The PCT saw some exciting fights for both promotion and relegation. It couldn`t have been much closer before the Japan Cup really.
Carlsberg with a late season push had the top position before Japan moving past Lierse and Netia into the last position. 2 of them would go down. 1 stays.
In the promotion zone Generali and Spar looked safe and also Repsol had almost 100 points gap but then Fablok, Indosat, Iberia, Podium Ambition all were really close with Ayubowan and Kulczyk only having tiny chances.
Japan Cup
Despite quite a lot of struggle by Meiji it couldn`t have ended better than with a home win in the Japan Cup! Nordstrom as runner up closely ahead of Novatek and puncheur squad Generali.
Regarding the close fights though, starting with relegation! Carlsberg`s Juul-Jensen in Japan, Kragh Andersen in Maroc and also Garby in Maroc had a fantastic scoring lately and JJ`s top10 in Japan made it easy to see that they would be the lucky team in the end. Dyrnes simply is no Kwiatkowski and Waeytens was a really underperforming rider again. Hard to say but Netia and Lierse will unfortunately go down to the CT division.
At the top Generali obviously defend their lead but in fact the full top5 remains the same!
Most important change could become Podium Ambition passing Iberia for 6th as you never know what the hot spot is worth in the end.
Ayubowan remains 8th ahead of Kulczyk and Reddit.
Pluchkin was the big star in the PCT division and while taking the individual crown, he couldn`t carry his team alone as it finished mid table in 15th with him scoring more than 50% of all points.
Lutsenko in 2nd as best puncheur and also here, a PT worthy rider that also couldn`t lead his team to promotion.
And same must be said about the next. Degenkolb as best sprinter or Coppel as best time trialist/puncheur combination rider. So apparently the PCT division is not about having one big star! It`s about depth and having multiple riders to score, in best case obviously alongside one "star" that scores a lot.
Generali have shown this impressively with Ulissi scoring 1004 points as 5th best but it`s only 25% of the team score!
Kinoshita with a late jump to 6th being best puncheur behind Lutsenko and before McCarthy.
Uran as best stage racer next to Pluchkin in the end. Surely some clever planning for him while Kwiatkowski had a strong season in 9th, but couldn`t avoid dropping to CT.
Baugnies then as dominant PCT cobbler in 10th ahead of Kudus, who lost the stage race position to Uran in the end and then Mohs/Ewan as best sprinters next to Degenkolb.
As expected really... Kinda worrying though that my team scored so little besides Pluchkin, and at the same time only having our stagiare left with 0 points... Oh well, Plu-bear should be more than happy to defend this title I hope, and keep us safe for another season.
Manager of Team Popo4Ever p/b Morshynska in the PCM.Daily Man-Game
In the end we were more than 400 points away from safety so it's not like we were unlucky and this should be a good chance to shake up the team now that we have to going down to the CT.
Our bet with talents was a risky one but unfortunately our top riders didn't perform. Nazaret 61st in the rankings with 379 was about 50-100 points short of what I hoped. Cornu scoring 267 was decent and probably the only of my leaders that I'm happy with. Bouhanni and Moser scoring 200 points and 90 points was far from good enough, they were terrible as a pair so I won't be trying that double leader experiment again. Caruso only managing 196 was a good 100 points short of what I hoped, he had a decent end to the season but was poor during the rest. Le Gac and Zingle didn't supplement this performance enough either.
Looking at the big positive, Borisavljevic managed to score 160 points which tells me he could score well at CT, given he'll be U25 again. Ganna had one fantastic race on his way to scoring 121 points which was also good.
All in all, a long season of struggle but looking forward to the reshuffle of renewals and the transfer season!
Snatched that first-in-line spot right at the death to make this our best season yet in the MG. But, and it's a sizable but, i don't see that extra PT spot opening up. Going through the managers i can only see one potential option which i don't think will actually happen. I'll keep my fingers crossed for something but it's probably another PCT run next season.
Ewan our absolute star but then to only have Talansky just inside the Top50 and still finish 6th is wow. Great depth from Thomas, Burghardt and Yates and points from most other riders really kept us ticking over.
But next season Burghardt definitely gone after another decline and Thomas is declining (i believe) as well. This opens up room to re-adjust our team design and pick up a new big name leader.
If we can get a PT spot the options are then huge! But even in PCT we're going to end up with good cap space to hunt down that game changing rider.
What a season for us, never would have expected to survive comfortably never mind achieve our top 15 goal, so this is something special, especially the turnaround from having nothing after a week of transfers. Really love my current squad, shame it will change a little but looking forward to how it grows towards our long term target of promotion. Velits was crazy, amazing, awful, inconsistent, beautiful and never dull to watch and I thank him for leading us to survival, though it was such a team effort! The depth scoring of Rowe overperforming in some huge ways and making a strong case for future training, Bennett using the niche races beautifully and representing NZ very well, Stan the Man finding a new level and making some huge results, Roux giving us some unexpectedly great moments and a top 100 year, Debesay with his ups and downs but in Cyprus a huge result that gave us real momentum (and he's unmaxed!), Tosh with the most stage wins though not using his full potential, Gilanipoor with that unforgettable 80km solo stage win, and all the rest chipping in along the way. Great year team!
Glad bbl survived so I can say a big ha ha for his preview basically predicting us last
Of course great sadness seeing Netia relegate but as I said after Japan I know trek will pick them right back up and then shoot to the high echelons of the MG with his awesome future focus. A maybe trained Kwiatek and the astonishing Pedersen and Kaspa in full flight all with home grown backups is still just around the corner, and I can't wait.
Congrats to Generali, very cool champions, awesome squad and promoting base (especially if the PT gets some funky calendar changes) and I can't wait to see what matt does with them in the top flight. Also very happy to see Indosat go up, great team and manager!
Just looking at the CT promoters of 2017 I'm so happy to see lots doing so well and a high survival rate. Really love that group of teams and managers! As much as we have our fun as "rivals" I am really really happy and proud to see Repsol promote, Aquarius did great things and then they overachieved huge in a great effort, every rider maximised their potential fantastically after he put together a great line of scorers. Well deserved newest addition to the club of back to back promoters and hopefully we'll meet again in the PT rather than the PCT - and we can once again be rivals rather than 11 places apart
Also love to see Kulczyk doing amazing, big fan of that squad and of course their manager, and I hope Booker can add that final piece of the puzzle to add to that lovely base to promote next year. Vien also doing really well first year! WCC establishing themselves as a solid PCT team, maybe even enough to get some more talents next year And also slight sadness in the result of our great friends Philips, and I know Abhi isn't super happy with his result and there's been bad luck considering his good squad, but I know next year they'll shoot up the table and/or add some big future plans, and I can't wait to see it Hopefully soon we'll be promoting together instead of in the mid table.
Sad to see Nordstrom and Azteca go back down, but Kent has bounced back before, and next time should be for good! And whitejersey has certainly learned from his mistakes and I think he too will be back in PCT very shortly - I'll be cheering for you!
And of course a huge thank you to roturn, tsmoha, Vien, Marco, Abhishek, Aquarius, Tamijo, SN and all the others who pick up a race or two for the great work that is your reporting, bringing the game to life your output of quality and quantity is so integral to this game! And of course everyone involved in the "backroom staff" who make the game tick - and good luck for this off-season!
Exactly mid-table. Hope number thirteen will not bring us bad luck next season. Think this is where we belong, even though we got some lucky results (Moulingui Omloop ). Had some hopes of a (disband) promotion spot when we were doing really well mid-season but then Úran ran out of RD and we went downhill ever since.
Úran will decrease the season after next season, so in my best interest I have to push for promotion next season. The cobbles squad is a strong point, even though Zepuntke could score a bit more. Don't know how Drapac will be handled in PCM 18, might be worth to retain him. Only thing I really need is a better puncheur, as first Betancourt and now Quevedo have failed to live up to the expectation.
Congratulations to Generali on the victory! Also to the other promoting teams, SPAR, Repsol, Fablok and Indosat. Podium and Iberia just outside but we might see you a lever higher next season as well. Carlsberg taking the survival in a tight battle, congrats bbl but my commiserations to Lierse and Netia. Hopefully they, as well as Nordstrom, Euskaltel and Azteca of course, can bounce back next season.
I want to thank roturn, my fellow reporters and all the other backroom staff for another wonderful season, and hope I can see many of you back next season.
First of all, huge congratulations to Generali on winning the division I don't think there could've been a more popular winner! Congrats to everyone promoting, amazing job done by all the teams there
Commiserations to the relegating teams, especially Netia and Lierse, to go down like that on the last day. Hated to be the bearer of bad news, to all divisions really! To Azteca, Nordstrom and Eukaltel as well. Hopefully, you guys bounce right back
Coming to our season, well it wasn't good. 18th place isn't really what I had envisioned after the transfers. Saber was brilliant and Per was as good as last season. Henao did ok, but nothing extraordinary. The fact that he wasn't our top scorer kind of shows the gap in his point-scoring. Costa didn't nearly get enough points. Navardauskas was a failed experiment. Van Zandbeek was surprisingly good and Te Brake was decent. Dieteren and Krieger were atrocious! The support staff couldn't pitch in with enough points and we had too many non-contributing riders. Planning wasn't the best either. Didn't quite realize how bad Henao would be in the hills in MO/HIL combi races, so that was a steep learning curve.
A lot of things have been on my mind as to how to turn things around (or make it worse ) in the off-season. The team needs a lot of work, and Henao has just one good year at the top left. A lot of things to consider then going ahead.
A huge thank you to everyone who work behind the scenes to keep this game moving forward. Having contributed a bit more this time, you realize exactly how much needs to be done even for seemingly small tasks. Thanks to all the managers for another wonderful season and hope to see you all back in 2019.
Well, we made it. To be honest, at the beginning of the year, I didn't expect to have been in a position to drop. I'm always a pessimist, so I kept that in mind and didn't get ahead of myself, but I did pretty much believe that after adding to my top 20 team from last year, I could potentially even sneak into the top 15 this year.
That was not to be. We were never even close. Instead, we got wrapped up in on of the most intense relegation fights ever seen. Three managers with teams that don't deserve to go down, all fighting for one spot. In the end, we were just the luckiest. We scored the right points at the right time, and got that coveted spot.
I want to send my deepest commiserations to Lierse and Netia. Their managers have put so much time and investments into this game and their teams, especially their long term futures. It would be a huge shame to have that erased by this result. They did not deserve it any less than me. Luck just wasn't on their side. I know it's easy to say these things when I'm the one that survived, but I really hope they have instant success in CT next year and come right back up. They deserve it.
Rider wise, you can trace most the problems to my cobbled squad. Although, not really by Vanspeybroeck after all. He managed to get enough points through his wins and placings to be relevant with a 21st place, and although he certainly could have done better, he did beat Blythe, who was supposed to be his biggest comptetitor. The real issue was outsiders continually winning and taking points from him, especially Jerome Baugnies, who was a thorn in our side the entire year. I would have loved to switch his point totals with VSB's, but that's not how the races panned out.
Regardless, I think the biggest failure was actually the rest of the cobbles team. They were built to dominate, soak up minor placings, and dictate the action. They never did that. VSB never seemed to have our super domestiques helping him when it mattered. Frederik Nolf was even worse than last year. Wish I had been able to sell him, but it is what it is. Sinkeldam had some moments of domestique duty, but besides that barely seemed to exist. There were no minor placings with any value to be had by them, even when they were all in the top 15/20 on paper. Even De Maar outscored them a few times - not gonna cut it.
Besides that, the usual regressions were expected. Juul Jensen and Appo were expected to sink this year and did, although both still overperformed a bit and were crucial to our staying up. In fact, the real disappointment was AKA and to a lesser extent Garby. I never expected much from Garby, but I thought AKA's flat would make him almost as good as Appo, and for the most part, that wasn't the case. But then, he came through in the clutch with a terrific performance in Maroc, so no complaints here.
I've got a long transfer season ahead of me, with a lot of dead weight to cut. We also, luckily, have a lot of talents coming up in the wings, although none of them are gonna be leaders in any sense. So the mission remains to get worthwhile leaders that will prevent us from being in this position next year.
Thank you to all who make this game possible, especially Roturn and all the reporters who revitalize the game every time it looks to be slowing down. You guys have managed to preserve this game even as site activity in general as dwindled. I'm very grateful for that. Congrats also to all who promoted!
R.I.P. Marc De Maar
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy
I'd say we probably underachieved by about 500 points, and in the end that made all the difference. McCarthy did slightly better than expected, but couldn't compensate for Yates and Monsalve underperforming. Add in the fact that my second tier riders didn't contribute much at all - Ranaweera, Kemboi and Atkins put up less than 200 points between them - and you understand how we managed to end up down in 8th having been one of the favourites for promotion.
You never know what may happen with disbandments, but I expect to stay in PCT and continue the rebuild process. Next season even before transfers we'll be stronger just due to riders levelling up - Ranaweera at 78MO, 73HIL, 74TT, Turgis at 77HIL, Kemboi at 79SP, 81PRL and Perera at 79SP - and our oldest rider will be 30, so our window is still open for another few seasons regardless of signings. Just a shame that we didn't promote this season as we had a team more than good enough to expect to.
Congratulations to all those promoting, and commiserations to those relegating - hope to see you bounce back next season
19th place in the end sucks a little tbh, missing out on the top 15 goal we had - but we survived relegation comfortably in the end so I cant be too mad about it.
There were too many gaps in our scoring as a team and Im not quite sure my leaders delivered all that well either. Durbridge was a couple hundred points off Zmorka in the end but delivered well enough for us, and we gained some decent depth points from our TT squad core as well. Bellis did as good as can be expected compared to the strength of the division as well which made me happy, but we certainly need more puncheurs than what we have now.
Meintjes is a difficult one, while he scored 550+ pts, given my investment in him I guess I'll always be slightly disappointed in him. He ended as roughly the 11th best stage racer - not great at all and that included Portugal as well which would have delivered a good chunk of that total as well. But with his wage cut down and some potential training I hope things will get better.
And then oh boy! its not too pretty looking at the rest of my squad. Fenn and Thwaites aren't too strong as a duo and while Fenn did get a couple good results, we need a stronger leader. Our sprinters aren't too much better at all, Stauff wasn't good enough in the end compared to the impressive depth of the division and I hope PCM 18 handles riders like him a little better, Rowe also didn't pick up his mandatory 1 win a season either... Not sure what I'll do
Juan Van Heerden was obviously meant to be the answer for this problem but we were outbidded by a new team that didn't understand the wage budget - Im sure he'd have disappointed me too but that meant we got our first proper talent in Cullaigh, who Im excited to develop even further! Maybe I'll find/suggest new British talents that I can develop in the future as well!
John St Ledger in Team Bunzl-Centrica and Team U25
Well, we made it. Back to back promotions, amazing! Even finishing in the PCT podium, which i mistakenly thought we would lose with Japan Cup.
Despite being all season in the promotion places until September when we dropped out, i never trully believe that we could have the power to actually promoting. I had the same experience in CT last season, promotion spots until late season when i would get passed by everyone. Luckily this time we had an ace under the sleeve with Tour du Maroc, where we throwed everything we had in the squad, and came out of it with the highest scoring of all teams there.
Looking at the whole season, i still don't think we had the squad to make it. I feel like everything that could go well went well, and barely anything that could go wrong went wrong. We really changed our team style from day to night with last year's promotion, from a one-men team to a several-leader squad. A +1000 point rider guarantees you to survive in PCT, but it won't bring you further.
First of them, Merhawi. What a season my men. I really had full confidence, as i stated before the season that despite the fierce competition between the climbers behind Pluchkin and Uran, you would be the best scorer of all of them, and you really delivered. That incredible ToME win in front of Pluchkin, winning your home race in Eritrea... Some could see before the season you were overpayed, but you proved them wrong. Building our PT squad around you should be the goal, but this might come one season earlier than desired. We'll see how it goes eventually
Sep, such an underestimated signing. Once our top puncheur hopes fell over we had to make quick moves to secure some scorer, and wow, for less than 200k of wage, 550 points, your maiden MG win in Rheden, and loads of great placings over the season. A proven PT scorer too, so he should be in the plans for the future, though age is catching up to him soon
Jurgen, we both knew this was a one-year thing, as i was looking for someone to get us a few points in the sprint, specially in the tougher ones where the pure sprinters can't be there. Winning in Philadelphia was one of the most amazing moment of the team in its career, and you kept delivering in those one-day races, and in Maroc you proved why you are one of the most prolific sprinters of MG history, helping to that final promotion push. Can't say your time is over yet, maybe you are worth trying as a leadout should we have a great sprinter next year
Sven and Valens, young nice talent. Sven wasn't one of the best puncheur, but had his moments, like that stage win in South Africa, and the regular great results put him almost in 400 points which is crazy to think before the season. Valens had that amazing Volta a Portugal, and supported perfectly Kudus during the season.
Jakub with that huge upset in Corsica. Definitely the craziest stage i've seen from the team's car in this time. He was suppoused to help Merhawi win the race and found himself as the race winner by being super strong.
No more big scorers, but Duchesne, Luisle, Pirazzi and Agostini have made all great contributions to the final score. So much production for so little money they get payed.
Our talents with Jaime, Eddie and Cristian couldn't get much points, but had their fair share of points. I'm really looking forward to see them in PT, specially Jaime, as he should already be a valuable domestique for Kudus, and hopefully with breakaway appaarences too
I don't have a clue yet about what will happen with us in the transfer season (i have some plans thought, but nothing certain until we get to renewals.
Thanks everyone for their congrats! Great to see that all 2017 MG class survived with easy (and will be joined by more of their members in PCT next season)
And finally congrats to Matt for winning the division with such dominance. It felt like every race there was a Generali rider in the first places even fighting for the win. Also, to my fellow promoters, i'll see you in the PT next season
Great to see my "Danish" friends from the Carlsberg HQ stay up. At the same time sorry to see Lierse and Netia go down, but I guess that's MG... Big congrats to all the promoting managers.
Massive thanks to all the reporters and to the admins who keep this MG ticking along. Huge respect to you all and to your stamina! Thanks for the excellent year (albeit with a little hiatus in the middle) and looking forward to another one ahead!
We aimed for top 10, were told that we'd probably fall just short, and ended up just ahead of the line. I can't say I'm too disappointed, and we'll mount that promotion push this coming year. The PCT effort was always intended as a two year plan, and we're well on track. Now to find some leaders while everyone else will be doing the same...
Going to be some excellent teams in the PCT next year, not least the promoting managers. We'll be missing a good crop of those who relegated, in particular (), but looking forward to welcoming some of the CT guys.
@Jandal, I'm pretty sure bbl predicted everyone to finish last . In all seriousness, thanks for the kind words and really looking forward to you continuing to fashion that exciting looking team. Areruya is a legend in the making.
Congratulations to all the promoting managers, especially Aquarius! You built that squad so well in the offseason, and the effort you put into this game is tremendous. We'll be cheering you on in the PT next year!
Well done everyone for the enjoyable season and can't wait to get angry at each and every one of you this transfer window
Sorry for falling off the face of the earth the past weeks, something came up that needs my priority atm.
So just a mandatory comment here, grats to baseballlover for this year's Croatia award (). for not relegating and all the other teams who performed well.
planning certainly didn't go right, but boy they have been unlucky thus year.
). Had some hopes of a (disband) promotion spot when we were doing really well mid-season but then Úran ran out of RD and we went downhill ever since.
its not too pretty looking at the rest of my squad. Fenn and Thwaites aren't too strong as a duo and while Fenn did get a couple good results, we need a stronger leader. Our sprinters aren't too much better at all, Stauff wasn't good enough in the end compared to the impressive depth of the division and I hope PCM 18 handles riders like him a little better, Rowe also didn't pick up his mandatory 1 win a season either... Not sure what I'll do 
- Im sure he'd have disappointed me too but that meant we got our first proper talent in Cullaigh, who Im excited to develop even further! Maybe I'll find/suggest new British talents that I can develop in the future as well!
. In all seriousness, thanks for the kind words and really looking forward to you continuing to fashion that exciting looking team. Areruya is a legend in the making.
