2017-2018 Season Recap - koszak27's Dynasty

koszak27's Dynasty Blog

2017-2018 Season Recap

Posted on August 19, 2016 at 01:31 PM.

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July 1st, 2018

- Exeter City, England

After finishing their inaugural month in the FL Championship with 0 points, Exeter City had their backs to the wall and a long season ahead. Summer transfers had amassed only a trio of loaned goalies and a back-up CB. A solution would yet again need to come from within the team if they were going to avoid relegation back down to League 1.

Exeter City was into the third round of the Capital One Cup by October but points in league play had quickly become the priority. Throughout the fall, the Grecians would earn a draw here or there and pick up about a win each month. The team seemed stagnant and formerly productive players like Jacopo Dezi and Daniel Sikorski had fallen off severely in form. As winter approached, they sat in 19th place just above relegation.

As for finances, the board had allocated $650,000 in the transfer budget and another $2,350 in weekly wages to start the season and the summer sales of goalie Christy Pym and center back Richard Duffy had added over $600,000 to that pot. It seemed like the winter window could welcome a new face or two to Exeter City and potentially reenergize the team. Just like every other year with the Grecians, however, it would not turn out in the logical manner one would expect.

Former number one keeper Christy Pym was sold to Morecambe this past summer.

Richard Duffy, the original captain for the "Team of Randoms," was purchased by Millwall in the offseason.

The transfer window started with the sale of Zach Pfeffer. The young center midfielder from the Philadelphia Union had been unimpressive during his year at Exeter City and he had not grown as anticipated. John Beavon, another center midfielder brought in during the same window, had quickly surpassed Pfeffer and taken his starting spot. Ryan Ledson, the other starting center midfielder had cemented a starting spot in the 2014 opening season and showed no signs on letting it go.

Pfeffer's poor form and increasing complaints over a lack of playing time seemed to make the decision easy for the manager. Teams quickly came calling for the 22 year old American and eventually West Brom won the race handing Exeter City $2 Million in return.

Zach Pfeffer's stay at Exeter City is over. The young midfielder is off to West Brom and the Premier League.

With Pfeffer transfered and some more money in the bank, Exeter City sent scouts out far and wide looking for a permanent goalie. By January, the team had the worst goal differential in the league and although it was not completely the fault of Italian loanee Archimede Almici, Exeter City needed a first team keeper under contract. Initial reports had ECFC scouts spotted in Turkey and Russia but as the end of January drew closer, rumours had migrated to Belgium and France. Ultimately, a decision was made by the team to sign 28 year old goalie Gael Perdomo of Tours FC in France. Perdomo, a 6'6" wall in the net, was signed on a free contract to join Exeter for the following season for $15,000 in weekly wages. The team seemed to think they could manage with Almici for the remainder of the year and this was obviously the cheaper way to go.

Pfeffer would not be the only casualty of the winter window as original random team member Ramiro Arias (LB) was purchased by Bolton for $475,000. With the window coming to a close, Exeter City seemed to be content with their changes when the bombshell was dropped; Ryan Ledson, the team's star center midfielder wanted an immediate transfer before the window closed. Ledson and the team had struggled over contract details for almost the past year and it seemed that the player was out for some revenge. With only about a week left in January, ECFC was forced to try and salvage as much as possible for their main playmaker.

Ryan Ledson demands a transfer from Exeter City with only days left in the window.

To make matters worse, the team had just sold his counterpart, Zach Pfeffer, and Exeter City would be short on starting central midfielders without an immediate replacement. Offers came in rapidly for the young star and eventually, it was Sunderland who scooped up Ledson for $8 Million. Sitting on almost $11 million in cash and with only days left in the winter window, Exeter City scouts were scrambling to finish reports on perspective players to bring in. Management knew that if the money wasn't spent in January, it would wind up in the board's pockets and not seen again.

Several areas (the center midfield especially) needed upgrades and half the season was left to play. In what looked like a big gamble, the team decided not to bring in any transfer players for the season. It was another seemingly odd response to the situation. The team had decided to put all of their money into free transfer players to get the most bang for the buck. The only problem was that none of the bang would be seen or heard from until the following season.

Several offers went out, including rumoured negotiations with Portuguese midfielder Bruma and St. Etienne CB Florentin Pogba.

Bruma to ECFC?!? Nope.

More than a dozen offers were eventually handed out by Exeter City but only a few were accepted. Joining the team the following season would be:

Florian Martin - LM (70 OVR)
Okan Alkan - RB (66 OVR)
Koray Gunter - CB (77 OVR)
Jose Izquierdo - LW (77 OVR)

Jose Izquierdo will join Exeter City after his contract with Club Brugge has ended.

On the final day of the January window, Sheffield United threw out a bid of $600,000 for unhappy LM Aiden O'Brien. Another original, random Grecian would be leaving the club immediately.

A giant gamble had been made by Exeter City's management. They would be getting a lot of help next season from free transfers but they still needed to somehow finish out of the relegation zone with no additional players. The payoff would be big but would the management team be around to see it?

Following the huge loss of Ryan Ledson in center midfield, the formation was altered again. In an attempt to strengthen the defense, the team switched to a 5-3-2 formation to make use of the deepest position at the club. Center backs Jang Sun Won, Danny Grainger, Fabian Danic, Do Heon Kim and Damien Robak would alternate on the back line throughout the remainder of the year in an attempt to distance themselves from the relegation zone and bring the goal differential back up. This was the typical starting XI for the remainder of the year:

Exeter City would have to see out another stressful winter and spring as the season came to a close. The winter window has proven to be chaotic over the past two seasons with league shaking transfers on both sides of the team. Manager Koszak27 had this to say:

"The first two seasons with ECFC were remarkable. We exceeded the board's expectations each year, built the foundation for our future success and really came together as a team. As the seasons have gone by, we are seeing new faces come in and original members leave and as sad as this becomes, it is also the way of sports. We all knew we couldn't stick together forever so we enjoyed the time we got to spend with each other and move on when the time comes.

Will I be here for the entirety of my career? I don't know, but I want to be. I think that is more than half of the struggle in professional sports. We are getting paid but you have to see past that and you have to be somewhere you are comfortable and somewhere you know you can succeed. We have hit some tough times these past two seasons early and had to really battle at the end to reach our goals. This year will be no different than last year in that we will fight until the last game for our fans, for our shield and for each other."

With inspiring locker room discussions like this, the team seemed to pick itself up in the 2nd half. The new formation and emphasis on keeping the center backs fresh helped keep the goals against down. Exeter City was starting to bring that goal differential closer to 0 and they were staying even with the mid-table teams. Reinforcements were on the horizon for next season and the Grecians just needed to hold their ground until the time came.

In the end, Exeter City would end the year with a 2-0 win at Nottingham Forest and conclude their inaugural FL Championship season in 19th place; 12 points clear of relegation. The top of the table would see Burnley and Wigan Athletic automatically heading up to the Premier League.

The board saw the 2017-2018 season as a successful one with the team staying in the Championship and eventually reaching the Capital One Cup semi-finals. With 5 free transfers set to join the team, Exeter City might just have to make the Premier League sooner than later.

Manager's Notes:
Crazy, crazy season. Simulating this season took probably 10 total hours over the course of a few days. I have terrible scouts who take 24+ days on one player if they aren't in the same location and it was almost impossible to get all the moves done in time before the winter window closed.

I gambled that I could keep us out of relegation with what we had, even after Ledson left and they managed to pull it off. In the games I played during this season, I think I only won maybe two or three games out of the 10 or so that I played. The AI was dominant at times and even when the game was close, they would score in extra time to tie it right at the end.

I think the new players will make a big difference to the team but I have never used any of them before so there is a chance that they are all not very good. We are down to only 10 original players from the random draw left and I think a couple need new contracts. A lot of my first group of youth academy players are due as well so the team may have even more new members by the time the summer window closes.

Here are the season stats for the players. I don't have the stats for the guys who left in January but they would have only been half season numbers anyway:

Soccer Leaders - Updated: Jul 1, 2018
Games	GA	Goals	G
1. Archimede Almici	49	1. Sebastien Romero	21
2. Danny Grainger	45	2. Diego Fagundez	7
3. Ben Davies	44	3. Jacopo Dezi	5
4. Diego Fagundez	44	4. Lorenzo Curiale	5
5. Michael Schimpelsberger	43	5. Do Heon Kim	3
Assists	A	Clean Sheets (GK)	CS
1. Sebastien Romero	5	1. Archimede Almici	11
2. Diego Fagundez	4	2.
3. John Beavon	4	3.
4. Jacopo Dezi	2	4.
5. Tom Nichols	2	5.
Average Form	AF	Overall Increase	UP
1. Sebastien Romero	7	1. Archimede Almici	5
2. Ritchie Robles	6.5	2. Tim Stevens	5
3. Lorenzo Curiale	6.4	3. Scott Batt	5
4. Diego Fagundez	6.3	4. John Beavon	4
5. John Beavon	6.3	5. Patrick Brough	4
Overall Decrease	DWN	(Points/Games) + Average Form	PGA
1. Daniel Sikorski	2	1. Sebastien Romero	7.65
2. Jacopo Dezi	0	2. Lorenzo Curiale	6.59
3. Danny Grainger	0	3. Tom Nichols	6.55
4. Damien Robak	0	4. Diego Fagundez	6.55
5. Duane Holmes	0	5. Ritchie Robles	6.5

Romero missed the Golden Boot by two goals again. I'll have the next update shortly because I'm already into October of the following season, 2018-2019.