The English Journey

So, it's been a while since I was last on here. After suffering the agony of losing my monster FM14 61 season save-file, I completely lost interest in FM14 and never touched it again. However, now the new FM has come out, I suppose it's time I start again isn't it?

In this career, I started unemployed with no coaching badges and only Sunday League experience, and also with just the English leagues (down to the Conference N/S) loaded, as I don't exactly plan on jumping ship over to Europe until I've established myself as a decent manager in England first.

I have already finished the 1st season, so the rest of the post will be a quick summary of my first season.

After around 2 months of selling fake Ray Ban sunglasses on Bilston Market, Hyde were looking for a new manager and I applied. A decent interview later, and im the new boss. No sweat.



After suffering the ignominy of relegation and just 10 points to boot last season, Hyde are currently plying their trade in the newly-named Vanarama Conference North. I arrive with the wage budget already exceeded by nearly £600 a week, and a transfer budget of £5k. I have promised the board that a mid-table finish will be attainable, and that I will bring the wages under control. I inherited a fairly small squad, but I kind of prefer that as there is less deadwood to get rid of.

End-of-season


A fairly nervy season to be honest. As you can see from the league position graph, we were in the lower reaches of the table for much of the season. My job was under question for a few poor home defeats in the middle of the season, but we gradually started to put together a few results, and finished the season undefeated in 10 games. This gives me confidence for next season as we pulled out some great results against teams above us, and we also did the double over league winners Lowestoft. With a few new faces and a better start, im confident we can at least make the playoffs.

Anyway, I'll start doing monthly updates from here on out.

This is going to be good! Best of luck buddy

Thanks Dan, I wanted to get a full season under my belt first, just incase I decided to call it quits.

Hyde haven't had the best of luck the past few seasons. I've been to watch them a few times with my home team Northwich Vics. Hopefully you can change their fortunes! Good first season there!

Good first season mate. Im sure you can grab play-offs next year

Good season Hopefully you can get in the play off next season.

I may or may not have forgot to arrange friendlies for the 2015-16 preseason.... whoops.

I was too busy trying to nudge the squad around and get some new fresh players in. I'll post a full review of all transfer activity at the end of the next month.

August 2015


Our opening game of the season against newly-promoted Hereford. They are tipped to win the league at 5/1, but we put in a decent performance before falling to a sloppy goal from a corner 18 minutes from time.


Much better performance, with the brace from 15-year old youth player Derek Pilsbury the highlight for me. 61% possession is great to see too.


After the result against Harrogate, I was hoping to kick on and take another win, but it wasn't to be. Joel Ambalu's first-half hat-trick had us 3-0 and our heads dropped. We had plenty of attempts 2nd half but never really looked like getting back into it.


Argh! Another early goal conceded and it's always going to be hard to come back away from home. O'Connor's sending off made things even tougher 2nd half.


Oh dear, another heavy defeat, and our poor run is taking its toll on the players, as we had 7 (seven) bookings for 7 different players. We got fined after the game for failing to control our players. We committed 28 fouls :O.


Technically not August but shhhh!
A WIN! We stopped our average of about 8 goals conceded a game and kept a clean sheet! We also bagged 2 great goals to stop the rot (sort of).



Currently sitting in 17th. It's been a poor month, but our performances haven't been atrocious, just our defending .

September 2015


One clean sheet was miraculous. Two, and in a row? UNBELIEVABLE JEFF! A great game where we pretty much were just hanging in there for most of the game against 2nd placed Alfreton. Two late goals from 2 substitutes no less earned us a vital 3 points.


Obviously my outstanding managerial ability is rubbing off on the players now, as we record another clean sheet and take another 3 points, this time against Stalybridge who were probably the worst team we have faced this season. Three first half goals and we just cruised the second half and saw out an easy 3-0 win.


I'd be lying if I said a draw was a good result. Tamworth were bottom of the league, but they caused us a fair few problems early on. Second half it was all Hyde, and we should have won. Oh well, another clean sheet is great though.


Very poor game. Leamington had three penalties, but could only convert one of them. We only managed 5 shots all game. We deserved to lose, simple as.


FA Cup 2nd Qualifying Round
Unlucky loss to inferior opposition, but we simply got hit on the counter 3 times and they scored all 3 times. Oh well, the FA Cup will have to wait another year.


2 wins, a draw and a loss this month. Could have been better, but I'll take it. At least I seem to have plugged up our leaky defence in the league at least.

An update on transfers will be coming in a seperate post.

Transfers


Not much to say really. Matty Hughes is a decent signing and plays either AMR or AML, and Tony Thompson is a fairly bog-standard keeper who replaced the keeper we had last season who was a loanee from Man City.

All outgoings were fringe players who were hogging up the wage budget.

October 2015


A win, a draw and two defeats this month. Pretty poor and there is talk of me possibly being under pressure. It's not going the way I had planned!


We somehow moved up a spot to 14th though. I really need to start putting a run together to try and climb up the table.

You can do it, mate! Chin up and go get 'em!

Wow, tough start, where do the board want you to finish, sure its only a matter of time before things come together!

I hope so!


Top half. They reduced my wage budget by around £400pw which is a fair whack at this level. Might try and jump ship first chance I get...