Reading FM09 Guide

If you're playing Football Manager 2009 already, you're probably testing your Premier League team. As big as a Chelsea supporter I am, I don't play my team, I prefer teams with more target. The Coca Cola Championship precisely. This time my pick is Reading while in 08 my team was West Bromwich Albion (WBA) which is already back in the big show this season.

Starting benefits:
1. 5m transfer budget which is sufficient to revamp the whole team if you get the right player
2. Strongest pair of central defense in the championship - Andre Bikey & Khalifa Cisse
3. Good overall cover for 2nd string players
4. Superb captain in James Harper, on the central midfield
5. Reliable keeper in Marcus Hahnemann (if you don't wanna get any keeper)
6. You've got very-wanted players
7. Consistent strikers in Shane Long and Kevin Doyle


Selling:
Not many will sell because of their big player / major name mentality from playing in the premier league for too long. Players that you can sell to boost your transfer powah:

1. Leroy Lita for 1m
2. Gylfi Sigurdsson for 400k
3. Adam Federici for 800k
4. Sam Sodje for 300k
5. Bobby Convey for 2.2m
6. Michael Duberry for 500k
7. Ivar Ingimarsson for 1m
8. Liam Rosenior for 1.5m

Total income will be 7.7m although some will be pending on monthly installment. Of course you can sell for more especially Rosenior and Convey, I was more eager to push them out the door. Plus that with your 5m, now you have 12.7m to spend to revamp the whole team. Besides, you need to balance the wage budget for your new army.


Buying:
Don't go buying English players, cos you can't afford the good ones, and the ones you can afford are crap. Reading like any other team have 2 problems; right wing and right back. Opt for smaller nation's players although sometimes you can find a freak in Serie C2 of Italian league as well. Now you need 2 central defenders to cover if you set the DCs' tackles to "hard". Bikey and Cisse is very yellow-card prone and ban-prone. For central defenders I opt for:

Center Back
1. Hamed Diomande. Ivorian 20 years old for 350k, no work permit problem
2. Alexander Rajcevic. Slovenian 21 years old for 325k

For my left and problematic right back, I opt for good physical stats especially pace and acceleration. I brought in 4, with another on January window.

Full Backs
1. Peter Masilela. 23, South African for 525k. You're missing out big time if you play the Championship without him.
2. Vasco Regini. 18, Italian from Serie B for 400k.
3. Janvier Besala. 19, from Congo for 850k
4. Tumelo Nhlapo. 20, South African for 160k
5. Jair Iglesias, 27 Peruvian for free

Solved the defense problem, now move on to midfield. Most of the kids don't cut it, so cut them off. After hunting and testing, I stick to:

Central Midfielders
1. Mascio, 17 y/o Italian from Italian Serie C2. This kid is going to be a monster in 2 years, unbelievable stats. You can snitch him for about 100k or less.
2. James McCarthy, 17 y/o from Ireland for 1.6m. Tad expensive but worth it. Consider him a replacement for James Harper when you ship Harper out in January for 4m+.
3. Tinashe Nengomashe, 26 defensive midfielder from Zimbabwe for 550k. Awesome defensive, mental, and physical stats

I'll probably need another one or two but I'll wait till January window opens before hunting in lower leagues again. Now wings, I opt for medium speed and high technicals.

Wingers
1. Nicola Madonna, 21 y/o Italian for 600k from Serie B. Free kick specialist when Mascio is not playing.
2. Anderson Cueto, 18 y/o Peruvian for 250k on the left wing.
3. Jakub Mares, 21 y/o Czech for 650k as cover

Keep Stephen Hunt for now until January window, then ship him out and get a new left winger. Ahmed Samir Farag from Egpyt or Banahene from Ghana can be a good player in Championship. Now my favorite part, strikers. 3 new buys are all unknowns, but very effective so far irregardless what pair I play them in.

Strikers
1. Javier Acuna, 20 y/o from Paraguay for 950k. Expensive but worth it due to his silky runs and great physical stats.
2. Opoku Agyemang, 19 y/o from Ghana for 350k. His stats are deceiving. This is the all new Ruud Van Nistelrooy + Nicholas Anelka for the Coca Cola Championship. Very good timed runs for diving headers and poacher.
3. Denis Maccan, 24 y/o Italian from Serie B for 500k. Good technical and mental stats but consider a slow type of striker. Very deadly if someone like Doyle or Acuna can open up space for him.


Come January window, sell Harper for 4m plus, the 2 Hunts for a couple of millions, and some other fringe players to "fix" your financial status. That's all. More goodies soon.

Jose Jose~

Last night finally the team reminds me of the trophy winning Chelsea gain. Deprived of some almost 4 key players, my team tapau-ed Aston Villa that's having a very good season so far until last nite. Joe Cole & Anelka scored. The still-standing Stamford Bridge unbeaten record reminds me of Jose Mourinho out of nowhere. He reminds me of "LOL". Because of these, a little rewind:

Pick Shevchenko

and this one...

Jose & His Amazing Technicolor Overcoat

and finally...

I Sign A Little Player or Two

LOL. Jose is The Funneh One on youtube.

As LOL as LOLnaldo

Cheesus Kryst. Its been a long long time since I've read something so sarcastically written, sarcastic till its so damn funny. Usually when you go to football news site what do you expect? Yada yada yada "a glorious cross from X met by a thumping header by Y" or "A keeps his faith in B and hopes that bitch bitch bitch bitch bitch". This is different. I'll quote the funny part just to keep it short.

Quoted from: Soccernet
Title: "Fifth official: The last look at the weekend"
Writer: The Fifth Official
Synopsis: Talking about what happened in England (BPL) over the weekend


Nicolas Anelka's expression after missing from 4 yards
"I bet you could sit him down, tell him he's won £250m on the lottery, been asked out for half a shandy by Scarlett Johansson or that his house had exploded and that sulking-mug wouldn't even offer up a flicker."

Robinho's performance, Man City 6-0 Portsmouth
"and presumably laughed until he fell over when he found out David James is currently England's number one keeper."

Mike Ashley avoiding the fans, NUFC's managerless team
"Newcastle United's team coach must have a half decent sat-nav system installed because with their management's woeful lack of direction at the minute they'd probably have ended up in Tajikistan had they organised it themselves."

Gianfranco Zola, against Newcastle
"his first game in charge of the 'Appy Ammers was against a rudderless, managerless and clueless club who are the Olympic gold medallists at implosion."

Theo Walcott's hype after hattrick against Croatia
"19-year-old was thrust into the limelight like a pushy mother forcing her goofy daughter to murder another Britney Spears song in front of a sneering reality show panel."

"articles about how good he was at school, his preferred breakfast or what his other half's favourite soap is."



"wait until he shanks a pen in the quarter-finals of the World Cup then dismantle the kid like he was a sideboard from Ikea. Then it'll be wasted talent this, WAG-obsessed that and before you know it he'll be drinking white spirit and begging outside White Hart Lane*."

Wigan's chairman praising Amir Zaki & Steve Bruce
"Now that is delusion of the highest order. Why doesn't he just go the whole hog and claim Titus Bramble has fulfilled his tag as the most promising defender of his generation?"

Tottenham Hotspurs' recent performance
"Mind you, even Calamity Bramble himself managed to shut out the Spurs and their £30m-worth of attacking talent. Now that is funny."

I lol-ed harder when I read this than how I lol-ed when I watch the replay of Lolnaldo diving and got yellowed.

LOL. I finally got off my lazy fingers and edited...

LOLnaldo. Lol.

Good, Not So Good, Bad

GOOD: CHELSEA FC

Everyone's blogging about the Olympics. HELLO, Premier League has started! Chelsea's opening match saw Big Phil taking charge of his first match in Samba style. Pure attacking game with the midfielders free to roam and run wild on Pompey. Doesn't even look like FA Cup winners to me, especially when you're trounced 4-0 at Stamford Bridge and Michael Ballack didn't even need to score (but he did a majestic defence-splitting pass that sets up the first goal by Joe Cole).

Utilizing the full backs to their full attacking ability, Ashley Cole picks up his game and Jose Bosingwa probably outran the whole team last night. After J.Cole, comes Nicolas Anelka with a defender-beating jump to head the ball into the back of the net (from Bosingwa's cross). I've always like Anelka, he was mostly no-show last season due to stupid Bulldog Grant playing him on the wings. Its one of those things that kills good striker's chance of scoring just like what happened to Djibril Cisse in Liverpool. And I've always thought Anelka isn't a huge guy till Chelsea was in Malaysia during my birthday.

Calamity James' accidental teleportation

Summing up the first half, ball handled in box, Frank Lampard celebrated his new 5-year contract (YAY!) with a penalty. Second half was slow, with Pompey picking up speed, too bad Terry & Co. is just tad too tough for their forwards. Last dying minutes, another new signing bites. The smallest after Shaun Wright Philips, Deco (or underwear in hokkien) blasted a 30-yard screamer that was flicked by David James into the upper right corner. I was guessing Deco aimed for the left corner but somehow the ball bent to the center and starts turning to the right. 4-0 we're on top of the table!

And somehow Manchester United drew 1-1 with Newcastle.

*cough cough @ Mike & Nessa*

NOT SO GOOD: LEE CHONG WEI

Chelsea is more important than this. After the first game, bah. Not bothered to watch anymore cos obviously Lin Dan don't even have to break out any drop of sweat. Silver and gold, very big difference. But obviously we have to settle for the latter right now. And Lin Dan pawned Chong Wei in less than 1 hour for both matches, starting the 2nd match with a 6-0 lead. No.1 vs No.2? It looks more like No.1 vs No.22 to me for that type of time for 2 matches.

Who knows what Chong Wei had been doing back there before the match? You know I know lah what China have the most in Malaysia. I wonder if he got blackmailed by triads over there with their bling bling porcelain guns before the match?

"Hey meng, yew got wang or two pling pling for pew pew?"

Basically watching the first match and then the scoreline really makes me go like this. Luckily Chelsea made my day last night.

Arghhhhhhhhhhhh LIM PEH VERY PEK CHEK AHHHHHHHH!

Well, irregardless of the medal Lee Chong Wei got, he's still one of our top athletes and hats off to him for reaching that far in the Olympics. C'mon we all know its not easy to even get to the quarter finals. Sometimes we are not very patriotic over some national stuffs, but when it comes to sports and your nation's player is up for the gold, you'd still be proud to be Malaysian and cheer for your player hoping he/she will bring glory to the nation. Thank you for bagging one medal for us, Mr. Lee. 100% certified Malaysian hero for your effort at tiong kok.



BAD: TOTTENHAM HOTSPURS

Total opposite of Holland, laughing stock of London. Holland are so well known as the choker of tourneys, playing extremely well attacking football and godzillous goal tallies, and then KO-ed after the group stage. Spurs is the other way around, only picking up steam when its usually too late into the season. No where near the top 4 for them this season again. Martin Jol's last campaign was disastrous. In came Juande Ramos and saved them some face on the table standing.

Its Jol all over again now, with Dimitar Berbatov on the bench. Wait, BENCHED? YOU BENCHED THE COUNT? After Robbie Keane left that's the last thing you'll think a man like Ramos would do. No, he had to start with Darren Bent, obviously an overpriced striker with no knees. And they just have to let Boro run over them 2-1. Even Mido can score... MIDO! Pfft. Well-deserved defeat. I like strikers like Berbatov. Relaxed, doing every movement the simple way, and when he strike he scores with ease. Maybe he deserve a better team like MU instead of Spurs.

Get your Tottenha-lmao Mid-season-spurs today!

What about a new jersey to commemorate Spurs' failure to start a season brightly?

Chelsea 2 - 0 Malaysia XI

Really nice match for my birthday. Didn't take pictures cos Jo got an SLR so ask him to kao tim for me compared to my little Canon A430 that's used for case mod pix only. Reason: I don't take pix all the time cos I don't need buku 555 to remember vivid memories in my head forever.

We all thought MY XI gonna roll over n die like they usually do but came out fighting. Even the defenders amaze me. We had lots of chances in first half but meh... bad passes, aeroplanes. Got freaked out on 2nd minute when one of MY XI player went 1 on 1 with Petr Cech but as usual la the finishing no need to explain. 1st half was mostly us dominating, Cech can even play Sudoku for the whole half. 2nd half MY XI starts attacking, which produce some near-result.

Chelsea FC:
- Petr Cech (sub Cudiccini)
- Ricardo Carvalho (sub Alex)
- John Terry (sub Ivanovic)
- Wayne Bridge (sub A.Cole)
- Michael Essien full 90 minutes
- Jon Obi Mikel full 90 minutes
- Frank Lampard
- Deco
- Joe Cole
- Shaun Wright-Philips
- Nicolas Anelka

Goals: Nicolas Anelka, Ashley Cole

Can't recall the remaining order of subs but Andriy Shevchenko, Paulo Ferreira, Scott Sinclair, Florent Malouda, Franco Di Santo did come in as well. Shevchenko as usual a freakin disappointment that even Di Santo's touches are better than his. Somemore got tummy... haih, I think the fan behind me was right yesterday when he shouted "SHEVA..SHEVA..TUKAR CLUB LAH WOI" when Shevchenko finished his practice and went into the changing room. Cudiccini is as blur as possible, passing the ball in the box to an MY XI player! Lucky the fagtree also a bit shocked and got the ball cleared. But can't really blame Cudiccini as he hasn't play a real game for quite some time.

If you were in the same RM83 stand as me and heard "ORANG BAGI CHANCE PUN TAK TAU MASUK BOLA!" during that incident... thats me. And when one of the players roll over and like dying from minimal contact with Mikel its "WOI CHRISTIANO RONALDO KAH?" and one last one was "WAH TEMBAK BURUNG LAH" (well just look at one of the 5 reasons why MY XI cant beat CFC and you'll know).

They picked MoM as Lampard but I think thats just usual lah since he's famous; he's like uber lost on the pitch, should've been Michael Essien or Obi Mikel the most hardworking 2 on the pitch. MICHAEL BALLACK; our big boss sit there wearing slippers goyang kaki throwing jacket at the staff for fun n laughter. Whole game I was watching thru the binoculars, greedy on the best birthday present ever mah, can see live already can see the players clearly now wanna see them in bigger picture lol.



P/S: My prediction of 2-0 to give face is correct and my 5 points of why MY XI cant beat Chelsea also all proven correct. Will upload pix once I get them from Jo.

Thank you again Kenny for the training passes although I fail to "invoke" their full powaaah

Thank you Chelsea for a great eve and birthday this year.

5 Simple Reasons

Most of the CFC supporters in Low Yat dot net knows that the Chelsea vs Malaysia FC will be on my birthday. AHEM. I remember pinning the news article to my CIMB cubicle the first day the news was released on The Star. :D


I'm a bit torn in the middle as a Chelsea supporter. You know, don't support the national team, tak patriotik. Don't support Chelsea, my heart tak boleh. I guess the best way is when Drogba scores first I'll cheer, then I'll sigh to balance it. Come to think of it, there's no way in hell the national team will ever beat the Blues. Here's my 5 simple reasons:

Get it? See you at the stadium!