premier-league – Valley Reviews

As a sports fan and football (soccer) fan today is a very sad waking up to news of the tragic passing of Diogo Jota and his brother Andre Silva, a footballer as well. It is something that makes me feel sick to my stomach, and a reminder how fleeting life and that someone who was living his best life on top of the World both professionally and personally.

Diogo played for my team of Liverpool FC, he was our forward and a player who was not one for the headlines and a flashy player but he was a player who would give their all and make something of nothing. If you needed a goal he was the substitution you made, typified by a headed goal this season against Nottingham Forest 22 seconds after coming onto the pitch. His first touch, a goal.

I feel absolutely sick and emotional that he is completely gone, when you read the media how he was traveling to the port to catch a ferry to return to Liverpool for pre-season – being unable to fly due to recovery from surgery making the change in air pressure a risk. A season to look forward to and the best years ahead, all gone in an instant due to an accident with a burst tyre. How quickly life can change and a young wife and three children left without a husband, father and uncle. Parents mourning the loss of two sons under 30.

A Summer of his life coming off winning a 20th Premier League with Liverpool and winning the UEFA Nations League with Portugal, capped off with marrying his childhood sweetheart less than two weeks ago. Life is very unfair at times.

For now we as humans, fans and supporters shall mourn the loss of our Diogo but in time we will come to celebrate him and he will always be our number 20 who helped us lift our 20th league title. Forever etched into our club and a part of folklore. I cant wait to hear his name chanted every game and his memory live on, I hope the club retires his shirt. A poetic beauty in our #20 lifting #20.

In sporting terms it was shaping up to be a Summer to remember and an exciting season to come with the squad building on the success of last season, now sport is unimportant and rightly so. It is just a game after all and a sombre few weeks and months to come but you know his teammates are going to play with him in their hearts and play each game as he did alongside them. Gone but never forgotten, both Diogo and his family have our motto with them “You’ll Never Walk Alone”.

His name was Diogo

For all my life I have gamed and played video games since I was a child playing on the Sega Mega Drive. One of the earliest type of games I had got into was football (soccer) management simulation games. I forget the names now of the very early games I played on Mega Drive, maybe FIFA Manager or Championship Manager but they got me hooked.

Moving on to PC gaming I remember picking up big cardboard boxes containing Greatest Hits versions of Championship Manager 97/98 onwards and that is really the bulk of my gaming. Championship Manager eventually split into two rivals Football Manager and Championship Manager, though the name was retained the quality and game went to Football Manager.

Today there is only Football Manager existing, and it is on Football Manager 2024 (2025 version scrapped for FM 26 due to development issues). The game has a yearly release and despite minimal changes in recent years I have always bought it and played the life out of it, a quick look at steam shows the hours I have put into it, though some hours account for idle time and background. I’d play while I work or do stuff. A huge chunk of my life devoted to the game. A game that is essentially a spreadsheet.

Due to the current two year cycle of FM24 it is feeling a little stale and boring even with updated squads and new matchsim files to play with (a key feature of the series is fan made skin and mods to update the quality of life and cosmetic aspect of the game like kits, badges, profile pics and skins).

I discovered something and I am addicted to it, it is making my own kits for my teams to use in the game. I discovered this site FM Kit Creator and it has blown my mind being able to create my own 2D and 3D kits to use in game. I enjoy using the real kits but its fun to make my own. You can edit styles, patterns, colours, badges, logos and sponsors. The past few weeks I have spent as much time making kits as I have playing the game.

I plan to going forward make new kits every in game season for whoever I am managing, like currently I am managing Liverpool FC and Brazil, so made custom kits for both.

Here are some (mostly Liverpool FC) kits I have made for my game.