The Mitchell Story

[kmitchell96]

16.8.2014
I watched the U18's lose 3-0 this morning to Torquay's counterparts. It was a bad performance and they had several chances to score whilst they were giving away silly goals at the other end. I also saw the score for the early kick off, Bolton Forest, before the game. It finished 1-1 and apparently Paterson, an ex Walsall player, was brilliant. I would love to bring him in so I enquired but they want £4m at least by the looks of it, money I do not have.

Only one change in the entire squad today from last Saturdays win. That is Pugh coming onto the bench for Rantie. Arter is back from suspension, and I am back to playing 4-2-3-1.

7 minutes in another throw in routine lead to another Wilson goal. Simple throw in from Cook to Daniels saw Daniels play a low cross along the box to Wilson who hit it first time for his 5th of the season. Otherwise it was a quiet first half. Brentford were playing rough and trying to force us off the ball causing a few players to come into half time a bit bruised but it wasn't working for them, at all. Arter got a booking to make it 3 in 2 games and I will sub him off on the hour mark.

Boom! 3 minutes into the second half another throw in exchange between Cook and Daniels saw the ball fall to Ritchie eventually from a wondeful cross and another first time shot saw us go 2-0 up, although apparently it was an own goal?! It didn't even touch a defender!

55 minutes in Arter wasn't worth risking a second booking and Fraser was taking a lot of knocks so they came off for Surman and Pugh. 10 minutes later Gosling came off for O'Kane, again he was tiring and needed to rest for Tuesdays game.

75 minutes in, another Cook throwing, a few passes, a wonderful cross... You get the jist, it would've been 3 and a second for Wilson but it was offside apparently. He got it later on though, Stanislas who had been quiet broke free on a counter and crossed it in for Wilson to tap it in.

I saw Freeman, one of my early transfer targets had scored on his debut.

It was now 3 wins from 3 with 3 goals in each game, not a bad start for me as I was yet to not win a game and this would hopefully continue into Tuesdays fixture against Forest who had started off with two draws, pretty poor for a team with ambition.

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[kmitchell96]

17.8.2014
Nothing happened today, gave the lads a day off again for rest before another Tuesday game. Same as last time, training Monday and Tuesday morning before the home game against Forest.

18.8.2014
Few scout reports came through today. Monts had found a few youngsters at Wimbledon he recommended and I said I'd look at a couple of them but asked for detailed reports on my desk. Also got the Forest report, Stores told me to focus on attacking movement to try and force a way through a strong defence. They had only conceded once in the league this year in a draw against Bolton.

Francis had made the team of the week twice in a row now, this week he was joined by Cook. I am wondering once again how Wilson hasn't been put into that team after scoring 2 goals this Saturday.

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[kmitchell96]

19.8.2014
I came into todays game happy. I'd won every game as a manager so far including 3 wins on the bounce against good teams, all scoring 3 goals. What was impressing me more was the defensive record so far, I have only conceded 3 times so far including pre-season. Today was my chance to make it 10 wins from 10 against Forest.

Forest were one of the best teams on paper in the league but they have struggled to put success together so far. They only managed 1 win and 1 draw from 6 pre-season fixtures before starting the season off with 2 league draws and a 2-1 extra time win against Mansfield which I found less than impressive. They have a strong squad though. A lot of great players who I would love to have; Paterson, Assombalonga, Lascelles. I'd looked at bringing all three of them in but funds didn't make it possible.

I turned up to the ground early and drew up the tactics so the players would see as soon as they arrived. I was leaving the side unchanged although in coming weeks I will probably have to start rotating for fitness reasons. I even managed to take a look at other fixtures whilst pondering about making last little changes before everybody arrived. Nothing interesting, only top half clash was Leeds at home to Brighton, 5th vs 6th, probably end a 0-0 draw.

I let the team talk handle itself. The players were already pumped and wanted to continue the unbeaten start to my management career. They knew what they had to do and me and the coaches just clarified this whilst McLoughlin made sure everybody knew their roles.

Well it didn't start well. Forest seemed to perfectly counter our style of play and they were constantly threatening the goal. In the first 15 minutes Boruc saved a few times to keep it level but the pressure kept coming and they managed to break through in the 27th minute. Some great play really but the lads should've stopped it.

Oh wait I spoke too soon. I'd turned around to talk about tactics with the coaches and missed the flag! Apparently McLaughlin was off side when he received the ball, he seemed onside to me but I'm not complaining. Hopefully we would push forward now and force the pressure on them whilst they are miffed about the disallowed goal.

Cook, throws it in, Francis passes it to Stanislas, Stanislas passes it to Callum Wilson... Wilson, shoots... Scores! 1-0, these routines were almost too easy, 4 or 5 goals from throw in routines now and teams didn't seem to know how to stop them. Wilson was now on 7 goals through 4 games! If he continued this form somebody might be in for him before September 1st.

Half time came at the perfect time. Simple team took, told them to tighten up and that they needed to force more going forward. Cook had taken a lot of knocks, Assombalonga was being physical and causing knocks so I brought him off for Ward. Otherwise I would save the other two substitutions for later on in case I desperately needed them.

At the hour mark they brought on Paterson, I was not looking forward to this. He is a brilliant player. I brought on Surman for Arter and Pugh for Ritchie. Both of them were tiring, as were others but I needed to solidify the middle and force something up top.

It was a tense final half an hour. Back and forth with lots of chances for both sides. Both keepers were making mistakes and the ground was close to silent in the final minutes. Wilson hit the post whilst at the other end Fryatt forced two saves and hit the post. Paterson was causing trouble but nobody was in the middle to finish of his creations.

Francis was given man of the match but I would've given it to Ward. He saved us time after time since coming on. He was perfect with his tackling and stopped everything that came towards him. The win saw us go top; 3 games, 3 wins, scored 7, conceded 0! Great record!

The win wasn't the same as our others, the first time I've not scored multiple goals. Luckily 1 goal was enough to see them off and we were brilliant at the back again. Boruc is a great loanee, he has been brilliant in net and saved us multiple times especially in this afternoons game.

One of their lads picked up an injury in the first half so we were being labelled as a dirty team! Not even Arter managed to get booked today and both teams played fairly, luckily Freedman agreed and didn't slate us. The last thing I wanted was a confidence knock for the lads.

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[kmitchell96]

Due to the time it takes to write I will be leaving this story unfinished as it takes too long to write it up.