Introduction

For this story line, Homero Lopez, will start the game unemployed, and will accept job offers from any Spanish-speaking club in South and North America.

Homero Lopez

Homero Lopez was born in 1981 on the town of Paysandu, on a fanatic Nacional F.C. supporter family. As expected, his family expected him to be the future star of the club. But Homero was never a great talent with the ball on his feet. After a few tryouts, the maximum that the young Lopez got was to the Uruguayan amateur leagues. Eventually he dropped and invested his time into studying and from his studies; he began coaching some school football. He had some success at child coach and that opened doors to greater things, yet not professional.

Lopez was managing the amateur team from the University of Montivedeo when he completed his studies for the Continental C License, he decided to quit amateur Football and start looking for a job on professional leagues.

From his schoolboy experience and university league, Lopez developed a possession approach towards the game. Being a very motivational and excellent to work with youngsters. Lopez strategy looks up for a slow build up, and counter attacks against opponents. He likes to experiment with three central defenders formation. Lopez is also known in the amateur leagues as a manager who likes to exploit a playmaker to the extreme.

Colon de Santa Fé

I took over CA Colon, on December 2014, in Argentina. At that moment, the Argentine League structure was going through a few changes, where the season that began in July 2014, ended in December 2014. A really short season, only to adapt to the South American Calendar. In 2015, the Argentine league structures season kickoff happened in January.

Colon was expected to get promoted in the short 2014 season, but didn’t, thus their manager lost his post. My character, Homero Lopez, took over at the end of 2014. I will be updating at the end of each season!

1ST SEASON 2015 – PART I

General Overview of the Club

At a first glance, it would be very easy my life at Colon. They have a big stadium, Estadio Brigadier General Estanislao López (47.000 not all seated). Their finances were very stable, though they had some debt; their expenditure vs. turnover was positive and their wage bill quite controllable.

Given that one of two philosophies to build up my work plan at Colon, possession football and sign youth for first team, could aid me in keeping a low wage budget, I was very eager to in a few years, have a team build mostly of players signed in their youth. We have some good facilities to attract youngsters, and the board will probably comply into building up in towards this approach.

Transfer Policy and Overview

I have a personal transfer/scouting/search policy towards Football Manager, and as the game evolved, it got similar to what I usually do. First, I do not use any external tool like scouts or editors. Second, I don’t use the internal tool also. I never set attributes, ages, etc to search players. The scouting team is the only tool I use to bring players to the club. Of course, agents are also tools to bring in names. But still, I have the offered players accessed by my scouting team. Once I have a large pool of scouted players, I tend to analyze them from time to time. If I need players urgently, I tend to follow my best scout’s opinion towards the signature. Anyhow, I just wanted to point out that I work very hard with my scouts to filter players, and never using searches, editors or saved shortlist.

At a first glance, I didn’t plan to sign any player. But I got tempted to look at young players, which could be used in the near future. This eventually got me to sign a few players. The previous manager has confirmed one signing, Lautaro Martinez, and I believe that he could be a leading player in the future. For the coming season, he will be considered only a hot prospect.

There where no real flaws on our squad, though considering that we were on the Argentine Second Tier. We had a solid and experienced keeper, good defenders, good players in the central pitch and forwards that despite not being deadly poachers, looked good on movement. I was happy to see 3-4 Key Players and around 10 First Team Players that could really fill up for the season and on average, be a strong team. The Key Players are, Cristian Llana, Jorge Braun, Facundo Carunchet, Marcos Fernandez and Mariano Bittolo. I will add a full squad report to my blog soon. So take a look there if curious!

I splashed a total of US$ 875 k on a few reinforcements, most of them youngsters and a few loanees to add up depth to the squad. On the other hand, I added quite a good money to our bank accout by selling dead wood. Actually, good players, that had clubs interested on them, and I negotiated their sales after receiving offers above their actual transfer value. Something a I learnt from an excelent blog I follow (Link for Put Niels in Goal). US$ 5 M was great to see coming in, but much of it was held back and not made available for transfers. However adding this to our bank account would obviously benefit Colon in the future.


Tactical Approach

After analyzing the squad, and having the defined the Senior Team, I now face up with how distribute these players on the pitch. Obviously Colon didn’t have the best season on 2014, as expected by the media to end the season in first, and only achieving a 7th place out of 11 clubs on the Group A. For the 2015 season, the media again expects Colon to finish in first place, thus our Possession based strategy must have an attacking mindset, as probably most of my opponents will kick off in a rather defensive approach.
After a poor pre-season using a 4411, I decided to use it as a backup formation, for a more defensive approach, perhaps to hold down a lead. The 4411 was very limited in getting the ball decently to my lonesome attacker. In addition, most of the balls he got, he wasn’t decisive enough to get closer to the goal. Therefore, with my current team, I will look up to play an flat 442 on most occasions, and depending on the game phase or scoreboard, I will navigate between the 4411 and a wide 4132.

During the preseason, I noticed that my slow defense could be a problem. We defended poorly against weak teams, but with fast forwards. Thus, playing against better opposition, we might have a serious problem. I may consider a formation that brings three defenders in line, with the middle one covering the gaps.
So our main strategy for this coming season will be a flat 442, with the following starting line, roles and duties:

Good luck!

2015-02-20 12:31#208555 Tallery : Good luck!

Thanks Mate! It will be fun!

Cheers

Argentine Nacional B – Second Tier


The first half of the 2015 season so far is a success. Though we face some difficulties along the way, we hold the first place in the table. Player morale has always been good, especially because I am being able to maintain a good squad rotation. We can definetly maintain the same level for the rest of the season, thus I feel pretty safe to say that Colon will be promoted back to the Argentine top tier.

The flat 442 has proven the best formation at the moment. I did experience with 4141 and a wide 4132, but players simply underperformed. The good point is that I have identified flaws and weakness on the three tactics that I have been using. It will be worked out on the second half of the season. Mostly because the flat 442 has taken us to the top of the league, so I’m not so inclined to swapping tactics at the moment.

Our biggest problem so far is not holding down to results or, conceding first, than having to fight to tie the game and having a tough time to do so. Anyway, we sit in first place in the Nacional B, with 3 points ahead of second placed Atlanta, and five points ahead of Aldovisi, the third place club.

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Transfer Window: June – July

On June, the transfer window opened, and we had a few changes on our squad. Most of the transferred out players were not used regularly, and I was happy that I had the Director of Football handling those, while I worked down the tactical and strategy puzzle. We did profit quite a lot from the “deadwood” that we sold, however, the big money came from two players that I was not expecting to sell. Our captain and number 1 keeper, had renewed his contract a couple week before Dinamo Moscow came up with a $3.7 Million bid. Precisely the minimum fee clause that Braun demanded to renew… The other big move was Cesar Meli, who was out on loan. I was happy to have him back, but he demanded to be transferred. When I said that I needed him, he went AWOL. Thus, to keep control of morale, I decided to transfer him. I was expecting to rake around $7 million. However, the highest bid I received was from Olympiakos, $5 million. Anyhow, Meli accepted the offer from Italian Torino, still the $4,5 million was an excellent value for us.

Facundo Callejo, Nicolas Rossini, Lautaro Riano, Matias Sosa, Franco Lazzaroni and Mattias Ballini where other players that gave us a significant amount of money. Though some of these are to be paid on monthly installments, we made a great penny.


On the other side, I managed spend just a small part from what I managed to sell so far. I spent money on two players, both young in accordance to our young player philosophy. Diego Rojas is 20 year old playmaker from Chile. I really look forward to him, and he might force his way into the starting XI quite quickly, as I’m not happy with Ramirez as my playmaker. From Colombia, 18 year old Brayan Navarro arrived to be prepared for the future. He was sent on loan to Atletico Nacional, from Colombia. I had arranged Lazzaroni’s selling around March, and decided that I would need a back-up for Bittolo. I was almost signing a 33 year old left back to be the reserve when I got offered Luis Ibanez from Croatian Dinamo. Although Ibanez is not a great talent, he would be signed for free, as his contract is expiring. He has some good attributes, and I believe he will play a good backup role. Also on free transfer, Leandro Diaz arrives from Colombian side Once Caldas, he is an average midfielder, but has good mental attributes. I expect him to be a rotation player on my midfield, or simply take over Ballini’s spot on midfield. Ibanez and Diaz, respectively 27 and 29 years old, are experienced, and I might like that in case we get promoted to the Argentine top division next season.

I was a bit “desperate” on the amount of mistakes we made on midfield, and was really looking for a good player to hold and distribute the ball. Marco Fernandez is doing a good job, but he cannot do it alone, especially that final pass to the poacher. Italo and Marcos Lleira where offered by their agents, and after signing them on trials, and analyzing my coach reports, I decided that for being free players, they would be worth signing. Both are gradually increasing their attributes through training, and perhaps they can be good additions. Italo is a player reported to have potential to be a Leading Top Tier player in Argentina. Therefore, I will keep an eye on him. Last but definitely not least, Lucas Dominguez came in for free and will take up the spot beside Lucas Landa in my central defense. Though he is not really faster than Landa, he is a bit more, and I plan to play him as a covering defender. At 25 years old, he is currently our only player that is defending a National Side.
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Copa Argentina 2015

On a very exciting match, we lost to Argentine First Division Godoy Cruz on the 5th round. A total 7 goals were scored, where all Godoy’s goals happened on first half, Telechea bagged a hat trick on the last 20 minutes of game. If we had had a better start on the second half, we might have tied the game. However “ifs” don’t win football matches, and we got ourselves eliminated from the Copa Argentina.
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Stats Center

So far, our squad has proven good enough for the Argentine second tier. However, I have a few concerns towards the proposed Possession Based philosophy. Our midfield is “kind” of good only… Nevertheless, I also attribute a not so good possession to the flat 442 shape I field out on most occasions, thus, only two central players to hold up the ball.

I will leave a more complete squad analysis per area of the field at the end of the season. For now, I must just say that loaned center back Perez and midfielder Mazzola returned to their clubs, as they did not add much to our current squad. I will give more opportunities to players like Conti and recently signed Calderon.

I am happy in general, though I am conscious that we are not totally into the possession philosophy. In addition, I must say that our forwards are really, I mean, bad finishers. There are games where we had less than five shots on target, and on average, we have over 16 shots on goal. What really gets my nerves on fire, are the amount of mistakes we are making, in my opinion, too much, especially from my midfielders when they try to reach out for the right wing.

I’m looking forward to a boxed shape midfield, probably a 42211 DM or a 4222 DM. Still not sure, how this could work out, but with this I’m expecting to hold more the ball and control the midfield with more players on that zone.

Goals:

• 10 goals: Facundo Caruchet
• 6 goals: Cristian Llana, Gustavo Villarruel and Fernando Telechea
• 5 goals: Geronimo Poblete
• 3 goals: Mariano Bittolo and Franco Vazquez
• 2 goals: Marcos Fernandez and Lucas Landa
• 1 goal: Wilfredo Oliveira, Franco Leys and Marcelo Arguello

Assists:

• 11 assists: Cristian Llana
• 6 assists: Gustavo Villarruel and Mariano Bittolo
• 3 assists: Facundo Caruchet, Geronimo Poblete and Marcos Fernandez
• 2 assists: Luis Castillo and Agustin Machado
• 1 assists: Fernando Telechea, Lucas Landa, Matias Ballini, Gustavo Piñeyro, Henry Caldero, Guillermo Feracuti and Martin Sosa

Best Avg. Ratings:

1. Cristian Llana – 7,34 – 23 matches
2. Facundo Caruchet – 7,34 – 19 matches
3. Gustavo Villarruel – 7,25 – 17 matches

Very nice league campaign, you're going strong. However, you need to keep it up in order to stay top.

I will follow any South American story, it's always nice to see one on here as I don't think it's an area of the game played in enough.

An excellent start to your season. You look ready to bounce straight back up to the top with Colon

2015-02-20 12:57#208572 Tallery : Very nice league campaign, you're going strong. However, you need to keep it up in order to stay top.

Hey Tallery!
Thanks mate! it's a good start! we need to kiu till the end!

2015-02-20 17:25#208608 Walter : I will follow any South American story, it's always nice to see one on here as I don't think it's an area of the game played in enough.

An excellent start to your season. You look ready to bounce straight back up to the top with Colon

South American leagues are very well balanced and competitive with medium average players, with great youth and gems that breaks quite often, but too bad that most of the gems leave to the big euros in the european leagues.

Argentine Nacional B – Second Tier



For the second half of the season, we suffered two defeats. However, after the second defeat, we held a seven consecutive victories run. Interrupted by a 1x1 draw against All Boys. The inclusion of Lucas Dominguez really gave us defensive depth, and he had a great season providing cover for Landa. I was also happy to see Gustavo Villarruel shine. After I told him he should show why he should be a first team player, he simply exploded! He did a great job when playing as a Shadow Striker. Our solid run gave us the promotion 7 matches before the end of the tournament. We secured the Nacional B title, Colon’s first. We now will have to face the Argentine top tier, against clubs like River Plate and Boca Juniors.

We lead the league, but we do not lead the general stats for the competition. We don’t have a real poacher bagging goals after goal. Curiously however, Colon is has the second best goals scored stats and the fourth best defense in the league so far. We have Llama leading the assists chart, and really most of our goals are coming from his passes. Even when the final pass to goal wasn’t his, he made the play for the ball to reach the player who made de final assist. Unfortunately, there are European clubs scouting him, and I believe he might get unsettled.

Aldosivi and Patronato deserved their promotions to the Primera Division. Patronato spent most of the season off the promotion zone. On the last match of the season, they jumped from the sixth place, to their final position, eventually being promoted. Atlanta on the other half, maintained themselves on the promotion zone for most of the season, and slumped at the end!

Colon did not impress by individual effort, however, as a team we did fine. Nonetheless, we did not have the best attack on the competition. Our defense, was the best in the league, conceding 13 goals less than the second best defense of the season. I have to say that I am pretty happy with the results, definitely we deserve to be promoted as champions.



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Stats Center

Starting from the back, I was very happy to see Andres Mehring showing that Braun won’t be missed after all. The young goalkeeper did amazingly well on the 17 matches he played. Vicintini, the backup, played a few matches, but again, I will not consider him as a starter. For now, Mehring is the owner of the number one shirt for next season.

My central defense was a bit messy on the first half of the season, but with Lucas Domingez arrival, we got better defensive results. As a backup, I also dropped Oliveira and terminated Joel Rodriguez loan, as he wasn’t playing much and got unhappy. The good surprise, was that Conti, once considered a dead wood, had a few good games. He will be maintained in the squad for next season. Lucas Landa, was a great leader after Broun left, and commanded the troops from behind. The bad thing is that he continues to attract foreign clubs. At 29 years old, I will probably listen to any offer that comes along. He is good, though not unreplaceable.

On the flanks, Luis Castillo and Mariano Bittolo had great performance. Scoring goals, getting assists, and becoming important figures in all of my three tactics. Bittolo and Llana had a great understanding on the left flank, and constantly where playing overlapping moves. At some points, I shouted for us to exploit the left flank, so I could benefit from Llana’s talent. It worked pretty well. I thought that Ibanez would be more used during the second half of the season. However, the leftback had his chances, on most occasions he would do ok, on lesser occasions he did bad, and he never had one excellent game only.

On the centre of the pitch, Marcos Fernandez was the ball carrier and began most of our plays. Later, Leandro Diaz arrived and shared that function. Franco Leys was our defensive minded midfielder, usually played when I wanted more control against more dangerous opponents. On the more offensive central midfielders, Diego Rojas came to be a fine addition to the squad. Though his stats are a bit below good, I saw in his performance what I need of the advanced playmaker. With 17 games played at total, I considered him to be fully blending now. Better stuff will come out of him next season. Italo and Matheus Lleira where signed in the half season transfer window, and potentially would fight with Rojas for this creative midfielder post. The Chilean was dominant, and only Italy had a break on the first team. Lleira is on the reserve, and his performance on the reserves are below expectation. I imagine that he won’t be very useful next season. I had great expectations over Agustin Machado, but after really bad performances, I dropped him to the U20 team. Only then I realized that perhaps he was just too young to be among the senior team. Back on the u20, he has one of the best average ratings. I must of have patience with him.

On the flanks, I had Cristian Llana as being the best player of the team in the season. Hitting the best average rating, leading the assists stats and scoring 1 goal less than our season top goalscorer, Gustavo Villarruel who scored 13 goals. On the Right flank, Geronimo Poblete was my man, he had quite a good season, with very consistent average performances, and a few great performances. Youngster Gustavo Piñyero has a story similar to Agustin Machado’s. Just too young, and not prepared for the argentine second tier level of play. He was also dropped to the U20 and had good performance there as well. He is very technically limited , but very gifted on specific winger attributes. I’m not totally sure if he will evolve into a good player.

Upfront, a mix of good and bad games for all of my players. Facundo Caruchet is our most valuable player, but he is not a great poacher. He is a good inside forward, but I do not intend to play using inside forwards. Anyway, he only scored twice on the second half of the season, and that is something to worry. Gustavo Villarruel had a few games fielded as the lone striker, but on that role, he didn’t play well. Thus I maintained him as the Shadow Striker only. Loanee Franco Vazquez, had his few moments, and scored quite a few goals. He was the closest I had to a natural born poacher. But he became 18 in the middle of the season, and he is no wonderkid. So he had more downs than ups. Looking at what I had in hands, I decided to promote Lautaro Martinez from the U20, he was signed upon my arrival, but as a deal arranged before my days began at Colon. Martinez played 10 games, scored three goals, no assists but earned the player of the match in one occasion. If I do not sign any higher profile for my attack next season, I plan to use more of him.

Goals:

• 13 goals: Gustavo Villarruel
• 12 goals: Facundo Caruchet and Cristian Llana
• 9 goals: Franco Vazquez
• 7 goals: Geronimo Poblete
• 6 goals: Fernando Telechea
• 5 goals: Lucas Landa
• 3 goals: Leandro Diaz, Mariano Bittolo and Lautaro Martinez
• 2 goals: Diego Rojas, Franco Leys, German Conti, Luis Castillo and Marcos Fernandez
• 1 goal: Lucas Dominguez, Wilfredo Oliveira, Italo and Marcelo Arguello

Assists:

• 16 assists: Cristian Llana•14 assists: Mariano Bittolo
• 9 assists: Gustavo Villarruel and Geronimo Poblete
• 8 assists: Luis Catillo
• 5 assists: Marcos Fernades
• 4 assists: Facundo Caruchet
• 3 assists: Diego Rojas and Luis Ibanez
• 2 assists: Lucas Landa, Leandro Diaz and Agustin Machado
• 1 assists: Italo, Fernando Telechea, Franco Vazquez, Matias Ballini, Gustavo Piñeyro, Henry Calderon, Guillermo Feracuti and Martin Sosa

Best Avg. Ratings:

1. Cristian Llana – 7,30 – 38 matches
2. Facundo Caruchet – 7,15 – 29 matches
3. Lucas Landa – 7,13 – 37 matches

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End of Season Review

Let’s just take a look at how we ended the season. The board is pretty satisfied with me, especially because I delivered the promotion crowned with the Nacional B title. I also delivered the youth philosophy, and in some way, the possession football. However, I do believe we have to improve in playing possession strategy.



During the season, the good transfers out that were made, gave us a nice balance. Though we are still in debt, there was enough money to promote an upgrade on our youth facility. I didn’t ask the board, they decided to invest on it. I’m pretty happy with it, as I have plans for the young guys in the club. This could help the U20 development into some classy players.



Cristian Llana earned himself the fans favourite of the season. It was quite a tight pick this season, with Lucas Landa just seven % points behind Llana. Marcos Fernandez also had a good amount of votes for himself. The formation below is the one I mentioned as a more centralized approach. Providing us more men power in the center of the pitch. Playing like this, we lost some of what Llana gave us, as he wasn’t natural central midfielder. I tried him in a few matches, he did ok, but would prefer the flanks of course. Anyhow, for next season, I’ll probably abandon this format, as I expect to exploit more of Llama.