FSV Mainz 05 – part 1

A new era…

Hi all and welcome back to the blog. Last update was the last in the Dusseldorf Diary, where after a turmoil season the board decided to give me the boot. Luckily I still had my job as the national coach of Italy to hang onto. My aim was to get back into club management swiftly and not have to wait until next season. Ideally I wanted to stay in Germany for two reasons:

1. The long term goal is to take charge on the German national side. Ambitious as that sounds having a Brit as their manager, but I am hoping they will have no option but to appoint me.
2. The second reason I want to stay in Germany is to gain revenge at Dusseldorf. I truly believe that I would have turned things around at Fortuna but the board showed a complete lack of respect and patience with the man that got them promotion, 4 consectutive campaigns in the Bundesliga and Champions League football. The club has never been in a better position, so what better way to stick two fingers up to the trigger happy chairman. Not that I’m bitter at all.

So unemployment is something very new to me, I like to stick around with jobs and have very rarely been unemployed in FM, I flew back home for a quick break to see what was available. The job centre back home in Swindon was filled with drunks, druggies and creatures that can only be described as ‘dog rough’. I turned straight back around not wanting to mix with the majority of Walcot and Penhill (my fellow Swindon readers will know exactly what i mean there), so decided I will fly back Germany and use that as my central ‘hub’ and wait for any potential job opportunities to arise. Plus I get to watch some entertaining Bundesliga football too. My luck was certainly in as quite a few clubs were taking action on their coaches within this period, so opportunities were quickly coming available. Metz (Ligue 1), Crystal Palace (Prem), Rayo (La Liga), Mainz (Bundesliga), Frieburg (2. Bundesliga), Parma (Serie A) and Koln (Bundesliga) all became available within a week of each other. I applied for all 3 jobs in Germany hoping that perhaps 1 would forget about my recent sacking and give me a chance. Koln straight out refused my application filling me with no confidence and that I may have to wait until people have forgotten about my failure earlier this season.

Mainz on the other hand offered me an interview within the next couple of days, filling me with confidence that someone could actually see past the slight negative and look at my achievements and potential to grow. The interview went swimmingly and within a day they offered me the job, a 3 year deal at the carnival club. I accepted their offer and was asked if I wanted to bring in any of my staff from Dusseldorf, I took them up on this offer and made some essential additions. Now my backroom is full of great staff that I am familiar working with and ones who I don’t but hold some great CV’s, I am looking forward to working with them all. The board have 2 philosophies that I must adhere to:

1. Sign high profile players to the club
2. Sign and develop youth players and bring into the first team.

Both philosophies I am happy to adhere to, although the first one might not be possible due to the financial and reputation of the club at this moment.  

With only 9 games remaining of the season and us sitting in 12th place, the aim is to simply try and get this group of players working as a cohesive unit to avoid the drop and to finish as high as possible. All players will be given a chance to show me what they can do whilst I figure out what system we will play and who will feature in my long term plans. Initially looking at the squad I was pretty happy with what I could use, especially my 20 year old regen striker who looks like he could become a really decent goal scorer. This ultimately turned me to start playing with a striker with Mainz, as opposed to the strikerless system created at Dussledorf (sorry Guido).

I opted with a pressing flat 433 that moves the ball around quickly from the back working the ball into the box. After I have stabilised myself at the club and work towards next season, I will go through my system in a little more detail, for now its early days and a need to win matches. I will focus more on the tactical side of things in the next post.   

As some of you may have seen on my twitter feed, as if it was fate, my first game in charge of Mainz was away to Dusseldorf, my old stomping ground. What better way of sticking 2 fingers up at them but by beating them in their own back yard in my first game in charge.

The remaining 8 fixtures went very well indeed, picking up 4 wins, 2 draws and only 1 defeat to 3 times in a row Bundesliga winners Leverkusen, the Bayern dominance is fading. The lads all showed me what they could do and were all willing to play for me and my system. Now the big test, improve the squad with little money and develop young talent to push for a starting place, ready to build on for next season.

Summer has arrived in 2020 and it is time for the European Championship. Italy who actually won it back in 2016 drew Turkey, Austria and Bulgaria in group D.  I was strongly criticised by the Italian media for calling up 5 young unproven players over some of the older experienced ones. In my view a 35 year old Chiellini with only 5 pace and who has declined at top international level, will not give me any benefit except perhaps some leadership. Here are the 5 young unproven lads I opted to give a chance to.

We came out of the group stages top after a 1-1 draw with the Turks, a 1-0 win over Austria and a 4-0 win over Bulgaria. The second round sees us against Finland and we went in with confidence but not over confident and picked up a dominant 3-0 win. Now into the last 8 and against the Netherlands, who we beat a week before the tournament in a warm up game 1-0. After leading 1-0 for most of the game, Depay equalised and took the game to extra time. My young front man Lluca came off the bench to score the winner on 118 minutes to send the Dutch home and the Italians into the last 4. England, the current world champions, a real test of our ability and nerve. Well the lads did not disappoint in the slightest, we thumped them 5-0 and booked ourselves into the final against the Portuguese. The final itself was a very scrappy game, very much like the final just over a week ago, with nobody managing to score, taking the game to extra time. This time though Eder did not pop up with a late winner, instead it went to penalties. We held our nerve at never missed, Scuffet was the man of the moment and we lifted the trophy winning 6-5 in the shootout. Making this 2 consecutive European Championship wins for the Italians. Surely the DFB have to start taking me seriously as a potential replacement for Schmidt.

So after all the lows and becoming unemployed momentarily, we finish on a huge high with my most successful achievement in this career. A European Championship Winners medal and accolade to my CV. What a story in a very much up and down year.

Thank you again for reading and the continuous support for this blog. I hope you enjoy. Please like, subscribe and share. If you think of any improvements to the blog or any feedback at all please comment or send me a DM.

Don’t forget to check out social media:

Twitter: @marcbowen17

Tifo: @mbowen17

Tifo Group: +limitedfullback

Düsseldorf Diary – Season 4

Well, here we go again. We have reached the climax of season 4 and what a ride it has been. Our aim was to simply push on from the fantastic finish last year in 6th position.

As mentioned at the end of Season 3, I wanted to invest in a shadow striker would would be a little more prolific in front of goal. Due to our wonderful final position and the prospect of playing in Europe next season, the board gifted me €30m to spend. After extensive scouting trips and analysing the market, this was our business:

Now simply put I could not turn down the money on the table for my wonderkid Lewis Cook, his replacement was transfer listed Lewis Holtby, almost a like for like replacement except Holtby is 5 years older but has a little more flair, even more pleasing, he only cost 1/5 of the income from Cook’s sale to Man City. The man who I trusted with the ability to fill the shadow striker role was transfer listed Adam Maher. With finishing, passing, technique and determination all between 16-17 I knew that he would be a great addition to my squad, with added European experience. The rest of the signings were all future prospects except for Leibold who came staight in at left fullback and Chamorro who was nipping at the heels of Clemens on the right wing. Lastly we strngthened our number 1 with the highly talented Loris Karius from Mainz. He proved to be a steal at €5.75m keeping a stunning 15 clean sheets in 33 Bundesliga games.

In January, Schalke met the release fee of Max Christiansen and he left for €15m, I knew I needed to find an instant replacement and decided to go for Niklas Stark, a young defender who had already moved to Dortmund but wasnt getting much game time. I snapped him up for the same price, but quite frankly, Stark is the better all round defender so a decent bit of business in my book.

So How did we get on?

Now a little piece of attacking and defending run through of my strikerless tactic.

A little reminder of the system we are using, a strikerless 4-5-1 with a high pressing philosophy. This tactic is by no means a perfect system by any stretch, but right now it is clicking and we are getting some important wins. There is always room for improvement and I am hoping to iron out any issues as we go forward.

Attacking movements

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

The move starts with Wolfsburg in possession and Arnold plays a pass forward which Kirchoff anticipates and cuts out playing it forward to Helmke in a quick transition. In this moment we are set up really nicely with our 3 central midfielders all within close proximity of each other and all free in space. Helmke cushions the ball to our Deep Lying Playmaker Holzhauser. He does exactly what is asked of him and looks up to pick out a precision pass. He sends a delightful ball diagonally over the defence after sporting the run from our left winger Atanga. Atanga is onto the pass in a flash leaving his man behind him, at this point Atanga is racing towards goal but has great support from the opposing winger and our shadow striker. As Atanga progresses into the area he is surrounded by 3 defenders leaving our 2 supporting players in great positions. With both supporting men drawing the other defenders away from the ball, Atanga skillfully beats his markers and is now staring 1-on-1 with the GK, he picks his spot and dispatches it perfectly. Pressing on the ball, intercepting and opposing pass, quick transition forward, through ball, defence splitting runs off the ball and a classy finish. This was one of many pleasing attacking moves during the campaign. We won the game 3-1.

Defending

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

This analysis starts from our own goal kick, given short to Bader. In this position you can see our team shape is a very prominant 4-5-1. Bader inflicts pressure upon us by being caught out with a heavy touch. Meyer dispossesses Bader but cannot drive forward due to our defensive shape so he plays it backwards to Goretzka. At this point our overwelming midfield step back to pack our 1/3 of the pitch and reduce the options. Goretzka plays a wonderful ball over Bader who is caught on his heels and Meyer has timed his run well. The high pressing philosophy meant that Bader chasing back and Kirchoff coming across causes Meyer to hesitate and lose the ball. Bader drives forward and plays a swift ball to Holtby ready to transition a counter attack. Holtby dithers on the ball and plays a sloppy pass straight back to Goretzka who first time finds Kruse in space where Kirchoff has moved across. The quick pressing comes again and by the time Kruse turns our shape has made a makeshift 1-4-1-4. having two rigid walls to break through with a sweeper behin each wall. Kruse doesnt have many options and fortunatley chips the ball towards Berahino who heads the ball straight out for a goal kick. Threat over, a few enforced errors but high pressing and structured shaped cancelled out any attack Schalke tried to throw at us. We won the game 1-0 in the end.

Fixtures

We had an incredible season and really pushed on well from last year only losing 4 Bundesliga games all season. We still struggled scoring goals, collectively we scored a fair amount but my shadow striker still wasn’t as prolific as I had hoped, but showed signs of excellence. We ended up finishing 3rd and only 3 points off the top, we stayed in the title race all the way until the last game were we bottled it and lost to Frankfurt. I cant really complain as once again a huge improvement and the prospect of Champions League next season.

Our cup run was appalling, losing in the first round. My own fault as I fielded a young side hoping that would be enough. Well, egg on my face after that one. Our European run on the other hand was more exciting. We danced through the group stages winning 6 from 6. Then progressed nicely through the knockout stages, beating some tough opponents,  all the way to the semi finals where we lost on penalties.

Next season will be fun, some of my youngsters will be given a chance and I am hoping to continue to build the squad so we can continue to grow as a club. 4th consecutive season in the Bundesliga and Champions League football. Dreams are becoming a reality.

Italy

Our run with Italy so far has been good, we have progressed through the strange European League system unbeaten and finishing top with 10 points. Hopefully DFB are keeping a close eye on me as I want the Germany job in the future.

I mentioned last post that I wanted to build a traditional Italian system with counter attacking skills. So far it seems to have worked, I am not completely happy with it as there aren’t enough games to really test and understand it. Only time will tell, but I am having fun whilst doing it anyway.

Sorry for death of screenshots this time around but I wanted to go into a little more detail with the story so far. It has taken a little longer to do so but that makes it a whole lot of fun.

Thank you again for reading and the continuous support for this blog. I hope you enjoy. Please like, subscribe and share. If you think of any improvements to the blog or any feedback at all please comment or send me a DM.

Don’t forget to check out social media:

Twitter: @marcbowen17

Tifo: @mbowen17

Tifo Group: +limitedfullback

Düsseldorf Diary – Season 3

Season 3

Welcome back to the Düsseldorf Diary, we are at the end of season 3. Firstly apologies for the delay in this post coming out, I’ve had some time away with the family and have been distracted by the Euro’s.

Transfers

We were given a massive transfer budget in comparison to last season, a massive €16m war chest. Overall our funds were spent very wisely to build the squad, many of our signings were a free transfer or a few loans to add numbers. My first 3 signings, all on a free, were arguably my most important of all the signings. The fact they were free makes them even better. Clemens, a very talented winger who was instantly worth €8.75m, great addition to the team and a great potential resale. Jan Kirchhoff, costing me a massive €38k a week, but to be honest, there aren’t many home grown defenders with the size, strength and pace that he has. He instantly comes in to the team and strengthens in massively. Lewis Cook, my favourite of the 3 freebies, a hugely talented young midfielder who demands the ball and influences the game. He is like a conductor of play, I also didn’t know until midway through the season but he is classed as a wonderkid, eyes wide, cha-ching.

A few other signings also boosted my team, including attacking left back Günter from Freiburg, Holzhauser, a young Austrian deep lying playmaker, and my record signing, €8m Max Christiansen from Ingolstadt. Max is a young talented holding midfielder but he has all the attributes for a ball playing CB. So that’s were he has been playing for me and hasn’t disappointed.  Schröter returns to us on loan again to lead the line in the shadow striker role, I mentioned last time I wanted to improve in this area but couldnt afford or attract anyone else to fit that position. This is somewhere I will make a priority next season.

So how did we get on?

The board expectations were to avoid relegation and like I mentioned before i didn’t want the dreaded 2nd season syndrome. We saw those expectations and we smashed them out of the park. the lads really clicked together well and put in some exceptional performances. As the table shows an incredible 6th place finish and European football next year for Düsseldorf. The Bundesliga itself was very close at the top with only 4 points seperating the top 3, Leverkusen just piping it in the end. 4th place was decided on the last game and Bayern just got it, with ourselves and Mainz right on there heels. Only finishing 1 point outside of a CL place has literally blown my mind. Obviously I believe that we will be winning it at some point, but never thought we would be this close this soon into the career. Truly amazing.

 Fixtures

Some brilliant results along the way including wins against Leverkusen, Schalke, Mainz and Wolfsburg, not forgetting some memorable draws against Bayern and Dortmund. My only disappointment was resting a few key players against Bochum in the DFB-Pokal, a really poor performance and Valdes conceding 4 against a Bochum side in 2. Bundesliga and they only had 4 shots in the match. Next year I want to progress in this competition as well as building my reputation in Europe.

I was awarded manager of the season to add to my accolades, something that I am very proud of and hope to continue in the future.

The board have made an attempt to purchase the ESPRIT Arena from the council, which will boost our finances. It also means I doubt I will get a new stadium anytime soon, The only hope is that when the deal goes through they rename it. Hopefully after an icon, hopefully that icon will be me, but I am not holding my breath for this.

Another positive this season is the performances from my wonderkid Lewis Cook, his dazzeling play has earned him a call up to the England team and he got his first cap. What makes this so brilliant is that Ranieri is the England manager, he continues his mastermind managerial skills he showed at Liecester and won the World Cup 2018 in Russia. Bloody Ranieri, the tinkerman. 

France, Italy and Portugal all were knocked out in the group stages and subsequently sacked their managers. After the season I had, I was a wanted man and offered the job for them all. I deliberated over it for a while as my long term aim is to become the German manager. Will it be an advantage taking another international job boosting my national skills, or would they see it as a negative being in charge of a European rival? I put it out as a poll on twitter to the FM community and the outcome was 50% in favour of the Italians. I also was given some good advice to take it, have success and beat Germany so badly they have no choice but to hire me as manager.

So taking the Italy job I have my wired Euro league group with France and Germany, it is going to be a challenge but fun. I am hoping to try something out of my comfort zone and aim to keep Italian tradition by having a 532 or a 352 system, a catenaccio if you will. I have always wanted to try a libero but have never had the bottle, wether I give it a go or not we shall see, but the solid system is a definate. @totalfootball71 is currently doing a Inter save and is working on a simular system that was so effective and historical in Inter’s success. Check him out at https://t.co/dmDPJNEQVq  

Thank you again for reading and the continuous support for this blog. I hope you enjoy. Please like, subscribe and share. If you think of any improvements to the blog or any feedback at all please comment or send me a DM.

Don’t forget to check out social media:

Twitter: @marcbowen17

Tifo: @mbowen17

Tifo Group: +limitedfullback

Düsseldorf Diary – Season 2 – Winter Break

Season 2 – the return to the top flight

So after the promotion party had finished we all sat down to discuss how the club will more forward and looking towards the season ahead. It also gave us chance to launch the new kits ahead of the season.

 

We were all in agreement that in order for us to survive we need to strengthen the squad. Unfortunately the club weren’t as understanding with this and gave us a massive transfer budget of €2.5m. I pleaded with them for a smidge more as the squad will be really stretched otherwise, but they declined and promptly told me to concentrate on results rather than finances. So a €2.5m war chest to sign better players, however our wage budget has been increased from €300k to €460k, so we have a bit of play. Hoffenheim offered €3m for Avevor, our super speedy centre half. I plain right laughed at that bid and negotiated €10m for him. He has 17 pace, 23 years old and has a bright future ahead of him, I really didn’t feel it was unreasonable. They came back but my money grabbing board accepted the revised offer of €6.5m, typically he accepted their contract offer in the same day and before I could even think about a replacement he was gone. 6 bloody million €’s for him. What made that deal even sweeter is that the bloody board once again have screwed me. Out of that €6m, I get a massive €1m extra to spend on a replacement, so all in all I have €3.5m to spend on my squad to try and attempt to avoid dropping straight back down again.

Transfers In

So as you can see we have brought in a 13 players and 7 of them are on loan, this is purely down to not having enough funds to bolster the squad. In terms of outgoings it has mainly been a handful of 2 nd team players who wanted stupid money that have left. Apart from that 3 main squad players left, Avevor as I mentioned earlier, as well as Bodzek and Koch. This provided me with just a little extra to spend. Not much though by any stretch. I won’t go into detail all my signings as it will get very dull and be the death by screenshots, but I will just mention the ones that I thought were a good deal and how they have got on.

Hendrik Helmke

Helmke has been a pivotal part of the team since arriving, he has bags of experience and at €400k, the 29 year old has been a bit of a bargain. He hasn’t completely dominated but his return has been very pleasing, a very decent average rating of 7.32,  with 6 goals and 2 assists to his name.

 

Matthias Bader

Now Bader has probably been the signing that I have been most pleased with, as the €2.3m transfer fee shows. The 18 year old really caught my eye last season whilst playing against him at Karlsruhe. His attributes look great and at such a young age he is bound to improve. My scouts and coaching staff all believe he has the potential to be a 4.5 star defender. He was initially brought in as back up the Schauerte but has kept the experienced right back out of the side. Every few weeks I keep getting messages from my coaching staff that he is excelling in training and his attributes are on the up. Very happy with Bader, will have to try and tie him down to long tern deal.

My other signings have all played their part so far and are continuing to cause problems with selection which is always a good position to be in. Younes and Horn are youngsters who look pretty decent and have mostly played as back up. Holtmann and Marin were brought in to strengthen the side in wide areas, disappointingly Marin hasn’t been as effective as I would have like him to be. Rani Khedira, the younger brother of Sami, brought in on loan, looks like he could become a similar player to his brother, once again adding strength and steel in the midfield. Yannick Stark similar to Khedira and only costing €100k. Felix Schroter has been my main goal scoring threat, playing in the pivotal shadow striker role, picking up 8 goals so far. Uphoff and Schafer are both young centre backs that I like the look of. Avevor was transfer listed by Hoffenheim due to lack of first team football so my diamond in the rough has returned for the second half of the season to add that bit of pace back to the back line. I will be keeping a close eye on him and hope to snap him back for a fraction of the €6m my board let him go for.

So how have we got on?

The expectations of the board are to attempt to avoid the automatic relegation places, as highlighted just after promotion and when the board announced our transfer budget, this was going to be a very hard task. Safe to say things have gone exactly how it was predicted. We have struggled, and when I say struggle, oh how I mean it. The most encouraging thing is that 9 out of 10 games we are putting up a fight and competing against the much more superior sides in the Bundesliga. Even more pleasing is that we are scoring goals, not specifically from one player, but as a team. 

We started off the campaign with the 1 st round DFB-Pokal tie away to Eltersdorf from the 4 th tier. As expected we came away 3-0 winners which was a great moral boost going into what would be a tough season. Our opening game in the Bundesliga was in the Rhein derby away to Gladbach, we played pretty well and overall I was happy with the performance, but to be denied a point from a late goal was a blow and we lost the game 2-1. I told the lads not to be to downhearted, on another day we could have won with that kind of performance. Another similar story in our next fixture at home to Stuttgart, this time it wasn’t a late goal that denied us just a few breaks as we tried to push on. We lost the game 3-1, the positive here is we have scored in both games. A nice international break gives our players a rest and a chance to concentrate on training, focusing on defensive positions and set pieces. We return from the break with a home tie against Hamburg, the rest and training has paid off here and a run out 2-0 winners. Thank god, our first win in our return to the Bundesliga. Honestly I didn’t know when it was going to come, I’m just glad it only took 3 games to get it as opposed to say 10 or more. A massive weight off of our shoulders and a clean sheet too, something to build upon.

How I was so very, very mistaken. Our next 4 games saw us take on Bayern, Schalke, Koln and Wolfsburg, which we lost all 4 games, cementing ourselves at the foot of the table. We lost 1-0 to Koln which is the first time we have been unable to find the net. All the rest we lost 3-1, which isn’t great although we scored against 3 big clubs, so still a small positive. If we hadn’t scored in any of them, then there would be some cause for real concern. We ended our losing run with a point away to Hannover and to be honest we should have won. We were the better side for the majority of the game but they pegged us back on a swift counter and the match finished 1-1. Now I thought we could perhaps change our fortunes with a nice run of games against some opponents where I could envision us getting some more points on the board. By this point we were sitting rock bottom on 4 points and Freiburg were our closest rival miles ahead on 10. So we had a lot of catching up to do and this is where I hoped we could do that. Once again I was very wrong, we lost all 3 games, scoring 3 goals but conceding 7. Our run without a win now stretched to 8 games. Sandwhiched in between these fixtures we played a 2nd round DFB-Pokal tie again RB Leipzig, who are still in the league bellow. We scraped through on penalties after a poor 1-1 draw, but I can’t grumble too much, we are through to the next round.

Our next Bundesliga match was at home to Hoffenheim and a return to the ESPRIT arena for my beloved Avevor. I held a meeting with the lads and told them that things haven’t quite gone our way recently but we have been playing well enough that our fortunes are bound to change. The lads put in a performance that was so pleasing and ended our dreadful run of defeats with a 2-0 win, 2 goals and a clean sheet, something we only dreamt of. We have got another 3 points on the board but so did the rest of the pack, 17 th placed Freiburg were now on 12, a 5 point gap ahead of us. 5 games to go before the winter break and we needed to get some points on the board before then to have any hope of staying up. We lost the next 2 games to Mainz and Dortmund,2-1 and 1-0, to be honest it we were defiantly the underdogs in these games and didn’t expect too much. The next game was away to Leverkusen and I thought that rather than trying to encourage the players putting pressure on them to try and win, I would tell them to relax and play with no pressure at all. This has worked many times for me in the past on other sides and we had come away with a point or a win, but on that day it went horribly wrong. We were battered 7-1, an utter embarrassment, 6-0 down at half time. Second half we matched them but they clearly took their foot off the gas so I can’t really say we were better, just better in the sense that we didn’t concede another 6. What made this more painful is that prior to the game we beat Stuttgart again, 1-0 but this time in the DFB-Pokal, a clean sheet and through to the quarter finals.

Our remaining 2 games before the break were Freiburg and Hertha, both sitting above me on 12 and 13 points respectively. I knew that we had to get at least 3 points from 6 here to stand a chance, otherwise moral will seriously be tarnished. Both games are massive 6 pointers, even at this stage of the season; results here could be vital come the end. Boom 6 more points on the board, a 4-2 against Freiburg and a 2-0 win and clean sheet against Hertha. We move off the foot of the table sitting in 16 th place on 13 points, but it is still ever so tight down here, at least we can look down at rivals now as opposed to straining our necks constantly looking up at them in the distance. We have now got hope, especially come off the back of that drumming from Leverkusen. But we are on a great run now and the winter break couldn’t have come at a worse time, we have won 3 out 4 in all competitions, our best run since promotion last season. Let’s hope we can continue this kind of form after the break, our first match back is at home to Stuttgart, let hope we can replicate out cup match and come away with another win.

That concludes the current update, I am encouraged by many of the performances, especially the last few fixtures. I hope this will push us on for the second half and ensure survival. Stay tuned for the next instalment. 

Thank you again for reading and the continuous support for this blog. I hope you enjoy. Please like, subscribe and share. If you think of any improvements to the blog or any feedback please send your comments.

Don’t forget to check out social media:

Twitter: @marcbowen17

Tifo: @mbowen17

Tifo Group: +limitedfullback

 

Düsseldorf Diary – Season 1

Season 1 – review

So time has gone extremely quickly, the season has flown past within a blink of an eye. Going into the season the one thing that I wanted to do was build a foundation for Düsseldorf, somewhere to start and have a slow burn into success. Well that was the plan anyway. What happened instead was completely different and honestly unexpected. 

Setting the scene

Saturday 14th May 2016 and it is a gusty grey afternoon. The final game of the 2. Bundesliga awaits. The Championship is due to be decided as well as the promotion and relegation play off places. Düsseldorf welcome Heidenheim to the ESPRIT Arena. What should have been a end of season mid table, nothing to play for fixture has actually turned out to be a massive fixture. Düsseldorf are currently sitting at the dizzy heights of 1st place with Freiburg snapping at their heels. Both sides have already been granted the achievement of promotion to the top tier, but are only separated by 2 points, so the Championship will be decided on the final fixture. Düsseldorf host Heidenheim, whilst Freiburg travel to 3rd place Nürnburg, who themselves are looking to guarantee a promotion play off place. Freiburg must win and hope that Düsseldorf doesn’t in order to clinch the title away from  them. The fans show their continuous amazing support for the side, willing them on to win.

What happens next?

Düsseldorf are set up for the win, Bowen knows that only a win will do as Freiburg are more than capable of going to Nürnburg and snatching a win. However Heidenheim put up a fight and Düsseldorf simply cannot find a way through. Anxiety is spreading through the fans and collecting momentum, it reaches down to the players and the staff. Supporters frantically checking their phones to find out the score in Nürnburg. The final whistle goes at ESPRIT and it finishes 0-0. But it hasnt finish in Nürnburg yet, what will be the outcome. The players are all waiting on the pitch desperate to find out the result. Then the crowd erupts, Freiburg drew with Nürnburg 2-2, meaning Düsseldorf are Championsh of the 2. Bundesliga. The players and staff are overjoyed, the fans go crazy, this is the first title since 1989.

We were predicted to finish 7th, the board were happy with mid table, I was happy with mid table. Never did I believe we would gain promotion, let alone win the league in  the first season. An amazing achievement and one that I am extremely proud of, especially as I was using my strikerless tactic for the first time. It started well so with a few tweaks along the way, it helped us along the way to achieve my first piece of silverware. Of course the first of many trophies (I hope).

2. Bundesliga Table

Fixtures

Overall I am delighted with my first season in charge. The next challenge will be survival in the top flight. The Bundesliga will be tough, reinforcements will need to be made if we are to stand any hope. We had no money what so ever so we made no transfers apart from a few U20’s on a free transfer. But they are so so and not even worth showing. I am hoping for a bit of money, but I am going to have to be very smart during this transfer window. We have 3-4 players who are returning to their clubs after a loan spell and no doubt bigger clubs will be looking at some of my other players too. I need to try and keep hold of most of the squad so I can keep some spine and cohesion within the side. Other wise we could have a swift return back to 2nd tier and continue the yo-yo pattern that Düsseldorf have been so fond of over the years.

Keep posted for my next update which should hopefully be mid season. Thank you again for reading and the continuous support for this blog. I hope you enjoy. Please like, subscribe and share. If you think of any improvements to the blog or any feedback please send your comments.

Don’t forget to check out social media:

Twitter: @marcbowen17

Tifo: @mbowen17

Tifo Group: +limitedfullback

Me & Marcelino

April 27th and I stumble across an amazing article based on Marcelino’s work at Villarreal. It simply grabbed me by the horns and I was hooked. I was itching to get home and dive straight into a save to see if I could emulate his work. Before we dive into the save I want to spend a bit of time talking about the fantastic piece of analysis by The Tactics Room. If you wish to check them out (and I suggest you do) you can find them on Twitter @TheTacticsRoom or thetacticsroom.com. The article is a great read and also suggest you read it before you continue with this post. https://t.co/Mw6anZnuHR 

The article studies Marcelino’s 4-4-2 approach. It is a highly structured machine with a rock solid defence and patient attacking style which is a balance to be admired. We can all see the rise of Villarreal over the last few years since their promotion back to the top flight. Finishing in 6th place in the last 2 seasons and currently sitting in 4th place hoping for a champions League spot. Everyone involved with the El Submarino Amarillo should be very proud of their successful rise under Marcelino.

So here I am taking over at Villarreal hoping to emulate the success that Marcelino has achieved in real life this season. I wanted to keep the squad the same as much as I could and create a tactical system that mirrors Marcelino’s side. Now when I say keep the same side, I was filled with the intentions that I would do just that. But when Chelsea wave the cheque book in front of you and basically say “how much do you want?” Then sometimes you just can’t say no. I brought in a massive £38m on selling 2 players to the blues, £16m for Manu Trigueros and £22m for Mateo Musacchio. Now I could have spent the same amount of money bringing in some massive stars, but like I said earlier I wanted to keep the original squad. I did replace those 2 players with like for like replacements. Håvard Nordtveit for £1.8m to add a bit of steel in the midfield and Emanuel Mammana for £6.5m. We all know that Mammana turns into a quality CB but during the first season he is nowhere near his full potential.

Tactics

So the team shape is pretty obvious, an attempt to mimic Marcelino’s 442. Pretty simple with a flat back 4, 2 standard CB’s and both FB’s on support. These would change to defend duty if facing a sides who create their most goals from out wide. The midfield 4 would sit nice and narrow, with the wide man cutting inside. The front 2 are made up of a defensive forward, he added as an extra midfielder without the ball but provided great link up play between the midfield and striker. The other striker is the advanced forward, his role is to play on the last line of the defence, running onto though balls, but also having a hand in the link up play itself. We played on a Structured shape with a standard mentality, this would change to counter depending on the opponents, but generally was on standard. I wont bore you with the team & individual team instructions but if anyone would like to try the tactic, I am happy to upload it to steam for anyone to try. Just drop me a DM and I can upload it.

So how did we get on

So this is how the table stands for Villarreal at present they are pretty much set on achieving Champions League football and are leading Liverpool 1-0 ahead of the Europa semi final second leg. An all round great season for the yellow submarine, but did I manage to beat this. We finished in 7th place which sounds worse on the surface of things, but Valencia preformed much better with Gary Neville in this save then what he did in real life.

Deportivo & Granada clearly overachieved. We actually wasn’t  that far off how Villarreal are in real life. 14 wins 15 draws and 9 defeats. 7 points less off, scored more goals, but conceded 17 more. On another day we could have turned some of the excessive draws into wins then the season may have looked a little different. 

An incredible pre season, winning all our fixtures and without conceding. The League itself started pretty poorly but the second half of the season is really when the results start going our way.

The silver lining to this season was the Europa League. We lifted the trophy claiming a Champions League spot. So in a round about way, we have matched the real Villarreal but in a bit of a scroungy way. I was most pleased with the act that we beat Real Madrid and Atletico twice and beating Barcelona at home. Quite a few of the draws came from conceding goals in the last 10 minutes. This is where I decided to change mentality to counter during the last 70 minutes if we were ahead. This helped some of the time but didn’t eradicate the draws. We also made it to the semi finals of the Copa Del Rey beaten by Real Madrid.

A quick review over some of our statistics. Our average possession was the 3rd highest in the league with 53.26%. Only Real Madrid and Barcelona were above us, as you would expect. Real averaged 54.71%. This was a shock to me as we were not playing possession based football. Our discipline was pretty good ranking 16th in the league with almost the lowest amount of fouls, 355, receiving 49 yellow and 1 red. From the 50 goals we scored we achieved 38 of them from direct play, 0 from free kicks or penalties, 4 from corners and 8 from indirect free kicks. We achieved 10 clean sheets and conceded from 4 corners and 3 indirect free kicks, the 41 was from open play. We completed a total of 16993 passes ranking the most in the division and a 80% success rate. Our biggest problem was scoring goals, we made the chances but could not finish teams off, this came back to haunts us many of times. from 189 shots we converted 36% of them, shocking, 17th in the division, but I did have Roberto Soldado, and spurs fans all know what he is like. Joking aside he actually finished 8th in the division with 56% of his shots on target. what on earth does that say for the rest of my side. Bakambu scored 14 league goals and 5 Man of the Match awards in 27 games with an average of 170.86 minutes per goal, not bad. He had 118 shot and only managed 48 on target and 70 off target, that is 41% and he only scored 15 of those 48, that is 32% conversion rate from the 41% target rate, ouch.

I think its fair to say that with a few more tweaks and maybe if I kept Trigueros and Musacchio perhaps things may have been better. But overall I am happy with the outcome. My first real attempt of studying a style of play and trying to emulate it with the same side in FM.

Thank you all for reading, please share, like and subscribe. I will be venturing back to Romania for the next blog. Once again if anyone would like to try this tactic out and give the challenge ago I am happy to share it with you.

Don’t forget to catch me on social media

Twitter: @marcbowen17

Tifo: @mbowen17

Tifo Group: +limitedfullback