Airdrieonians Diamonds from the rough

  • Thread starter Thread starter Mr_Grieves
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Not looking brilliant right now, but I'm sure the ship will be turned around over time.
 
stonecold said:
Was it hard not to write "Simply the best" haha
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Hahaha possibly! Nah I love my club and support them 100% but i'm not a WATP FTP kinda guy I've grown up from that carry on and try to discourage my son from being like that XD he watches youtube videos of rangers songs all the time and its so ****** hard to avoid ones that have pictures of god **** uvf soldiers etc its irritating as I want him growing up loving Rangers the football club not the other side of it.
 
The GallantPioneer1872 said:
Hahaha possibly! Nah I love my club and support them 100% but i'm not a WATP FTP kinda guy I've grown up from that carry on and try to discourage my son from being like that XD he watches youtube videos of rangers songs all the time and its so ****** hard to avoid ones that have pictures of god **** uvf soldiers etc its irritating as I want him growing up loving Rangers the football club not the other side of it.
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I totally agree. That was a different times problems. It really puzzles me why people felt the need to turn it into a religoius witch hunt considering its 2018. Footballs football. Hate them because its your neighbour or closest rival but why add everything else into it? Just a excuseto cause trouble
 
stonecold said:
I totally agree. That was a different times problems. It really puzzles me why people felt the need to turn it into a religoius witch hunt considering its 2018. Footballs football. Hate them because its your neighbour or closest rival but why add everything else into it? Just a excuseto cause trouble
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90 minute hatred! Put it this way I will call you a SSB for 90 mins despite me having family from Banff lol, I call some of my mates certain things as a joke because they are celtic fans and I'm married to a celtic fan and her family are but after the footballs done I go home gutted maybe but not full of hatred wanting to physically beat someone up XD Hatred probably isn't even the correct term because it's rather strong as we are all passionate about the same thing our football club!

Don't agree with the whole football casual scene either but if you are one and keep the trouble out the way and only involve other "Casuals" then fair enough do whatever you want don't bring innocents and randoms into it though.

Anyway XD hope to see you in the prem soon with Airdrie!
 



October





Fixtures
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Things could only get better. It was impossible to be worse than September. It would turn out to be more frustration as we collapsed on our **** against Albion in a vital league game and before that we threw away 3 points against Ayr and Arbroath along the way




League Table
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Suddenly we are starting to fall away from the rest and any thoughts of promotion are long forgotten. Its all about staying in League 1 with the teams in the playoffs spots on double our points haul and amature side Queens Park at the bottom are only 1 point behind



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November


Away from Airdrie we had our first domestic final of the season and it was one of the best finals in Scottish history
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Fixtures
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Back to us and we might have finally turned the corner. I took away some instructions and put players in more comfortable positions and immediately we saw results putting 4 past Alloa then winning 2 of our 3 league games to double our seasons total. The best result was beating championship side Dumbarton 5-2 in Extra time while even our defeat to East Fife had reason for optimism as it was the only time we conceded in the league all month




League 1 Table
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We crawl out of the bottom 2, by a whole point. Even better the playoffs are only 5 points away!




A win in the Scottish Cup sets us up with our second game of the season against Hearts

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Nice little earner there against Hearts, Hopefully you can maybe sneak something if they become complacent and play a weakened side!
 



December




The turn around in we crave has finally happened! 4 wins from 5 games including beating the top two Ayr and Raith along the way to drag us into play off contention and within 10 points of top spot, although a lot will have to go right before were worrying about that.




We cram in some transfer business grabbing a long term target in Craig Storie on a free after Aberdeen released him in real life January

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Fixtures
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6 goals from Carrick scoring in every game since the Forfar win! In fat until the Alloa match we never looked like loosing convincingly beating all comers




League 1 Table
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We were overjoyed to go 8 points clear of the bottom two arriving at the back end of the playoff push. Another month like this and we might start to think about chasing down Ayr and East Fife, but thats getting well ahead of ourselves



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January


We finally evolve into a team that has an unbeaten month. Darryl Duffy took over from Carrick by scoring in 3 of the 4 games on his way to player of the month.




Fixtures
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Duffy started the new year with a hattrick as we thrash Albion away. That was just the start of our goal fest. Title favorites East Fife were thrashed 6-2 to really announce we are coming for the top 2. Stranraer was the only blip through January but even that felt like win with a 91st minute equalizer only just keeping our unbeaten run going.






League 1 Table
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Our run of results has us up to the dizzy hights of third all of a sudden but dont get too excited as there is only 8 points between the top 8!






Scottish Cup 4th Round
Airdrie 1-2 Hearts
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We put one of our best performances of the year and went in at half time in the lead thanks to man of the month Darryl Duffy. Craig Levine gave his SPL team a kick in the **** and they came out firing in the second half quickly getting level before on loan Aberdeen winger, who should be on loan with us ina fair world Scott Wright hit the winning goal ending our cup run!


The other mystery of this game is why did only 3,704 fans come to see a SPL team play but over three times that came to see Celtic u20s?




Transfer Window
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We add another 16 year old and sell two of the defenders i bought in the summer. Adams especially angered me at how poor he was after spending money on him. i wont be making that mistake again!

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February




Manager of the month for the 3rd time in a month
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We copy our form of January with 3 wins and a draw




Fixtures
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Beating Raith and basement dwellers Queens Park was handy but the match of the season for us was our game at Ayr




Ayr 3-4 Airdrie
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This was a utter classic, one of the best matches i've had in FM. League leaders Ayr too the lead through another former Aberdeen youngster Lawrence Shankland, More on him later. Dale Carrick had us level for all of 3 minutes before Shankland once again put Ayr ahead going into the break. The second half was where the drama went into overload. On loan Motherwell forward Jake Hastie got us level again till a goalless 20 minutes setting up a frantic ending. with 10 minutes to go Shankland put Ayr ahead for the 3rd and final time. Ryan Conroy quickly pulled us level for the third time before a thrilling game got its thrilling end with our last striker standing Dale Carrick hitting the winner in the 92nd minute.




League 1 Table
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There's still very little between the top 8 but having said that we are in the pack with the leading 5 and having had the 2nd worst goal difference around September October were now top!




Irn Brew Cup Semi Final
Morton 1-2 Airdrie
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Another big game filled with drama in the last 15 minutes. Championship Morton fell 2 behind with Carrick and Hastie hitting two late goals that put us on our way to the final in March where we'll play championship contenders Queen of the South.



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March


We go top of the table twice but that was after our only 2 wins from the 5 games

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Despite this i get rewarded with a new long term contract. On minimum wage by my choice so i should get more money to spend on players and wages

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Fixtures
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March was about as up and down as you get. A pretty straight forward win against Stranraer was followed by a close game with title rivals East Fife where we went 2-1 behind and down to 10 men. We went for it and that just made East Fife's task easier. Next up was Alloa who we thrashed 6-0 but next time out we were dropping points at home to Raith Rovers before a real stunning result where the side almost certain to finish bottom Queens Park beat us 2-0 after i took a crazy decision to play all my best youth prospects.




League 1 Table
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Simply put there is 4 games to go and the top 5 teams are split by 4 points. Were right in the middle but with the best goal difference and 2 of our final 4 games are against contenders Ayr and Arbroath. Leaders Ayr have the easiest schedule with no top 5 teams meaning we MUST beat them in April to have any chance of the title and automatic promotion

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Irn Bru Cup Final 2018

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Queen of the South vs Airdie

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A cup final in our first season. I would not have believed in a million years that this was possible after the way the season started. The Final will be our toughest test in every which way wth Queen of the South our toughest opponent, except Hearts and we have to go against Stephen Dobbie the best player we've played, except Hearts. We're also missing 3 our top u19's who are on international duty




Queen of the South 1-2 Airdie
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We had a huge advantage from the start as despite both teams having a game 3 days earlier there squad was knackered with players starting the game in the 80's. We went with a rare high tempo attack and it was doing the business as Dale Carrick gave us the lead. We held the advantage all the way to the 80th minute when star forward Stephen Dobbie pulled the favorites level. They made it to extra time but that was there biggest mistake as the picture shows they were knackered and we just had to keep going and as usual Carrick came up with the good to get back into the lead and this time we held on to become the kings of the lower leagues!

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End of Season run in




Match 33
Airdrie 3-0 Ayr
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Our biggest match of the season see us go join top with the long time leaders Ayr, Two goals in the first 10 minutes had the game in our hands and to be fair Ayr couldnt lay a finger on us and we added a 3rd in stoppage time from Duffy




Match 34
Airdrie 4-0 Albion Rovers
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Albion are at the other end of the table but they got the same outcome as Ayr one week earlier


No real change in the league at the top, The goal difference slides further in our failure with 2 games to go the bottom two spot are set but any of the top 5 can still take the title!

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Match 35
Arbroath 0-1 Airdrie
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If there was going to be a stumbling block this is exactly where i thought it would be. The gods were looking down on us here with the Red Lichties loosing there keeper right on half time and missing a penalty right after the break. As you would expect with two teams in win or bust mode keeping a clean sheet was the order of the day and as time was running out it was looking like if either team could score that would end the other title challenge and it was the usual suspect Dale Carrick who with 11 minutes to go ended Arbroath's title hopes keeping us in pole position with 1 game to go


EVERYTHING GOES RIGHT!
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Ayr and Raith both draw ending Raith's challenge due to goal difference, East Fife are also in 59 points needed us to loose to have a chance. All this means is only Ayr and Forfar can stop us not. Forfar need to beat us to give Ayr any chance!




Match 36
Airdrie 3-1 Forfar
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We have to overcome a huge scare when Forfar equalizer right after half time but we did and it means amazingly after the start to the season we had Airdrie are the League 1 Champions!

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Matt G said:
How the **** did you manage that - holy ****!
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Only major change was the tactics. Went more settled and played to the players strengths with less instructions makign it far simpler for the less skilled players. Team was far more settled thanks to a let up in injurys
 
What a turnaround, I've been recovering from the old firm defeat and the man flu and haven't been on and come back to you winning the league!! well done man. Unlucky against Hearts also!
 



Season Review






Final League Table
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We had already won the league but sadly for 2nd place Ayr they were plastered by League 1 side Falkirk 5-0 in the playoff final. A worrying sight for our future. Both Albion and Queens Park are relegated to League 2 where they belong.




Airdrie will be one of 3 new teams in a very strong Championship next year with Ross County & Dundee falling down the leagues taking the places of promoted St Mirren & Queen of the South

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Airdrie squad
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The strikers carried us to all our success with a total of 50 goals between the 2 of them, Gavin Milne & Austin Stevenson as teenagers look like they could be with us for the long run. Young wing back Scott Stewart and the best bits are. Every main player is under 22 except Dale Carrick




Fans award
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Players of the Year





Dale Carrick
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The former Scotland U21 international prove his worth by Scoring 19 goals in the league to fire us to top spot as well as 8 in the cups, usually involved in the important moments. Signing him to a long term deal will be a important job this summer.


Jordan McGregor
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I had actually overlooked McGregor at the start of the season having him no higher than 3rd in my depth chart but once he sneaked into the first team and became our best center back. With all the stats to succeed he's a player i would not be scared to give a game in the SPL if we ever reach there!


Scott Stewart
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A star and captain in real life. His stats dont stand out but he get the job done!




The Kids
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Three are key starters with Milne, Stevenson & Edwards all under 18 and starting every week


Nathan Jordan & Ally Main impressed when they got a rare run out but Steve Bennett was the only let down.
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Do you think you'll go professional now or will have to wait until you're in the Premiership?
 
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