Non League To Premier League (FM24)

Non League To Premier League FM24

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the brand new Non League to Premier League, a career mode where if played correctly, almost anything can happen. After years and years of watching Lollujo work his magic, it’s rubbed off on me and I’ve decided to do an annual series for myself starting with Football Manager 2024. Non League to Legend is the most celebrated of all creator career modes on YouTube when it comes to Football Manager creators and I aim to follow in the footsteps of people who are much better at this than me, but it also means I feel like I’m representing all the normal guys, all the ones that find it tougher to make a winning team, the ones that try their hardest to move up the leagues with the smaller clubs. Stand by for the rules, just in case you’re unsure about how all this works.

The Rules

Rule 1: I must start at my most local club on the vanilla database on Football Manager 2024 at step 6 of the English football pyramid.

Rule 2: All moves I make in this career must be the decision I would make in real life. If I’m managing a lower league club, and a Championship club comes in with three times my salary, I’m going there.

Rule 3: All staff and player signings must be signings that have been sent to me through reports. At no point will I be using the player search option, or the bar at the top, unless I’m looking at different competitions to see how they’re going. 

Rule 4: The editor must be taken out of the game, and I cannot use it at any point.

Rule 5: The final point is not necessarily a rule, but although it’s called Non League to Premier League, I can manage anywhere in my game world. Not just in England. It’s literally just a name I can get away with. 

Starting Club

Last night, I spent the best part of 10 minutes working out where my nearest club was in Football Manager 2024. As in the photo below, I live in the town of Wellingborough in Northamptonshire, so although Wellingborough Town would be in the Northern section if they were high enough, I’m relatively close to the National League South as well, so I had to work it out. So I calculated the position of all 48 Step 6 clubs, put all of them into a list, and the team I will be first is… Brackley Town. Brackley Town were formed in 1890, and are a club that play in the National League North, based in Northamptonshire. Otherwise known as The Saints, they have played at Level 6 for over a decade, winning promotion in 2011. They play at the 3,500 capacity St James Park, where they have played since 1974. 

The club also won the FA Trophy in 2018. 

Starting the Save

Here we go then, ladies and gentlemen. We are the brand new manager of Brackley Town FC, at the age of just 26. Oh to be 26 again in real life. We do indeed replace former manager Gavin Cowan.

The media prediction is very much what I expected, as the club have been trying to earn their place in the National League for a number of years now. There are two professional teams in the league in the first season in Scunthorpe United and South Shields so it will be tough to compete at the top this season, and although we will be in the play offs hopefully, one of those teams will be as well I’m sure. They will be difficult to get past. 

I do follow local non league football, but I’m closer to Kettering than I am to Brackley, so I wasn’t entirely sure of their squad. The lad on the right of the strike force is known to me. He goes by the name of Jordan Crawford. We will go in on him more in a moment, but I’ve seen him play at Corby Town and Desborough Town. A quick, pacy little forward who will torment National League North defenders this season, but I will look more into the squad a little later on.

So the aim for this season is to reach the National League North Playoffs, which I thought would be the case. The owner has only told me to strive to make progress on and off the pitch. It does say to be competitive in both cups we are in, but the aim for me will be to make at least the First Round of the FA Cup and get to the later stages of the FA Trophy. If I can do it, that’s great. If not, he’s only told me to be competitive which is fine. He wants to be out of this league by the end of the second season. As for the fans, they want the playoffs, to embarrass Banbury in the league, and smash Kettering if we play them.

We have a really strong squad for this level, our best player according to the report being Gareth Dean at 33 years old, a centre-half in his prime years at this football club. He’s strong in the air and tackling which is vitally important for any defender playing part time. He’s a strong choice for captain as well, being a strong team leader, and working his butt off for this team as well. If there’s anything we need, it’s someone who can tower above all comers in the league. 

Our best centre forward is 32 year old Danny Newton. A finishing ability of 12 is good to see, especially at this level, but he probably wouldn’t be able to go much higher, National League at a push. The final player to look out for is Alfie Bates. He’s 22 years old and is deemed to be a man who will hit almost 5 stars later in his career at this level. There’s 12s and 13s all over the place, basically anything in yellow is good for this club. His first touch and passing are both at 13, and he’s your typical DLP, which is the sort of player I want in this team. 

This is our strongest team in their strongest formation which I will go with for now. I would say we need players of stronger ability at centre-back, with Gareth Dean and Zak Lilly both needing improvement. I may need to change a few of the roles in the team, that’s not Newton’s strongest role up top. But yes, we will go into the transfer market. 

On the next update, we will have played through pre-season and about to enter the league games in August. We will go through the first few games and see what happens with transfers. Don’t forget that the transfer window lasts until March in the National League North, so we have a lot of time to tweak and change this team. Hopefully we’re on to something here. I hope you enjoyed the first update, and I hope you’re enjoying playing Football Manager 2024. Let me know who you’re playing as in a comment, and we will go through this journey together. Let me know also if you’re doing this challenge, and where you start with. Thanks for reading, and I’ll be back later on.

Non League To Premier League FM24 Part Two

Hello and welcome to Part Two of Non League to Premier League, my journey as a manager from my most local team at Step 6, up to the higher echelons of World football. When I was with you last, we were looking through our squad ahead of the first season in game. We are going to head into the pre-season friendlies, and we will try to get more staff into the club as we are very short in that department. Obviously as a manager, we are starting with a National A License as that’s what the game gives you with Brackley Town, so some big news before we start anything. The club are paying for my first course, and it’ll last 4 months.

Tuesday 4th July 2023

Friendly

Brackley Town 3-0 Brackley Town Second XI (Lilly 2’, Gudger 4’, McHale 29’)

An easy win over our second team started pre-season off as well as it could have done. Two corners from McHale found the heads of our two centre-backs Lilly and Gudger in the opening 4 minutes. McHale then scored a cracking goal from the corner of the penalty area as we picked up a comfortable win at St James Park.

Saturday 8th July 2023

Friendly

Tonbridge Angels 6-2 Brackley Town (Greenidge 10’, Turner 13’, Lyons-Foster 20’, Fagg 41’, Turner 44’, Fish 85’; Lilly 34’, Calder 73’)

When we went down to Kent to take on National League South Tonbridge Angels, I didn’t immediately expect to be having to decide to change my team completely as we were 5-1 down at half time, their passing game absolutely destroying us. Maybe I’m going to have to rethink the pumping forward I thought we’d be going to do. This is what pre-season is all about though. I’d rather lose 6-2 now than in the league. 

Saturday 15th July 2023

Friendly

Ammanford 0-3 Brackley Town (Gudger 25’, Lilly 28’, McHale 90’+1)

In this game, we went to the entire other end of the UK, as we travelled to South Wales to face JD Cymru South side Ammanford. A comprehensive win was expected and that’s what was delivered. Our set pieces are working well, Gudger getting his head onto a McHale corner, and Lilly heading home from a Lyttle wide free kick. We had a number of chances in the second half, but nothing much happened until added time at the end of the game, when McHale latched on to a dreadful clearance from the goalkeeper, and went on a winding run before finishing, 

Announcement

No transfers yet, but below are the squad numbers for the brand new season as I’m quite, quite mad.

Saturday 22nd July 2023

Friendly

Poole Town 1-5 Brackley Town (Budd 90’+2; Gudger 29’, 62’, Crawford 41’, Lilly 45’+3, Carline 47’)

A second convincing pre-season victory in succession as we thrashed Southern League Premier South side Poole Town by 5-1. Our corners are working like a dream, with our 3 centre-halves all scoring with headers from corners. I brought off Alex Gudger on a hat-trick. Jordan Crawford got his first of pre-season as well so hopefully that’s a good start for him. Thought we’d keep the clean sheet, but Budd got a cracking goal outside the area to make it 5-1. But no worries, good result. One more friendly to go.

Injury

Unfortunately, that game also brought our first major injury of the season, as Liam Cross is expected to be out for the first few games of the season after he pulled up during the Poole Town game.

New Signing

You’ve been waiting for this and so have I, but it’s not been for the want of trying. With the lack of money we have, it’s been difficult to try and bring in players. I know I didn’t mention it but we literally have no transfer budget, so it will be all about free signings and loans in this first season. We’ve signed Charlie Waller on loan from MK Dons in League Two. He’s not going to set the world alight. He’s 18 years old, he can play at both left-back and centre-back and we only really needed him to boost up the squad in terms of numbers. Saying that, he has a few yellow ratings at least when it comes to heading, decision making and aggression. But that’s our first signing.

Strong Potential Youth Player

We’ve made a signing of a young player that has caught my eye. He is a regen, it is his first club. He goes by the name of Ben Clarke-Jacobs. He’s 16 years old, he plays as a Centre-Back, though again, looking at our first team, our centre-halves literally do the job when it comes to winning headers from corners. I’m sure there’ll be opportunities for him to appear in lesser games, potentially against relegation candidates. He’s here to learn really and to play in the FA Youth Cup. He has got good first touch, good work rate and determination, and yellows when it comes to his physical attributes as well.

Saturday 29th July 2023

Friendly

Brackley Town 2-1 Southend United (Armson (pen) 60’, Crawford 66’; Cardwell 43’)

We played our first opposition from a higher level as we hosted National League Southend United at St James Park, for the first game in front of our home fans. It was very much a game of nothingness until Southend got a corner, which was obviously worked on the training ground, finding Cardwell at the far post and he headed into the top corner. On the hour, Armson equalised from the penalty spot. Jordan Crawford grabbed the winner with a cross from the left by Calder, which found his head and he managed to grab us a valuable pre-season win. Good result.

Injury News

This is not the one we wanted to see though. Morgan Roberts will be out for 3 weeks, after he made a tackle during the Southend United game and has pulled some ankle ligaments.

Squad Hierarchy

There will be people wondering what’s going on so this is the squad hierarchy pyramid, with Dean as captain and Lewis as vice-captain.

July Round-Up

So that brings us to the end of the first full month of this save, I will be playing two months a day on this save. The friendly results worried me after being tonked by Tonbridge Angels away from home, but three consecutive wins, one against Southend United, have made me think this defensive formation actually works. We have only made 2 signings so far, but as August begins, there is more in the offing, including a potential loan signing from Shrewsbury Town. In the next instalment, we begin our Vanarama National League North season away at Chorley. I’ll see you then.