Asunto: The Unawaited Return

Hi all

I'm back! I've just signed up again after a fair while away from Sokker and have started building my new team Total Football FC (yeah I struggled).

A few of you may remember my team in charge of Roar FC under my previous (and strikingly similar) moniker of Cloete. My now defunct Roar team spent quite a number of seasons battling it out atop the A-League a few years ago (I genuinelycan't remember when it was I gave it away. Anyway as I never won anything, all records of that team were wiped off the face of the Sokker earth as I became inactive.

I guess I just wanted to say what up again and to let people know I'll be toiling away in III.11. As I am the proud owner of a Galaxy S3 phone I should be able to stay up to date and check in easily enough (I apologise for the ensuing typos). No promises that I won't go inactive down the track though.

For now though I'm entrusted to be back and have been successfully wasting away my lunch breaks and public transport commutes. Less successfully putting together a competitive team though.

I've thrown the guys onto some much needed stamina training and brought in some young guys to train a few weeks of pace to. In the meantime I'd love to receive all of your suggestions on how I should go about building a new team and any hints on the new stadium prices, youth school, pitch choices stuff etc. Salutations are also encouraged!

Yeah, lots of typos. Just assume I can spell and assume I know when to use 'enthused' and when to use 'entrusted'. Similar thing goes for time and team. Good old predictive keyboard.

Actually on the subject of phones, I'd love to know what Android browser everyone uses for Sokker. I'm mixing it up between the default and Firefox because it's so dodgy.

Welcome back! It is a long hard road back to the top in this game. No shortcuts! But at least you will win a lot of games.

My advice (I was the last-to-join manager to reach A-league so had to fight my way up)
You start with cr@p players bar 1 or 2.
Get rid of all your players bar the 1 or 2 that are playable. If you post your player list you can probably get some advice on keepable ones.
Buy all 17/18 year olds. You can pick up better 17/18 yr olds on the TL for free than the 20-30 year olds you start this game with. Train pace. You can train pace for 3 seasons until you have to worry about specialization.
You don't need to expand your stadium as fast as you used to have to. You can increase the seat prices instead. Also, you get more money for tickets than you used to, so build seated stands with roof so you don't lose ticket income from rain.
There is zero forum activity in div II let alone div III so add the A-league forum to your list and talk to us there.
Make a tactic - at your player level, don't play wingers - mids aren't good enough to pass it there and the wingers don't have enough tech to keep the ball in. Play a well spread tactic like:
---x-x---
--x-x-x--
---x-x---
--x-x-x--

Look at my junior tactic. At low skill levels keep your players central and close together!

Anyways, sick of typing now. Welcome back!

Welcome back. I recall some cracking matches between Roar and Chelsea.

Even I remember you. Welcome back.

Good to see you back. :)

Good to see you back. You've missed a fair bit since you've been away but a lot of the fundamentals are the same as what you were use to.

Probably some of the most notable differences are now:

1) Games are now played in 3d
2) Junior school has been completely revamped with random ups/downs as coaches now "under/over estimate talent and recalculate each week as well as having the extra match in the week for supposebly guessing what skill each player has but it doesn't always work the way you expect.
3) Champions cup - gives the league/cup winners something to aim for by taking on other nations winners in a knockout cup tournament.
4) So much more money in the game it's crazy. Added gate receipts which is fully controlled by the manager. Higher prices equals less people though as you would expect.
5) Height/weight/BMI added to apparently create different player qualities (don't really notice too much of an effect yet though).
6) Can set 2 tactics for the one game and trigger using conditional orders. No more guessing which side the winger is and getting lucky/unlucky, you can flip easily enough in your orders. Also have more conditional order slots as well making it a little better tactic wise.

Not a whole lot else has really changed from what you remember to my knowledge. Not sure if U21's were in when you last played but have a feeling they might have been.

Oh yes, one more thing

7) Can now request friendlies from other managers outside of Australia now instead of having to go through their match page.

There's probably more but it's been a while. Welcome back, you'll get to div 2 easily enough but getting back to the A League could be tough (though it's probably easier then it has been in the past since naph/achmid/jkhtong have all reduced game time and downgraded their squads as a result).

@uber: Thanks for the tips mate! Congrats on getting to the A-League as well!

I've already started the clean out. Got pretty much all of the defaults listed for sale either tonight or tomorrow. I'm expecting that most won't sell and I'll end up sacking them. I've already started recruiting in earnest and have managed to land what I think are a couple of bargains. I'm a bit stuck as to whether to land that gun striker who's 32 or try my luck on the 19 year old who's substantially worse. I'll definitely post up the team so you guys can critique anyway. I'll definitely start with pace but don't know if I can put up with training one thing for three seasons straight haha.

Your tactical pointers are interesting. I haven't had a proper look at my friendly yet (smashed 6-0 for the record), just watched it on my phone. I'll check it out now and see what I can improve with my tactic. Keeping them all a bit closer together seems quite a good idea, but I may just play one winger high up the park as well. It used to work a treat back in the day and I've bought an older bloke to hopefully do that job for me for a little while. The biggest concern is finding midfielders who are young and trainable in pace, but can also tackle and pass. The other initial tactical question I have is on tactical discipline. How much of an impact does it have on your team? It was still quite new when I last played and didn't really affect too much from memory. I can't remember if it was because everyone started at tragic or because it gave players with more experience quite a high level already - which would have been my entire first team. Anyway, is it a big consideration for all of you?

I'll leave the tickets as they are for a little while until I gauge how many punters are keen to come along. What should I be doing with my pitch at the moment?

@agbell We certainly had a few to choose from mate. Good to see you kicking on in the A-League

@Vilpu & @borkos Thanks guys. First thing that comes to mind are the old [NT]Vilpu and [NT]borkos007 threads :D. Good to see you're both still as active as ever. And borkos, it's amusing to see Enzo Deroo kicking about at 35!

@cometer

Firstly, thx god for Davio.

1) Noticed the 3D. Got a beast of a computer running so I'll endeavor to take advantage of it properly when I eventually shell out for Plus. Am I right in guessing everyone pretty much uses the 2D still for tactical analysis? Just FYI, it's pretty damn awesome being able to load a 2D Sokker match on a phone. I remember frantically trying to update my team for a league game while on holidays in a dodgy WAP browser on an old Nokia haha

2) That came in right near the end and I never really got to test it out. Will that affect me quite substantially given I'll be kicking around with a VG or so YC for a while? Is it worth me bothering with the juniors? Bear in mind though I'm always keen to give them a run, even if there's little to no return on the investment haha

3) Indeed. I believe the Comets are frequent participants. Which Aussie team has fared the best so far and how far did they go?

4) Are transfer prices reflective of this money? I've been fairly surprised at the caliber (bar the problematic midfield) of team/prospect of a team I've been able to put together in a relatively small amount of time and with about $200k. I guess Junior gate receipts are another source here as well.

5) Does anybody care about them? Would it impact your transfer decisions? I understand it's supposed to affect acceleration and the like.

6) Yeah I've seen that. Probably way above my head at the moment. I'll be hard pressed trying to get a decent tactic to start with. Might take a few weeks before I even put in red card or injury conditionals. Something to think about for DII down the track though.

6.5ish) U21s were in. I think you may even have been in charge of them if you weren't NT coach at the time.

7) I saw that. Good feature. Got hammered by an English team last night and have accepted an invite from a Div IV Spanish side next week. They got 35000 punters down to their last home league game though, so I'm hoping to make a little bit of coin from the shelacking haha.

7.9) I noticed AS have been getting hammered in the A-League and Tribe were down in DIII (!!!!). If I go up pretty early on there's going to be a huge gulf in class.

Anyway I may as well post up the squad as well. I'm still at the point here where I'm undecided on how I'll go about building a club. The only thing with buying players is that I still want to have a somewhat competitive team, so I haven't just dived in and bought solely 16-18 year olds. On that note, a 24 year old will still pop every 3-4 weeks in the lower levels right? (Say average-solidish) It's been a while!

Geez that was comprehensive. Thanks for all the inputs and salutations!
(editado)

Good to see you back mate, shame I'm on the way out (sold up all but one Aussie and one English prospect in my team just this season).
If I do come back it will probably be in a similar fashion to you, starting up a new team sometime further in the future, because really, starting up the team is one of the most exciting times in a management game. Where all youth pulls could be potential first XI players, and where you are not the favourite to win.

Although I always considered cometer to have a much better team than me, it got quite boring being ranked number 1 in the rankings for nigh on 3 seasons (I was probably more consistent than cometer, but his team always stood up in the big matches thus getting the trophies he deserved for all the effort he has put in to his team, others teams, and the Australian Sokker Community).

Hopefully one day, we manage to have another one of our great matches followed by lots of swearing and general displeasure at losing to one another

2) Depends on who you talk to as to whether it's worth it or not. There are valid points both ways. If you don't have a youth school you save the cash of paying a youth coach wage and the wages of the players. On top of that you don't have to worry so much regarding pitch maintenance but you obviously forego any income from gate receipts (albeit small) and the value from juniors (either from sales or from saving from having to purchase off the transfer list). Minkees made a good run with not having a youth school and saving the money generated.

On the other hand, youth schools are in themselves income generators and provide a constant stream of income. I've been a supporter of having youth schools and uber's probably the best case of that in recent times. I just feel that it makes more money in the long run then it costs and it only takes 1 gun to change everything. As a team starting out I'd advise to use a youth school but not to go overboard with it too soon as I'm not sure what finances are like down that end these days. Talent reading becomes a lot more complicated though, and linear regression seems to be the most commonly used method for talent estimation now.

3) Probably unsurprisingly there haven't been too many sides from Australia in the competition as it's usually been 1 of the big 4 (naph,vivski,Achmid or myself) occupying the spots. I've gotten as far as the 4th round before being well beaten and I know naphs got to either round 3 or 4 as well. No one has got further than that though and it completely depends on the draw you receive. Seedings really have no significance like the domestic cup as strong teams don't always have high ranking points. It's not looking promising for myself making it 5 CC's in a row though at this stage. 3 pts down in the league and mass goal difference as of having played Achmid with most of their players still in the squad unlike everyone else.

4) Transfer prices depend on what people are after. At the lower end players have quite possibly gotten cheaper relative to the income increase, but at the top end prices have definitely risen but perhaps not by as much as income has increased. Strikers and midfielders are still the most expensive and that's unlikely to change anytime soon.

5) Hard to say. I haven't really noticed too much of a difference as they're similar ranged but certainly with height (weight and BMI is still too new to me) if they've got similar skills, I'll favour the defender/striker with height over the one who doesn't and as for midfielders I really don't care too much. It's not like heights going to add millions difference though. Taller players are supposed to be able to win headers more often but that's questionable in the current environment.

Welcome back Cloete....& yes, that team name?

To address the important point - I use Dolphin Browser HD, but have downloaded Chrome and it seems okay. Is Chrome the default browser on the S3?

Hey Cloete, welcome back! Your advice to me when I started out was to train strikers. 6 young players, 17yo strikers. Good to see you back.

Cloete, my old mentor :)
Welcome back!

Not only was Cloete my mentor in SK, he got me interested in A-League. I'm now a MVFC member.

Welcome Back mate!

We had so many epic battles in the past.. Hoping to possibly re-create them again in the future!