Bianche Casacche

I tried my luck as a player in my country, Romania, but did not succeed because of injury’s and maybe because I never was very talented in tehnical attributes, more in mental attributes. This things made me hang my boots at 22 years, and started the coaching course. I managed some teams in Romania, but then I had to move to Italy.There I managed only youth and reserves squad’s, and made lots of friends, between them I met this man, named Massimo Secondo.

When I was about 25 years old, a recived a mail from my agent, that says: “ I have good news for you mate, do you remember Massimo Secondo? Because he does remember you, and he want to meet you! See you at my palce!”
I searched on google about him, and found that he is the president of Pro Vercelli, a team that has relegated this season to serie C. I googled “Pro Vercelli” and found that they are former serie A champions 7 times. Sounds good, so I decided to go to the meeting.
We talked for hours, he sad he is pretty low on finances and he is looking for a manager for the club, wich does not want a big salary. He said that he would like Pro Vercelli to win serie A like once did, but first we have to restructurate. He put me on the table a contract for 2 years, time for me to restructurate the team, from almost nothing. The team had a lots of loaned players, he ended the loans, we have to reconstruct the team. I accepted and this is how my adventure begins!

Good start mate but the images dont work for some reason

Now that’s a bold move.

Pro Vercelli is the team in one of the best FM stories I have ever seen by Grantland writer Brian Phillips, The run of play, Pro Vercelli.

Looking forward to this story.

Next day I met the team...if Icould say "team", because after the players who were on loan left, we had only 9 players. From this poit I knew that me and the staff will have a period with very busy days and even sleepless nights.
We have a staff meeting, me, chief scout, director of football and the president. I told the president that I need 2 more coaches, he said "ok, but you can only offer them a maximum wage of 20,000 per year". That means I have to look after inexperienced coaches, with little reputation. I went home and start thinking about this situation. I said to myself "we must bring players who recently retired. If we can find players with big names, we can incrsease our image." And I started daydreaming about how people will say "they have this very big players as coaches, let's see what they can do, maybe we will become a suporter!" 'Rriiing' - phone rings and wakes me up, it's my chief scout, he called to tell me he has a list of players wich are interested in coming at the club and he emailed it to me. I told the director of football to get them all at a trial day to see what they can do. After this, I start looking again for coaches, and found this two:
This two singings were really perfect for us! Now we will have to search for players. I sent a scout in Europe, we will wait and see with what he will return.

MALDINI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Solid start mate, good luck

I think you're the only person other than me who uses per year (but I only use per year because I'm in MLS), I can't wait to see how this story unfolds!

Next couple of weeks were very tough ones for me and my staff. We had every day lots of players on trial, the scouts were in Europe, looking for players. I talked with the director of football, and we agreed that the maximum wage for a player to be 120 k p/y, only for briliant players we may spend oevr 120 k, but no more than 160 k p/y, because we had a wage buget of 1.3 m p/y, and we need around 15 players. We found some good plaeyrs on the first week of trial, but some of them wanted over 200 k p/y like A very powerfull central defender, great at heading, played at OM, Bolton and Wes Brom. But we couldn't affod him. So we tested players again, again and again. One day, my phone rigns, it's an old fried from Romania, he is an agent now and he called me to offer me a player 18 years old, on his name, Fabian Himcinschi. I remembered that I heard of him at TV, he is one of the best players of U19 National Team. I gave him a trial and signed him.
He certanly has potential to become a good player, we'll wait and see.The rest of the players we have found are: Mateo Paro - A very interesting CM, he played for Juve when they were relegated in Serie B. 29 years old, a good deep lying playmaker. I was surprised he accepted our offer.
Abderrahman Kabous - A good ball winning midfilder, very good tackler,an agressive player and very brave.
Fabricio Fuentes - at 35 years old, he isn't very fast or agil, but he has enormous experience, 4 seasons played at the highest level at Villareal.He is a perfect limited defender, and he will boost our shirt's sales. He was found by my chief scout.
Gustavo Nery - Again, an experienced palyer,35 years old, a great left back for Serie C, and he can play everywhere on teh elft side.
One day a recievd a mail from the assistant coach of Ternana, a team were I managed the reservs squad, and he said that he has a very good RB to send on loan. I decided to give him a chance, and invited him at a trial. I realised he was very good so I signed him.
After I sigend Matteo Ciofani, the cheif scout calls me to tell me he has found a very good player for us, but we have to move quick because eh is wanted by mroe clubs. I didn't have time to give him a trial, I belived the chief scout and signed him. He is a evry good left wing, dribbler, technique and very fast player and only 22.I knew that this a hell of a deal. He could play for us a couple of seasons, and then we can sell him for good money.
The other scout called me from Holland, he said he has found a good stricker, he is transfer listed by Sparta, they want only 10 k for him. I talked with the director of football, and we decided to sign him.
At a trial, we found this defedner, called Vinícius, he is a powerfull defender and has good experience, I decided to sign him.
Done with the deals, we made 15 transfers, that is enough. Now the friendly games started.Not the best way, we struggled a bit, till the players acomodated with the new conditions and the strategy. In teh first round of the cup, we drawed Treviso and we managed to beat them, but them we had to play against Atalanta, so we are out of the cup. The players look like they settled in, and they are ready for the new season. Our best player in the friendly matches was strangley Himcinschi. And this is how the month of August passed.

A nice start, great level of detail. Will certainly follow.

Good start, good luck season .
Sandro good player.

The season has began with a first game home against Virtus Entella. Although we made a draw, 1-1 I was pretty pelased how the team played. We had 60% possesion, 18 shots, but sadly only 3 on target. Calabro scored our goal.
Next game was against Savona, away. We started scoring, not like in the first game. Final score was 1-4, a hattrick from Calabro. In my mind I started thinking that I did so good, listening to the scout.
Third game was against Lumezzane. The situation from the frist game, we are dominating the game, but we are missing very much. Final score 1-1. This is not good, we had to do something, so next day at training grounds I asked Julio Cruz, my coach, to tell them how he scored so many goals in his career.Hope it will work.
Forth game was really hard. We palyed away at Grosseto. I didnțt expect nothing, they were first place and in a very good form.But we played pretty well an get a 1-1. I am pelased, this is a big point.
The last game of teh month was against Feralpi Salò. We won 3-0, seems like Julio Cruz did a good motivation work. Calabro scored 2 goals.
At the end of the month we are on 5th palce, but oly 3 points from first palce. Overall we had a good month.
Our best player was Sandro Calabro, he scored 6 goals is 5 league games. I praised him and told him to keep scoring.
He is also the league top scorer. Ițm proud of him, and I thank again to my scout.
The player who improved the most was Himcinschi. He played in 3 league games, he started on the bench in all games.I praised him and told him to keep working hard, oane day he will be a great player.
This was the month of September.

Second month was a perfect month if we look at the results, but if we look at the performances, it isn't that good. We miss a lot, Calabro scored only once this month, and Himcinschi once.
The first game was against Pavia.We won 1-0, but they missed a penalty. We dominated the game, but lack at finishing.
Second mach was home,against Portogruaro.We won 2-1. It was a good game, Greco scored again.
Third match was away, against Carpi.We won 2-1, but they had more oportunities to score.
Last game of the month was home against San MArino, one of teh weakest teams in the championship. We only won with 2-1. This is not good. I asked Paolo Maldini to teach my defenders to be mroe organized. We'll see next month if it will work.
This month our best player I think it was Greco, I use him as AM, Inside forward.
I am hoping that next month we will improve our game. That was the month of Octomber.

Good player Greco .
Good match .

No lose, good luck promotion !

The month of november started as I exepcted, we lost our first game. The defensive part dosen't work. I'll take a look at the tactics and change something.
First match was against Cremonese and we lost 3-0. We didn't have even 1 shot on target. It's clear that we ahve to change something in attack, so from teh next game Himcinschi will start from the begining.
Second game of the month was home, against Como. We played pretty well, won 1-0. Maybe the change in tactics helped.
Next match, away at Alto Adige. We lost 2-1. I realized that we have problems in teh defensive compartment. The two CD are to old maybe, they are slow and make some easy mistakes. The RB did not acommodated. And we need a backup for our AML. I send scouters to search for CD,RB and AML.
Last game of the month was against Cuneo. We drawed 1-1. Poor game from our players.
But at least are coming good news this month, Julio Cruz said that Himcinschi evolved very much this month, we should start counting on him.
Other good new are that our scouts found an AML and a CD. The AML is Martin Mikkelsen, he is a 26 years old Danish, playing at FC Federicia. We payed 40 K for him.
The CD is brazilian, has 29 years.His name is Tiago Salleti.We only payed 7 K for him.

The month of December began with a very good game by our players. We won 2-0 against 5th place, Pro Patria.
Second game of the month was full of goals. We had 3-0 at half time, but second half, our defenders played like 10 years old kids. Match ended 4-4.
Last game of the month was against AlbinoLeffe.We controlled the game and won 2-1.
We had a Christmas Party. The players enjoyed the evening, but me,the assistant coach and the director of football stood all night and discussed about the future. We established that we have to release some players and bring 4-5 new faces if we want to achieve promotion.We'll see what the month of January has to offer to us.

In january we had a hard task...we had to sign some players beside Mikkelsen and Salleti. It was very hard, almost no player wanted to join us, we only managed to sign one player, a left back, but a very good one, if we will promote to serie B, we can use him even there.his name is Ibrahima Sory Camara.
First game of the month was against Virtus Entella. They had a red card since 9 minute and they still dominated us. Poor game.
Second game we won 1-0, against Savona.This time we pretty controlled the game, we (me and my staff) had to do something, the player performance is fluctuating, we changed a little the strategy, but we decided that the big changes will be in the summer,now the players will not have time to adapt.
Last game, again a draw. 1-1 against Lumezzane.
We are still in the objective, this is how the standing are looking:

Looks like it will be a tight ending to the season!