I am the Premiership Manager of the Year!!
Gael Kakuta got the goal of the season
Victoria Park is to be extended by 106 seats lol
Youth and training facilities to be upgraded
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SUMMARY
Well its safe to say that we took to the Premiership quite well. To finish the season in 6th place and win the Capital One Cup was fantastic. My players are continuing to develop also. Luke James got called into Englands preliminary squad for the upcoming Euros and Seth Schwartz is valued at £12m!!!!
During the season we finally lost our unbeaten home record in the league and Scott Flinders finally missed his first game for me too.
So next season the aim has to be another top 6 finish and a decent run in Europe. We have won a trophy every year under my management so I hope that continues.
Cyprus 3 (Stefanou 67, Anastasiou 78, 90) Ukraine 6 (Yarmolenko 34, Seleznyov 44, Bezus 45, Khacheridi 76, Konoplyanka 83, 86)
3 decent friendlies. Solid against the Swiss, competitive against the Spanish and a good win with lots of goals to boost the confidence against the Cypriots.
GROUP F Ukraine 2 (Harmash 58, Stepanenko 84) Sweden 0
Lineup - Koval, Butko, Chygrynskyi, Khacheridi, Rakitskyi (Polyovyi), Stepanenko, Harmash*, Yarmolenko, Konoplyanka (Kozhanov), Bezus (Taison), Seleznyov
A very good win to kick off the campaign as I think they are the strongest side in the group.
Lineup - Koval, Butko (Kryvtsov), Isakov, Khacheridi, Rakitskyi, Stepanenko, Harmash, Yarmolenko*, Konoplyanka (Milevskyi), Bezus (Taison), Seleznyov
A good win but it should have been far more comfortable as we dominated from start to finish.
Sweden 1-2 Austria
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Ukraine 4 (Taison 11, Yarmolenko 19, Seleznyov 47, 81) Austria 4 (Hosiner 51, 57, Alar 66, Schmid 72)
Lineup - Koval, Butko (Kryvtsov), Chygrynskyi, Khacheridi, Rakitskyi, Bezus, Harmash, Yarmolenko, Konoplyanka, Taison*, Seleznyov
Absolutely raging about this result but we top the group anyway I suppose.
Lineup - Koval, Kryvtsov, Chygrynskyi (Bilyi), Khacheridi*, Rakitskyi, Stepanenko, Harmash, Yarmolenko (Shachkov), Konoplyanka, Bezus, Seleznyov (Vernigorov)
Delighted with this win as Croatia have a strong side. Spain up next though...........
Spain 2-1 France Russia 1-4 Germany Austria 0-4 Portugal Czech. Republic 2-1 Greece Poland 2-1 England Slovakia 0-4 Belgium Scotland 0-0P Italy
Spain 3 (Pedro 10, Javi Martinez 33, Llorente 45) Ukraine 2 (Harmash 5, Bezus 87)
Lineup - Koval, Butko, Chygrynskyi, Khacheridi, Rakitskyi, Stepanenko (Mykhalyk), Harmash, Yarmolenko (Shachkov), Konoplyanka, Bezus, Seleznyov (Milevskyi)
So close. To be fair we are at a level below the top nations despite our ranking being 6th in the world. Never mind.
Germany 1-3 Portugal Belgium 1-0 Italy Czech. Republic 0-2 Poland
I resigned after we got knocked out and went in for the jobs with Portugal, Spain and Germany and understandably I didnt get any of them. Bosnia, Poland and Czech. Republic held no interest for me so off to South America I go!!!!!!
With the likes of Falcao, James Rodriguez and a few others we actually have a decent side.
This is kinda a half update as the season for us kicks off in late July for the Europa League qualifiers. I still have to bring in several more players but I have been busy strengthening my squad anyways...........
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PLAYERS IN
I received a transfer budget of £22m and blew half of that (and beat my transfer record by £6.5m) by signing Nathaniel Chalobah from Chelsea for £11m. He will partner Baldwin at CB and should be a rock at the back for many years to come. View attachment 475666
Also for the first team squad came 2 free transfers in the shape of Scott Sinclair and Connor Wickham. Both will add and improve the strength and depth of my squad. I also arranged to bring in Jake Kean from Blackburn ages ago for £3m. He is a favoured person of Hartlepool after a loan spell earlier in his career and I thought it was a good deal. View attachment 475665View attachment 475664View attachment 475663
Firstly to the players that havent left lol. I rejected a bid from Everton for Femenia for £8m while I cant seem to get rid of Djurovski or Jarju surprisingly.
On their way however was a few backups. Jonny Whelan (87/21) went to Aberdeen for £875K and Steven Hetherington (118/10) went to Doncaster for £475K. Jonathan Franks (84/9) is off to Brentford for £180K while I also received £65K from Dundee United for Angus Gunn.
Masoud (48/15) and Poole (59/11) were released, Tommy Miller retired while I loaned out Siegrist, Guindo, Mlinaric, Fardeau, Ford and Souayah.
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SUMMARY
Regarding the new signings, Kean is my new keeper, Chalobah will come in at CB and Sinclair LW (at the moment) so Kakuta will move inside to AMC. I still need to bring in a few players so we shall see what changes in my August post.
I think we can challenge for Europe again though providing my players are up to the whole playing on Thursdays and Sundays. What better happen is that Igor Augusto has to contribute. He has great stats and performs well but didnt get a single goal or an assist last season shockingly!!!
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OTHER NEWS
I get a new contract with a £40K per week wage rise
We will face Stromsgodset in the Europa League
and
KRIS STUART APPOINTED POLAND MANAGER
I went to bed last night and thought I would rather learn a different language to Spanish lol (I may end up managing a better Spanish speaking nation later). I was going to go in for Bosnia but that was already taken so Poland it is. They have a few decent players and obviously Lewandowski so we shall see how I go.
AUGUST
UEFA Europa League 3rd Qual Round 1st leg Stromsgodset 0 Hartlepool United 3 (Femenia 49, Connors 72, Wickham 79)
This should see us through. Kean, Chalobah and Sinclair made debuts from the start and Wickham, Fueyo and Joao Paulo came off the bench to make theirs.
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UEFA Europa League 3rd Qual Round 2nd Leg Hartlepool United 2 (Lamacraft 23, 58) Stromsgodset 1 (Sagbakken 87)
(Hartlepool United win 5-1 on aggregate)
Needless to say I rested my first picks for this game.
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Hartlepool United 2 (Connors 8, Baldwin 51) Everton 1 (Armenteros 24)
This was a very even game which could have went either way but we managed to sneak it. --
UEFA Europa League Playoff 1st Leg Rangers 2 (Daly 24, Murphy 34) Hartlepool United 3 (Kakuta 31, 41, Connors 37)
We should have won by more but I am pleased to win having been behind twice.
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Stoke City 1 (Huth 36)
Hartlepool United 2 (Kakuta 19, Sinclair 78pen)
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UEFA Europa League Playoff 2nd Leg Hartlepool United 3 (Fueyo 42, Joao Paulo 69, Wickham 70) Rangers 1 (Murphy 2)
(Hartlepool United win 6-3 on aggregate)
Again I rested a few players as I thought we would be too strong which proved to be correct.
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Hartlepool United 1 (Connors 84) Southampton 0
We made life difficult for ourselves here as we missed a host of chances after Charlie Adam got sent-off for them in the first half.
What a busy month I had. Sven games played produced seven victories as we have started the season on fire. We got Southend in the League Cup and in the Europa League we will face Dinamo Zagreb, Dynamo Kiev and Sturm Graz.
Transfer wise there were many deals. I sold Kiko Femenia to Wolfsburg for £12.75m which is all profit. He wanted to leave earlier and when I offered him a new contract he wanted a minimum release fee of £4.5m!!! The other departees were all on loan - Tesfaye, Djurovski, Healy, Stratford and Schmidt.
Now for the incomings. To replace Femenia I brought in Joel Ward from Crystal Palace for £7.5m. I had found an amazing Brazilian but was quoted £37m for him! I also had a long standing agreement to bring in young Peruvian Roberto Castrillon for £325K. View attachment 475638View attachment 475637
Then on deadline day I brought in Kieran Gibbs from Arsenal for £3.3m and Samir Nasri on loan from Man City. He was available for £500K but his wage demands were atronomical so I paid a £2m loan fee and 20% of his wages. View attachment 475636View attachment 475635
Those deals took my total transfer spend to £26m having recouped nearly £15m. I am pleased with te balance of my squad. I have a strong English spine in the shape of Kean/Flinders, Baldwin, Chalobah, Gibbs, Holden, Clarke, Ward, Connors, Sinclair, James and Wickham.
Hull City Tigers 1 (Berisha 47) Hartlepool United 1 (James 90)
Our first points dropped this season but we sneaked a point thanks to our only shot on target.
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UEFA Europa League Group J Dynamo Kiev 3 (Ideye 2, Bezus 9, Mehmedi 76) Hartlepool United 4 (Connors 8, Sinclair 39, 63, Joao Paulo 83)
While selecting my side I noticed that I forgot to register Joel Ward stupidly!!
In the end we came out on top in a 7 goal thriller. Dynamo have a decent side and Bezus is a great player but we just had enough to beat them.
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Hartlepool United 1 (Connors 40) Aston Villa 1 (Vuckic 44)
The result was kinda disappointing but worse was that Baldwin got injured and is out for 3 months.
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Capital One Cup 3rd Round Southend United 0 Hartlepool United 2 (Mahon 108, Basic 118) AET
My backups made hard work of this but we make it through.
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Chelsea 4 (Lewandowski 10pen, 44, Chalobah og47, Oscar 56) Hartlepool United 2 (Sinclair 41pen, 65)
3 league games without a win is a worry as we give Chelsea their first league win of the season.
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UEFA Europa League Group J Hartlepool United 1 (Lamacraft 42) SK Sturm Graz 0
I would have preferred a bigger winning margin but I played a backup side so it was understandable that we didnt win by 3 or 4.
A frustrating month. We didnt win a league game but won all our cup games so its quite hard to judge how well we played. We are looking good in Europe though which I am putting a large emphasis on to attract better players.
Good effort in the league last season! 6th is massive for the first season. Brilliant win for the League Cup! Happy days. Let's hope this season is an even better one. European trophy would be nice no pressure lol.
OCTOBER
Hartlepool United 1 (Igor Augusto 35) Tottenham Hotspur 0
IGOR AUGUSTO FINALLY SCORES!!!!!!
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Hartlepool United 3 (Kakuta 18, 50, Nasri 88)
Newcastle United 0
A cracking result. Nasri was unstoppable here as he scored 1 and setup 2. We needed the two home wins after our recent league form.
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UEFA Europa League Group J Hartlepool United 1 (McKinney 82) Dinamo Zagreb 0
McKinney quite often pops up with a goal whenever he plays and he did so again here. They had a man sent-off midway through the 2nd half which helped.
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Manchester United 2 (Hernandez 8, Powell 10) Hartlepool United 0
We were battered throughout but I cant help but thinking that if we didnt start off like we did we might have nicked it.
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Capital One Cup 4th Round
Swansea City 0 Hartlepool United 1 (Kakuta 63)
In all honesty this was one of our best performances under my management. We peppered the goal and ahd plenty of shots on target it was only the amount of goals scored that was lacking.
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Liverpool 6 (Suso 26, Sturridge 37, 44, Yarmolenko 45, 70, Radu 90)
Hartlepool United 4 (James 10, Connors 17, Kakuta 53, Sinclair 87)
A crazy game but I am ****** off that we threw away a 2 goal lead. When you score 4 in any game you expect to win but thats a few times we have lost doing that..............
As so often has happened since we have been in the Premiership it is hard to judge how the month went! We started the month well with 3 good home victories but we slipped up towards the end of the month with defeats against Man Utd and Liverpool although we battled away.
We are 8th in the league which is a bit of a false position (in a bad way) methinks. If we dont finish in the top 6 I will be disappointed.
UEFA Europa League Group J Dinamo Zagreb 1 (Medaric 81) Hartlepool United 4 (Gibbs 24, Connors 54, 59, Chalobah 78)
A fantastic victory that qualifies us for the next round and all but wins us the group.
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Hartlepool United 3 (Connors 20, 38, Sinclair 90) West Ham United 2 (Rooney 30, Carroll 42)
A very entertaining game in which we got a last gasp winner. We were missing a few players so that made the victory even more pleasurable.
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Cardiff City 0 Hartlepool United 2 (Connors 20, Sinclair 89pen)
Nice.
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UEFA Europa League Group J Hartlepool United 3 (Joao Paulo 43, Connors 45, Basic 79) Dynamo Kiev 0
We have now qualified for the next stage as group winners with 1 game to go.
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Swansea City 1 (Hosiner 21)
Hartlepool United 3 (Kakuta 20, 79, Connors 71)
Swansea are bottom so this was an expected victory. However Kakuta and Joao Paulo got taken off injured.
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Capital One Cup QF
Hartlepool United 3 (Wickham 37, Jarju 70, 81) Arsenal 1 (Raage 15)
A fantastic result but we were fortunate that they had a goal disallowed that would have put them 2up. Jarju came in from the cold to star.
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Reading 2 (Anichebe 45, Chahechouhe 46) Hartlepool United (Connors 4, 35, 62, Joao Paulo 28)
Once again the oppo had a goal disallowed at a key time (to make it 3-3) but we put the game to bed. Connors is in an unbelievable run of form!
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A fantastic month as we racked up the wins. True the fixture list was slightly kinder than last month but we still had to go away from home a few times to get a result and the win in the cup over Arsenal was the icing on the cake.
Jake Connors hit top form with 10 goals during the month. If he keeps on developing like he is and keeps up the scoring rate I will have a dynasty player as the Americans would call it lol
Chelsea came calling for me during the month as Mourinho has lost it with them as they are in a relegation battle!!!! They offered me a £40m transfer kitty but I said no.