CM2 96-97 Italia - Career of Gianluca Peroni - Season 5

Going into my fifth season with Cesena having never originally planned to stay this long, and maybe do a couple of seasons to build up my reputation and then move on to a higher profile job! I now found myself now amongst the names at the top of the managerial rankings and with a squad who I genuinely thought could challenge for the title this season! My accomplishments seemingly also hadn't gone un-noticed by the F.I.G.C... After Italy performed "poorly" at the Euro Championships, knocked out of the Quarter Finals by eventual winners Germany, they dispatched of Claudio Ranieri and promptly offered me the role of Manager!

I was tempted. It's certainly on my list to take on the role at some point in this save and add the Euro Championship and World Cup to my Italian trophy cabinet... but it didn't feel like the right time. I'd built up a good squad at Cesena, and it was starting to bear fruit. I had unfinished business and I wanted to give that my focus. So; I declined. And they ended up appointing Carlo Ancelotti, former Manager of Parma in game, instead. Maybe another time! In the interim I opted to make 3 new additions to the team; Left Back: Gianluca Franchini for free from relegated Reggiana as a backup to Gio Bosi, Central Midfielder Esteban Valencia for £3.8 Million who, with 34 assists for Salernitana last season will likely start on the left side of my 3 man central midfield, and German Forward; Alexander Zickler from Bayern Munich for £2.5 Million who I hope will push Simone Inzaghi for a place in the starting 11 alongside Chianese.

I decided not to make too many new signings this season. With Afanasenko having a promising end to last season and with Campilongo being a surprise winner of Young Player of the Year I wanted to integrate both into the first team whilst trying to retain consistency amongst the starting 11. Our first test, and something on my trophy cabinet tick list, was against Juventus in the Supercoppa Italiana. And whilst it was a totally bonkers game, ending at 4-4 by full time after Juventus registered FIFTEEN shots on target, we weathered the storm to take it to penalties before a Afanasenko save won us the shootout 5-4 and the first Supercoppa Italiana for the trophy cabinet on our second attempt at it!

I was really pleased, OK it's the Italian equivalent of the Charity Shield and not the most prestigious trophy you can compete for but to qualify you have to win the league or the Coppa Italia, neither of which are easy. And I really wanted to check it off as a winner at least once! So I was pretty happy even if we did have to edge it on penalties! Following that win we dispatched Ancona from the Coppa Italia with a 3-0 win at home and started our league campaign with a 3-0 win away at Venezia before commencing our European campaign back in the Cup Winners Cup again this season with an away tie against Estonian side FC Tavalte Tallinn.

I don't know much about Estonian football, wasn't Mart Poom Estonian? But FC Tevalte Tallinn didn't really prove to be much a challenge as we steamrollered them 11-1 on aggregate across both ties. Back in Serie A, we picked up three wins in a row in between European ties with victories over Ancona, Lecce and a great win away at Juventus 2-1. We were drawn against Universitea Craiova in the second round, another quite friendly draw if I'm being honest given the depth of competition in the Cup Winners Cup. Returning to Serie A, we suffered our first loss away at Roma 4-2, but responded with a great win at Inter 5-1! Before beind held to a draw with a 1-1 against 'frienamies'; Sampdoria. Univ. Craiova again proved to be not too much of a challenge, although tight, we came away as overall winners; 6 - 5 on aggregate and also progressed in the Coppa Italia beating Salernitana 2-1. Wins against Foggia, Bolonga and Genoa in the league as well as draws against Pescara, Fiorentina and Milan, meant that we picked up 12 points from a possible 27, suffering losses to an in form Cremonese, Bari and Lazio. But with 28 points after 16 games we sat, again, comfortably in the top half of the table in 3rd place and 5 points off Inter on top.

Back in the Coppa Italia we - once again - faced off against Sampdoria and across two legs beat them 6-3 on aggregate to book a place in the Semi Finals. We went on a 4 game winning streak in the league with wins over Brescia, Venezia, Ancona and Juventus (and I was delighted to score 2 league victories over Juventus in the same season!) We drew 1-1 with Bari away in the first leg of the Coppa Italia Semi Final but I wasn't too concerned as Bari are a tough side to play. We lost 3-0 to Lecce which was a dreadful game we didn't even turn up for, but regained our confidence with a 4-1 win over Sampdoria - our 4th time playing them this season... to then just narrowly edge Bari in the Coppa Italia Semi 2nd leg with a 2-1 win at home, setting up a chance to retain our trophy with a cup final showdown against Serie B champions candidates, and Carlo Ancellotti's former team; Parma.

Back in Europe, having been gifted fairly easy ties in FC Tevalte Tallinn and Univ. Caiova, we were drawn against a familiar opposition in England's Arsenal. Last years winners of the tournament, but also the team we knocked out in the Semi's two years ago. Nevertheless I thought that might be the end of our European run but after managing to salvage a 3-3 draw at Highbury after being 2-0 down at half time, I thought there might be chance we could beat them at the Dino Mannuzzi. And sure enough, when it came to playing us at home we demolished them with an incredible 5-2 win! This setting up a Semi Final tie against Belgian RSC Charleroi who we're strong... they'd gotten this far, but a 3-0 win at home against them coupled with a.. FIVE NIL win away meant that we were once again going to a Cup Winners Cup final against Portugal's Benfica.

We had lost out in this position before, against FC Arges Pitesti, so I took nothing for granted, but I actually felt a little bit better about playing a more recognizable team in Benfica. Although to get to the final they had knocked out Fenerbahce, Deportivo and PSV so clearly they weren't going to be pushovers... Whilst all of this was going on, league form had been going very well. We picked up 6 wins out of 7 with wins over Inter, Roma, Foggia, Cremonese, Bologna, and Bari. With only a disappointing loss away at Pescara 2-0 blotting our copy book. Sandwiched between Cup Winners Cup Semi ties we drew 2-2 away at Parma in the Coppa Itallia Final first leg with Parma playing much more like a top half Serie A team and demonstrating why they comfortably sat top of Serie B. After our magnificent victory over Charleroi in Belguim 5-0, we returned back to Italy and in our home tie obliterated Parma 5-1 to take it to 7-3 on aggregate and retain the Coppa Italia trophy for another season!

Really happy with this. And apart from the Challenge Cup with Queen's Park (it's considered a minor competition so does it count? Does it not? I don't know...), I haven't retained back to back trophies yet in these CM96 leagues saves so a game first and blog first. And also it was our 3rd Coppa Italia in 4 seasons. I think 2 more and we get to keep it! There was just 5 games left to play and 2 trophies still in contention; the Serie A title and the Cup Winners Cup. We took a step closer to the Serie A title with a 3-1 win against Genoa and an 8 point lead over Inter in second with 3 games to play meaning that if we won our next game against Milan, regardless of the Inter result we were Serie A champions. However, things didn't go to plan and in a lacklustre effort we ended up losing 1-0. But when I got back to the Results screen and saw that Inter had been soundly beaten 3-0 away at newly promoted Ancona (?) I suddenly realized we had done it?!

We had done enough! We had won the Serie A title with a 1-0 loss away! With 2 games left to play we held our 8 point lead and Inter in second now mathematically couldn't catch us! Those early season victories over Juventus and Inter had ultimately been a difference maker!

In real life, in the 1996/97 season Cesena were relegated out of Serie B after finishing third from bottom (Cremonese and Palermo were relegated below them, Cosenza with them). In 5 seasons I'd taken them from relegation threatened candidates to Serie A champions! Not that that was ever the challenge from the beginning, but I will take it! And not to diminish what I accomplished with Hereford in my England save, but this felt like much more of an accomplishment. The level of competition in Serie A is surprisingly high, at least in this in-game universe, and you aren't guaranteed a win against any team really. Even newly promoted Serie B teams will pose a challenge. So to take Cesena to league champions, I was really happy with this accomplishment. BUT there was one more trophy left to play for yet. A show down against Portuguese heavyweights Benfica at The Nou Camp in Spain.

It had already been my most successful season yet, but could I go 4 for 4? Or would we once again get all this way to fall at the final hurdle? Things started off rocky when a handball in the box gifted Benfica a penalty in the 14th minute... but Afanasenko denied Paulao a goal and it stayed at 0-0 until half time. In the second half we put one passed Manuel Tomas of Benfica with a goal from Vincenzo Chianese but Benfica responded 7 minutes later with Paulao adding his name to the score sheet this time to make it 1-1 by the 57 minute. And... it stayed that way up until the end of 90 minutes. In Extra Time though, I subbed off an exhausted Chianese for Alexander Zickler who hadn't really been setting Italian football on fire by this stage... with 4 goals in 23 appearances... but in Europe he'd scored 4 in 5 games. In the 94th minute we were gifted a penalty ourselves and stepping up to take it was Alexander Zickler! He (presumably...) blasted it home to take it to 2-1 our way and I immediately switched to Sweeper Defensive to see out the last 26 minutes! Although Benfica never really mounted a come back and after 120 minutes of football we had done enough to secure victory and lift our 4th trophy of the season!

Supercoppa Italiana, Coppa Italia, Serie A and the Cup Winners Cup. The most successful season I've had with any team in any of these CM96 Leagues so far. And this Cesena side may just be the best side I've managed yet. And I managed a Scotland side that won the World Cup! The final 2 games of the league season were a 1-0 win at home to Lazio and 1-0 loss away at Brescia but to be honest we were, I think the phrase is, on the beach by that point. Registering 1 shot on goal and 1 shot on target the whole game! But I didn't really care. We'd done all the hard work. And despite losing the last game of the season we ended up finishing 11 points above Juventus in 2nd.

Our third season in Serie A and our best points tally with 67 points from 34 games. And that's the Serie B title and the Serie A title now both in the trophy cabinet. It's been an incredible season and I genuinely don't think I'll be able to replicate it again! But the squad is relatively young with Bosi and Tsymbalar being the oldest members of the starting 11 at 31. So I'm hopeful that there are at least a couple of seasons yet where this same crop of players can continue to perform at their current level if I can do enough to hold on to them. Omar Melizza was once again Player of the Season. He missed out on a handful of games owing to injury / fitness but as the middle Midfielder in our 3 man central midfield he consistently played well and bagged 12 goals in 31 games. When he is fit. He starts.

Top goalscorer this season was Vincenzo Chianese with 30 goals across 43 games. Having a decent but not spectacular debut campaign for us, I still had faith that he could be our leading man and he was incredible this season. Also notching up 18 assists along side Simeone Inzaghi for most of the season (who also had a decent second season with 14 goals in 39 games) and becoming the defacto starting striker displacing Girolamo Bizzarri from the squad.

And leading the way creatively was new signing Esteban Valencia on the left hand side of our 3 man central midfield. With a staggering 35 assists in 40 games, it should be noted that he's also our corner taker... but unlike Zironelli before him, he's a better player on the pitch with it, finishing the season with a 7.37 average rating. I signed him to create goals for us and he did exactly that and is potentially the driving force behind our success this season. You can't score a chance if you aren't given a chance to begin with...

And I don't usually do this... but a little bit of personal success! Owing to our 4 trophy haul this season and potentially because of the Cup Winners Cup victory I also topped the Managerial Table for the first time, outscoring Marcello Lippi in second by 160,000 points despite Juventus beating Real Madrid in the European Cup this season!

At the End of Season Awards we absolutely cleaned up! Vincenzo Chianese was voted Football Writer's Footballer of the Year, Omar Melizza took Player of the Year, Nicola Campilongo took Young Player of the Year for the second year running, I took Serie A Manager of the Year, and Chianese was Serie A top scorer! Practically everything we could have won, we did win! Very nice to add another Manager of the Year to my personal trophy cabinet to go alongside my 1997 Serie B Manager of the Year award!

Looking ahead I've been enjoying this Italian leagues save quite alot. It always helps when you have a good team and do well... but it's also been fun to play. I thought about; do I want to stop here and have a go at something else? But I think for now I'm going to carry on with it. I have a few more goals I want to accomplish first; I want to win the European Cup and the UEFA Cup - not necessarily with Cesena - at some point. I think we will compete for the European Super Cup against Juventus next season, so let's have a go at winning that. I would also like to have another go at managing an National team after playing as Scotland and Wales in prior saves and win some International trophies and I always keep a tab on who is newly promoted to Serie B at the end of each season. If a particularly currently famous-in-real-life team from Lombardy just so happened to become manageable in game, then the opportunity to play as them might just be too much to resist. But for the moment, I'm committed to taking The Seahorses into at least another season and defending our Serie A crown!