marcMCFC1986
Member
- Joined
- Mar 28, 2013
- Messages
- 144
- Reaction score
- 7
- Points
- 18
I started this save as an unemployed, Sunday league experience, tactical manager.
Leagues loaded:
England, Spain, France, Germany, Portugal, Italy, Holland & Belgium.
My plan is to take whatever job I need to progress through the ranks, in whatever country a job comes available, until I get the dream job offer…Manchester City!
Following interviews with both Bishops Stortford & Weston Super Mare, only Weston Super Mare offered me a job – that’s fine, I do like to be beside the seaside! Vanarama National League South…here I come!
With £0 transfer budget, £3k per week wage budget, most players on non-contracts, one coach restriction by the board, and a media prediction of finishing 21st – things were looking bleak. However, setting the team up to player Counter Attacking football, in a 4-5-1 DM formation, with two exceptional wingers (Dayle Grubb & George Kellow) and a clinical striker (Elliot Richards) we started the season more positively than expected. Kane Ingram bossed the centre of midfield, Luke Purnell decent between the sticks, and Oli Barnes solid at Centre Back, which formed a good spine up the middle of the park. After the usual stuttered start of alternating between scraping 1-0 wins and getting hammered 3 or 4-0, we became a bit more consistent and started to climb the table, and looked safe from relegation (Board expectation) by January.
In the cups: Whilst on a good run of form we played Hendon, from the Regional divisions, in the FA 2nd Qualifying round, and decided to put a reserve team out against them – assuming we’d still get a result. We didn’t. Out of the FA Cup! The FA trophy was a different story entirely though, and managed to fight our way to the Semi Final, beating Wrexham on the way, only to be hammered by Ebbsfleet 7-2 over the two legs.
The league season continued well, with a few bumps on the way, as you’d expected. On the last day of the season we hung on to a Play Off place, despite losing, and were drawn against Hungerford. We’d lost both league games against them, so my hopes weren’t high – but an early red card for them in the first leg opened the tie up, and we took a 3-0 lead into the away leg. In the second leg, I shut up shop, parked the bus, whatever you want to call it – and lost 1-0, but won 3-1 overall. Whitehawk awaited us in the Final.
To have gone from one of the favourites to be relegated to the Play Off final in one season, I was happy to take any result from this. I felt we had made enough progress to really push on for the following season and build a squad to compete for the title and automatic promotion. No need – we only went a ****** beat them! 3-1, the boys had done it. 125/1 to be promoted at the start of the season, odds-on to be relegated – we’d defied the odds and were up!
The summer went a bit like this:
We’ve got all summer to get the squad ready. *Click continue* Oh, it’s getting closer, better renew some contracts of our better players *Click continue* Oh S**t, we’re about a week away from the first game of the season – PANIC BUY/LOAN!
Couldn’t name a single player I bought, but it’s fair to say that we were going to struggle in the Vanarama National League, regardless. Scraped a win opening game of the season, but then 3 or 4 heavy defeats made me think it was going to be a gloomy season, and we’d be going straight back down. We snatched a couple of wins here and there, but were always followed up with heavy defeats to bring us crashing back down to earth. I knew we were going down, and that the heroics of the previous season were forgotten…
One person who didn’t forget the heroics of last season, though, is David Beckham. News Item pops up…Newport County have offered me a job interview. Rock bottom of League 2, one win in 14 games – and the Chairman conducting the interview, is David Beckham! He must have sacked Miami off for the sunny shores of South Wales – which is actually only a short 16 mile walk/swim over the Bristol Channel from Weston Super Mare, so not a huge upheaval for me! I got the job!
First thing at Newport County, get them set up to play the way my Weston Super Mare team did in Vanarama National League South – luckily the players are already quite familiar with that set up. Unluckily, our first game – in 2 days time – is at home to 2nd placed Cambridge! This is going to be a baptism of fire, right? Wrong! 1-0 up within minutes…easy! 2-1 down by half time…oops. Wait, we’re now winning 3-2!! PARK THE BUS! PARK THE BUS!
Lovely jubbly – won first game in charge. Need to sort that defence out though!
More to come soon…
Leagues loaded:
England, Spain, France, Germany, Portugal, Italy, Holland & Belgium.
My plan is to take whatever job I need to progress through the ranks, in whatever country a job comes available, until I get the dream job offer…Manchester City!
Following interviews with both Bishops Stortford & Weston Super Mare, only Weston Super Mare offered me a job – that’s fine, I do like to be beside the seaside! Vanarama National League South…here I come!
With £0 transfer budget, £3k per week wage budget, most players on non-contracts, one coach restriction by the board, and a media prediction of finishing 21st – things were looking bleak. However, setting the team up to player Counter Attacking football, in a 4-5-1 DM formation, with two exceptional wingers (Dayle Grubb & George Kellow) and a clinical striker (Elliot Richards) we started the season more positively than expected. Kane Ingram bossed the centre of midfield, Luke Purnell decent between the sticks, and Oli Barnes solid at Centre Back, which formed a good spine up the middle of the park. After the usual stuttered start of alternating between scraping 1-0 wins and getting hammered 3 or 4-0, we became a bit more consistent and started to climb the table, and looked safe from relegation (Board expectation) by January.
In the cups: Whilst on a good run of form we played Hendon, from the Regional divisions, in the FA 2nd Qualifying round, and decided to put a reserve team out against them – assuming we’d still get a result. We didn’t. Out of the FA Cup! The FA trophy was a different story entirely though, and managed to fight our way to the Semi Final, beating Wrexham on the way, only to be hammered by Ebbsfleet 7-2 over the two legs.
The league season continued well, with a few bumps on the way, as you’d expected. On the last day of the season we hung on to a Play Off place, despite losing, and were drawn against Hungerford. We’d lost both league games against them, so my hopes weren’t high – but an early red card for them in the first leg opened the tie up, and we took a 3-0 lead into the away leg. In the second leg, I shut up shop, parked the bus, whatever you want to call it – and lost 1-0, but won 3-1 overall. Whitehawk awaited us in the Final.
To have gone from one of the favourites to be relegated to the Play Off final in one season, I was happy to take any result from this. I felt we had made enough progress to really push on for the following season and build a squad to compete for the title and automatic promotion. No need – we only went a ****** beat them! 3-1, the boys had done it. 125/1 to be promoted at the start of the season, odds-on to be relegated – we’d defied the odds and were up!
The summer went a bit like this:
We’ve got all summer to get the squad ready. *Click continue* Oh, it’s getting closer, better renew some contracts of our better players *Click continue* Oh S**t, we’re about a week away from the first game of the season – PANIC BUY/LOAN!
Couldn’t name a single player I bought, but it’s fair to say that we were going to struggle in the Vanarama National League, regardless. Scraped a win opening game of the season, but then 3 or 4 heavy defeats made me think it was going to be a gloomy season, and we’d be going straight back down. We snatched a couple of wins here and there, but were always followed up with heavy defeats to bring us crashing back down to earth. I knew we were going down, and that the heroics of the previous season were forgotten…
One person who didn’t forget the heroics of last season, though, is David Beckham. News Item pops up…Newport County have offered me a job interview. Rock bottom of League 2, one win in 14 games – and the Chairman conducting the interview, is David Beckham! He must have sacked Miami off for the sunny shores of South Wales – which is actually only a short 16 mile walk/swim over the Bristol Channel from Weston Super Mare, so not a huge upheaval for me! I got the job!
First thing at Newport County, get them set up to play the way my Weston Super Mare team did in Vanarama National League South – luckily the players are already quite familiar with that set up. Unluckily, our first game – in 2 days time – is at home to 2nd placed Cambridge! This is going to be a baptism of fire, right? Wrong! 1-0 up within minutes…easy! 2-1 down by half time…oops. Wait, we’re now winning 3-2!! PARK THE BUS! PARK THE BUS!
Lovely jubbly – won first game in charge. Need to sort that defence out though!
More to come soon…
