Florence And The Goal Machine (5.1) ‘Ganso’ The Boy From Porto Alegre

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Welcome to the latest post from Florence, on a cold November day in Florence back in 2019 I decided that I would take myself off to Brazil for a few days and take a look at a few youth team games during a blank 14 days in the Serie A calendar. My first port of call was a game in Porto Alegre between Gremio U20 and Flamengo U20 to run the rule over left wing back Juninho Capixaba who was on loan at Gremio from Corinthians.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine (5.0) The Ponte Vecchio 2022-2023

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Welcome to the latest post from Florence, I can’t believe that we are now in our fifth season together in what I can only describe as a marriage made in heaven. I am really in to the save enjoying every minute of it. My last post was the first part of a player development series that is looking at how I develop players at ACF Fiorentina.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine : One Man’s Rubbish Is Another Man’s Treasure : Part One

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Welcome to my latest blog post, I thought it was about time that I put in to writing a post about how I develop players and have a look at how some of them are getting on. The title ‘The Young Violets’ is obviously taken from the clubs nickname The Viola (Purple) and also from the club that I have chosen to be our affiliate FK Austria Wien who have a B team in the Austrian 2nd tier called the Young Violets. I was lucky that the board gave me the opportunity to pick an affiliate and I thought FK Austria Wien would be an ideal club that we can send our players too to get game time at a good standard. In Part One I will give you a brief overview before showing you how its panning out after a few years at the club in Part Two.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine (4.2) Smoke On The Water 2021-2022

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Welcome to the latest post tracking my managerial career at Fiorentina. Our fourth season together has ended so it’s time to take a look at how things have panned out since the winter update. The last update ended with us on joint points with a Guardiola rejuvenated Juventus at the top of the table and a mouth-watering Champions League knockout clash against Tottenham Hotspurs to look forward too.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine (4.1) Dreamweaver 2021-2022

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Welcome to the latest going’s on from Florence were we are now in to season four of the save and although I have really been in to the save from day one I am now feeling a lot of love for the digital World of Florence. Yes it’s that time within a save that you have developed a bond with a group of players that you can’t stop thinking about and to be totally honest I have struggled to get to this point over the last few years of FM but this Fiorentina save is different and I am totally absorbed in it.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine (4.0) Who Are We 2021-2022

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Welcome to the latest post of my FM19 save with Fiorentina. We are entering the fourth season on the back of winning the Scudetto after the clubs 52 year wait since winning the title back in 1969. The 2021-2022 season promises to be an interesting season with Pep Guardiola replacing Zinedine Zidane at Juventus, Jose Mourinho replacing Carlo Ancelotti at Napoli and Marcelo Bielsa already at Atalanta, the entertainment value is about to increase.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine : (3.2) Standing In The Shadows Of Love 20-21

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Welcome to my latest post tracking my managerial career in Italy with Fiorentina. We have come to the end of my third season in Florence and I have to say it’s been very enjoyable. I was determined to put last seasons disappointing end behind us and give the fans and the board something to cheer about. My last post took us up to the end of November with us sat nicely in 3rd place just 4 points behind Milan and Lazio after 15 games that consisted of 7 wins, 7 draws and just a single defeat on Matchday 15 away at Lazio.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine : (3.1) An Argentinian Shining In Florence 20-21

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Happy New Year and welcome to the latest offerings of my time in Florence. After a dreadful end to our second season I decided that I would make a few changes in the summer and freshen up the squad giving it a more youthful feel by clearing out some of the older players in our ranks see my last post here. I also needed to show both the Fiorentina board and Tifosi that I am still the right man for the job after we chocked when we was on the brink of success last season.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine : (3.0) A New Dawn In Florence 20-21

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Welcome to the latest instalment of Florence And The Goal Machine. We are about to embark on season three in Florence and I am very excited to what lies ahead of us. After finishing 3rd in Serie A in our first season we finished 5th last season and reached the the final of the Coppa Italia only to be denied of our first piece of silverware by Roma after a penalty shootout. Last season we started like a train and by the end of January I really thought we were title contenders however we finished the season in abysmal form.

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by TheWidePlaymaker

Florence And The Goal Machine : Catastrophic Failures (2.2) 19-20

IMG_20181217_073128Welcome back to the virtual World of Football Manager and my latest blog post about my save with ACF Fiorentina . My last post took us up to the end of January 2020 in my second season at the club with us sitting pretty at the top of the table after 22 games and most definitely looking like title contenders. Our system ‘The Iron Triangle’ was producing the goods then all of a sudden the wheels fell off.

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by TheWidePlaymaker