Over on Twitter, there has been several Football Manager based competitions running over this lockdown period, and the FM Lockdown Tournament has now reached it’s 3rd season (yes, that’s how long we’ve been in lockdown). It’s a great tournament which I was delighted to have been selected for after missing out on the first 2 iterations.

In the tournament, 128 people are allocated a club or international side and face off in Football Manager matches with 1 eventual winner. The team draws are completely random, meaning it comes down to a bit of luck and your tactical know-how. Obviously, getting a good team drawn makes things a bit easier, but it’s all in the name of fun and entertainment. Personally, I have never really played the online mode of FM, meaning this is the first opportunity I’ve had to challenge other players, and it’s interesting to see how others’ chose to set their sides up with different tactical styles. Just from being in the discord, I saw a few formations and ideas that I will be trying out in the near future on some saves.

I believe they are planning on keeping this running a little longer, so I would highly recommend getting involved in the next season if you can. It’s tremendous fun and great to have chats and matches against actual other Football Manager addicts such as myself, and it’s a great setup in the discord chats.

Head over to @TheFMLT on Twitter to get involved and check out the work they are doing, and possibly get yourselves involved.

Without further ado, let’s go over my experience in the tournament…

My Team: Club Olimpia

So, I was not particularly fortunate with the team I was drawn, as I received the Paraguayan club side, Club Olimpia. This is a side that isn’t actually available in the base game, meaning my research had to go to the real world. Now, I knew almost nothing about the Paraguayan football league (I now know it’s called the Paraguayan Primera División or ‘Primera División de Paraguay’), and so looking up the club 2 things struck me on the initial research; firstly, their badge is bloody lovely in it’s design, and I think I’ll be investing in one of their kits in the near future, and secondly… their main strike force consists of former Blackburn Rovers legend Roque Santa Cruz and all-round legend Emmanuel Adebayor.

This revelation had me buzzing and thinking I could take on anyone with those 2 greats up-top, however that was short-lived as it turns out Adebayor is not technically their player currently after he travelled to Togo in March 2020 and thanks to covid he could not return to Paraguay. Since then, the club and player have parted ways for the meantime, although both would like him back in the future, however we will wait and see. Have you ever heard of a more Emmanuel Adebayor esque story than that.

So, with that heart-breaking news settling, I decided to go with just the 1 striker in the form of Santa Cruz. The rest of the side are pretty much unheard of for myself personally, however I am now much more familiar. Olimpia are Paraguay’s most successful side, and I will certainly be finding an illegal stream to watch them in the future, once I own their shirt and find someone streaming the Paraguayan Primera División.

First Qualifier: 2-1 Lovely Start

So, the format for this seasons’ tournament meant you had to play 2 knockout matches to narrow down the pack a bit. For me and my Olimpia boys, this was tough, as it was all or nothing straight from the off.

In the first match-up, we came up against Ferencvárosi TC, a Hungarian side that similarly to how I started with Olimpia, I had never heard of. As I felt fairly confident in my main-man upfront, we stuck to just 1 striker, and went quite attacking into this match. We were rewarded in the opening 7 minutes, as Paraguayan international Richard Ortiz bagged the opener. We were pegged back after an own-goal in the 22nd minute, however at this point the stats were in my favour and things looked promising, so I pushed on with the attacking tactical style of play. In the 37th minute, it was my main-man up front who bagged the winner, Sir Roque Santa Cruz. It had to be him, and boy he did the job, as the second half played out a fairly average 45 and the job was done, we were past our first hurdle.

The reward for this victory… Tottenham Hotspur.

Second Qualifier: 1-0 And Done…

The second qualifier, and a bloody tough match-up against Spurs. I’m glad I caught the match stats from this one that I can share, as my boys did me proud against the likes of Kane, Son and Bale. We easily could have been humiliated, but it looked like we were getting the draw until the 71st minute and Kane broke down our defence.

Despite having to play a more balanced-defensive style of play, we still got a few shots off, and had a fair share of possession. As I mentioned, this was a game I thought would be more like a cricket score, but the boys from Paraguay did their nation proud as they held their own against some of the best. A 1-0 defeat against a full-strength Tottenham Hotspur side is a good victory, and we left the tournament with our heads held high.

We will return…

While my time in this season of the FM Lockdown Tournament was short lived, I certainly will try to return with a vengeance and hopefully challenge for the title. In the meantime, if Club Olimpia are looking for a coach, they know where to find me. I could do with some Paraguayan sunshine in my life.

Once again, a big thankyou to the organisers who put a lot of organisational time and effort into these tournaments and it is a great experience for all of us Football Manager fans trying to kill some time over these weeks and months. Additionally, I must mention the charity of this seasons tournament