Gone Travelling

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Sammuthegreat said:
Solid mid-table season seems like a much-needed relief after your previous gig!
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Happy enough so far just hope that if we stay up we can bring in a few players with a it more quality, as we are bit behind some of the teams on that front, otherwise I'm not sure how much progress we can make
 
September would be a quite month with only 3 games and all of them winnable with 2 teams in and around us and 1 team struggling against relegation. I'd like 9 points but would settle for 6. Just hope we can keep the lads motivated now that survival has been achieved.

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4 points isn't to be sniffed at but a draw against 2nd bottom Qianbao was poor. we are also starting to slide down the table a little and now sit 10th.

October would be 4 games with 1 game against a team who are mid table and nothing to play for. The other 3 games however definitely have riding on them. Promotion chasing Chongqing visit us whilst we travel to relegation threatened Tianshan and Annapurna. My main concern is that we will be on the beach whilst at least 3 of the teams that we are up aginst will be right up for it, 6 points is the target but fear we may struggle.

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And struggle we did. Not in any of the games did we play well,or dominate and were lucky to get anything from the month. Comfortably beaten by Chongqing who kept the title promotion hopes alive. We then didn't turn up against Yanbian and 1-0 flattered us. The 2 games against the struggling teams we were 2nd best and it took a 90th minute equaliser against Tianshan to spare our blushes.

With the league over we had survived, in truth we were never in any danger of going down. I was a little annoyed that we seemed to switch off in the 2nd half of the season and were really on the beach for the last 4 games. The good news was we still had a couple of million in the transfer budget and a few quid in wages, and I feel that this league like the Indian league was fairly close quality wise and with a few good signings we could really push on next season.

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11th place after we had fallen from 7/8th which we had been for the majority of the season, but it is still 3 places higher than we were predicted so I guess I have to be pleased with that.

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The season was over and I was sat at home thinking about my next step. I was enjoying life in China, certainly more than my month in South America, and I had a solid if unspectacular team. I had spoke with the board and they had agreed budgets for the new season of £2.1m and £40k in wages, which was loads and was plenty to reshape the team, however as I had found out last year having more and spending it in this league were 2 different things. I was going through my scout reports and backroom staff reports on how players had performed and I noticed that we had only used a total of 19 players in the league last year, I quickly compared that to the rest of the league and found that this was the lowest, it wasn't that I didn't want to rotate more that I couldn't beyond the first team there was little or no quality, couple that with a lot of aging players and it was time to rebuild, mainly squad depth as I still think we'll have trouble attracting the better players to the club as we are still one of the favourites to go down, 5th favourites to be exact which is 1 better than last year!

Anyway the scouting team were dispatched to find me 1 foreign as Davi the Brazilian midfielder had retired, and the best Chinese players we could get, I wanted numbers, I wanted to be able to make 4/5 changes and not severally weaken the team. The weeks rolled by and reports on players came in from far and wide, but the first player to catch my eye was a young centre back That I had brought in last year and who during his season in the reserves had improved and was now to be promoted to the first team (truth be told I forgot about him last year as he gone straight into the reserves rather than the first team when I bought him).

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A decent centre back for this level with good tackling, heading and marking. His pace will also be a big benefit to us though his jumping is a concern, he can also fill in at right back and so is exactly the type of player I will be looking to bring in over the coming months.
 
With all the reports in the scouting team and I sat down and identified our targets. I was looking for back ups for almost every position, as I felt that last year when we got a few injuries we didn't perform, that and we had sold a couple of players, a couple had left on free contracts and a couple had retired. I wanted to bring in first teamers but again we really struggled to attract the quality of player that would have gone straight into the starting line up.

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Only 2 departures for actual money. Tong Xiaoxing had wanted to leave from about half way through last season as he wasn't getting enough game time, with his contract only having 1 year left to run and a replacement being signed I was happy to take what I could get for him. Lu Yao on the other hand I would have liked to stay. I had identified tha we had one on the worst defensive records in the league last year and had set about signing a few defenders. Lu Yao had moved down the pecking order but would still have got some game time, however when he said he was worried about the new signings taking his place and that he didn't want to fight for a place I was only to happy to let him go.
 
Now with the ins. A few of these were brought in by the club President as players for the future and will be in the reserves for the next season or so and I will therefore not mention them. Most of the others are going to be squad players who if the improve or can get a run of firm going will definitely be in and around the first team.

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As you can see we even managed to spend a couple of quid this season and I now feel we have a squad that can cope with a couple of injuries and that will allow me a bit of rotation.
 
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Bambu comes in as my 3rd foreign player. A very good centre back who will be first choice. Good in the air and with very good tackling and marking along with some pace is an upgrade on what we had last season and will hopefully help shore things up at the back.

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Gong was brought in as back up for the poacher role. Last season when our poacher was injuried or out of form we didn't have a natural replacement and ended up with 2 target men playing neither of whom had any pace, Gong will hopefully mean that this season we don't face that problem. Decent pace and finishing is about all he has going for him but all I want from him is to run and score so should be an OK back up.

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Boxuan was brought in to add a few numbers to the left hand side of midfield. We had sold 1 left winger and released another so were a bit light on that side of the pitch. Doesn't really set the world on fire but is a solid back up, or 3rd choice as he would soon become.

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Another centre back this time with some experience. All of our other CBs are quite young whereas Jianbin has experience on his side. Will mainly be a back up but he is decent enough for a 4th choice.

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Just a bit of squad depth for the middle of the park. Probably won't get too much game time but if we have a few injuries a player that i'd be happy to play. He has decent physicals and his technicals and mentals are ok for this level, again as 4th choice will do a job if called upon.

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Another left sided player who I wasn't going to sign but when I got the final scout report I couldn't not. At this level he could be a star. Pacy with really good dribbling and crossing. I have high hopes for this guy and think he will get plenty of assists and probably even a goal or two. It does however cause me a headache as he is now the 4th foreign player and we can only register 3, a few tough decisions to be made before the season starts!

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Zheming is again just more squad depth. Kind of a jack of all trades type player who can fill a couple of roles in the middle of the park and this may lead to him seeing a bit of game time. Good passing and vision but his taclking and marking are better than the ball winner we played last season so I think he'll play a few games .
 
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Season 2

So with the signings completed we headed into pre-season in high spirits. I was confident we could improve on last years 11th place finish I just wasn't sure if we could improve enough to be pushing for promotion, however a top half finish was definitely within our grasp. On a personal level I was keen to continue my own development as a manager and would therefore ask the board to go on a coaching course at every opportunity, maybe if I bugged them enough they would just say yes to shut me up.

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Three wins and 2 defeats and I was happy with how it went. 2 wins against Super League opposition and we hammered the team from the lower division. Even in the games which we lost we were playing ok and gave a good account of ourselves. I was beginning to think that top half was maybe under estimating how good we were, but then you can't read too much into pre-season results.
 
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We would kick off our season at home to one of the relegated teams Henan who were one of the favourites to go straight back up, I just hoped that we could put in a decent performance and keep morale high as the next 3 games were very winnable being against teams that weren't expected to do too well and according to the bookies at least would be fighting with us against relegation. 6 points would e an acceptable start but would love 9.

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What a start! 12 points, 10 goals scored and only 2 conceded I'm a very happy boy. We completely hammered Henan in every department, and it was the best I had ever seen us play. The next 3 games were closer in scoreline but not in performance as we dominated all 3 games and being deserved winners in each case.

So 2nd in the league and 5 games to come in April. 2 against teams predicted to do well and be in the mix for promotion and 2 who were going to be in and around ourselves. We would also have the 3rd round of the cup and after going out in this round last year I was keen to have a bit of a run in it this year, not that it would stop me rotating a little.
 
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So we suffer our first defeat of the season away to Guizhou and I wasn't too disappointed. We had played well and they are due to to be towards the top of the table. We were back to winning ways straight away with two 2-0 wins. I was especially pleased with the away win at Changchun who are being tipped by many as potential champions. I rotated fairly heavily in the cup and we didn't perform and for the second year running we fall at the first hurdle. That poor performance I had hoped to put behind us when I restored the starting 11 but they also failed to turn up and our second league defeat of the second followed. Need to get back to winning ways in May if we are to maintain our position towards the top of the league and mount a title challenge.
 
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Despite our relatively poor month in April we were still doing ok sitting in 4th in the league and only 2 points off top. This meant that we were confident going into the 5 games in May. Another mixed bag with a couple of teams who were performing well a couple of decent teams who were under performing and 1 game against the team who were 2nd bottom of the table. I'd like to think that we could pick up at least 9 points from this month ad keep us in the hunt for promotion.

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Well that didn't go as planned. We started the month with 2 wins and a draw and I was happy with the performances and we had put ourselves back into the automatic promotion places. e then came up against Yanbian who are a decent side and playing quite well this season though below us and I was expecting a tight game and so it proved. We shaded possession and shots but they shaded the only stat that matters and got the 2-1 win. Up next were 2nd bottom Tiehan and going into the game I was confident that we could bounce back, how wrong I was. It was a weird game as we had all the ball (63% possession) more shots (9-6) but less on target (4-6) but it Tiehan who were clinical. Everything they touched turned to goal literally, including 2 wonder strikes from 30+ yards. I didn't know what to say to the lads as they had played ok but got spanked, in fact we had played worse this season and won! I just hope this hiding doesn't effect morale too much as we can't afford to drop too many more points if we are serious about pushing for promotion.
 
Mate, how do you paste your screenshots into the story so they are big and people don't need to click on them to open them up? I've been attaching mine and they always appear as thumbnails making it a pain in the **** to open up to view
 
BallyC7 said:
Mate, how do you paste your screenshots into the story so they are big and people don't need to click on them to open them up? I've been attaching mine and they always appear as thumbnails making it a pain in the **** to open up to view
Click to expand...

Once you have uploaded the image double click it and it gives you options about size and position.
 
The 4 matches in June would take us to the half way point of the season and I was keen that our heavy defeat wouldn't be carried over to the next month. With games against 2 teams that were around us in mid table and a couple that we towards the bottom of the table I was sure we would bounce back and thought we would pick up 6 points and could easily see us go unbeaten.

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So it look s like that defeat may have effected us more than I first realised. Our two away games we didn't turn up for. We went to Shenxin who were in the bottom 3 and got completely dominated in all aspects of the game. It was a similar story against Huanghai though at least they were right behind us in the league, well before the match they were. Morale was on the floor when Chongqing turned up at our place. They were also struggling at the wrong end of the table but given how we'd played in the previous 4 games I still wasn't confident. When they went 1-0 on 33 minutes I thought hear we go again, however the lads responded and we went 4-1 up before conceding a late consultation. I hoped we had turned the corner with that win Beikong though brought us back down to earth with a confident win.

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Having lead the way at one point to now find ourselves 7th and 11 points behind was incredibly disappointing. We needed to improve in the second half of the season though I fear that the chance of promotion has gone for this season. My fear is that we have a repeat of last season and struggling again which could see us fall further down the league.
 
July would be four games against teams below us in the league and so would offer us a good chance to get a few points on the board and build some much needed morale. I was hoping for an unbeaten month and ideally 10 points minimum, especially when we were playing the teams 13th 14th 15th and 19th.

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Only 1 defeat but at the same time only 1 win means it has to be viewed as a disappointing month. The 4 points we did gain don't do us ant favours as far as league position goes either as our slide down the table continues. It may be time to look at different tactics, roles and personnel. The match we won against bottom of the table Chaoyue was the only game we were the better team so I suppose it could have been a lot worse.
 
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August was set to be a difficult month. We'd have high flying Rongda and Changchun along with 3 sides that were around us in the league. I had amended a couple of the roles and personnel but was going to stick with our 442 shape. As far as a points target anything would be good, I had written off the 2 games against the teams at the top of the table but was hoping we could pick up a couple of wins that would stop us falling any further down the table.

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Well that was a disastrous month. Whats worse is its the hope that gets you as we played ok in most of the games and even took the lead in a couple of them, but our failure to be able to defend just keeps costing us. We were the better team against Guizhou but they scored twice in the space of 2 first half minutes and despite our dominance we couldn't get a goal until the 91st consolation. Tianjin was just a mad game 2-1 up at half time to 4-2 down by the hour mark. I expected them to go on and win at this point but the guys dug deep for a change ad we turned it around with 2 goals in 2 minutes with just 15 minutes left on the clock. The next 3 games followed a very similar pattern. We were rubbish and didn't deserve anything but did manage to take the lead in the last two games giving me false hope on each occasion.

Onwards to September and it didn't get any easier with 1st and 2nd in the league to play along with 2 teams in mid table. I could only hope that the mid table teams were as switched off as us now that they had nothing to play for and that we could maybe pick up a few points, I'd settle for a few draws at this stage.
 
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Title chasing Hangzhou made light work of us and walked away comfortable 2-0 winners. At this point I switched to a 4123 formation hoping that the defensive midfielder would help our defenders out a bit and make us harder to beat, and it seemed to work with 2 good wins and good performances to go with them. Away to top of the table Yanbian was never going to be easy but I was pleased with how we played and restricted them, though going forward we offered very little. So the best month we had had for a while 6 points and only losing to the top 2 in the league.

October would see us round off the season and with 4 games against teams like ourselves with nothing to play for I was optimistic we could pick up a few points, though if I was honest I just wanted the season to be over so I could look at replacing some of the players who had let me down in the second half of the season, there were going to be some big changes next season and some of the players who think they are untouchable could well be shown the door if the don't start to perform and quickly!
 
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Another month gone and another month were we didn't turn up, or at least a few of our players didn't turn up. The only good thing is that the season is over. With the exception of the 2-2 draw we managed 1 shot o target in each of the other 3 games, we were terrible and had been for most of the second half of the season, and I couldn't work out why we were so bad in comparison to the first half of the season. Anyway the final uninspiring month left the table looking like this.

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