Change of plans.
Starting the save without "Add Players to Playable Teams" hasn't worked out the way I had envisioned. It did give me the opportunity to build Stony Stratford Town's squad from scratch, which was a lot of fun. However, I didn't anticipate what happened next.
It's halfway through the season, and very few players are being signed by the other teams in our division! Week after week, I find myself going up against a team full of grey guys. Every once in a while, we'll meet an opponent who has as many as three "real" players on the pitch. Many of our rivals have nothing but grey guys.
Now that my team has learned its tactic, the game is almost too easy to be any fun. The greys tend to have very generic profiles, with middling ratings for every attribute. My team has considerably more pace, is much more determined, and works tons harder. That makes a huge difference at this level. I can usually launch a barrage of long balls over the defense and watch my forwards gallop past their markers, bear down on the 'keeper, and make his life bloody miserable.
After the loss on 27 December, Stony won nine consecutive matches, with an aggregate score of 26-4. All four of the strikers who played regularly had a hat trick.
When I look at the league leaders in any statistical category, the lists bear a striking resemblance to our team squad list.
I'm going to go back to Square One. I'm staying in England, but this time I'm going to "Add Players to Playable Teams" so the league I'm playing in offers a richer, more realistic context. I'll be back later this weekend with an update.
Sorry for the false start!
