Andrew

Rumoured to be heading to Chelsea/Man U/City so don't hold your breath.

If that comes off then Benfica are really getting stripped this summer, already lost two of their best players. Also, us spending that sort of money on a 28 year old is something I thought we'd seen the back of.

Well, the dream is over. I'm being melodramatic, nothing that bad has happened but Berardi has left, deadline day and in come Dortmund to meet his minimum fee release clause, which leaves me scrambling as I'd sold Mitro at his own request and was already signing Batshuayi to replace him. Couldn't find any value at all in the permanent market so went for a loan option which was then rejected at work permit stage leaving me with a less than ideal two strikers for the first part of the season. That Batshuayi and Dolberg are both plenty good enough so I'm not too concerned but fitness/injury will become an issue at some point. I did manage to push through the deadline day signing of Cristian Pavon from Boca though, which I'm delighted about since he's absolutely superb. I missed out on the CL proper after drawing Roma in the final qualifying stage and losing 2-1 on aggregate which is really disappointing but it just means another europa league campaign which is fine at this stage. Lazaar got a massive injury the day before deadline day and will be out for 6-7 months so I was chasing a loan option for the season which worked out pretty well and I replaced Gamez with Darmian, pushing Yedlin back to second choice so overall I am much stronger on paper this season, though it will take time to properly gel. Squad; Main/Rotation Horn/Sels Darmian/Yedlin Mbemba/Diallo Nastasic/Clarke Loan guy whose name I've forgotten/Haidara Ilsanker(C)/Hayden Dahoud/Oliver Xhaka/Diame Pavon/Carillo Gnabry/Lombardi Batshuayi/Dolberg Notable spares; Shelvey, Murgia, Ritchie, Harit. (mostly out on loan now)

True but at least he'll be looking for players for his own system now rather than "This agent I know says this guys shit hot, also he's cheap and I'm being paid to get him this move"

Bloody well finished 4th in my first season back in the PL! Happy with that, after Christmas the sheer number of games resulted in a fair lot of injuries and a fall away from the very top of the league and I settled into a battle for 4th with Arsenal. Made it to the europa league final, which I unfortunately lost to Lazio but I then won the FA cup the following weekend to thats 1 cup, 1 final and 4th place in the league in season two to follow 1 cup and winning the league in season 1. Strong. Player wise Berardi was the star of the attack, finishing as my top scorer and winning the PL young player of the season award, Lazaar won the NUFC player of the season after a great season. Diame was the star of the europa league team, scoring a goal a game in the tournament overall. I kept up rotation between two separate 11s as much as possible for the season, though a bad run of injuries scuppered it for Jan/Feb a bit. I've moved to strengthen central midfield in summer, 3/4 of my defence were in the PL team of the year and my attack was great but the midfield lacks stand out quality. Xhaka was on the transfer list, Dahoud was on a free and Olivér (from athletico) was too so thats that sorted for a combined £20 million. Chiriches is going to Milan for 30 million, he's been replaced by Nastasic for 17 which is both an inprovment on quality and a handy amount to spend elsewhere, next is a right back following Gamez's contract expiry. Oliver will need retraining to play a little deeper as hes currently a natural AMC but I want him at CM, his stats are absolutely astonishing for a CM Advanced Playmaker (support), 18's for all the recommended technical stats, 15 minimum for the mentals, if he retrains position properly he'll be absolutely unreal.

Nice I think this may be the best start to an FM save I've ever had. League and Cup in season 1. Currently in November of season 2, top of the premier league 13 games in, qualified from my europa league group with 2 game to spare. I've essentially got two elevens, one for the league and one for cup/europa game that I rotate since I have midweek fixtures constantly at the moment, which will be handy over the Christmas games too. I forgot a signing I made during summer, Kasper Dolberg who lives in the cup squad at the moment. I feel sort of bad for Mitro, he had such a great season but he's not getting a look in over Dolberg and Berardi as it stands as neither can do any wrong.

Brilliantly, he was completely unsuited to the tactic, complete forward (support) had 1 star for it and was down at the bottom of familiarity and yet he scored 19 in 21 starts(I wasnt using him at first, it was gayle until he got an injury) Not sure on the more detailed stats off the top of my head, I changed up what I usually do so Im actually using wingers rather than inside forwards and a proper CDM.

Back in with a new NUFC save going. Won the league on the last day with 94 points (sound familiar?) in the frst season and...won the League Cup, which was fun! Didn't go mad on signings first time out played this for the first half of the season Sels Yedlin Mbemba Clarke Lazaar CDM Ilsanker (from RBL, handy player) Shelvey Diame Ritchie Atsu/Stoch Mitrovic. Spent some money in January when it was available on Chiriches and a couple of Kids from Lazio Murgia and Lombardi. First season in the PL signed Timo Horn, Diallo from Monaco, winger Carillo and Domenico Berardi (who Im using as a striker, hes ace) top of the league early in the season as it stands, 8 or so games in. Probably the most successful start to a NUFC save I've had on this version so far.

Chronicle - Two new sets of investors have made contact with Ashley following his apparent willingness to sell.

Chronicle saying we've offered Willy Caballero a deal.

Man City have named their price for iheanacho, 25 million. hes played less than 50 league games and has 12 goals. 25 million.

oh youre serious

Ronaldos decision to leave Madrid is "irreversible" apparently. And Conte is potentially facing the sack at Chelsea after having a strop about transfers. The pace of silly season has really picked up since I was lamenting how boring it was.

Optics is a field of physics.

Easier for her staff to control the situation inside a hospital than out and about, definitely a response to the shit she got for not talking to anyone though. The express today going with "is this the EUs fault"(no) and a sun reporter has been caught impersonating a victims relative at a hospital trying to get information.

4th CB we've been linked with since the end of the season. Maguires gone to Leicester, Semedo went to Villareal, Lejeunes gone nowhere yet and now this guy.

Half and half to be honest, I get the point that increasing the salary would attract better people but they're hardly hard up as it stands. To suggest a solution to something like this is that we should pay people who are already fairly well paid (compared to the majority of the population) more money just...sounds shitty.

Yeah, its Rayvin.

so 2 or 3 times the national average plus expenses? Yeah they definitely need a pay rise so they don't have to take these conflict of interest positions.

How much are MPs paid?

by the way @Ant I hadn't seen that team until I posted here last night. That is utterly mental, how much have you spent?

PSG could, they'll want a big star and to regain the league title after Monacos brilliance last season. It looks like they'll lose Veratti to Barca as well so... Could happen.

Ronaldo has (supposedly) told madrid that he wants to leave spain after taking the hump at being accused of tax dodging.

Kane ended on 29 though, whens that from?

He got three against members of the top 6 last season which isn't great, but you could possibly argue that he wasn't supplied, though I don't know if that stands up. He is only 24 as well, so I guess he has a few seasons of improvement before he hits his "peak" .