Mid-season 2014
I think I’ve got a good-enough squad to achieve anything I want to achieve in this Master League. I’ve got quality players from back to front. I don’t need to sign any more players, but it’s a very rare negotiations period in any season, in any Master League career, in any PES, when I don’t sign anyone. So I think I will sign some players.
The reasons for this are varied and complex. It’s not just a case of buying players for the sake of it. If I had to boil it down, if I had to nail the reason why I often buy players during a PES negotiations period when I manifestly don’t really need them, I’d say it’s just to have something to do during those weeks when there’s nothing else to do. It seems wasteful and wrong simply to press the button repeatedly to go to the next week and then reach the end of the whole period with nothing to show for it.
And anyway, my squad, although talented, isn’t as big as it could be. 25 players is more than adequate to conduct a possible Championship-winning campaign (fingers crossed), but I think to win a Treble and be comfortable whilst winning it (i.e. not picking fatigued players) a squad-size of about 30 is ideal. And I might as well set about preparing for next season right now. At least this way the players will have been with me and settling into the team for the rest of this season.
So I had a look round… and I didn’t really like the look of anything I saw. I checked the Youth list, as ever—always, always, always check the Youth list, every negotiations period. There’s usually gold just laying around waiting to be picked up. Yes, you have to wait a few seasons before the gold becomes, ah, golden, but the wait is worth it, and it can save you paying a hefty combined transfer fee and wage for that player further down the line. For me, PES Master League wouldn’t be half the game mode it is without Regens and the development of young players.
Shevchenko was sitting there in the Youth list, and I snapped him up. Like his real-life counterpart, PES Shevchenko can be either brilliant and unstoppable, or tame and anonymous. That’s how I found him to be in PES5, anyway, when I last had him—let’s see how he turns out in this one.
There was no one else I wanted in the Youth list. I had a quick search for a good strong centre-back. For some reason I have to rotate CBs from game to game much more frequently than I ever remember doing in the past. Maybe it’s my playing style, maybe it’s just the game this year. Whichever, I needed the cover.
I found a very useful-looking young CB with the unlikely name of Feli Forranz. Never heard of him. But he looks like he could handle playing the one-game-in-four that he’ll probably end up playing for me.
I didn’t get rid of any players. The two who came in added to my squad. All that’s left now is to complete this season and win the league. I think I’m going to do it.
Your squad looks very ‘top heavy’ (i.e. more fowards than the rest), I always find it hard not to end up with squads like that as well.
Although hes either probably not regen’d yet or is withering away at the end of his career M.Taylor (Matty taylor from bolton) is a very solid looking playing. I bought him in to help strength my Charlton squad for its first shot at at the Premiership, hes everything at the moment is yellow stat-wise with a big 3 year upwards curve. Hes 26 now and I think once he peaks he is going to be a very very good player. Worth having, in my squad hes one of my starting XI but he’d be a very good squad player in a team of ‘world-class’ players.
Paww – yup, it always happens to me in every career too. I think with me it’s because I play the 4-3-3 and it’s a very ‘striker-hungry’ formation, and also I like to get AMFs that can also play up front (and CFs who can play in midfield).
Also when I search for players and perform the Sort by Ability on a list, I go straightaway for the Attack stat, which of course favours the CFs and SSes and AMFs. Because of this, most of the players I get from the Youth list in particular are CFs/AMFs. “Oooh, look, Del Piero, I’ll have him…”
Can see that!
You’ve almost got enough players to form a squad of living legends.