Edinburgh City - Challenging The Status Quo

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This will be my journey from the fourth division of Scottish football to the top with the little known Edinburgh City. In a country where the footballing strength is concentrated around Glasgow, I hope to turn Edinburgh's latest upstarts into Scotland's best club, and to establish Edinburgh as the home of football in Scotland. And just how will I displace Glasgow as Scotland's football capital? Well, that's the main facet of the save.

Edinburgh City FC will only sign players born in Edinburgh.

By developing a local force, I hope I can create a club which is the centre of sport in the city, and one that provides a launchpad for Edinburgh youngsters to play continental and international football.


Edinburgh City begin the save in Scotland's League 2, having been newly promoted from the regional leagues. They are favourites to be promoted, and have a largely intact squad from their previous campaign. A couple of key signings have been made, but the squad will need continued improvement in order to compete.


1. Only players born in Edinburgh (according to FM) may be signed, they can be of any age.
2. Non-Edinburgh players must have all transfer bids accepted and cannot be offered new contracts.
3. Youth development must be improved at all opportunities.


I understand that I've stopped quite a few stories already, but hopefully I can stick with this one for a bit as I'm already a couple of seasons into the game. On that note, updates will likely be season-long for a while until I catch up. Hopefully you guys enjoy!

When you say Edinburgh only do you mean only the city, or the surrounding area? If Its just the city this will be a hell of a challenge bro, good luck

That'll be a hugely difficult challenge as you're very limited. Looking forward to how this pans out, good luck.

InfraRed: To make things easier for my scouting, its just the city. Basically, to be able to sign a player, their Place of Birth in FM must be listed as Edinburgh.

ScottT Cheers mate, will definitely be a little difficult.

In my first season at the helm with Edinburgh City, I had the daunting task of staying afloat against odds of 500-1. We had a reasonably strong squad, but with quite a few non-Edinburgh players. I was hoping for at least a mid-table finish to launch from next season.

We made a number of signings in order to add depth to the squad, with, of course, all the players coming in born in Edinburgh. In the summer transfer window, we managed to land six free transfers, including three central midfielders in Allan Walker, Gary Fusco and Paul Currie. Brian Martin came in as a left back, whilst Ross Gray gave us depth in the undermanned wing department. Declan O'Kane presented as a promising youngster for the years ahead after being released by East Fife.

In January, we added two more attacking midfielders, with Michael McKenna becoming our first transfer signing, costing £2,200 from league rivals Berwick. Omar Kader also crossed on a free from Arbroath, with both proving to be talented wide options. In the same month, we managed to offload 5 reserve players to various clubs around Scotland, not because they were non-Edinburgh, but because they were non-good enough.


We had a brilliant end to the season which almost saw us in contention for a playoff spot, dropping to 7th on the final day. However, a 7th placed finish is not too shabby in my opinion. We solidify our position in the league, and it gives us a good base to prepare ourselves for next season, which will be tougher. Next season, we will have lost most of our squad.


A win in our opening cup campaign gave us promise, narrowly defeating league rivals Clyde 2-1, but we were humbled 3-1 against another league rival in Annan, which was especially sour considering we had thrashed them 5-0 just a fortnight earlier.


We can't really complain on this front, having to come up against 4 teams in superior divisions. Our best result was a penalty loss to Dumbarton but apart from that, largely unimpressive.


In the first round of this secondary cup, we managed to nab an extra time win against Inverness CT Reserves, courtesy of a last minute winner from Ian MacFarland, and were drawn against League 1 leaders Stanraer. Unfortunately for us, we were downed 2-0 against superior opposition.

Our best players in our inaugural season proved to be our central midfielders, with Englishman Josh Walker and Edinburgh-born Marc Laird playing extremely well in the centre of the park, with the latter going on to the win the Fan's Player of the Season. Ross Gray top scored from the wing with 12 goals, whilst Aaron Dunsmore chipped in with 11 assists from right back whilst on loan from Hibernian. Other key contributors in the season were Ian MacFarland at right wing, Chris McKee at centre back and Callum Antell in goals.

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I'll be rapidly updating, hopefully in quick succession, to catch up to where I am in game. Most of the updates will be almost entirely text as it makes it easier to catch up.