Which the club was not professionally prepared for. In their defence, though it is not our duty to blame the Nibeljits for not being able to do so, since what they achieved and experienced as a consequence was their first experience. Which, of course, they immediately restructured themselves.
The previous fall season, Frady’s squad had gone very well, and from the outside it looks like they are really capable of rising to the next level: as well as keeping the domestic field firmly in check, they are now a force not to be underestimated on the international battlefield.
In the latter, goals and points weren’t presented as a gift to a high-quality group, but worked towards it by going into battle as an equal force. The player policy (buying and selling) leading up to this point was appropriate, and the professional staff was also in sufficient harmony with the team. It was therefore taken for granted that Freddy would calibrate himself a step higher. An appearance in the Champions League group stage should not be wishful thinking, but a benchmark goal, and the main draw of the Europa League for Plan B doomsayers. At least in theory, because practice has shown the exact opposite.
But everything turned upside down when they won the fifth set. Mostly the usual spring schedule. Until then, Ferencváros can form his team according to his desire, build his team, so that he is forced to touch as few places as possible in the summer, and the machine will already be ready during the qualifiers, which is the summer period that decisively affects participation in the Autumn Cup. The team had half a season available for all of this, considering they never had a home game, which was far from unbeaten compared to Nebblegate’s strength. There was no need to measure training work and mental control with pharmacy scales; weeks, or rather months, were available. The coach and player must focus again with all their might on the big task ahead.
However, the Round of 16 matches in March stirred it all up. Let us add that the team was able to experience all of this during a period when the usual schedule of the football world was turned upside down due to the holding of the World Cup in the winter. The club should have – and should have – prepared something with brilliance and skill, but as the signs show, they have already outgrown their current strength, willingness and/or ability.
A larger shift and more work was required in the summer than before
The FTC team traveled to Germany unbeaten in 2023, but when they got to the match that was declared as the match of the year – 19 years later, the Hungarian club’s team reached the spring of the cup, and the FTC played in this period after 1975 – due to injuries, they were completely exhausted in numbers and strength. Despite a 2-0 defeat away and then at home, the FTC did not play second fiddle to Leverkusen, but did not have a serious chance of advancing in the encounter.
Something broke in the team, and at some point there was a serious possibility that they might not even reach the championship title they thought was certain, at least not as easily as they expected. Then they broke the deadlock, and with three rounds to go, the championship title became certain. Although the euphoria wasn’t complete even there, as the gold medal was pocketed in such a way that the team members sat in front of the TV at home and watched their only remaining competitor, Kecskemét, lose to Budapest Honvéd, who were eventually disqualified. The next day, the champions celebrated their home win at the Groupama Arena, but then began to take an early vacation: they finished the remaining three matches without a point, scoring one goal in 270 minutes – plus extras. Not exactly a glorious victory parade, but a fitting finale to an excellent season.
It seemed like more work and degrees were needed in the summer than usual, but time was tight this time too. But knowing the balance of power, the first round is not that dangerous, it is enough to set a date for the first squad at a later time, for the third or even fourth round of the qualifiers.
The Faroese champions didn’t look like an equal opponent, and they weren’t: the opposition offered what a motivated and dedicated semi-pro team could do. But at the limit! Ferencváros, on the other hand, suffered in his shadow, as he did all spring, with few exceptions.
During the 90 minutes, the Ferencváros players weren’t fresh enough in their movement and thinking. All this indicates that the foundation work and psychological adjustment in the summer were not successful.
Among the key players, Tokmak Nguyen, who has dominated the scene in recent years, has not been able to spread, and Ryan Mmaye has also been excluded. Adama Traore and Christopher Zachariassen were key in the second leg, but the former’s stunning decline, which has been going on for months, is as big a question mark as the team’s decline, and this time the latter did not have the spark it would have. It made him appear as a savior over and over again.
Two summer arrivals (Abu Fanny and Barnabas Varga) He was given a role in a particularly important position, while Muhammad Ali bin Ramadan And Cyprill Macrix came as a substitute. He was among those who arrived this winter Peter Barratt And Oso Kwabena Also, the former was a starter, and the latter was a substitute on Wednesday. He also came off the bench in the second leg Christian Lisztwhose talent came to light several times in the spring. Of the 16 players who participated in Wednesday’s game, seven of them did not participate in last fall’s rally.
Which can be an integral part of a conscious planned construction, if payers experience progress rather than setbacks.
For now we are here and there, in the European Conference League it will be the Irish side Shamrock Rovers, who also failed in the English Premier League, to be Nibblegate’s opponents. The first leg will be held next Thursday in Budapest, while the second leg will be held a week later. For the group stage, two more matches must be successfully won.
Financial and communication failure
Of course, Frady’s early farewell raises other questions besides professionalism. For example, economical, because the budget may not have included the amount decided (from to) up front on the revenue side, such as the big clubs that plan permanently with the Liberian, but it is clear that they have a prominent role among certificates, salaries and bonuses. And
It doesn’t really matter whether or not the bonus comes from the EU after performance, or how big it is.
Because, given the prominent role played by the Premier League, UEFA pays much more there compared to the results achieved in the other two cup series.
Of course, there is hardly an unbridgeable gap in Ferencváros’s budget between the amount that was realistically thought to have been nearly received and the amount actually received, but the big shortfall will surely be felt.
Then there is the high ball that Ferencváros showed in their pre-match communication. It’s still more or less alright if only the BL mainboard is floating around in front of the eyes of the people in charge, that’s the only goal for them, though if they don’t adjust it to the facts, fans who can believe it can easily be pushed into miracles under All conditions in the woods.
With the fact that the team won Group E last year and then reached the Final Eight, it has not yet won the second series clearly. Instead, he brought in the addition, which would have been a massive feat that could be replicated. Compared to this, seeing ourselves only and exclusively in the Premier League group stage is self-deception, nothing else. It is clear that in a deck this can be the case, but one does not necessarily lead to the other. Did anyone really mean this?
Anyway, it could have been better, it could have been smarter… Two years ago, but for the foreseeable future, there was another Hungarian club where they thought they had transcended the Hungarian sphere and were capable of becoming permanent, he noted. . players on the international stage. Let’s see what happened to them: An inexplicable string of first international goals, then domestic goals, then dreams later abandoned, the club can only be happy as they are grasping at the last straw in the Hungarian top flight.
Solemnly look down on the opponent
After the first match in the Faroe Islands, as a prelude to the second leg at home, the FTC’s outreach on social media was solely about the fact that promotion was out of the question. This is not one of the habits of professional sports, but rather they try to cover it with sportsmanship, even if it turns out that it is just a fake sportsmanship by knowing the balance of power.
Magne Hoseth, coach of KÍ Klaksvík, didn’t attach much importance to it, in the post-match press conference he said: “In Ferencváros’s place, I think I would have looked down on our team too. We didn’t feel bad about it, and fortunately we proved that maybe it’s better to We play the game first before putting anything online…”
It would be much better for the 42-year-old not necessarily to take this with him from his first visit to Hungary, but he did receive a very cordial welcome in Budapest.
At the Groupama Arena, it was no coincidence that this time the standing ovation was for the winning Faroese team, and not for the losing one.
In addition to the professional lessons, there are also plenty of communication lessons to be learned from such a sporting event. The biggest and strongest club can’t take more than that because they don’t respect their rivals. Against a competitor who had already given a strong signal a week earlier.
Because if you engage in such communication, you give yourself the opportunity to find yourself in a battle that transcends team, club, sport and sport in the event of a negative outcome. While with a more restrained kick, his embarrassing miss would have remained within the usual footballing circles…
The author is the head of the sports section of the index.
(Cover Photo: Christian Lestis, Ferencváros player(s), played in the first qualifying round of the UEFA Champions League in the second leg match between TC Ferencváros – KI Klaksvik at Groupama Arena on July 19, 2023. Photo: Tibor Ellis/MTI)
