The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Plymouth Argyle (England)

Hello all and welcome to my newest (And hopefully last) Football Manager 2015 story in which I will be aiming to take Plymouth Argyle from the depths of League 2 to the euphoria of the Premier League.

This may end up being a very long save depending on how my performance goes but being from Plymouth myself (Born there in 1995) I have a great passion to take this club back to, and beyond where they have been in the past.

Following the clubs constant battle with administration over the past 5 years this will definitely be a save that is all about rebuilding, similar to Portsmouth FC.

Upon creation of the save I will be starting with no previous playing experience or coaching qualifications,
as shown below:

View attachment 720689

Hopefully as the club climbs the ranks of English Football I will be able to build my own reputation alongside that of the club.

Now that you have a brief idea on the background of this story, let's move on to the Club itself.
​


About the Club:

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Founded in 1886, Plymouth Argyle are a team who are known by Football fans across the country. Having played alongside the likes of Newcastle United in the 2009/10 Championship the club has since gone on to have a very different path to that of the aforementioned club and having suffered back to back relegations in 2009/10 and 2010/11 the club now finds itself in the depths of League 2 (Due to financial trouble).

Since surviving the drop to non-league Football in 2012/13 the club has now gone on to achieve higher league finishes, narrowly missing out on the play-offs last campaign.

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Despite being founded over 125 years ago Plymouth Argyle are still yet to win a major trophy (Such as an FA Cup), they have however managed to win both the League Two title on one occasion and the League One title twice (As well as a lot of lower league titles/cups).

This is certainly an area to improve on and with the club being so well known across the country, it is only fair that I try and bring the club the silverware it deserves, something for the fans to cheer about!​


The Squad:

View attachment 720703

As you can see, Plymouth Argyle do start with a well sized squad and while there is room for improvement the club does have depth in most positions allowing for that much needed rotation throughout the 46+ game season.

Here at Plymouth Argyle there are a couple of youngsters who I am determined to keep at the club, the likes of Matt Lecointe, Curtis Nelson and Tyler Harvey who all have potential to be very good players at the club (The former two having been capped by England at U18 level). Ben Purrington is another player who I will be looking to develop, the 18 year old full-back already has great ability and a lot of room to improve.

As well as the youth we do have some great older players, the likes of Plymouth Argyle Legend Paul Wotton (Mr Argyle himself!), Dominic Blizzard and Marvin Morgan, all of which can do work for us here as we look to climb out of League Two.

Through the use of a parent club and our £2,000 wage budget I may be looking to bring in a couple more players just to help aid with the squad depth, the more players we have to rotate the likely we're bound to do throughout the 2014/15 campaign.​


The Aims of the Save:

1. To take Plymouth Argyle to the Premier League.

2. To win a major trophy with the club (FA Cup etc).

3. To upgrade the facilities at the club to the maximum.

4. To eventually go on to become a Legend at the Club.

5. Ultimately, to get the club into Europe for the first time.

(Please feel free to add any objectives that you would like me to try and complete in the comments!)


Hopefully you'll enjoy our Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

​
 

The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Season One
Pre-Season Update (2014):

Having just taken the hot-seat here at Plymouth Argyle we now entered the pre-season where I would be hoping to develop tactics, evaluate the squad and make some additions based on our weak areas to help us mount a serious challenge in the upcoming season.​


Tactics:

So far I have only developed a single tactic to use here at Argyle, but hopefully one that can be chopped and changed depending on the opposition we are facing as opposed to having two tactics; one for home days & one for away days.

Formation #1:
4-2-3-1

View attachment 721081

The formation we will be using is a bog standard 4-2-3-1, this formation allows us to be a threat going forwards while also remaining solid at the back, due to our wingers being the more attacking wide-men the full-backs will be able to focus more on the defensive style of play without the need to constantly bomb down the wings.

I have also set instructions for the players to try and add my own twist on the tactic and to get the team playing the kind of Football that I like to use when managing a club, hopefully the squad can work as a single unit and work well together to get the most out of this formation.​


Transfers:

After arriving at Plymouth Argyle I quickly noted that the current squad we had was by League Two standards a very strong squad, lots of quality in depth and some great potential youngsters as well as a couple of players with fantastic experience at this level.

I did however go out with the intentions of finding a couple more bodies to help aid the rotation of the squad to ensure that we could get through the season with a minimal number of injuries, here is an overview of the transfers:

View attachment 721082

As you can see we've managed to bring 3 players to the club, having only a small budget of £0 and £2.5k on the wages I wasn't able to sign a large number of players but luckily for us we already have a well rounded squad.

Transfer #1; Ross Jenkins (Free Agent)

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This former Watford midfielder will be used as another body in the center of the park, with our formation it is icnredibly important that we have midfielders who are capable of winning back and keeping possession, and for a free signing with low wages I believe Ross Jenkins can play a role here at the club.

Transfer #2; Mateusz Taudal (Free Agent)

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Mateusz is a 19 year old Goalkeeper that was scouted during a trial-day and while he is only 19 the former Everton youngster has the ability to challenge Luke McCormick for that #1 spot between the posts, I've always been a firm believer in having two good quality Goalkeepers and the signing of Mateusz allows that to be the case here at Plymouth Argyle.

Transfer #3; Frederick Champion (Free Agent)

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Frederick is another player who was scouted at the England trial-day, the 20 year old midfielder has good potential to succeed and having been released by QPR now has the chance to work his way up the Football ladder with us here in Devon, a bit of a risk but who knows, if he develops he could be a very key asset to the squad and for £0 there is little risk in getting his signature.

Currently no players have left the club be it on loan or permanently.​


Results:

Pre-Season was a great chance for me to evaluate the squad and see who would be in my starting XI while allowing the squad to familiarise themselves with my tactics and while the pre-season results were not important I still felt they gave me a feel of how the squad would compete this season.

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As you can see we actually managed to win all 5 of our pre-season games, and while most of these were against low league opposition, we did still manage a very impressive 5-1 win over League One outfit Bradford City.

Ben Purrington, Reuben Reid and Jason Banton particularly impressed throughout the season as they all managed to grab a handful of goals each.

If they stay firing all year I have no doubt we'll get promoted!​


Other News:

Finally, I decided to ask the board to look for a parent club, somebody who can pay us a yearly sum while possibly allowing us to loan some of their youngsters without charge and to my pleasure the board happily agree to this, but who would our parent club be?

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That's right, out parent club going forward would be Premier League side Southampton F.C. who are also a fellow team from the South, and with an array of great academy products and a healthy £38,000 yearly fee this link between the two clubs could only benefit us in the long term.

With that said and done I think we are now ready to kick-start our 2014/15 campaign!​
 
A great Pre-Season there mate, as a Brighton fan it would be good to see them go higher as we have good links with them
 
SamPeters said:
A great Pre-Season there mate, as a Brighton fan it would be good to see them go higher as we have good links with them
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It'd be great to at least reach the Championship again! I've enjoyed reading about your Brighton save, always a club I've quite liked and even more now that Hyypia is in charge! (Not sure for how much longer though...) :-)
 
Should be good Argyle have some decent youngsters, Im from Cornwall so Plymouth have always been the closest proper football team i could go and watch.
 

The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Season One
August Update (2014):

Off the back of a successful pre-season we now entered August where the league campaign would commence, while predicted 13th in the table for this season I would like for us to challenge for the play-off places, a promotion early on would certainly help our cause!​


Results:

View attachment 721271

August proved be as you'd expect a very scrappy month as we began the season by picking up 2 wins, 2 losses and 2 draws from 6 matches.

Our first match of the season saw us fall to a 3-1 defeat to Newport County away from home, a particularly disappointing performance but we did apply a lot of pressure late in the game but sadly failed to pull an equaliser out of the hat before being hit on the counter by Newport in the dying minutes.

Our next game saw us play our first Cup match of the season, a 1st round Capital One Cup tie away from home against League One outfit Swindon Town. Heading into this game a loss was expected, having to play a rotated squad against a strong Swindon side was never going to give us a huge chance of winning but there was always a lingering hope that we could reach penalties, this wasn't the case however, a strong performance from Swindon saw them advance to the 2nd round with a comfortable 3-1 victory, evidently showing the gap between League Two and League One Football.

Overall I wasn't too disappointed to lose as we were never expected to advance.

In the month of August we managed to pick up 2 wins against Shrewsbury and Luton although you could argue these were both 'lucky' and undeserved. Having been 2-0 up against Shrewsbury after 60 minutes we quickly slumped to a 2-2 after the away side bagged a quickfire double but luckily for us we managed to sneak a winner in the 93rd minute..Completely against the run of play!

A similar story against Luton, having led 1-0 at HT we didn't exactly come out in the 2nd half, the home side applying all sorts of pressure before picking up an equaliser which to be honest they deserved, but this time we won it in the 92nd minute, Striker Reuben Reid finding the net following a Jason Banton cross, absolute madness!

The other two matches saw us pick up draws against Stevenage and Cheltenham, both games were 50/50 and didn't deserve a winner, similar story to the Shrewsbury and Luton matches but luckily for us in those games we had tremendous luck late on, but overall I'm glad that we've picked up 8/12 points following back to back defeats early on.

Other News:

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Towards the end of August we were drawn into the Johnstone's Paint Trophy South 2nd round draw where we would face fellow League Two side Southend United at Home Park, this match will take place on the 7th October 2014 and with a bit of luck and a good performance we may find ourselves in the pot come the 3rd round draw.


League Table:

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Following this run of 4 unbeaten matches we now occupy 11th in the table which personally I think is a good start to the season, definitely something to build on.

Come the end of the season I think I'd be more than happy with a top half finish!​
 
coolmcool said:
Should be good Argyle have some decent youngsters, Im from Cornwall so Plymouth have always been the closest proper football team i could go and watch.
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Definitely, Lecointe, Harvey and Purrington are a few to look out for in the future! I love Cornwall, such a lovely place to go..Just a shame I live in Norwich now but hopefully I'll move back down South someday, I miss watching Argyle!
 
SamPeters said:
Started off tough but a nice end to the month!
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As long as we don't slip towards the bottom it'll be alright, such a long season so if we can be 10th-12th by 30-35 games we'll still stand a good chance of a play-off push!

I see Brighton have just gone 1-0 down, no surprise as it's away at Derby..is Hyypia in trouble, what do you think about his management?

Edit: Make that 3-0...That escalated incredibly quickly.
 
Last edited:
Rednaxela said:
As long as we don't slip towards the bottom it'll be alright, such a long season so if we can be 10th-12th by 30-35 games we'll still stand a good chance of a play-off push!

I see Brighton have just gone 1-0 down, no surprise as it's away at Derby..is Hyypia in trouble, what do you think about his management?

Edit: Make that 3-0...That escalated incredibly quickly.
Click to expand...

I was happy at the start because of having a manager but we need him to go, otherwise we will be going down to League One next season in front of less than 10K at the AMEX
 

The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Season One
September Update (2014):

The end of August saw us laying in 11th place and having gone unbeaten in the last 4 matches we were full of confidence and hope going into September. ​


Results:

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To put things in perspective September wasn't the best of months, we had some incredibly tough games against the likes of Burton and Portsmouth and as you can see we only managed to pick up one victory in our 5 matches played in September.

We began the month with back to back draws, the first being against Burton Albion and the 2nd coming against York City and unlike the last month we managed to come from behind in both of these matches as opposed to blowing an early lead, so in hindsight they were pleasing results.

We then extended our unbeaten run to 7 games following a 1-0 victory over bottom half side Northampton Town, Reuben Reid picking up the only goal of the game 8 minutes into the 2nd half to secure the points.

We then rounded off the month with back to back defeats against Accrington Stanley (Who are they?) and Portsmouth FC. Despite finding themselves as the whipping boys in recent campaigns Accrington Stanley were heading the table when we faced them at the Crown Ground and they quickly asserted their dominance in the shape of a 3-1 scoreline, a disappointing defeat but following a 7 game unbeaten run I wasn't too disheartened.

Our final game of the month saw us take on former Premier League side Portsmouth F.C. at Home Park, with the opposition flying high and expected to take the championship this season we knew it was going to be a tough game. In the end Pompey stood to be too strong for us to play against, wonderkid Jed Wallace playing an influential part in both goals, scoring the first and setting up George Green for the 2nd with a deft flick and we had little in the way of a response and ended up taking the 2-0 defeat.

A disappointing end to the month but once we gather a bit of momentum I'm sure we'll be able to compete, I may be looking to bring in another striker on loan to help Reuben Reid out, Marvin Morgan isn't really up to scratch in my opinion.


League Table:

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Despite our back to back defeats at the end of the month we still manage to find ourselves sitting mid-table in 12th, having slipped down only one place in the past month.

In September I'll be looking to bounce back with a couple of wins to ensure that we can get into the top half and with the Devon derby coming up, we simply need to win that match, both for the club and for the fans!​
 
A mixed month there mate! but still only early on so enough time to climb up the table!
 

The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Season One
October Update (2014):

September proved to be a mixed bag last month and with the club still placed in the middle of the table we needed to crack on and pick up some wins, and I was hoping to achieve that in October.

​

Tactical Changes:

Tactic #2:
4-5-1

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Heading into the month I decided to add a new tactic to go alongside the 4-2-3-1 and opted for a 4-5-1, I believe this tactic will allow us to have more protection in front of the back four and allow us to do a better job of keeping possession.

I'm still fiddling about with the roles but the formation itself will stay the same.​


Results:

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October proved to be another month of mixed results..A couple of draws and wins sandwiched between two losses.

The first game of the season saw us take on bottom side Wycombe Wanderers at Adams Park, with our opponents struggling we were looking to take full advantage and come away with the 3 points. But as you can see this didn't go as planned...Despite having 15 shots and dominating possession our opponents managed to ****** an 89th minute goal on the break to take the spoils. A very bitter defeat...

Our next league match would end as a draw which came against Devon rivals Exeter City as we were held to a 2-2 draw despite leading the game twice, our inability to hold the lead once again costing us dearly.

We were then able to cap back to back victories against 2nd placed Carlisle and mid-table crusaders AFC Wimbledon to boost us back up the table, the first match against Carlisle saw us convert two from the spot as our opponents struggled to deal with the pace and trickery of Banton and Alessandra.

The win against Wimbledon was shaky, despite getting an early 3-0 lead the complacency began to show in our squad as we quickly conceded a quickfire double through former Crawley striker Matt Tubbs. Luckily our defence was able to hold out for the victory.

The final league match came against Southend who we had also played earlier in the month, this time however the hosts took the spoils in a 4-3 result, after coming from 2-0 down to be 2-2 the game quickly turned as Southend fired another two in the dying moments of the game, wide-man Alessandra finding what proved to be a consolation with the final kick off the game.

The other match of the month saw us take on Southend in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy South 2nd round. The visitors quickly took a 2-0 lead after 15 minutes as we were slow coming out of the blocks, but a late resurgence saw us bag a double in the final third of the game to take the game to penalties.

Goalkeeper Luke McCormick proved to be the hero as he made two saves to send us through to the South Quarter-Finals, where we would face AFC Wimbledon at Home Park.

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Other News:

Last month I made a note that I would be trying to secure another Striker on loan to partner with/back-up front-man Reuben Reid and after a lot of searching I managed to secure a 3 month loan deal for young Bolton Striker Tom Eaves, the young target-man looks to be a good fit for our squad and for a total of £0 monthly fees it's a win/win situation for the club.

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Here is a look at the young man's attributes:

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(I was playing on a different device hence the change of skin, you weren't going crazy!)


League Table:

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After picking up 7 points from 5 games this month we still find ourselves in mid-table, this time however we are in the top half having moved up 2 places. It's key to bare in mind that the play-offs are only 3 points away and that a couple of wins can quickly see us rise into these places, keep the faith!

Top Goalscorers:

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It's also nice to see club front-man Reuben Reid finding himself in 3rd on the League Two top goalscorers chart with a tally of 8 goals, not a bad record at all!

If our defence tightens up I have no faith that Reuben's goals will see us through.
​
 
Some mixed results mate but not all too bad! keep it up mate!
 
SamPeters said:
Some mixed results mate but not all too bad! keep it up mate!
Click to expand...

Just really struggling with consistency...That and holding leads, trying new things but not to a large degree of success..Might just have to stick with the tactics and hope things improve!
 

The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Season One
November Update (2014):

Still marooned in mid-table we entered November where we would play two cup games alongside a couple of league matches hoping to progress as a Club.​


Results:

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Similar story to October as we once again pick up two wins, two draws and two defeats (One of the draws resulting in a loss ultimately).

Our first game of the month saw us take on struggling side Cambridge United a team who have recently sacked their manager and one who we were looking to beat as we look to regain our winning momentum.

Things didn't go as planned though, despite Smalley putting us 1-0 up after 3 minutes we failed to build on our lead and some poor defending cost us to slump to a 2-1 deficit and despite a late surge of pressure our CB Peter Hartley saw red for a professional foul against former Argyle man Nick Chadwick causing us to lose 2-1.

Next we had back to back cup games, the first was a shocking 4-2 defeat away at Vanarama Conference side Woking, we didn't come out fighting and quickly found ourselves 3-0 down after 15 minutes and things barely improved as the game went on, a poor performance which had me questioning the attitude of my squad.

The next game saw us take on AFC Wimbledon in the South Quarter-Finals of the Johnstone's Paint Trophy, having exceeded our boards expectations of reaching the 2nd round we now looked to progress further into the tournament.

The game itself turned out to be something special, end to end football with lots of goals which encapsulated both great attacking play and disgraceful defending but ultimately our visitors took the spoils in a penalty shootout, an unlucky effort from the lads.

After this tough start to the month I decided to tweak my tactics by changing instructions and roles which proved to be a good tactical move as our next 3 games saw us take 7 points out of 9 while conceding 0 goals as we beat Dag & Red and Oxford while being held 0-0 by Bury.
​


Other News:

Having seen weaknesses down the right side of our line-up I decided to sign former Sheffield Wednesday Right Back Frank Simek on a Free Transfer, hopefully his experience at higher levels can pay dividends as we look to tighten up our defence.

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Here is a look at Frank's attributes:

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League Table:

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Again it's a similar story to last month, we're still stranded in 11th place and currently 2 points away from that final play-off spot, but with a game against Mansfield Town next in the schedule we have the chance to propel ourselves into the play-off contention.

The amount of goals were conceding is definitely an issue and something I'm looking to build on over the next few months.

Player Stats:

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Following another couple of goals this month Reuben Reid still finds himself in the top goalscorers chart with 10 league goals while Central Defender and former England U18 man Curtis Nelson now finds himself on the leader-board for highest average rating and most MOTM awards with a total of 4, I dread to think how poorly we'd be doing without our star defender!

​
 

The Pilgrimage to the Premier League!

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Season One
December Update (2014):

Another month has passed by and we still remain in the middle of the park, if we're to get into the play-off push we have to start picking up the victories soon.​


Results:

View attachment 722830

December only consisted of 4 matches following a 2 week break at the start of the month, and once again we failed to pick up a winning run of form, only picking up 1 win in the month along with a single draw and back to back losses.

The first game of the month saw us draw to play-off contenders Mansfield Town 0-0 at Home Park, a drab game with minimal action which ended as it began. Stalemate.

We then managed to take an impressive 2-0 result home from Newport as we overcame our rivals to pick up our only win of the month, along with another clean sheet!

We then suffered back to back losses to play-off hopefuls Hartlepool United and Tranmere Rovers, a shocking couple of matches as we managed to concede 8 goals from the two matches while only scoring a single goal.

The story of our season so far, a poor leaky defence and inability to string wins together.​



League Table:

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Following another poor month we had now slipped further down the table and found ourselves in 14th place, a place under our expected finish. If things were to stay this way not only would me miss out on the play-offs but I'd probably be out of a job!

I desperately need to turn things around come the turn of the new year.

​
 
Even if you stay in the middle of the park it will still be a good season but hopefully you can push up!
 
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