’…as we try our best to head towards Série A and the ‘gold’ that lies there. I mean, it is a bit of a rush, as we progressed through 2024 we dived further into the red. What was -$900k in June, became -$4m six months later. Who knows what it would be a year later if we continue to pay some of these players Série A salaries (the club has not fully transitioned to life in Série B just yet).

So, how would we try to rectify this and win points? Answer: with a narrow 4-3-1-2…

Gold Rush!

I like this shape because it’s a reminder of some good FM22 memories I had with Western United in Australia (read more here). Whilst this latest tactic has shades of that Calcio inspired system, with some of the player roles I’ve re-used, I’ve started afresh with Team Instructions. It’s another attempt to keep things simple.

I’ve got a stronger presence of creativity on our left hand side…the Complete Wing Back will advance and stretch the play, a left sided Ball Playing Defender, a left sided Central Midfielder instructed to Get Further Forward and Take More Risks and a Deep Lying Forward. It’s geared to feed the Poacher, but I also have an Attacking Mezzala and a No.10 ‘in the hole’ to chip in with goals.

I won’t introduce the whole squad, but below are the top 3 rated players on my arrival. Having both Wing Backs representing two of the top three is promising, and justification for the narrow formation. Both Lozano and Barros have high Physicals for the level we’re in, and are also our squad’s best crossers. Both will hopefully dominate the flanks.

Alan Empereur is not only an epic name, he’s a solid defender with good First Touch and Vision. You may notice that the roles I am playing them in the 4-3-1-2 align with the recommended ones based on attributes, “keep it simple, stupid”:

Overall the tactic feels like it has a nice balance, and I’m enjoying the highlights immensely. How does it fair?


Season 2024

Série B

An opening 5-1 win at home against Brusque and then a two-month unbeaten run quickly led me to believe that Cuiabá would stay up. But it didn’t stop there: nine wins in our final twelve league matches meant we had a strong chance to achieve automatic promotion to Série A with one league match to go…

A bit like in 2023 with Sampaio Corrêa, I’d face Final Day Drama in Brazil. We went into the final match Vs Operário Ferroviário as favourites, and the only home side in the race for promotion (positions 2-4 gaining automatic promotion). Win and it’s certain we’re up, a draw is helpful…providing results go our way. A defeat could prove costly.

Serie B, one game to go…

We Did It™ [with a dirty draw at home!] Fortaleza leap frogged us into 2nd place, but Guarani and Remo both lost away from home. Cuiabá will be a Série A club for 2025!

Copa Verde

Whilst we juggled promotion, the 4-3-1-2 continued to do well in the Copa Verde cup competition. The Final was really at the Semi Final stage, as Série B Champions Goiás gave us the most difficult challenge. The two legged Final itself was relatively easy, a 7-1 aggregate win meaning Cuiabá became 2024 Copa Verde Champions 🏆

2024 Copa Verde Winners.


Stadium Move? 🏟

Things are looking good for Cuiabá! Their new-ish 2014 World Cup ‘Arena Pantanal’ stadium would soon be hosting top league football again…or would it? Well, it wouldn’t be Football Manager without some epic trolling. A day after securing promotion I got a News Item which stated:

I took several minutes to digest the news, I even went to pour myself a Fernet and Coke: our 44,000 seater stadium in ‘very good’ condition would be ditched in favour of renting a 16,000 stadium in a ‘poor’ condition. The move also means a 400km round trip for players and fans to Rondonópolis, I look forward to welcoming la crème de la crème of Brazil to the Engenheiro Lutero Lopes soon. Let’s play ball!

💔


Data Led Recruitment + General Manager

I am now faced with the difficult challenge of keeping a team in a league containing some of the best South American club sides, all on a relatively modest budget of $6.5m salary budget p/a and a transfer kitty of $900k. I am also not sure how long this financial package remains, the club is still in $4m of debt; and now we’re renting a stadium hundreds of kilometres away. Regardless, I am sure whatever salary we settle on it will almost certainly rank within the bottom 4 clubs of Série A for 2025 season.

In addition to financial pressures, the club hierarchy has also added two new club cultures to work towards, which I could not negotiate away: Play defensively solid soccer (low goals and low shots ratios) and Play counter-attacking soccer (exciting, forward thinking attacks). I therefore may need to think about some tactical tweaks to the 4-3-1-2 in order to please the board (and I do have some ideas 😉).

In order to make the most out of the money available, I have decided to be led by the numbers again. This is a method I used with the help of FM Stag earlier on in the FM22 cycle, and I really enjoyed the unpredictably of what the data throws up as to the interesting players to recruit. Only this time recruitment will be a little different:

  1. Firstly, I will be using Zealand Shannon’s ‘Moneyball’ sheets and formulas in order to test out that approach. This will drive our recruitment for all outfield positions.

  2. I will be using FM Stag’s new Goalkeeper Calculator, which he has kindly shared with me. This will be needed after 35-year-old Vice Captain João Carlos decided to pre-emptively agree on a move to Série A’s Ponte Preta via the Bosman ruling mid-way through the season. My aim is to see if the numbers can find a suitable shot stopper for limited outlay.

  3. Lastly, I’ve been lucky enough to recruit a decent General Manager in Geraldo Lantyer. Big G Lantyer has Negotiating 16 and will therefore be tasked with negotiating both player bids and contracts. I will be using my podcast co-host’s approach for player recruitment (read more here). This sees Dan issue short-term focusses via his scouting team, and I will do this in combination with items 1 and 2 above to hopefully find suitable players for 2025 season.

I’m really looking forward to seeing what each of the three processes mean for our recruitment, and whether it’s enough to keep us in Brazil’s top division. A blog will inevitably follow on how this all goes down.

A big thank you for reading/sharing and caring. I’ll be back soon with another Faceless, where the rush for gold continues 🎭

Tony / FM Grasshopper