PES 2013 MLO - END OF AN ERA

Hey guys and gals! Welcome back to THE PRO EVO MASTERS LEAGUE! 

It has been a hell of a long time since my last post, which unfortunately was due to many things happening in my life. I was hoping to continue from the last, in a way that would benefit many other players like yourself, but also to give you an insight of what it was like being a die hard PES player. 

I am sorry for the posts not returning for this length of time, but as the phrase goes "All good things come to those who wait!" I have thoroughly enjoyed writing on the blog and also receiving the feedback that came with it. It truly means a lot when you have something to say too.

Within the time I had spent here, I have also met some very interesting people, some of which are also players who have a firm grasp of PES and gaming culture and who are now well known on other blogs and feature well on You tube.

So following on from my absence, what has been happening in my gaming world? Well, since starting PES 2013, I continued to play games as and when I could. I never really played much of Master league offline (which was my main source of PES previously) so I never finished my first season. My BAL was a little more in depth, with BOB JONES working his way into his 3rd season, but still, I never really felt the overwhelming urge to play the mode much.

So what about MLO? Master League Online certainly had me hooked. I remember starting with the default players. Sold a few, then bought a couple of decent players and went in search of that winning mentality. Such as my demise, I found that in the first 5 games, your results depended on which status you were set. I Found myself in the 500 point mark, which was Top Player. 

My first 20 games after that led me to believe that I was not going to be able to fend off many players. I lost too many games with my mediocre squad, and could not afford to strengthen it! My rating had dropped to a lowly 360! This was terrible! The game I had spent hours playing in the past because of my love for the way it felt and what you could do! 

I ended up having a few weeks off because I was so annoyed and had wished that I had never bought the game! MW3 was the back up game, but even that did not quench my thirst, so I eventually broke my diet and went back to MLO. I spent a good hour or so tweaking with my tactics and finding the way to get the most from my players. I won a couple, drew one then lost a couple so it left me back at square one!

Did this deter me further? NO! I was sure I could do this and be able to recoup my status back to Top Player. So I pushed forward and really concentrated in the game. I learnt some controls that I had never used before and found my new style of play. Within a few weeks, I managed a 9 game winning streak and had saved about 35 million to strengthen my team! I was as shocked as anyone would be, but it helped me fill the void of losing so many in the beginning!

After the new year, I was still some way of being able to afford the best players. Renewing contracts was the main problem. My other problem was trying to gain some ground on my win/loss ratio. At that time, I think I had lost around 70 games more than I had won. This had always been a factor in previous years as my goal was to end my reign having won more than I had lost.

So again, my uphill task was ongoing. I found myself swapping tactics all the time, trying out more pace skilled players to form a good attack, but nothing seemed to work for long. I had then decided to go to research mode and see what other players had done and if there was any other way to improve. One thing that I found, along with many other players was that the ones I tended to lose against, or even be paired with, were the long ball, "boot the ball up field" players. The spammers! The ones you play by passing the ball about to make a chance at goal, then with a stupid twist in the game, they somehow manage to get the ball, "hoof" it up the pitch to a speed merchant that is clearly offside, and then score. This happens over and over again and was found to be the evil within PES!

How can you justify that playing as realistic to football as is possible in a game, that someone who cannot be bothered to try and play, but just boots the ball hoping it will go to someone like Martins, then score and win????? Well something had to be done!

I managed to find a video tutorial in which The Midnite Kid had posted on You tube. It showed how he managed to stop Through ball spammers. You drop your defence as deep as is possible, Use your marking tactics to stop the runners and use a DMF to drop back and watch the striker. So I put it into force. Then went off to play. It worked!!! Not all the time, but probably about 75-80%. This was great! It helped me so much, but I still needed to work on new skills and building my team.

I hope you enjoyed reading and hope you can enjoy the next follow on post which will be posted soon!

BOB

BEST CHEAP ATTACKING PLAYERS IN PES 2012 MASTER LEAGUE ONLINE

 The problems most PES 2012 ML online players have, is which players to choose that are cheap. Most of us obviously want to buy some decent attacking players that can have a beneficial effect on our match results. I am sure I am not not alone when I say that there are plenty of times you will end up being drawn against another player with the likes of Pato, Rooney, Eto', Forlan, Villa etc. This of course can be a very daunting experience, especially when your own team does not even compare statistically to your opponent. 

I have been tinkering about a bit with my own ML team quite a bit recently, but really wanted to get a proper feeling of how well a team can perform on a budget. Obviously, my main aim is to become a decent player, as well as be able to compete with the big boys. But the challenge I have given myself is to try and perform on a budget. Be able to grow my team and of course, WIN matches in ML online, just by buying cheaper players and using them effectively.

My current up to date progress has seen me rise in ranks and divisions from division 5 all the way to division 3. This is where I have been hovering over the last week. My points have gone down, but also gone up, leaving me in a position to now think of my next move. I have not been posting much, due to the urge to compete with the budget players and try to gain a decent status.

After all of the highs and lows of this challenge, I am happy to say that it is possible to compete with budget players, but only up to a certain level. To get further, I believe is another campaign altogether.

So here is the brief story of how I changed my team and which players I found to be the best cheap attacking players in ML online.

With a whole team reshape on the cards, I had to be brutal. I decided to sell my non-performing players until I was down to my last 16. With the funds I gained, I checked my game plan to see which positions were needing to be strengthened. My keeper had to go, but I decided to spend between 2-3 million on one. The defence needed some tweaks here and there, but generally was not too bad. Each defender had a 70-76 ovr and was reasonably priced at about 1-2 million each. Playing with a 4-3-3 formation, I suggested a CM would be a good choice and spent around 2 million on Lodi. He has been performing well, and consistently averages an orange or red form arrow. For the RMF, LMF, RWF and LWF positions, my choices would be from Utaka, Obemyang ( not totally convinced the spelling is right!), Mateus, Musa and  Biabany ( slightly more at around 4mil). SS and CF positions would be chosen from C Benitez, Moulongui (again another spelling not so sure!), Mphela, Van De Mirch, Utaka (when not being used on the wing).

From these attacking players, especially when most are on good form arrows, can bring very good results. Al range from between 900k, to 4mil. My team at the time I was promoted to division 3 was around the 36million mark. I enjoyed my best winning streak at 6 games, but most importantly, managed to fend off some pretty decent D1-D3 players.

I hope to strengthen my defence more to allow some pace. This will hopefully catch some of the onslaught of the world class players, but until that time, I hope to keep playing and will reveal any other helpful tips along the way!

Thanks for reading and please feel free to leave your comments and any suggestions in the comments section below.

BOB

PRO EVO MASTERS LEAGUE HAS GONE MOBILE!

I have finally done it and decided to get a new phone! It has been 3 years since I last had a new phone and I felt it was time to catch up.

There were lots of reasons for this, but the most important was that I was lagging behind! Badly.

I wanted to be able to keep up with the current trends, but also be able to get more mobile on the web. 

My phone is not a smart phone, and I did not want Internet access at the time I got the phone.

Now though, I have been getting myself more web wise, and beginning to have a presence on the Internet. I have been updating this blog regularly (although not as much as I had hoped!) and needed something more mobile that I could use for updating when I want to, not when I get chance to.

Having a new smart phone, I am now able to do this. The plan is to leave more posts on the blog, but reduce the size of each post. I will still be writing more posts that have been a decent length, but not as much as my mobile posts. 

Pes is definitely a game that has a lot to talk about, and I aim to do just that. I will be aiming for more posts on all of the modes featured in PES, especially the newer, for instance master league online.

As many of you are mentioning, pes online master league brings many challenges, but also leaves you wondering where the answers are. Come back for more regular posts on this mode and each of the others when I take them more in depth!

Thanks for reading, and I hope you keep playing!

Bob

A GUIDE TO PES 2011 MASTER LEAGUE ONLINE

Today's random post focuses on PES 2011's online master league.

I have had my ups and downs with this mode, but generally I do enjoy playing it.

The whole process of pro evo's master league online is to be able to build a team, starting from the usual line up of pro evolution soccer's own created players, into your very own dream team to play against other PES players.

When you start your online master league, you will find that your players are not very good. Your funds are 500k (you can change the currency, depending on your location).

You use your funds to buy new players.

But here is the bad news! If you think you will be able to buy decent or top class players early on in your master league career, then you are wrong! 

To be able to build your team, you must play many matches against players of different levels. To play a match, you must go to next match, much like when you play Master league offline. Once selected, you can choose to play either a quick match, or you can play in a competition. Below explains what happens in each match format.

QUICK MATCH  

If you select quick match, you will have to pay a match fee which relates to the value of your team. You will then be paired with another PES player that is available to play at that time. 

You are then taken to a pre-match screen which allows you to check the fitness levels of your players and what your gameplan, formation and any other settings are needing to be done before the match. You have a time limit in seconds which appears at the top right area of the screen. 

Once each player is happy to play within the time limit, you can both select start match, or wait until the time runs out, in which case the game will automatically start.  You then play your match.  

After your match, your points will change accordingly in relation to the result. Your points are used to determine which division you are in and are updated weekly.

You will select return to main menu when finished taking a look at the match stats etc. On the way to the main menu, you will then be given match revenue. Both players receive this regardless of the result, but how much depends on how much your opposition's team is worth, and how well you did against them. I personally managed a 4-2 win against a division 1 player who had the likes of messi, Eto'o, Rooney etc (A team of great value), and I was in division 5 with a very low valued team as I still had many default players in my team. This brought me over 350k revenue. My match fee was about 64k.

COMPETITION

In Competition mode, you pay a one off fee when you start the competition. The fee is generally higher than the quick match fee, but you can play as many games as you can fit into the qualifying period. The qualifying period is 1hr from the opening of that particular competition. 

There are 3 different competition modes. Division cup mode, where you play in the cup related to the diviosion you are in at the time, Division cup coach mode, where you let your players play, but coach from the sidelines and make decisions on gameplay and subs etc, and master league open which is a cup that anyone from any division can enter. Be warned though, as there are some very good players that may knock your chances.

You generally want to keep an eye on the time for the next competition, as places in the competitions go fast. There are 400 alocated places, so when all 400 have been taken up, you will be unable to enter. The trick is to enter as soon as the time changes to the opening time of the competition.

In the qualifying round, as I mentioned before, you have about 1hr to play your qualifying games. You will be paired with the next available player, much like quick match. When the qualifying round is up, you will be placed depending on your last 3 results in your qualifying match games. The best advice is to stop playing until the qualifying period is over, if you have managed to win 3 games in a row. The better the results, the more likely you will qualify. Any player that qualifies will be placed in the knockout stages amongst the last 16 players, and like many knockout competitions, teams will go through to each phase dependant on their results.

You may also receive price money whatever position you finish in the tournament.

This is a good way to generate revenue, but you may also lose money if your revenue is less than your match fees. This will only happen if you lose to a team that is a lot lower in value than yours.

So one last piece of advice is to keep playing, no matter what the result is. You will get better as you go along, and eventually, you will be able to buy players.

To my current knowledge, I believe Christiano Ronaldo is about 28 Million to buy, although if you are only receiving about 50k profit per match, you may be waiting a while to buy him. There are other players out there that you may be able to afford sooner, but that is another post.

Until the next time

Enjoy yourselves!

Bob!

PRO EVO MASTERS LEAGUE - GUEST POST

Sunday's is guest post day! 

Unfortunately there are no guest posts for today as no one has been brave enough to write a post.

Not to worry though, as I am sure there are a few of you that will come through and tell everyone in the PES community how you have been getting on.

The whole concept of the Guest post, is to give other players the chance of their say about PRO EVO. What are your likes and dislikes about the game? Do you have a great story to tell about your progress in your Master league, on or offline? Or do you have a group that enjoys regular meet ups to play tournaments or cups? These are just a few ideas on what you could write about.

Don't be afraid to speak your mind (just watch the language!). Pro Evolution Soccer is one of the best football simulation games on the market, and although Konami do not have all of the licences to the team kits and player names etc, you can still find decent option file updates that others in the community have kindly created and made available for free, so others can enjoy playing PES without switching to the rival game that is fully licensed.

I myself am an avid Pro Evo player, and love to participate in matches against other players. I do have gripes about the game itself, but it doesn't stop me playing! There are of course those out there that decide to cheat somehow when playing online matches. I don't know as of yet how they do it, but generally I don't see why they have the need to cheat. The whole point in playing the game is to have fun and try and win. If you have a good match and lose, but the other player is a decent individual that has not cheated and has won the match just because they have scored more goals, then I feel that is a good game. If you play your socks off and the other player somehow influences the game into letting him, or her win without putting any effort into the game, then in my eyes, that counts as a void game! There should be a way to weed out these individuals, and give the good, honest players a chance of some decent games.

Until next time peeps.......................Keep playing!

BOB

BECOME A LEGEND - GALARATH AT DEPORTIVO LA CARUNA

With a new season underway, and a new team, my BaL player Galarath was set for life in La Liga. 

Up against some of the worlds top football teams, it was going to be a test to see if his skills had advanced enough for the tough matches to come. From the start, he was a favourite choice with the manager and looked set to be playing full 90 minute matches. His stamina had been gradually building up in the seasons previous, and overall the stats showed he only dipped with his passing skills. Other than passing, Galarath had gained the stat levels needed to raise his ovr to 81.

To get you up to date with my current progress, Galarath had played every league game and had won man of the match in almost every game. The latest fixture was a big match. Deportivo were to face one of Spain's footballing giants, Real Madrid. My biggest fear was they were fielding Cristiano Ronaldo and he was going to be on form, but low and behold, he was actually out of action! And I mean badly! If you see in the picture, he has a red cross against his name, meaning he will be out for a while.

This was definitely good news, but the rest of the team still looked tough to play against. Higuain was on form and had improved stats over the seasons since starting BaL. My team was OK, but still seemed no match for the might of Real.

I took to the challenge and played the game. Luckily for me, Real seemed to have dipped form and misplaced many passes. A half time  0 - 0 scoreline showed some sign of a chance to win the game. Deportivo had a few chances, and Galarath was helping out the team in many ways. By winning the ball back and dropping into defence, to making chances on goal and having a few shots himself.

In the 53rd minute, a golden opportunity arose and Galarath waved for the ball. He was in the middle of the box, as Guardardo ran down the right wing. As the ball came in, you could see Galarath's arm up as he called for the ball. He volleyed the shot straight past the keeper and scored the opener! You can see the goal below.

The game finished 1-0 to Deportivo, and Galarath was once again named man of the match. A huge win for the club, and a great achievement for Galarath.

PES 2011 Become A legend mode was proving to be very rewarding and enjoyable!

Bring on Barcelona is all I can say!

Please visit tomorrow (friday) for the latest news on my progress with PES 2011 master league (offline). This is my campaign with Blackburn Rovers.

Also don't forget  ............. If you would like to write a post and have your say about life with Pro Evolution Soccer, please contact me now. Posts must be no more than 500 words and can contain up to 2 pictures. Please contact proevobob@hotmail.co.uk.

All guests posts submitted will appear every Sunday. You will be notified when your post will appear on the blog.

Please join the official Pro Evo Masters League facebook page to keep up to date with all the posts. Also feel free to leave comments, as I will be happy to reply to you.

Don't be shy!

Happy playing peeps!

Pro Evo Bob!

MASTER LEAGUE - BLACKBURN ROVERS vs CHELSEA FC

The master league is upon us once again

My team, Blackburn Rovers had been promoted from the Npower Championship and was on course to take the Premier league by storm, I hoped!

The first 4 games had seen them take 3 wins and a draw. Not a bad start to the newly promoted club. The players seemed to be taking things in their stride, but a bigger challenge awaited them just round the corner.

Everton and Fulham had been the harder clubs to play, but still gained 4 points between the games. The picture  to the right shows who Rovers were up against next.

Was this to be a giant killing game, or were they to be knocked senseless?

Chelsea were just below Blackburn in 4th place. Neither team had lost a game, so who was to gain another 3 points? Or were both to get even honours?

I started Blackburn's lineup as shown. Chelsea had a decent team to play against and it was not looking to be an easy game. Would my strikers play their socks off or, fumble to the pressure of such a big named club?

One thing was for sure, the players were not going down without a fight. As the many managers in BaL normally say........."were taking on a big team, try and do what you do best lads!"                                        

So the game kicked off with a formidable attack from Chelsea. They were fast, and Drogba was damned hard to get the ball away from. It seemed as though he had stuck the ball to his feet!

In the unlucky minute (you know the one I mean.......just a little superstitious!), I managed to slot a delightful goal into an open net, courtesy of Agbonlahor. It wasn't the first shot in that space of time, but I am sure you will see, it was deserved after the effort leading up to it.

I had taken plenty of shots previous to the goal, but did not manage to net any. The keeper was on a fair bit of form. I knew if I kept persisting, at least 1 shot would go in.

As the game went on, I was 1-0 up at half time. In the second half, I seemed to keep a good rhythm, although Chelsea seemed to lose theirs. Their passes were going a miss and each player seemed to be playing dumb when the ball came near. I wasn't sure of any bugs in the game, or generally if their players were a little tired.

The match was looking towards a win for Rovers as the time ran seriously close to 90 Min's. Then........under a stroke of great misfortune, Chelsea ended up with a lucky scramble in the box, to which Drogba assisted Sturridge who scored the equaliser. As the game was about to restart, The commentary mentioned that they had levelled with so little time remaining. This was very true, as when the match restarted, the final whistle blew. Chelsea had grabbed an extremely late equaliser and robbed Rovers of all 3 points. 

Not to worry, at least a point is better than none, plus the rest of the season awaited. I am sure their will be more challenges ahead!

Blackburn managed to stay in 3rd place, but Chelsea had slipped to 7th. I am sure this will change in future weeks, but until then, I am glad to be keeping my place.

Friday's post features Blackburn's first Europa league match against Fiorentina, as well as a few results from the next Premier league games.

Don't forget to come back tomorrow for a round-up of Galarath's career in Become a Legend.

Thanks for visiting

BECOME A LEGEND PES 2011 - GALARATH UP TO DATE

After winning the World Cup with England, Galarath had truly deserved the awards he had been given at the end of the season. Not just with AZ, but leading his country to World Cup glory!

Questions were asked regarding his future with AZ and whether or not he was to help with their Champions league campaign.

There were surprisingly no offers on the table during the International tournament for this completely on form individual. He had captured the hearts of many female fans, but also grown a fan base around the world. Did no other team want to try and negotiate a contract for this young star at the top of his game?

The truth is, many believe that the clubs interested were keeping clear and not getting in the way of his form by throwing the offers around. His concentration of the tournament was a must, not just for himself, but his national side and also a chance of giving the scouts something to get greedy on.

Galarath DID end up moving to another club. After leaving AZ, he joined Borussia Dortmund in the German Bundesliga. In the December of the same year (2014), Galarath was informed that he had won the world footballer of the year award! A great achievement and good end to a very successful year.

He notched up 19 goals and 4 assists in 32 games for Borussia. Feeling a little let down, regardless of the goals, he was looking to move away from Germany and join another club. The style of play was not what he had hoped or imagined. When the offers came in, only one stood out. Deportivo la Caruna. They were in the Spanish league which gave me chance to sample some of the larger European clubs and see if Galarath was up to the challenge.

He signed with Deportivo for £2.8 Million on a four year contract. Was he here to stay, or will he end up transferring at the end of his first season like the others? Many have their doubts, but one thing is for sure, he only wants to get better and better! 

Thursday's post will get you up to date with his current goings on within his life in La Liga.

PES 2011 - RANDOM POST

Today's post is the first of many random PES related posts for monday's.

I am hoping to be creating plenty of PRO EVOLUTION SOCCER related content each and every monday. There will be no sneak previews before each weeks post, but it may be in the form of screenshots, video's and maybe, just maybe something a little more special than I have ever posted before.

As many of you PRO EVO lovers out there enjoy scoring goals, I am sure you all love to check out other player's goals to see if you can get any hints and tips which may aid your goal scoring opportunities or even just to see if you are playing better than some.

In this weeks featured post on PES randomness, I wanted to share will you a selection of a few of my own goals. Some are from my many master league games, some are from my very enjoyable become a legend games. I also wanted to make the compilation a little special, by adding some music and a few geeky transitions between each goal.

If you like the selection and would like to comment about them, or even comment on any posts on the blog, please feel free to do so. I am happy to see any comments you have to make. 

The future of my video content on the pro evo masters league will become more frequent and I may add a regular day for certain 'special' moments within the world of PRO EVO.

Anyways, for today, I will leave you with the video I have attached below and I hope you enjoy watching it. 

Please leave your feedback and let me know what you think, along with any suggestions to how you would like to see the blog evolve in the future.

 

 Enjoy!

MASTER LEAGUE - LIFE IN THE PREM

After the quick update in the last post, I got to work getting as much info as I could to get you all right up to date with my progress in MASTER LEAGUE mode offline.

I have been making sure not to play any more games until I am totally up to date with my blog postings, then the future of the posts will come as frequent and regular as I have been mentioning recently.

I do love to keep track of my progress within all the modes I play on Pro Evo, but today, as you can see in the schedule is all about my Master League with Blackburn Rovers.

As you may be aware from my last master league post, I have been promoted after winning the Npower Championship and also winning the FA Cup! This was a decent achievement and I was pleased to be back in the top flight. 

I haven't had a bad start and as you can see I am currently 3rd and have not lost a game out of four played.

I hope to keep somewhere in the top 7, to ensure a chance of European matches next season.

Since I got promoted, I was informed that I had qualified for the Europa league which was a shock! This is not a bad thing though as I can see more revenue on the way and chance of another trophy. I will again see how things go there.

My team has changed for the better (I hope!). As you can see, I have signed Clichy to play in the left back position. Agbonlahor and Valbuena were also new signings and I hope them to be good assets to the club. From the picture, you can see they are all performing well, which gives me hopes for the next match.

I have spent a little more than I hoped, and signed a defender - Gokhan who is an 88ovr and also promoted a youth team member called Tchite who is on 69 at the moment. Babic was also promoted from the youth team but is rated much higher at 78ovr. 

I mainly moved Babic up and signed Gokhan to strengthen my defence, although both have been on constant purple arrows since signing so I haven't played them. Tchite was promoted to grow him into a decent future star with the aim of regularly using him in the first team, but also to ensure a possible future sale. I won't sell until the time is right though. It would be good to get some decent games out of him and see how he progresses.

So now you are a bit more up to date with the progress of the team and can see how they have been doing in the top flight. 

I also want to show you how well the players have been doing. In the next few pics, You will see that Fabiano is my star player  who is currently top scorer. With him doing so well, I couldn't let him get all the glory as football is a team effort. With all good results from teams, you should notice how well other players in the side have helped to bring those results. Agbonlahor has also bagged a few goals and is also in the top scorers list.

As you can see from the other picture, Valbuena has shot up to 2nd in the assist leader board with 2 assists. 

Not to rain on his parade, and like I said about it being a team effort, you will see 5 other players grabbing 1 assist each.

Hopefully the team can carry on with the form they are showing and I aim to bring a few more decent players when the funds allow.

By doing so, I hope to have enough of a decent side to have good squad rotation and also to have enough on form players on match days to take on the bigger clubs.

The future of the club is essential, and I hope they do well in the first season in the Barclay's premiership!

WHAT'S WITH THE PRO EVO SCHEDULE?

I know, I know, its been another week since my last post.

I have been experiencing some real life problems and it has been tough for me to continue in the way that I had hoped with the work on this blog.

I did have the schedule all planned out, as you can see to the right of this post.

But the main thing now, is the need to get back to writing.

I really want to make sure the schedule I have set continues each day as I wanted it to. So as from today, minus any major life crisis incidents, I will try my hardest to make it happen.

So back to today! It is Tuesday and that can only mean one thing...........Master League progress!

The last post I had written about my ongoing campaign with Blackburn Rovers was their challenges within the FA Cup and the current progress in the Npower Championship.

I have since manged to progress them into the Premiership by winning the league, but also managed to win the FA Cup in the first season! This is all played on Top player and each match is 10 minutes long.

I am as surprised as you are to see that I managed both of these challenges in the first season, but I do hope to carry on my form and try and clinch a spot within either of the European competitions.This was a picture taken before the season had come to an end, but as you will see, Rovers were top and continued to hold the fort till the end.

In my next post, I will bring you up to date with all the current progress within my first new season in the Premiership, and from there hope to keep a much closer account of the campaign. This will be aided my much more pictures, and also the best and worst moments in the form of videos.

Thank you for visiting and I hope you come back again soon!

MASTER LEAGUE CAMPAIGN - BLACKBURN ROVERS

Due to unforeseen circumstances yesterday, I was unable to publish a post about my current master league progress with Blackburn Rovers.

So in today's post, which luckily is one of the regular post days about this area of my PES game playing, I will fill you in on everything I was going to write yesterday, as well as a little extra that would be posted today.

So on with the post.

After a surprising win in the FA Cup against the might of Man Utd, I was to continue my progress within the Championship in the hope of promotion at the end of the season.

Hull were my next opponents in fixture 7. I had a tough time breaking through their defence, but managed to weave a run with Pederson into the box. There was no shot as I got taken down and awarded a penalty. Luis Fabiano took it and scored. This was the 18th minute of the game. I managed to continue with the lead until the 58th, but a defensive and somehow AI assisted error gave Hull a clean attack and a 1on 1 with Robinson. Solano managed to lob the ball over the keeper with plenty of time to spare before my defenders caught him. The game finished 1-1 as none of my efforts were rewarded.

Looking for more wins to further my cause, I played Norwich and Bristol city over the next 2 games. Both gave me a 1-0 win and 6 points to my table tally.

The Championship was still proving to be a worthy league in respect of the opponents as I don't think I had played what I would have called 'an easy game'.

Ipswich were next in fixture 10 of the season and looked on form. This was not an easy game, but I felt I was robbed on numerous occasions in the form of Shot ratio to goals scored, and dreadful passing from my players. Well the end result was no goals scored for me and Ipswich won the points. I think the bugs that have plagued most PES users since 2011's release were the cause, but I took the loss on the chin and moved on to my next match.

The FA Cup was once again upon the team and Crystal Palace were the team to beat if I wanted a chance of furthering my chase for the Trophy. They were still top of the league and seemed a formidable force, but my players were also on form despite the previous games loss. I was glad to see my players perform so well in this match as they did the business over Palace and gained a 2-1 victory over the division's leaders.

After their victory in the FA Cup, the team seemed spurred on to play much better, although I did end up using most of the same players each game due to 'bad arrows'!

The next 5 games were much better than earlier in the season. 1-0, 1-0, 1-0, 3-1 and 3-0. 

This pushed the team much higher in the league and into a promotion spot. It was still close at the top with only 3 or 4  points between 1st and 6th.

It was time once again for an FA Cup game. This time in the Quarter Finals! High flying Rovers had earned a draw against Tottenam Hotspur. Was this going to be a knockout of a game or another notch added in the road to the FA Trophy?

Well after an exhausting defensive effort and a goal late in the 86th minute, I managed to scrape a win and progress to the Semi Finals! A result which my back line won almost single handedly. Definitely worth praise!

This is where the post will leave you today, but I hope to bring the next highs and lows of my road to promotion, and of course to hopefully lifting the FA Cup.

Thanks for reading and I hope you visit again soon!

BECOME A LEGEND - GALARATH'S FIRST WORLD CUP

Having played a relatively good season with AZ and received some good comments from his national team manager, Galarath was picked to play for England in the World Cup.

Favourable, above the likes of Rooney, Crouch and Defoe, Galarath was the top choice for the CF position with his National team

He had played quite a few friendlies along the way, but also helped England qualify for the most well known cup all over the globe.

From the start of the group stages, he made his presence known by playing some decent through balls and creating plenty of chances on goal in addition to having a few shots himself.

This however did not reflect in the manager's comments. The manager felt he was a real let down and had not played well. But his stats showed different. 

Being the lone striker it was to be a tough time on poor Galarath as he ended up losing out on many occasions due to pace.

England however did manage to go through to the knockout stages. Was this with the help of their lone striker? Unfortunately not! In the 3rd game of the group stages, Galarath missed out on the next 3 games due to an injury sustained during play.

Once back, His stats showed the promising 'red arrow' which he used to his advantage. The first game back from his absence, Galarath helped England to a 4-1 win over the Ivory Coast, setting up 2 goals and tracking back to defence whenever the team needed his help.

The semi finals proved to be tougher than expected, but the whole team did their part.

Galarath had supplied many through balls and crosses to ensure plenty of chances were created. Although he didn't score himself, his rating was an 8 due to his pass rate and interceptions. The opponents were Spain, who had previously won the world cup.

 The game finished 1-0 to England thanks to a brilliant run by Galarath which ended in the team winning a penalty. Rooney slotted the ball past the keeper and it was on to the Final!

Surprisingly, the opponent in the Final was Belgium. They were also much harder to play than expected, but I believe the game rewards teams that progress further in competitions, making them play better and harder to beat.

Undeterred, England came back from a 1-0 deficit in the first half. Galarath supplied yet another assist to draw level. Then in the 79th minute, a lofted through ball from Lennon allowed Galarath to score the winner and crown England as the World Cup winners!

After the results were shown, it was revealed that Galarath had won a few awards.

World Cup - Player of the Tournament

World Cup - Team of the Tournament

World Cup - man of the match - x2

And of course........World Cup Winners!

A good summer for Galarath and hopefully plenty more awards to come in the future!

MASTER LEAGUE CAMPAIGN - BLACKBURN ROVERS

Apologies for the lateness in the post. I had decided to give my online master league a go again after a month or so out and became a bit engrossed! I won't mention anything about that area today though, but I may write a little about it in Monday's Randomness post.

Back to today now. As you will have noticed by now, Wednesday's are to become regular posts on my master league campaign with Blackburn Rovers. 

I have set the difficulty to Top Player, selected the original Blackburn Rovers lineup, and after the previously mentioned option file update, I have started the team off in the N Power Championship league.

As with the start of PES 2011's master league mode, after the initial team selection process, you are put through a quick tutorial on how to buy players within the game. My scout suggested on trying to negotiate a deal for Luis Fabiano.

I decided to give it a go and received the go ahead, depending on my financial status.

The price wasn't to bad, and well within my budget, so I approved the deal and signed him.

The Blackburn team was not too bad, but lacked the skills in certain areas, especially attack. With my new signing, I was happy with the squad and decided to save my money till the January transfer window in case I needed to bring anyone in.

Getting underway, I soon found that life in the Championship was going to be tougher than I hoped. 

It wasn't all bad though, as I like a challenge, hence the decision to play on Top player mode.

In my first 6 matches, I scored 6 and let in 4. There were 2 draws 3 wins and a loss to.......Doncaster!

Not a result I believed would ever be there in front of me! 

The FA Cup was going to be a challenge in my seventh game of the season as I faced Man Utd. After losing to Doncaster with players on red arrows, to having a team mostly on blue and purple against the likes of United, I had the feeling I was in for a thrashing.

The game finished 2-1 to Blackburn! I was 1-0 down at half time, but a surprisingly good performance from Jason Roberts brought them level in the 57th minute. N'Zonzi scored a stunner in the 74th to put Rovers ahead and win the game! My next opponent was to be Crystal Palace, currently top in the Championship.

I was down in 8th place, but could feel that something good was to happen for my team.

Is this the start of something special? I will let you know in Friday's post.

Until next time, Happy gaming PES fans!

GALARATH BECOME A LEGEND

Since Become a Legend mode was first created with the PES franchise, I decided upon myself that no matter what happens, I would always give BaL a shot and see how well I could do with a player I have created from scratch.

I am sure there are plenty of you that have tried this mode, some who have had plenty of fun, and some who decided to drop out and concentrate on another area of Pro Evo.

Today's post is about bringing you up to speed with the latest news about my current BaL progress with my player Galarath.

From starting his career, I selected the CF position, with SS as a second option.

His first club was to be Newcastle Utd. There were offers from other clubs, but this seemed the best opportunity of regular matches. He did get subbed quite a few times in his first season, mainly due to the limited stamina. However notching 3 goals and 1 assist in the 30 games he played between the 2010-2011 and the 2011-2012 seasons was not a bad start for a player with such low stats.

My favourite team Blackburn was the next team in line in season 2011-2012. Playing 29 matches, scoring 8 and assisting 1 seemed like he was getting into his stride a little more. The stamina during games was a major problem which I addressed with his focus points to allow extra for extra training.

Between seasons 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 Galarath played for Bolton Wanderers. 9 goals and 4 assists added to his career tally from 34 games. It was an improvement, but still lacked the rise I was expecting from his work rate. Over the seasons so far he managed to notch up a whopping 25 Man of the Match awards, 3 FA cup Man of Match awards and was in the Premier League's best eleven at Bolton.

I felt it was time for a change from the Barclay's Premiership and shipped Galarath off to play for AZ in the Eridivisie. The team itself did not seem statistically strong, but they did however show commitment and helped Galarath score 27 goals in 47 matches in the 2013-2014  season. He also gained 3 assists. On top of his scoring ability, Galarath gained 15 Eridivisie Man of the match awards, which helped gain a place in the League's best eleven. He also won the Top Scorer award for the first season with AZ. AZ finished second behind Ajax, but had gained a place in the Champions league next season.

Thursdays post will follow on from the end of Season 2013-2014. The World Cup is soon to begin and Galarath has been called up to play for England. 

How well will he do? 

And will he steer England to glory?

Only time will tell!