#2 Rookie Season

[Zoone16]

It’s been an interesting start to the first professional season for Alessandro Del Pirlo. In the academy leagues, Del Pirlo got better every game and the results showed with plenty of assists and goals coming in the latter half of the season. So far this year, Del Pirlo only has 2 goals and some assists to his name. From day one of getting to his team, who recently moved from Laos to New Zealand, the Italian central attacking midfielder was held to higher standards than most. Playing in a shadow striker position, the opportunities should’ve been aplenty from the get go but surrounded by older players such as Lopta, Taytow, Goddamn, Clamence up front has left the young Italian in more of a passer or playmaker position for the time being.

However not everything is doom and gloom for Del Pirlo. Halfway through the season, he only has 2 goals to his name but is finally starting to impose himself within the team and on the field. Teammates are finally starting to use him as a ball distributor who can also shoot. He’s hit several posts and has created plenty of chances for his teammates to score, even if they end up offside more often than he’d want. Last game players, against Athenai, Del Pirlo was named player of the match with a goal and two assists on top of several chances that tested the opposing keeper.

With another 6 games before the end of the season, the goal is clear for Alessandro Del Pirlo; continue to improve the attack for North Shore and focus on playing a more complete game in the midfield to complement the transition between offense and defense. After that, it’ll only be a matter of time until he inevitably gets the call up to play in the big leagues. At least that’s the dream.

(309 words)

APPROVED - Please list player page link in future.

[Metafiction]

Jude Greer Player Page
Career Task 1: Biography

Jude Greer's rookie season got off to a deceptively promising start. After being drafted 4th overall in the Season 12 Prospect Draft, Greer immediately made good on his lofty draft position, recording an assist in his first game in a Cairo City shirt.

What followed, however, was a season full of false starts and frustrations, as Greer initially seemed to struggle to match the pace of the professional game. Positioning errors, mistimed challenges, errant passes and more dogged Greer all season as he often failed to make a significant impact, and he only recorded one more assist that season--in Cairo's final league game. Throughout the season, Greer was dogged by critical press coverage, not the least of which from pundit Paul Merson, who for some unknown reason (though seeing as Greer turned down a developmental contract from Arsenal as a teenager to attend Sewanee University, "sour grapes" has been floated as a possible motive) is intent on emphasizing every mistake Greer makes while drastically downplaying the Nashville native's better moments--of which, in fairness, Greer's rookie season had very few to offer.

To make matters worse, Cairo struggled mightily on the whole, as despite a wealth of talent on the wings, the Pyramids lost eight of their fourteen matches and conceded the second-most goals in the Minor Division with 30 (behind only Athenai's 36). It's not immediately clear where the blame lies for the performance, but nonetheless it remains a bad visual for a newly-drafted defender.

Fortunately for the left-back, the second season appears to have brought much better fortunes. After a respectable performance at the World Simulation Football Classic in the offseason, Greer's sophomore campaign has proven significantly more fruitful, with six assists from eleven overall appearances as of this writing. In addition, Greer managed to net his first career goal on Matchday 6 against Athenai, marking an unforgettable moment and a significant milestone in his career.

With a handful of matches still to play in Season 13, Greer will probably prefer not to think about the disaster that was his rookie season. Yet in some ways, it could be argued that his newfound success couldn't have happened were it not for that rough first season. After all, they say struggle breeds success, right?

(375 words)

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[Puppy]

Career Task One
Player Page

The rookie season of Wang Zhihao could be seen as a relative success given their first introduction to professional football. Against a league of growing talents, experienced veterans, and other hungry young players, the competition was fierce at every turn, against every opponent. Coming into a Montreal side that had finished bottom half of the league the season before, struggles were expected from day one. Still, despite the adversity, Zhihao managed to play a key role in several matches for the Canadian side. Not only did the young Qingdao native managed to lead Montreal in assists with 10 total across 17 games in league and cup. Added on 3 goals and Zhihao displayed good promise for their upcoming seasons in the Simulation Minor League.
 
Zhihao came out strong, scoring a debut goal in a 3-1 win against eventual 3rd place finishers Cairo for a surprise victory in retrospect. These performances were followed by creating an assist in a draw to FC Kaapstad, with another coming in the next match in a 2-2 draw with Inter London – eventual league and cup winners for the season. These three matches saw the Chinese midfielder get off to start with a 7.5 rating. This early season form didn’t last, as over the next 6 matches, Zhihao only managed to put together a 6.7 average and only two assists, both coming in a 2-2 draw with Seoul. The latter half of the season boasted better results, as improved performances on the pitch came through. A string of five games came in the form of getting matches scores in order of 7.0, 7.2, 7.4, 7.9, and a season best 8.2. Over that streak of games, Zhihao put in an impressive 2 goals and 4 assists. A series of three final games saw more benign outings from the rookie midfielder, but by then the team had already been cemented into their place in the standings. There is plenty of enthusiasm both in Qingdao and Montreal for Zhihao’s sophomore season, something the young player is determined on living up to.

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[Durodo]

Player Page - Erik Beermann

Career Task #1 - Biography

With the first season in SSL’s Minor League under his belt, Erik Beermann can look back at a pretty successful rookie year. Not only on personal terms, but also as a collective team with Cairo City. On the team side of things Beermann and the ‚Mummies‘ were in the fight for the Minor League title for a long while. Ultimately they finished just short of it, losing ground in the last few weeks of the season and only ending up in 3rd due to a worse goal difference than North Shore. With them fighting for the title for majority of the season, Beermann did contribute effectively to helping the team succeed. Similarly to his time in SSL’s Academy, the German midfielder has proven to be a defensive key player for Cairo. As far as defensive actions are concerned, Erik did top a few of them for both the team and the whole league. He topped the team’s statistics in three categories right away, with them being: Tackles attempted, Interceptions and Succesful Presses. For the latter two Beermann was also the top player in the Minor League overall.


With his defensive prowess Erik Beermann did contribute heavily to Cairo only conceeding 33 goals over the season, which does put them as the 3rd best defense in the league. Even on the attacking end of the field it was a celebration for Beermann, who managed to find the net for his first SSL goal this year, a well placed shot from just outside the box against Athenai FC, as well as bagging his first assist. All things considered Beermann still has a lot to improve on. His tackles, while being at the top end of the League in both attempted and completed tackles, could still be more consistent as he sits at only a 74.5% rate of successful tackles. As the season went on Beermann did find himself more and more back in his usual role of acting as almost another central defender, making sure to stay back at all times and really trying to keep his opponents from jumping on the counter.


One can only assume that it’ll be yet another improvement next year for Freising born Erik Beermann, going into the second year of his two year contract at Cairo City. With an uncertainty about his future on the horizon it could be even more important for him to really turn in performances of the highest standard in Season 14.

APPROVED - good luck in your sophomore season. @Durodo

[CapnCooper]

Career PT#1
Player Page

Heather Bull's rookie season was certainly a wild one as she was introduced to the SSL in a big way. We'll get to the big part shortly. There wasn't a lot of expectations from Bull when she first suited up given that she was more well known as a bass player and vocals of Chronic Tooth but she did her best to put all that judgment aside and be a team player. In her first game she played for 45 minutes and managed 2 shots on target (3 shots total), completed 3 key passes and had 1 attempted header which stuck out at the time. Bull had been known to head back soccer balls to crowds during live shows which really started her climb to fame with soccer fans during european tours.

As the Paris coaches began to earn her trust and see that she was really taking this career seriously they gave her full playing time in just the 2nd game and was playing 90 minutes for the rest of the season. Bull went on to finish the season with two goals and 4 assists as well as 7 shots on target (17 shots total). They also had a clean 86.51 pass percentage and 19 successful headers out of 31 attempted.

Heather was fortunate enough to start her career with a very skilled team in Paris. Together they had the opportunity to win a division 2 championship! Since winning that championship, Bull has had a fire underneath her to be competitive and to win again as nothing beats that feeling of being the best!

Heather learned a lot as a rookie and got to see a lot of different perspectives and it's truly been beneficial to her career. She is still applying those things she learned in that first season to how she trains and focuses now. She absolutely still finds time to play bass while bouncing a soccer ball on her head but there is no doubt that Chronic Tooth will never get back together but Heather will do her best to continue to win and strive to be the best!

APPROVED - love the music angle. @CapnCooper

[Tomen]

Player Page; Career PT #1
Well Alexander Selich's first season playing in the SSL ecosystem was quite an interesting one considering he started his career in the Academy League at the sportsclub from Stockholm. One might say that Selich had quite the rookie season for the ages in the fairly newly formed Academy League considering he managed to net in 14 goals in his 15 appearances for the club and also getting 7 Assists bringing it to a grand total of 21 goal contributions in 15 games. Alex Selich also average a 7.63 Rating which is the 2nd best average rating for players that played in all 15 manages. Only his striker partner Gerd Klose posted a better number in that regard. On a more negative side or rather a side that Alex Selich still needs to do some significant improving is the amount of time he was caught offside which was 2nd in the entire league, again only behind his striker partner. Klose had 33 Offsides to Selich's 27. Interestingly enough Selich had the 2nd most fouls in the entire league which is something you don't see often for a striker who primarily things about how he can make an offensive impact. A bright spot for Selich this season was that he managed to get quite a lot of shots on target with 30 in just 51 attempts. This puts him at the #3 spot in the league but which a better shot on target% than the ones above him. Another bright spot in his rookie season is that he managed to lead the league in xG with 12.12 and have 4.22 xA which gives him an expected goal contribution of over 1 per game which is quite nice. That even the statistics show that Selich had a nicely productive rookie season. Here is hoping he will be able to replicate anything close to it with Paris in the minors of the true SSL.

APPROVED @Tomen - good luck in the minor league!

[ZootTX]

Player Page
CPT #1

So far, Steven Urkel, the goalkeeper from Senegal, has had a most auspicious start to his career in the SSL. Urkel made the trip from the streets of Dakar to play his first SSL season on the Victoria Falls Eagles of the academy league. Its actually quite a long ways from Dakar to Victoria Falls, almost 9k kms by car, so Steven was very grateful the team sprung for plane tickets. Traveling so far from home was definitely a new experience for Steve, and it took a while before he was comfortable in his new home. With the season already underway when Steve arrived, he had to catch up quickly. Traveling all over the world to play soccer was new to Steve, and he relied on the guidance from his teammates and coaches as he got used to flying and staying in hotels on the road. On the field, though, everything was the same as before, and Steve was excited to continue his soccer journey. Steve learned a lot, but the instincts honed from hours of playing with his friends back in Dakar also paid off. Victoria Falls was a really strong club, and Steve stepped right into the goalkeeper spot. Steve ended up playing in 11 of the 15 academy games. He racked up wins in 6 of those games. Impressively, 4 of his wins were clean sheets, meaning he didn't allow any goals. Steve ended the regular season with the highest rating of all the goalkeepers, and an 82% save rate, which was 11% higher than the next closest keeper. The Victoria Falls Eagles rode this high into the Academy League Championship game, where they ended their season with a 4-0 win over Atlético Medellin. Steve's first season in the SSL ended on a high note, and he really looks forward to see where he ends up in the upcoming draft and where his soccer career can go from here! (322 words)


APPROVED @ZootTX - from a fellow keeper, it gets harder from here. And more rewarding.

[Muford]

Player Page

Career PT #1


Gerd Klose’s rookie season has been quite a surprise for him, and we all like to assume also for Hollywood FC. While Gerd Klose fell completely out of the first round, and was the 10th pick in the second round, there wasn’t a lot that was expected of him. The most expectations for Gerd Klose were that he would be what most second round picks are, serviceable. Instead, this rookie season, Gerd has gone above and beyond for Hollywood and has cemented himself as a man with a mission to put the ball in the net. Gerd Klose, through 9 matches (according to the index) has 6 goals and has 8 shots on target on 9 total shots. He knows how to finish, and he finishes the ball well. Throughout the cup as well, he has 2 goals in 3 matches, as well as 2 shots on target on 2 shots taken. Gerd knows how to finish with the ball. The rest of his game have been suspect at best so far, but he has been able to keep up with the big leagues, since he was thrust into division 1 right away.

While Gerd has shown thus far that he has a knack for scoring, a lot of other aspects of his game need to be improved on to make sure that he can stay in League 1 and prove to everyone else that passed on him that it was a massive mistake. He is passing subpar 90% which is something he will surely improve on this off-season, as well as his heading. He heads at an abysmal 19.6% success rate, which just will not fly in the big leagues. If Klose wants to keep his starting gig, he needs to work on these important statistics, to improve upon what he has already accomplished as a rookie and to continue to strive for greatness.


(315 words)

APPROVED @Muford - ball in net, we don't sweat how.

[Squid]

player page    update page   CPT #1 - Biography

Marco Tentacles is a pacy left back that likes to use his speed to cut in and send a cross into the box but not sacrifice the defensive part of his game in order to do so. Using his speed he breaks up plays and dishes the ball to a safe option rather than trying to dribble it up himself. Playing for the Victoria Falls Eagles in the Academy League, Tentacles's squad was able to win the league in his only Academy season. Tentacles was not a stand out performer on the squad and was quietly contributing defensively on the back end. He did not expect much from the draft, maybe a second to third round pick as most clubs would be looking for an offensive difference maker. Marco was extremely surprised to go 8th overall to Reykjavik United. It was his preferred destination but he didn't expect them to take him with their only pick in the draft, much less at 8th overall. Being sent down to the minor league to play for North Shore United, the stacked Reykjavik and North Shore squads allow Tentacles to develop and familiarize himself with both clubs and teammates before having to jump into a major role with either team. Tentacles has been trying to have a positive impact whenever he plays for North Shore, and that has been reflected in his average rating of 7.3 this season. Putting up a pass percentage of 87%, the left back has 2 goals and 1 assist in the 12 matches played so far this season. Tentacles has been breaking up plays fairly well, with a tackle percentage of 74.3 and 43 interceptions so far this season. North Shore is contending for the league title this season and Tentacles hopes to raise his play enough to contribute to their success. A solid rookie season either way, Marco wants to improve on his defensive numbers next season and raise them into the 80+% and into 50+ interceptions.

(332 Words)

APPROVED @Squid - now go kill it in D2!

[jj2416]

https://forum.simulationsoccer.com/showt...2#pid40082- 1st career task

My rookie season was not bad. I was at the top of my class in the D2 at the time on Athena a team that was devastated and did not have much. Which lead to me being the main striker, but also lead to lower opporuntites and lower assisting. 7 goals and 4 assist is not bad and I performed higher than my XG which is always a great thing showing I did have some luck on my side and being able to see that maybe where I was putting my TPE was a great spot and being able to leverage that and being able to make an impact faster. My player was happy with where he was and being able to see that was fun to watch. My focus was physically and trying to be fast. Going by people and going way past all the defenders and making sure that I can have a ton of space by them and having them always be in fear when I am in the match. At the start being able to have that at such a young part of my career showed how much potential was there. Being a very rough prospect, but have the foundation needed in order to get where I need to be and make a huge impact. I was not there yet as a rookie, but that is expected and I can not be that superstar at such a young season, but still having that impact on the D2 team was shown to other clubs even with the low win totals and a not great season. Great thing to show for a struggling franchise to have a star in the making giving the clubs fans hope as they are looking at the team. Being able to have some hope for the team with where it was and being able to see where things will end up in the end.

APPROVED @jj2416 Thanks for adding the player page link.

https://forum.simulationsoccer.com/showt...068-Player Page