#FM20 Post 2 – Cobh Ramblers – Meet the Squad

Today I’m going to have a look at the players I have at my disposal – initially I was also going to play a friendly (v Dungarvan) plus our my first league game in change versus Cabinteely but this is going to be a long post anyway, so that can wait for next time.

Firstly however I will be updating my squad view that allows me to export all information from the squad screen to an html file, from which I can convert into a text file for loading to my FM Database, allowing me to pull stats out and track things such as attribute changes really easily.

FM20 has a few more useful, usable attributes available to us in the squad screen, the most useful are below:

• Penalties Faced (Seems bugged)
• Penalties Saved
• Agreed Playing Time
• Actual Playing Time

I’d really love an ‘Unused Sub Appearances’ stat at some point please SI – It’s the last bit of budgeting that you can’t do as you just can’t get it from the squad data – you’d need to work it out manually.

I’ll also be looking to build up full xG/xA for the league i’m managing in from Game 1 – FMTahiti has a great series in Northern Ireland currently with Belfast Celtic, and the xA approach to working out whether goalkeepers are efficient or not is very interesting to me.

So, with no further ado, lets meet the lads, listed in current ability order.

Charlie has come back into the fold a few days back and is our start player based on current ability. He’s pretty solid as a quick FB/WB, more a WB for me due to his low tackling plus 15 Acc/12 Pac/16 Nat Fit. Solid Mentals, I’ll be looking for a lot from Charlie. He also starts as Captain.

Ian (think you can tell which one he is in the above picture) has spent a decent amount of his career playing in the Irish Premier, and is our right winger (Him and Fleming making up a very strong right side). Great set-piece technicals (All 13) and solid physicals. With a little bit of Flair added in, I’m looking for him to do damage down the right.

James is our first choice Centre Back, Good heading, marking & tackling plus solid Physicals, hoping he can be part of a solid back 4, from which we can build attacks from.

David is Cobh through & through, and I’m looking to him to be the engine room of the team. Good physicals, fit, great work rate plus good passing and 15(!) long shots – David is my BBM & Vice Captain

Adam is a rotational option in goal, currently slightly better than our other keeper Paul Hunt. Solid with some good mentals.

John is a bit good for a 16 year old!! And a bit beardy 🙂 Very brave, 16 teamwork already, and useful physicals and technicals for his age. He’s our back-up left back, on a wing back setting.

Cian is a useful, quick striker with good physicals and some decent striker technicals. Hoping the 13 Off the Ball also helps those around him.

Kevin is our starting left back, another one of the lads who started at Cork City. Again solid but unremarkable.

Ben is our 2nd centre back. Decent defensive technicals and good mentals, but not the paciest, which we will need to keep an eye on.

Fighting for the starters place with Adam Mylod, Paul is a fair bit taller and has more experience but looks weaker overall. 2 Composure worries me, plus he’s averaging 6.36 from 17 games this season….Will be starting with Adam I think.

Greg will be our 2nd centre mid, most probably as a BWM, solid with good physicals.

Daire will be employed as a pressing forward with Cian in the front 2 – fit, good mentals & a bit of aggression, I’m hoping he can be a bloody nuisance 🙂

Last for now, but by no means least the 3rd of the newgens in our starting squad is our starting left winger. Lyamine is an Irish Algerian from Cobh and is rapid (16 Acc 15 Pac) but needs lots of development everywhere else.

Now, with 3 newgens in the squad already I’ve take a look at our coaching, and its not bad (Average Academy Coaching, Adequate youth recruitment) so hopefully we will get a few more guys come through.

Finances – We have £6k in the bank, a wage budget of £1,880/wk and a committed spending of £1,570/wk. Looking at the squad I reckon we can cut about £200/wk at the end of the season. Scouting/Trialling is commencing for Centre Mids, Strikers & Wingers. Money is going to be a problem, with a maximum attendance so far at 429 @ £9/ticket and only 116 season ticket holders we will be taking c £3k per home game – we’re most probably only going to wipe our face if we get a bit of prize money in, plus I’ve asked for a Senior Affiliate, maybe a team from England…………….

The vision is OK – Don’t finish bottom (no relegation!!) and just stay in the First Division year-on-year. It will be nice to get a coaching badge or 3, but that will be very much based on the finances.

So next time we will look at tactics, a few possible signings, a friendly v Dungarvan, our first league match v Cabinteely & another tune-up friendly as our schedule has lots of gaps in it (Only 9 league games to play in 3 and a half months) – See you then