As with quite a few other FM addict's at the moment, I've been struggling for motivation in a few different saves, but I think I've found something now that I can truly get my teeth into. I'm going to start at the bottom of the English football pyramind with Torquay United, affectionately known by their fans as The Gulls.
Torquay find themselves at their lowest point for some years, now playing in the Vanarama National League South (the 6th tier of English football). It's been a steady decline down the pyramid since 2004/05 when they were as high as League One. I'm here to get us back up the leagues and hopefully beyond to new heights that the fans have never experienced.
Many would argue that Torquay would have been punching well above their weight when they were competing in League One though. Plainmoor only has a capacity of 6,200 and the training and youth facilities at the club are only adequate and nothing to rave about. As I attempt to move us back up the leagues, I will need to attempt to grow the club as we do so, to ensure we are actually competitive when we get up there as well.
The board do have an immediate goal of getting promoted within my first two seasons in charge, with the playoffs being the minimum expectation for this season. We have 5 years to become established in the Vanarama National after getting promoted, but I personally have my eyes set on getting us back to the football league proper within those first 5 seasons.
The squad I inherit should be good enough to finish close to the top of the league in my first campaign. It's made up of some very decent players for this level, representing all four countries of the United Kingdom.
In terms of goalkeepers, it's actually one of the positions I am concerned about. Neither of the two I have in my first team squad are all that good, but it is James Hamon who is the clear first choice between the sticks. However, if an opportunity arises to improve this position with the right player, I'll be jumping at it.
The best way to describe the defence is probably average. Jay Foulston will sit at the heart of the back line and the 23 year old Welshman will be a very important part of my team for the first season at least.
At right back, Jordan Thomas offers us an attacking wing back type threat and I'll look to exploit his pace and determination to get him forward and support our attacking exploits as much as possible.
The ball winner in central midfield is Oscar Threlkeld. He is going to be our aggressor, our enforcer, the one to stick the boot in dominate the opposition's attacking midfielders to keep them from imposing themselves on the game.
And in attacking midfield is where our key strength is and we have players that can cause problems for any team down at this level. Matt Jay, Jordan Young and Dylan Morgan are a formidable attacking midfield trio that should strike fear into the opposition in majority of our National League South games.
The main man ahead of them, leading the line, is likely to be Cody Cooke, who looks a very good striker for down at this level and I'm actually shocked my assistant manager only rates him as 3 stars.
With the players at my disposal, this is the starting tactic I have come up with. Two defensive midfielders should give some additional cover to an average defence and allow the wing backs to bomb on without leaving us too exposed at the back.
Although I have identified weaknesses, I am generally pretty happy with my starting 11, but it's the number of players to cover that concerns me right now. We are short in a few positions and additions to the squad will be required.
This is what I have identified we need. However, it's going to be tough with absolutely no transfer budget available and only £1,000 spare in the wage budget as well.
Chapter 2 The League Begins!
Saturday 19th August 2023
I said that if the opportunity came up to sign a better goalkeeper, then I would jump on it...and I have. 24 year old Brad Wade is a considerable step up for us and joins the club on a free transfer - his signing has taken me over our current wage budget so I will need to balance the books if I can there, but Wade should prove worth it as we improve between the sticks.
Pre-season didn't entirely go as planned if I'm honest and although we started with a big win over Basingstoke, we didn't manage to get the victory in any of our other 4 warm up matches. What's more worrying is that two of the teams we failed to beat are in lower divisions than us!
That meant it was time to announce my first captain at the club and it's attacking midfielder, Matt Jay that I deem to be the most suitable candidate for the job.
With the league campaign about to kick off, we take a look at the preview and see that the bookies make us third favourites for the title this year, so we need to put a poor pre season behind us and sharpish! Our first game of the season will be against Welling, who are predicted a mid table finish, and we will go away from home so it will be a challenging first match.
But we were excellent and played so much better than we did in any of our pre season games. Hopefully I have a team that just can't motivate themselves for friendlies as if we repeat this kind of performance in the league every week, we will win most of our games for sure!
We followed up our opening day win with another against Chesham in our first home fixtures of the season. Our fans were certainly entertained with the 6-3 scoreline, although I wasn't entirely comfortable myself when Chesham pulled it back to 4-3 after we'd been 4-0 up!! At least we did respond though and went on to win the game!
There's only two teams that were predicted to finish above us this season and one of them is Boreham Wood, so this is a massive win so early in the campaign. It was a close game, but Cody Cooke was at the double following up his hat trick against Chesham and ensures we go home with the 3 points.
Cooke was on the scoresheet again as we made it 4 wins from 4 to maintain our 100% start to the season.
Chelmsford also have a perfect record, although we are just about top of the division on goal difference. I'm not quite sure what is more impressive, the 14 goals we have scored already or the fact Chelmsford haven't conceded a single one yet!
Chapter 3 First Defeat & First Cup Game Wednesday 20th September 2023
We kick off this chapter with some bad news. Jordan Young is about to miss up to a couple of months of football as he has picked up an injury following the Hampton & Richmond match. A massive loss for us as Young is one of my key attacking players.
More bad news as our unbeaten start to the season is also over, as Weston-super-Mare come from 2-0 down to beat us! It's always disappointing to lose, but to lose when you had a 2 goal lead at half time is an even bitter pill to swallow.
It was our first test of character this season, to see how my lads would react from our first defeat. I'm pleased to report that we reacted perfectly, with a convincing win at home against Salisbury in our very next game. Cody Cooke was once again on the scoresheet, keeping up his record of scoring in every league game so far this year!
Cooke's form has secured him the first Player of the Month award of the season.
And it's a Manager of the Month award for me too!
Cooke is proving to be an absolute machine as he scores yet again on our way to giving Tonbridge a good thrashing on their own turf. I think it's safe to say my team has reacted well to that defeat!
Just two days later, we had another match against Farnborough and a very tired squad. I was almost forced to make 5 changes to my starting lineup to bring some fresh legs in, which definitely weakened us from the off. Despite that though, we chalked up another win and although Cody Cooke failed to score for the first time this season, the focus was on the incredible 30 yard strike from Dylan Morgan which hit top bins and doubled our lead on 37 minutes.
The game against Aveley came quickly after and more changes were required. It definitely disrupted our rhythm and we weren't great here but just about managed to escape with a point. Daniel Hayfield came into the team for his first appearance of the season and grabbed the equalising goal.
We had a much welcome 7 day break before our next match and it gave the whole team time to rest and recover. And our next match was an away day at Glebe in what would be our first cup game of the season - the FA Cup 2nd Qualifying Round. We are through to the next qualifying round after a comfortable win against the lower league side.
We resumed winning ways in the league as well. Truro were no real match for us here and we dominated from start to finish.
And that keeps us top of the pile in the Vanarama National League South. Chelmsford have dropped right off since our last league update and they now sit as low as 13th! It's Worthing that are our nearest challengers right now, but we have opened up a nice little 5 point gap back to 3rd and 4th.
Chapter 4
Major Injury Rocks Our Season
Monday 30th October 2023
Chippenham Town are struggling in the early stages of the league campaign this year and sat 19th as they came into this game with us. Despite that, we made hard work of getting the 3 points here, but we did and I suppose that's all that matters.
Enfield Town were up next for us in the next qualifying round of the FA Cup. We haven't played them in the league yet this year, but they sit down in 14th position so I expected us to progress to the next round. What I didn't expect was it for us to be such a walk in the park and the home fans will be bitterly disappointed with the poor showing from their side, whilst our fans will be singing all the way home!
September has been another good month and that means back to back Manager of the Month awards for me!
We kicked off October in pretty fine style too, smashing 5 past St Albans. It was a 10.0 performance from left back, Matthew Carson, who got the assist for 4 of our goals and took home the match ball as a result.
The FA Cup 4th Qualifying Round had pitted us against higher league opposition for the first time in my career. Sutton United away is a tough draw for us and we'll do really well to get through to the first round proper from here, especially with them flying so high in the National League.
We were soundly beaten and crash out of the competition. We weren't entirely outclassed though but their finishing was more clinical than ours on the day and the side with that extra bit of quality progress.
Dorking Wanderers are arguably another side with more quality than us and were tipped to win our division this year as odds on favourites. They justified that favouritism by inflicting defeat on us as they move up to 2nd behind us in the league.
After just losing to 2nd placed Dorking, we invited 3rd placed Worthing to Plainmoor and were expecting another really tough game. But Worthing offered very little in the way of a challenge as we absolutely battered them to get back on track after back to back defeats.
Dean Moxey is 38 years old now and picking up a hip injury that could keep him out for up to 3 months might just signal the end of the centre back's career. Although he hasn't been a regular in the starting lineup, we'll still miss him with us having such a small squad.
Back to the action and Slough are bottom of the league so there was no surprise to see us go out there and beat them. I just expected it to be in more convincing fashion.
Now what is really, really ******* bad is that goalscoring machine, Cody Cooke, is now out for the rest of the season! An absolutely gutting blow to take and this could have massive implications on our title challenge for the remainder of the campaign.
We do at least have a 5 point lead at the top of the table for now.
We had already beaten Enfield Town in the cup this season, but with our top striker now out with injury, this was a different game and although we created plenty, putting the ball in the back of the net proved a problem and we could only manage a 0-0 draw here.
Scoring was again the problem in our next match against 3rd placed Hornchurch. They got an early pen to take the lead and then we absolutely peppered their goal for 90 minutes but it took us all the way round to injury time until we finally took one of our 33 chances to earn a point.
Although we've had back to back draws, I am still getting plaudits in the media after my first 20 games in charge at Torquay, having led the club to the top of the division with 14 wins under my belt so far.
I didn't make it 15 wins in our next game though as we lose at Eastbourne. Ever since the injury to Code Cooke, we've really struggled to score goals and it's costing us quite dearly right now as we make it 3 games without a win.
And to make things even worse, I lose another one of my key attacking players for the next few weeks!
Luckily, our next match was against lesser opponents in the form of Sheppery in the second round of the FA Trophy, so we had no problem scoring against them to progress in the competition.
Back in the league, we make it 4 games without a win as we are held at home by Maidstone. Despite enjoying more possession and most of the chances, we were unable to get the 3 points again and I feel this is going to be a similar story for the time being.
And rubbing salt into our wounds, there is yet another injury to an attacking player for us to deal with. How **** is our luck this season with these injuries!
We also received the devastating news that Cody Cooke will not return at all as he has taken the decision to retire from football at the early age of 31, due to his current long term injury. Bad news in the long term, but it does get £850 per week off the wage bill as of next week which might actually allow me to replace him (probably with a loan move).
In the week leading up to our match against Chelmsford, I added a couple of 'chance conversion' sessions to the training schedule in order to hopefully improve our finishing. It seemed to have done the trick as we managed to score twice for the first time in 5 league games. More importantly, it was a much needed 3 points!
Unfortunately, we couldn't follow up against Bath and have to settle for a single point at home to The Romans.
That means we've only won one of our last six league games and that has seen us forfeit top spot to Dorking. Not only that, but The Wanderers have opened up a 4 point gap over us too. Our injury crisis is really hurting us right now and we have to ride this storm.
Chapter 6 Cody Cooke's Replacement Arrives Wednesday 10th January 2024
Brentwood Town in Essex was the destination for our FA Trophy 3rd Round match and the bookies had us at 2/5 odds on to progress to the next round against lower league opposition. I'm glad to report that we justified those odds with a dominant display.
Our next league game was only 3 days later, so there were plenty of tired legs in my squad and with the injuries we have, I wasn't going to be able to rotate anywhere near as much as I'd have liked. Luckily that game was against a Weymouth side that are really struggling this season, sitting 23rd in the league having lost 11 of their 21 games, and we extended that to 12 defeats as we cruised past them here.
Following the retirement of top scorer, Cody Cooke, I have been on the lookout for a talented striker to replace him. I have opted for 18 year old, Errol Mundle-Smith, who joins on loan from Norwich for the remainder of the season. The youngster has a good work rate, combined with decent off the ball movement and finishing, but it's his blistering pace that I am hoping will wreak havoc for the defences of the National League South.
It took Mundle-Smith just 5 minutes and 47 seconds to score on his debut as he immediately introduces himself to the Torquay faithful. Later on in the game, he became a fan favourite already as he bagged the 85th minute winner to double his and our tally! What a start for our new man!
It was Jordan Young at the double as we beat Chesham next time out. Young's first strike was a free kick from 25 yards, a powerful effort into the top corner that even Premier League keepers aren't saving, before he scored from the penalty spot to put the game to bed.
Our final game of 2023 was a home victory over Welling, with Lirak Hasani scoring our goal of the season so far as he hits a first time shot into the top corner from about 35 yards out. An absolutel banger of a strike from our central midfielder!
It rounds off an unbeaten December and it could be safe to say that our little blip of bad results is well and truly past us.
It was a near perfect month that saw us return to the head of the league table too.
But we weren't able to pick up on New Year's Day where we left off the previous year as we are beaten by 4th placed Boreham Wood in a very tightly contested game.
The Boreham Wood result can probably be forgiven as we'd only had a 2 day gap between matches, and with a full week's rest under our belts we bounced back with an away day win at Hampton & Richmond. It was a result that never really looked in doubt from the moment we got our heads in front.
We conquered Weston-super-Mare pretty comfortably as well, with Matt Jay scoring the pick of the goals as he cut in from the left, beat his defender and curled a low effort into the far bottom corner.
Dorking and ourselves are opening up a little gap at the top of the table, but there are a host of clubs queuing up behind if either of us was to string together a bad run.
Chapter 7 Building Momentum For The Final 3rd Of The Season Saturday 9th March 2024
We were knocked out of the FA Cup by National League opponents, and now we may face the same fate in the FA Trophy as we go away to Eastleigh in the 4th round. They are sitting in mid table in the division above and will present a tough challenge for us to progress.
As expected, we are out of the competition. However, we certainly didn't disgrace ourselves and went toe to toe with an arguably better side than us. An unlucky result, but one we can accept and hold our heads high.
Salisbury presented much easier opposition for us, but we still only just managed to nick the 3 points with a narrow 1-0 victory at The Raymond McEnhill Stadium. Lirak Hasani with another belter from outside the box scored the only goal of the game.
A convincing performance against Tonbridge followed and another 3 points are chalked up. It's all about keeping as much momentum as possible now in the final third of the season to maintain our title challenge.
Our schedule in February looked pretty appealing too as we had a full week's rest between four of our games and would play four sides in the bottom half.
We took 11 points from an available 15 so it was a pretty good month, even if we aren't firing on all cylinders at the moment only managing to score once in each of our last three matches.
Our form has allowed us to open up a 6 point lead at the top of the table with 11 games of the season remaining. It sounds stupid to say, but I'm literally only just realising that we have only lost 4 times in the league this season and I feel like patting myself on the back as that's an impressive record over 35 games in a very competitive division, where anyone can beat anyone.
Our next game was without a doubt the biggest of our season so far. A top of the table clash between us and Dorking and we went into it knowing that a win would leave us 9 points clear of them and in pole position for the title with 10 games to go.
The magnitude of this result can not be underestimated. It's simply massive!
That defeat for Dorking allowed Worthing to leapfrog them into 2nd place. And guess who our next match was against...yep that's right, for the 2nd week in a row we would play the team in 2nd place.
And for the 2nd week in a row, we beat the 2nd placed team! It's another huge victory and the title is now well and truly ours to lose after the last two matches.
Chapter 8 First Ever Youth Intake Sunday 31st March 2024
After playing two of the best teams in the league, we travelled to Slough to take on the side that was sitting rock bottom, with only 4 wins all season! However, in probably the most bizarre twist of our entire season, we are beaten by them and quickly reminded that we haven't won anything yet!
Although, even in defeat, we did secure a playoff spot! However, I have our eyes firmly set on automatic promotion so need to get the lads up for it for an immediate response to a poor result.
I'd have been really ****** off if we had failed to win the game against Enfield Town, after having 60% possession and 16 shots (to their 4), but we did eventually get over the line despite some woeful finishing on the day. It might just be a case of grinding out these sort of results to get over the line now.
There was no 'grinding out' against Hornchurch though, as we hammer them in front of their own fans. Matt Jay has been fishing for more first team starts of late and backed up his case here with a double.
That result against Hornchurch also saw us break two club records. Not bad for my first season in charge!
With an 8 point lead and 6 games to go, I knew that 4 wins would guarantee we win the title, but realistically 3 would probably do it. Eastbourne Borough were our next opponents and sit 6th in the league, so were going to present a tough challenge. It was one that we rose to and pick up a big win that moves us one step closer to that league trophy.
We turn our attention, very temporarily, away from the football on the field as it's the most exciting time of every season - the youth intake...and my first one at the club. The assistant manager is describing it as an excellent intake with some decent looking prospects coming into the youth team this year.
Hugh Whisken is the highest rated of all of the youngsters and could well be a future first choice goalkeeper for the club.
The best of the rest is possibly Shakille Joseph. He will need some nurturing over the coming years but could become a decent attacking midfielder in time.
Back to the football now and we have 5 games of our season remaining and an 8 point cushion at the top of the division. The title is so close I can taste it!
March was a good month for us and one that saw me lift my 4th Manager of the Month award of the season.
Matthew Carson has been a regular at left back for me all year and has 21 assists in 40 league appearances...he's been nothing short of incredible for us down that left side and is probably my favourite player. He gets a well deserved player of the month for March.
I don't know why, but I had a really bad feeling going into the game against Maidstone. I can't even explain it but it was like I really thought we were gonna lose. However, I must learn to have more faith in my team as we cruised past them at The Gallagher Stadium and move yet another step closer to the title.
Dorking and Worthing both now sit 10 points behind us and with just 12 points available, one more win will ensure we are Vanarama National League South champions.
So we knew we had 4 games to find 1 win to wrap up the title. But we only needed one and it's a wonderful feeling to be crowned as champions in front of our own fans with a few matches still to play! We will officially be playing National League football next season!
With the title in the bag, the board set next year's budgets and there is a hefty £10k wage budget rise which should allow me to bring in some better players in the Summer. I won't have any transfer budget though so will have to turn to the free transfer and loan markets.
Having already won the title, you could forgive the lads if they were on the beach already now, but I don't think that's the case as we still worked hard to get a draw away at 7th placed Bath. A decent result.
We were far from being at our best against already relegated Weymouth, but our penultimate game of the season did still end in victory.
It was nice to sign off the season with a big win against Hemel Hempstead as well. The pick of the goals coming from Ed Palmer with a powerful strike which flew in from 30 yards.
The final league table shows that we ended up actually winning the league pretty easily, by a margin of 10 points. Only losing 5 games all season was extremely impressive and scoring over 100 goals is also a major positive. Dorking and Boreham Wood backed up their pre-season odds by finishing right behind us in 2nd and 3rd and will be favourites to join us in the National League next year via the playoffs.
And that points tally sees us break another record this season.
Competition Winners
Premier League - Manchester City
Championship - Luton (Norwich and West Brom promoted)
League One - Wrexham (Bolton and Birmingham promoted)
League Two - Doncaster (Colchester, Bradford City and Notts County promoted)
National League - York (Yeovil promoted)
National League North - Scunthorpe (Kidderminster promoted)
National League South - Torquay (Dorking promoted)
FA Cup - Liverpool
Carabao Cup - Manchester City
Community Shield - Manchester City
Bristol Street Motors Trophy - Stevenage
FA Trophy - Yeovil
What a season it was. Finishing as champions exceeded my pre season expectations and to do it by a 10 point margin was a dream come true.
On our way to winning the division this year, we were 1st in many of the categories that success in the league is measured.
We had very small cup runs in both the FA Cup and FA Trophy this season, beating a few lower league sides, but ultimately went out of the competitions against higher division clubs so no shame here.
New Arrivals
The Best 11
Club Awards
League Awards
The commercial summary for the past season makes for a positive read, although the figures involved are an absolute pittance compared to the hundreds of millions that are thrown around just 4 divisions higher.
And with promotion to the National League, the board have seized an opportunity for additional revenue by raising the ticket prices for the forthcoming season.
We will need it as the current financial situation sees the club in the red.
The supporter profile has changed ever so slightly, gaining a slight increase in our family section and nearly 2000 additional social media followers. The aim for the fans next year is simply to avoid relegation from the National League, whilst continuing to play an attractive brand of football.
The ambitions of the supporters is mimiced by the board, who have similar targets.
