The summer of 2026 is where we ended things in the Aswijan blog series, as I considered winning three consecutive titles and the Champions League worthy of conquering Aswijan. I’d really enjoyed the journey but we’d achieved everything possible in Aswijan club football, so I considered it time for a new challenge.
However, I did go ahead and simulate the game into the future to see how the Khaliza boys got on without me as I was interested in whether the foundations we’d built would lead to long-lasting success. I initially holidayed for two years, then realised it would be easier to resign and sim the game, so I edited all the key players’ contracts to expire in 2033 and simmed ahead to that point.
How did Khaliza get on?
The bad news is that immediately after our three league titles the Aswijan crown immediately went back to Aswijan Malikiy, who then won five straight. Khaliza finished second in two of those seasons, in 2027/28 and 2029/30. However, Khaliza have had a renaissance, lifting the league title in both 2031/32 and 2032/33.
After I resigned, the club replaced me with Zinedine Zidane, who has remained there for the five years since. In addition to the two league titles, Zidane has also led the club to two Copa Azore and a Copa Populare win.
Are our signings still at Khaliza?
At first look, there are plenty of our signings still at Khaliza in 2033. These include the brilliant Ulrich Awono, who is now 28 and valued at £101 million! He never lived up to the success of our final season in Aswijan but has had a solid career with Khaliza, scoring 41 goals over the last six seasons. Strangely, he had a spell of three seasons where he only got two league assists. However, he holds the club record with 100 league goals and his records in that final season all still stand.
It also includes 100 Scout rated Francisco José, who it looks like Zidane has been deploying in centre midfield, which is a little odd. He has fared a little better than Awono, scoring 54 goals in the last six seasons and averaging around a 7.30.
Midfielder Yacine Adli is also still there and has performed generally very well. In the season just gone, he had his best goalscoring season of 11, but his best campaign was 10 goals and 15 assists in 2029/30. Since we left he’s scored 42 league goals and assisted 47, which is pretty decent. He is now also the club’s all-time appearances record holder, moving on to 285 league games.
Our record signing right-back Goncalo Serra is also still with the club and he’s performed very well since we left, averaging at least a 7.40. In 2029/30, he averaged an amazing 7.61 in 30 league games. Also still there holding the defence together are centre-backs Hugo Vandevelde and Pascal Payen.
Another player I bought in my final season, Philippe Meijer, has become probably the best left-back in the world, valued at £86 million and took the place of the fantastic Gabriel Fersino, who moved to Barcelona for £45 million in 2032.
What’s changed at Khaliza?
Zidane went and broke our transfer record by blowing £82 million on brilliantly named Greek striker Panagiotis Piskopakis from Roma in January 2033. He’s scored 6 goals in 14 league games since signing and looks a very good striker.
Khaliza’s record sale has also been broken as our Aswijani striker Faatih Vukojevic moved to Liverpool for £113.5 million in January 2029. Vukojevic is now a genuine superstar, scoring 116 goals in 143 league games for Liverpool and is Aswijan’s all-time record goalscorer with 69 goals in 77 caps.
Other major sales saw both our goalkeepers sold in 2029, with Julian Frontzeck going to Hertha BSC for £18 million and Matheusao joining Wabani for £15 million. Zidane replaced them with Pontus Dahlberg, who he then sold a year later – weird. Right-winger Cristian Lopez moved to Roma for £40.5 million the same year and has developed into an elite winger.
Striker Gustavo Collado struggled after we left, went on loan to Sevilla then moved to Juventus for £37.5 million in 2030. He’s been superb in Italy, scoring 64 goals in 100 league games. Left-winger Stefano Gatto was also sold the same year to Dortmund for £39.5 million and has become an elite winger scoring 25 goals in 78 league games for BVB. The club also sold midfielder Ilaix Moriba, who was solidly unspectacular after we left, to rivals Marrador FC for £42.5 million at the start of the 2032/33 campaign.
In my opinion, with the exception of Piskopakis, Zidane’s replaced them with absolute dross. For example, in the season just gone, Khaliza spent £303 million on their way to the title, including £45 million on a bang average 27-year-old Brazilian midfielder and £56 million on a defender nowhere near the level of Vandevelde and Payen.
However, credit where credit’s due, Zidane has led the club back to glory after another spell of Malikiy dominance.
Simming ahead to 2039
I decided to sim the game even further into the future to 2039, which marks 20 years into the future from the start of the game. Furthermore, all of the players we had will have either retired or their contracts will certainly have expired. I wanted to see how the club had fared and if it built on the new success Zidane had delivered, and where other players ended up.
The title Khaliza secured in 2033 turned out to be their last of the decade, but didn’t totally fall away as they finished as runners-up in 2034 and 2038 and came third in 2037. In the 2038/39 season just gone, the club finished in 5th place in Liga Regale, some 15 points behind winners Wabani. However, they did win three more Copa Azore titles and the Europa Conference League in 2037.
The Aswijan title has been won twice by Wabani, breaking up three more successes for evil Aswijan Malikiy. Malikiy now have 27 league titles, as well as twice being runners-up in the Champions League in 2036 and 2038.
Khaliza and Zagora in 2039
Khaliza are now managed by former Bayern Munich man Niko Kovac, who took over when Zidane was sacked in 2036 after nearly eight years in charge.
Disappointingly, Piskopakis is the only person to have become a Khaliza legend. The likes of Awono, Serra, Moriba, Francisco José and Vandevelde are all considered icons, while my name seems to have been scrubbed from their history books!
Furthermore, quite a few of our former players are still at the club 13 years later! That includes, surprisingly, Ulrich Awono, who is now 34 and has 73 goals from 159 caps for Belgium. Awono has scored 138 goals in 470 league games for Khaliza and racked up a massive 725 games in all competitions during his 16 years of service. He is also the all-time record goalscorer and record league appearances holder.
Goncalo Serra, now 34, is still there and is the club captain, but he is leaving for Benfica at the expiry of his contract in June 2039. He’s racked up 437 league games and 684 in all competitions for the club. Vandevelde is also still at the club but doesn’t seem to be playing too frequently, and the only other player is Meijer, who is vice-captain and still a key player.
My first Aswijan club Zagora are nicely settled into Liga Principale. They were relegated from Liga Regale in 2023, then went down to Liga Dukh in 2030 but got promoted the following season. The club is now managed by former Juventus player Blaise Matuidi and had been managed by Paul Pogba from June 2034 to December 2035 and Alessandro Nesta from December 2023 to September 2025.
Where are they now?
Of the players no longer at Zagora, Ilaix Moriba is still playing at the age of 36. He stayed at Marrador for four seasons before joining Talat, then going on loan to Hoffenheim for a year before joining CSKA Moscow in 2038/39. Surprisingly, he never played for Spain.
Adli stayed at Khaliza until 2034, when he joined Lille and stayed there for two seasons before retiring. He earned 78 caps for France and scored three goals. He’s currently an unemployed manager and has never had a non-playing role.
100 Scout rated Francisco José stayed with Khaliza until 2034 then moved to Wabani for £23.5 million. A couple of loans to Talat followed and he’s just retired at the age of 36. He won 26 caps for Brazil and scored three times, and is now an unemployed Director of Football.
Our first big signing at the club Calvin Stengs left Khaliza in 2032 to join Monaco, where he stayed until 2035 when he retired aged 35. He won 64 caps for Holland, scoring 19 goals.
Aswijani striker Faatih Vukojevic is still playing as he’s only 32. He’s now with Manchester City, where he’s scored 152 goals in 201 league games having scored 116 in 143 for Liverpool – which makes him the Premier League’s all-time record goalscorer. He’s also scored 133 goals in 142 matches for Aswijan and is regarded as a legendary striker.
Another striker Gustavo Collado is also still playing, he’s now 34 and at Villarreal. He scored 87 in 166 for Juventus before moving to Spain in 2037 and has 22 goals in 62 league games for Villarreal. He seems to have switched allegiance to Spain from Argentina and has four goals in nine caps for them.
Our goalkeeper Julian Frontzeck, now 35, is still with Hertha BSC, who he joined in 2039. He’s only conceded 209 goals in 215 games for them, after only conceding 96 in 152 at Khaliza.
Defender Pascal Payen is now at Fiorentina, having stayed at Khaliza all the way through until 2038, making 323 league appearances. Striker Michele Mari, who scored the best goal I’ve ever seen on FM to win us our first league title, retired aged 34 in 2038. We sold him to Mufala Malikiy in 2024 and he stayed there for 12 years scoring 113 goals in 341 appearances before moving back to his homeland for two years with Chievo Verona.
Another legend of our time in Khaliza was centre-back Adam Hemmingsen, who left in 2028 to join Talat then Bennaria. Another was right-back Silvan Hefti, who is now the manager of Liga Dukh side Neim and has good managerial attributes. We sold him to AZ in 2026 and he went on a bit of a tour of Europe via Lokomotiv Moscow, Stuttgart and Metz, before becoming a coach at Marrador FC then taking over at Neim in 2038.
Moving back to our Zagora days, my favourite player Mirco Bjerg left the club for Uswana in 2024. He played for five more Aswijan teams, including FC Lakhra and Hadria Kuduqni, then joined Al-Ittihad in 2033. He retired aged 35 in 2035.
Our young right-back Arkadios Gram left the club for ACAT in 2026 then moved to Mufala Malikiy a year later and Wabani Athletik another year later. He did a bit of a tour of Aswijan, making 274 appearances for nine clubs before retiring in 2036.
Striker Aatami Begovic left Zagora in 2024 to join Hadria Oskat, where he stayed for nine years scoring 69 goals in 254 appearances and retired at the age of 34. Vladimiro Mashashi, our first captain at Zagora, also played for five clubs in Aswijan before returning to Zagora in 2029 and staying there until he retired in 2032.
We’ll finish with Zagora’s young left-wing starlet Martin Goronda, who stayed at the club until 2025 when he moved to Ouarrik Oskat. He played 270 games for Oskat, where he stayed until 2034 before going to Zaan for a couple of years before retiring at 34 in 2036.
I hope you’ve enjoyed following our story with Zagora Athletik and Khaliza Unidi and I’d encourage you to download the database and give it a go for yourself. I’ve also made the save available to play on the Steam workshop, from the point where I finished managing them in 2026, should you ever want to dip in and manage the likes of Awono, Francisco José, Moriba, Adli and co for yourself.
I hope you enjoyed reading about this adventure in the fictional nation of Aswijan! If you want more FM content then check out my recently concluded Journeyman save and an exciting Raith Rovers save. And there’s plenty of FM21 content coming, including the the Rossoneri save through the Beta with AC Milan.
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