Going for Trebles in PES can be a nervy business. The league is strangely the easiest component of the three. Once you’re good enough to be going for a Treble, you’re usually good enough to be able to win enough games over a long season to take the title.

The trickiest part of the Treble is making progress in the two Cups.

Even in PES2008, you can’t afford to have a bad Cup game. If you do have a bad game, it’s better to have it in the first leg of the tie, so you get one more game in which to put it right.

If the bad game comes in the second leg of the tie, you’re out, and that’s the Treble gone in a puff of smoke, instantly. No second chances. It can be hard on the nerves.

I’ve played the first legs of the two Cup semi-finals. I had two fairly bad games in both of them.

First was the Division 1 Cup: Chelsea at their ground. The final score here was 2-2. I was lucky not to lose it 2-1; Mattsson popped up with an equaliser towards the end. The return leg at my ground should be tense, but with those two away goals under my belt I’m confident things will go my way.

If you’re going to have a bad game in the Cup, it’s better to have it in the first leg, and it’s even better if it’s away from home. That way, any goal you score in the otherwise bad game is an away goal. Any goal(s) that the other team scores aren’t away goals. Many’s the time I have been kicked out of Cups in PES because I conceded an away goal or two in a bad first leg game.

Which is why I’m shaking in my virtual football boots over the result of the other semi-final. The ECC semi-final against the mighty Real Madrid finished 2-2 as well.

The difference here is that it was at my ground. Real Madrid have two away goals. I will have to score at their ground, and it will be tough. Real Madrid were all over me for much of this first leg. They played incredibly well. I had to exert all my, uh, exertions just to keep up with them They took the lead, I equalised, they took the lead again, and I equalised again near the end. It was a strangely (even suspiciously) similar game to the Chelsea one.

As for the League… it’s hardly worth mentioning any more. Liverpool 2, Coventry City 5. Coventry City 6, Bolton 1. And plenty more. I’ve all but won it. I’m 7 points ahead of Man Yoo with seven games left to play. They might as well call a halt to it now and hand me the trophy. If I manage to lose enough games not to win this title, I’ll give up PES for good.

Well, this is one way to put your bogey team in their place.

Nine goals in one game isn’t unprecedented for me in PES. I managed it once or twice in previous years. I remember one game in PES5 that I won 9-1. I had Veron in my team back then and he scored four of the goals. But…

In regards to PES2008, for the past several weeks I’ve had a certain sinking feeling lurking at the back of my mind and in the pit of my stomach.

While I was still getting to grips with the game I read forum posts on PESfan and elsewhere saying that the game was too easy and it was routine to get 5+ goals in every game. I never took much notice. I’m just an average player, I thought. I’ll be all right.

If this turns out to be the norm - if I discover that scorelines of 4-1, 5-2, 6-3, 9-0 etc. are commonplace for me in PES2008 - then the game might as well be dead to me. The only way I could continue playing Master League would be to handicap myself with some pretty restrictive house rules. I’ve kind of done this before, back in PES4. I also found that game relatively easy for a PES title.

But all of this is somewhat jumping the gun. I’ve had one 9-0 result. One swallow does not a summer make, and so forth. At this relatively early stage the jury is still out, but it’s walking toward the jury room door and Henry Fonda has nothing to say…

Back at that Sunderland game, Schwarz scored six of my 9 goals. Here’s his sixth goal, set up by a nice back-heel from Andy Cole:

In two other league games from this period I beat Arsenal 2-1 and Helsingborg 5-2. I all but sleepwalked through the latter match. Hmmm.

It’s frustrating not to have hit top spot again yet. Manchester United simply refuse to lose. As soon as they do, with my formidable goal difference, I’ll be there.

Man Yoo, myself, and Arsenal are slightly pulling away from the rest. I’d prefer a two-horse race to the title. It’s more clear-cut. It’d leave me some spare attention to concentrate on the Cups. Speaking of which…

The final match in the pre-tournament ECC qualifying group ended PSV 0, Coventry City 1.

It was a tight, tense game. I knew a draw would see me through, but a defeat would be disastrous, and while it was 0-0 I was always in danger.

It stayed 0-0 until the 80th minute. Every time PSV attacked I thought: this is it, PES2008 is about to mug me. But I held firm. Mattsson soothed my nerves in the 80th minute with a firm headed goal from a corner. I finished top of the group in the end. I would have qualified in second place on goal difference even if I had lost the PSV game.

The Treble is still alive. I did my level best to sabotage the campaign before it had properly started. I have dug myself out of a giant hole that was all of my own making. Never again. I’ve got a very welcome run of just one league game per week for a couple of weeks, and then I’ll start playing in a new group in the ECC competition proper, and the next round of the D1 Cup will also get underway. I plan to take great care.

My performances in the Cups so far have been eccentric to say the least. I played the first three games of the ECC thinking I had won just by turning up. I wasn’t just flirting with disaster - I was French-kissing it whilst stroking its thighs. Never again.

(p.s. I have to work over the weekend so we’re back to one post per day until Monday - then it’ll be two/three posts per day through to the big finish!)

The league is still going well. Played 4, won 3, drawn 1. Beat Club Brugge 5-0 with a hat trick from Orellano (a PES stalwart who is just starting to come good). Thumped Everton 4-0. A tough 1-1 draw at Newcastle. I’m second in the table and well-placed to maintain the title challenge.

There’s a but, though.

The crowded fixtures list here at the start of the season is not doing me any favours (getting the excuse in early…).

I’m kind of prioritising the League, making sure to use Schwarz and Shimizu, Felipe and Mattsson, Bradley and Kaiser in particular solely for those games. The rest can fill in for the Cups. I’m not operating a formal Second XI system as I tried so unsuccessfully to do last season.

As good as I think my squad is, I’m struggling to cope with the Cup games using my squad players.

In the Division 1 Cup, I have played the first leg of the opening fixture against Newcastle. It was at my ground, and I lost painfully 2-3. So not only am I behind going into the second leg, but I shipped three away goals. Oops. That’ll be a testing return tie at Newcastle’s place.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, there was worse to come.

First up in the ECC (the PES version of the Champions League) were Marseille. The game was at their ground. Home field advantage doesn’t seem to make much difference in PES - or, indeed, in any football video game. Has anyone ever noticed anything different?

Having said that, despite me taking an early lead and bossing most of the first half, Marseille went into overdrive in the second half. They played as if they were being spurred on by a vociferous home crowd. They double-whammied me with two late goals and won 2-1. I shouldn’t have tried to chase the game after their equaliser. I should have shut up shop and settled for a 1-1. This is a group setup, after all. Taking the point would have been the smart thing to do.

Toulouse were next. I went into this one full of confidence, on the back of handing out that 5-0 thrashing to Brugge in the league. I fielded what I thought was a great side: Shaw played, Beerens played, Andy Cole played, Traore played. It was at my ground. Any home field advantage that may be modelled in PES should make this an easy win. Right?

Wrong. Coventry City 1 - 3 Toulouse.

I can’t even complain about scripting - not too much, anyway. Toulouse just seemed to play better than me. My players were sluggish and I failed to take many good chances to score.

Played two, lost two in Europe is not Treble-winning form. In the last of the first games against the other group hopefuls, I played PSV. This was a titanic game. I took the lead, then I gave away a stupid goal, then PSV took the lead, then I equalised. Then PSV scored a third. There were about ten minutes left. Damn.

I went into full-on panic mode. My season was disappearing in front of eyes, right here, right now. I charged all over the place. My finger barely left R1 (I know...). PSV were playing keepball. Then I got Mattsson sent off.

2-3 behind and down to 10 men, in the last seconds of stoppage time I raced forward with Beerens, more in desperate hope than any kind of realistic expectation. Lose this game and kiss goodbye to the Treble, I was thinking.

I skinned a PSV midfielder with Beerens and went on one of those long, looping, semi-circular runs that people who play this game online seem to do all the time. I burst down the wing and sent over a cross… and there was Reyes on the penalty spot to head the ball in. 3-3, and the final whistle blew straight after their kick-off.

So, I salvaged a morale-boosting point right at the death. But will it be enough? I’ll have to win all three remaining group games to be sure of finishing in the top two and progressing to the ECC tournament proper. These are worrying times.

This season, for me, is all about the Treble: League, Cup, European Cup. Winning one or two of them without the third would be a failure.