Its Friday! Rob’s experiment reaches the end of the first season

We begin the final part of this epic trilogy with a tale of retribution, at the beginning of this adventure we travelled to Valencia and were beaten 5-1 in the most even of games.  It is fair to say that thanks to Lards and Mori, Spain’s perpetual substitutes we atone for that most unfair result.

We have come to that nice part of the season where the games are a week apart as we got ourselves knocked out of the Copa del Rey and our Champions League quarter final is a month away.  As an added bonus there are no international matches for a while either, so we all just relax into the task at hand, coming second to an overpowered and frankly ridiculous Barcelona team.  The only negative of the four league games is Frankie Dumb-ass getting himself sent off in his third appearance for the club, otherwise it goes quite swimmingly.  Georgie W and Japh ND are quite special, they only operate in the final third of the pitch so I can’t call them the spine of the team, maybe the axis and atlas of the team.

The calm and serene month of February is followed by the madness of March.  Juventus are our Champions League opponents in the quarter final and we are off to Turin for the first leg.  In part 2 I think I made some less than positive comments about Jens Lehmann, the truth is I love Jens, not racist text message Jens but Match of the Day, Chelsea vs Arsenal Lens, when him and Drogba flopped about on the floor together.  The point of this story being that Jens has started to turn up of late and his MOM performance against Juve helps us take a 2-0 win back to Madrid.

We follow up the Juve game with a nice little win away to Tenerife.  Borrelli has been solid in the central midfield position and his goal is well deserved.

A week later, another away game, we bank a victory in Santander.

International silly season begins, I genuinely think the AI has got something against me, 12 players get called up for international duty including new signings P Knuts, Pagey, Borrelli and Amoroso.  To top it all off Jens is upset at being left out the team despite playing the last 10 or so games in a row.  I’ve just said nice things about you fella, you’re staying put.

Before we undoubtably lose a few more players to international friendlies an excited 100,000 plus fans come to watch the second leg against Juve.  They leave happy despite the result, I however spent 68 minutes with my heart in my mouth.

A week later and annoying news from the vidiprinter, these guys have gone 8 months without a cap, I’ve signed them and suddenly they’re brought into the national squad.  Some might say ‘you knew this was going to happen,’ I would argue I carefully chose my signings based on the fact they weren’t playing international football.  In the end though, it doesn’t matter either way.  We lose Borrelli, who like D Hubbs captains his country for his first international cap.  Bobby Page plays a MOM 10 for Wales in his fist game.  Lards and Mori finally make it off the subs bench against France, Christophe Revault was playing in goal for France against them.  Martijn Reuser hasn’t played much for me but he gets a cap for the Netherlands and finally Alessio Pirri and Fabio Galante play for Italy.  A quick bit of summing tells me we’ve lost eight players, six of them were first team regulars, Marty and Chris are just collateral damage.

All those international call ups scrambled my brain and I somehow let Lards play another game and he scores.  Lorenzo is livid, he tells me ‘another mistake like that at your are gone.’ Fortunately, we lose against Betis so I don’t feel to bad about my transgression, it’s also probably the reason Lorenzo let me off with just a verbal.

After a March that was in no way as good as February I/Mr Nobody gets manager of the month. He/I’ll take it.

Man Utd come to the Benabeu in the Champions league semi-final.  It all looks to be going well after JND scores but Man Utd are Man Utd so April Fools mother fu**er, Scholes scores an 88^th minute winner, a tough second leg is in store if we are to progress to the final.

Zaragoza pose few problems despite the score line, still it was one of those matches where you can just feel an unjust equaliser being scored at the death.  Instead, Frankie Dumb-ass, who has just returned from a three match suspension gets himself dismissed with two minutes to go and suspended for another four games.  Since arriving he has spent more time watching from the stands than playing, the lazy tosser.

A couple more victories raise the spirits before our journey to Old Trafford, JND and Georgie continue their good form, I’m not sure where I would be without my Chadian/Liberian neck of the team.

What a game this was, the mass enforced exodus coupled with a number of cup tied players meant we had to field  a fair few fringe players.  Franz Carr, who had a chance to win the game played, as did Bjorn H and Stevie B, neither could score a penalty.  Georgie W scored two goals but could convert either of his two shoot out penalties.  Jens Lehmann was a beast in goal and score a penalty, as did Pete Schmeichs.

I thought we had pulled off the impossible when Georgie scored in the 79^th minute only for G.Nev to make in 3:3 on aggregate in the 88^th minute, with either side able to do anything in extra time the tie was decided on penalties and oh boy was this exciting and nerve racking in equal measure.  I’m can’t say I was particularly disappointed being on the wrong end of a 10:9 shoot out score line, more disappoint nobody took that chance to be a hero.

Despite the Champions League exit nearly 96,000 turn up on Saturday so see Sean Devine score his first goal for the club against Celta and then get injured, for a month 22 minutes later.

There are some more international friendlies at the end of April so of course a couple more people are going to have to depart.  Dumb-ass, who is still suspended comes on as a 74^th minute substitute for France, he managed eight games for us, one more than the number of matches he missed through suspension.  Super Stevie Watson plays 60 minutes for England against Holland, for some reason England only named 13 players in the match day squad.  To top it all off the next match is against Barcelona who we haven’t beaten since the very first game of this BLOG and despite Franz and Georgie’s best efforts we still can’t beat them.  A bitter man might describe Barcelona as OP, not me, but some would, but not me, those bastards.

We bounce back straight away with a win against Sociedad, Georgie with a hat-trick as he closes in on 50 goals for the season.  This match also sees us reach 100 league goals, Un-Capt-ico CENTURIONS!

We beat Gijon in our 36^th league game but it is not enough to stop the red and blue Barca machine from being crowned champions, their nine-point lead now insurmountable.

The penultimate match is one for the fans as we struggle to beat nine man Atletico in a spicy derby.  Eventually Amoroso gets his only his second goal since joining, how someone who is so good on CM01/02 is so bad on CM9798 despite his relatively decent stats boggles my mind.

The final game of this BLOG is away to Deportivo, Georgie needs two goals to make it 50 for the season.

Rest assured he will be getting a £1 fine for jug avoidance.

That brings a rather crazy season to a close, here is the league table, the 60 goals conceded is ridiculous, the 106 scored was entertaining.  Barca’s record is ludicrous.  A comfortable second place in the end, seems funny that we won our one and only trophy after the second game with a full-strength squad.  Lorenzo’s final input was to pop by late one Sunday evening at the end of May to say he was pleased with how it all went, small wins.

All that’s left is a little round up of the Un-capt-ico stars of the season and a final summary of the players we left behind.  The clear winner of fans player of the year is future Liberian president Georgie Weah, he topped every chart.

Disciplinary

MOM

Assists

Goals

Averages *Contreras only played one game*

Love him or hate him, there is no denying Steve Bruce is a really nice guy and we need to take a moment for the 37 year old veteran who played 27 games for Real Madrid with stats like this.

Two final pieces of news before the table of departures and a little goodbye.

A year in Madrid and one assist was all a bit much for Micky.

Player	Appearances	Goals	Avg. rating	Current location
Jaap Stam	2	0	7.00	Chelsea (110k)
Gabriel ‘Batigol’ Batistuta	0	0	0.00	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Rui Costa	2	1	7.00	Barcelona (£8.5m)
Sanchez Fernando	2	2	7.50	Valencia (£11.5m)
Santiago Canizares	0	0	0.00	Jaen (£1.1m)
Ibrahima Bakayoko	1	0	7.00	CD Logrones (£6.75m)
Dario ‘The Bison’ Hubner	9	16	8.33	Parma (£3.9m)
Tommy Svindal Larsen	11	1	6.81	PSV (£1.0m)
Luigi Di Biagio	6	1	7.16	Juventus (£2.0m)
Mark Iuliano	15	2	7.80	Parma (£7.5m)
Lee Clark	23	0	7.00	Real Betis (£7.25m)
Santiago Denia Santi	16	0	6.87	Real Valladolid (£7.75m)
Christophe Revault	13	0	7.30	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Fabio Galante	31	4	7.51	Man Utd (£9.25m)
Robert Page	6	0	6.83	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Alessio Pirri	29	1	7.17	Lazio (£9.5m)
Juan Jose Borrelli	6	1	6.83	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Martijn Reuser	13		6.84	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Fernando Morientes	29	15	7.37	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Jordi Lardin	30	13	7.36	Barcelona (£13m)
Franck Dumas	8	0	7.25	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)
Steve Watson	28	1	7.25	Real Madrid B (Transfer listed)

To finish, a couple of things I have learnt from this endeavour.

• The AI can be both stupid and infuriating in equal measure, the number of players who suddenly got a cap just after I bought them.  How can Batigol sit in a B-side all season, madness, that FGN badge has a serious negative impact.
• I think you could win quite a few games with a team full of George Weahs, although he has gone down in my estimation after deliberately avoiding 50 goals just so he didn’t have to buy his teammates drinks.
• How good could Dario ‘the Bison’ Hubner be?  Maybe a BLOG is needed to find out.
• Steve Bruce’s regen would be good to look out for he was surprisingly good for a 37 year old.
• Franck Dumb-ass loves a red card, he was pretty good when he wasn’t suspended.
• Changing players every few months takes it out of you, good fun though.

Thanks for reading, and maybe the Bison and I will see you soon.