PES Chronicles

When I fired up PES2008 this morning, my PS3 blinked at me a couple of times, then displayed the news that there was another patch for the game. It was 130MB in size and took a little over three minutes to download.

This was a surprise. I’ve heard no rumours about another patch. When the game started I was keen to see what changes had been made. I think that this patch may be intended to rectify the still-awful condition of the PS3’s online game. I’m not big on online play and I didn’t have time this morning to go online to find out what, if anything, has changed.

One thing that I was hoping for was for pre-game kit selection to be introduced in all offline game modes. But no, it wasn’t. We’re going to be left twisting in the wind on this one all year. Kit selection exists in Exhibition mode, so why, in the name of all that’s holy, is it missing in every other mode? Why?

First impressions of offline gameplay after the new patch is that replays seem to be a lot smoother, and actually watchable most of the time. But you can never underestimate the placebo effect. I’ve got a few days off work and will be playing PES2008 a lot – online and offline – so I’ll post in a day or two about this new patch.

—————–

Here in the last third of the season, it’s time to face up to something: the Superleague is hard.

Thanks to the cash brought in by Elcherino’s notorious/celebrated run in my team last season, I bought players well above the ability levels of the players I had at a similar stage of my last ML career.

I should be achieving a lot more with this squad. Instead I’m plodding along in the bottom 8 of the table. It’ll all have to improve next season.

Feyenoord 1-0 Singers FC

This was actually the first-leg match of the D2 Cup Quarter Final – something I didn’t realise until after the match was over and the post-match calendar revealed the shocking truth. I’d just played one of the most important games of my season without knowing it. Er. Ooops?

Never mind. I’d still played as well as I could. I just couldn’t seem to get a break for the whole game. Feyenoord were in supercharged mode throughout. Despite this, I enjoyed the overwhelming share of possession – 75% at half time, 61% at full time. Possession counts for nothing on its own.

I’ll have to play really well in the second leg to advance to the semis. I want that trophy. If nothing else, it’d boost my club ranking and enable me to get some great players in the off-season. I’m going to need them in 2009.

Spartak Moscow 1-0 Singers FC

Back to the league. I had two players sent off. Bale was red-carded for a professional foul (naughty me, but no complaints). I reorganised my team, going to two up front and bringing on Ruskin for Leonardo. Then Ruskin was sent off for a typical PES2008 nothing-tackle. He’d been on the pitch for one minute.

D2 Cup Quarter Final 2nd leg:
Singers FC 3-0 Feyenoord (3-1 on aggregate)

(I knew it was the Cup this time.)

I made it. In truth, it was easy. Feyenoord were strangely subdued, or my lads were on fire, or both, or the Team Seabass script in the game’s dark heart was written in my favour, or all of these together were true, or none of them were true and I’m a fool, or, or – oh, who cares? I was happy.

Here are the goals:

I had Bale sent off again near the end. That boy’s getting himself a reputation. Referees are picking on him, I swear it.

Singers FC 0-2 Ajax

A post-Cup hangover saw my subdued, lightweight team get turned over with ease by the Dutch masters.

Singers FC 2-0 Marseille

Leonardo finally scored his first goal, a tap-in from six yards after a goalkeeper fumble. I’ll take it…