I’m so glad January is over. What an absolutely abysmal month it was for us. It included a 3-1 league defeat against our rivals and being knocked out of both domestic cup competitions, falling short against Nacional in the Taca de Portugal 6th round (quarter final) and the semi final of the Taca da Liga against Porto.

This post has a tactical tweak, more player signings and our best month of the season so far. What a treat. Read on!  Continue reading →

The season is flying by and I’m loving managing Vitória on FM19 so far…

I’ve reached the January transfer window, plus there’s the small matter of some matches to play as well, including a quarter final and semi final in both domestic cup competitions. Have a read on to see what happened across the month.  Continue reading →

In update one we’d made a poor initial start to the league season but turned it around with four wins and a draw in our five league fixtures since the defeat on matchday one.

That saw us sitting third in the league, behind Porto and Benfica. Could we sustain that level of form? Continue reading →

It’s time to get stuck into some actual match action with Vitória. If you’ve missed any of the posts so far, click here and catch up.  Continue reading →

We’ve ticked the tactic, the squad and staff off the list, now it’s time to go through some of the finer aspects of the club.

In this post I’ll be detailing how our facilities currently stack up, what the financial situation is and outline what the board is expecting us to achieve this season.  Continue reading →

My first day in charge of Vitória is going well so far. I’ve spoken to the squad about the way we’ll be setting up on the pitch this season plus I’ve put together a proposed starting 11 from my evaluation of their skills and qualities.

It’s now time to speak to my backroom staff and determine whether firstly, the current staff will be staying and secondly, whether I need to add a few extra bodies to improve the current quality of coaching, scouting and injury treatment and prevention.  Continue reading →

In the last post I took you through my tactical thinking in preparation for this post, evaluating the squad.

I’m a new manager in a new league. I’m joining Vitória with virtually no prior knowledge or preconceptions about any of the players currently at the club. I tend to not like to make big changes when joining a club. I won’t rip a squad apart and everyone will be given an opportunity to work their way into my thinking. However, I won’t make any promises around any current players being sold or new arrivals coming in. It’s important to judge what you’ve got at your disposal and make changes for the good of the club.

This initial look over the squad is my opinion. I’ll be evaluating the current backroom setup at the club next in order to determine whether any changes need to be made there to help me going forward. But let’s have a look at my players first.  Continue reading →

My time as Vitória manager on Football Manager 2019 has begun. It’s my first day in the job. Before I even click continue I’m going to go through a series of steps to evaluate the essential aspects of the club. This post will go through how I’m aiming to set us up on the pitch and how I arrived at the thinking behind it.

Jumping straight in to talk tactics might be slightly unconventional, but if I’m going to judge the quality of the players already at the club (which will be the next post), I need to know how well they’ll fit in to my preferred system.  Continue reading →

I’m heading to Portugal to join Vitória Sport Clube, or as I’ll be referring to them throughout the save, Vitória.  Continue reading →