Keeping the team together after this minor-key organ blast appeared in the Vercelli Soccer Express was one of the more difficult man-management challenges I’ve faced this season, not least because I had to keep myself together, too. We were already in the midst of an epic tailspin—following the loss against Inter with a 2-1 loss to Torino, following the loss to Torino with a 1-0 loss to Livorno, seven losses and no wins in our last eight games—and now I was about to lose my club to a group of martini drinkers who’d been exactly and specifically nowhere while I took it from Serie C2 to Serie A? It was all I could do not to resign instantly, move to another club, and let the “consortium” decide for itself whether replacing me with a manager whose only previous accomplishment was getting Lecce relegated was really the smartest play.
But I kept my cool. I’d worked too hard to bring Pro Vercelli to this point, and I loved the club too much, to walk away now, especially since I didn’t even know how the negotiations would work out. So I waited. Soon after the Maglione item appeared in the Express, the transfer embargo came down from our current board:
And that was the context in which we played out the end of our first season in Serie A: the club on the verge of a takeover, my job—absurdly—in jeopardy, prohibited from making any plans for buying and selling players over the summer.
We didn’t win a match in February. We didn’t win a match in March. In April, we finally got the breakthrough we’d been waiting for, taking Fiorentina 2-0 at the Artemio Franchi. Then we beat Catania 1-0 in Sicily. Then we beat Bologna 2-0 at home. Everyone was healthy (finally). Morale started to improve. The Express even ran a series of rumors saying that the takeover bid was about to collapse.
We fell apart against Parma, letting them come back three times for a 3-3 draw, and lost 1-0 at the Olimpico to Roma (they were out for revenge, and weren’t going to lose even after they went down to 10 men). But the team stayed focused, and we beat Sampdoria 3-1 in early May—sweeping our parent club for the season—just in time for the final results of the takeover negotiations to be announced.
“Changes sooner rather than later”…”Brian Phillips could be replaced”…the new chairman sounded brash. At this point some fairly dark currents started running through the supporter groups, who didn’t have any reason to trust the “big plans” of a businessman who’d played no role in turning the club around. (Didn’t we already have “big plans”? Big plans we were right in the middle of fulfilling?) The players started grumbling, too, not finding themselves all that eager to play for a coach who’d become a midtable mainstay of the second division.
I got a message from the new chairman:
Fantastic. In any sane world this Fabio Maglione character would’ve been bending over backwards to promise his full support for me and for the team. Instead, he was saying he’d “consider letting [me] keep [my] job.” In other words, he hadn’t been able to fire me without facing a revolt from the fans and the players, so he was falling back on a classic club-owner tactic—setting the manager a test. By giving me time to prove myself to him, he was making sure that if I lost in the next few games, he’d be able to claim that he was justified in firing me: he’d given me a chance, and I’d failed. As much as I’d appreciate the training-facility improvements he was boasting about (were we now owned by Daniel Levy?) this was too much. Incidentally, our next two matches were against A.C. Milan and Juventus.
In the press conference before the Milan match, well, I guess I was in a bad mood:
I sent out a cautious lineup at the San Siro, planning to defend like mad and pray we could steal a late goal. Milan had already clinched the championship, and we were playing them in their last game before the Champions League final, so maybe they’d be distracted against us. Then Jefferson Arteaga, our strong defensive midfielder, was sent off for a professional foul in the first minute of the match. I feared the worst, but we held on for a scoreless draw in the first half.
Then Miguel José was carried off in a stretcher in first-half stoppage time. I feared the worst again, but somehow, largely due to the goalkeeping heroics of Jacob Larsen, we snuck away with the nil-nil draw:
It was our second draw against Milan this season, as I loudly reminded the press after the match. The fans were ecstatic. But no word from Fabio Miglione.
Against Juventus, in our penultimate game of the season—our last at the Silvio Piola—we came out sharp and threatened to score several times. The second half was tense, physical, and tight. My job was on the line, and Juventus were playing for European qualification after a mildly disappointing season. No one was giving anything away. Then, in the 66th minute, Andrea Nocenti got on the end of a cross from Gaeti and gave Juventus a 1-0 lead.
We kept battling, though, and in the 80th minute Alessandro Di Marco was whistled for fouling Barone in the box. Jacopo Sammarco converted the penalty, and we left with a 1-1 draw. We’d gone undefeated against Juventus for the season, as I loudly reminded the press after the match. We were in 10th place in Serie A.
At that point, Fabio Miglione couldn’t have fired me if I’d shown up at the training ground in a Biellese goalkeeping kit. I got the following note the next morning:
Thanks for your munificence, Fabio. Don’t sprain your hand while you’re signing my checks.
Oh, and:
So my job is safe, at least for the moment. I have no idea what kind of latent hostility the board is harboring for me now, but I don’t care as long as they’re not in a position to act on it. And I’m hoping they’ll realize of their own accord that their best course of action is to defer to my decisions in absolutely every respect and stay entirely out of my way.
We won against Napoli in our last game, so the season finished like this:
Milan won the Champions League (1-0 against Liverpool in the final), their first European Cup win during their incredible run of now seven consecutive Serie A titles. That will be us one day. Assuming the club chairman doesn’t decide to assassinate me first.
Read More: Football Manager 2009, Pixel Dramas, Pro Vercelli
by Brian Phillips · April 11, 2009
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Oh Fabio Magilone, soon enough you’ll be bidding on high profile players behind your back and selling off all the top talent to Milan and Inter for a pittance.
Hopefully he’s not an invasive chairman and thankfully saw the light on keeping you on as manager. He would probably be beaten in the streets if he had fired you in real life after you history with Pro Vercelli.
Wonder when Sampdoria are going to break that link with you, I guess it’s free money for you every year until they do.
Remember to always use a convex mirror when shaving so you can see his goons sneaking up on you. Maybe pay a few Ultras to serve as bodyguards. I wonder how those would show up on the Expenditures tab, “match day expenses”?
This is really much more enthralling than it deserves to be, well done Brian.
Wow, so is this game really this detailed, or are you creating this storyline? If this is all part of the game, then is this just one of the dangers associated with playing a lesser team? (Lesser of course only in initial stature)
p4limpsest — The game is really this detailed. Takeovers aren’t just a danger for smaller teams; they can be a danger/reward for larger teams as well.
For instance, whenever I get stressed about Pro Vercelli’s ownership situation, I take a minute to think about what the Juventus of this game world is going through. A few years ago they were bought by a devastatingly rich Chinese plutocrat who installed his own team to run the club:
He poured obscene amounts of money into the team (last year they spent €106 million on new players and made just €4.5 million from selling their old ones) but without seeing any real results (last year they finished in 6th place, just four points of ahead of us).
Now the owner has lost his patience:
Have fun being poor, Juventus. Enjoy having to make it on your own using only the vast resources of your enormous fan base, state-of-the-art stadium, lineup of star players, constant presence on television, and robust global distribution network.
Suckers.
I know this Maglione type, Brian. He’s all too familiar. You could be the best manager in the world — indeed, it’s possible that you are the best manager in the world — but that counts for nothing, because you’re not Maglione’s man. You do not owe everything to him. It is a constant reproach to his self-valuation that, in the little world of Pro Vercelli, you existed before he did. He did not create you from the dust of the earth, and for this he will never forgive you.
Welcome to the wonderfully wacky world of Italian football. The only thing worse, would be managing Real Madrid …
Can you give us some details about this Milan team? Seven straight Serie A titles is an achievement nearly as remarkable as Pro Vercelli’s…
So if Roberto Begnini plays Colombo, then surly Alan Rickman will do his best Italian and play Maglione. He’s got Peter Ridsdale written all over him…
Greg — Milan in this game are a perfectly designed, self-sustaining orb of death. What’s the opposite of a biosphere? A mortisphere? They’re a mortisphere.
They’re led by Francismar, a world-historically-great Brazilian midfielder who’s transparently based on Kaka, but with the difference that he could plausibly wear a shirt that said “Jesus Belongs to Me.”
He has won six (six!) consecutive World Player of the Year awards, as well as every other shiny implement in the game. Note that the picture above captures him at the age of 33, when his stats were already 2-3 years off their peak.
He’s joined in the starting lineup by Samet Izdri (European Player of the Year, two-time European Striker of the Year, two-time Champions League Best Player), Cristian Gentile (two-time European Defender of the Year), nine players worth €17 million or more, and four players whose weekly salary is more than that of every Pro Vercelli player combined, including the reserves and the under-20s.
You can’t even say they’re getting old, because they’re constantly restocking with players like this:
They play a straight 3-4-3 with three central defenders and three pure strikers. Their original manager in the game, Stefano Savoldi, sensationally left for Liverpool after the third straight Serie A title, but his replacement, Vito Scalpi, has now reeled off four more and wound up beating Savoldi’s Liverpool team in the Champions League final last year.
Just a terrifying company.
Not that they scare us, of course.
“Luca Maglione, we running this rap shit”
There would appear to be something wrong with the game logic to allow one team to be so dominant for so long. I mean, even more than late 50’s Real Madrid?
I have been playing on an extended run with Palermo (the Kings of Sicily) and AC are the bane of my existence. They won six straight Serie A titles and almost as many European Championships.
I finally won the A after a 97 point, undefeated season. I do not expect to replicate this form. AC typically lose twice a year, draw five to seven times, and win the rest. I have compared their ridiculous run of results to historical results in Serie A and they have been winning by 10-15 points more than the average winning point total in the last dozen years. Palermo in my game is fantastically rich, its players are outstanding (we run 20 deep), but the pressure AC applies to my title aspirations means little time for experimentation (with young players or tactics).
So, based on my experience, AC will be Pro Vercelli’s zenith. It’s not that they cannot be defeated, but the grind of Serie A football is navigated by none better than AC Milan.
Any controversies? Match-fixing, mafia takeover involvement, etc.?
Brian – have you been smoking cigars during the midnight hours in the lobbies of posh London hotels?
If not, then you are missing out on the best perk of being a manager.
Just out of curiousity, and I am totally serious about this (due to mentioning of perks), but does FM have WAGs?
This Magilone is a nutjob… Who could have thought that Vercelli could finish 3 points away from Europe after 6 seasons. I can’t wait for next season… Im predicting fourth.
Oh and curiously, AC Milan have won 5 straight outta 5 total in my FM09 game as well.
Red Ranter — No match-fixing so far, but based on the name of Pro Vercelli’s new general manager I can’t absolutely swear to the lack of mafia involvement:
Kingsnake — No WAGs. In terms of basic veracity it’s probably the single biggest shortcoming in the game.
Brian, any of your guys getting international call ups?
Also, have you got any offers to manage other clubs, should this guy be completely stupid?
AC Milan has taken the last three Scudetto’s in my game as well. However, in the Champions League final, Legendary Midfielder Steven Gerrard (as he is now referred to in my game) and his merry band of gentleman recently overran them like something out of the first scene of A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, though.
Brian, you’ll be interested to know that Rafa has returned from his sojourn into the world of zen-gardening. He has taken the job managing England. I’m quite interested to see how this plays out, the 2012 Euros quickly approach.
So, when I start a FM game, I should pick AC Milan? Or, does the game require you start at … oh … Aldershot?
You can start with anyone you want, but it will obviously drastically affect the difficulty. I have tried both methods, and will say that Brian’s accomplishment of getting a lower team up using fake players is very difficult. I tried unsuccessfuly (understatement), and like i said in a previous post, nearly destroyed my computer in the process…. Compare these frustrations with my current FM game (Real players Barcelona), where i have started 5 for 5 in La Liga titles, including 3 straight Doubles (w/ Copa) and a last season Treble (w/Champions League).
Of course i am thinking about trying the San Marino challenge… Evidently San Marino Calcio plays in the Serie C2 somewhere, and the goal is to manage both the club to a treble, and the country to the World Cup!?! I was reading some forum where some guy says (inFM07) that he wins the WC with San Marino in 2026, and by 2030ish has won like 17 Serie A titles and several Champions Leagues.
Brian, have you ever heard of this challenge?
I haven’t, but it sounds intriguing. I can see a path to pulling it off, but only by naturalizing most of the players on the club team so that they’d be eligible to play for the country as well.
There’s virtually no way you could win the World Cup on tactics alone with the players available to San Marino, so it would be a matter of luring promising young players from other countries to the club, holding onto them until they gained nationality in the country, and then calling them up for San Marino before they’d been capped for Italy or Argentina. In other words, you’d eventually hope for an almost perfect overlap between your club team and the national team.
So it would be a problem of identifying player potential, building a team from scratch, and (crucially) retaining players. It sounds tough, but not quite impossible. If I’m imagining it in the right way, it’s a really well-designed challenge, actually.
It would be a lot easier using real players, of course.
I wish i had remebered some links to let you look at it..
Some more information that i recall: First, they do use real players. Anyone who could pull that off with fake players could surely challenge as the greatest manager ever, but most likely cheating. Second, the naturalization rules are strange, as i believe San Marino can only sign one non-EU player a year. Addionally, the EU players will not take up San Marinese nationality when they are eligible. So like you say, Brazil, Argies, and from what i saw some Eastern Europeans. But you have to keep them under the radar until they naturalize and cap them asap..
The one guy that actually won the World Cup(!?!) seemed to do it by getting promoted to/being succesful in Serie A, using the money to build youth facilities, and start churning out 15 year old San Marines regens capable of playing in a decade. He didn’t have perfect overlap, as only the best San Marinese nationals would be able to play on the club (now by 2015+ an elite club). But he could youth train en masse, send them all out to the midtable clubs, and then cherry pick those who developed best.
Another hitch would be actually getting the international job, which as i remember doesnt usually happen until the late teens as well.
oh god…there’s a page 2. 95 posts?!?! this could be a long night.