Arsenal Career - Entry #3

Season 3 (2015-2016)

Opening Thoughts

I've just finished watching Arsenal demolish Aston Villa in the FA Cup. It was some of the best football I've see Arsenal play in a while, and it was certainly a less nerve-racking experience than last year's final against Hull City. It's also interesting to see how the real team looks different than the virtual version under my care. Nacho Monreal had a great game today and a great season overall, but I shipped him off immediately in season one. Santi Cazorla was arguably the best player on the pitch today, but due to the game's player aging mechanics, I opted to sell him sooner rather than later. In hindsight, I wish I had just hung on to him and let him retire with the club. I would have also liked to have done the same with Arteta and Rosicky, especially now that I have a better grasp of how the game's economy works (hint: there's too much money).

I finished season three and began season four around Christmas 2014. I moved onto my Grasshopper career shortly thereafter, but I haven't played much FIFA between then and now. Fortunately, I still have a save file from the end of season three, so I'm going post all the in-game information and offer some commentary at the end.

Results and Final Standings

EPL Table
Arsenal 93  (29-6-3) GF: 65 GA: 13 GD:52
Chelsea 91
Mac City 86
Man Utd 82
Liverpool 73

Community Shield:  Arsenal 2-0 Chelsea

FA Cup Final:  Arsenal 1-0 Manchester City
Semi-final: 2-0 win vs. Chelsea
Quarter-final: 3-2 penalty shootout vs. Swansea
Round of Sixteen: 5-0 win vs. Blackpool

League Cup Final:  Arsenal 2-0 Everton
Semi-final: 4-1 win vs. Huddersfield Town
Quater-final: 4-2 penalty shootout vs. Blackpool
Round of Sixteen: 2-1 win vs Bolton

Copa Europe: Arsenal 2-0 Roma

Champions Cup Final: Arsenal 3-0 Real Madrid
Semi-final: 5-1 Barcalona
Quarter-final: 1-0 Roma
Round of Sixteen: 2-1 Sevilla

Group F
1st - Arsenal w/12 points 5 GD
2nd - CSKA Moskva w/12 pts 2 GD
3rd - Borussia Dortmund 7
4th - Bordeaux 4

Europa League Final: Bayern Munich 2 vs 0 AC Milan

Transfer History

Record Transfer Fee Paid: James Rodriguez - 79.0 M
Record Transfer Fee Received: Michael Bradley - 30.0 M

OUT
Koscielny - PSG 15M (4.5 value) - Over 30 plus PSG made a great offer
Sanogo - Southampton 5M - Not going to make the cut, preferred to trade to EPL team
Podolski - Athletico Bilbao 9.5M (6 value) - Aged out (30, 78 ovr) plus booted in real life
Giroud - Lille OSC 18.1M (7.5 value) - Wanted to upgrade striker (29, 79 ovr) plus good offer
Bradley - Real Madrid 30M - Surprise mega-bid from RM, didn't plan on selling for another year or two (28) but way too much money to pass up
Johannsson - Calcio Catania 5.5M - Never going to make the cut, languishing on bench despite a few strong cup matches, TEAM USA approach abandoned after disappointing second season

IN
Reus - 19M (12.5 value), 180k for 4 yrs; 26, 85 ovr
Rodriguez - 79M (55.5 value), 220k for 4 yrs; 24, 88 ovr
Cavani - 55M (39.5 value); 29, 88 ovr

Season Loans
Bellerin to Milwall - currently 3rd choice RB

Short Loans
Zelalem - MK Dons
Green - Aston Villa

Free Transfer (secured for season four)
Mandzukic - Free (14M value), 160k for 3 yrs; 30, 83
Sneijder - Free (17.5M value), 190k for 3 yrs; 31, 85
Lewandowski - Free (36.5M value), 240k for 3 yrs; 27, 87

End of Season Finances:
134. 6 M
293.5K in wages

Commentary and Analysis

After a sluggish second season, Arsenal started season three strong by winning both the domestic Community Shield and the continental Copa Europe. These wins set a positive tone for the rest of the season, and we finished the campaign by winning every possible trophy in dominant fashion. In terms of our new found success, there were a few key areas of improvement. First, the Hummels-Varane partnership was solidly in place. We were miserly on defense, giving Gibbs and Jenkinson more opportunities to push forward safely. Second, we had plenty of options in midfield, but most importantly, the line was now being led by a world-class striker in Edinson Cavani. I've always scored plenty of goals with Arsenal (usually with wingers), but this was the first time that the majority of my goals came through a single player. Cavani was dominant in the air, strong on the ball, could poach from anywhere inside the box, and could hit the back of the net from several yards out. He was the complete package and a consistent performer during the entire campaign. Long gone were the days of grinding out victories in the final ten minutes. Most of our matches were decided by half-time, allowing me to sub off both Cavani and Mesut Özil, his favorite supplier. As a result, my two best players were fresh for almost every match of the season, which leads me to my third point.

During the previous season, I spent too much time trying to develop squad and utility players. Although fun against lower opposition, it was too risky in the long-run. Another downside to player development is that player growth is often unreliable. I could score a hundred goals with Sanogo, but it might not make a difference. Without consistently improving stats, I was stuck with bench players that couldn't make an impact on tight games or close out 1-0 victories. To solve this problem, I brought in two world-class midfielders: Marco Reus and James Rodriguez. Reus was brought in to secure the left flank, but he didn't get too many minutes because I was really happy with Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Antonie Griezmann (who I must have purchased during season two). Rodriguez, on the other hand, was my go-to sub for tough games. He often replaced Ozil in the middle. The plan is to eventually replace the aging German for the younger Colombian, but this transition is a couple of seasons away at best.

On a final note, although I was sad to see Michael Bradley leave the team, it didn't seem right to me to prevent him from joining Los Blancos. To be honest, however, the 30 million dollar valuation went a long way toward helping ease the pain. Without Bradley, I didn't have much cover for Jack Wilshere and Aaron Ramsay in the holding midfield position, so I relied on John Brooks and Oxlade-Chamberlain for occasional support. After the amazing season Francis Coquelin has had for Arsenal this past year, I imagine I will be picking him up real soon (even though his FIFA 14 stats aren't so great).

As for next season, I will have to invent new ways to keep the game interesting because not only is my current team completely stacked with talent and trophies, but I'm also getting three great players on free transfer for next year: Mario Mandzukic, Wesley Sneijder, and Robert Lewandowski.

Arsenal Career - Entry #2

Season 2 (2014-2015)

With the school year coming to close, I decided to pick up FIFA again. It has become something of a summer ritual at this point. I started playing with my Grasshopper Zurich career, which I must have started some time around Christmas 2014, but as usual, I eventually found myself returning to my Arsenal career. My last save picked up in September or October of my fourth season with the team. I had several new high-quality players, so I decided to check out the blog and see if I had taken any notes. I was pleased to discover that I had published a detailed write-up of my first season, including a brief discussion of how I never finish any of my career modes. What luck!

I also checked my unpublished drafts, and I found a mid-season update on year one, which I've posted at the end of this entry. It offers an interesting glimpse into my thought process and future plans for the team. It's really fascinating to read these old video game entries, so I'm going to keep writing them for future me to enjoy.

As for my second season, I no longer have access to my save file. However, I have been able to piece together a few bits of information:

Record Transfer Fee Paid: Mats Hummels - 40.5 M 
Record Transfer Fee Received: Mathieu Debuchy - 9.0 M

I believe that this was also the season that I purchased Raphael Varane in order to fully revamp my aging back line of Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny. I picked up Debuchy in season one because Arsenal purchased him in real life, but he was a flop for me as well as for the real life Arsenal. I believe that I stuck with Jenkinson (and probably Bellerin) for most of this season. It also wouldn't surprise me if I ended up playing Campbell in the RB spot for a few games.

Final Standings:
EPL: 5th
FA Cup: Winner
Capital One Cup: Winner 
Champions League: Winner 

I lost six matches during the entire campaign, and I had sixteen draws. If I remember correctly, I just didn't have the squad depth to crank out victory after victory during league play. Instead, I focused my efforts on cup competitions, a gamble that obviously paid off. Had I not won the Champions League, I would've spent the next season toiling in the Europa League. Although it would have been a nice change of pace, it's definitely not Arsenal's style to play in the junior tournament. And, of course, this is working under the assumption that the board would not have fired me on the spot for breaking Arsenal's Champions League streak.

During my first season with the team, I sold some quality players, but the problem was that I only brought in youth players and future prospects to replace them. This was part of my TEAM USA project, but despite my noble intentions, I just didn't have enough quality on the field to compete in both the league and in the tournaments. I still had Koscielny at this point, so my defense was solid. Both Brooks and Zimmerman performed admirably, although not always reliably against strong opposition. Without a doubt, defense is a major asset when it comes to progressing through tournaments. You can always grind out a game into extra time or penalties in order to decide a winner, but strong defense with a toothless offense leads to far too many dropped points over the course of a campaign.

Fortunately, I snapped a picture of my Champions League progress with my cell phone. The results were as follows:

Champions League:
Final: Arsenal 0-0 Inter Milan (5-4 pen.)
Semi-finals: Arsenal 2-0 Bayern Munich
Quarter-finals: Arsenal 3 - 2 Real Madrid
Round of 16: Arsenal 3 - 1 Athletic Madrid

A lackluster season in the league combined with a grueling defensive stalemate during the Champions League final convinced me that I needed to bring some big guns to the Emirates in order to compete next season.


And last but not least, here is my original post from about a year ago:

Season 1 (2013-2014)

Winter Transfer Window:

OUT
Nacho Monreal - Norwich - 4.0 M
Ryo Miyaichi - Aston Villa - 1.5 M
Thomas Eisfeld - Charlton Athletic - 375K
Mathieu Flamini - Swap (for Gonzalez)
 
IN
Alexis Sanchez -21.0 M
Javier Pastore - 16.0 M
Joel Campbell - 11.0 M
Omar Gonzalez - Flamini + 2.0 M


I probably should have held on to some of these guys for one more window because I haven't had a chance to fill out my roster with recruits from the youth academy. My roster's a bit thin, which makes it tough when I have back to back to back matches against strong opponents. I tried to sell Nacho last window, but their weren't any takers. I sold him for above value to Norwich. I wasn't super excited about selling Miyaichi because he's always been good to me, but he's too far down the pecking order. Eisfeld was never going to happen, so I let him go. I was running low on funds, so I used Flamini as a counter-weight. Like I said, I wish I had hung on to them a little longer, but I was operating under the philosophy of out with the old and in with the new. Hopefully, these guys will get some decent playing time.

Joel Campbell is already an Arsenal player, but he starts out at Olympiakos in the game. He had a monster World Cup, so I added him to the team. I finally paid the extra million dollars and picked up Pastore. He's an improvement on Podolski, but I still use both players. I tend to pair Pastore with Ox and Podolski with Walcott to even things out. I wanted a stronger CB...