2016-2017 Season Start - koszak27's Dynasty

koszak27's Dynasty Blog

2016-2017 Season Start

Posted on July 20, 2016 at 11:18 AM.

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September 1, 2016:

Upon joining the ranks of English League 1, we knew there would need to be changes moving forward. The team changed a lot from June 1st to September 1st in 2016 so let's begin. The board was very happy with our surprising promotion last season. So happy that they have given us the goal of gaining automatic promotion into the Championship. This will be a tall order and one that our randoms squad would not be able to accomplish without some help. The board also decided that if automatic promotion wasn't tough enough, they would also only allocate $425,000 in the transfer budget with another $2,100 in weekly wages.

A free transfer in Henrik Ojamaa was set to come in and provide further strength to an attack which already had Romero (22 goals) and Sikorski (21 goals) combine for 43 goals in the last season. Ojamaa can also naturally play LM but I decided to try him up front and switch to a 4-3-3 to start the year.

Ojamaa joins Exeter City on a free transfer.

The first player sold off the squad was the young Australian LM, Chris Naumoff (60 OVR). He had an outstanding season in 2015/2016 scoring 9 goals and notching 8 assists even with several weeks missed due to injury. He was in very high demand with offers coming in from several clubs but in the end, only one team met our lofty transfer fee of $650,000; Oldham Athletic.

Naumoff leaves Exeter City after a career high 9 goals and 8 assists in only 34 games last season.

With Ojamaa coming in as a striker and some young depth on the bench, we transfer listed 26 year old Aaron Schoenfeld to see if we could get some more money into the team. We ended up accepting a transfer fee of $625,000 from Crewe Alexandria for the 61 rated ST.

Aaron Schoenfeld heads to Crewe Alexandria and the hope of a starting role.

An opportunity came in for us to sell a youth player and it was one I couldn't pass up given the high expectations for this year and the low transfer budget we were allowed. Several teams came in with bids for our exciting LM prospect, Seung Il You (65 OVR), but AS Nancy blew everyone out of the water with a $5.5 million offer. Even with Naumoff gone, a starting role for the young youth graduate was up in the air with his lack of pace and only three midfield positions open. Ultimately, the large transfer fee was the biggest reason for this move and one that opened the door to further acquisitions.

With the significant increase to our budget from the Naumoff, Schoenfeld and especially You sales, Exeter City were in a position to solidify the midfield and invest in a quality goalkeeper.

The first move was for Italian goalie Eric Lora from Roma. After enquiring about his purchase and hearing he had just joined the team, we were happy enough to just loan in the 18 year-old as a try-out for the season. At 67 OVR, he was already an upgrade over Christy Pym (59 OVR) who had shown flashes of quality play but just wasn't growing his skills.

Once the goalkeeper position was upgraded, the revised midfield was the next focus. With scouts in America for most of the last season, we had some good targets to look at for potential moves. The top guy on our list was American RM Joshua Gatt who was playing at FK Molde. They accepted our initial offer but we were unfortunately out bid and weren't able to counter in time. Our next highest player was Zach Pfeffer (68 OVR), a 21 year old CM at the Philadelphia Union. We were able to lock him into a 4 year deal for a transfer fee of $2.2 million.

Zach Pfeffer moves to England to join Exeter City on a 4 year deal.

The last signing of the window was 18 year old CM John Beavon (65 OVR) from PAOK. The young midfielder showed great strength and playmaking ability after his 1st season and would come in to be the primary bench player for Exeter City. He was showing great potential and cost Exeter City $2.5 mil and 63 OVR CAM Sean Davis. It was more than we wanted to spend but signing the English midfielder would help down the road.

Sean Davis(above) heads to PAOK as part of a deal for John Beavon.

With the player exchanges complete and a few games under our belts, Exeter City sits 6th in the table as of September 1st 2016. Automatic promotion will not come easy but the player transfers have upgraded the squad into a team with a fighting chance.

The only other notes are a few youth academy players who have made the senior team. They are:

Tim Doyle, 60 OVR LW (AUS)
Scott Batt, 54 OVR LM (ENG)
Tim Stevens, 62 OVR CAM (AUS)

2016-2017 Exeter City Starting Squad:

2016-2017 Exeter City Depth Chart:

Exeter City Depth Chart - 2016
	STARTER	2ND	3RD	4TH
G	Lora (67)	Pym (59)	Bonmann (60)
RFB	Schimpelsberger (68)	Arias (61)
LCB	Grainger (64)	Danic (58)
LFB	Davies (64)	Ognevoski (63)
RCB	Kim (69)	Duffy (64)
RCM	Dezi (68)	Jung (63)
CM	Ledson (67)	Beavon (65)
LCM	Pfeffer (68)	O'Brien (61)
RF	Sikorski (64)	Nichols (61)
CF	Romero (66)	Jay (56)
LF	Ojamaa (72)	Doyle (60)

We will be putting all of our efforts into gaining promotion this season so the cup games will not be prioritized. I plan to play one game each month, probably against the top teams in the league. The next update will be the June 1st 2017 end of the season re-cap.