1st leg

It was a tight affair, as might have been predicted from the build up to the game, with underdogs Roma and their wily manager Heath Brown relying on a defensive set-up to counter City's attacking wealth.

A valuable away goal was the result in the first leg, set up the second leg nicely.

2nd leg

City's lead was reduced to nothing in the first half in Rome, and that away goal was potentially counting double if Roma could hang on.

But a valiant defensive effort was to no avail when Torres equalised early on in the second half, and that seemed to knock the wind out of the sails of Brown's youngsters, despite City finishing the match with only eight players on the pitch.

City gaffer Alex McLean was delighted with his boys' triumph, and the club's record equalling second Youth Cup

Youth Cup Winners & 'Wild Card' Prizes

At the start of the season, someone (sorry, I forgot who) came up with the excellent idea to offer in-game prizes to the winners of the Youth Cup, and also to one manager drawn at random from all the entrants (provided they hadn't forfeited any games), to encourage participation.

The idea was to offer a 'free hit' at a new player added to the player database as a free agent - the source of many a good young prospect, and so keenly fought over that we voted to introduce a rule to make bidding on them fair for all.

So Alex at City (for winning the Youth Cup), and Jimmy at Newcastle (for winning the 'wild card' random draw).

New Free Agent Prize Rules

For the month of June, Alex and Jimmy can claim exclusive bidding rights on one new free agent - when they do so, anyone who has already bid must withdraw, and no one else must bid. Alex and Jimmy will take responsibility for monitoring bids and messaging managers to withdraw, as much as possible, and anyone who fails to abide by this will incur a transfer ban.

Claimed players must be announced by Alex and Jimmy on the newsfeed by 10 am on the day that the player is added.

In the event that both Alex and Jimmy claim the same player, Alex will get priority as Youth Cup Winner.

Any dispute will be settled by the game world owner.

Semi-Final Results

1st legs
Manchester City	2	-	1	Dynamo Moskva
AS Roma	3	-	0	SL Benfica	Overage team
2nd legs
Dynamo Moskva	0	-	2	Manchester City
SL Benfica	4	-	1	AS Roma	Away goals
Aggregate results (including away goals)
Manchester City	4	-	1	Dynamo Moskva
AS Roma	5	-	4	SL Benfica

AS Roma

Path to the final

1st Round

A late equaliser in normal time from Man of the Match Marcelo Saracchi against Nuno Bento's young Baggies' superstarlets took the match into Fictional Extra Time (FET).

Roma progressed 3-2 in the end, thanks to the arcane rule that if the sides are still level after the usual FET rules (Most possession, most shots on target, scorer of first goal), as these two were, then a deciding 'golden goal' is awarded to the team with most possession + shots on target.

2nd Round

FET was needed in the next round against Spartak, but was much more decisive this time as the hosts overran the young Russian side winning 5-2.

3rd Round

A tricky tie on paper, but Roma overcame PSG in Paris with relative ease.

Quarter Final

A superb double from Man of the Match Mert Muldur saw off a strong looking Atletico Madrid side to set up an even tougher semi-final against Benfica.

Manager profile: Heath Brown

Former West Bromwich Albion, Sevilla, PSV and Wolfsburg boss Heath Brown has racked up almost 200 games with Roma, and won two SMFA trophies, and also reached the final of this season's Top 100 Shield, where they were unfortunate to lose to Standard Liege.

Season	Div	Pos		Team	P	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
1	4	6		West Bromwich Albion	38	16	10	12	57	58	-1	58
2	3	8		PSV	38	16	9	13	48	36	12	57
3	3	5		PSV	38	19	8	11	46	34	12	65
4	3	11		PSV	38	13	10	15	48	51	-3	49
5	3	11		PSV	38	13	11	14	45	48	-3	50
6	1	16		VfL Wolfsburg	38	8	13	17	43	59	-16	37
7	1	17		VfL Wolfsburg	38	9	12	17	30	50	-20	39
8	2	6		VfL Wolfsburg	38	15	11	12	49	33	16	56
9	1	5		AS Roma	38	19	11	8	60	41	19	68
10	1	8		AS Roma	38	16	10	12	47	43	4	58
11	1	8		AS Roma	38	14	10	14	46	48	-2	52

In his first season with West Brom, he took them what is still their highest ever league position, 6th in D4, recorded PSV's joint best ever points total (65 in D3 in Season 3), took Wolfsburg to their highest ever league position (16th in D1 in Season 6), topped that all off with Roma's best ever league finish (5th in D1 in Season 9).

Club	Pld	Pts	Ave Pts	Start	Until
West Bromwich Albion	31	65	2.1	11 Aug 2015	17 Nov 2015
Sevilla	5	9	1.8	17 Nov 2015	4 Dec 2015
PSV	174	331	1.9	10 Dec 2015	4 Aug 2017
VfL Wolfsburg	82	128	1.56	04 Aug 2017	25 May 2018
VfL Wolfsburg	45	83	1.84	01 Jun 2018	20 Oct 2018
AS Roma	196	407	2.08	21 Oct 2018	Present

In Heath's own words...

We were really pleased beating Nuno at my old club West Brom, that and the win over Atletico Madrid are the highlights for me.

We weren't going to enter the Youth Cup, but I loaned Svilar in from Davy at Brugge, as we didn't even have a keeper.

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Top players have been Mulder at the back scoring and playing well, Saracchi at left back, Berisha has pulled the strings in midfield and Fernando up top has scored some really important goals along the way.

I seem to be good in the cups getting to two last season, winning one and losing the World Club Shield to Anderlecht, winning the SMFA Super Cup this season against Liverpool and then losing Top 100 Shield to Liege. The Roma Rollacoaster League form the same but up to 13th now.

Me and City boss Alex get on well and will share a beer afterwards not matter what the result, I hope.

Manchester City

Path to the final

1st Round

Man of the match Hannes Wolf led the line as the rest of the pack tore through Internacional.

2nd Round

City were given a much tougher game in Round 2, a late equaliser from Diallo sending the tie into Fictional Extra Time.

Man of the Match Ferran Torres helped ensure his team came out on top 3-2 to progress to the next round.

3rd Round

That Man of the Match Torres again - City's youngsters left it a little late to finish the job, but the outcome was never in doubt.

Quarter Final

Another walk in the park, with a stunning hat-trick for Donyell Malen, and a third in four games for Wolf, as City eased into the semi-finals.

Semi Final

Wolf scored his fourth of the tournament in a Man of the Match performance against last season's beaten finalists Dynamo Moskva.

In their first road trip of this season's Youth Cup, for the 2nd leg, City could have been expecting a tougher challenge, but went through comfortably in the end with Man of the Match Boubacar Kamara easing any nerves with an early goal.

Manager profile: Alex McLean

Former Olympiacos and Internazionale boss Alex has amassed 276 games in charge of club he supports in real life. Under Alex's stewardship, City have reached an SMFA Shield final, but more significantly won the Youth Cup itself in Season 8.

Season	Div	Pos		Team	P	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
2	5	9		Olympiacos	38	15	9	14	55	47	8	54
3	5	1		Olympiacos	38	21	12	5	51	27	24	75
4	2	4		Internazionale	38	15	17	6	54	40	14	62
5	2	4		Internazionale	38	17	13	8	55	35	20	64
6	2	7		Internazionale	38	15	11	12	48	37	11	56
7	1	5		Manchester City	38	18	7	13	54	45	9	61
8	1	18		Manchester City	38	9	8	21	44	67	-23	35
9	2	9		Manchester City	38	16	10	12	41	34	7	58
10	2	10		Manchester City	38	13	12	13	44	43	1	51
11	2	16		Manchester City	38	12	9	17	47	58	-11	45

Alex won the D5 title in his second season with Olympiacos, and followed up with three consecutive D2 playoff places with Internazionale.

The task at City was always for a major rebuild of the playing staff, and despite achieving the club's highest ever league position (5th in D1) in his first season, Alex saw the club relegated the season after.

Since then they have been trying to stay in D2 while developing a phenomenal youth set-up, the which is now beginning to bear fruit.

Club	Pld	Pts	Ave Pts	Start	Until
Olympiacos	63	130	2.06	04 Mar 2016	14 Oct 2016
Internazionale	128	230	1.8	14 Oct 2016	30 Dec 2017
Manchester City	201	394	1.96	30 Dec 2017	18 Sep 2019
Manchester City	36	55	1.53	19 Sep 2019	3 Jan 2020
Manchester City	39	67	1.72	03 Jan 2020	Present

In Alex's own words...

We lucked in somewhat early doors with the sale of Ndidi to Juve. That brought us Malen. And we brought in Torres before his rise. That helped a lot. 

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My biggest fear was Juve, after that it was Ruts [Benfica]. Juve getting knocked out reasonably early helped my cause, but ruts' fateful error in playing his FULL squad against Roma was the game changer! 

The work still had to be done on my part, and bar some minor struggles I think our progression to the final has been relatively painless! The final is a double edged sword. If I win people may so 'well, you had the stronger team'. If I lose people will doubt my ability. 

Naturally I am confident. It would be great to have another Youth Cup win on my CV. But this is 2 legs. Anything can happen. I remain optimistic but cautious.