I Feel Very Machiavellian Right Now

Sometimes you have gaming experiences where it feels like everything is against you, no matter what you do. And sometimes you experience a series of events that you've set in motion that make you feel like an evil genius, all of whose plans are coming to fruition.

This is one of those latter tales.

It all starts as my time at Peru's Universidad San Martin in Football Manager 2011 was winding down to a close. I had just won the Peruvian First Division title, and I was looking for a new challenge.

So I quit my job there and while there were no positions immediately open, I did publicly express interest in a couple of jobs which had been occupied at the time, but which were ripe for the taking, as the people sitting in those chairs were not bringing the kind of success that management was looking for.

I went after jobs with Boca Juniors in Argentina and Penarol in Uruguay. Boca said they had to see how things were going with their current manager, but Penarol offered me that job almost immediately. I had wanted an 18 month contract, and they would only give me 6. So I finally relented.

And it turns out that in taking the job, I put Luis Fernandez Suarez out of a job. Now, when I was at San Martin, I had a rather poor professional relationship with Suarez, who had been the coach at Cristal before Penarol approached him to manage their club.

So getting that job at Penarol was screwing someone who I had a bad relationship with already, which was sort of cool.

Then I looked at the standings for the first half of the season.

Penarol finished 4th. The difference between where they were and first place was 2 points or to put it another way, the difference between a win and a tie.

I had booted someone I hated out of a job because in one game out of many, Penarol didn't score one more goal.

Again, I got a job because of a single goal or lack thereof.

So I was pretty much in a situation where I was going to succeed, and I did everything I could to see that the team met its goals. I won the second half of the season and qualified the team for Copa Libertadores (which is the highest level international club competition in South America).

And as my contract was nearing an end, Boca then approached me and asked me to take over as soon as contract was finished at Penarol.

At this point, I should mention who the coach of Boca Juniors was at the time.

Diego Freakin' Maradona.

A guy that gets mentioned in the same breath as Pele (and one who some say was the greatest soccer player of all time). A polarizing figure who is loved in Argentina.

Yeah, I pushed that dude, out of a job. If I had pushed him out of nearly any other job, it would have been a little funny. The fact that I pushed him out of Boca Juniors, is amazing. I mean, they love him at Boca. They even have a fight song about him.

I pushed the man who scored what has been called the Goal of the Century for Argentina out of one of the crown jewels of its premier league.

That is a lot of responsibility. But I kept my head.

Then I won. And won. And won.

I won both halves of the season. I won the Copa Sudamericana. I took out Santos, Pele's and the rising star Neymar's former team in the Recopa, and I won the biggest South American club prize, the aforementioned Copa Libertadores. All in my first year.

That wasn't merely victory... that was a curb-stomp battle.

Of course, now they love me.

And riding that wave, I requested to my board that Boca pick up a feeder club, and so they looked around at literally thousands of in the world clubs and came back with a single choice.

Penarol.

Which means that upon agreeing to that, they are sort of my bitch now.

And to think, if Penarol would have given me that 18 month contract to begin with, well, they wouldn't be under the thumb of Boca at this moment.

The sprinkles on top of that icing is now due to my success at Boca over the past year, the Argentinean FA has offered me the helm of the national team, a position I can do concurrently with Boca. At this time, Argentina is ranked #1 in the world.

So yeah, this is going to be fun. If I was really evil, I could use my power as the national coach to sabotage my club side foes by calling up their stars right before I have to face Boca. I'm not going to, but oh, I could be so corrupt. And that is why I am on the verge of crossing the line from every day villainy to cartoonish super-villainy. And that's a good thing.