Your advisary is propably a 3 level higher player who used the sell/buy trick at the end of former season. The trick is to sell all your players at the end of the season and keep a few 1-3 star players. Based on the stats of your team on the last day the new cup will be formed. As you have about 2 star quality you will be placed in a very low cup draw. Then the first day of the season you just buy yourself a whole new team and voila you will have mostly 9 stars with all players compared to the player 3-4 levels below you. Stupid trick which I hate. Cup draw should be based on your average quality throughout the whole season. Problem solved.

About your advisary. No player has a special ability, that is at least some comfort. Other then that I can only wish you good luck.