The story of a failed footballer

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Monthly review
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With our form a laughing stock at the moment I decided it might be time to change something with our shape and see if we could get some sort of reaction to that in our first game of March against Elgin City. A 3-5-2 formation was what we decided on and after an entirely dominant first half display things were looking good. So of course we then concede straight away don't we? Yeapp. Thankfully we salvaged a draw late on as Steven Ross volleyed one into the net from a John Rooney cross. We just can't escape these 1-1 draws. I quickly decided to change revert back to our more familiar tactic after that match as I just feel it covers us in all areas, we just needed to perform better! As they say, there's no room for sentiment in football and as a result my cousin and our fullback Conor Bell found himself dropped to the bench and Scott Linton dropped back into left back in his place. Connor McManus took the place of Liam Caddis in the centre of midfield and Caddis went on the right wing in place of Joe Thompson who moved over to the left in Linton's place. I honestly have no words for the fact we led Livingston from the twenty-seventh minute and dominated only for them to score in the ninety-second minute to equalise. Getting a win in that game could have changed everything and put us one point behind St. Mirren and two behind Livingston but no holding on to a win is too hard. It would have been the best birthday present in the world too. One win in eleven games since the turn of the year, dreadful. In a dramatic upturn of events we managed to get our promotion bid back on track with a thumping 3-0 victory over St. Mirren which pulled us back level on points with them. Unfortunately Livingston also won their match and so we remained six behind the league leaders. Despite our promotion rivalry I was very disappointed and gutted for Micky Mellon as he was brutally given the sack by St. Mirren after our match. A nicer man you couldn't meet, a real shame given how close the promotion race actually is, he hasn't done a bad job at all. Once again though, we failed to capitalise on results elsewhere as Livingston and St. Mirren joined in the 'draw' as we failed to beat Alloa for the second match on the bounce, we really should have. The one positive to come out of the Alloa match was that we kept another clean sheet which is the first two on the bounce since early January! It's all looking pretty tight as we head into the final four games of the season now and it's looking like a playoff for us now.

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April 1st, 2018
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Clyde manager Christopher Burns quits​


After almost two years in charge of Clyde Christopher Burns has decided to step down as from his position as our manager. This comes as a shock to all of us at the club and we can honestly say it's something we weren't expecting in the slightest. However, it is with regret that we have accepted Christopher's resignation. We have a statement from Christopher which you will see below.
Christopher Burns;
I would like to express my thanks to all of the supporters of Clyde and everyone involved within the club, the players, the staff, the boardroom, the catering staff, everyone. I have loved my time with the club but due to some unforeseen circumstances I have taken the decision to step down as manager, it hasn't been an easy one but it's one which I felt was best for all parties. I would like to wish the team luck in their promotion bid this season too. Thank you.
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Surprised to see you leave after recently signing a contract extension. Where you looking to go next?
 
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Monthly review​


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This is it.. Make or break month!! For a change we actually got the month of to a good start for the first time in a while. We didn't start with the most convincing win ever but we started with a win and that's what mattered. Unfortunately though, we couldn't carry that in to the next match as we could only muster up a drab performance which resulted in a 0-0 result. After the East Fife game Quade Taylor was ruled out for two months with an injury and then after the Brechin match Krystian Nowak followed suit for the same length of time! Disaster. Our two best centre backs M.I.A as we aim for promotion, good one. In addition to that, Martin McNiff and Callum Donaldson are also injured which left us with just five defenders of which two are left backs and two are right backs. Still, we couldn't dwell on it and with a patchwork side ready to face Stranraer what could go wrong? Well a draw isn't quite the worst thing that could've happened but following it up with a loss in the final match was. Devastated to have fallen at the last hurdle and only finish third after such a terrific first half of the season. That being said, second, third or fourth it doesn't really matter as we all enter the play-off places, it was more of a prize money thing as we lose out on an extra £16k. Our play-off opponent's will be.......... St. Mirren!! Only played them five times this season.. Unbeaten in five with four wins though.

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Going into the first leg of our play-off match with St. Mirren I decided not to make a change to the team that failed to win our last two games. A bold move you could say, my reasoning is this; we are very thin on the ground and any changes I make won't significantly strengthen the side and will only serve to disrupt the flow of the side. Rooooneyy, ohhh just past the post!! That was close! Rooney with another shot, saved. Ross with the rebound, and he misses too. Rooney is seriously threatening. Brilliant, just brilliant. We hit twelve shots and fail to score and they go up and score a screamer with their third. Love it. We're running out of time now but it's our sub Stephen Maher with the ball looking to make something happen, he passes it out wide to Liam Caddis, Caddis with the cross now for Steven Ross and IT'S IN. Ross has pulled it level with just five minutes to go. You little 'belta. Nooooooooo it's offside. It's over. This does not look good.

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Do you expecting same result by deploying same tactics, same line up?

Definitely something need to be done with your striking force. I don't know, probably fine them or something?
 
Zinedine Zaiddin said:
Do you expecting same result by deploying same tactics, same line up?

Definitely something need to be done with your striking force. I don't know, probably fine them or something?
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What it is, I feel, is that I went away from the game for that long and when I came back to it my team was doing well so I never changed anything. Now, thinking back, I know that was wrong as I'd usually change things around but I guess I just forgot how the game works and that I needed to change things! I basically played the exact same tactic and formula all season so I can't really complain with the end product. We were the leading scorers in the league up until January I think.. We finished as the third top scorers in the league and my striker Steven Ross got thirty-seven goals in forty-five games! So it's not really the striker but more that the team didn't really score when he wasn't on form. Next season I won't be so complacent!
 
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Season two of football management over and I feel like I've aged ten years in the process. After a fantastic first half of the season the second part just ruined things for us. We were so close to Livingston for so long and had a bit of a gap over St. Mirren but as you know, it was those two sides that were promoted in the end and not us. I must admit I am seriously gutted about the outcome, I thought we had it in the bag. In fairness though, when we started the season I wasn't expecting a promotion chase so I can't fault the lads too much. We had a couple of decent runs in the cups too so all things considered we had a really good season. It just doesn't feel that way after looking certainties for promotion. I'll be honest and say there have been moment's these past few weeks where I've considered stepping down from my position. The one massive overriding feeling for me is that I owe Clyde far too much to walk away from them at this point. They have stuck by me through a lot of **** when most clubs wouldn't have kept faith. **** most clubs wouldn't have hired me!! So we learn from our mistakes this season and we'll go again only this time promotion is firmly in our sights. With Dumbarton and Dunfermline coming down from the Championship I'm actually quite positive about our chances as I actually think that we could even really push for the league as I don't believe either of those teams look too great. Three of our senior players will leave the club at the expiration of their contracts and we have four loanees who are going back to their clubs and of the four only Krystian Nowak is a player we'd be interested in re-signing. There can be no more room for sentimentality and it's with that in mind that I've told my cousin Conor Bell that we won't be looking into signing him again. With seven players out the door we have a lot of rebuilding to do and we'll be making top class signings a priority rather than trying to fill the squad up with quantity. No one's position at the club is safe should we receive an offer for them or should a higher calibre player become available. We've also let eight staff members leave the club and we've brought in four replacements in the key roles of assistant manager, goalkeeping coach, fitness coach and a first team coach. We let our director of football, head of youth development, under 20's manager and under 20's coach all go. It was a bit of a cost cutting move as we've also released all of our youth players as not one of them is good enough to make it at this club. So there has been quite a bit of upheaval and there will be more to come, I look forward to updating you.

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I have just pledged my immediate future to the club and days later I've just been informed by the club Chairman John Alexander that the club will be reverting from our professional status to semi-pro. Is he kidding? We will go up this year! Well I thought we were set to anyway but with this latest revelation how am I supposed to bring in the calibre of player we need? Luckily we've already made six transfers so the squad has been bulked up a bit. We really need two left wingers, a left back and a centre back. We have decent ones at the club but we need very good ones.. Why did I get into management? Oh and to make matters worse it is expected that we will gain promotion, it is expected that we reach the quarter final of the William Hill Scottish cup(WHAT THE F*CK) and it is also expected that we should reach the final of the Irn-Bru Challenge cup. So basically, a miracle is expected. Give me strength.


 
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Having trimmed down the backroom staff and brought in staff of a higher calibre as well as letting a few players leave on free transfers we had a decent budget to start our summer recruitment of players. I am really happy that we managed to bring in Theo Wharton, Lee Croft, Reece Hall-Johnson and Aaron McGowan as they are top quality players who will fit right into our starting line up at centre midfield, right midfield right back and left back respectively. Greig Spence is a good goalscorer and will provide back up for our front man Steven Ross so I'm happy to have him on board. Josh MacDonald and Daniel Baur are a couple of young centre backs that will provide back up to our main men Quade Taylor and Patrick Kanyuka. Gary McKenzie is an experienced centre back we were able to add to the squad and he may even get in ahead of Kanyuka as Taylor's partner in the centre of defence. Steven Smith is another experienced player we've added and he will be a great asset to the dressing room. He will be our back up left back but should be a more than able deputy. Overall I am pleased with the business we have managed, thankfully we done most of it early on and were able to bring in players before we turned semi-pro. I did have greater ambitions once we hit July and there were a lot more free transfers available but the board put a stop to that which meant we had to bargain hunt even more than we would have liked. Still, the squad is looking decent so here's hoping they play that way too. In the Betfred cup we have been drawn in a group with Partick Thistle, Falkirk, Alloa and Stenhousemuir. I am really excited to play in the competition again as I really like the format of it and look forward to seeing how our lads fare against Premiership and Championship opposition in Partick Thistle and Falkirk.

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As we geared up to play our first game of the season there were five players set to make their debut; Theo Wharton, Lee Croft, Reece Hall-Johnson, Gary McKenzie and Aaron McGowan. The rest of the squad consisted of our top players from last season; Amadeusz Skryzniarz, Quade Taylor, Ursene Mouanda, Scott Linton, John Rooney and Steven Ross. We went into the game as underdogs and were given a good price of 7-2 for a win by the bookies. If we were to do that though it would be a bit of an upset it would be fair to say. Despite that, we were in control for the first twenty minutes of the match. Then, against the run of play Falkirk went up and scored through Nathan Austin. Miles Hippopotamus, sorry Miles Hippolyte made it 2-0 with a header from Tom Taiwo's corner. To make matters worse Nicky Low then scored a thirty yard screamer of a free kick two minutes later and it was 3-0 at half time. It was 4-0 by the fiftieth minute. Twelve minutes later; five. The deficit was reduced by one after some great link up play between Linton, Ross and Rooney it was Rooney who got on the score sheet and Ross the provider. Falkirk were the favourites for a reason I guess, they certainly showed their class however if we were to go by the match facts the scoreline should really have been closer. We've got to play better than this!!

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