Portsmouth - Back to the Big Time!!!

[darnho]

February 2017

Not a bad month, but more of an annoying month. We started off with two 2-2 draws against Wycombe and Accrington Stanley (who scored a 90th minute penalty), continued on with three wins against Blackpool, Barnet & Carlisle. Another worrying part about my results in the last couple of months has been the amount of goals I have been conceding and the amount of mistakes my back line have been making, especially David Forde.

 

[darnho]

March 2017

The month began with a good 3-1 victory over Crewe but then it happened, we basically went to sh**e for a couple of games and had me thinking that we just threw away the league title. Our little blip in form started with a 2-0 loss against Colchester and we were shocking in the game and deserved nothing more than we got, so we moved on to the next game versus Grimsby. Now, we were atrocious last time out against Colcester but holy mother of god were we bad at home to Grimsby, the game was like watching paint dry, both teams ahd 1 shot on target in the entire game and their shot found its way past David Forde, like most shots coming at him seem to do these days. I have as much confidence in Forde at the moment as Klopp has with both of his keepers... NONE!

Thankfully, the rest of the month went well with two wins over Stevenage and Newport Co. After the two losses the gap between ourselves and Luton went down to 1 point but after these 2 victories we managed to push it back out to a nice 6 points.

 

[darnho]

The board have made a wise decision....

 

[darnho]

April 2017

Soooooooooooooo.... all my giving out about David Forde came back to bit in the ****.

It got worse when I noticed my sub goalkeeper was 19 year old Alex Bass with a current ability of 1 and a half stars. He was chucked into the starting 11 of a team closing in on a league title who could not slip up in any game. This is how we got on...

Thankfully, we managed to wrap up the league and Bass actually played brilliantly for being chucked into the deep end. It always nice to get the league title in your first season as it really gives you the enthusiasm to keep going with your save.

At the start of the season, I was talking of a rivalry between Chaplin and Smith, on who would be out number one striker, well that didn't last too long as Chaplin destroyed Smith throughout the season. Chaplin finished with 25 goals while Smith managed to get only 5.

Here are the end of season awards and season review...

And the final table for the 2016/17 season, where we finished with a nice 100 points, 10 points clear of Luton.

 

[darnho]

Pre-Season 2017

Starting our pre-season, I knew if I could bring in the right players and get rid of the dead wood in the team, we could have a good season and hopefully compete.

The bookies seem to think we will have an average season having us at 30-1 to win the league and 14-1 to go down, hopefully we can prove them wrong.

Here's a look at our transfer activity during the pre-season...

If you have a look at the very bottom of the transfers out, you will see Jack Whatmough, the man who forced his way out of the club because he wanted to play for a better team even though he was barely good enough to get into my team, he shall now be know as the Judas!

Anyway, onto my transfers in...

Michael Cain - Free - Leicester: I picked up Michael on a free after his contract expired with Leicester, with him only being 22 years old and asking for 1.4k in wages, he was a steal for the stats he has.

Joe Cole - £14k - Tampa Bay: In my opinion this was my best transfer in the window, even with Joe being 35, he could bring skill and experience to the team having played on the highest platform, that was until he decided he would retire in October of this year.... DISASTER!

Connor Randall - Loan - Liverpool: When looking at my squad at the start of pre-season, I taught we could do with strengthening the right back position, so with the opportunity to take Randall on loan from Liverpool arose I was very happy to take it.

Tyler Forbes - £145k - Brighton: Again, the right back position needed some cover so bought Forbes with the idea that he would be back up to Randall this season and could take over the position once Randall went back to Liverpool at the end of the season.

Dean Henderson - Free - Free Agent: With all my whinging about Forde last season, I knew I needed new goalkeepers, so with Henderson being released by Man Utd, he was a good addition to the team.

Samba Diakite - £500k - Rochdale: This was my joint most expensive acquisition of the transfer window, hopefully with him having played in higher divisions he can bring some experience to the midfield.

Harry Cornick - £165k - Bournemouth: At only 22 years old, looks like a player who could be good for some years to come, with good stats for pace, passing and first touch.

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Gboly Ariyibi - £500k - Chesterfield: My other joint highest transfer at half a million quid, with the American being 22 years old just like Cornick, hopefully its a transfer that will keep me happy for seasons to come.

Connor Ripley - £115k - Middlesborough: Again, with starting the season with only one star Bass as my goalkeeper, I knew i'd have to bring in more than one, so Ripley was brought in to fight Henderson for the number one shirt.

Danny Philliskirk - £300k - Blackpool: I was happy with Chaplin, Yesil and Smith as my strikers last season, however a little new competition is always good to keep players on their toes so Danny was brought in from Blackpool.

Sinan Bytyqi - Loan - Man City: Having the affiliation with Man City is always nice when you can get a player like this on loan for the season without having to spend a penny on a transfer fee or wages.

 

[darnho]

End of Pre-Season 2017

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We had a good pre-season, played plenty of games in order to give as much game time to our new players. The quicker I can get them all on the same wave length, the quicker we can start playing well together.

Started off with a couple of good wins, then a loss against Derby, it was a good loss, if there is such a thing. We played well, were the better of the two teams but Derby has more clinical finishers who made the couple of chances they had, count.

We quickly got back on track with three more wins, including a confidence builder against Newhaven before the start of the League One season.

Next up is the month of August 2017....

 

[darnho]

August 2017

Well, that went better than expected, obviously having such a large number of pre-season games was a positive for the team going into the League One season. A good opening day victory against Fleetwood, even with a quite fortunate own goal going our way in the 9th minute. Losing on penalties versus Ipswich was a kick in the bollocks as we were the better team.

Our next two games were impressive victories against Northampton and Walsall, but then came the bad part of the month, two losses against Bradford and Peterborough. I really don't know who is my first choice keeper as they both keep having poor performances.

A nice 3-0 win against Swindon in the Checkatrade Trophy rounded out a good opening month for us.

 

[darnho]

September 2017

Decent month, a draw against Birmingham is a great result in my opinion, they had real quality in their team so I was happy with that. Then we put together three great results versus Millwall, Bolton and Leyton Orient. Jaime O'Hara had been unbelievable for me this season, if anyone is doing a save in League Two or League One, I suggest you sign O'Hara. A draw against Scunthorpe and a loss against Coventry saw us at the end of the month.

These results saw us go upto 3rd place in the league, if you offered me this position before the league started I would of snapped your hand off, hopefully we can keep this run going.

 

[darnho]

October 2017

Well....... I.... I.... I don't know what happened, I feel like Rick Grimes in The Walking Dead, the world has just went to sh**e around me, well maybe thats just being slightly over the top, but this month did not go well. Combined with the results at the end of September, we went 6 games without a win.

We started off with a loss to Eastleigh in the Checkatrade Trophy which didn't really bother me as I'm not too interested in this competition. Then two draws at home to Sheffield Utd and away to Notts Co, is then followed up with a loss to Luton. At this stage I knew I had to change something in order to stem the tide of bad results.

I don't like making big changes to my team so I just made a small change in hope to change the losses and draws to victories. Instead of playing a 4-2-3-1 Wide, I dropped the CAM back into CM to make a 4-3-3 Wide as can be seen below....

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This small change seemed to work as we finished out the month with two victories against Swindon and Bury.

And to anyone reading this, if you would like me to change the way I post my updates or have any advice in general, I would be delighted to hear it.

 

[Sam91]

Great job signing Joe Cole!! Looking forward to seeing how you'll get on

 

[darnho]

Great job signing Joe Cole!! Looking forward to seeing how you'll get on

Cheers mate, sadly he retired in October and he's now a coach for my U-18s side! haha

 

[darnho]

November 2017

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This month has been impressive, the slight change in tactics we made last month seemed to work and we strung a few good performances together throughout the month.

Started off with a great performance in the FA Cup 1st round against Whitehawk, we then had another brilliant game against Swansea U23's which put us into the second round of the Checkatrade Trophy. Three more victories against Shrewsbury, Wigan and Oldham kept us up near the top of the league.

Our only disappointing result of the month came away at Preston, sadly we can't seem to beat the teams around us this season which is going to need to change if we want to be in contention come the business end of the season.

 

[darnho]

December 2017

This month opened up with with a victory away to Dag & Red in the FA Cup 2nd round, and then we somehow couldn't score against Wimbledon in 90 minutes so we were brought to penalties which of course we lost. I know I previously said that competition didn't matter but after you get a few wins in a row you get some confidence of some silverware on the horizon but nevermind... haha

A couple of scrappy 1-0 wins followed against Port Vale and Southend, then the worst result of our season came with a 4-1 loss to Gillingham, we were embarrassing in the match and thats the result we deserved. We got back on track with a couple of wins to end the month.

So, coming to the end of 2017 we find ourselves in 2nd place which I am over the moon about, players like Cain, O'Hara and Clarke have carried the team this season and hopefully they can continue this run of form.

 

[darnho]

January 2018

Lets start off with the January transfer activity from us, it was a month with more departures than arrivals. Players on my team decided to become like a bunch of crying babies because I supposedly was not giving them enough game time, and when I did? They were *****! So even though I only bought them in the summer:

Samba Diakite - £550k - Colorado
Danny Philliskirk - £350k - Minnesota
Connor Ripley - £200k - Tottenham

Even though I am not happy about letting them go half way through the season I am at least making a small profit on each of them, good riddance to players who don't like being team players.

The only arrival was Richie Towell from Brighton for 70k, an absolute steal for that money in my opinion. With Diakite leaving, its nice to get another CM in to cover.

Anyway, on with the games in January....

This month started with a couple of victories at home to Bradford in the league and Swindon in the FA Cup 3rd round. Then, we had a top of the table clash, 1st versus 2nd, away to Peterborough. We managed to scrap a 1-0 victory after Samed Yesil nicked a goal in the very first minute. Yesil has proved over the last couple of months that he might be our number one striker, displacing Chaplin in the process.

The very next game after the top of the table clash we had a howler away to Walsall, we couldn't hit a barn door with a shovel, we were awful. We turned that around next with a very good win over Birmingham with Cornick being the star of the day.

FA Cup 4th round, yeah..... lets not talk about that, move on nothing to see here! haha
Outclassed by Premier League opponents, that's all to say on that game.

We finished the month with a win against Millwall thanks to a nice finish by Harry Cornick.

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Here's how my squad looks at the end of January, Matt Clarke is developing into a fantastic CB and at the age of 21 he has many good years to come.

 

[naterr]

looks like it's going well! let's hope you can get back to back promotions!

 

[darnho]

looks like it's going well! let's hope you can get back to back promotions!

Cheers mate, yeah hopefully we can keep the run going!

 

[darnho]

Although I am enjoying this save, with the new patch coming out I am tempted to start a new save, what do you guys think?

 

[WWred]

Nooooo commit to this one until you bleed it dry! Plenty of time to switch to new patch before next years game comes out!

 

[darnho]

Nooooo commit to this one until you bleed it dry! Plenty of time to switch to new patch before next years game comes out!

I think you're right mate! and especially with tweets like this from Southampton, its time for Portsmouth to get back to the Prem! XD

 

[darnho]

February 2018

So, as you seen in the last update, we signed Richie Towell and when he signed he was just coming to the end of injury which was fine, but then.... this ****** game..... he made his debut and 10 minutes into it... BROKEN ANKLE!! and out for the rest of the season.... typical....

Anyway, we went this month unbeaten with 3 draws and 2 wins, only realised as I was writing this that we had another game this month that we haven't played yet, I will show that in the nest update. Overall it was a good month as we kept a hand on 1st position with only a couple of months left in the season.

Wins against Leyton Orient and Sheffield United and draws against Bolton, Scunthorpe and Coventry.