Transfers

IN: 7 for 68M (1 young GK, 2 young DC, 1 young Argentinian ST, 1 young German ST, 1 Spanish MR, 1 22 yo English ST for 29M)

OUT: 15 for 25M (notable here was the ML that I bought last season I sold for 20M...he just didn't look like he was going to pan out as I had originally thought)

Summary

Now, given what I had said about my young ST last season, you may be wondering why I spent so much money on a new ST. Well, Turkish ST was 32 entering this season and this was probably going to be his last starting with me. 

My youngsters, while promising, just weren't looking to be good enough. My scouts found the young german kid and argentinian kid and they looked a little more likely to step up in a season or two. Because of this, I did sell off 2 of the three promising others though. This also allowed me to get a partner back up front for Turkish ST.

The season started well, and new English ST was looking to be the dog bollocks at the start. In the first 5 matches he had scored 8 goals!!

 Surely this pace couldn't continue? It didn't. While he was still excellent, he stopped scoring at such a blazing pace, but instead started getting assists...and I mean a LOT of assists. At the end of the season, English ST had 19 goals and 22 assists!!! That is a fantastic season for anyone! 

Turkish ST also had his best season ever with me banging in 27 goals with 8 assists. I felt a bit bad for him because I had pretty much already decided this was his last season starting for me as young argentinian looked good when brought in. At 19 I can't complain about the 8 appearances and 6 goals!

But, the season you ask? Well, our run of unbeaten games came to an end 8 matches into the new season, bringing our run to an end at 55 games. The most notable things about this season is that our defense was almost impenetrable, and our scoring was positively lethal. 

If it was possible, Cameroon MC had an even better season than last banging in 15 goals and 12 assists from a central midfield spot!! He again won LIGA BBVA player of the season....and he really was a bargain when I bought him!!

Final Tally

1st Valencia 32-4-2 95F 9A +86 100 pts

2nd Real Madrid 31-4-3 94F 17A +77 97pts

3rd At Madrid 26-6-6 70F 24A +46 84pts

12th Alicante 11-12-15 55F 56A -1 45pts

Alicante look to have settled down since my departure and were well clear of relegation.

Cups

Spanish cup saw us win it all with a final against At. Madrid...a team that we just own for whatever reason...we haven't lost a match to them in 2 seasons.

Champions league was a little different...we breezed through very tough group of Man Utd, Bayern Munich, and Austria Wien. We then played Inter in the first knockout round and won 3-0 on aggregate...onto a 5-0 thrashing of Juventus in the quarter and then a 1-0 win over Roma in the Semi....onto the final against our old group mates of Man Utd....a poor match that was 0-0 at the half and 0-2 with us losing at full time....no treble for us!!!

Highlights 100 points!!!

Lowlights Not getting the treble!!!

WARNING...this is not a good read!!!  

Our group saw us placed in what appeared to be a shockingly easy group....England, Morocco, Israel, and Mexico....before I share some of the results, let me post the final group table first...

Group F

1st Mexico 2-0-1 5F 4A +1 6pts

2nd Morocco 2-0-1 6F 6A 0 6pts

3rd Israel 1-0-2 5F 3A +2 3pts

4th England 1-0-2 1F 4A -3 3pts

As you can see, it wasn't a good world cup. Things started good, but ominously when we beat Israel 1-0 in our first match. I, and everyone else, thought this should have been by a greater margin. Sadly, this was the only goal we would score. 

We then lost 0-1 to Mexico...not a terrible result and we still had a chance to move on...but, we were embarrassed by Morocco...we lost 0-3!!!! 

Needless to say I was almost immediately sacked as England manager.

To be fair to Morocco, they did beat Italy 1-0 in the second round before losing to Spain on penalties in the quarters. Other notable teams....DR Congo beat Scotland in the Second round on penalties before losing to Germany in the quarters....Egypt also made the second round where they BEAT brazil 2-0!!! They then lost 2-0 to Mexico.

The final saw an all Spanish speaking affair of Mexico v Spain, with Spain winning 2-0.