Premier League = Arsenal Championship = Nottingham Forest
League One = Cardiff
League Two = Walsall
National League = Eastleigh
FA Cup = Manchester City
Carabao Cup = Wigan Athletic
EFL Trophy = Chelsea U21s
Community Shield = Manchester City
FA Trophy = Halifax Town
UEFA Champions League = Manchester City
UEFA Europa League = Aston Villa UEFA Europa Conference League = Newcastle United
So it was a fantastic first season in the Premier League for us as we secure a mid table finish! The first half of the campaign was a lot better than the second for us and clearly our biggest problem is at the back as we had one of the worst defences in the league this year.
The FA Cup saw us get through a couple of rounds that I'd expect us to win before we were knocked out by Everton. That game came just 3 days after our Carabao Cup final win and I'm convinced that had a part to play.
But talking of the Carabao Cup, yes we did lift our first domestic cup under my management! And it was thoroughly deserved - I mean just look at the run of teams we had to beat to win it!
The New Arrivals
Overall Squad Stats
Best 11
Club Awards
After a good season in the top tier, we are closing in on 1 million social media followers. We've also gained a waiting list for season tickets nearly as long as the amount of season tickets we actually have now! We could double the size of our stadium tomorrow and fill it!
Despite finishing mid table this past season, the board still only expect us to battle relegation for the next 5 years, but surprisingly they expect us to give a good account in the Europa Conference League next season!
Chapter 39 A Busy Summer With Plenty Of Ins And Outs 1st August 2027
My first signing of the Summer is wonderkid goalkeeper Callan McKenna, who at the age of 20 is already Scotland's number 1 between the sticks with 9 caps! I paid £4.5 million to bring him here from Queen's Park and he'll now be our backup keeper although he will get his chances in the cup competitions to show what he can do and stake a claim for the main spot!
And our first departure of the Summer is Ryan Yates who leaves for Portsmouth for £5.25 million. Yates did a solid job for us in the year we won the Championship, but really struggled in the Prem last season so it was time to go.
The Summer is also a chance to make improvements off the pitch. Our upgrade to the training facilities will soon be completed and now the board have agreed to turn their attention to improving the youth facilities at the club too. We're slowly getting there.
A few players left the club as their contracts came to an end but the biggest name was probably Andre Luis who joins Mirassol on a free. He has been bitterly disappointing since joining us 2 years ago for £1.2 million, suffering from major injuries, playing only 14 times and scoring only twice.
Another player that was disappointing last season following his £92k signing was Fran Alvarez who struggled to make any impact on the first team. Still, we have made good profit on him as he moves to Trabzonspor in Turkey for £1.4 million.
My first 'big' signing of this window is centre back Taylor Harwood-Bellis. There is no denying I wanted to improve my defence before the new season starts and the £25 million signing of Harwood-Bellis from Norwich definitely improves us. He's English as well and it's important for me to keep an element of English core throughout my squad moving forward. We pay £11 million up front with the rest of the fee being paid over the next 3 years.
It's a new record transfer fee for the club, by some way!
With Yates and Alvarez leaving us, it left me short on numbers in central midfield. To rectify that, I turn to Rangers to sign 26 year old Belgian, Nicolas Raskin for £17.5 million (we pay £9 million up front with the rest over the next 2 years). Raskin is a significant step up on the two players that left the club!
Our central midfield was then further boosted with a loan signing. AC Milan's Giacomo Faticanti is not seen good enough to break into their first 11 just yet, but he can definitely make an impact in ours! Really pleased to have the 22 year old here for the season and if he shines, we have an option to buy him for £16 million at the end of the season.
Then there was another central defender in. He's a more experienced head in the back 4 as Southampton's Lyanco signs for £8 million. He's 30 years old but could make a huge difference to our defence this season and hopefully help us concede a lot less than we did last year.
With the new additions to the squad, I now feel like we are the strongest we have ever been as a collective squad. Therefore, I wanted to go with a more attacking formation and setup for this season. I've always played a 4-1-2-3 which is quite deep, where as I am now going to attempt a 4-2-3-1 with a more attacking focus, rather than the positive/controlling style we had before. This is what I have come up with and is likely to be our best starting 11 at this stage, before anymore departures of incoming transfers.
Then there was a new addition, one in the wide attacking positions and a player that can comfortably play down both flanks. I paid £18 million to bring him to the club from Hertha Berlin and the reason is because of his ultra consistent performances for them, where he has recorded average ratings every season of between 7.05 and 7.48 from a total of 122 league appearances in both the Bundesliga and 2.Bundesliga. He scores goals and gets assists too and I'm hoping he can transfer that to the Premier League. I paid £10.5 million up front with £7.5 million being paid over the next 2 years.
After adding a couple of new centre backs and my plan to bring Daniel Hoey into the first team squad this year after signing him last Summer, it meant I needed to move someone on. Mason Holgate is 30 now and didn't perform all that well last year, so he is the man I sacrifice and he joins Sunderland for £11 million.
Pelly-Ruddock Mpanzu has also left the club. I've been trying to sell him all Summer but with no joy, so eventually terminated his contract for a fee of £525k to get him off the wage bill. He done a good job for me but again is 33 and didn't manage to cope with Premier League football last year.
So this is where it leaves my squad as we head into the new season!
Chapter 40 An Underwhelming Start 1st September 2027
Sam Tickle has come up the leagues with me and was my number 1 keeper right up until last season. The 25 year old did have his nose put out of joint last season though and when he was picked, he was below par in the Premier League. In short, we ended up falling out towards the end of the season and from then on, his departure was almost inevitable. The final nail in the coffin was the arrival of 20 year old Callan McKenna as my new backup keeper this Summer and Tickle has now moved on and joins Valencia for £23 million.
What that did allow me to do was strengthen further in defence by bringing in Brandon Williams from Norwich for £26 million (with £16 million paid up front and the rest paid over the next 3 years). Williams gives us great full back versatility as he can play on the left or right and is considerably better than any other full back at the club.
It means I broke the club's transfer record for the second time this Summer. It also means Norwich have had £51 million out of us for the two players that broke the records.
With his arrival, we were able to move on one of our existing left backs and Dimitris Giannoulis returns to his native Greece to join Olympiakos for £3.6 million.
I personally feel we are a lot stronger than last season, but the bookies don't see us as being that much more competitive and still think we will get relegated. Newly promoted Forest and Brentford are tipped for good seasons, whilst Man City are predicted to wrestle the title back off of Arsenal and those two are seen to be well ahead of the rest!
We will kick off our season against a West Ham side that we shared a win each with last year.
It wasn't the start to the season we were looking for. James McAtee's early sending off certainly didn't help and it was always going to be a struggle to get something from the game after that point.
And we make it 2 defeats from 2 as we lose to Manchester United as well.
Hopefully, we could do better in our first venture into Europe. We have one qualifying round to get through to get into the league phase of the Europa Conference League and standing in our way are Slovakian side, Trencin.
We were totally dominant out in Slovakia, but we only managed to score once from our 17 shots on goal. It was enough for victory though and we do at least bring a narrow lead home with us for the 2nd leg.
Back in domestic football, we are struggling with the Premier League in the early stages this year and lose again!
At least if we do get relegated this year though, we will at least have a European campaign to enjoy after winning the second leg of our qualifier against Trencin.
The fixtures for the league phase have now been released and I have to feel confident that we can progress to the knockout stages.
As we started our defence of the Carabao Cup, we were very nearly embarrassed by Morecambe and it looked like we might lose this game when they went 2-1 up in the 66th minute. We eventually got over the line, but the performance was nowhere near good enough!
On transfer deadline day, I made one final signing as I snap up Porto's transfer listed winger, Gabriel Veron. The 24 year old Brazilian had fallen out of favour with the Portuguese side, but gives us a valuable attacking option. He cost just £8 million which is a bargain!
Just 3 days after just about overcoming Morecambe, we were back in Carabao Cup action and this time we didn't get away with it against lower league opposition. A poor performance and we are out of the competition we won last season!
Our fourth Premier League game of the season ended in our fourth Premier League defeat of the season as newly promoted Nottingham Forest get the better of us. We are bang in trouble in these early stages!
After the start we've had, I had absolutely no confidence going into the match against Manchester City, but we do in fact pick up our first Premier League point of the season!
It would give us confidence going into our first game in the league phase of the Europa Conference League and we win in Ireland, although I am disappointed we conceded a couple of goals against much lesser opposition!
Back in the league, we were totally outclassed by Liverpool, but despite having only 4 shots in the whole game we still managed to salvage a draw at Anfield and take a very good point from the fixture!
Without a win in the league this season, it probably wasn't the best time for me to request upgrades to the facilities, but it is disappointing that the board rejected my approach.
We can only manage a draw against Wolves too. That's now 7 games into the season and still no league win!
We were largely outplayed by Fulham and were lucky to lose by just a single goal if I'm honest. I really don't know what has gone wrong this season. I've even switched back to the 4-1-2-3 formation over the last few games and it hasn't brought about any improvement!
Our form in the league went from bad to worse and heavy defeats to both Chelsea and Arsenal are at the forefront of a very poor Premier League campaign. Weirdly, we were doing well in Europe and had won every game in the Europa Conference League.
The win against Middlesbrough looked like it had got us back on track, but the following result against Luton, who were bottom of the league and leapfrog us to leave us sitting in 20th after 14 games with just 7 points, was the final nail in the coffin and I am relieved of my duties as Wigan manager.
It was a good career that saw me take charge of 230 games with a win rate of 57%! During my time at the club, I won League One, the Championship and the Carabao Cup!
So it's time for a new challenge and I'll be back with a new story in due course. Thank you to all those that have followed, liked and commented along the way!
Thanks mate. I enjoyed the ride that's for sure and it was gutting for it all to come to an end....especially as I reckon we were in with a chance of lifting the Europa Conference League too! Too many moves in the Summer both in and out I think disrupted the team too much....will remember that for future saves I play though, not to go too mad in the transfer windows.
Gutted mate. I think there were other factors rather than just our poor league position. A few players had come to me to have 'conversations' and because I didn't pander to them and left them unhappy, there was a lot of disgruntled members of the squad so it might be fair to say I'd lost the dressing room a bit. Still p155ed though as I would have expected my players to show me a little more respect after what I'd achieved at the club, but again I suppose this is the problem when you have loads of new players that you haven't quite earned the loyalty of yet.
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