Isk42 Legends League Interview with Scruttino

1) Hi, we want to make an interview related with Legendary Players. Firstly, how did you feel when you hear that?

Thanks Ismail (Isk42), I hope you don’t mind me going to your profile page and looking up your real name. The legends league is still a new concept, with each new competition being more competitive. In the first season most managers adhered to the have fun policy of picking players who may not have been the best, but were remembered most fondly in their respective starting teams. That has changed in this second edition, as the managers involved took things a lot more seriously. As a result, about a third of the way through this league crew issued an ultimatum that no more tactic changes can be made. Not every side was making changes, I ran the same tactic from the start, but a couple of sides that began poorly were wanting to make ongoing changes for each game. Given the extra work involved for Crew, mainly on Peter’s (Thunderexpress) end to accommodate these adjustments I can understand the decision to place a lock on the tactics.

2) What was your nation’s attitude towards legendary players/league? Especially in Forums?

Initially I began asking for submissions using a forum thread. Australia had many more managers in the past, producing a lot of great retired players and we still hold the record for most goals scored by a player in a single world cup with Ivan Hogan’s bag of 21 goals in the 2005 World Cup. Also I’ve run threads regarding our best players of the past, in order to name some of the A-League competitions.

I’m the current HRA for Australia and New Zealand, working as a reporter for the zone for around 3-4 years and written on the A-League for the last 10 seasons, along with a few stints as an NCA, so I’ve a good idea of who our best players were. But I wanted to hear from the community, it’s unfortunately getting smaller, but we still have a few managers with knowledge that reaches all the way back to the beginning of Managerzone and they were invaluable to providing insights on players around before I began playing and a sense of their story from which I could embellish. Not many Aussie managers post in the forums, but I want to thank the 10 or so that did during the early phases of putting this team together.

3) What kind of strategy did you follow to be able to collect the team? Were there pros and cons?

I used my knowledge of past international players through being involved in the National team setup and domestic players with a good story that weren’t involved with the National team like Downing Beer, the greatest name to ever be bestowed upon a player before the introduction of youth name change options. I went through every international tournament and made a list all the players that were given their starting debuts in each era, put these lists on the forums and had members of the community recall their favorite players.

Using their input I made the final selections. The original side was heavily weighted with strikers and light on defense. But I thought why not run with it and see what happens, so our 1st edition team was an entertainment plus committed attack, with no thought to defense. We scored heavily and conceded just as many. So at the seasons end I re-evaluated and went on a specific recruitment drive to bolster our backline adding 10 more players. I undertook this task by myself, but I did inform the community of what my intentions were, the reasons why I was doing so, who the recruitment targets were and no one objected. So with a new tactic and mindset we began the legends 2^nd edition.

4) What was the most different story you wrote when you were making up the squad? And who did it belong to?

I had a lot of fun putting the biographies together, though they took a bit of time to create an original story for each player. I turned them as a creative writing exercise, combining the available international statistics for each player and manager’s recollections of each player using direct quotes by each manager from the forums. I further embellished each player with an individual personality as to what they have been doing since their playing careers ended. These have varied from working in the media, backpacking, elderly sea changes taking up surfing, wheeling a couple out of the retirement home, battles with arthritis and those who have settled down overseas to name a few.

Over the years I’ve also been able to gather information regarding why some managers have named their teams what they have. For instance, our longest serving manager without sporadically leaving and returning is Rookerman and his team Glasston. No team have spent more seasons in the A-League than Glasston, 3 of his players have made the Legends squad Cullen Rowden, Jessop Howard and Neale Christini. In his own words his team have been named after the Glasston Bottles factory, I don’t know if it’s a real of fictitious company, but since he rarely sells players and has the only two players Cullen Rowden and Neale Christini in the legends squad to have been a youth and play out their whole careers at the same club I was able to incorporate zonal drafting laws based around clubs only being able to recruit players living within the residential boundaries of the clubs’ territory. I made Cullen Rowden’s dad an employee of the Bottles factory whose family lived in the company built housing flats, so he was a local kid that became the star of the local team he supported as a kids, going on to become captain of the National Team.

5) When you were setting the tactics, how did you decide it? Did you get some help?

The tactic we used in the 1^st legends league was a 3-1-3-3 formation chosen by Dagriggstar, I gave a few options on the forum and he suggested another formation that could fit all the strikers into the team. I went with it, organizing the nuts and bolts of who played where and what rules were used. It ended up being short passing, committed, attack. We scored as many as we conceded, but it was fun and gave me a lot of data on who were our best attacking combinations.

For the 2^nd legends league I made known my intention to reinforce the defense and balance the side out. The changes weren’t radical, 7 of the starting players in the 1st edition were still on the pitch with 6 new players joining the active tactic as either starting players or bench subs. I changed the formation to a more standard 3-2-2-1-2. The changes I made were Paz Beattie in goals, Roger Miller to defense and Amos Fazey as a sweeper, Munroe Waterland moved from the bench to starting striker and Brandon Pickhills, Eliot Cuddihy and Zackery Forrest joined the bench.

I made any changes based on the data from the legends 1^st edition. Bo Boylin remained in central midfield with Cullen Rowden as wide midfielder. Murdock Rizzardo became our main striker, Bickford Bundy wide striker and Munroe Waterland sat in behind them. Amos Fazey joined Berke Kean as our sweepers. Brain Beattie became the heart of the defense, flanked by Berry Beverley and Roger Miller, with Paz Beattie in Goals. Bishop Lawrence moved to the bench, with Zackery Forrest, Irwin Finden and Brandon Pickhills organized subs and Elliot Cuddihy our bench Goalkeeper.
6) According to you, how was the Legendary Players League? How do you see your own legendary team?

In one word I’d sum up the Legends League as ‘unpredictable’. Italy began badly before changing tactics and storming home, but they were the only constant in the second half of the season as Turkey, Brazil and the Netherlands all lost and drew games they were favorites to win.

Of the current legends season Sngtn from Argentina sum it up well saying ~ This league is weird, we have passed from champions to be the last team with the same players and tactics.

Given our results in the first legends league I had no expectation, other than a general thought we’d do better than the inaugural edition. But man was I surprised by how we got out of the blocks winning our first 4 games, opening a 5-point lead which remained steady until the end. We managed to beat every side in the league, maintaining our lead from the moment we got it all the way.

I never expected to win the league, but the team has performed above and beyond what I thought possible with all 6 strikers and 2 midfielders scoring at least once. Australia now has another trophy to add to our 2013 Confed Cup success.

7) Which players performed well and bad during the league?

Everyone played amazingly well. When you come from a smaller nation you expect to lose when you play nations like Italy, Brazil, Sweden, Argentina, Turkey and the Netherlands. Yet we beat them all, some twice.

Keepers – Paz Beattie in goals was the stability we needed, while Elliot Cuddihy remained on the bench the whole season, he was the only player not get on the pitch.

Defenders – Brain Beattie in the center of defense was his normal tough self. 2 draws and 2 losses came when he was either subbed off for receiving a yellow card, sent off directly or absent because of said suspension. Our other defenders Roger Miller, Berry Beverley and sub Bishop Lawrence played their roles well but it was all held together best when Brian was in the middle.

Sweepers – Berke Kean was going to play well anywhere, but the surprise was how effective Amos Fazey was. During his playing career he was as a striker that learned to defend in his 30’s. Unlike Berke Kean who was fast tracked into the national team as a starter in his early 20’s, Amos was lucky to get on the bench and spent most of his time in the reserves. In this tournament he found his true calling as a defensive sweeper.

Midfielders – These two stayed in the same positions they were from the 1^st edition of the legends league. I have no idea what Bo Boylin’s (1 goal) ball count or skills actually are, but he was rock solid in a hardest position on the field. Then with Cullen Rowdon (2 goals) as our attacking wide midfielder, his love of getting forward meant we had a 2^nd wide attacking midfielder/supporting striker on the field at all times.

Strikers – Everyone was brilliant as they shared the goals around, Murdock Rizzardo (16 goals), Bickford Bundy (15 goals) and Munroe Waterland (11 goals) all clicked from the outset. When one had an off day, another would step up and score. This combined with an equally effective subbing trio of past Crimson Eagles greats Irwin Finden (7 goals) and Zackery Forrest (5 goals), with wandering utility Brandon Pickhills (4 goals) playing Waterland’s role as striker/attacking midfielder.

This has been a team effort all over the pitch. We didn’t have any bad players, Brian Beattie got sent off twice, but in a league setup I’ll happily accept that for the safety of knowing we have a tough central defender not afraid to put in a hard challenge.

8) Which match was the most challenging one for you? (It would be the teams except yours.)

Turkey were the only side that ran a wing defense/wing attack for the full 90 minutes. Brazil had wings as an alternative formation triggered in specific circumstances, though I don’t know what these circumstance were as I couldn’t watch matches with my web browser at the time. 6 teams were running 4 defenders at the back. So with the intention of using the same tactic in every game, I chose a 3-man triangle defense, with a short passing attack to grab all the small advantages I possibly could. Knowing that I’d be at a disadvantage against Turkey, but calculating I’d make up the points difference against everyone else.

So with this in mind our most challenging game was the round 10 rematch against Turkey, we got lucky in our first round game as they were experimenting with a short lived tactic winning 3-0, but this return fixture was going to be different. Turkey won 8-1 as they wiped us off the park. Another drubbing followed in round 16 in our rematch with Italy losing 6-0, this was surprising as we won the first match in an even contest. It also brought Italy back into the title race as we’d still have to play Brazil, a loss or draw for us and Italy continuing to win would hand them the title. Thankfully Italy were held to a draw by Chile thanks to a red card and 2 very late goals, while we beat Brazil comfortably for the second time in the season to take the title with a game in hand.

Turkey and Italy turned out to be our most formidable opponents. Turkey for running a wing tactic and Italy because their short passing tactic caught fire and a red card was the only way anyone would get close to them, even Turkey lost to Italy 1-7.

9) What should be done to make Legendary League more popular do you think? Any advice?

The amount of work involved in organizing the teams, writing the bios and formulating tactic is very time consuming. Usually it falls on one person in each country, who realizing nothing is happening does the majority of the work. This can leave them feeling frustrated when only a handful of people in their online communities acknowledge what they’ve done or care about the results. I’ve tried to increase the awareness of the Legends League in the English speaking main forum, yet it’s a hard sell in its current friendly league format to actively engage with the broader community beyond the Admin forum.

Another thing is the declining number of Zone’s around the world, with overworked reporters struggling to balance their volunteer work with real life commitment. As you need a zone to publish the player bios in order to qualify for a team to be put together and the bios take a lot of work to put together. With the collapse of all but 3 English zones left in India, MZ Country and Australia because of a lack of new managers willing to be RA’s and fill the positions the left vacant by those who have left. Currently the USA and Scotland may have a zone returning, but they will be organized by 2 managers in Darkline and Whins who are part of the older generation that left their post a while back.

I don’t blame new managers for not wanting to be RA’s, it’s a lot of work for a voluntary position only past RA’s understand as a thankless task. Plus, new managers have watched those involved burnout badly and lose their passion for being a reporter, which can result in them leaving the game. There could still be many more Zones around the world or make a comeback in the future if crew allow them to operate like the current Aussiezone does with a once a season release. Without an active zone in the current setup, many countries are excluded from having a legends team even if they wanted to organize one.

I liked the overall league format and locking in one tactic for the season. As it forces people to get creative and choose carefully what tactic they will run. Because whatever you choose can be countered by someone else. It all depends on the risk and reward of who is playing what over the whole season.

Putting the teams under the control of the elected NC’s would allow for players to be added to squads, their full skills viewed by someone organizing the tactic and friendlies games to be setup without the involvement of crew, freeing up their time for other tasks.

Changing the current Clash of the Titans legends league format into an official international friendly league with matches that can be track through the creation of a third National team page called Legends.

U/21 National Team – A competition for U/21 players

Seniors National Team – A competition for current senior players

Legends National Team – A competition for retired players allowing each country to put together their best ever teams

Doing so would create a trophy for which more countries will want to win. Legends leagues would be the ultimate fighter version of all national team competitions, when enough teams join you could organize it in a way similar to the Bessie with a multi-tiered league promotion/demotion system. Southern Hemisphere vs Northern Hemisphere would be cool to see.

10) If you had been a legendary player, what kind of player would you be? Which position 🙂

In real life my name is Matt, I’m 31, I live in Melbourne, Australia studying for my Masters in Cultural Heritage and Museum Studies. After this I want to begin a PhD, obtain my doctorate and earn a living as an Anthropologist. I was born with natural athletic ability I’ve played many sports, including both indoor and outdoor football. I’ve played every position across the pitch and in goals. I can tackle, pass and shoot with both feet, the right for power and swerve, the left for increased control, spin and dip. My favorite position is central midfield, as you’re involved in making forward runs, setting up the attack with through balls, firing off a few shots, taking free kicks, corners and penalties. But also tracking back, organizing the defensive line and putting in the tackles. I’d love to be where Bo Boylin is commanding the center circle.

Clash of the Legends 2^nd Edition Final League Standings

	Team	M	W	D	L	+	–	=	P	Last 6
1	Australian Legends	18	12	2	4	61	39	22	38
2	Italian Legends	18	9	5	4	63	28	35	32
3	Turkish Legends	18	10	1	7	52	31	21	31
4	Brazilian Legends	18	9	3	6	79	30	49	30
5	Netherlands Legends	18	8	3	7	38	47	-9	27
6	Greek Legends	18	7	4	7	40	53	-13	25
7	Argentinian Legends	18	6	3	9	30	56	-26	21
8	Swedish Legends	18	5	5	8	36	48	-12	20
9	Chilean Legends	18	6	2	10	37	67	-30	20
10	Hungarian Legends	18	2	4	12	16	53	-37	10

Overall League Top Scorers

	Player	Team	GP	G	YC	RC
1	Tuncay Fazilet	TRXI	18	33	2	0
2	Amerigo Manzi	ITXI	18	25	0	0
3	Ronaldão Abreu	BRXI	18	22	0	0
4	Birger Lundqvist	SEXI	18	21	0	0
5	Almir Lago	BRXI	18	19	0	0
6	Wanderson Costa	BRXI	18	19	0	0
7	Luís Fernando Leme	BRXI	15	18	1	0
8	Concetto Melfi	ITXI	18	17	1	0
9	Murdock Rizzardo	AUXI	18	16	1	0
10	Alberigo Taraborrelli	ITXI	18	16	0	0
11	Marco Terciero	CLXI	18	15	0	0
12	Bickford Bundy	AUXI	18	15	0	0
13	Roger Elst	NLXI	18	14	0	0
14	Sahin Munib	TRXI	18	14	1	0
15	Cecilio Ponce	CLXI	18	13	0	0
16	Iosif Theocharis	GRXI	18	13	0	0
17	Ciro Lander	ARXI	18	12	0	0
18	Eugenios Androulakis	GRXI	18	12	1	0
19	Munroe Waterland	AUXI	18	11	0	0
20	Wictor Mellbad	SEXI	18	9	1	0

 The Australian Squad Stats for Clash of the Legends 2^nd Edition – Top Scorers, Most Ill Disciplined and Clean Sheets

	Player	Team	GP	G	YC	RC	CS
1	Murdock Rizzardo	AUXI	18	16	1	0	0
2	Bickford Bundy	AUXI	18	15	0	0	0
3	Munroe Waterland	AUXI	18	11	0	0	0
4	Irwin Finden	AUXI	18	7	0	0	0
5	Zackery Forrest	AUXI	18	5	0	0	0
6	Brandon Pickhills	AUXI	18	4	1	0	0
7	Cullen Rowdon	AUXI	18	2	0	0	0
8	Bo Boylin	AUXI	18	1	1	0	0
9	Bishop Lawrence	AUXI	18	0	2	0	0
10	Brian Beattie	AUXI	16	0	1	2	0
11	Berry Beverley	AUXI	18	0	1	0	0
12	Berke Kean	AUXI	18	0	2	0	0
13	Paz Beattie	AUXI	18	0	0	0	2
14	Roger Miller	AUXI	18	0	1	0	0
15	Amos Fazey	AUXI	18	0	0	0	0
16	Elliott Cuddihy	AUXI	18	0	0	0	0

Written by Isk42 and Scruttino

Interview with Thunderexpress

1) Hi dear Peter. First of all thank you very much for your courtesy. We know that you are really helpful and kind all the time. You always try to solve problems. So, what kind of person is Peter in real life?
Thank you for having me! That’s very kind words, I try to help as much as possible and if I could, I would have answered all questions from all our users. Unfortunately time is often against me. I try to be pretty much the same in real life as I am in ManagerZone. I am extremely competitive and a bit of a workoholic.

2) In real life, every person faces with difficulties. We all (and still) live in a world of hardness. What is your story, would you please tell us about your past?
I agree that we are facing difficulties in the world, especially in these times. Even though Sweden is blessed in many ways. I come from Sweden, the land of dark winters and bright summers. I started working at the age of 15 and at the same time i studied. I studied software engineering at the university and at the same time I worked as an IT tech guy. I was more or less head hunted to Power Challenge (the owner of ManagerZone) and I never hesitated when I got the question. I have always loved football, hockey and computer games. So this is really a dream job for me.

3) Let’s talk about ManagerZone- World’s Best Online Game. When and how did you join ManagerZone? Do you keen on your team “Laughing Dogs”? And I wonder why your team name is “Laughing Dogs”?

I started working for ManagerZone 5 years ago. I really love working for ManagerZone. I love the game, the Community and the future for ManagerZone. It is difficult to play ManagerZone since I know “too much” about the game so it wouldn’t be fair for everyone else if I tried my best to play. the name Laughing dogs comes from my real life dog. He was a dalmatian and he could laugh like a human, hence the name ‘Laughing dogs’. I am proud of my team of course but I don’t want the Players to be ‘too good’ if you understand what I mean. I don’t want users to think that it is any funny business going on so I try to not rise to high in the divisions.

4) Can you please tell us about ManagerZone’s unknown sides? I mean as users we just play that wonderful game and enjoy. But how do you Crew (and/or other assistants) work to keep this nice organization sustain, how many people is behind this nice organization? And what makes ManagerZone different or special?
We are a small company and a lot of our time goes to maintain the company. We treat ManagerZone as if it was real life. We (crew) take ManagerZone more serious than any other real life sport. For every season break we go through everything manually to make sure that everything looks OK for the new season, every Cup we create is created manually etc. So even though we are not a lot of people we live and breath the game! You guys are the difference between ManagerZone and other games. Our wonderful community is very special. Even though we sometimes disagrees, we get so much valuable input and suggestions from our community who helps us develop the game in a good direction.

5) Have you ever faced with harsh things in ManagerZone? Or did you experience something that you can’t forget? Maybe some good memories also.

The good memories are a lot more than bad memories. I love the passion that I see from Managers, like the ManagerZone meeting in Turkey when Managers brought their families to the meeting. That was really awesome to read about! I have also attended MZ meetings myself and it is always a real treat to meet our passionate Managers. Regardless where in the world I go, it always strikes me how much passion our community has and how much they love the game. It is fantastic to see that ManagerZone brings people together. Since I am a little bit famous in ManagerZone I sometimes become a target for frustated users. It is obviously not fun to be threatened but at the same time I know how much ManagerZone means and I understand that sometimes Managers needs someone to channel the frustration towards. That’s just something that comes with the job.

6) Related with the previous question are there any good or bad memories about our community?

Yes, as I said I really enjoy reading about ManagerZone meetings from Turkey and I hope that I can attend a meeting very soon. Turkey as a community is very passionate and I visit the Turkish forum every day and read about what you like and what you don’t like. I use google translate and usually it gives me an idea of what is the hot topics. I wish I could write more but unfortunately I can’t speak Turkish and I don’t want to disrespect the community by writing in English or Swedish too much.

7) Let me tell you something, recently we have found that there had been ManagerZone World Cup Organizations in some countries in real life (in 2004 in Sweden, in 2005 in Argentina, in 2007 in Brazil for example). Would it be possible again? We would like to host “ManagerZone” in Istanbul.

Yes, that was before my time but I have heard and read about it. It is a great idea and I would love to rewamp this idea. Istanbul would be the perfect place to host a World Cup. With one of the most passionated football fans in the world I can’t imagine anything other than a success.

8) Do you follow any Turkish soccer team in real life? I know that you are a fan of Fenerbahce -do not let them know actually I am a fan of Fenerbahce 🙂 – What do you think about this year’s transfers of Turkish teams?

yes, I follow the Turkish soccer league, but not as much as I used to. We have had a lot of good Swedish football players in Turkey but at the moment Swedish football is not very good (a part from Zlatan). van Persie to Fenerbahce was an interesting transfer but I am afraid the RVP is not the same great footballer that he ones was..

9) And do you follow any Turkish managers/teams in ManagerZone? What do you think about Turkish managers? Personally we think that ManagerZone World League was organized for us –Turkish managers 🙂

Haha yes, you are extremely succesful in ManagerZone, what is your secret? I follow the Turkish top league and the World League. You have some real legends in Turkey like legendaryboy52, unbeatenteam,raikkonen52 etc. I am very impressed by the Turkish dominance at the moment. It proves that the Turkish community is very good at adapting to the improvements to ManagerZone.

10) What is pros and cons of our managers do you think? For example I have to tell you that token price is regarded as expensive for our socciety. 1 euro is nearly 3 Turkish Liras and buying token sometimes can be expensive for all of our managers. I meyself think this is cons for our managers.

Yes, I wish that everything could be of charge in ManagerZone but I promiss you that all the money we make in ManagerZone goes right back into Managers for new servers, new features and maintaining the game.

11) What do you expect from Turkish community as Crew member of ManagerZone? What is your advice for our community and for our managers?

I expect that turkey will be an even larger ManagerZone country and we all know that it is more fun to play ManagerZone the more users we have. So I expect everyone to tell their friends to start playing this wonderful game. You will see a lot of great new features and I can only say that you have just seen the beginning of the ManagerZone era!

12) Is there anything else you want to talk about dear Peter? Do you want to add something?

I just want to thank all of you for playing and supporting the game! You are great and remember that ManagerZone is a place to get away from the hard world outside so please be nice and kind to each other.

13) Thank you very vey much dear Peter. We are really happy to see you in our community. We know that you are too busy but when you have time please visit our Forum pages and at least say “Hi”. Hope to see you again.

I am frequently visiting the Turkish forum but I promiss that I will be better at writing in the forums. Thank you very much for having me in your great magazine. And thanks to all RAs for all the efforts you are putting in to make ManagerZone a better place!

Written by Isk42 and Thunderexpress

Interview with Hogweed

1)In our society Crew members seem different from each other for example we say landlord for patrick777 and industrious for thunderexpess 🙂 how do you describe yourself? Mysterious maybe because we can’t see you so often?

I’d say I’m a controller since I help the crew with things that are related to the assistants. That’s probably why I’m not so visible in the game as Crew…

2)As far as we know you live in Italy. Would you please tell us about yourself and your past?

Yes I live in Italy near Rome. I’m cooperating with Powerchallenge company since 2008 and it has been a great opportunity for me. I started helping out as assistant and then I became Crew. Even if this is not my main job it’s something I really like to do.

3)Italy can be identified as country of football. Do you like football and what is favorite football clup? Italian teams are still very succesful but in around 2000s there was an Italian dominance with Zlatan, Adriano, Cafu, Nedved and Delpiero and lots of legends that I can’t count. I miss them so much. Do you?

Well… I’m 45 years old and I’m a supporter of AC Milan. This team was very strong in the 90s and in 2000s. My favourite players ever are Van Basten, Franco Baresi, Shevchenko and Kakà. Considering that AC Milan is currently not even able to qualify in Europa League you can bet I miss the old glorious years 🙂

4)What do you think about Turkish football and Turkish football teams. Is there any match that you can’t forget towards a Turkish team?

I remember a Turkish coach that came to AC Milan for a short while, Fatih Terim. He didn’t have much luck there but I really liked him as coach and person.If I’m not mistaken he is now training the Turkish NT.

5)Now if you let, it is ManagerZone time- World’s Best Online Game. When and how did you join ManagerZone? And what makes ManagerZone different and special do you think?

I joined MZ in 2006. What makes it special, IMO, is the way you can see players growing up day by day. It’s probably a sort of special balance of things that creates a relationship between the managers and its players 😉

6)What does your username “hogweed” mean? And I see your team name is “Coccodrilli Brilli”. Do they have special meanings for you?

Never heard of the Genesis musical band? They made a song called “The return of the giant Hogweed”. About Coccodrilli Brilli it means drunk crocodile… nothing special but in Italian looks funny.

7)I like asking that question because everyone has a story with ManagerZone: Did you experience something that you can’t forget in ManagerZone? I’m sure there are so many but the most interesting or funny ones if you mind 🙂

The most special moments are when I had the chance to meet in RL people I knew only in MZ. Last year I met Peter in RL and it was really nice. We have been to a meeting with other Italian managers and it was really fun! When you finally can see the face of the person you daily meet in MZ is fantastic.

8)How do you describe Turkish community and Turkish users? What do you offer for Turkish community as a Crew member?

Turkish community is very big in MZ. In these years I had the opportunity to know many Turkish managers and I have to say that many are brilliant guys and loyal assistants. I can say that my role is to try to assure that the Turkish assistants do their best to control the forum and the market, to keep the game translated and to entertain the community with TZ Magazine. And I think that the Turkish assistants are a good team!

9)I asked that question to dear Peter and he was positive. Let me ask to you too: recently we have found that there had been ManagerZone World Cup Organizations in some countries in real life (in 2004 in Sweden, in 2005 in Argentina, in 2007 in Brazil for example). Would it be possible again? We would like to host “ManagerZone” in Istanbul.

I’m only the controller. The decision is up to the “Landlord” 😉

10)Thank you so much dear Alessandro. We are glad to see you in our community. If you have time please visit our Forum pages and please say “Hi”. Hope to see you again 🙂

Thanks to you for the interview. A big “Ciao” from Italy!

Written by Isk42 and Hogweed

Interview with gore (MA,NC and GPA)

1) Hi Luciano, can you describe yourself for the people that want to know about you?
Hi there 😀 I have 31 years old, married, i live in Braga a beautiful portuguese city where i studied Law and i work here for Peugeot as a salesman. I’m also father of a 2 month old beautifull baby called Lourenço 😀

2) You started to play on 2006. It seems you play for a long time for the MZ World. What’s your story to begin the game?
Yeah 9 years is a lot of time dedicated to this beautiful game. I started playing MZ in a lan house where i player Counter Strike, one day a friend showed me and the rest of the costumers in the lan house a game he compared to Football Manager but online and really addicted. Almost everyone that hanged in the lan house created a team 😀 I loved the game and i’m still here, most of those users unfortunaly left the game, but the user that brought the game to our knowlegde still plays, username “mocas”.

3) You compete now in Portugal Super League. And also play in top Uxx leagues. When, you think, you will be in top league of World League?
Being in the 4 Top leagues is very hard, specially for some seasons in a role, but the world league is a lot more competitive, it has the best teams in the MZ world so i think i’ll need at least 4 seasons to get there, but at the moment my time is reduced because my son “stealls” almost all of my free time so it will probably take more than that 😀

4) You are MA in the game. What are the difficulties and advantages of being an MA in the game? Your actual duty is FMA, so how do you see your national forum in MZ? As i recognize 2 FA’s are responsible in your country. What are your thoughts also for the Turkish Forum?
Being a FMA is a role that sometimes can be hard, but the FA team is great so i really don’t have much difficulties 😀 My job is mostly hire new FA’s or dismiss them when required and help them in the hot cases. I’m the FMA for the Portuguese and Brazilian forum so i have more than 2 FA’s in the team 😀 My national foruns are almost the opposite, the Portuguese forum has few posts but the Brazillian forum is one the the most, if not the most posted in MZ. I’d love to see the Portuguese forum with more “life” as the Brazilian one 😀
I think that the Turkish forum is great, the Turkish people is very enthusiastic when it comes to football 😀

5) You also help national football as a NC. You are selected with %30 difference against your nearest opponent. How you feel to work for Portugal National Team? You were in the same group with Turkey on the last European Championship. You lost at final match and couldn’t promote to higher level. What do you think about the championship and Turkish National Team in that sense?
Working for the national team is a great honor, it was a great experience, unfortunaly the results came up short due a couple of unfortunate events, bad luck with the red card bug ;( But it is part of the game, this time we got it, the next it will happen to others 😀
I think that the European Championship was great and ha a unexpected winner, but i saw great games 😀
The Turkish NT did a good championship, in the group stage even tough Portugal managed to beat them in a balanced match they had IMO the best squad, and one of Europe’s best.

6) You comment about Turkish National Team in MZ. What can you say about the Portugal and Turkish football in real life?
Both Portugal and Turkey have great football teams 😀 Always very competitive, Galatasaray, Fenerbahçe, Besiktas seem to be the top teams, in Portugal “my” Sporting C.P., F.C. Porto and S. L. Benfica are the top 3 teams.

7) What can you say about the game platform of Portugal in MZ? What are your plus and minus sides?
The game plataform here is nice, it has some interesting partners and used to have publicity in the TV and some sports papers. At the moment the minus is the low number of users compared to the past, crisis took a lot of users from the game.

8) In admin forum there are studies about the new SIM and you also work as a GPA. Can you tell us about the new SIM?
I can tell you that i liked the tests i have made, that the defenders are a whole lot better and strikers score a lot more in one on one versus the goalkeeper. It’s a more reallistic SIM even thought it’s only in it’s beta version. I believe that it will be the best SIM this game ever had.

9) You are one of the three people in MZ who work as an admin, national coach and GPA. So the game is much more important for you. Can you tell us the role of MZ in your life?
MZ usually takes much of my time, i really like this game, the possibilities and potencial in MZ is gigantic, youth leagues, senior leagues, youth formation, maximization, deteriotation (yeah i like the system of deterioration ). At this moment MZ takes less of my time because of my little baby 😀
10) Finally do you have something to add?
Many thanks for this interview mate, it was a pleasure and an honor, and keep up the great work in the TZ interviews, you had a lot of great interviews in the last TZ’s, from CREW to Assistants.
For the turkish comunity my best wishes and a happy 2016 😀
Thank you for your honest replies and time.

Written by Isk42 and Gore

Interview with Silverkhan

1) Hi dear Timothy. First of all thank you very much for your accepting our offer. You are known as an objective and active HMA and also you are a good leader for all assistants and for the managers, too. What kind of person is Timothy in real life, what do you do?

In real life I work for the Belgian Government, I’m 33 y old, married, have a daughter and play football on a recreative level.

2) We know that you live in Belgium. Have you ever faced with harsh things in your life? Would you mind talking about your past dear Timothy?

Everybody faces some harsh things in life somewhere but of course it depends on what you mean by harsh. I imagine that growing up in Belgium you are most likely to have a good life, face some things that might bring you down a bit but never as harsh as elsewhere in the world.

3) Belgium National Team is number 1 in FIFA classification. How did Belgium National Team manage this big success do you think? What is the main point? And in 2016 Europian Championship what do you expect?

It’s incredible that we’ve been able to achieve the number 1 spot. We’ve got some talented players for sure and we’ve got a decent enough mix of players but I doubt that the number 1 spot reflects the strength of our national team. All in all there’s a pretty decent youth education in Belgium, you can learn to play on the streets but most definite there’s a good scouting in Belgium as all of our youngsters are playing abroad.
My expectation is that the team is being overrated. I’ve seen a lot of other national teams play and I’m more convinced about Italy’s or Englands youngsters. I was impressed when I saw the Polish national team play and I’m impressed by Austria. It won’t be as easy as most people think and I believe Belgium will survive it’s group but will be eliminated pretty soon afterwards.

4) I’m sure you like football much and you are fond of some Football teams in real life? What is your favorite team?

In Belgium my favourite team is Club Bruges. Worldwide I’m a fan of Borussia Dortmund and Liverpool FC. I dislike everything that’s Spanish football with exception of Atletico Madrid.

5) Do you know any Turkish football teams or any Turkish players in real life? How do you comment on Turkish Football?

We’ve got a pretty large Turkish community in Belgium. Cause of that I do know some Turkish teams yes. The three big Istanbul teams certainly are known well, but I also know Gençlerbirliği, Antalyaspor, Buraspor, Kasimpasa, … and probably some more. Sometimes I know them because of Belgian players of players coming from our league play there. For example Ryan Donk, sometimes because of the more famous players like Wesley Sneijder or Robin Van Persie.
Playerwise the older stars like Hakan Sukur, Emre, Volkan Demirel and so forth ring a bell. But also the newer players like Arda Turan, Hakan Calhanoglu, Burak Yilmaz are worth following. There’s of course also some Turkish players that chose for other countries to play for.

On the competition itself I can’t really say much I’m afraid. I don’t really follow it very active. I think the Turkish league is stronger then Belgian one.
It was with a bit of luck that Bruges eliminated Besiktas last year.

6) We see that you joined ManagerZone in 2003. It’s been a long time, how did you join ManagerZone? Do you have a story?

I joined ManagerZone because of a friend who bumped into it. He told about it to myself and 4 other friends. So I started out with 5 guys playing, discussing,… a healthy rivalry. Only me and 1 other guy kept around. The rest quitted within 6 months.

7) And your username is “silverkhan”. Does it have a special meaning for you dear Timothy?

Not really a special one no. I tend to use the name on various platforms. It means the Silver Conquerer.
Silver because we try to win as much silverware as possible, Khan coming from Genghis Khan.

8) As we said before you have been playing this nice game for 12 years. I’m sure you are full of memories, do you want to share one of them with us?

I did come across some nice things during that period yes. Most people would probably mention their first tittle or cup as one to remember, I actually don’t.
I started playing ManagerZone when it was hugely popular in Belgium. I won division 5 and 4 with great ease but then I ended up in division 3.2. A division that is still famous in Belgium. This because of the fact that nearly all of the topmanagers from Belgium passed through it. Guys like jerdefox, denbasti, kleintje, brillian ants fc, bootleg babies .. Sometimes I think that division was througher then our First Class. I took me 7 seasons to get passed it. And I held on, didnt complain but simply enjoyed to big games.

9) We can’t say you are away from Turkish Society, you are always with us. What do you think about Turkish Society? As an HMA what do you see in Turkish Society?

I wouldn’t say I’m never away. I follow from a distance and through some people I know in the community as well as through the xA’s we’ve got there. I’m happy to have some friends who keep me informed and I’m more then happy to have some very good agents at ZenDesk as well as good people in the FA, RA and LA ranks.
When nothing happens I’m also less informed then when things gets stirred up. It’s then when the bells start ringing at all sides :-).

I think I can say that it’s a very passionate community. Passionate in their discussions, the love for their teams and the love for ManagerZone. A large winners mentality with all of the managers, good friendships between managers but equally passionate rivalries that sometimes evolve a bit to far. But I’m glad we have such a big Turkish community and I hope it can keep growing.

10) Do you follow any Turkish managers in ManagerZone?

I’m afraid that I’m not following any managers no. But rest assure I simply don’t follow any managers specifically in any place.
Don’t have a special love or hate for any team on ManagerZone. When I started ManagerZone I did do that, I followed some English, Danish and German teams but I don’t really do that no more. So many teams are good and the list would be to large to follow.

11) You are leading nearly 50 assistants and ten thousands of users. We know you are not only leading assistants but also help users by yourself. Isn’t it hard to coordinate all these people? Do you have any memory that you can’t forget related with your HMA job?

Lets stop at leading +/- 50 assistants. It’s those assistants that lead the 10.000 and more users. And lets keep in mind that I don’t lead myself but I lead with my fellow HMA’s as well as with the 4 GMA at ZenDesk if you pick my part of the game. Without my colleague HMA/GMA and especially without my agents I would not lead at all. The harder work falls on their shoulder being the spokespeople of ManagerZone.

I’ve helped many people yes, I probably also made some unhappy. Not all of the xA job is fun. I think I was most happy when I could help out crew reform the xA ranks.
The regional way of working, the more structured way of working as xA’s, .. I think and hope the xA’s still like that way of working and I hope it has helped ManagerZone to be more transparant and to be more responsive.

12) Lastly, what do you offer for our community? Do you any advice?

Keep on doing what you do? The Turkish community has become a very important community on ManagerZone. It’s become very large and very active. Like I said already I hope that it keeps growing and I doubt I can give an advice to do that. The only advice I can give is don’t give up, even if the results are not as you’d like them to be don’t give up. Keep looking for something new, keep looking for ways to make your team better and simply enjoy building up rivalries with people in your league.

Written by Isk42 and Silverkhan