CHELSEA, the "BLUES"

Hello everyone, this is a tribute to the game Championship Manager 97/98, a soccer management team that really kicks.(puns intended) I would like to share with you here the wonderful experiences I had in managing Chealse FC in the game, which is quite challenging as the Board of Directors expect to see a silverware/trophy almost every year.

I am currently in my fourth season, and I bet you will be completely surprised to see the players I have from the original team, the team for the first season, the team for the second season, the team for the third season, and the team for the current season (4th).

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For my first season in the English Premier League, I actually did quite well, based on the changes that went through. As I tried to get rid of all foreign players in my team, I managed to sell Petrescu and Babayaro (who stayed 1 season due to injury, but played well after recovery) and Poyet (played extremely well first season) was finally relegated to my B-squad because his salary ($24,000/week) was getting too high, although he still perform very well in season two.

Most of the other *Stars* in the team were also sold, or traded for cheaper players, and from the sales of those players, Chelsea made a profit of almost $37million pounds.

At the end of the season, in the last game, Chelsea was at the number 4th position with a 2 points lead over Blackburn Rovers, but I sadly only managed a draw, while they defeated Middlesbrough 4-0 and won on goal differences. Luckilly, I won the Cups Winners Cup in the penalty shoot-out, 3-2 even though I had 2 players injured during the game, and missing my 1st and 3rd penalty shots. Richard Wright was the-man-of-the-match. In the same year, Flo narrowly missed out on the Golden Boots award for Premier Division, scoring 32 goals, being edged out by Dwight Yorke with 33 goals. Gianfranco Zola was named the European Player of the Year with an average of almost 7.90 in domestic, european and international games. Same season saw the world transfer fee shattered twice, the first time when Blackburn Rovers bought Sol Campbell from Totenham Hotspurs for $15.5million pounds and Perez Alfunso Munso to Juventus, and the sale of $20millions, to Manchester United, from Newcastle...Alan Shearer!


    

I had just started the second season, and bought/sold a few more players. I am beginning to feel that I had made a bad decision, because I am messing my team up all over again. I guess the biggest achievement I had made during the pre-season period was purchasing Michael Owen from Liverpool for $14.4million pounds. Sure it is expensive, but as a starter, he is my current top scorer. Problem is deciding whether to field Michael Owen/Tore Andre Flo($9.75million pounds) or Michael Owen/Michael Branch($8.75million pounds) as my twin strikeforce. Sometimes, I even deploy Zola as a creative striker, away from his supporting playmaker role right behind the strikers.
The biggest dissappointment for my team is Sol Campbell, whom I bought from Blackburn (yeah, can you believe it?) for $9.5million pounds, as he is a D/LC, I tried him on both left-back and center-left position, and he is not playing up to his worth.


SEASON ONE IN THE EPL

TOP FIVE STANDINGS FOR SEASON 1
  1. MANCHESTER UNITED
  2. ARSENAL
  3. NEWCASTLE
  4. BLACKBURN
  5. CHELSEA
Season one was an experimental year. There were many tradings where I sold and bought many players, which ultimately gave me a big check for further purchase of players and player salary further down the seasons. It is a crazy year, as far as the team performance go. It was a one-way race since the beginning for Manchester United, and the rest of the clubs were just trying to qualify for Europe, including Chelsea. The only consolation is the Cup Winners Cup, which I finally won. Zola was European Player of the Year, and my group of little young players gaining experience in high-level competition.In my first season, I employed a typical 3-4-1-2 passing formation, which is quite successful, with Flo and Branch causing great deal of trouble for opposing goalkeepers.

SEASON TWO IN THE EPL

TOP FIVE STANDINGS FOR SEASON 2
  1. ASTON VILLA
  2. MANCHESTER UNITED
  3. ARSENAL
  4. NEWCASTLE
  5. CHELSEA
Second season started well, I defeated Manchester United in my first game, everything looked rosy. I will go on and defeat Man.U again in the European SuperCup, 3-1(H) and 1-3(A) for a 6-2agg. (pretty impressive =) ) I bought some good players, most notably Sol Campbell from Blackburn for $9.5million, and Michael Owen from Liverpool for $14.4million. This same year also saw me repeating my success in the Cup Winners Cup again, where I defeated Feyernood in the semi-final, and Inter-Milan in the final. I also won the FA Cup, surprisingly, which finally gave me a total of 3 Cups (FA, Cup Winners Cup, European Super Cup) In the second season, I began to change my formation to be based upon the players I have. I used 2 different formations, either a 4-3-1-2 passing defensive or a 4-3-1-2 passing offensive. Once in a while, I will resort to the traditional 4-3-3 formation because of my offensive firepower in Michael Owen, Tore Andre Flo and Michael Branch/Mike Forsell(strange player).

Forsell started the game at the age of 16. I barely used him, and then threw him down to my B-squad in my first season. When I checked on him after the end of season 1, his value shot to $9million, and I was astounded, and took him up to the A-team. He has been performing rather well. Also in this season, saw the injury to my favorite player in the entire squad...Gianfranco Zola. Broken leg in the semi-final of the Cup Winners Cup, out for 15 long months! I ended the season in dissapointment again, edged out from the top three spots for the second consecutive years.


SEASON THREE IN THE EPL

TOP FIVE STANDINGS FOR SEASON 3
  1. MANCHESTER UNITED
  2. CHELSEA
  3. EVERTON
  4. ARSENAL
  5. NEWCASTLE
Season three, and yet again I was involved in frenzied tradings. My biggest catch for the season was Steve McManaman from Liverpool for $7million, Jesper Blomqvist from Manchester United for $900k, and Wes Brown from Manchester United for $1.8million. I started the season badly, going 6W 4D 8L in the first half of the season. In the mean time, McManaman were injured, broken leg, out for 11months, joined Zola in the injury list *sob*