Sutton United: Taking Them To The Top

[rtaylor12]

View attachment 344390
Sutton United F.C.
Season 2013/14 (Pre-Season)

​

So I've finally decided to do my first ever management story, and I've chosen to manage my local team, Sutton United of the Conference South.

Pre-Season Analysis:

I think the squad is primarily strongest down the middle of the park. The strongest player on the team is Jason Brown, by quite some distance, who is described by the scout as "a good player for most League 1 sides". He has primarily played in the Scottish Premiership and League 1 level, but did make several appearances over a few years in goal for Blackburn in the Premiership. The second best player in the team is Charlie Clough, who is described by the scouts as being "good for Conference Premier sides". I think that these two will be my defensive stalwarts, and who I'm going to be building the team around, as the rest of the squad are either Conference South level or Regional Premier Divisions quality.

The weakest areas of the squads are primarily the wings. The best right-back is a 41 year old Player/Coach, described as being a decent player at Regional Premier Division quality, while there are no left-backs in the squad at all - an issue that needs to be fixed on both sides. Additionally, I think that the right midfield position leaves some to be desired, and as such, I will be focusing on this

Pre-Season Friendlies:

Sutton United 3 - 4 Welling United (Conference Premier)
Att: 119
Williams (12', 88', 90+2') - Lafayette (3', 16'), Pires (27'), Healy (56')

Sutton United 0 - 2 Derby U21s
Att: 1,139
Sawyer (Red Card, 68') - Bennett (34'), Vernom (42')

Sutton United 0 - 2 Hull U21s
Att: 1,192
- Dawson (34'), Clark (51')

Sutton United 1 - 1 Celtic Reserves
Att: 2,206
Dundas (34') - McDonagh (23')

Sutton United 2 - 0 Aldershot Town
Att: 173
Binns (3'), Dundas (79') -

Sutton United 0 - 2 Cardiff U21s
Att: 1,146
- Turner (22'), Cowie (45')

Grays Athletic (Isthmian Premier Division) 2 - 0 Sutton United
Att: 58
Jones (44'), Corrigan (51') -

​

Pre-Season Transfers:

Tom King (LB): Season-long loan from Bristol City. 21 years old.
Danny Senda (RB): Free-agent. Has spent 10 or so years in the Football League at League 2 - Championship standards with Wycombe and Millwall. 32 years old - hopefully has a few good seasons in him.
Lee Hendrie (RM): Free agent. Played 15 or so years in the Premiership with Aston Villa. Now 36, and most likely to be a stop-over for the single season.

Pre-Season Friendlies Analysis:

Overall, I was a tad disappointed. While the U21 matches were only to bring in fans, and thus money, I wish we had pulled together a better result against Welling United, which I feel we should have won, and the defeat against Grays was infuriating. I was most impressed with the match against Celtic Reserves, where we were pushing for a winner for the full match, and my player of the pre-season was Marvin Williams for his hat-trick against Welling.

 

[rtaylor12]

View attachment 344382
Sutton United F.C.
Season 2013/14 (Post 1)

​

And so the regular season finally starts, beginning with an away trip to Eastleigh on the South Coast.

Conference South: Eastleigh 1 - 0 Sutton United
Att: 371
Fleetwood (73') -

A boring match, with virtually nothing of interest occurring, except for a disappointing late goal from Eastleigh. On the plus side, after the match, I picked up an excellent looking Centre Midfielder, Eoin Wearen, in free agency. The scouts described him as a leading Skrill South player, with the potential to be a good player in League 1.

Conference South: Sutton United 4 - 1 Staines Town
Att: 388
Melligan OG (3'), Dundas (8', 39', 41') - Willock (83')

Absolutely fantastic. A first half hat-trick for Dundas was amazing, and the team dominated from the first minute to the last. Every player on the Sutton team had a match performance over 7. My only disappointment was that we couldn't take the momentum from the first half and feed it into the second, possibly getting a few goals more.

Conference South: Sutton United 1 - 0 Bishops Stortford
Att: 390
Willams (23') -

I was glad to hold on to the win. Although we didn't play too well, we went a man down with 15 minutes to go after Paul Telfer (right-back) went off injured. Unfortunately, I'd made all 3 subs and had no spare right-back on the pitch, so I took the risk of playing 3 at the back instead of dropping a midfielder back, and luckily we held on.

Conference South: Concord Rangers 0 - 2 Sutton United
Att: 140
- Williams (5'), Binns (7')

Another good performance to take us to 3 consecutive wins, with 7 scored and only 1 conceded in that time. A great early start from the attacking boys put us 2 up after seven minutes, then we just sat back, absorbed the pressure and take home the 3 points.
​

I was planning doing 10 or so games this evening, but I'm popping out with the family for a bit, so I'll be doing a few more games later on.

 

[rtaylor12]

View attachment 344057
Sutton United F.C.
Season 2013/14 (Post 2)

Conference South: Sutton United 1 - 2 Whitehawk
Att: 412
Williams (16') - Mills (17', 86')

Nowhere near good enough. The defence wasn't solid enough, and we missed a great chance to go second, after both Ebbsfleet and Hayes and Yeading dropped points. Very disappointing. However, after the match, Craig Dundas picked up Conference South Player of the Month, with Marvin Williams in third.

Conference South: Tonbridge Angels 0 - 1 Sutton United
Att: 389
- Dundas (36')

A nice win all round. The team came together well, everyone had a good performance and it was capped off with a trademark first half Dundo goal - ball fed through, beat the offside trap, place it into the far corner past the keeper, superb.

Conference South: Sutton United 5 - 2 Farnborough
Att: 395
Williams (12', 67', 90+2'), Clough (47'), Mangan (62') - Hammond (70'), Berry (79')

I was starting to get a little concerned. After being 4-0 up, to drop down to 4-2 had me worried that there was a come back on, but a beautiful hattrick from Marv, a rare goal from Centre-Back Charlie Clough and a goal from debutee forward Andy Mangan certainly made this a match to remember. To round it off, Ebbsfleet dropped points at Basingstoke, putting us 1st for the first time this season.

Post-match was the FA Cup 2nd Qualifying Round draw, where we were given a tough home draw against Bromley of the Conference South.

Conference South: Sutton United 4 - 3 Dover
Att: 394
Dundas (6'), Sinclair (11', 24', 39') - Ciardini (66'), Modeste (79'), Goulding (83')

I've got to admit, I spent the last 10 minutes bricking it. We were doing to 9 after Wearon and Scannell went off injured, but somehow, we managed to hold on to the victory, beautifully topped off by Dean Sinclair's 1st, 2nd and 3rd goals of the season

Conference South: Havant & Waterlooville 1 - 2 Sutton United
Att: 354
Ramsay (86') - Hendrie (21'), Williams (36')

Overall, not a bad performance. I'm getting concerned by the fact that we tend to concede late, and like to take it close.

FA Cup 2nd Qualifying Round: Sutton United 3 - 2 Bromley
Att: 573
Williams (54', 69', 86') - Joseph-Dubois (17'), Kiernan (79')

Marv bangs in his second hattrick of the season (third if you include the pre-season fixture against Welling), and we just seem to be banging in the goals. Unfortunately, the 79th minute goal was yet another example of us conceding late and putting ourselves under more pressure than we need to. To resolve this, I've loaned in a guy called Aarran Racine from Forest Green Rovers (Conference Premier) to shore up the centre of defence alongside Charlie Clough.​

To conclude the first part of the season, we've played 9 in the league, winning 7 and losing 2, scoring 20 and conceding 10 in the process. We've also been gifted a home draw in the cup to deadly local rivals Carshalton Athletic of the Isthmian League Premier in the 3rd Qualifying Round of the FA Cup, which I am looking forward to massively.

League Table After 9 Games:

View attachment 344056

UPDATE: I was also awarded Conference South Manager of the Month for September!
​

 

[Tracz]

Great start to the season pal,
how many rounds till the big teams enter the fa cup?
whats your long term aim for sutton?

 

[rtaylor12]

Great start to the season pal,
how many rounds till the big teams enter the fa cup?
whats your long term aim for sutton?

1st round is for the rest of the Football League, 2nd round for a few Premiership boys and the rest come in during the 3rd round, so probably between 2 and 4 matches for a big game. At the moment, I don't have a long term aim. Ideally, I'd love to do the stereotypical "win the Champions League" sort of thing, but at the same time, I suppose my aim is to just go as far up the system as I possibly can.

 

[Tracz]

Yeah i wasnt sure how many qualifiers before the 1st n 2nd rounds,
think its only 5 promotions till the premier league lol,
ive never been able to do a llm career, very rarely drop below league 1/2,