onsdag den 30. juli 2008

back from holiday

Sorry if gotgot to wrtie I was away on holiday. I had a good time in Sweden and came back to find that Zutcorp FC had missed out on promotion to the premier league in the XFA..on a 90+4 goal.

Luckily someone else withdrew (I think - or maybe the playoffs went bad) and I got up anyway, since I finished 3rd. So next season is all about survival and scraping in a few points here and there.

There was great success in the u21 league as i WON it. I´m not able to see the final league standing but it has to have been close as there were 5-6 teams able to win, when I left. And the Bendtner led boys did it. I wont talk of the u17 boys, since they suck :-)

Next season i expect a top 10 in the u21 but no more, since Bendtner and Bjarnason has gone to the seniors. Still have some great player left, and I have won the first 7 in the new season. Not going to last though!

Bendtner is out injured so Ive tried to play as few senior games as possible untill he returns.

Expect (even) fewer updates here, as I feel its a bit of a waste of time, since I appear to not have a lot of readers. So ill write updates once in awhile.

till then
Zut Out

lørdag den 12. juli 2008

Spending the cash!

Yesterday Per from De Urolige approached me asking if I wanted Morten Gamst Pedersen, whom Id be impressed by earlier. He is a 28 year old AML with good stats in just about every place. After a bit of negotiating we ended up on the price of 2 mil+Fellah (who I stole from him in an auction). A bit steep, but hey, its beta.

This meant that my u21 team is perhaps no longer in the top 5 in the world, and it showed when one of the very best, Cairneyhill, shoved me out of the cup on away goals (or did they win it late?.. I forget). I still have a very competent u21 team, and we are leading the u21 XFA league both on real and virtual points after having played loads more than no. 2. I like!

the seniors are currently doing ok, but draw a bit too much. Im contemplating going to a 4-4-2 as the 4-1-4-1 seems a bit too defensive at time. Maybe when Ronnie Schwartz returns from injury ill try it out. In the XFA 1b im hovering right around the top 6 spot that will get me a playoffspot. Could be very intersting to play one of those :-)

I went out of the XFA cup in wha was one of the mostunfair results in recent history. I outshot him 30-4 but ended up drawing 1-1 and loosing on pens. I must admit i was very very angry! SCORE already!

tirsdag den 8. juli 2008

Ijnuries and lag

It seems Si has crushed the lag problem. Whether its the new servers, less active users og something else, the game is again very playable, even at night. hurray. This sends us much closer to retail, and I think itll only take a succesful off season to send us into the clear. let´s see.

In other news zutcorp FC is kicking ass and taking names. up to 35th in the rankings and 7th youthwise is VERY VERY nice, and Im proud of the boys. We just won a comp at youth netting us a massive 195k!!

Right now I have both Leon A. and bendtner out with injuries so Im playing the waiting game. I cannot afford to loose either and continue my winning streak. NIck Bendtner is simply a key man, even if he doesnt score that much.

torsdag den 3. juli 2008

Oh no

Oh no, Nicklas bendtner finally succombed to the tons of freekicks and willbe out for a day. He is the one player I cannot live without, so I wont be playing any more XFA game - maybe a few u17 - and will only play a few friendlies tonight I think.

Lukcily its only one day, so hell be ready again tomorrow morning..

onsdag den 2. juli 2008

lag hell and FA trouble

So, Ov Collyer, the Si-legend, made a post explaining that the lag we have suffered the last week is all part of the testing phase, trying to optimize code. This leads me to belive this is crunch time for FM-live. Once they have fixed these problems, I bet well hear the big news of release.

meanwhile season 2 started under some chaotic circumstances. The mod from XFA was unable to log on for very long, and this lead to the Xtreme FA becoming more extreme than I expected, paying almost 15 mil to the premier league and around 8.5 til league one and 6 til league two. This is of course extreme...Just not the way I envisioned it.

I hope this is a glitch and wont be the future for the XFA - if it is, I thin I'm out, ince I believe a more flat payment structure is more a more enjoyable way forward.

Meanwhile I lost my first XFA league game, through some great goalkeeping by Tangerine Dreams GK. He was awesone, and we lost 2-1. Played a good match, and Im pretty confident we will challenge for a top 10 spot anyway. We'll see.

Oh and a shoutout to Anderlech FC, managed by MMORPG-blog VIP tobolds.blogspot.com who has started rather well, even if he knows next to nothing about how Football Manager works. As always he is studying hard and beat my reserves rather soundly in his second game...He then proceeded to get hammered by my u21 team later on, showing theres still a lot to learn.

søndag den 29. juni 2008

Zutcorp FC ready for season 2

For the first time in days I had time to play a lot today - well time coinsiding with the server working - and zutcorp FC seems ready for the gruelling season ahead.

I have sold of most of my experienced backups and subs and have gone with only youth (well 19+) on the bench. Otherwise those talents will never be ready for the 1st team.

Its looking good with the new signings and everything and Ill make a presentation for next season sometime during the next few days. Im still sort of looking for a GK, since Rune Pedersen hass started being the weak link a few games. But there arent that many good scandinavian GKs, so well see.

My budget looks very sound, so I might just save up for someone like Daniel Agger or another Scandinavian star sometime during the season.

Oh and the scoreline today 7W 2D 1Loss - bring it on!

torsdag den 26. juni 2008

You are not ready..

Well, I guess there is a reason they call it BETA. Since the release of the friends scheme, loads of players have joined the gameworlds, causing havoc with the servers. Or it could be the amount of contracts being extended and all that (although I hope thats not it!)

Fact is, this is good for FM LIVE and bad for all of us betatesters. bad cause it disrups our playtime, and leaves me not playing a game I´ve enjoyed a WHOLE lot this last month. Its also bad because some players are in and they can poach players off of wage auctions with just slightly higher that standard bids. Its a really hurtful time of the season to be "down".

It good however, that this gets discovered now, and not once at release, where youll have loads of pacifiers flying out of prams!

Also they have postponed the start of season 2 for another 3 days, which is propably good for all!

As for the game the signing of Dorsin and Poulsen har stabilised my team like they were supposed to. That with some tactical adjustments Zutcorp FC are now officially a force to be reckoned with. We have moved up to around 30th in the rankings and have lost one match (vs. an AI of course ;-) )

Luckily, theres football on now - I have fallen in love with the plucky Russians, and my heart still bleeds for yesterdays Turkish defeat.

mandag den 23. juni 2008

Another signing

So I caved. Denmark has NO left back worth anything really so I have now signed a Swede for the job. Michael Dorsin joined on a pretty high wage of 7500k, but then he does look the goods. Im pretty much set for next season now except for perhaps an AML, even though Kahlenberg can do it pretty good.

I think I can afford one more good player.

Oh, and I might have a few beta invites coming up with the invites going out sometimes this week. Im going to reserve 2 for a couplde of friends, and I would prefer you to be scandinavian, if you want to join.

Feel free to leave me a mail or a comment, if you would like to have one of the spots i MIGHT have..

søndag den 22. juni 2008

Big signing!!

I have been testing out the holiday feature of FM live the last days, since I have been to a most excellent Bon Jovi concert held in the middle of nowhere in Jutland. It took us over 2 hours to just leave the parking lot. HELL!!!

On comning home I had to decide if I wanted 1 star or 3 minor signings during this off season. After muh delibarating and thinking I tried to negotiate with the manager of Simon Poulsen and Dnaiel Jensen, but ended up signing the hardest man in danish football: Christian Poulsen. the ppm "winds up opponents" seems very very fair, but he also has some beautiful stats.

This will allow me to move Leon andreasen back into DC and I think this could well lift my team to a higher lvl, with quality in all 3 lines.

In his very first match Christian setup a lovely Bendtner goal. I like!

lørdag den 14. juni 2008

speaking about being bored...

Do you know whats worse than being slightly bored with your FM-Live? not playing FM live!!! the servers are down for a bit longer than estimated.

Me wants to se me new rankings!!!

A lull before the storm

Im in the XFA, the Extreme FA. We are supposed to play a ton of game. But lately Im not playing any FA games, except a few in our flawed u21 league. why? Theres a few inactive managers and Ive already gone and played most of my games.

This has made this last week less intense although the user made comps are also rather fun (and Im way ahead in winnings :-) ) but they are still not with as much on the line as the FA games.

Now, Im sure ill be finishin somewhere around mid league. Hopefully I´ll make it into the 2nd division i.e. a place from 8-12. Im in a very strong division, so Ill be pleased with that. Im also still winning more than im loosing, so all in all it is going well.

Im still a little bored, mainly because I have no money to spend, after spending a lot of cash on leaon Andreasen and tommy Bechmann. Now Im going to save up for the end of the season where a lot of wage auctions will take place. here I have a couple of targets. If they dont work out Im saving up for a big name, if I possibly can. Might even go for a certain Swede...well see!

mandag den 9. juni 2008

I Give you, Zutcorp FC

I have now made the last signing of the season and im ready to pressent to you the mighty all danish team ZutCorp FC:

GK: Rune Pedersen - 28 year evteran, who has travelled many leagues in his life. Has super reflexes.. Backup: Mikkel Andersen - great talent and u21 keeper.
RB: Henrik Kildentoft. Good tackler, and pretty fast. Not worth a whole lot going forward but is developing. Beckup: K.E.Pedersen. DRLC is a great thing to be to have a job as a sub
LB: Søren Jensen. Got too many Yellow cars earlier but isnt bad anymore. Is perhaps the weakest link in the team.
DCs: Dan Tomassen. A very good all round DC. Makes few mistakes and has the speed and aerial abilty to keep his spot for along time.Simon Kjær: Like Real life he is an etxraordinary talent, but is not quite there yet. Developing nicely and is only 19Backup matthias ´zanka´Jørgensen. Has all the physical skills but lack mental readiness. Will be a star, but is only 18

MR: Dennis Sørensen. Excellent AMR with skille in the 13-16 range for almost everything. Doubles as striker. - BAckup Bechmann, stokholm
ML: Kahlenberg. Better at AMC, but no slouch at AML. An all round elegant player who does everything well.
MC: New signing Leon Andreasen is hard as nails. He can also play football and Im very proud to have signed him. He should stop the goals leaking in quite so much.
MC: Stokholm: A midfield general of sorts, but is getting old at 32. Doesnt score enough, but leads his team. Backups: William Kvist (who will take Stokholms space soon) and hans Henrik Andreasen (who is danger of getting sold)

FCs:Tommy Bechmann: All about the speed. Scores in 40% of the games!
Nicklas Bendter: the star, the legend to be, potentially one of the best in the world. He shall lead us to greatness. Still not quite great yet, but getting there! A goal every 40% of the games, but many many important ones. Dominates at u21 lvl. He is only 20!

Sub: Frank Kristensen (really not good enough) and Dennis Sørensen.


Talents to watch, but not ready for the 1st team.Mads laudrup, Nikolaj Agger, Ronnie Schwartz

søndag den 8. juni 2008

form and formations

Thursday was a great day for Zutcorp FC. we managed to sign Tommy Bechmann, who is very fast and runs at the defense. Also we went to a quite attacking 4-4-2 and that combo sent us on a 13 game unbeaten streak with many wins. I went to bed thinking I had it made and I was to shoot up the rankings the following days.

not so much.

It seems I had hit a formspike on thursday and friday and saturday saw nowhere near the same results. Especiallt vs. the 4-5-1 we would loose horribly.

So now ive made a more defensive 4-4-2 and it seems more stable, and I now use those two along with my old 4-4-2 diamond.

Form can be devastating in this game and very very frustrating.

As for signings im negotaiting to buy me a DMC but i really do not have the money for him, If I sign him I might have to try and sell someone off to finance it. On the good side im doing well in the league and will likely finish mid table and thereby win quite a lot of money in 2 weeks time. Maybe its better to save up for then and get someone good!

torsdag den 5. juni 2008

The limits of my (den) team

oh well, it seems the fun is wearing off my all danish team now. It cannot sign any more good free agents as there are none. Also Løvekrands and Jon Dahl Tomasson are stuck at inactive managers, and as such my players base is getting too small.

So Im contemplating breaking my (den) pledge and just sign someone good from the free agent pool while some are still left.

onsdag den 4. juni 2008

u21 powah!

Well it seems Im shooting up the rankings in the u21 world - even though im not winning that much - but Im up to 2nd out of 23 ranked teams.

no chance Ill stay there, but I have decided I like youth teams, as they seem a fun way to broaden out your gaming experience, and perhaps get succes if it eludes you in the seniors.

This game is hard!

This has to be one of the most frustrating and "hard" games I´ve ever played. I think I mean it in a good way.

As has been said many places this game is NOT for everybody. You will most likely not have instant succes. at least not in the "I´m king of the world" kind. there can be only one of those pr gameworld.

This is a game where you need to find smaller and more reachable goals. Build that world class DC. Make money. Have an all danish team do well (I dropped 100 places in rankings after two poor nights in a row). that kind of thing.

Its going to be interesting to see if this game will keep its interest in the long run.

mandag den 2. juni 2008

Injuries

As many of you know (hehe, sounds like you are a lot :-) ) injuries are realtime. Right now my new AMC Kahlenberg is out for the night, Dennis Sørensen is out until tomorrow sometime.

That leaves me with reserves for their spots and that is neither fun nor the recipe for victory. So im taking the night off.

I played a few u21 games though and ended in a bit of a argument because the XFA u21 league was made wrong when it started as a senior comp. So I ended up playing 2 games with youth vs. adults. One of them we ended up playing reverse afer to even it up, The other ended in a bit of a bad mood as my opponent didnt want to play very fair.

oh well its all a game and all that, but still not something to brighten up your day.

My bank manager didnt go balisticc after all as Søren Larsen went elsewhere for princely wages. I must admit to smiling a little as I got the news saying he was to be out injured for even longer time. And it made me take out insurance on Kahlenberg (makes him free while injured for the cost of 10% of his wages).

Tomorrow should see my team back at full strength - I hope - and also a signing or two in the youth department.

My bankmanager cringes!

Exciting times at zutcorp FC. This morning and last night we launched bids for 2 current danish national team players. Both are injury prone so I'd better trin some physio skills if they join.

If I sign these two, which I propably won't since I'm in heavy competetion for one of them, I won't sign any more players this season, except perhaps for a couple of u/21s. If that happens I'll make a team presentation during the week, so stay tuned!

edit: Two transfers down. Two more in the pipes still. Kahlenberg joins for 275k (already worth twice that if the market value thing is true) and I hope he can make a difference if he can stay injry free. Also jesper Blicher a very fast AMR for my youth..should be good!

lørdag den 31. maj 2008

Streak!

Winning in FML is all kinds of fun. Loosing isnt! My first 5 games of Fa ball yielded 1 point and I went to bed a very worried man!

Today I have played another 18 games, and lost just 4 moving up to a projected 6th, which I would be very happy with! my team has just clicked and won a lot of games quite clearly. They are sound defensively and finally bendtner works. By doing what you say? Ive stopped trying to make him a centerpiece and just focussed on what made the games flow. and suddenly we started scoring and winning.

We got some money from the FAs yesterday and Ive already launched a bid which I hopefully shall win tomorrow. Ive decided I want youth since the XFA had a u21 tournament with some quite nice prices in it. I want to do well there. And I have some key perssonel to do it with. Namely one N. Bendtner :-D

Just one game I want to talk about. My last tonight against Sheffield Thursday. in the very 1st minute we took a RED CARD. my very first of the game so far. So crisis time ensued and I juggled what I had left into a semblance of a team. Amazingly we got a goal from a corner and we managed to hold on for 1-1. Great work by my guys. Very proud!

fredag den 30. maj 2008

FA's about to start

Tonight the FA's will start and Zutcorp FC will see the first competetive action. Should be very interesting.

This morning I trialed in 5 youths to make me able to field a u/21 team and I had 3 games. Nicklas Bendtner dominates at u/21, and I won 2 out of 3. The loss was grossly unfair.

The A-team had a dreadful night last night, and we dropped to 75th in the rating. Nothing worked, and I lost faith in my tactics. Im now back to the usual tactic and doing better with a clear win this morning.

My goal now is to try and find myself a striker to sublement big Nick - I might have to go with a Norwegian og swede - but hey, they are all really Denmark anyway ;-)

Really looking forward to the supposed windfall of the FA money, and I hope I can turn them into quality. Daniel Agger; Kahlenberg and Christian Poulsen is also on the wanted list, but they are very much too expensive. I noticed that Kahlenberg is on trial all the time - even if he is injured for 4-5 days. What gives? Why would people take him in to pay his rather extortionate wages and not be able to play him?

onsdag den 28. maj 2008

Building for the future?

I'm learning a lot from playing the game these early days, and of course I'm making some mistakes. One of them might be going to youth in a betaworld that will last one or two season.

Anyway I went and bought Matthias "Zanka" Jørgensen fro 50k aq fee and around 3k salary. He is only 19 but already looks like a physical beast. His mental skill could be better, and I'm sure they will be. I don't yet have the skills to see potential but I'm told he is a 4*.

But perhaps it would be smarter of me to go with some more experiences players since they will likely perform better on this short schedule.

Not regretting signing Nicklas Bendtner though. He is doing rather well, and will be better once I finish learning my Target Man skill, which should be sometime today. After that I'm going for some more tactics skill, and then turn to coaching.

Oh, I also switched FA's and went Xtreme - yeah baby! and stepped 1 step up the ranking ladder to 47. I think that might be my highest as danish talent is thin on the ground. Its fun having a themed team, and propably not a bad place to start as a newbie2 since theres fewer players to concentrate on.

On thursday the FA's start up and we should recieve some cash. They'll go towards another couple of defenders and perhaps a fast amc if they are available. Let's see..

tirsdag den 27. maj 2008

day 2

I had ysterday off so I played almost all day. I signed two more players who did well on trial and generally did well.

I won 4k in a tournament with 12 other teams walking the league phase undefeated and winning the final on penalties via an Ai game (didnt know it was set to it, but I beat the team in a pesonal match 1-0 later on).

I am now up to around the 50th spot in the ranking after entering at 62. I win a little more than I loose which is ok considering i'm playing with a themed team.

mandag den 26. maj 2008

All good plans...

Theres a saying that all good military plans go out the windows at the first sight of the enemy. Well this happened to me when building my first ZutCorp FC squad. It turned out that the acquisition fee, not so much the wages, was the stumbling block to greatness...

Well without further ado here comes my first impression from 3 odd hours (would have been more, but I had to go to bed - early morning and all that - dreamt about it though :-) )

The beginning.
Well, I got my mails sorted out sunday afternoon, and it went as smooth as can be. Schose my name zutcorp fc and went of the the Buxton Gameworld. I was greeted with a very good wizard that held my hand through the starting up.

I chose team colours and all that and uploaded my nice logo, courtesy of fmlineonline.com. Off to a great start!

Temptation
As you saw in the earlier post I had a strategy planned out to build a good team, but in the end it didnt make any sense to do it like that since the AQ fees made it too hard to do. So i started building a team from only danes, since I thought it could be fun for the beta. I signed loads of decent players...thenn noticed one N.Bendtner. Niclas is the real deal, but young at 20, and about the only real worldclass player Denmark really has.

but 300k AQ fee and 9k wages?

I thought and thought, assembled teams with and without him. And in the end I decided to say wth, and go for it. So ZutCorp FC set the GW record for signings and offered up 60% of my budget for him. The plusside of this is that he is propably the best player in the GW and he is very very cheap in wages, so I ended up with only spending 50% of the wage budget, which should make is pretty easy to get stronger players later on.

First 7 games
With bed time fast apporaching I wanted to play 10 games to get ranking and therefore money, but it was not to be. Each game took 5-10 minutes and I simply had to stop and go to sleep. No more gas on the tank.

I lost the two first games, while dickering with tactics, but settles for a standard 4-4-2 diamnd, made narrower and things started to click. Big Nic started scoring and I started winning. won 4 in a row and drew against one of the best team of the GW so far. A very promising start.

Hook, line and sinker
I am already addicted. the game seems to have buckets of promise and I'm very happy to be playing.

more later...

onsdag den 21. maj 2008

Starting strategy

So, apparently Zutcorp Fc will be founded either today or tomorrow.

Here are my starting priorities.

I'm going to be playing a version of 4-4-2, most likely a diamond one.

We get around 100k wages, and this is how I think I’ll spend it.

GK: I'm going to want someone old and composed. Good decisions, position and overall decent. Budget: 8 k
DR+DL: Players that will not score own goal. Do the odd tackle and generally not be in the way. CHEAP. About 4 k a piece. They'll mostly stay back and punt the ball away.
DC+DC: Solid players, preferably one old and one young. Budget 8k
DMC: A scrapper. Doesn’t matter if he can play, but should tackle and lay short passes. Budget: 4k
AMC: the creative spark and the playmaker. Star of the team: budget: 12k
MR+ML: decent players, but nothing special: 8k
FC: Big lump. Target man: 12k
FC: small and fast: 12k
5 subs: Young talents, preferably Danish - and cheap. No more than 2k worth of wages.

The strategy will be for youth except for the DC's, DMC and GK where it would be good to have some solid campaigners. I aim to save around 10k of wages, so I can still be active in the transfer market during the first weeks if someone good crops up.

I think I'm going to try for players I know from Denmark, but I still have no idea what players the starting money will buy.

Getting excited now. Zutcorp FC shall rule the world.