Career Foxy Goes Back to His Germanic Roots - Season 4

[FuddledFox]

Back at Christmas Mrs F and myself did a DNA ancestry test to see where our ancestors came from. One of the things this test revealed was that I am approximately 18% Germanic so what better way to celebrate my Germanic roots is with a tour around the “Low Countries” and Germany beating the top scorer records in those leagues.

The challenge I will be doing was posted by @BatiGoal way back in 2017.

The challenge goes like this.

• Break the record in Belgium, Holland and Germany for most goals in a season.
• Start with no reputation so that needs to be built up in order to move clubs.
• The challenge score is my best total from each nation so I can try and beat my own record each season I am in that league but I cannot go back to a league once I have moved on.

These are the records I need to beat and it’s goals in all competitions that count.

• 🇧🇪 - 41 goals
• 🇳🇱 - 55 goals
• 🇩🇪 - 67 goals

I have to start in Belgium as I have to complete the leagues in the order posted above. I don’t have a huge knowledge of Belgian domestic football apart from a few club names so my club choice was based solely on them having a player I wanted to use in season 1 and then someone to develop to use in season 2 and beyond if needed.

My club choice is Club Brugge.

 

I am using the March update database and Brugge have Bas Dost in the squad so he is the reason I chose to go with them at the start of this challenge.

 

My local reputation wasn’t exactly convincing Bas that I was the right man for the job though so I’m going to have to give the big man a bit of a cuddle and a pep talk to see if I can get him firing on all cylinders for 1 season of goalscoring.

 

 

As well as needing to convince the players that I am the right man for the job I also need to wheel and deal if I want to improve the squad as the financial situation isn’t great with the club over its wage budget and just £2.2m to spend on players.

 

The wage budget is easy to sort as they had a couple of players on loan who were costing a lot in wages but didn’t look worth the money we were giving them so they went straight out the door.

It was then a case of selling a few players to make some money.

Two transfers to ignore are Vlietinck as that transfer never happened because I didn’t agree the deal so I don’t know why it’s listed. The deal taking Kossounou to Leicester came in January and I didn’t spend any of that money as I decided to save it for the following summer window and I wasn’t too worried about losing him in January as he looks good but I had other options at CB.

Spoiler

 

The three sales I did make in the first window raised around about £10m of which I spent just over £7m on players with the main emphasis on trying to get some creative players into the squad to create chances for Big Bas and then a few players to other positions to make sure I have plenty of options.

You can see all my signings under this spoiler.

Spoiler

 

I have to start with a normal reputation as no unlockables are allowed in this challenge unless earn’t in the save and a big part of this challenge is to build my reputation up enough to get a job at a good club in Holland once I have broken the goal scoring record in Belgium.

You can see my rep is local but at least the squad respects me after just the three games.

 

I will be back in a couple of days with the outcome of season 1 and with some luck Bas will have beaten the record in Belgium and then I can concentrate on bettering his record and building my rep to get a move.

Thanks for reading.

[Woody]

New name soon then "GermanicFox"??

Love this challenge and a great starting player choice. Best of luck my friend 👍

[FuddledFox]

12 minutes ago, Woody said:

New name soon then "GermanicFox"??

It would have to be “GermanicFuchs” I think.

[broodje kip]

Good luck GermanicFuchs

[hhooo]

Wait wait wait what's the other 82%?

What are you hiding?

[FuddledFox]

10 minutes ago, hhooo said:

Wait wait wait what's the other 82%?

What are you hiding?

I’m hiding all kinds of terrible secrets.

[DLC]

Good Luck FuddledFuchs! I'm looking forward to this one. 👍

[Rich]

Best of luck Fucher 😁

[Albionic]

Good luck mate, another interesting career to follow!

[FuddledFox]

7 hours ago, broodje kip said:

Good luck GermanicFuchs

 

5 hours ago, DLC said:

Good Luck FuddledFuchs! I'm looking forward to this one. 👍

 

3 hours ago, Rich said:

Best of luck Fucher 😁

 

41 minutes ago, Albionic said:

Good luck mate, another interesting career to follow!

Cheers lads 😀

[geordiekrispy]

Nice challenge. Look forward to seeing how you do in the confusing as hell Belgian league!

On a side note, I'm trying to get my UK goal challenge career started.

[Scratch]

Always meant to give Belgium a go sometime - so will be watching interestedly. Your signings look pretty good for what I imagine is the average for the league, so I'm thinking you will make short work of this. Good luck Fuchsy! 

[SK15Kev]

Enjoyed the intro - good luck

[FuddledFox]

4 hours ago, geordiekrispy said:

On a side note, I'm trying to get my UK goal challenge career started.

I look forward to seeing how you do on that one if you can get it started. I did consider that challenge as well and I might eventually try and complete all three of Bati’s challenges like this but the UK one is league goals only and I’m less keen on challenges where cup games don’t count towards goals.

3 hours ago, Scratch said:

Always meant to give Belgium a go sometime - so will be watching interestedly. Your signings look pretty good for what I imagine is the average for the league, so I'm thinking you will make short work of this. Good luck Fuchsy! 

They should all do ok and create some chances for Bas but I don’t think it will be crazy numbers of goals in season 1.

1 hour ago, SK15Kev said:

Enjoyed the intro - good luck

Thanks mate.

[geordiekrispy]

13 minutes ago, FuddledFox said:

I look forward to seeing how you do on that one if you can get it started. I did consider that challenge as well and I might eventually try and complete all three of Bati’s challenges like this but the UK one is league goals only and I’m less keen on challenges where cup games don’t count towards goals.

Yeah I was looking at my version of Bati's UK goals challenge and trying to remember why I made it league goals only. I think because they were only league goals, not cups etc.

If you add in cups it gets a bit harder as Fred Roberts scored 96 goals in all competitions in Northern Ireland in one season.

[FuddledFox]

33 minutes ago, geordiekrispy said:

you add in cups it gets a bit harder as Fred Roberts scored 96 goals in all competitions in Northern Ireland in one season.

If you can get a squad that can take you deep in Europe then you do get about 75 games a season in Northern Ireland so it’s not an impossible total.

[Rob]

Love this Mr Fox!

[FuddledFox]

 

Season 1 - Club Brugge with Bas Dost 🇧🇪

Firstly thanks for the comment @Rob

This first season was all about a one season love affair with Big Bas as he aims to hit 42+ goals in all competitions. If he can do that then I can effectively tick off Belgium from the challenge and then it will be a case of trying to better Bas goal record whilst building my reputation so I can move to a good club in the Netherlands.

I showed my season 1 transfers in the intro so if you missed that take a look.

Dost the Destroyer looks pretty decent at the start of the season despite lacking some pace. He is still very effective as a target man so if he can get the service he certainly looks capable of hitting the target set.

In the Champions League we drew a tough group and my aim was simply to finish above Marseille and get 3rd place behind Sevilla and Inter but as it turned out we put in a good showing to finish second behind Sevilla.

The highlight of the group stage was smashing Inter 3-0 and it could have been better if Bas had scored his penalty as well.

 

I would have preferred to go into the Europa League because I would have fancied us to have a decent run in the knock outs of that competition but some extra Champions League games won’t hurt the reputation either.

We drew Man City in the 1st KO round and that was where the adventure ended with two 1-0 defeats.

 

At the middle point of the season it was looking good for Bas(her) as he was trundling along at a goal a game. It’s certainly not a mind blowing return from the Big Man but if he stays fit and keeps at this rate he should get 42gls or more which is fine by me for season 1.

 

He added another goal in the Belgian Cup final as the boys lifted there first 🏆 under my guidance.

 

Whats quite handy in Belgium is the 6 extra games you get in the league if you secure a top 4 place as it qualifies you for the Championship Group. Your points get halved when the group starts so my actual final league points was 94 as we won the title.

 

 

By the end of the season Dangerous Dost was starting to show some signs of wear and tear and his attributes were on the slide. This was always a one season deal with the guy though and he had one chance to set a new record.

 

I certainly can’t fault the bloke as he hit 50gls in 48 games to break the record by 9 and set a new target for my next guy to beat in season 2.

 

My top assister was Noa Lang who was already at the club on loan from Ajax and will be signing for the club this summer. He proved that pace isn’t everything for a winger with 22 assists over the season despite a paltry 13 pace rating.

 

 

Here’s the full goal and asssists stats of my team for those that like that kind of thing.

Spoiler

To celebrate each time I set a new record during this save I will post an absolute Choon in the post for no reason other than I want to so please enjoy some AC⚡️DC.

 

 

 

 

This means that Belgium is technically completed but I can now look to improve my score by beating the record I just set. I also need to build my reputation so that I can get a good job when it comes up in Holland.

My rep has grown a bit and now is Regional instead of Local but it’s still not good enough to get the Ajax, PSV or Feyenoord jobs at this stage.

 

The reason I choose Bas this season was because he is obviously good for the Belgian league but I also wanted him to mentor the player I will be looking to beat his record with in season 2 and potentially beyond.

I doubt Badji will take much introduction being a wonderkid this year but he has developed well and has pace which Dost didn’t. I don’t like his lack of stamina because Bas suffered because of that but at Badji can hopefully improve that over time.

 
 

Thanks for reading.

[Albionic]

Great first season mate, breaking the record already! Although it may not last long, looking at how Badji is developing 🤔

[FuddledFox]

9 hours ago, Albionic said:

Great first season mate, breaking the record already! Although it may not last long, looking at how Badji is developing 🤔

Cheers mate, I agree Badji definitely looks capable of adding a lot more goals onto the record.

[FuddledFox]

Season 2 - Club Brugge with Youssouph Badji

Season 1 was pretty successful as Bas Dost hit 50 goals which broke the record but he had a second job as well and that was to help develop Badji in the hope that he can improve on the record this season and possibly next depending on if I can get a move to Holland or not.

Badji is looking decent now and I will be disappointed if he can’t smash in a good number of goals and improve the record by a good amount.

 

My main focus with the transfers was to bring in more creative players especially on the wings. Noa Lang was my top assister last season and he already had a transfer arranged so he joined and Robin Quaison and Danjuma were my other big signings that would hopefully make us a more free scoring side with Badji getting the bulk of the goals.

All the signings are under the spoiler.

Spoiler

 

I kept hold of all my best players so everyone that left was simply to raise more funds from players I didn’t need.

 

Last season I made it through my Champions League group knocking Inter out in the process but we couldn’t repeat the feat this time. We gained creditable draws with Lazio and PSG abut we also lost to them and couldn’t beat Young Boys twice which meant it was a third place finish.

This might not be a negative as the Europa League is much more our level at the moment so hopefully we can have a good run in that competition.

 

The Belgian Cup wasn’t a success either as our defence of the competition ended in a penalty shootout in the 7th round which we lost.

 

The Europa League campaign was much more successful though.

The first test came in the 2nd knockout round after we had despatched Lokomotiv Moscow in R1. We took on Roma and over two close games we came out 3-1 winners on aggregate.

Just the 1 goal for Badji over the two games though. 

 

That set up a Quarter Final with Krasnodar which we progressed on penalties after a 3-3 draw over the two legs.

This set up a Semi Final with Arsenal for a place in my first European final of the career.

The first leg was at home and we gained a draw with no away goals which was a positive. Arsenal certainly created the better chances though so I was happy to still be in the tie.

 

Again Arsenal were the better side but we were far more clinical with 2 goals scored from our only 2 shots on target. The clean sheet in the first leg came in handy as well as we booked our place in the final on away goals.

We would take on Napoli in the final and after these good results I had already cleared a space on the mantle piece for the trophy.

Spoiler

It wasn’t to be though as a close match went to penalties and this time we weren’t successful. The run to the final should have been a good boost to my reputation though.

 

The league campaign was pretty successful but I’m disappointed with how many points we dropped considering how prolific we were in front of goal and we were pretty tight at the back as well. A lot of those dropped point came towards the end of the season though as focus was on Europe more and we drew 4 and lost 1 of our final 7 league games.

It was enough to win the league though and in total we had 95pts in a normal league structure.
 

 

That just brings us to Badji and he had some fine moments during the season especially in the league and he got 9 goals out of just two games during the season.

 

That said though he was inconsistent at times and his average stamina was a factor as he got tired and lost form towards the end of the season. He is only 19/20 though so he’s very young and he should do better next season.

He finished the season with 54 goals so he improved on Dost’s record by 4gls which is ok but I had hoped for more. The lack of cup games hurt him and he really struggled in Europe as well only scoring 5 in 10 matches.

The league was were he made hay though scoring at 1.36 GpG and scoring 45 goals in 33 games. What I probably should have done is played him much more in the league and rested him in Europe in order to keep him fit and hopefully score more league goals but you live and learn.

This adds another 4 goals onto my career total though which is ok.

He had a small growth in attributes over the season and I’m certain with some better planning he can do much better next season.

 

That said he might not get the chance if I can get a job in Holland because I need to start to thinking about moving on to keep this challenge going. I can’t use regens in this challenge to set records so I can’t hang around for ever in Belgium because I need to complete Holland and then get a good job in Germany were the record to beat is 67gls. If I stay too long in the Low Countries I might miss out on some peak players to smash the German record.

My reputation took a good boost this season thanks to the Europa campaign even if it ended ultimately in defeat. I am now well known on the continent and that has to put me in with a shout of the Ajax, PSV or Feyenoord jobs if and when they come up.

 

At the end of the season there is no new jobs on the horizon so I will keep focusing on Brugge and improving the Belgian record until something comes up that I fancy.

 

Thanks for reading

 

[geordiekrispy]

Wow, great results in terms of goals, if not trophies.

I was thinking about further down the line and making sure the players are real, Wikipedia references may become a requirement when posting about who's getting a goal

[Rich]

Well done Fucher that’s a great season right there, I’ve used Badgi in my TT and his stats are awesome so I’m sure he will get an increase for you. Hopefully a job in Holland comes soon enough as well 🤞🏻

[Woody]

I know your down beat on Badji only getting 54 but like you said any improvement is good.

The squad is looking good and the Europa League run to the final proves that(aswell as your excellent tactical knowledge of course).

Nice job mate 👍

[Albionic]

Another great season mate, 54 for Badji at his age is very good! A great run to the final of the Europa league especially with a Brugge team in the second season, fingers crossed a job you want comes up soon 🤞

[FuddledFox]

12 hours ago, geordiekrispy said:

Wow, great results in terms of goals, if not trophies.

I was thinking about further down the line and making sure the players are real, Wikipedia references may become a requirement when posting about who's getting a goal

Thanks Krispy, I agree and I definitely think I will be checking players are real in the next few seasons once the good regens start appearing.

12 hours ago, Rich said:

Well done Fucher that’s a great season right there, I’ve used Badgi in my TT and his stats are awesome so I’m sure he will get an increase for you. Hopefully a job in Holland comes soon enough as well 🤞🏻

Cheers Richard.

11 hours ago, Woody said:

I know your down beat on Badji only getting 54 but like you said any improvement is good.

The squad is looking good and the Europa League run to the final proves that(aswell as your excellent tactical knowledge of course).

Nice job mate 👍

Those Arsenal games were definitely more luck than judgement or tactical knowledge by me I think but I will take that.

10 hours ago, Albionic said:

Another great season mate, 54 for Badji at his age is very good! A great run to the final of the Europa league especially with a Brugge team in the second season, fingers crossed a job you want comes up soon 🤞

Thanks Albion, it was a good return from him and it’s getting to the stage were it will be a shame to leave Brugge because the squad is coming together now and I will end up going just as they are really good I think.

[FuddledFox]

Season 3

Season 3 is a strange one because lots happened and yet nothing happened because I didn’t break any records.

The summer brought an offer for Badji from Sevilla of £75m and I decided that even though he could better last season that was a lot of money for a club that had just given me £9m to spend on players.

I took the deal and he was off to Spain to carry on his career.

That money helped me keep hold of the rest of my good players but also improve the squad by spending £78m on players.

 

All my signing are under the spoiler.

Spoiler

 

That meant I needed a new striker to set a record and I went to America to buy a German. I haven’t used Burkardt before and hadn’t even heard of him but he looks good already and hopefully he can develop a bit more over the season as well.

 

He settled in well and after 10 games he had scored 12gls. He had started quicker than that with 8 in 5 but he then had a dip of form after that. Even so it’s a good start from him.

 

Then this happened.

 

This was weird because really it’s a no brainier of a decision as it’s a move to the country I need to go to next and to the leagues biggest club as well. I actually saved up at this point because I wasn’t sure what to do.

• Stay at Brugge - This was tempting because I had just spent all that money on the team and I was really liking Burkardt. I have also managed Ajax this year and I was tempted to wait for PSV or Feyenoord to come up for some variety.
• Go ti Ajax - It’s the biggest club in the league, they give me the perfect platform to beat the Eredivsie record and perform in Europe to get a move to a huge German team.

I took some time to make the decision but in the end my head ruled my heart and I signed for Ajax in mid September.

 

The squad at Ajax wasn’t too much different to what they start with so you will be familiar with most of these names I’m sure.

 

It wasn’t impossible that I could get the record this season but my main aim was to simply win as much as I could and decide which players would stay or go for next season.

Haller would have been my choice to get the goals for the record but he was out injured for a few weeks so I gave this fella a go.

 

He had only played once so far and hadn’t scored so all his goals for me would count for the record if he got there.

This is the season of the winter World Cup so the season had a break in November up to January. He was going ok for me having scored 13gls in 12 games but the squad isn’t exactly how I would want with lots of good players but lacking in the exact type of players I want which is out and out wingers.

 

I used the break to start building the team how I want it and sold a few players.

Only Tagliafico was sold before I joined.

 

All these signing were done by me in January but I still need to do more this summer to get the squad into shape.

Spoiler

 

I was looking at strikers and a name appeared on the transfer list that I recognised which was Nany Dimata from Anderlect and as I had some money left I went for him.

He joined at an absolute bargain price of £3.6m and he will be my challenger for season 4.

 

My aim for the rest of the season was simply to get the team working for him and it seemed to work as he had a great time scoring 28gls in 22 games. I am sure he can break the record in the next season or two if I can improve the squad more.

 

Also a bit of FoxLove has meant he is improving as well.

On the pitch we won the Dutch Double.

 

In Europe Ajax were already in the Europa League and we progressed as far as the 2nd knockout round but with just 1 legged ties this season we unfortunately went out to Zenit 2-1.

 

So in the end this season was a bit of a write off but in challenge terms progress has been made because I’m into country two and I have a player ready to (hopefully) smash the record. I now just need to build him a squad that will give mim the best chance to do just that.

 

Thanks for reading.

[Rich]

Enjoyed the journey of that season Fucher! I can see why it would have been tough to leave after getting £75m for Badgi but that’s a great move, Ajax always fun to manage, good start there, I had Dimata on a save last year and he’s great, good luck next season 👍

[Rob]

Lovely career, as always, Mr Fox

[Albionic]

Good work on getting the Ajax job, the correct move in my opinion, as who knows when another one would come up. Dimata looks like a real gem, sure he will smash the record next year!