Sam if you'll lose it'd be best to PIC, although with a wretched leader as coach I'm not sure how much good it'll do. Hire some sports psycologists before the econ. update to get the confidence back up, ts will rise and supporter mood will drop (not too much though I'd think as you'd be a massive underdog). Sponsor mood shouldn't fall too much as long as there are a few spokesmen keeping them happy.

Have a look at the team he plays in the cup, it may be weaker for training purposes so you might have a chance.

As for the arena use the Hattrix Arena Sizer. As a general rule I'd expand to no more than around 30* your fan club. Maybe 35* if you're really optimistic and looking at large future growth (which you should be with that size of a club in V). I'd say 30K max. Those 15K extra seats would cost a fair whack, £250K ($375K) or so I'd say.

Nice pg, let's hope he doesn't get injured in the international games like my keeper did.

Chelsea Preview:

And so we lurch towards Stamford Bridge and high-flying Chelsea. Both sides are under new management and while Jose Mourinho’s men have lost just once in nine league games and conceded just two goals while Mark Hughes looks to have serious problems on his hands. The shortcomings of the defence and a front line which must be one of the weakest in the Premiership are the two most obvious ones for our new manager.

Chelsea’s defence seems very strong, only James Beattie has scored from open play against it and it is up front that the problems arise. With Drogba injured and Mutu digging himself into all sorts of problems it appears likely that Kezman and Gudjohnssen will start up front. Kezman has struggled to find his feet so far in English football and has yet to score. Possibly the surprise performance of the season has been Tiago in midfield, the ex-Benfica man was a relatively low-key signing but has been performing well and is as regular a player as any in the midfield. Quite who Rover’s star performer is it’s difficult to say, Emerton is probably as close as any one, having improved dramatically on last season’s efforts.

In recent times the games have produced some entertaining matches and Blackburn are unbeaten in the league at Stamford Bridge since 1984 (when not even Craig Short was playing professional football). Last season the two teams played out a 2-2 draw at Stamford Bridge while at Ewood Park a last minute Glen Johnson goal won the game for Chelsea 3-2, after Gallagher had equalised only moments before. At the Bridge Cole scored twice for us while Mutu and Hasselbaink got Chelsea’s goals. For various reasons none of these players will be playing on Saturday and it’s interesting to take a look at the line-ups from that day. Both sides could certainly do with a goalscorer like Cole or Hasselbaink.

Chelsea (H vs. Blackburn Rovers, 30/08/03):

Cudicini, Johnson, Terry, Desailly, Bridge, Veron, Lampard, Geremi, Duff, Mutu, Hasselbaink.

Four of the XI are first team regulars under Mourinho, four more are in the reserves and three are playing elsewhere.

Blackburn :

Friedel, Neill, Amoruso, Babbel, Gresko, Flitcroft, Tugay, Reid, Thompson, Cole, Jansen

More of the Rovers side have seen sustained first team action this season. The exceptions being Babbel and Cole who have moved on, Gresko who’s been replaced by Gray and Thompson and Reid who have spent yet more time on the physio’s table.

The season before both sides won the away fixture, Zola scoring twice at Ewood in a 3-2 win while Rovers won 2-1 in London thanks to Yorke and Dunn goals. 2001/02 saw two 0-0 draws in our first season back in the top flight while back in 1998/99 Chelsea won 4-3 at Ewood as Le Saux got Perez sent off. In the overall head to head league records Rovers have a slight advantage, with 31 wins to Chelsea’s 30. However when cup competitions are included the sides are level with 33 wins each.

An interview with a Chelsea fan will follow in the next few days...

We all made mistakes bisuitbutt, I paid £75K for a multi-skilled inadeqaute It's only through mistakes that you learn.

I'm having a hard time determing how big my stadium needs to be.

I have 697 members in my supporters club and my fans are "satisfied".

My team is called the Exploding Dumpsters and my ID# is 222781 if you're interested in checking my stuff out.

Have a look at this page:

Hattrix Arena Sizer.

It will give you the number of seats etc. you need to add. I'd go for the biggest recommended size as it will give room for fanclub growth.

It has to be said that voting for someone you have never seen play takes a great leap of faith.

That said, FLB managed to convince us that Bob Compton was a worthy winner.

Spot on. The same thing's happened with England. I voted for him this time around due to how good people said he was (also voted for Eckersley but that was also to do with feeling that Le Saux was an unsuitable choice after Moscow etc.). No one person made eulogised to quite the extent FLB did with Crompton but there were a large number of people all willing to testify that he was world class. This for me has got him the vote ahead of Henning Berg, much as I admire him.

First time around I voted for Hendry, he really was a hero for me and I felt he had to be in there.

Got my cup match tonight. Opponent is really strong in the middle, but VERY weak on the wings (defensively, too). He plays a 4-4-2, so I'm probably going to go with a 3-5-2, with one midfielder playing defensively. Was thinking of attack on the wings, but worried it will open me up too much to his middle players.

If he has a strong central attack, don't play AOW as he'll take advantage of your weakened central defence. Do play two offensive wingers though.

Oceania have been around for a long time Sam, ever since I've been playing. Pirate did great to get us to the final and the 4-3-3 was him trying to strike a compromise between defence, attack and midfield after the MOTS against Finland in the semis.

Just a quick heads up. The World Cup Final is tonight at 20:00 HT time and England face mighty Sweden. GM-PirateWolf has done great to get England this far but we're definitely underdogs this evening.

Come on England!

American: Form will affect the stars players get, as well as secondary skills etc.

As for feds there's loads out there. There's a BRFC one although it's not too active. Some people join feds for what they're training eg. Keeper Trainers fed and if you're new to a training scheme or something and want to talk to experienced pros then they're quite good.

There's a lot of general, friendly feds which are large and have all sorts of topics and people in them. Hattrick Anonymous is a big (mainly) English fed which I used to be a part of (The Hattrick College, Kraftworks Union and maybe The Alliance in Oceania are similar as well). There are a whole range of others (friendly cup feds, sports feds for example). Just join feds you think might be interesting and see whether you like them.

As for a BRFCS fed I'm not sure it'd work. We have a forum here and there's only three of us with supporter (you need five minimum in a fed).

Also at low levels games seem to be won and lost much more on pure midfield strength, which PM and stamina are used to calculate. I'd say secondaries are a bonus, even weak and inadequate passers and defenders will give you some boost. Concentrate on PM and stamina (which is a must) at this stage.

Sam, cup round 1 is in 10 days time I think, so you and American will have to wait a little.

Congrats on promotion btw, supporter is well worth it there's loads of great federations around to join (with loads of wise and funny people), fantastic stats, match kits etc, etc.

Good match Sam. The nicer part was I almost broke even money wise on it! Maybe you need to train stamina during the offseason? (I was reading to do it then, as you will lose some form.)

And everyone gets training, whether or not they play unlike most trainings.

In my experience the form penalty generally kicks in a little few weeks afterwards, but improving PM's stamina is well worth it.

Oklahoma, if you won each game you'll go up automatically.

A cup might be an idea, I could probably help organise it I guess although I'm not sure if I'd be able to play as I play every year in one friendly cup and plan to have a decent cup run.

Sam are you using HT-Frid's cup ranking page?

At the moment you'd play

Wests Tigers 35- 45 13 : 5 in V.113 (3529)

However there are another 15 or so teams on 13 points as well, if you win your last match you'll almost certainly rise up in the table and there are so many teams that you've got no real idea who you'll play next.

Coach leadership doesn't affect form, sounds like you've just been unlucky.

Rommedahl will run rings around Neill.

Rommedahl seems to have struggled to make much of an impact so far I thought. Rather like Emerton last season.

Your playoff opponent will probably change sam depending on the results of the last round of league games.

Why exactly do you want to change regions American?

One final thought. What we are looking for is the "Greatest" left back. When Graeme Le Saux left this club, he left it with a lot of acrimony - I was on Ewood when Bill Eckersley's family spread his ashes on the pitch at the blackburn end.

No contest, Bill Eckersley every time.

Agreed. I don't think I can vote for Le Saux because of the punch up with Batty and the way he left. Newton seems to be primarily a right back so that probably rules him out.

I'll wait and see a bit and read what people have to say first.

Edit: Btw den none of the links apart from the Suter one work in your post, I get an error message.

Ive got 33k to play with before a transfer embargo

Any ideas on how to raise money?

Have you got a training scheme set up, training young players? If so the best thing is probably to sell one next time they go up a level (an older one with high skills prefrebly). Debt should be avoided at all cost in HT as a new team.

"I was never a big Manure-fan, and Mark Hughes was never a rolemodel. It was all about Marco van Basten for me!"

He's gone up in my estimations.

What about Greenland, is that part of the wider Norden world? Denmark own it don't they?

Cookiemonster: If you go below £-133K you get a transfer imbargo, dropping below £-333K means you get 5 logins the next week to rectify the situation or you'll be locked out.

Sam: Your coach's leadership is at poor which means that the effects of PIC will be limited however it's probably still worth it as you're below the mid-point. Your attack and defence is much better than his and so you should win even if you PIC. As his wing attack isn't up to much I'd suggest playing AIM if you play with the winger as a towards middle midfielder.

Also consider whether you feel you could win your league next season and so it would not be a disaster if you lost a playoff or whether you feel teams like Pink Snitch are stronger. If you think you're unlikely to win next season take the risk and PIC (although I think you'd be fine anyway).

If you did get promoted could you survive in V? Oceania expanded to VI not that long ago didn't it? In which case you could probably survive as there'll still be some bots in V, I'm not the best person to comment though.

Staying down deliberatly is kind of a taboo subject in some areas and I don't like the idea myself but at your stage it may be worth considering.

14/09/2004 Bought Apichai Jaimun from Real_Perfect FC 108 333 £ 1 790

14/09/2004 Bought Nopphadon Chumsai from Holy Spirit 50 000 £ 1 190

Are these the two? They've been brought, sometimes it takes a while for transfers to come through at busy times.

What about PM American? Buy three 17yo passables with decent secondaries at the start of next season (maybe not week 1 as there'll be silly prices) get solids who are 18 or 19 for the first team. Stick with this for the next four seasons or so and you'll have a kick ass midfield. You can also improve your winger's PM on the side.

Training is as much about making money as it is improving that area, so if results don't come straight away just be patient and hang in there.

Depends on what point in the training cycle you are.

At the moment, I'm almost to the end of my 1st winger training cycle. I sold a World Class winger in week five, and my two titanic wingers will both be sold during the next season. That will give me heaps of cash to boost the rest of my team.

At this level, your gate receipts are effective 'top-up' money. They help you upgrade players (e.g sell a brilliant playmaker for a world-class one)... but you can't exist on the gate money alone.

I usually have about 1-2 million in the bank, unless I've just bought a new player in which case I am often in debt.

I avoid long-term debt at all costs.

Interesting you say that pg. I train keepers (yeah stop laughing at the back ) and I have one long term trainee who's an U20 and my other trainee I train from exc-brill/mag in one and a bit seasons and then sell.

I don't know how long you've been in III, I'm just coming to the end of my second season and have been relatively succesful but I find I make a profit over the season without training. My wage bill is around £100K ($US 150K) and I make an £80K ($120K) loss before matches. Match revenue exceeds £150K even on a bad day. I'll then make a steady £2M+ from training up the reserve keeper.

This along with selling a player that I want to replace should give me at least £4M to spend at the end of the season.

Some recent comments from Hughesy and his agent in the Taffy press...South Wales Echo

Did anyone else think of a certain MB member at first who has some interesting rumours?

a popular choice is not the answer its an eperienced choice that matters on this occasion.

More than likely

Strachan

Houlier

Hughes

How is Mark Hughes any more experienced than Jewell, Sturrock et al.?