Eric Portapotty - Comments

Well literally everything has gone to shit eh

Midseason 2021/22

A great start to the season with only a blip against Future preventing us from having a perfect start.
... Then Bodden Town came along. Terrible result, made worse by my desire to chase the game instead of cutting my losses.
Then Elite did one over us, then Academy, then Roma nearly did as well as we finished the 1st half of the season winless in 4.



Bottom half despite having more wins and losses, but we're not in a good place right now so I can completely see us getting worse.

President's Cup draw's been made as well:



Elite in the 1st round, probably Academy in the next, lo and behold 2 sides that we've lost to this season.

At least you lot had the highs of beating the top sides, we've had fuck all to be positive about so far

Y'all are fucked

Ole knows how to set up to defend, it's why he only managed a draw against an Emery team who was similarly cowardly.

Preseason 2021/22

A short update, but a bad one as well:



Well what can I say - being slapped left, right and centre.
A new-ish defensive partnership showed its teething problems, with both Cupids (Alejandro and Theron) clearly needing a lot more time to gel as a regular centreback pairing.
Not that that's our only problem - Abijah Lewis looked worryingly off colour throughout and finished preseason with only 1 goal.



Per the usual, midtable is where we're expected to be. Judging from our preseason though I'd take that right now.

Fucking hell

Ahahaha you're still around

In any case he'll definitely win them a trophy while leaving them worse off in the end (Jerome Boateng added to their stable of 30+y/o defs anyone?) but Levy's probably going to use the fact that they're no longer trophyless as leverage against that inevitable shitshow.

Where's that BMG Spurs fan at

End of 2020/2021 Season

Apologies for the absence lads, but I've just played out the season:






We had a fantastic run of wins through February and March, but other than that it has been a frustratingly inconsistent time.
Oh and no draws since December, and only 2 for the whole campaign.

That said, spare a thought for Future, whose fairytale run to the title was thwarted by a Scholar's own overachievement, missing out on the title by virtue of having scored 1 goal less.
And we thought Man Utd had it bad...

President's Cup

Well we'd won it previously, so I'm not too fussed at all to have gone out.
It did mean a death knell of sorts for Martin Hernandez though, the goalkeeper with terrible shotstopping ability who has led me to concede my punt on him has arguably failed.

CIFA FA Cup

I wouldn't give us too much credit here - Elite played 2 games in the previous 4 days, and a third in 5 would clearly too much for anyone.



Pretty miffed about this one though, having seen us battle real hard for over 80 minutes and holding on the a lead for on hour, only to let slip late in the game.
And we can't take penalties apparently.

Players of the Season

(It's the usual suspects really)

Abijah LewisMan's gone from strength to strength despite his seemingly terrible ability, averaging over a goal a game and finishing top scorer despite missing a quarter of the season to injury.

Joshewa McLeanBy contrast McLean's ability is consistent with his performances, which also led to a 1st cap for the Caymans.
The pair have a real Aubamezette vibe going on, with a straight poacher pairing up with an all rounded support striker.



Obviously you've got the likes of Ian Barnett and Jessus Connolly delivering the goods as well - I don't see us moving on from this setup any time soon.

We also had a youth intake:



A pretty dreadful intake tbh, with a single standout:



Ian Ebanks-Cupid can certainly keep up physically, but his complete lack of passing ability is serious cause for concern.
Didn't help his cause that he got himself sent off in the season close against Roma; still, he'll be around, and he's the only one kept around in his batch.

Lastly:



Mr. Challenger decided to retire and obviously I wish him a happy virtual retirement in his virtual world.
The new guy's not a tycoon unfortunately, so we'll have to continue building the hard and long way.

Arsenal bosses “100%” behind Unai Emery, deny considering change or talking to candidates, plan to review in summer. Kroenkes + execs offering full support, won’t react to “noise”, feel results will improve atmos & think #AFC on right path. @TheAthleticUK: https://t.co/rXXrMAtd9a

— David Ornstein (@David_Ornstein) November 10, 2019

This is basically blaming the fans. Get fucked. pic.twitter.com/t0xD6nni7g

— arseblog (@arseblog) November 10, 2019

smh

I suppose there was a case made that the club needed fresh blood to start growing our financials.

Too bad for us he was a fucking fraud in his time here - we consistently trailed Utd for instance in commercial deals, we signed players based off his bullshit StateDNA, he came out with bullshit Warchest statements when we spent fuck all, and the only reason he got away with it was thanks to Wenger being his human shield.

Wenger then quits, he puts himself front and centre of the triumvirate that chose Emery as the new coach, then fucked off once there's a half-decent opportunity around, didn't even have the desire to see his supposed vision for Arsenal come to fruition (or the balls to front it when it fails).

Man's a fucking paper tiger and I'm fucking glad that he's shown himself to be running another club to the ground, fucking fraud.

Wenger, hands down - it's not necessarily a diss on Emery, more of my support for Arsene.

I know VP might probably disagree but I'll take current Wenger back, I've always believed that he was done so dirty by that inept cunt Gazidis, and with Raul/Edu hopefully replicating what David Dein all those years ago he'd be less hamstrung than he was with that bald fraud and his fucking StatDNA shite.

What is the point

Oh and Leicester will absolutely tear us a new one, I have no doubt whatsoever

I ain't betting of chaos (i.e. us)


My understanding was that Son is the designated backup striker? Though obviously you lot were linked with more than a few forwards as well

OLE'S AT THE WHEEL

(inb4 we lose to Villa)


I mean you lot didn't lose anyone and got signings (Ndombele, GLC both good additions) so why not?

Group H is EN FUEGO, as is G

November 2020

I know it's Elite and we were always going to struggle, but it was still incredibly frustrating to watch us go 3 down by the half, which flattered us such was the awfulness of our backline.
Lewis so nearly hauled us back into contention, but there was only so much 1 man can do. We were fortunate to no lose by more thanks to Coleman's penalty save.



Oh fuck sake.
We did very, very well on the day, playing on the break and sitting back against Town's usual 4-5-1, and we found ourselves 2 up going into the break.
We continued to defend and looked well within reach of a vital rebound win, only for Cupid to well, capitulate - concede a late freekick and a caution, then deflect that FK into your own net? Terrible stuff.



Finally a win this month.
Cayman Brac weren't at 100% on the day, and Lewis opportunistically put them to the sword early, before Barnett did what Barnett does with a goal of his own.



Scholars already have a significant lead, but at least everyone below us have at least played the same number of games, so we won't be looking at a tumble down the table for now (I hope).

No longer a NEET baby
(well from Sept 2 onwards anyway)

October 2020



Quick tip guys, don't play attacking football if the team's not familiar with it, even if the opponents are there for the taking.
Dire game from the strikers, and Connolly was the most suspect in the backline with the foul that led to the penalty.



Thank goodness we've got our annual 3 points up next, though even Tigers gave us a hard time in the 1st half.
The introduction of the recently fit Ian Barnett changed it all, with 2 pinpoint crosses leading to goals (could've had a hat trick of assists had the finishing been better as well).



Early doors, though losing so early does get my goat quite a bit.
That said with the other challengers having dropped points (make that everyone) it does mitigate the impart of our opening day setback.

Preseason 2020/21

It's the preseason we've all come to expect - friendlies with teams we'll be playing in the league, good results but not necessarily good performances.
Been playing almost exclusively a Counterattacking system, which could be a problem when we need to turn on the screws against a team happy to sit back.
Indeed when we first played more attacking against Roma we proceeded to lose.



Both the board and the bookies think we're comfortably midtable, which I'll gladly take since we've already shown we're far more than the sum of our parts.
In fact I've got so much faith in this current team that no signings have been made this transfer window, which explains the rather short update here.

@terriersmad everything I've read about Siewert in his time here points to him being incredibly confrontational I have to say, would be amazed if he lasts the month let alone the season

They were stern indeed...

End of Season 2019/20

CIFA FA Cup

We weren't to have the fairytale run of the President's Cup repeated here, and unfortunately it's probably shown again that Martin Hernandez is levels below Leighton Coleman - both goals were arguably preventable with a more capable stopper, but nevertheless we keep faith in our cup goalkeepers over here.
We went back on level terms just as half time was approaching, and while both sides had chances at the winner we eventually went the distance to penalties.
It's times like this when you need your senior players to step up, like a captain for instance. Well for Leighton Robinson he came off the bench and promptly missed his penalty in sudden death.
Granted he's rubbish at penalties (the whole team is), but it stings that little bit more when it's your captain who ballses it up.



Bit of a pity they didn't win the whole thing so we couldn't say at least we lost to the winners, but they did beat Elite which is equivalent to a cup win in most cases.

National League

The team was still finding its way back from that terrible loss to Academy, and we clearly weren't on top of it when Williams opened the scoring.
We're still very capable of chance creation though, but despite the equaliser (Abijah with a sweet cross for McLean after some good buildup) we were pretty wasteful.



I don't think I'll ever be as pissed at us scoring 7 goals.
Sunset played with 3 up top and they tore us to shreds in the 1st half, with 2 goals for their rewards. Thankfully for us there was good reason for them being near the bottom of the table, and we tore them an even bigger one in the second half. The number of chances that Lewis and McLean missed though, the could've had 5 each easily - double hat tricks though, that's some feat in itself already.



A massive, massive smash and grab win.
Andre Wilson left me with plenty of egg on my face when he struck home the opener from just inside the penalty area. Bodden Town should've built upon that lead, but as usual their 4-5-1 relied too much on their sole frontman being on form, and he hasn't been performing against us for some time.
Someone who did perform this game was Abijah Lewis, who used both his height and speed to great effect (helped on by a couple of errors from the Bodden goalkeeper) to earn us the shock win.



An emphatic way to end the season, and revenge over North Side after the Cup exit.
North Side were the more accomplished side as seen during the cup tie, so we went with a more conservative approach this time round, which paid off handsomely.



Winning 3 of our last 4 made up for the 3 straight losses earlier in April, and resulted in us climbing back up into 4th in the end.
Bit of a shame that we finished 13 points behind Scholars though, considering we were 3 ahead halfway through the season.
Oh and the title race was as tight as the table suggested - it took literally the final game of the season (Elite played theirs a week after Bodden's last) to decide its fate (quelle surprise, Elite won).

Season Review

Dominated the league in terms of individual performances, but our susceptibility to disastrous dips in form need to be remedied if we are to mount a serious title challenge.
Nevertheless, some encouragement in the form of both Ian Bennett and Jessus Connolly (the leagues top 2 for Average Rating), and top scorer Abijah Lewis.



Pretty surprised that Emcuna Ebanks-Cupid was the best signing of the season, though to be fair to him he did step up well when Lewis wasn't available.

Players of the Season

Ian BarnettWell what can I say? He made the left side his own again, this time making sure the league knew he meant business.
I'm pretty certain his indispensability also contributed to a fair few knocks over the season, particularly as we were chasing the President's Cup - next season will hopefully see more rest for him.

Jessus ConnollyBennett's equal on the opposite flank, Connolly topped the assist charts but was similarly blighted by injury as Barnett.
Also, no flair? No problem.

Abijah LewisTop scorer this season, his sheer physical and finishing ability more than made up for his lack of determination.
Obviously it's a bit of a worry that he's got a low ceiling, but that's a problem for future me to figure out.

Joshewa McLeanYou can tell I love my partnerships here - McLean acting as the bruiser to Lewis' speedo.
Also affected by injuries over the season, but he made great work of his time on the pitch - 13 goals and 6 assists in 23 starts is cracking stuff.

Loose Ends

Bingo, but with the CIFA FA Cup holding the keys to the CFU Cup Championship (aside from the league obviously) we'll need to go for that next season.



Bit of a shame, but absolutely the right decision because we sure as hell couldn't have afford either of these.
It's not all bad news though:



We've managed to pour more cash into the youth setup, which probably means I'll be playing the long game with regards to challenging for the league.

Damn you've got a serious Midas Touch on this, keep it up

You've jinxed it lol

I can't see this being anything other than a wake-up call for them tbh, they've always had the ability but the mentality is lacking

Commiserations mate, but your career moves onwards regardless doesn't it, a new club it is

Can you still spend outrageous sums of money in China?

April 2020

CIFA FA Cup

We started very well, as our strike pair gave us a 2-goal lead in under 2 minutes, but a lack of communication led to Connolly's own goal and a bit of nerves about us.
Barnett added a goal to his earlier assist for a (yet another) MoTM performance, before Academy had a late consolation to bring back those nerves.
But a win's a win, a it's a first step to a cup double.

CIFA National League

East End have been an annoying bogey team for us, having not beaten them in an official game since I took over last season.
And so it continued, as we eventually succumbed to their increasing control on the game.



Shocker as Tigers cave yet again.
A bit more difficult this time as our bumper schedule necessitated some rotation, but once McLean scored we never looked back.



We were listless this game, attack was out of whack and our defence couldn't hold - one of those days I suppose.



Admittedly I should've been much braver than simply playing on the break, because they were definitely there for the taking.
They didn't have their shooting boots on in the 1st half, as were we, but giving up so many chances to a superior side was bound to bite us in the arse eventually.
A late siege on their goal didn't bring the equaliser, but it definitely highlighted how vulnerable they were to chances as we were - if only we'd gone at them earlier.



A completely different outfield 2 days later properly backfired on us, as Academy avenged their cup loss pretty convincingly.
Oh and quelle surprise, we can't take penalties.



4th is well within our grasp if we can stop this recent slide, though we're equally likely to tumble down the table.
Such an annoying drop in form again though, but with 6 games this month something simply had to give.

At least the club had a bit of a positive at the end of the month:



You may or may not have noticed that I've taken a pay cut, and it turns out I probably should've too:



I could well have bankrupted the club with my requests for facilities upgrading, oops.

Finally, as promised there are the youth prospects I've signed:
Personally Cupid is the best of the lot - he's already made his debut, and despite his lack of ambition I believe he can develop into a serviceable defender, hopefully for us to transition into a 3-4-3, because there just aren't any decent RBs around.
McLaughlin doesn't quite count - he's tall af and will also be trained to play in the centre.
Roach-Ruiz and Andre Solomon-Williams are both absolute wastelands technically, but possess some pace and are somewhat willing runners, and I can definitely have use for guys like them.
I'm counting on Ruiz Martinez's good Vision to be our primary playmaker of sorts, though he'll need a lot of work on his other Mental attributes before he can start regularly.
Benjamin Solomon-Williams was the last of this bunch to be signed - good enough in the air, good enough determination, not as good as Cupid for now but who knows a year down the line.

March 2020

President's Cup Final

It was a cautious start from both sides and it was looking like we'd go into the break goalless, but for a run and cross down the left from Barnett, which Thomas unfortunately diverted into his own net.
We came out of the 2nd half and scored the second almost immediately, before Lewis made it 3 in under the hour.
Cayman replied with 2 goals of their own sandwiching McLaughlin's effort, but we did just enough to seal the win.



Oh yeah, trophy number 2 lads.



Both Elite and Bodden Town crashed out in the first round too, which definitely made the cup win significantly more possible.

We've also had the draw for the other cup competition:




Rather (very) unusually, the fixture list doesn't display the cup tie, instead showing the league game - also against Academy - on the same day.
No idea if it'll fix itself come the day, but I really hope this thing doesn't crash on me already.

Ok, back to the league:

CIFA National League

Managed to forget to switch out Hernandez the cup keeper, who (bless his heart) is nowhere near as good as Leighton Coleman.
Granted the loss wasn't his fault, but Coleman would've saved those I reckon.
At leats McLean got a couple of goals after some time out with injury and only coming back recently.



I took the loss as an opportunity to do some squad rotation, particularly since this game was just 3 days after.
Undeniably nervy - the 1st meeting earlier was a close 1-0 win and Scholars with their 4-2-3-1 was inevitably keeping the ball well.
But of course we were always going to have chances with Ebanks-Cupid up top - unfortunately he (and late sub Lewis) fluffed their attempts.



The first XI was back in town against Cayman Brac, but it looked like we were headed into another winless streak when Solomon curled it a sumptuous shot for a shock opener.
Thankfully Connolly put those fears to rest with a quick reply, before we put the game away in the 2nd half.



We've got games in hand on our direct opponents above us, as well as everyone below which gives us a very handy buffer, but we're basically at least 8 points behind the top of the table.
Rather annoyingly, Scholars have also kept themselves just out of reach for now. Still, with a cup title in hand this season has been undeniably fruitful no matter what.

Lastly, the annual youth intake has arrived:



I'll give you guys a proper rundown on the ones I've decided to keep once their trials finish next month.