Career Where There's Grot There's Goals - A 1K Challenge

[Peely]

Hello all. After a break of about four years the World Cup got me back to playing FMM and I thought that the perfect way to get back into the swing of things would be a good old-fashioned 1,000 goal challenge. I'm not intending to do anything fancy in this save, other than making a footballer bash a ball into a net until they're too old to control their own bladder, let alone a football.

Rather than lay out all of the info on the challenge up front, I thought I'd see if anyone wanted to guess the player I've chosen. Some clues:

• He's a powerhouse forward (for his age)
• He is signed to a Championship club, but starts the season on loan to a club in his home country
• He's got a fantastic name
• He comes from the land of edam, tulips and clogs.

I've already played a few seasons so will try to get some updates up in the near future but first, any guesses?

Edited July 19, 2018 by Peely

[Nucleus]

Has to be Jay-Roy Grot? 

All the best with this whoever he is! 😁

[ManLikeRobbieBrady]

The man, the myth, the legend; Jay Roy Grot!

Great choice if it is him!

[Peely]

Correct

He's quite a menacing looking chap when he puts on his moody face. He definitely seems a solid choice so far.

[Adoring_Fan]

My favorite cheap striker this year tbh, pretty good all round attacker.

Best of luck, I'm sure he'll smash the 1k in no time.

[lilgwanz]

Good luck with this and welcome back mate

[Ashez]

Peely

[Gvicii]

4 hours ago, Peely said:

Hello all. After a break of about four years the World Cup got me back to playing FMM and I thought that the perfect way to get back into the swing of things would be a good old-fashioned 1,000 goal challenge. I'm not intending to do anything fancy in this save, other than making a footballer bash a ball into a net until they're too old to control their own bladder, let alone a football.

Rather than lay out all of the info on the challenge up front, I thought I'd see if anyone wanted to guess the player I've chosen. Some clues:

• He's a powerhouse forward (for his age)
• He is signed to a Championship club, but starts the season on loan to a club in his home country
• He's got a fantastic name
• He comes from the land of edam, tulips and clogs.

I've already played a few seasons so will try to get some updates up in the near future but first, any guesses?

YES YES YES YES YES!!! Peely your career is what got me into FMH and the FM series! I am sooo hyped

P.S - Origi still has a special spot in my heart still

Edited July 19, 2018 by Gvicii

[Peely]

Thanks very much for the encouragement and kind words. I'm enjoying being back so far. Origi is always going to be my "special one", but maybe Grot can find a place in my heart, too. 😁

Edited July 19, 2018 by Peely

[Taff]

Welcome back @Peely, and what a way to return with a 1K, always a classic, good luck

[Paul186]

good luck with the 1k, looking forward to this career. 😁

[Peely]

Introduction

I was born into one of the most illustrious footballing families in the world. My grandfather started the family obsession with the beautiful game, moving from an entirely forgettable career on the pitch into management. It's fair to say that he was a much better manager than a player and he used to hold me spellbound as a child with tales of his past glories.

My father also started his footballing journey on the pitch, but had a bit more talent than his old man. While never world class, he was a stalwart defensive midfielder and a fixture in the national team, making up for his middling talents with a prodigious work rate and 100% commitment. It was no surprise to anyone when he followed his father into management and it some became apparent that the coaching apple didn't fall far from the tree.

I continued the family tradition, with a bit of help from my father, who brought me through the youth set-up at Sporting. Turned out I was quite a bit better than my forebears when it came to kicking a ball around and I set the ptiches alight, all over Europe at club and international level.

Spoiler

Now that I'm too old to get involved on the pitch, I've turned my attention to management, like my father and grandfather before me. My family name carries a lot of weight in the world of football and nowhere more than the club where my grandfather started his own managerial career, all those years ago.

Spoiler

Now I just have to try to live up to the old man's legend.

The Player

I was pretty pleased with the Ajax team, but I wanted to bring in some new blood and put my own mark on the squad. Having been a striker in my playing days, what I really wanted was a youngster that I could take under my wing and develop into a star. I had my eye on someone already - a powerful, hardworking young striker, who was already making a bit of a name for himself, but needed a bit of guidance to help him achieve his true potential:

What a monster and his name is even more ridiculous than my own.

[Peely]

 

Season 1

 

 

 

Transfer Activity

While the team was pretty decent, I needed to doa bit of restructuring to suit my tactics and get rid of some dead wood.

Spoiler

A few extraneous strikers and a bit of dead wood out, one young protege and some sturdy defensive types in.

 

 

The Season in Review

Spoiler

It wasn't a great start in European competition for me. We got knocked out of the Champions League in the Best Placed Play Off, but I was too traumatised to take a screenshot, it seems.

The Europa League consolation prize got off to a decent start:

But we then got knowched out in the first of the knockout rounds (no screenshot again). A poor start, but hopefully it can only improve.

 

The Dutch Cup

Another disappointment. The Ajax ans must be starting to wonder if I'm really a worthy successor to my old grandaddy.

 

 

The Eredivisie

Hooray. Some success at last.

A pretty dominant performance.

 

 

Summary

 

 

The Grot in Review

Spoiler

A strong start with a goal on his debut.

 

His first hat-trick followed soon after.

 

Game of the season for Grot.

 

Some decent development in his stats.

 

A fantastic performance for his first season. Scoring more than a goal a game is always a good sign.

 

 

 

Team-mate of the Season

Spoiler

Younes is an assist machine.

 

He even beat Grot to the Golden Boot.

 

 

Me in Review

Spoiler

I had to look this one up. An award especially for Belgian football managers.

 

Nice to have it.

The board seem reasonably pleased with me.

 

So a mixed start at club level, but a great showing from Grot. As long as I can keep hold of him, this should be very achievable.

Edited July 19, 2018 by Peely

[lilgwanz]

Cracking season peely, I'm expecting the 100 goals a season soon

[Peely]

Thanks. I Hope so, but the downside of the Dutch league is that you don't get that many games in a season, particularly if I keep dropping out of the cups early

 

[Scratch]

That's a great start! More than 1.5 goals per game. This lad is going somewhere (all the way to 1K or more likely 1.5K). And Younes had an incredible season. I'm struggling to find a player who will provide that many assists without scoring too much...

Anyway, fantastic start and can't wait to see the next installment.

[Paul186]

Great start but how come Grot didn't win the Golden Boot, is it not given to the top scorer in the Dutch League?

[Peely]

It's seems to be a player of the year award rather than top scorer.

Thanks for the comments, everyone. I'll try to get another update posted shortly. 

[Gvicii]

Great season! Looking forward to the next one

[Peely]

Thanks for the support. I've been struggling to find time for an update, but I'll try to get something posted soon.

[Peely]

Season 2

 

 

 

Introduction

I had made a reasonable start to my career with Ajax last season - nobody's going to complain about winning the league - but was a bit disappointed in my cup form. I'm conscious that I'll probably want to move clubs to further my career (and Grot's) at some point in the future and winning the Eredvisie isn't really going to catch the imagination of the boards at major clubs. On a more positive note, my young protege had made a fantastic start to his time at Ajax and I was confident that he would go on to achieve great things, hopefully with me trailing behind him lapping up all the vicarious enjoyment of his achievements.

Transfer Activity

I carried on my overhaul of the Ajax team, bringing in some promising youngsters and ditching a few of the more mediocre members of the squad.

Spoiler

I suspect that Wallace Silva de Sousa may be Kaka reborn, but I haven't looked into it in details. Ondrej Mazuch was the only older player that I brought in, but he's been a great addition to the squad and a bargain at £2.5 million.

I seem to have lost the top of the transfers out. Clearly some reasonably large sales missing from those shown. Is suspect that the majority of the difference is down to Kaspar Dollberg. A great young player, but a bit surplus to requirements while Grot is around.

 

The Season in Review

 

 

The Johan Cruijff Shield

A good performance by the team and, in particular, young Mr Grot got the season off to a winning start.

 

The KNVB Cup

You can generally rely on the KNVB Cup to offer some good scoring opportunities:

 

Unfortunately an embarassing defeat to Feyenoord dumped us out of the competition at the Semi Final stage. Old glass-legs Van Persie showing that he still has it.

 

The Eredivise

 

Another reasonably straightforward season.

 

Europe

Another disappointing season in European comeptition. I got knocked out of the Champions LEague early enough to be put into the Europa League, but I didn't do much better in that competition:

A decent second leg wasn't quite enough to offset the first leg drubbing.

 

 

The Grot in Review

After his fine first season, could Grot grow as a player and achieve even more?

 

His best match of the season. He must have a foot (and head) like a traction engine!

 

Hmm, peaked so soon? Let's see what he looks like.

Good growth in his stats. I'm particularly impressed by the improvement in his shooting ability.

He gets to be the bride, rather than the bridesmaid,this year.

Boom! Lovely stuff.

 

 

Team-mate of the Season

 

It's that man again.

 

Not quite as impressive as last year, but I won't complain.

 

 

Me in Review

 

Another one of these. Thanks, I suppose.

 

Meh!

 

 

Another great season for Grot and good progress towards the challenge. I'm still struggling to make progress in Europe and I'm concerned that Grot will start to attract the attention of larger teams if he carries on like this. I either need to achieve great things at Ajax or move on to a bigger club to keep him happy, but I'm not making much progress on either front at the moment. I've also noticed that very few big jobs have become vacant so far.

Anyway, thanks for reading. Any comments are always very welcome.

 

The Challenge

 

Goals Scored: 138

 

Goals Required: 862

 

Edited July 22, 2018 by Peely

[Peely]

Gah! managed to mess up the spoilers and I can't work out how to un-pick it with this new-fangled system. It wasn't like this back in the old days of 2014, you know. We wrote our updates with quills back then.

[Nucleus]

5 minutes ago, Peely said:

Gah! managed to mess up the spoilers and I can't work out how to un-pick it with this new-fangled system. It wasn't like this back in the old days of 2014, you know. We wrote our updates with quills back then.

Faintly remember! Formatting anything took forever due to all the coding! 

wasn’t this the one for spoilers [\spoiler] 

something like that anyway 😂

[Peely]

That's right. At least I could work out how to un-spoiler something without deleting it, though 😛

[Nucleus]

I wrote that as you used to have to do and hey presto! It still works! 😂 I didn’t write much back then and I think all that coding was the reason why. Thank the lord Putzy upgraded the site to what it is now

[Taff]

Hell that boy looks very impressive and banging in 70 + at 21 is incredible 

will keep an eye out for this kid in the future

[Ashez]

Talk about hitting the ground running! 

[Woody]

Woah....wth!

Had Grot as aback up a few times never thinking he could become as beastly as you have him.

Super goalscoring mate and love the write ups.

Keep em coming and nicely done 😆

[Scratch]

Oh yeah, he is doing great! Scoring goals for fun. He'll go close to 100 in the next few seasons for sure! 

[Peely]

Season 3

 

 

Introduction

My second season had been marginally more succesful than the first, in that I'd secured some additional silverware in the form of the Johan Cruijff Shield, but minor Dutch domestic trophies weren't going to butter any crumpets when it came to building my reputation. I was glad that Grot had continued to devlop and was showing every sign of becoming a star; I was just a little worried that he may out-grow me if I didn't up my game.

Transfer Activity

I continued to stengthen my squad with a mix of experience and youth.

Spoiler

I'm sure Bernat will be familiar to most of you - he's been one of my favourite wingbacks/midfielders for years - but Daniel Amartey is worth a bit of attention, too. A very talented defensive player who can be trained to play in all sorts of positions. Lerma and Ndong were both great successes in the center of midfield and Penalba is a very talented young regen defender.

 

On their way out - a couple of decent Ajax originals, who just weren't as good as the newer players and moany, lazy Alex Song.

 

The Season in Review

Spoiler

The Johan Cruijff Shield

A fantastic vistory with a lot of help from Grot. What a way to start the season.

 

The KNVB Cup

The whole of Dordrecht is covered in a thick layer of goal pie.

 

Eat my scoring, PSV!

 

The shame! The shame!

 

The Eredivise

There were some good games for Grot in the league.

 

And what a performance from Mr "Here, let me help you to that goal" Younes.

 

Never really much in doubt.

 

Europe

Now that's what I call a group of death.

 

Yup. Pretty deadly. Not even Europa League consolation for me.

 

The Grot in Review

Could Mr Grot keep improving after two imense seasons?

Spoiler

Some of the big teams had started to notice my star striker and he wasn't too happy at me turning away their advances,

 

He didn't make a fuss over me turning this offer down, however, so that's mildly encouraging.

 

Some modest improvement over last year (although a slight drop in stamina). It seems most of his development is done, but I can't complain.

 

Kablammo! Another great season from the Grot-meister general.

 

Inevitable.

 

Oh yeah! He's one of the best.

 

 

Team-mate of the Season

Spoiler

Who else.

 

Almost an assist per game and a few goals, too.

 

Me in Review

Spoiler

Predictable.

 

Still only national reputation. I'll need to work on that.

 

 

So another great season for Grot, another mediocre season for me. This is starting to become a bit of habit. I'm a little worried about whether I'll be able to keep hold of Grot if I can't start making more of mark in Europe. As always, encouragement, comments, insults and so forth are always welcome.

 

The Challenge

Goals Scored: 221

Goals Required: 779