The official FMV Tour of the Netherlands

From the home of world Cup winners Spain, to the home of the defeated 2010 finalists – the FMV Tours have landed in the Netherlands where a challenge awaits those who wish to make a little history and test their skills. This is the 7th destination on our tour (and our 8th challenge) around the globe and the leagues have an interesting structure, plenty of clubs with a story to tell, and a history of producing some of the best talent in world football for themselves whilst also developing some of the greatest foreign players too!

AGOVV Apeldoorn

This is an old and proud club that is currently undergoing a period of transition as it looks to break into the top division and make some history. They last won this league back in 1959 and is their last competition win to date but that could be about to change.

With a mid-table finish as the minimum expectations there is £650k to spend on transfers and the current wages are at about 60% of the projected budget – so the finances are there to achieve this kind of finish. However the departure of last season’s top scorer (Belgian winger Nacer Chadli) to new Eredivisie winners FC Twente, leaves AGOVV looking a little short of quality up front. There is quality in the nets however, as former Aston Villa and Wolves giant (6’7) keeper Stefan Postma is a handy number one. The squad itself could do with a few extra faces as it’s quite small (excluding the youth players) and is suffering from a lack of cohesion – something to be looked at straight away. Could you be the catalyst for that change?

AGOVV Apeldoorn is a Dutch football club, playing in the Eerste Divisie, based in Apeldoorn (a municipality and city in the province of Gelderland, about 60 miles south east of Amsterdam, in the centre of the Netherlands. It is a regional centre and has 136,208 inhabitants).

The club was founded on 25 February 1913 as AGOSV but when the club joined the football association of Gelderland, the club had to change its name due to a clash with another club called Steeds Voorwaarts (which is what the SV stood for in AGOSV). This resulted in the name being changed to AGOVV, which then translated as Apeldoorn football club for teetotallers. The meaning of the abbreviation has since been altered and the new meaning of AGOVV now translating as Only Practising Together Brings us Further.

AGOVV has had an unstable history and became a professional league club in 1954, returning to the amateur ranks in 1971 due to financial problems. On 1 July 2003, AGOVV returned to the Dutch league, when it was re-admitted to the Eerste Divisie. In the 2003/2004 season, forward Klaas-Jan Huntelaar became top scorer of the Eerste Divisie with 26 goals.

Recent Eerste Divisie Positions
2003: 10th
2004: 10th
2005: 10th
2006: 20th
2007: 18th
2008: 11th
2009: 6th

KEY HISTORY
Eerste Divisie: 1959
KNVB Cup (runners-up): 1938

Sportpark Berg & Bos

Sportpark Berg & Bos, known as Fly Brazil/Desko-stadion for sponsorship reasons, is a multi-use stadium in Apeldoorn, Netherlands. It is currently used mostly for football matches and is the home stadium of AGOVV Apeldoorn. The stadium is able to hold 3,159 people and was built in 2002.

It is currently the third smallest stadium in the professional leagues of Dutch football behind the ‘Mitsubishi Forklift Stadium’ (3,000 capacity home of Almere City FC) and the ‘Tata Steel Stadion (2,000 capacity home of Telstar).

CHALLENGE DYNAMICS

This challenge will last for five years, upon completing your fifth season in the Netherlands, you can consider your excursion to be over as far as earning points for the challenge.

You must start set your manager experience as “Automatic”.

You have until the 30th September 2010 to accumulate as many points as you can within the confines of a maximum of 5 seasons.

You must use the August 20th update of RC’s FM2010 Update which can be found here at FMV. (Download database)
(Visit this thread to keep up todate with the summer transfers)

HOW TO SCORE POINTS

Eredivisie
Relegation – -10 points
Beat relegation via playoffs – 0 points
15th – 1 point
14th – 2 points
13th – 3 points
12th – 4 points
11th – 5 points
10th – 6 points
9th – 7 points
8th – 8 points
7th – 9 points
6th – 10 points
5th – 12 points
Win Europa League Playoffs – 5 points
4th – 20 points
3rd – 25 points
2nd – 35 points
1st – 50 points

Eerste Divisie
20th to 15th – 0 points
14th to 11th – 1 point
10th – 2 points
9th – 3 points
8th – 4 points
7th – 5 points
6th – 6 points
5th – 7 points
4th – 8 points
3rd – 9 points
2nd – 10 points
1st – 25 points
Nacompetitie Qualification – 5 points
Promotion – 10 points

KNVB Cup
1st Round Win – 1 point
2nd Round Win – 3 points
3rd Round Win – 5 points
4th Round Win – 8 points
Quarter Final Win – 10 points
Semi Final Win – 15 points
Winner – 25 points

European Champions League
Qualify for groups – 0 points
Qualify from Groups – 5 points
Win in Round of 16 – 10 points
Win in Quarter Final – 15 points
Win in Semi Final – 25 points
Winner – 50 points

Europa League
Qualify for groups – 0 points
Qualify from Groups – 2 points
Win in Round of 32 – 5 points
Win in Round of 16 – 8 points
Win in Quarter Final – 10 points
Win in Semi Final – 15 points
Winner – 25 points

Bonus Points
Beat Ajax – 3 points (Every time you do it in a competitive fixture)
Beat PSV – 3 points (Every time you do it in a competitive fixture)
Beat Go Ahead Eagles – 1 point (Every time you do it in a competitive fixture)

One Off Achievements
Increase bank balance to £20m – 15 points
Increase bank balance to £40m – 25 points
Sell a Regen originally from your youth team for £5m + – 20 points

POINT DEDUCTIONS
Sacked – -25 points

Well there you have it, AGOVV are a team with a troubled past but an exciting future. Can you take this club to greatness? Dare to dream say I and claim this leg of the FMV Tours. Good luck to everyone!

Join the challenge discussions here on the FMV forums  to register your score and see how others are doing!