A-Z in 116 leagues

Welcome!
Welcome to my attempt at the rather ridiculous JK's alphabet challenge. If you have no idea what the challenge is then please read JK's original challenge post here. As the rest of you will know, the challenge entails winning the league title in 116 leagues across the world, starting with 'A' countries, going through the alphabet in order until the final league which will be Zambia.

About me
My name is James, aka Largey24. I am from England and my favourite team is Newcastle! My first manager game I ever played was LMA Manager 2003, followed by LMA Manager 2005, and then Championship Manager 2007. My first FM was FM13, and I have had both of the FM's since.

What you can (and shouldn't) expect
I will be the first one to tell you that I'm not the most amazing Football Manager in the world. If you're reading this story and expecting me to create amazing tactics and boss every league then you are definitely reading the wrong story. I will be using some downloaded tactics (and if/when I do I will give credit to the author.)

Secondly, let alone this being my first story on FM Scout, this is my first ever story on any game whatsoever. I will not be creating my own graphics for my story as I have no knowledge of how to do so. This will mean that my writing style will evolve throughout the story through learning and feedback. And on that note, any feedback, tips, encouragement, or just general chatter is warmly received. It will be nice to know that that people are reading this.

Final notes
This save will contain blood, sweat, tears, and many, many expletives (atleast on my end whilst playing it.) As the nature of a challenge it will take a very, very, very long time, 116 seasons at a minimum if I complete every league in 1 season, and that is nigh impossible for me! To help with this, I will be doing a few things to aid me time-wise. Firstly I will be holidaying between games as it will save me a lot of time. Secondly I will probably be choosing some of the best teams in the leagues to give me the best chance of completing it relatively quickly (with the exception that a few of my favourite teams I will probably manage even if they're not the best in the league at the time, such as Newcastle.) Thirdly I will not put an awful lot of effort into balancing budgets, as it does not matter to me if a club I go to goes into debt aslong as I win the league! And finally if a league infuriates me, or I see an offer too good to turn down it is likely I will leave a league half-way through a season and rejoin it at a later date.

And with all of the formalities out of the way, I sincerely hope you enjoy this story, and in the meantime I'm in for the long haul!

It's a mighty challenge, best of luck!

That it is! Thanks a lot MichaelBBack!

Good luck!! Don't forget to let me know on the stream how you do

Thanks MrJK, and yeah I will update you if I get anywhere

So here it is, we are finally getting underway with this almighty challenge. To start with I loaded up 5 leagues (due to the limitations of my laptop), these are; Afghanistan, Algeria, American Samoa, Andorra and Armenia!

I started unemployed as the challenge suggests and went on the job hunt. When I looked at the job centre I was suprised to see a plethora of jobs available in every league selected, so in the spirit of the challenge I decided to go with a team whose name began with the letter A. There weren't many but one of them caught my eye!



And just like that, I was the new proud manager of Atalan in Afghanistan.

The Club and the League

Alright so, what mess have I gotten myself into?



Well, De Maiwand Atalan FC are a club that represents the South-West region in Afghanistan.
In real life, the Afghan Premier Division is set up like this:
2 Groups of 4 teams who play each other once. The top two teams of those groups go into a semi-final of knockout round. The winner of the knockout round is crowned as the champions of the Afghan Premier Division!

The furthest Atalan has ever got in the Afghan Premier Division in the leagues 3 years of existence are to the semi-final of the knockout round.

However, in the challenge the league is set out slightly differently.



It is set out as one league of 8 teams. Each team plays each other 3 times, so there are 21 games in the league. It is worth noting that in all countries in the Alphabet Challenge there is only one division, so that means there are no relegations or promotions. Some leagues have cups, which are not required to be won to complete the challenge but hey, they are nice also continental qualification is also enabled in each league so there is a chance to win even more silverware, which if I carry on with my plan to manage the top teams I will hopefully do sometime, but once again there is no requirement to do so.

The Squad

So let's have a look at the squad!



Oh god. Whilst our attack is alright for the league, our defense is an absolute shambles. Also some of the ratings are a bit wacky as my Assistant Manager has a JPA of 3!

Transfers

And so this is my first foray into the Transfer Market! Just like us, every team in Afghanistan is Amateur so I can get players in on frees.



As you can see, I brought in 5 players, all defensively minded.
Hamidullah Yosufzai is a good quality GK for our league and is also an Afghanistan international! This doesn't mean he's particularly good mind you, but if he's better than our opposition then he's good enough for me. He was brought in on a free from Kabul City.

Maqadar Qazizadah is a decent RB for our league and is another Afghanistan International. He was also brought in on a free from Kabul City.

Sayed Maqsood was one of the best CB's available to me at the time, and will play a key role in the centre of our defense. He is also an Afghanistan International from Kabul City.

Shafiqullah Yakubi is a decent DM who will be a key Anchorman in our midfield. He arrived from Oqaban.

David Habib is a decent LB who aswell as Qazizadah will perform an important role in our team. They will create a lot of assists with their play on the wing. He arrived from Bazan.

Matches

Now all that's left to do pre-season are the friendlies! All matches were against lower league opposition. I understand some of you aren't interested in the friendlies so I have included them as a spoiler for those who do not wish to view them.


At this time I was using my own 4-3-3 2DM Wide formation, but soon after I switched to a downloaded 4-1-1-3-1 tactic off of FM Scout. I can't remember who made it because it looks like it's been taken down as I can't find it now but it's called Sir Alex Ferguson's Goalstorm Assymetric and it tries to emulate Sir Alex's style of play.

Anyway that's it for this chapter, thanks for reading!

Now, time to get started with the main part of the season! We kicked off in the hardest possible fashion, away to defending league champions Toofan. In a league of terrible players, they are perhaps best described as 'best of a bad bunch'.

Toofan 3-2 Atalan

'23 J. Ahmed
'74 J. Ahmed

We put up a good fight but ultimately we lost to the better side. It was good to see that we were not that far away from the best team in the league, however if we want to win the league this season this is the kind of match we need to be getting points in.

Our pride was not the only casualty in this encounter, as our new RB Qazizadah was stretchered off just before the half-way stage of the match, and as a result he will miss the next couple of games.


Our next game was against Oqaban, a team who are quite similar to us, and definitely not one to underestimate. It was also our first Home tie of the campaign.

Atalan 4-2 Oqaban

'6 J. Ahmed
'42 J. Ahmed
'46 K. Arezou
'72 H. Islam Arimi

This was much more like it, Left Winger Jawid Ahmed seemed to have put his scoring boots on once again with 4 goals in the first 2 games. When they got it back to 3-2 from being 3-0 down I was starting to worry, but quickly after their second goal CM Haroon Islam Arini put the game to bed.

The next game was at home to Sape, an average looking team who are predicted to finish 8th in the league, definitely a team we should be beating.

Atalan 0-1 Sape


We dominated them in terms of shots, however hardly any of ours were on target and they scored with one of their 2 shots on target! Our strikeforce was also starting to worry me, as 3 games in not a single goal of ours had been scored by a striker!

Our fourth game of the season saw us on the road to Bazan, a mid-table side who had won 2 of their first 3 games.

Bazan 2-2 Atalan

'52 M. Faqiryar
'83 J. Ahmed

Once again we dominated in terms of shots, and this time we had a much higher amount of them on target, however we still had to come from 2-0 behind to draw with a team who scored both of their shots on target. This was also the first goal for striker Faqiryar.

Our fifth game saw us at home to bottom of the league Mawjhai, who had only managed 1 point in their first 4 games.

Atalan 3-1 Mawjhai

'34 J. Ahmed
'46 D. Jamshid
'67 S. Maqsood

A much needed win to keep us up near the top of the pack, with a 6th goal from Ahmed aswell as first goals from CM Jamshid and CB Maqsood sealing it. Worryingly, our striker has still only scored 1 in 5.

Perhaps even more worryingly...

Yep, Mawjhai managed to injure the only player in our team who has been consistently scoring!

Next up was a Home tie against Simorgh, a team tipped to finish top 3 but has suffered a similar start to the season as us.

Atalan 4-4 Simorgh

'3 H. Islam Arimi
'30(pen) M. Faqiryar
'61 M. Faqiryar
'64 M. Qazizadah

In a match that could only be described as great for the neutrals, we went from being 2-1 down to 4-2 up, only to throw it all away in 2 minutes to draw 4-4. There were positives to be taken from the game, as Faqiryar seems to be able to score now, however our defense needs to step up if we ever want to have a chance of winning the league, as they have not managed a clean sheet in any of the 6 opening league games. Perhaps what was evening more worrying was how Toofan had only dropped 2 points in their opening 6!

The last team in the league who we had not faced was Shaheen, tipped to finish mid-table they were in 7th place, with 2 points in 4 games.

Shaheen 1-3 Atalan

'29 N. Allahdad
'33 N. Allahdad
'72(pen) N. Allahdad

Overlooked due to the proficiency of Ahmed, Nasim Allahdad certainly proved a point as to why he should be in the team! The left winger was instrumental in us winning this game, tucking away all 3 chances our team had on target. From this game forwards Allahdad was the first team LW and Ahmed was used as the first team CAM player.

Our next game was against Oqaban away. Sitting in second place, they were looking for revenge on the defeat we inflicted upon them earlier in the season.

Oqaban 0-8 Atalan

'11 A. Gariwal
'21 A. Gariwal
'26 M. Farqiyar
'56 H. Islam Arimi
'60 A. Gariwal
'69 M. Farqiyar
'82 D. Ahmadi
'87 K. Qaumi

Well let's just say they got more than they bargained for! Our first clean sheet this season and in what a style too, we absolutely destroyed them, and this time it was our RW Ahmed Wahid Gariwal picking up the hat-trick!

Our last game before the new year was to be against none other than the league leaders Toofan who had still only dropped 2 points in 8 games. This was an important game to get points from, if I lost I'd be 8 points behind only 9 games in, and Toofan would have continued their unbeaten run of form. I told the players to get revenge for our first game against them, hoping for the best.

Atalan 8-2 Toofan

'4 S. Qaumi
'7 J. Ahmed
'9 A. Gariwal
'10 M. Faqiryar
'19 M. Faqiryar
'34 M. Faqiryar
'38 N. Allahdad
'40 M. Faqiryar

Well to say this result was on the cards would be the biggest porkie* of the year! Once again we demolished them scoring 8 goals in one half! Alas, upon the FM god's whim we didn't score a single goal in the second half, but it was still a great performance from the team. This was also our third hat-trick in three games!

And this is where I will end the update, just before the new year and the Winter transfer window. Currently we are sitting in 2nd, 5 points behind Toofan and drawing on points with Oqaban.

Thanks a lot for reading!

*for those who do not know what I mean when I say porkie, it's short for porkie pie, which is British rhyming slang for a lie!