A quick paragraph of ‘previously on Pro Evolution Soccer: The Chronicles’-type stuff is called for, I think. So. I’m in my first season in Division 1 on Master League in PES2008. I’m playing on Top Player difficulty. And it’s been a disaster so far. I’m 5th from bottom of the league with eight games to go. In eight long, happy years of PES gaming, I have never been in this kind of situation before. Not even remotely close to it. This definitely isn’t Kansas anymore.

There are four or five teams above me within 3 points. But two of the four teams below me are within 2 points. Only the bottom team, Celtic (who’ve had one win all season - against me), are guaranteed to be relegated right now. Everyone else can still escape the dropzone. No one is safe.

A run of results was needed to boost me away from the danger area.

I started with an epic 0-0 draw against Liverpool that I could and should have won comfortably. I was all over them for most of the game. I had 61% of possession. I had 16 shots on target to their 5. I hit the post twice during one attack. I hit the bar with a 40-yard shot from Guimaraes, who is suddenly developing into an accomplished all-round full-back in the Roberto Carlos mode. Albeit on the right, of course. It’s still early days for him yet, so we’ll see.

After Liverpool I played West Ham away. With the Hammers hovering not too far above me I knew that this was a big game - a six-pointer. I took the lead and held it until the 85th minute. (What is it with PES2008 and the 85th minute?) They had a corner that I knew they would score from no matter what I did. They scored. Self-fulfilling prophecy? Perhaps. That would seem to have been that. I kicked off in the 90th minute and raced downfield with Shaw, hoping for a dramatic last-minute winner. I shot, but it hit a defender and deflected wide… for a corner.

Two can play at the CPU’s sneaky game. I get lots of headed goals from corners in PES2008. I swung it over, high and hard. There was Mattsson, my second-choice CB, to head home from the edge of the six-yard box.

The final whistle went almost straight after the Hammers’ kickoff. A precious 2-1 victory for me.

Next up was a league game against Manchester United. I’ll be playing them three times within a few games, as they’re my semi-final opponents in the Division 1 Cup. But the Cup can go hang right now for all I care. I’d take 3 points here and now in the league. I have been struggling to pick up results against the poor teams in Division 1, never mind against the big boys. I was worried. That relegation zone has looked like a yawning chasm below me pretty much all season so far.

Pre-game I spent a minute or two in the Regulate Condition screen. I’ve been pleasantly surprised to find it more effective at adjusting players’ form arrows (and less punishing on their stamina) than it was the last time I used it a couple of PESes ago. All thanks are due to Ziggy Bashmore’s excellent Master League guide for pointing me back in this direction.

So it was that I went out onto the pitch against Man Yoo with a team packed by red-arrowed supermen. Apparently…

I kicked off, knocked the ball back to my defence, played it around at the back for a bit, then passed through to Shimizu up front. Shimizu lost the ball. It skated clear to Ferdinand, who moved upfield. I gave chase with Shimizu and put in a sliding tackle that clipped Ferdinand’s heels, bringing him down for a free kick. Oh, and Shimizu got a straight red card, of course.

Shimizu headed for the dressing room, and I fumed. For the thousandth time, I’d had a red card for an offence that wouldn’t even be a yellow card most of the time in real life, anywhere in the world.

Never mind, I thought. I’ve ground out results with 10 men plenty of times in PES2008. A draw would be a good result from this game. I’d just have to tighten up and hang on for dear life. I didn’t make any substitutions. I moved Chiesa back to Shimizu’s position, and dragged the other two CFs into the centre, Schwarz slightly behind and to the left of Boyd (who was playing in place of the unfit Frutos).

Not very much more time had passed when Tevez burst through my centre, evaded several attempted challenges, and coolly slotted the ball past Friedel. Damn. Damn them all to hell. The maniacs…

I would be lucky to avoid a sound thrashing now, I thought. I got hold of the ball and kept it at the back for a bit, knocking it around. Wasting a bit of time, and seeing if the CPU would come out a bit, leaving a nice gap or two…

I played a hopeful L1+Triangle punt over Evra, looking for Chiesa in behind him. The ball didn’t get past Evra’s head - but the rebound did drop back to Guimaraes. I passed it first time, long, to Boyd standing about 30 yards out. I jinked past a defender, to my amazement. (I rarely jink. Jinking is just not me.) I found myself on the edge of the area, clean in on goal.

Instead of trying to blast it past the keeper, I did no more than tap the shoot button. The ball went under Van der Sar’s body into the net.

1-1, and I would have settled for that. But Man Utd were still a force in the game, and the best form of defence is attack, so… I attacked as much as I could. Playing with 10 men so often has made me pretty good at keep-ball.

So, after keeping the ball at the back for a few minutes, I rapidly passed upfield, and once again found Boyd more or less where he was before - standing just outside the box with the ball at his feet and the Man Utd goal in front of him. Another careful shot, and another goal for Boyd and for me. 2-1! This was amazing. (I should play with 11 men the way I play with 10 men. I see that now.)

But there was one problem. I had 10 men, I was playing Manchester United, and there were 40 minutes left to play in the match… Factor in the CPU’s notorious onslaught mode (or God mode, or aggro mode, or whatever name you call it), and I was in for some serious testing, right here, right now.

The onslaught started immediately from Man Utd’s kickoff, and lo, it was terrible. I survived through luck, of course, and some skill. Well-timed last-ditch sliding tackles (for once) and - most importantly - positional discipline. Every one of my players had to stay within 10 yards of their position. No dragging them across the pitch to chase down CPU players with the ball glued to their feet. I’d tap L1 and switch to another player nearby when that happened. It seemed to be working. It is especially important to keep your side-backs in their position, I have noticed. It’s too easy to let them wander up to the halfway line, or across to the CB positions.

Manchester United couldn’t get past me. But I knew by now that it was really only a matter a time before they did, even if it took a corner or free kick.

Then I conceded a corner. It was the 75th minute. This is it, I thought. This is the Man Utd goal. They are going to score, right now. I was already resigned to it.

However, I think I might have discovered how to defend PES2008 corners more effectively. Instead of positioning a defender at some notional sweet spot on the corner of the six-yard box (it always worked in PES5 and PES6), this time round it’s best to position your defenders in and around the opposition players, wherever they happen to be. You have to stand around them, crowd them out.

It takes some doing, as the game will only let you control at most two defenders before the corner comes in - and most often they’re the wrong defenders. But you can usually drag one or both of them into the box and stand them right on the toes of the other team’s key players. Using this method I have found that my corners/goals conceded ratio has come way down. But it is still a problem. The CPU still has a knack of getting that vital goal from corners when it needs it. Hence my worry right now in this big game.

But I needn’t have worried. Over came the corner. It was a high, vicious in-swinger. I got a head on it, and the ball dropped outside my area to Shaw. Every outfield player I had was behind Shaw. I had to go off on a run:

That was pretty satisfying, believe me.

One of the things that PES2008 has got right is that pacy players like Shaw can now outstrip other, slower players. I’d never have made it so far forward with Shaw in PES6 - the defenders would have simply caught up with me, regardless of the stats.

The game ended a few minutes later. Having played with 10 men for 85 minutes and been 0-1 down, it was one of my best performances ever.

Now I’ve just got to reproduce it in every game and I’ll be laughing.

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NB: A word for all those wanting to see either the usual grainy mobile phone photo of the current league table or (preferably) a clear text reproduction of it…

I was certain I took a photo of the league table right after the above Man Utd game, but as a certain wizened sci-fi character might say: Find it I cannot.

After playing a sequence of games - or an entire session - that I think will make a good blog post, I usually just jot down a quick note or two. The note I made after the above three games, for example, reads: 15th p32 w8 d10 l13 f30 a43 d-13 yell31 red21. And I use that to update the information in the sidebar. I also usually take a screenshot of the table, but on this occasion either I didn’t, or I’ve misplaced it somewhere somehow, or I’ve deleted it to make room for more on my phone.

However, I do have photos (plural) of the league tables taken after the even more critical games to follow, and will post them up in due course.

From season 2011 I think I’ll make a new section in the sidebar specifically for the league table. It’s a bit of an oversight not to have already done that, but I play PES first and blog about it second, and don’t ever want it to be the other way around.