Bonjour! You join us at the end of season five, where after sitting in second at the halfway mark, a horrible dip in form saw us lose over half of our games in the second half of the season, but we managed to finish fourth despite the wobble. Let’s see what another summer with no money brings us…

Departures first, as Artetxe and Loinaz are both released after their contracts expire…

And Aguirretxu hangs up his boots…

It’ll be Troyes to start in the League Cup…

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Praise the f*cking Lord!!!

Although we finally have some money, I still bring in some free-gens, starting with the reincarnation of Garcia Fuentes Asier…

Artetxe decided to retire after his release, and he returns in his afterlife…

As does Aguirretxu…

Next is Juan Luis Sukunza MkII…

Meet Jon Andoni Goikoetxea the second. I do love it when the regen has a proper Basque-sounding name…

Ricardo Mendiguren Jr follows…

And finally, it’s the regen of Jose Angel Uribarrena, a forward who I almost signed in the early days before opting for Double D…

I decide to let Garitano go. He wasn’t signing a new contract, plus I think Mateo is ready to replace him, and this now gives me £2.9m to spend…

This is getting beyond the joke now…

Rafa Alkorta Jr is the first to head out on loan…

Those bits of business leave the squad looking like this. I’m happy, but am biding my time with the money until some players who will improve the squad become available…

Here’s how we’ll line up. Sotero, Mateo, and Nando all come into the starting eleven to freshen things up, so it’ll be interesting to see how they do…

We start at home to Bastia. All three newbies perform well, with Nando scoring as we make a solid start…

Bidaurrazaga and Tomas head out on loan to Atletico Madrid B, and Salamanca respectively.

It’s the worst start at Lens, but a penalty gets us back in it, and both teams cancel each other out for the remainder…

Marseille are next. New season, same old sh*t…

We’re handed Dinamo Minsk in the UEFA Cup, which could be a lot worse…

We’re fortunate at Toulouse after they miss a penalty, but a late goal gives us a deserved point…

I splash £575k of my injected cash on Oscar De Paula from Sociedad. Happy with this one, he looks a player…

I let 32 year-old Billabona go. His disciplinary points record will never be forgotten…

De Paula makes his debut in a hammering at home to Bordeaux, although you could be forgiven for thinking it’s Liverpool, going by the scorers…

It’s a struggle in Europe, but one of the few experienced players in a mostly-second string side nets a hat trick to get us over the line…

Cobra Kaiku keeps up his good form at Nantes, and De Paula joins him on the score sheet with his first goal…

Sh*t just got real…

It’s pretty lacklustre at home to Auxerre, but I don’t think they’ve beaten us in a while, so it was probably coming…

It’s an entertaining second leg with Dinamo, and once again the experienced heads show their class to see us through…

To face Bayern Munich…

It’s troix against Troyes in the cup, and a date with Cannes awaits…

Caen get revenge for the Mick McCarthy meme…

I splash another £625k of my cash on a man who was a hero in the original Basque Boys. Hopefully he’s still just as Igor for goals…

We’re shipping a few goals in the league, so I bite the bullet, and change formation. This beauty by Nikolai brought me success with Bilbao, so let’s give it a whirl…

And what a start! Granted it’s not the Monaco of old, but still…

I would have been happy with a score draw at Bayern, but the formation comes up trumps again, and it’s a rout…

A solitary Diaz goal is enough to make it three wins on the spin at Strasbourg…

And then Lyon hand us our first defeat in seven games. I shouldn’t grumble, I suppose…

Calle gets us off to the perfect start in the second leg with Bayern, and their solitary reply isn’t enough to stop us going through to take on Valencia…

It’s not quite as easy against second division Cannes in the cup as I’d hoped, but we find a way in the end, and the prize is Nimes…

We’re cruising against Montpellier until the game tries its best to f*ck us over, but we hold on…

Our ten men are clinging on at Metz, but for one last throw of the dice, I bring on the only man for the job, and he doesn’t disappoint…

Back in Europe, it’s a Desmond at the Mestalla after we come from behind to lead, but I’m happy with two away goals…

We ride our luck against Guingamp, but a Calle brace completes the comeback in front of a record crowd of 14,367…

This is a bad one. We throw everything at Gueugnon, and get champed at the end…

The second leg with Valencia is a repeat of the first, and Leighton is the hero as he saves their last penalty to send us through…

Blue is the colour, football is the game…

Normal service is resumed in the league, with a narrow win over Le Havre taking us up to fourth…

There’s a couple more loan departures during the winter break…

Last up this week are PSG, and our goose is cooked before half time. The only plus is Arenaza getting his first goal…

That loss was our first in ten games, and luckily Auxerre drew with Toulouse, so we stay fourth at halfway. The formation change has helped, and despite the goals conceded column not backing that up, we do seem to be more consistent at the minute…

Due to our European run, it’s been a longer episode than normal this week, so I hope you’ve enjoyed the extra games, and there’ll be more of the same next week as we try to extend that run even further, and get past Chelsea into the semis. See you then, Au Revoir!