[Archived] Football Manager 2009

[bennyboyt11]

Going to start a new Rovers game after not playing for a couple of months. I got pretty frustrated with the game, in particular issues with getting two strikers to work, number of injuries, tactics working then suddenly not.

Thinking of playing with a 4312, the middle MC with a Barrow into the DMC slot to put less pressure on my defense and the AMC in the hole behind my two forwards. I know there were issues with the AMC getting low ratings but i think its been fixed a bit on the latest patch.

£5 million budget at the start of the game (on 9.03) for a mid table finish, i think i can maybe push for a uefa cup/europa league place with a few signings. Probably going to sell Roque for £15-20 million (City usually put in an offer) to fund some decent players, Roque has done well for me on past games but i think i can sell him and bring someone in cheaper and just as good.

The starting squad is actually good enough to achieve that, maybe a midfield or GK signing but defense and forwards are very good, Santa Cruz and Samba in particular.

[RibbleValleyRover]

The starting squad is actually good enough to achieve that, maybe a midfield or GK signing but defense and forwards are very good, Santa Cruz and Samba in particular.

Yeah i think so as well.

GK- I'm happy to stick with Robinson for at least one season, at the same time i will look to bring in a young keeper with some serious potential. Jason Brown i think i will offload, on a previous save i sold him for £2.5 million (might be able to get more) with bids from Chelsea and Arsenal!.

Defence- Pretty solid IMO, Samba and Nelsen are pretty decent together. I will probably look to offload Zurab or Andre (maybe both) and bring in someone younger who will be able to replace Nelsen long term. Leandro Gioda or Tore Regnuissen are ones i have gone for in the past, then there is the young english defender Mark Beevers? Right back i'll bring in Santon for around £1 million, huge potential and should compete well with Emerton. Left back Olsson and Warnock will do for now.

Midfield- Plan to make some serious changes here, not playing with wingers in the formation so Pedersen will go, either that or i'll try him in the AMC slot behind the forwards. Planning to get rid of Mokoena, Vogel etc as well. Does anyone know a decent left footed MC? I was thinking of trying Joe Ledley there, might develop well with games and the right training. I'll need to buy a DMC or two as well. Some friends of mine have had great success with Beckham in central midfield, its possible to get him on this latest patch though the wages will be high.

AMC- Will be trying Villanueva behind the two forwards and will be looking to bring in at least 1 more AMC. Dunny was superb on a previous save in terms of assists and goals in that position but i am looking for better.

Forwards- Definitely going to offload Roberts and probably McCarthy. For some reason I've never managed to get Benni get firing on all cylinders. I could offload Roque for £15-20 million to City and bring in someone cheaper like Cardozo, Gignac, Pogrebnyak or Milevskyi if i want a targetman, this would give me more money to spend on the midfield. I will need some pace up front and will be bringing in Lewandowski as a future talent as well.

I'll probably buy a few future stars as well to make a profit in the long term.

[DE.]

I'd try and keep Roque for at least the first season, City will bid just as much the season after. Roque is a goal machine on FM (or was for me, anyway) but is injury prone. He'll probably play half your games, 2/3 at a push, so you'll need a back up striker who is capable of putting ball into net. The rest of the Blackburn team is solid, the FM team always seem to rate us far higher than we are in reality

[LeChuck]

You can sell Rovers players for ridiculous prices. I sold Dunn for £5.25m, Pedersen for £4.2m, Brown for £1m (to Chelsea!), Warnock for £8m, McCarthy for £6m. I think there were some more as well, that's just what I can remember off the top of my head.

Mind you, I did get sacked in February of the first season so maybe my model isn't the one to follow! I did move to Swindow and save them from dropping into League Two though, then got them promoted to the Championship the following season thanks to signing Brett Ormerod on a free.

Look like I'm going to be a solid mid-table team in the Championship, managed to get a bit of a Rovers connection going with Gallagher, Kane and Hoilett all members of my first team. Gally in particular seems to enjoy being given a free role playing off a big target man, got a few teams sniffing round him already and it's only October.

[Anti-Dingle-Brigade]

Agreed, my best deal was probably £14m plus De Jong for Steven Reid.

Need to get playing this again.

[bennyboyt11]

On my 2022 save with the mighty Rovers this is what I did first season.

Season 08/09 transfers

Season 09/10 transfers

As you can see I managed to get some hefty sums for the players, I would definitely recommend having a sniff at the players I signed, especially Sanchez/Enyeama/Mascio/Foti (EPL golden boot 4 times)

If you haven't started a game yet, choose to load all players from Brazil and Italy and sign Mascio (CM) and Hugo (DC), Hugo is a player at Desportivo Brasil and can be bought for just 7k.

[DE.]

And he gets a work permit?

[RibbleValleyRover]

Well i've bought and sold a few players. Decided I am going to keep Roque for a season as he has been banging goals in during preseason.

Goalkeepers:

Robinson

Bunn

(Looking to bring a young, potentially world class keeper).

Centre Backs:

Nelsen

Samba

Gioda

Demidov

Reginiussen

Left Backs:

Warnock

Olsson

Right Backs:

Emerton

Santon

Defensive Central midfielder:

Demidov

Grella

(Looking to bring a youngster, Stelvio?)

Central Midfielders:

Skjelbred

Dunn- Playing really well in preseason

Reid- Playing well so far

Tugay- odd game, can tutor some of my youngsters.

Skolnik- Youngster decent potential.

AMC:

Villanueva

Skjelbred

(Youngster to be brought in Marquinhos?, Borges?).

Strikers:

Santa Cruz- scoring loads of goals in preseason. Hughes is trying to unsettle him through the media.

Lewandowski- Becomes immense on previous saves, thought i might as well bring him in.

Kadlec- Youngster who with the training becomes a beast.

(Looking to bring in another, Doyle? Gignac? Fletcher? Bangoura? Offered a contract to Cardozo but it says he isn't interested. Both Doyle and Fletcher have some decent pace and finishing and room to improve.

Going to take me a season or two to get the team i want, got a few youngsters which will make a nice profit in the future.

Some players i've sold:

Benni- £5 million to Sunderland.

Pedersen- £7.5 million to Fulham.

Mokoena- £3 million to Portsmouth.

Jason Brown- £2.3 million to Arsenal.

Jason Roberts- £4 million to Sunderland.

[bennyboyt11]

Marquinhos becomes immense, as does Foti if you buy him cheap enough

[DE.]

Marquinhos is the man. If you go for him in the first season you can get him for around 7.5M, any time after that and it rises to 10-15M.

Other decent players available in the first season:

Lautaro Acosta (AMRC, ST) - usually around 5M, contributes tons of assists! Doesn't score much, though. Best to play him MR. Have noticed that sometimes you have to wait until the second season before Sevilla allow him to leave.

Razvan Rat (DL) - 2.7M, a must buy! Quality, reliable left back. My first buy in practically every game. Can be trained to play DC quite well.

Zebina (DR) - 1.2M, normally good for one or two seasons.

Roman Zozulya (ST) - price varies, stats don't seem great, but he's always done well for me.

Francisco Ochoa (GK) - I got him for 6.5M, a young but top class goalie who has at least 10 years of fantastic service in him.

Vincente (ML) - 4.3M from Valencia, solid left winger.

Martin Palermo (ST) - Might seem old at 34, but this man is a goal machine! Will cost 1.5M, but well worth it for the goals he'll put in. He signed for Fulham in my last game, and even though they were relegated he was still the Premiership's top scorer with 29 goals!

Also, Alan Judge becomes a quality player. Keep hold of him.

[bennyboyt11]

Ochoa is a quality keeper along with Akinfeev.

[DE.]

Only problem with Akinfeev is he usually costs tons to bring in, both in fee and wages. Ochoa, by contrast, is relatively cheap.

[Cocker]

The PSP version is a breeze for me. I have the following players in my Rovers squad now:-

Sergio Ramos

Clichy

Ronaldo

Messi

Ben Arfa

Fabregas

Torres

Benzema

I still get beat against the odd 2nd division team though even with that lot.

[dopper69]

Just pickedthis up for my laptop.

The Rovers onnly start with a 5M transfer kitty! Any cheap players that you can recommend that do a job?

[DE.]

Just pickedthis up for my laptop.

The Rovers onnly start with a 5M transfer kitty! Any cheap players that you can recommend that do a job?

Rat 2.7M. DL isn't a massive priority, but you can train him for other positions.

Zebina - decent DR, 1.2M

Palermo - 1.5M, old but got a couple of seasons in him where he will bang in goals for fun.

Ronald Garcia - decent DMC , costs about 1M.

Eduardo Costa - another very good DMC, not sure on his price but don't think he's too expensive. Doesn't always appear on databases, though.

[RibbleValleyRover]

I made a save before i bought all my signings just in case i had a real shocker or my save became corrupted. I think on my latest save i brought too many players in, looking at the harmony and the team gelling/understanding there are some serious problems which have had an impact on performances. I've read on a few forums that buying too many players at once, especially non english speaking ones (if you are playing in the english leagues can cause some problems at least in the short term).

Going to load up my save again at the start of the season and buy less players.

[RoversSG]

Just pickedthis up for my laptop.

The Rovers onnly start with a 5M transfer kitty! Any cheap players that you can recommend that do a job?

Try selling all the squad players like i did on 9.03 version. On it, at the begining of the season i sold:

Reid: 6.75m

Nelson: 6m (He's good but his value starts dropping after half a season and i wanted to cash in)

Benni: 5m

Roberts: 2.5m

Judge: 2.7m

Gallagher: 3m

Reigters: 3m

Zurad: 3.9m

Treacy: 2.7m

Brown: 3.1m

Hodge: 300k

Kane: 300k

Winnard: 600k

Keife (or something like that): 750k

In Jan, i sold:

Emo : 6.75m (His value will start dropping once he turns 30)

Diouf: 4m

Basically, with all the sales, i basically rebuilt the side. Doing quite well now in Mar of the 1st season having just won the league cup and in 5th place. RSC is the league top scorer and i just signed adraino (who scored a hattrick on this debut) and Gago from Real.

[Cocker]

Just pickedthis up for my laptop.

The Rovers onnly start with a 5M transfer kitty! Any cheap players that you can recommend that do a job?

One of the hardest things to do in FM is to get through the first season (with Rovers) still with your job. If you can do that then its easy because you just buy up any half decent player you can get on the bosman and straight away sell them (unless they are really good of course) a couple of these and you have 20m in the back which really you should just through at 1 player. Keep doing this and after a couple of seasons not only will your transfer kitty go up because your now winning lots of games but you will attract better players.

[DE.]

One of the hardest things to do in FM is to get through the first season (with Rovers) still with your job.

Not really. You start with a decent goalie, a good defence, an average midfield and a striker in Roque who bangs in goals. After selling a few fringe players you can end up with a 10 - 15M transfer budget to add to the weaker areas. With the starting Rovers squad alone achieving a top 10 finish should be a breeze.

[RibbleValleyRover]

Not really. You start with a decent goalie, a good defence, an average midfield and a striker in Roque who bangs in goals. After selling a few fringe players you can end up with a 10 - 15M transfer budget to add to the weaker areas. With the starting Rovers squad alone achieving a top 10 finish should be a breeze.

I agree with that, the midfield needs some serious investment plus the striking options depending on the formation you play.

I don't know why but i've always had more success on this game playing with just 1 striker with an AMC/FC behind him than 2 strikers. If i play 2 strikers i seem to have one that scores and the other that doesn't.

[G Somerset Rover]

Ochoa is an awesome keeper - him and Santon are must buys in my opinion. Into the fourth season and I'm doing well in the league and champions league.

My Team :

Ochoa

Santon

Barzagli

N'Koulou

Fabio

Capoue

Coutinho

Carioca

Saivet

Feghouli

Marquinhos

I may start a new one and 1) attempt to keep some orginal Rovers' in my first 11 and 2) I'm looking like Wenger right now - I need some English!

[Lurid Coat]

Away on holiday now, and it's been bucketing down with rain for a couple of days. This resulted in my using the FM Data Editor to update the database with all Premier League transfers, and other major transfers. Didn't have the patience to wait 'till the end of the transfer window before putting the update to use, so I started a Rovers game. Gave myself a transfer kitty of £16m (cash from Santa and Derbs).

Squad:

Robinson

Bunn

Givet

Shawcross (£2m from Stoke, good stats)

Warnock

Samba

Zurab

Jacobsen

Nuno Valente (free transfer, decent enough stats, backup for Warnock, as Givet is mainly a DC in the game)

Emerton

Grella

N'Zonzi (he's been excellent in the pre-season, with some killer through balls)

Van Heerden (surprisingly good stats)

Diouf

Dunn

Gamst Pedersen

Driver (£2.8m from Hearts, decent competition for Gamst on the left wing)

Fernandinho (£12m from Shaktar Donetsk)

McCarthy

Milevskyi (£11m from Dinamo Kiev)

Bangoura (£2.9m from Dinamo Kiev)

Hoilett (has been on fire in the summer friendlies, lightning quick)

Mido (released on a free from Boro. 5th choice emergency backup)

Players sold:

Nelsen - Aston Villa, £7.5m, wanted a new challenge

Andrews - Burnley (!), £850k loan fee

Reid - Boro, £4.2m

Olsson - Wolves, £2.3m

Treacy - WBA, £1.1m

Roberts - WBA, £1.1m

Brown - Hibernian, £250k loan fee

[awhom111]

2108: (Rovers are waiting for you to bring them up from League One)

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=WHKDUKGI

[Cocker]

2108: (Rovers are waiting for you to bring them up from League One)

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=WHKDUKGI

Can you confirm exactly what this is?

[BiggusLaddus]

Can you confirm exactly what this is?

Looks like a save game file from 2108.

Do the players use hoverpacks in the future?