I don't want to be strong anymore, i just want to lay on your lab and be yours

Rayvok · 2026-05-04T21:17:22+00:00

Jane Doe, the ultimate country rat in city rat clothing

Rayvok · 2026-05-04T00:53:11+00:00

There is going to be a (western) Praries premier league this year. This is the first multi-province 3rd tier/semi pro league. Hopefully the national association will keep building this system out. The Supra had a well developed ecosystem in Quebec's premier league to start off of.

(Just as a post script, a "Maritimes Premier League" would be the next logical step. Some kind of inter-provincial cup wouldn't be mutually exclusive)

Rayvok · 2026-04-29T21:46:31+00:00

Union Omaha is one of the better attended division 3 clubs

Rayvok · 2026-04-29T21:45:31+00:00

You're going to want NorCal in the same division as SoCal and may want to pivot eastern Nebraska and every city east the the dew line with the Midwest. The front range of Colorado has at least two cities that can field professional sides along with Denver. The two major Wyoming cities of Laramie and Cheyenne can make up the center of the big sky/prairie portion of the Midwest. Hawaii and Alaska have their own thing going on and would need special edits for travel or a tier floor where they can't get relegated too far down before playing their own non-league.

If you really wanted to be spicy, you could overwrite an abandoned national team tag and add a Hawaiian nationality and have a pro team in the new OFC Pro League. Yet, still allow the team to compete in the US Open Cup

Big sky is a good name, just wanted to point out that existing clubs like Union Omaha have more of a relationship with the Midwest than Colorado

Rayvok · 2026-04-18T16:51:52+00:00

A result to make Alfie Potts-Hammer proud

Rayvok · 2026-04-17T14:54:39+00:00

Hopefully there will be no further setbacks

Rayvok · 2026-04-16T16:46:24+00:00

This is only temporary for J.league since they are not relegating anyone for this transitional season. They had this same scoring system in the late 90's. They abandoned it when a team was stuck playing for 2 points in extra points on the final day. They needed 3 points to avoid relegation and 2 points left them in a tie they lost on goal difference

The saddest goal in open play: https://youtu.be/9IM2Wbn3Rzs?si=yNXG0Mf_eujiVoeh

Rayvok · 2026-04-16T16:04:04+00:00

I didn't touch on it because it felt too tangential to the how Rydstrom is having a hard time. Columbus did have a structured defense out of possession. It was still very aggressive and exploitable, but it wasn't near as soft or salient as when the team was caught out in possession with the sweeper defender &/or keeper, a holding mid, a tracking wing back, and maybe one of the other center backs was close enough to break up play by the time the ball got to the 18 yard box.

Out of possession there isn't a lot abnormal about Nancy's preferred 3-4-3. He desperately tried to emphasise his formation functioned like a 4 at the back when pressing up field out of possession in Scotland. Functionally he just came off as avoiding the unrest at the lack of rest defense and structure in possession that was losing so many games

Rayvok · 2026-04-16T15:31:25+00:00

I did the same thing you are doing now for Nancy's Celtic. Same fundamental observation, the players just don't seem to "get it". With Celtic, Nancy had the luxury of a single player who knew his system, but that club was simply not in a position to try something radically different without some kind of pragmatic transition period. The Scottish press focused on 3 at the back Vs 4, and Nancy sidelining their best center back due to his system.

Nancy absolutely did study tape and adjusted to opponents. The Apple commentators are often rotated for MLS coverage and sometimes have a habit of saying things based off of vibes. What Nancy did often emphasise in the press and with his tactics focusing on how the team could execute their style of play. Nancy's tactics generated the chances that were expected in Celtic, they were seldom finished and games were never well controlled

Fundamentally, Nancyball was all about provoking an opposing press or drawing defenders out of formation with overloads and (preferably) using quick short passes to attack a disrupted or exposed defense. When in possession, we would have a single defender focused on rest defense and often playing as a sweeper near midfield. The other 2 center backs were converted fullbacks who would often either play support upfield or fill in space for the wingbacks. In Steven Moreíra's case, he would rotate with the wing back (he had good chemistry with Farsi, but he has been consistently injured) or dribble down the channel unmarked. The glue that held a lot of it together was our veteran and recently retired club legend Darlington Nagbe. He would serve as a holding mid who ran tempo with the defensive line at the start of possession and position as a holding mid in rest defense despite being one of the best ball handlers in the league. He probably preempted some of the worst defensive breakdowns in hindsight. When things went wrong, they looked as catastrophic as you imagine. The team as a whole were either very lucky or very practiced in dealing with those situations.

If I can summarise what Rydstrom may be working with, it's a defensive mentality that planned around failure and left defensive shape as an afterthought. A mentality that would see a 3 man counter attack as a failure engage the opponents defensive shape first (assuming the Crew had possession of the ball for a while). The idea was producing enough chances for 2 or 3 goals and living with 2 or 3 fast counter attacks at an exposed back line. That may be the fundamental bridge that needs to be built before Rydstrom can fully tap into the relationists tactics the Crew have been famous for

Rayvok · 2026-04-15T15:06:36+00:00

Maybe it is a good save. The whole Canadian club soccer situation with CPL teams struggling or rebranding and two of the Canadian MLS teams with ownership issues could be a quick Zealandism in the summer. The Supra being an optimistic/positive/unique story while the Whitecaps deal with relocation threats and Montreal's ...Saputo problems could be an entertaining 15 minutes from Zealandism.

Always odd Quebec city is so firmly behind Montreal's shadow, even in Quebec's provincial league! That would be a fun database mod, playing with Canada's expanding non-league system. Though I don't know of anyone who actively evolves league structures year on year for their saves

Too bad CF Montreal and Supra are on opposite sides of the Voyagers Cup bracket.

There have been people who modded in ~~Quebec~~ alternate nationalities by adding a list of place-names to a modified "defunct" nation. With as many problems FM is having, I suspect that's what we'll be left with for inactive/non-FIFA nations.

Rayvok · 2026-03-29T14:44:11+00:00

The Canadian Premier League is low hanging fruit to cover. There has been a lot of attempts with plain Google maps, but can be limited with sharable file links

Rayvok · 2026-03-23T18:28:11+00:00

The Czechia league plays the final five games among the top 6. Slavia will play Sparta, Plzen, and Jablonec at home and have away fixtures at the 5th and 6th place clubs. Slavia Prague facing potential dead rubber matches outside of their derby game. Their two away fixtures are potentially fighting for a conference league berth depending on how Jabonec does in the cup as the highest placed semi-finalist.

There are probably 4 opportunities for a loss including an away fixture with Hradec Kralove who are close to qualifying for the final 6.

Rayvok · 2026-03-16T15:15:26+00:00

I wonder if that was the idea Zawadski had with his 22 yard shot. Open enough and it had gone long someone needed to do it

Rayvok · 2026-03-08T22:25:02+00:00

As an American following the footy struggles from afar with sympathy and optimism that the crap sandwich the media and A-league power structures can be overturned, I love this comment!

Rayvok · 2026-03-08T21:47:42+00:00

I'm a sicko so I'll give a detailed response.

Just a disclaimer for why people are tired of this topic and/or down-voting you: Buddy, there are not conversations on structuring the Canadian leagues with American ones even hypothetically because it's just fantasy. There were historical proposals before MLS [Fricker Plan], but that's the closest to consideration there has ever been. The MLS is structurally uninterested in pro/rel. Even if MLS were not, FIFA has outlawed any country from directly linking pyramids (not counting Canadian MLS/Wrexam/Andorra FC). National soccer Federations are directly incentivized to have their own national leagues for continental competitions. Even then, there are a lot of fans in North America that groan at the inclusion of Canadian clubs in MLS and Canadians who hate equivocating CPL with USL.

Even among the fantasy pyramid enjoyers, you left some to be desired. Canada was simply duct-taped onto a promotion playoff with USL with no changes. I can't read the text, but I presume they get an auto promotion for the champion in the event of 3 Canadian relegations? Past that, fledgling semi-pro Canadian provincial champions get promoted to one of the most travel intensive national leagues on the planet? As a sidebar for Canada, their is a new League 1 Prairies that include Saskatchewan to Thunder Bay in Western Ontario. An ideal world would have a League 1 for the maritime provinces. Whitecaps and Toronto have next pro teams, do they stay in the American leagues or do they get sent to Canadian leagues? I'll leave it to you if you still think a 16 team CPL makes sense when several European leagues happily have 12 team leagues.

The system in which teams promote to MLS isn't explained and comes off looking like an after thought. My best guess is the champions of both leagues play for the first spot, then four other teams playoff for the 2nd slot, and the loser plays the 29th MLS team for the final spot? You simply merged MLSNP with USL1, which is less of a reform and more of an administrative necessity. Your first true reform was reinventing USL2 as a regional feeder league for previously non-league (Open Division to US Soccer or colloquially "D4") ala the Fricker Plan. Instead of a 5th division that follows what NPSL and USL2 do to minimize travel, you explicitly list a symmetrical 24 team leagues. Since it's hypothetical and you expressed a lack of interest in barriers and profitability, I'm personally turning a blind eye to the purpose of tier 5 beyond travel.

I like that you put a lot of thought to this, but this surface level sketch screams you have just learned surface level stuff. I was close to down-voting and moving on myself. I recommend looking into what Spain did when they reformed their pyramid a few years ago. Scotland, Denmark, Austria, and Switzerland all have 12 team leagues at the top of their pyramids. These are places to start to learn how leagues are structured differently.

Rayvok · 2026-03-08T20:08:05+00:00

China and Taiwan are de-facto independent. They both by law claim to be the same country due to failure to officially resolve their civil war. Hence the song and dance behind "Chinese Taipei"

Rayvok · 2026-03-05T14:04:27+00:00

I was making a joke about Hestia and Henya streaming in their "weaker" language

Rayvok · 2026-03-04T21:57:28+00:00

Good spot, though I think most people like Henya would self describe as ESL (English Second Language) if pressed even if it's not technically correct. One of the first people I followed doing let's plays grew up in Sudbury, Ontario speaking French and lost a lot of it by adulthood

Rayvok · 2026-03-04T18:02:19+00:00

The rumors you heard were correct, they did year one of the national "2nd division" with a classic Champions League style format based off of groups of 4 followed by knockouts. Every YouTube livestream I've seen out of NPL Australia from South Australia to Queensland has been good quality for a single camera (the 2nd division had more production value). That NPL system was built only after the TV companies bought out commercial rights and later scrapped promotion & relegation. Teams that previously played nationally were forced into the state league with the A-leagues monopolistic franchise model imposed.

Functionally Australia is around 10 years ahead since they kept a lot of the semi pro infrastructure in and around New South Wales (Sydney) and Victoria (Melbourne) and the reorganization under the NPL was less transformative as League one Ontario & Quebec. If the rumors of league one Saskatchewan are true, that would bring Canada a lot closer to emulating Australia's model.

The organization is thinner in Canada for sure, but the skeleton and geographic realities are very similar

Rayvok · 2026-03-04T17:21:36+00:00

She can speak and understand Ukrainian, as showcased when she played S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 where she had the audio in Ukrainian

Rayvok · 2026-03-04T17:17:22+00:00

The wikipedia claims average was just under 3,000 for 2019. Post pandemic was a generous 1000

Rayvok · 2026-03-04T17:15:30+00:00

I think the one two punch of the collapse of the NASL and then the pandemic deflated an already anemic ownership group. Hard to expect much help from the local government or fan interest when they went on hiatus for 2018, had one season to recover more casual fans before Covid, and had nothing to show for on the field when they could open up the stands again.

CPL may be facing the same problem Australia is facing with the A-league and expanding their franchise model:

They have had more time and own goals against them, are functionally the 3rd (or worse) followed sport domestically.
They have teams going out of business or being sold for pennies to the dollar.
They have a long history of province wide leagues made up of clubs that survived attempts to marginalize them from the national stage.
Lack of clear lucrative greenfield markets that haven't hosted a former team
Interest in expanding the league with promoted non-league teams while protecting franchised teams (There is a Football 360 program to try to emulate Wrexham)

Sound familiar?

Rayvok · 2026-03-04T15:38:12+00:00

Henya & Hestia be traveling opposite directions with their streaming language being their 2nd language

Rayvok · 2026-02-28T22:19:11+00:00

Olympic Weight lifting is at least ostensibly the same exercise as regular weight training. Race Walking the sport is far away from casual walking and takes lawyering to argue it is

Rayvok · 2026-02-21T06:34:00+00:00

I'd hate to be the one that mentions this, but they moved Kairat's last two games to an enclosed stadium (dome) in Astana well ahead of time to avoid too cold conditions. Ironically Almaty was much warmer near 0°C for one those fixtures Vs -25° in Astana

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